Identity Politics

This past summer, I had the incredible experience of working as an intern on an Atlanta mayoral campaign. Though I had previously worked in the world of political campaigns, never before had I been able to so frequently and earnestly. Given Atlanta's relative prominence around the world, this race was quite contested and deeply competitive - a key reason being that for the first time in decades, Atlanta could very well elect a white mayor. For a city as diverse as Atlanta, this really mattered - for just as representation in government, media, business, and countless other sectors of the working world is pivotal for people of color, so is the knowledge that if a white person will be representing them, they do so with enhanced attention to their needs. This fall's race was diverse in a multiplicity of identities: in color, sexuality, gender, and political leanings. As such, working on the campaign of the moderate straight white man was certainly a fact I contended with every day. Moreover, so did the campaign manager, political director, phone bank director, and several other senior officials on my campaign, all people of color.

In speaking with them throughout the summer, I learned that was one of the most complex issues a politico of color had to face: supporting the candidate of their choice, regardless of the color of their skin. Much of politics revolves around trust, depends on who constituents believe in as an advocate for their needs. In a time of increased media attention on corrupt practices, our political landscape is more polarized and distrusted than ever. Furthermore, the nastiness and pervasiveness of American racism is an oft ignored issue by politicians, despite its undeniable relevance to our communities and culture. Politicians are seen as not having the tough conversations or seeking to understand the constituents who cannot directly benefit them, all of which alienates the political process from people who deserve to have an intimate understanding of and relationship with it.

The hurdle that white politicos must overcome is the fear of verbal missteps. White people cannot allow the concern of saying the wrong thing to prevent us from actually saying anything at all. When we take our language, our rhetoric into greater consideration before speaking on lived experiences that are not our own, we are far more likely to speak effectively. Though it is imperative that we start the conversation, it must be followed by more active listening than running the conversation. Candidates who earnestly attempt this not only hold the potential to transcend identity politics, but also to improve the political landscape at large. Further, greater representation of people of color in politics goes far beyond the candidate themselves, and when a candidate surrounds themselves with a diverse team, they are taking the first step in advocating for the greater community.

Name Your Shame

Growing up in Atlanta, I consistently lived in neighborhoods with few white people and attended schools with few people of color. My parents’ teaching positions were simultaneously a privilege and a hurdle, for the schools they worked for were of incredibly high caliber and prestige, but their salaries were not such for our family to truly assimilate with the dominant community culture. I grew up watching the ways in which my city would change on that drive to school, crystallizing a feeling of difference in me, an understanding that the exclusivity and inaccessibility of this elite upper class life would render me never truly a part of my school community, but that my experiences as a “passing” member of Atlanta society would limit affinity with my neighborhood. 

When I found my first job, I felt a profound sense of difference within my work environment, resting in the intersection of race, age, and class. Despite the similarities my coworkers and I shared, I felt as though my participation in the deeply white and upper class circles I knew was irreparably damaging to our ability to relate to one another. 

Through my reading of Thandeka’s “Learning to be White” this semester, I have realized that this experience was one of my first major moments of white shame. As a young woman who labels herself progressive, I was at last reckoning with the negotiation of that label with my active search for association with and mobility from the white elitist groups at my disposal. 

White people, regardless of how progressive our politics may be, have a history of complicity in oppressive laws and practices, admiring upper class affluence at the expense of greater systematic equity. Though we preach the good word about how *others* should treat marginalized individuals, we tend to neglect to examine the effects of our own actions and passivity. 

The predominant environment for my day to day life had been for many years one in which I was the less privileged... my white shame that summer was the slow and steady realization of what it felt like to be in an environment in which I was the most privileged. 

Moreover, while my coworkers embraced exactly the socioeconomic status they had, I yearned for something more, looking towards new status and losing sight of my current one. It takes incredible privilege to value where you could be to the point you forget where you are. 

White shame is valuable if it is the first step in a more enlightened understanding of your own privilege. 

Doug Jones vs. Roy Moore: How Black People Saved Alabama

When Doug Jones came and spoke to our high school, I had no idea that he would be the senator of Alabama just a few years later.

On Tuesday, December 12^th, for the first time in 25 years, a Democrat was named the Senator-elect for the state of Alabama. In an upset election, Doug Jones, who is a former prosecutor responsible for prosecuting the remaining living Ku Klux Klan members responsible for bombing 16^th Street Baptist Church and killing four little girls in 1963, was able to beat Republican opponent, Roy Moore.

Roy Moore has been accused of homophobia, islamophobia, and molestation of girls as young as fourteen-years-old, to name a few things. He is labeled as a sexual predator. Several hash tags were used to condemn his campaign such as #noMoore and #MeAt14. I know that Alabama is one of the most conservative states, but how could someone with this history even be eligible to represent any state in the Senate? Yet somehow, the race between Roy Moore and Doug Jones was very close, a little too close for comfort in my opinion. It was such a close race that Moore is still not conceding, and requesting a recount. The final percentages were as follows: Jones received 49.92% of the vote, while Moore received 48.38% of the vote.

Voter turnout and voter demographics surprised me in this election. 29% of the people who voted on Tuesday were Black men and women, while 66% of voters were white men and women. 72% of White men voted for Moore, and 63% of White women voted for Moore. I was surprised to see that such a large number of White women, about 2/3 of them, despite numerous claims of molestation, still voted for Moore. Black women and men, on the other hand, denied Moore almost unanimously. Only 2% of Black women voted for Moore, and 6% of Black males voted for Moore. I did not think that Alabama was ready for a Democratic senator, and it looks like White people were not; however, Black people were. Why were they not ready when we were? How can you trust someone that is accused of hurting children? Despite half of the amount of Black voters as compared to White voters voted Tuesday, their voices were heard loud and clear. Black men and women won the election for Doug Jones on Tuesday night. It goes to show what can happen when we stick together and work toward a unified goal.

Naylor, Brian. "'Black Votes Matter': African-Americans Propel Jones To Alabama Win." NPR. December 13, 2017. Accessed December 16, 2017. https://www.npr.org/2017/12/13/570531505/black-votes-matter-african-americans-propel-jones-to-alabama-win.

WC: 408

Is there a difference between resistance and rebellion?

While writing my final paper, I chose to write on the second option where we were asked to pick two themes from the entirety of the course to evaluate. This was no small task to decide on, considering the vast amount of literature we have read, as well as supplemental outside sources we have discussed. Three themes that immediately came to mind were rebellion, resistance, and resiliency, in no particular order.

When I thought about resiliency, I pictured slaves crossing the Atlantic Ocean during the Middle Passage. A voyage that was terrifying, to say the least, and that lasted anywhere from a few weeks to several months. The Trans Atlantic Slave Trade was responsible for the deaths of millions of enslaved Africans, forced to emigrate from Africa’s Gold Coast. Those who survived the passage demonstrated copious amounts of resiliency. Arriving at their destination was also no easy task, especially if the slaves ended up in the Caribbean where the expected life expectancy was about 7 years.

When I thought about resistance, I imagined the women that killed themselves and their children to escape the horrors of slavery. I think about Kojo’s wife, Anna, who committed suicide after being captured by slave traders despite being a free woman, or Margaret Garner, who killed her infant child with her own two hands and even attempted to kill her other children. In the contemporary moment, I thought about how hip-hop is used as a form of resistance. The lyrics of songs like Beyoncé’s “Formation” or Kendrick Lamar’s “Alright” are often about the struggle that Black people endure and how we must persevere despite the world being against us.

When I thought about rebellion, I thought about Nat Turner, a slave who led a large slave rebellion in Virginia that killed at least 50 white people before he and his fellow slaves were killed. I also thought about the readings about the sit-ins and nonviolent protests that happened around the country during the Civil Rights period and beyond, which we can argue about whether or not we are still living in that time period.

After grouping together examples of resiliency, resistance, and rebellion, I realized that they are all interconnected. Someone that is resisting can appear to be rebelling, depending on who is observing. Likewise, a person who is resisting could be seen as someone being resilient. To resist, seems to be almost synonymous to rebelling and vice versa. Were slaves resilient, resistant, or rebellious? The answer depends on the person. I also believe that resiliency, resistance, and rebellion, all fall under the idea of Black Empowerment because in order for Blacks to show that they were and are people too, they had to and have to be resilient, resistant, and rebellious.

WC:446

Still AmeriKKKa???

Still AmeriKKKa

There is currently a debate on this kid who was being bullied by black kids in school because he has a differently shaped nose. So everyone took to social media and it briefly became a stop bullying movement; however, at the same time, the mom was on twitter posting racist things about black people and pictures of them holding up confederate flags. They also started a go fund me account which is now on hold due to the contradictory things the mother was doing online. It was also shown that the mom was just looking to raise money for Christmas gifts and she was not going to do anything to help stop bullying.

            Another thing was that the boy who was being bullied had been calling the boys who did it Niggers before they started bullying him. Neither of them are correct for responding the way they did however, this brings up the subject of racism in the communities. The mother that posted the video got confronted by one of the celebrities after posting these things and after he questioned her she said something along the lines of “I thought all us whites were supposed to stick together”.

            During a time like this, things like this help to show me that racism still exists and is very prevalent in our community, because of a lot of the people, after finding these things out were still in support of the mom and the kid and believed that he was being bullied. On the other hand, there was a lot of people who did not support the things she was doing and deleted the posts about what they thought about this as well. Also, shows that all the way down to kids today people are still passing down racist fundamentals to their white children continuing the cycle of discrimination and racism and this process must be stopped starting with kids. I think if the problem is stopped at the root of kids then when they have kids they won’t continue to pass the things forward and maybe we can begin to change more as people and love people as people and not simply judge people based on their skin color. We have come a long way from where we used to be as a country, however, there is still a big change that needs to happen so that black people can be given the same opportunities and chances as white people in America.

Stereotypes

Stereotypes

The formation of stereotypes in America started when America was first being built. These stereotypes about black people started before slavery. Slavery helped to form these stereotypes. For some reason, stereotypes about black people often stay the same due to them being formed so early in time. Some are added some are taken away. A few of these are lazy, late, and violent. Now that I think about it a lot of these are an effect of racism and jim crow laws. One that is very simple to explain is that black people are violent, I think that this is due to being forced to always have to protect your family from all the white people who were always trying to burn down your house and do other violent acts. Another one is that black men are angry this could have been created during the time of slavery when black men would be forced to watch as their daughters and wives are raped in front of their eyes. Also, some of the men would be forced to have sex with them Male slave master in front of everyone which was men to be degrading to the man and to show dominance over them. These things could definitely make a man angry.

 I think these stereotypes stuck because at the times it wasn’t the black people making the books and writings normally it was white men. Because at the time I would say white people were significantly more violent with the things that they did and the things that they were allowed to do far more than that of the black people of these times. White people during these times could get away with almost anything; however, if you were black and you were to retaliate then you are in the wrong and should have called the police. Even though the police could have been the KKK off the clock.

One the other hang white stereotypes always change for the good like they are healthy, green ect which I still can’t understand why exactly this is. Also, it’s interesting how white people take something from chitterling which was a trash food that slaves ate, to now is it considered a delicacy all because white people changed the meaning of them, and also how easy it is for white people to change the meaning or the stereotype behind something but it is far harder to do this in the black community.