My posts regarding interracial dating have proved quite contentious. While uncertain if this post is productive, I’d like to take a moment to discuss the symbolic significance of said contention.
Namely, in a post authored last week, I concluded my argument by disclosing that I wished I could find happiness in those of the black diaspora who find love outside their race/ethnicity. A reader found my in my inability to bear contentment towards interracial dating a cause for sympathy and authored a comment to reduce the totality of my argument to a single sentence. Another reader performed a similar deed, stating that we are all “god creatures” and “you love who you love.” These ideologies are the catalysts for this post.
There is a certain feeling that accompanies anyone that dares to think outside the parameters of white supremacy. All the things that you used to do, now take on a vastly different meaning. Every facial expression, joke, book, movie and television series bears a direct correspondence to racism. Suddenly things that you once found funny are insulting. Scenes that once seduced you mentally, now send searing shots of anger through your body. The beauty that ignorance allowed you bask in, appears not only ugly in enlightenment, but dangerous.
On the journey towards consciousness, the enlightened undoubtedly envy those who can vote for Hillary Clinton and feel as if they selected “the lesser of two evils,” watch Scandal and live vicariously through Olivia Pope, a white-coveting jezebel who plays mammy to the rich and powerful, or deem gentrification an “upgrade” to traditionally black areas. This envy is not because this ideology is correct. It is not. But because life would be much easier if unable to see through the veil of white supremacy. I wish I could smile as those around me gush over interracial kids and unions or not cringe when they say “all mixed kids are cute.” There are times where I wish I did not see these statements for what they are—self-depreciating comments that denigrate blackness in favor of non-African aesthetics and attributes. This wish does not mean that these comments are valid, or than an alternative perspective is anything other than evasion. This statement functions simply as an acknowledgment that these beliefs grant a degree of normalcy disassociated with an enlightened identity. These feelings are of course fleeting. As no amount of bliss could paint oblivion as attractive.
This bliss, while seemingly positive, is actually dangerous. To adopt western fiction as fact is a matter of life and death for black Americans. Consider the following:
Eurocentric historiography—the biasing and falsification of history in ways which justify White supremacy—is not merely the fiddle- faddle of absent-minded professors ensconced in academic ivory towers. It involves a deliberate and serious exercise in myth-making, in the development or Eurocentric cultural mythic thought which rationalizes a concrete social order founded on the perpetual subordination of African peoples to European peoples (Wilson 4).
To obtain this normalcy as a black person on American soil is to adopt western mythology as fact. A prominent attribute of western mythology is compartmentalizing those who implement fact over fiction as bitter, angry, crazy, delusional or my favorite, ignorant. This interpretation of enlightenment as negative functions to encourage ignorance and fester the societal confusion necessary to afford white supremacy its stagnancy.
But with more information and awareness comes a much greater social responsibility. This responsibility also prompts many to opt for bliss, as responsibility proves burdensome to the selfishness nurtured by the western world.
As an enlightened individual or an individual on a journey towards enlightenment, you become less of an individual and more of a collective identity. You begin to view your body as a vessel, your skills as tools best employed to improve the black collective. The enlightened become preoccupied with unity and a collective intelligence and less attentive to personal gain or personal intellect.
These comments represent an individualized sentiment not reflective of collective interests or understanding. If asked whether all white, Asians, latinos, Indians should marry blacks– the answer would most likely be no. These comments most likely reference that a selection of all groups should have the free will to marry who they like–a comment that does not actually refute the essence of my collective assertion. In an effort to address and preserve the collective, my assertions function differently.
Interracial relationships are aggressively encouraged and glamorized by the contemporary world. From television to politics to Youtube, interracial couples and biracial children dominate much of the imaging targeting the black demographic. This encourages erasure, but also encourages the production of a racially ambiguous group that is not only confused about their identity but pushes blacks further down the societal hierarchy. From romanticizing a rape in Belle to demonizing blacks in the United Kingdom, and demonizing segregation by depicting the strife of interracial love in Loving, contemporary society mutates significant parts of our story with superfluous and romanticized interracial relationships. The previously listed movies function to silently declare that “All Lives Matter” rather than “Black Lives Matter.” Is systemic oppression generally harmful? Yes. But this harm remains significantly more detrimental to blacks. Thus, these representations function to deflect from the black lives, suggesting an equality in suffering that is simply untrue. All lives do matter, but no life endures the extent of systemic oppression like a black life. Interestingly, racial mixing presents itself as the antidote to racial conflict, often demonizing black reception to suggest that black “hate” is the emotion that damns America.
Thus, my posts regarding interracial relationships are out of social responsibility—an effort taken to make those of the black collective cognizant of the grave efforts the western world takes to control the black collective. The ignorant black sees the noose around his/her neck as a necklace and willingly applies this noose daily as fashion, not a fatality. The blissful chews the poisonous apple of white supremacy veiled as an essential nutrient. This nutrient is of course essential— to the black demise.
Denmark Vesey
Amos Wilson
Amos Wilson
Assata Shakur
George Jackson
Jonathan Jackson
Fred Hampton
Bobby Wright
Angela Davis
Malcolm X
Medgar Evans
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
to name a few, did what they did as vessels of black excellence. They took on the complexities of enlightenment and endured a journey that would only grant one of three consequences: exile, incarceration or death. Their lives were not blissful but inundated with the immensity of social responsibility. Their acts were a selfless plight to better the collective. They discarded white cowardice for black courage and bore the stain of white wrath as a result. I do not mean to paint myself in their image, but to state that the motives for my actions are not individualistic but function as a penny in the pot of black enlightenment. Furthermore, to “feel sorry” for someone who wishes to stand on shoulders on their ancestors is a laughable act of pseudo condescension reflective of a deep-seeded investment in a fictive reality.
In reading this comment I can’t help but think of the slave who feels like they made it because they live in the house with master—overlooking the grave reality that slavery is not limited to the plantation. This house slave manifests in the free man who journeys north to escape the “harsh” conditions of the south, ignoring the pertinent reality that slavery is a condition of the mind, not the body. Similarly, this house slave mentality manifests in the black who feels as if “he’s arrived” because the white man allotted him a job, where his/her black body helps to manifest a white man’s privileged destiny. Contemporary culture glorifies the house slave, who made his or her way into white institutions and perhaps even found their way to the elusive top. This glorification comes in the success labeling that accompanies the acquiescent African who assimilates into western culture. In their
Contemporary culture glorifies the house slave, who made his or her way into white institutions and perhaps even found their way to the elusive top. This glorification comes in the success labeling that accompanies the acquiescent African who assimilates into western culture. In their pseudo-victory, the house slave believes that they somehow won the “game” of racism. This house slave thinks that their “success” is proof that slavery does not exist, an ideology that functions as a form of escapism deluding the oppressed into believing that they can escape what they refuse to acknowledge or that they can escape what they do not even fractionally understand.
Such actions betray a psychological slavery that seduces the black mind to conceptualize covert racism as an improvement from overt racism. A battle is more easily won when the opponent is seen, and more commonly lost when the victim is unseen. Thus, integrative efforts veils the racial tensions segregation exposed. It is the exposition of these tensions that awards blacks a winning stance.
The bliss of ignorance prompts an individual so see the contemporary world as vastly changed from the past, rather than a contemporary manifestation of the same thing. Racism does not change. Once westerners realized that they did not need chains to restrain blacks or fields to rob blacks of their labor, the western world implemented various means re-invent slavery. Desperately seeking change, the black collective was doomed to see progress where whites saw another means to disenfranchise.
Interestingly, ignorance is commonly regarded as optimism. It was not optimism that steered blacks from the south to the north—it was ignorance that covert racism is any less pernicious that overt racism. Racism is racism. Personally, when I hear blacks refer to themselves as optimistic, I see a black person draped in the white starched outfits of the KKK, destined to perform against the interests of their people.
In closing, it is far easier to deem those who think outside the box of white supremacy worthy of sympathy than to feel sorry for the fiction the blissful adopt as reality. While admittedly confused by the animosity embedded in these comments, the deepest emotion that I feel is disappointment. It is disappointing to know that these ideologies persist in contemporary culture. It is perhaps more disappointing to know that these ideologies accompany support and eschew the shame they cast onto the black collective.
I will apologize for the title of this post, as the conscious community does not clap back–we raise the black fist.
Whispers of a Womanist 
Hear! Hear! Keeping it real!
Reblogged this on shelbycourtland and commented:
“The ignorant black sees the noose around his/her neck as a necklace and willingly applies this noose daily as fashion, not a fatality. The blissful chews the poisonous apple of white supremacy veiled as an essential nutrient. This nutrient is of course essential— to the black demise.”
Truth, truth and nothing but TRUTH!!
I concur.
Kristen Maye on Why I Don’t Date White Men:
“This pro-Black lifestyle, as my mother calls it (a gross oversimplification to be sure), is really just my embrace of, and clear reckoning with, the reality that the life I’ve lived has been one colored with experience based on the color of my skin and the kinkiness of my hair. But this rather obvious fact tends to be off-putting to many white people, and tends not to be particularly alluring to white men interested in stepping outside of the color box when it comes to dating. Rather irrationally I would judge, it’s perceived as a confrontation when most white people I encounter are reminded of racial difference between themselves and others. They get really defensive. I would imagine the defensiveness and resentment to be especially acute in a space as intimate as dating, wherein people ideally expect to be able to strip themselves of all identity tags and simply exist as souls in love. But I believe that no one at any time in their life is ever not who they are. And the choice to ignore a difference as obvious and magnificently unique as one’s racial/ethnic background constitutes an investment in the blindness that privilege conditions in white people.”
She’s right on the money.
Darlene Clark Hine on the state of Black relationships:
“There are so many unresolved, unanalyzed, undiscussed consequences to having generations of our ancestors enslaved. If you think about it, we’ve only been free for 140 years, but we were enslaved for almost three centuries. And one of the things we haven’t dealt with is our relationships.”
– Darlene Clark Hine, Historian.
This one from Mikki Kendall(Karynthia):
“I’m always amused when I see “The real sign of progressiveness is interracial relationships involving white people” because that is so clearly the logic of a bigot with an allergy to history books. If you think POC being shown loving each other isn’t revolutionary then you need to go take a hard look at American history & media narratives. Hell take a look at Jim Crow etiquette, Black people weren’t supposed to be affectionate to each other in public because two Black people kissing offended white people.
Hell even with the Loving case, no one cared that a white man wanted to sleep with a Black woman, anti miscegenation laws were more concerned with Black people having the legal status that came with proximity to whiteness, because that could set a precedent for all Black people. All those pesky things like inheritances, property rights…you know the trappings of legal equality. You want me to take your progressive claims seriously? Get comfortable with the idea that POC have a right to love each other.”
Stephaniegirl
“The bliss of ignorance prompts an individual so see the contemporary world as vastly changed from the past, rather than a contemporary manifestation of the same thing. Racism does not change. Once westerners realized that they did not need chains to restrain blacks or fields to rob blacks of their labor, the western world implemented various means re-invent slavery. Desperately seeking change, the black collective was doomed to see progress where whites saw another means to disenfranchise.
Interestingly, ignorance is commonly regarded as optimism. It was not optimism that steered blacks from the south to the north—it was ignorance that covert racism is any less pernicious that overt racism. Racism is racism. Personally, when I hear blacks refer to themselves as optimistic, I see a black person draped in the white starched outfits of the KKK, destined to perform against the interests of their people.”
Wow! I’m speechless! This is outstanding! And what I’ve come to expect from you. I will definitely share this.
WiP civilized patriarchy White Supremacy is not very different to WiP civilized patriarchy Black / Asian / Muslim etc Supremacy; where if you be the wrong black / asian / muslim tribe from the Black / Muslim / Asian ruling tribe, you may as well be a member of the black tribe living in white supremacy. See how minority african tribes are treated in african countries, such as for example: Mugabe’s Matabeleland massacres; or European tribes were treated in Europe by other Europeans: Inquisition; or how the Japanese slaughtered and enslaved the Chinese, and on and on and on and on.
The only difference would be that the WiP liberal supremacists .. make allot of effort to pretend that their WiP slavery plantation is a duhmockery… where they be trying to help the poor.. while profiting off the poor. They understand it helps to make their slaves more obedient and docile. The right wingers are more in your face mean: so you don’t have any illusions that you be living on a slavery plantation.
What Malcolm X referred to as the growling woof conservatives vs the smiling fox liberals.
It is all about resource conflict — or as Hitler called it Lebensraum aka Living Space — resulting from overpopulation and overconsumption of resources in a given area, and finding excuses to resource thieve another group or tribes resources.
“Investigation shows that whenever two nations have become engaged in warfare they have been advancing on converging lines of (resource acquisition for growing consumption or procreation) self-interest and aggrandizement. When the contact takes place, the struggle for supremacy, or even survival is at hand. This inevitable hour is approximately fixed and determined by the angles of convergence plus the sum of the relative (consumption / breeding war) speed by which the nations are moving along their respective lines. Thus it is that, when the angle of (breeding / consumption war) convergence of both or even one of the nations is acute and the speed or progress along one or both of the converging lines correspondingly great, war results in a few years or decades.” – EoP Amended quote of Homer Lea, Valour of Ignorance.
Any WiP Revolution.. whether it is WiP White Power Apartheid » WiP Black Power Mandela or WiP DNC Barack Obama » WiP GOP Donald Trump.. is simply replacing the Masonic War is Peace Slavery Farm Managers, with new Managers; while the slavery farm continues for their profits off racial, religious and class resource conflict and misery.
Ecology of Peace revolution aims to abolish the slavery farm; by abolishing the root causes which the slavery system: the right to breed and consume with total disregard for ecological carrying capacity limits clauses of international law.
If or when an Ecology of Peace international law social contract is implemented; EoP scientific and cultural law shall allow for Cultural Law Self Rule for any group of individuals with Groups with Subjective Racial, Religious& Gender Culture-Conflict Identities; who had signed their Responsible Freedom Declarations.
A copy of this comment shall be posted to eop-v-wip.tygae.org.za
This piece is filled with so many jewels, I do not know where to begin. While reading this, I was remembering all the times where other black people who were very confused about racism white supremacy commented to me “things could be worse” trying to shame me or make me feel as though I was ungrateful (Negro) because I would be pointing out racism white supremacy, saying things to me like “well just be glad you have a job”, translation just be glad you haven’t been forced off of the plantation yet. I have family members who have chosen “ingnorant bliss” as a lifestyle. I am always deeply sadden by these type of comments because as you become awaken you realize it’s a lonely existence, not only do you have to watch out for white people who are practicing racism against you and other black people, you also have to watch out for black people who are confused about racism and therefore may counter you.
In Neely Fuller’s The United-Independent Compensatory Code/System/Concept – A Compensatory Counter-Racist Codified Word Guide – One of the terms Mr. Fuller says we should not use on p.390. It reads:
Things Could Be Worse – Do not use this term. Instead, say, “it is the duty of all people, all creatures, and all things, to use truth to produce justice, and to produce correctness, in all areas of existence at all times.”
Note: “Truth” is that, which is. “Justice” means balance between people – which means guaranteeing that no person is mistreated, and guaranteeing that the person who needs help the most, gets the most help. Correctness means balance between people and all other creatures, beings, things, etc.
I thought of this when I read “Such actions betray a psychological slavery that seduces the black mind to conceptualize covert racism as an improvement from overt racism”. It made think, because you will hear this type of talk a lot from other black family, friends etc. They will make statements like “just be thankful” or “I’m blessed” when they are really not, but really it’s a matter of not embracing reality and being honest. We should strive to be honest about our situation, racist man and racist woman have done a lot to condition black people not to be truthful when discussing racism white supremacy, and because of the outcast you can get from discussing, most will not want to discuss it at all.
“The ignorant black sees the noose around his/her neck as a necklace and willingly applies this noose daily as fashion, not a fatality”. I will have to quote you on this, this quote sums it up perfectly and leaves little to be said, I will try this one out at the next family gathering for sure! In regards to this quote, I also think the white supremacist work extra hard to make sure we view things that are detrimental to us as black people as good for us, it’s part of the mental enslavement.
You summed it up perfectly when you said to “feel sorry” for someone who wishes to stand on shoulders on their ancestors is a laughable act of pseudo condescension reflective of a deep-seeded investment in a fictive reality”. That is superb! Because of the pain inflicted on black people many have put their brain computers on sleep mode, choosing to believe in a fictive reality, this is dangerous to the black body and the black body risks becoming a walking zombie. Oddly enough when the walking dead bump into those of us who happen to be less confused about what’s going on, it makes them uncomfortable a sign that may mean there is a black person still alive buried deep within their consciousness, so we shoulder on, pushing forward trying to do the best we can like you eloquently stated, putting the black collective before our individual selves.
Great Post this really made me think. Your writing is equivalent to brain computer food. This is what black excellence looks like!!
Thank you for your feedback! I definitely have to read this text you reference, it sounds like a gem.
Also, I love that you stated that consciousness is lonely because it is. I would argue that the few on this journey are outlasted from the general public and are made to feel crazy! But as you mentioned, this is central to mental enslavement.
Thanks again for the mental stimulation!
Yes you are most definitely outcasted and made to feel and look crazy, white supremacy has done a job on our minds but as I tell other blacks (victims of racism) ignoring the problems and issues we are faced with will not solve our problems. Of course we constantly get this messaging from racists who do not want us to work through are confusion and solve our problems, to do so would mean the end to their system of white supremacy. So racist will tell you things like the best way to solve racism is to ignore it. Now, funny, I work it purchasing for a very large global chemical company, now I wonder if I could even finish out the day if I told a category leader the best way to solve the problem with one of our suppliers is to just not talk about it, yet this is the logic they will give to us to use, it’s no wonder so many of us are confused with this type of messaging be strongly suggested. I am currently reading My Life, My Love, My Legacy by Coretta Scott King. I have only gotten through the first three chapters and I must say if the book continues as it’s going this book will be a classic, it’s phenomenal thus far. We can learn so much from reading the words of our Ancestors and how they experienced and dealt with racism white supremacy. One of the repeating themes is her and Dr. King and some of the other characters not being able to accurately describe racism white supremacy or in some instances just not being able to accurately describe what is happening or happening to them. This is so important. Some of our people who have experienced racism or racist acts will say the people who committed the racist act are ignorant, and nothing could be further from the truth, a person that has methodically, calculatedly decided to practice racism on you because you are not white is not stupid. They are dedicated to maintaining white supremacy but they are not ignorant. Gus T Renegade the host of the C.O.W.S radio broadcast always says that if anyone is confused about how racism white supremacy and how it works, it is black people”. That’s what motivated me to get Mr. Fuller’s word guide because I have been guilty of not accurately describing things myself and using metaphors that really confuse what I’m trying to convey about racism. The book can be purchased at http://www.producejustice.com. It is a great tool. Yes consciousness is a lonely world because most black people tend to be unconscious, I think this state of mental capacity was perhaps self induced during slavery and passed down through the generations as some sort of protection mechanism but I’m ready for us all to fully wake up, myself included.That’s why it’s so important for those of us who are Less Confused, to take care of ourselves, making sure we do the little things like drinking enough water and getting enough sleep, taking time to nourish our black mental health, it’s very important because racism is in all things in this mechanical world we live in and will take its toll on us like it did on our Ancestors. As you become more conscious you begin to notice racism more, my wife just commented to me “this is another way that we know the so-called well meaning whites that are supposedly working against racism white supremacy are not really serious about ending white supremacy, she was watching a movie and the black person was trying to get a cab, of course a white person came and a cab pulled right over, well this particular white person gave the black person the cab. My wife commented, that if the so-called anti-racist white people who are so pained by white supremacy will not work on solving this little problem which to my knowledge they have not worked on if they have they have not solved it, what would make us think they would tackle the larger problems of racism. I have never seen this act of correct behavior on the part of whites in reference to giving up their cabs, I suspect the only time this happens is in movies. Furthermore, we have great scholars and writers who have written about the system of racism white supremacy and their endeavors while priceless for us, they have not been financial rewards so to speak, now in contrast white authors will get funded and received financial rewards as well as paid nice sums for speaking engagements and they get the benefit of doubt of being a well meaning white person that black people adore, just see Tim Wise and many others, the problem is many of these white people are admitted racist getting paid from work their people have created. You are an asset to our people while our young people glorify these celebrities who are thinking on the individualistic level they should be reading and fashioning their selves and children after black woman such as yourself.
What an excellent analogy!! I will definitely have to take this to the classroom.
Just reading your comment and knowing that people like you and your wife exist truly eases the disappointment and frustration that consumes my daily life. Thank you so much for sharing your wisdom.
Reblogged this on Site Title and commented:
Excellent Post!
I made us tea in the community kitchen. We talked and talked—primarily about her Negro poet.
She was trying to ditch him. He was stalking her. She showed me pictures of the guy. He didn’t look full of shit. That’s the first thing I notice about a person. Even in pictures you can tell whether somebody’s full of shit or not. He had on a cap in one of the pictures, but it wasn’t a full of shit cap. It was a cap like my grandfather used to wear, the kind of cap Henry Miller used to wear. I liked the look of the guy. He was all twinkly and smart looking. You could tell he and Ginny had liked each other when they hadn’t been fighting.
Ginny got out an old green Webcor tape recorder with “Property of Sarah Lawrence College” stenciled in black letters on the cover and played me a tape she and Jim Moss had made. It was a conversation they’d had when they were first getting to know one another. He did most of the talking, but it was pretty palpable that Virginia was there, hanging on his every word. His vocal cords seemed to get thicker and thicker as the tape wound slowly from one reel to the other. My own vocal cords swelled some, just listening to the way Ginny had been listening to the guy.
The tape was pretty much a monologue. Ginny didn’t have much to say. It was mostly him talking about jazz, about how jazz and sex and seduction are all the same thing. He interspersed the monologue with nuances of different musical instruments he had the uncanny knack of reproducing with his voice, like a scat singer: clarinets, a saxophone, brushes on a snare drum. Of course it was all just sweet talk to get into her pants, but it was good sweet talk, really sweet sweet talk, and it sure was working. You could tell that too.
“Jazz means fuck,” I heard Ginny’s voice say.
“Yeah? Where’d you hear that, sugar?”
“In music history.”
“You’re pretty educated, ain’t you, baby?”
I could almost see them. They were in her apartment on 45th Avenue. She would have been in one of her flannel nightgowns; he would have been sitting across from her. There would have been a bottle of Beefeater Gin on the floor between them. The tape recorder would have been off to one side. She would have had nothing on under her nightgown but a pair of white cotton panties. Her hair would have been hiding her face. I could almost hear it in the tape when his thick black index finger brushed the inside of her upper thigh. I could almost feel her squirm, could almost see his hand moving slowly, deliberately, up toward her pretty face, touching the tiny, erect little nipples of her breasts, pushing her hair out of her eyes, touching her cheek, holding his hand under her chin, touching her mouth, leaning toward her, kissing her forehead.
“How about we turn this off now?” Jim Moss said.
“Uh-huh,” I heard Ginny say.
Sure, I was jealous. What do you think? You’d be jealous too. The guy’s voice was mesmerizing, mellifluous. He was saying things I wish to this day I could say. He was a poet. And, yeah, absolutely, of course I knew he fucked her brains out the minute I heard the tape recorder click off. Hell yes, I was jealous—but it was still that delicious kind of jealousy where nothing’s any skin off anyone’s nose yet.
Reblogged this on 👨🏾🎨Edwin Taylor👨🏾🎨.