What an Obama presidency would mean, for two African American women
I've seen a lot of comments on various political sites/posts, from people who presumably are not black (and in fact often identify themselves as white), accusing African American voters of being "racist" because we are overwhelmingly voting for Obama. A few friends have suggested to me that they feel that people are largely voting for Obama because it's hip or cool, or because it makes them feel good to be able to vote for a black man.
These arguments don't make much sense to me. As I've said to a few people now, I don't believe that most reasonable people of whatever race (or gender) will vote for someone they consider to be unqualified or opposed to their best interests just because that candidate is the same race (or gender) as they are. I don't think this argument holds much water, but that isn't really the point of this post. Other folks have pointed out the illogic of this argument more succinctly than I could.
I suspect that most people who make the argument that black voters are "racist" know deep down that what they are saying makes little sense. Overwhelming black support for Democratic candidates is hardly anything new. What really bothers them, I think, is the enthusiasm of black voters for Obama, as exemplified by the record turnout of black voters in many states in the primaries, the projected record turnout of black voters in the general election, and the naked, raw emotion with which many black Americans talk about what it means to have a viable black candidate running for president for the first time in American history. The rhetoric of "color blindness" in which so many Americans, often white Americans in my experience, claim to deeply believe demands that we all pretend that race "doesn't matter." So when black Americans turn out in record numbers to vote for a black man, or cry over the prospect of Obama being president, it's obvious that his race does matter to them, that it does mean something to them. This violates the principle of color blindness, of pretending that race is meaningless, that it doesn't make any difference what race anyone is, and therefore any emotional reaction to the race of a minority presidential candidate, even if it's a positive one, is "racist."
I have been thinking for a while about writing a post explaining why this perspective is, to say the least, flawed, but I didn't know how exactly to address it or write about it. The truth is that Obama's candidacy is deeply meaningful to many black Americans, and other Americans of color. At the same time I don't want to claim that I speak for all or even most black Americans just because I am black. And even if I could, it would be rather presumptuous to think that I could explain what the prospect of an Obama win would mean to millions of Americans who are racial or ethnic minorities.
A few days ago I got a very moving email from an older family friend who is an African American woman and a long-time Christian. In this email she offered some personal reflections on how her race has shaped her experiences as a black girl, woman, and mother. She explained why she is voting for Obama, despite the fact that many of the people she worships with believe that voting for someone who is not a conservative is not, well, very Christian. I sent her an email in response thanking her for sharing her experiences with me and laying out some of my thoughts on what this election means to me as a young black woman and the mother of a biracial child. She very graciously gave me permission to share some of her thoughts here, which I've posted below along with my reply. Neither of us can speak for all black Americans, but we can speak for ourselves. This is what Obama's candidacy means to us as black, American women. This is a longer preface than I intended, so I'll only add the following disclaimer: When we talk about the racial attitudes of some McCain supporters, we are not talking about ALL or even most McCain supporters. There are reasons to vote for McCain that have nothing to do with Obama's race, and there are reasons to vote R than I can respect even if I don't agree with them or don't consider them to be of highest priority in how I vote.
The Original Email
About Obama. I think the reason that many folks are voting for him who are African American in this country is because we remember.
I was born in '59. My father was in the military. We travelled this country. I remember that we travelled through Nashville, Tennessee and had a hard time finding a place to stay. Turns out that all the folks who looked like us had to stay in a certain area of town. And a nice sheriff told us so.
Back then we were told that anyone could grow up to be president. And we'd think... yeah right (ha ha).
For a short time We lived in Houston, Texas. I remember that at that time the home we moved into was being vacated by a nice family who happened to be white and who had let their son play with a little boy on the cul de sac who happened to be black..so the other families on the street (who happened to be white) where shunning them. in fact the little boy's family was the only black family on the cul de sac. I remember hearing this as a 6 year old and thinking "And we are moving onto THIS street". But we did. Our next door neighbor's son called my dad name while their parents watched. But we stayed anyway. And our neighbors on either side of us moved out. By the time we left only 3 years later 6 families moved out of the cul de sac (It was called "panic selling" and the street became all black.
And we were told that anyone can grow up to be president (yeah right, we'd think). While we were in Texas both Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy were shot.... within 3 months of each other. In fact my dad had once shook Robert Kennedy's hand...
I went to college for the first time in the 70s. I travelled to Kentucky... my father's family was from Mayfield, Kentucky. I discovered that the graveyards in Mayfield were separated between black folks and white folks (I remember being an 18 year old and asking my father... where do they bury the asian folks....etc). I attended a very nice church while in college in Kentucky 77 - 81. Some of my friends took a chance in befriending me since I was only one of two black folks in the church. Once to humiliate me for coming to the skating rink with my church the skating rink owner said something to embarass me... he said it over the intercom of the skating rink to make sure that everyone could hear. I ignored him and continued to skate.... my friends at the church were very supportive... Their Christianity made a big impact on me... I stayed in that church even when a visiting minister made a racial comment from the pulpit (and our pastor later apologized to me and asked me to stay in the church).
And I would hear that anyone could grow up to be president (yeah...right, I'd think).
I've been at my church for 20 years now. Been a Christian for a lot longer than that. Have always said that my Christianity comes before my race . . . Being "Right wing" does not mean someone is a Christian.
Obama says he is a Christian and that he bows at the foot of the Cross. He is a family man. Reached out to poor folks in Chicago. He's a democrat.
McCain does not claim any religion as far as I can see and being a conservative does not mean being a Christian (duh). The poor man can't remember how many homes he has....and many of his followers are down right scary in their racial views.
And as for me. I've always been an independent...
And this time Obama gets my vote. And Not because I'm African American. But because when I see McCain speak... look at the folks around him...no one looks like me. I think Obama best represents this country.... And growing up in this country I only hope that he is well protected... I've met some really crazy folks in my time who called themselves believers in Christ when what they really are standing on is their conservative political views.... and they would really rather not have Obama be president and would go to crazy lengths to make sure it does not happen...
I want my daughter also to believe that its not wrong to want to get an education . . .and if she wanted to be president... she most certainly can. Being a conservative does not make one a Christian.
I want my two little nieces to live in a country where their parents don't have to worry about where to live (as my brother said, since his wife is white...they found it too dangerous to live too close to the city and too dangerous to live too far away due to the racial views)
Besides... a president Palin administration scares the living daylights out of me. And as my son texted me when Colin Powell endorsed Obama today...."guess he doesn't care that she can see Russia from her home"...
Yeah...I'm a Christian... I'm black...
My response
Thank you so much for your message. I appreciated hearing your reflections on your personal experiences and the history behind this campaign and I am really touched that you shared them with me. I have been thinking a lot about many of the same things - the history of racism in this country, and reflecting on my experiences as a young black woman in this country - and your comments really resonated with me.
My experience of being black in this country has been very different; we came here when I was 8 and it was really a shock to me to find out that people who looked like me had been so systematically discriminated against in the US. But I was raised in communities where people believed that racism was a thing of the past, that it no longer had any real effect or power and that people who talked about racism were either holding grudges, making excuses for their failures to work hard and succeed, or trying to exploit some sort of white guilt. I believed and accepted this for a long time - that except for a few extreme people, no one cared what color my skin was as long as I worked hard and was a good person. I believed that the problems in the African American community were entirely of their own making ("their," because I didn't like to think of myself as African American, which I knew had a bad connotation. I would always insist that I was African). Racism had nothing to do with it.
I've been very lucky that my personal experience of racism in this country has been minimal. I've been followed around in stores a few times, occasionally people will ask me ignorant questions I know they wouldn't think or dare to ask if I were white. But for the most part my experience of racism has been as a minor annoyance and not a major obstacle to any of my goals - at least as far as I am aware. The older I get the more aware I am that my experience is exceptional, and it's not one I should take for granted. It has been very difficult and disillusioning for me to realize how entrenched racism still is in this country. It's still there, and it's still powerful. It's just gone underground.
So I really agree with your observations about the choice we're presented with in this election. It really is a choice between America's past and what I hope will be America's future. I've also been struck by how homogeneous McCain's rallies are in comparison to Obama's. Obama brings together people from all walks of life. McCain's rallies are increasingly pandering to a segment of the population that is dwindling and aging, that wants to see power stay in the hands of people who meet a very narrow set of criteria about what it means to be a "real American," people who expect that anyone who doesn't fit these criteria should just remain invisible, voiceless, and powerless. If McCain wins at this point, despite everything - even with the shoddy campaign he's run, his terrible VP pick and the mess the Republicans have made of the country - it will be because this segment of the country succeeded in clinging to the past and keeping the status quo for a little bit longer. And if Obama wins, as he should and it looks like he will, it will mean that our country is taking a step, not to end racism, but to loosen its grip on our culture and our future. It really is a choice between change and more of the same.
As an adult I have never really believed I would see a black person - male or female - become president of this country. In the past couple weeks as Obama has pulled away at the polls I have started to let myself believe that it could happen. I've been surprised at how emotional and poignant it is for me. I don't support Obama because he's black. I think he is clearly the better choice to lead the country. But as a black woman and as someone who is about to bring a biracial child into the world, it means so much to me on an emotional level to think that our baby could be born into a world where s/he never has to question whether its possible that the US could have a president like him or her. To think of Tovid growing up in a world where what seemed impossible to his parents and generations of people before us is not only possible, but real . . . that gives me a lot of hope. I am of the same mind as Michelle Obama, who said that as far as she is concerned her husband is the underdog until he is sitting in the Oval Office. But the more it seems like that can and will really happen, the more excited and hopeful I get.
And even if by some crazy fluke Obama doesn't win, his campaign has given me hope that the status quo can only be maintained for so much longer. The country is changing whether people like it or not. People who look like you and me and your daughter and Obama and Tovid are becoming more numerous, and we're becoming more empowered and emboldened. We are real Americans no matter what other people say or how they feel about it. And eventually we will be present in such large numbers that they'll have no choice but to pay attention to us and to take us seriously. This country is going to change sooner or later; I hope it's sooner but I'm more hopeful than I ever have been in my adult life that it will happen.
These arguments don't make much sense to me. As I've said to a few people now, I don't believe that most reasonable people of whatever race (or gender) will vote for someone they consider to be unqualified or opposed to their best interests just because that candidate is the same race (or gender) as they are. I don't think this argument holds much water, but that isn't really the point of this post. Other folks have pointed out the illogic of this argument more succinctly than I could.
I suspect that most people who make the argument that black voters are "racist" know deep down that what they are saying makes little sense. Overwhelming black support for Democratic candidates is hardly anything new. What really bothers them, I think, is the enthusiasm of black voters for Obama, as exemplified by the record turnout of black voters in many states in the primaries, the projected record turnout of black voters in the general election, and the naked, raw emotion with which many black Americans talk about what it means to have a viable black candidate running for president for the first time in American history. The rhetoric of "color blindness" in which so many Americans, often white Americans in my experience, claim to deeply believe demands that we all pretend that race "doesn't matter." So when black Americans turn out in record numbers to vote for a black man, or cry over the prospect of Obama being president, it's obvious that his race does matter to them, that it does mean something to them. This violates the principle of color blindness, of pretending that race is meaningless, that it doesn't make any difference what race anyone is, and therefore any emotional reaction to the race of a minority presidential candidate, even if it's a positive one, is "racist."
I have been thinking for a while about writing a post explaining why this perspective is, to say the least, flawed, but I didn't know how exactly to address it or write about it. The truth is that Obama's candidacy is deeply meaningful to many black Americans, and other Americans of color. At the same time I don't want to claim that I speak for all or even most black Americans just because I am black. And even if I could, it would be rather presumptuous to think that I could explain what the prospect of an Obama win would mean to millions of Americans who are racial or ethnic minorities.
A few days ago I got a very moving email from an older family friend who is an African American woman and a long-time Christian. In this email she offered some personal reflections on how her race has shaped her experiences as a black girl, woman, and mother. She explained why she is voting for Obama, despite the fact that many of the people she worships with believe that voting for someone who is not a conservative is not, well, very Christian. I sent her an email in response thanking her for sharing her experiences with me and laying out some of my thoughts on what this election means to me as a young black woman and the mother of a biracial child. She very graciously gave me permission to share some of her thoughts here, which I've posted below along with my reply. Neither of us can speak for all black Americans, but we can speak for ourselves. This is what Obama's candidacy means to us as black, American women. This is a longer preface than I intended, so I'll only add the following disclaimer: When we talk about the racial attitudes of some McCain supporters, we are not talking about ALL or even most McCain supporters. There are reasons to vote for McCain that have nothing to do with Obama's race, and there are reasons to vote R than I can respect even if I don't agree with them or don't consider them to be of highest priority in how I vote.
The Original Email
About Obama. I think the reason that many folks are voting for him who are African American in this country is because we remember.
I was born in '59. My father was in the military. We travelled this country. I remember that we travelled through Nashville, Tennessee and had a hard time finding a place to stay. Turns out that all the folks who looked like us had to stay in a certain area of town. And a nice sheriff told us so.
Back then we were told that anyone could grow up to be president. And we'd think... yeah right (ha ha).
For a short time We lived in Houston, Texas. I remember that at that time the home we moved into was being vacated by a nice family who happened to be white and who had let their son play with a little boy on the cul de sac who happened to be black..so the other families on the street (who happened to be white) where shunning them. in fact the little boy's family was the only black family on the cul de sac. I remember hearing this as a 6 year old and thinking "And we are moving onto THIS street". But we did. Our next door neighbor's son called my dad name while their parents watched. But we stayed anyway. And our neighbors on either side of us moved out. By the time we left only 3 years later 6 families moved out of the cul de sac (It was called "panic selling" and the street became all black.
And we were told that anyone can grow up to be president (yeah right, we'd think). While we were in Texas both Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy were shot.... within 3 months of each other. In fact my dad had once shook Robert Kennedy's hand...
I went to college for the first time in the 70s. I travelled to Kentucky... my father's family was from Mayfield, Kentucky. I discovered that the graveyards in Mayfield were separated between black folks and white folks (I remember being an 18 year old and asking my father... where do they bury the asian folks....etc). I attended a very nice church while in college in Kentucky 77 - 81. Some of my friends took a chance in befriending me since I was only one of two black folks in the church. Once to humiliate me for coming to the skating rink with my church the skating rink owner said something to embarass me... he said it over the intercom of the skating rink to make sure that everyone could hear. I ignored him and continued to skate.... my friends at the church were very supportive... Their Christianity made a big impact on me... I stayed in that church even when a visiting minister made a racial comment from the pulpit (and our pastor later apologized to me and asked me to stay in the church).
And I would hear that anyone could grow up to be president (yeah...right, I'd think).
I've been at my church for 20 years now. Been a Christian for a lot longer than that. Have always said that my Christianity comes before my race . . . Being "Right wing" does not mean someone is a Christian.
Obama says he is a Christian and that he bows at the foot of the Cross. He is a family man. Reached out to poor folks in Chicago. He's a democrat.
McCain does not claim any religion as far as I can see and being a conservative does not mean being a Christian (duh). The poor man can't remember how many homes he has....and many of his followers are down right scary in their racial views.
And as for me. I've always been an independent...
And this time Obama gets my vote. And Not because I'm African American. But because when I see McCain speak... look at the folks around him...no one looks like me. I think Obama best represents this country.... And growing up in this country I only hope that he is well protected... I've met some really crazy folks in my time who called themselves believers in Christ when what they really are standing on is their conservative political views.... and they would really rather not have Obama be president and would go to crazy lengths to make sure it does not happen...
I want my daughter also to believe that its not wrong to want to get an education . . .and if she wanted to be president... she most certainly can. Being a conservative does not make one a Christian.
I want my two little nieces to live in a country where their parents don't have to worry about where to live (as my brother said, since his wife is white...they found it too dangerous to live too close to the city and too dangerous to live too far away due to the racial views)
Besides... a president Palin administration scares the living daylights out of me. And as my son texted me when Colin Powell endorsed Obama today...."guess he doesn't care that she can see Russia from her home"...
Yeah...I'm a Christian... I'm black...
My response
Thank you so much for your message. I appreciated hearing your reflections on your personal experiences and the history behind this campaign and I am really touched that you shared them with me. I have been thinking a lot about many of the same things - the history of racism in this country, and reflecting on my experiences as a young black woman in this country - and your comments really resonated with me.
My experience of being black in this country has been very different; we came here when I was 8 and it was really a shock to me to find out that people who looked like me had been so systematically discriminated against in the US. But I was raised in communities where people believed that racism was a thing of the past, that it no longer had any real effect or power and that people who talked about racism were either holding grudges, making excuses for their failures to work hard and succeed, or trying to exploit some sort of white guilt. I believed and accepted this for a long time - that except for a few extreme people, no one cared what color my skin was as long as I worked hard and was a good person. I believed that the problems in the African American community were entirely of their own making ("their," because I didn't like to think of myself as African American, which I knew had a bad connotation. I would always insist that I was African). Racism had nothing to do with it.
I've been very lucky that my personal experience of racism in this country has been minimal. I've been followed around in stores a few times, occasionally people will ask me ignorant questions I know they wouldn't think or dare to ask if I were white. But for the most part my experience of racism has been as a minor annoyance and not a major obstacle to any of my goals - at least as far as I am aware. The older I get the more aware I am that my experience is exceptional, and it's not one I should take for granted. It has been very difficult and disillusioning for me to realize how entrenched racism still is in this country. It's still there, and it's still powerful. It's just gone underground.
So I really agree with your observations about the choice we're presented with in this election. It really is a choice between America's past and what I hope will be America's future. I've also been struck by how homogeneous McCain's rallies are in comparison to Obama's. Obama brings together people from all walks of life. McCain's rallies are increasingly pandering to a segment of the population that is dwindling and aging, that wants to see power stay in the hands of people who meet a very narrow set of criteria about what it means to be a "real American," people who expect that anyone who doesn't fit these criteria should just remain invisible, voiceless, and powerless. If McCain wins at this point, despite everything - even with the shoddy campaign he's run, his terrible VP pick and the mess the Republicans have made of the country - it will be because this segment of the country succeeded in clinging to the past and keeping the status quo for a little bit longer. And if Obama wins, as he should and it looks like he will, it will mean that our country is taking a step, not to end racism, but to loosen its grip on our culture and our future. It really is a choice between change and more of the same.
As an adult I have never really believed I would see a black person - male or female - become president of this country. In the past couple weeks as Obama has pulled away at the polls I have started to let myself believe that it could happen. I've been surprised at how emotional and poignant it is for me. I don't support Obama because he's black. I think he is clearly the better choice to lead the country. But as a black woman and as someone who is about to bring a biracial child into the world, it means so much to me on an emotional level to think that our baby could be born into a world where s/he never has to question whether its possible that the US could have a president like him or her. To think of Tovid growing up in a world where what seemed impossible to his parents and generations of people before us is not only possible, but real . . . that gives me a lot of hope. I am of the same mind as Michelle Obama, who said that as far as she is concerned her husband is the underdog until he is sitting in the Oval Office. But the more it seems like that can and will really happen, the more excited and hopeful I get.
And even if by some crazy fluke Obama doesn't win, his campaign has given me hope that the status quo can only be maintained for so much longer. The country is changing whether people like it or not. People who look like you and me and your daughter and Obama and Tovid are becoming more numerous, and we're becoming more empowered and emboldened. We are real Americans no matter what other people say or how they feel about it. And eventually we will be present in such large numbers that they'll have no choice but to pay attention to us and to take us seriously. This country is going to change sooner or later; I hope it's sooner but I'm more hopeful than I ever have been in my adult life that it will happen.