Christmas Programs and Such

Last night, my sister performed in her first recital (she plays the French Horn) as a part of her school's Christmas Extravaganza. My entire family went to show Mini Me some support. When we finally got there and got settled, a white family sat a seat away from my younger cousin. The principal asked many times for people to close gaps between them so that the only empty seats were on the end of the rows. The little white girl looked up to her mother and whined, "I don't want to sit next to those Black people." I didn't hear what her mother said but the fact that the little girl didn't move into the empty seat let me know that it positively reinforced her worries. Well, not long after that, the principal walked around and asked her to move down before the program started. She slid into the seat apprehensively, watching my little cousin the entire time as if he was going to sprout an extra arm. To spare my little cousin from this incident, I swapped seats with him. The little girl watched me, almost amused for a while. After deciding that I was as normal as humans come, she turned to her mother and said in what she thought was a whisper, "Mom, I thought you said all Black people smell like pigs."

Ignorance and hatred begets ignorance and hatred.

30 questions

I could blog about all the times people make fun of my afro, proof of how Black natural hair is unacceptable and ridiculed in society. But those comments I get are a dime a dozen. Someone made an interesting joke to me the other day however, and as usual concerning my hair.

It went as follows:

"Hey Rob I really like your hair, it's so cool, it's almost worth the hundreds of years of oppression"

Immediately I was confused and befuddled. My hair is part of my natural identity. Is this a joke in the guise of a comment concerning his beliefs on how it's not worth being Black because of the oppression we've faced.

This remind me of the infamous racist white liberal essay by Neil Poedhertz in which he poses the question, is all the pain and the suffering [the holocaust] worth being Jewish.

All sick.

Point taken.

Out of all the blogs I have ever written for or started this is the one I want to continue. I'm going to try this time too. But just help me get into the habit of it first.

I located in August to the city of New Orleans. In part because of my desire to help in its recovery, in part because I had to escape the bastion of white ultra-liberalism at my previous college (Warren Wilson), and in part because the Black culture of this city gives me such pride and hope in us as a people that I had to get closer to it.

And so I am here...

A new journey?

Perhaps.

Or a new location with the same baggage?

Several white girls have grabbed my hair in astonishment this week. One person called my views "uncomfortable".  Perhaps what I once thought was an extreme is actually a norm? We shall see how bad it actually gets.