Value of Teachers

My alma mater has a contest in which it gives substantial awards to innovators in education. It hopes that giving an incentive will help those with new ideas bring those ideas into fruition. We need new ideas because many of the old ones either haven't worked out, or haven't been allowed to not work out. One way or another, we need something to work out.

I have met a lot of bright kids who simply don't understand the world. I have met adults who are in the same boat. In my mind education isn't about getting a job, though one does need to pay the bills, but rather having the tools needed to understand what is going on around ones self and being able to find a way to employ an individual's talents and dreams in whatever environment they find themselves in. That is education. Education requires teachers.

Teacher's need not be formal, be housed in a school or program, but they are necessary. We, at least in America, do not place the value on teaching as a profession that it deserves. We are more willing to reward quarterbacks and pop-stars than we are those who teach reading and math. I'm not really comfortable with that... but thanks to economics teachers in college, I understand how we got to this point.

Penn partners with the Milken Family Foundation to fund their education innovation contest. Winners need not be teachers, or schools, but they do need to have an idea that teaches. Lowell Milken said, "Only when society demonstrates respect for educators will the brightest and most capable students choose it as their profession." he was right.

I worked for a school that had a special, and expensive, program for people who had already graduated from college, but were willing to take extra science classes, just to be more competitive applicants to medical school. In talking with potential applicants it was obvious that the majority of these students were not motivated by saving lives, but rather motivated by the idea of becoming a doctor. Why? Because society demonstrates a respect for doctors. It demonstrates this in money as well as prestige. The same is not true for those who lay the foundation for those wishing to become doctors.

It isn't logical. Those who claim economics is logical are in many ways, illogical.

What good is saving a life if the life being lived is unfulfilled? Teachers help us learn how lives get fulfilled.

How Modern Racism Works

I once spent a week in a Manhattan office as a sort of test drive for a possible new career. The staff was friendly and competent, the work was interesting, and the opportunities were sky high. I liked the company well enough and they liked me. They liked me quite a bit. I was exactly what they were looking for. I had met the founder/CEO of this top notch firm in church. We were both serving in leadership roles and had worked together in differing roles there. He liked how I went about things and asked if I would consider a career change that would include coming to work for him. It looked like a great opportunity.

The moment I stepped off the elevator I saw that this was not like any company I was used to. Everyone was Mormon. Not just Mormon, but graduates of BYU. It is not normal to find such a place on the East Coast where Latter-Day Saints are about as common as Panda Bears. At all my previous jobs I was forced to spend an abnormal proportion of my conversational time explaining why I wasn’t drinking like everyone else, why I was wearing an extra layer under my clothes, or why I never dropped the F-bomb like everyone else. I found this a bit frustrating as I would have rather spent my time talking about literature, movies, or maybe football. Rarely did I get a chance as my Mormonism trumped my other interests, or at least trumped anything else that may have been interesting about me. None of that would happen here. If I took this job those days would be over. I was intrigued.

“I like hiring Mormons. I understand them, they understand me, and we can have a work environment more in line with my values,” The boss told me. “I can start off at a level of trust with a new employee that I wouldn’t have otherwise and in this business there has to be trust.” I don’t think this employer was completely against working with non-Mormons, I know that nearly none of his clients were LDS, but he knew what he was looking for, knew where to find it, and he just did what he knew. He knew Mormons.

In the end I didn’t take the job. We just couldn’t get the numbers to work. That was years ago and they are still going strong. I don’t know everyone there but I can pretty much guess a thing or two about whomever it was that took the job that I did not. I’m pretty sure they were Mormon, went to BYU, and were extremely capable. I think about them, and my experience there, quite often. Strangely enough I think about it when I read in the paper about affirmative action, racial profiling, and income inequality. I thought about it during the Treyvon Martin trial, the Cliven Bundy showdown, and now during the Donald sterling drama. In all these cases there is so much talk about racism, or false accusations of racism, or reverse racism. Everyone has an opinion, everyone knows what should be done, and everyone, no matter what side they take, is upset.

So many are upset in part because we, the collective we, do not really understand how racism works. We think racism is, or happens when, we hate someone who is different. We think it is when we act out on this hatred of another in some way. While this may be one way racism works, it is very much not THE way racism works. The truth is that today, and in years past, for the most part racism works just like that office in Manhattan.

Racism happens when we simply show a preference for our own.

Preference for our own is a precarious thing. It makes sense. It’s easy. It’s also very exclusive and insular. Not only is it those things but it is also the justification most all overtly racist policies or groups have used to justify blatant discrimination. Most of those who supported Jim Crow laws did not claim to hate black people, they simply wanted to “protect” their own. Real estate agents and neighborhood alliances didn’t say black people were horrible, they simply wanted to make sure white people could live amongst their own. Labor unions, employers, and colleges never had to say they hated minorities; they only had to say that they had a level of trust in the abilities of their own.

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not necessarily calling that office full of Mormons racist. Nor am I calling the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints racist. But I will say that all the people in that office were white. There were also no Jews. There were plenty of women and during that week I never heard one person say anything negative about any group previously mentioned. But the level of niceness, affection, or broad respect for humanity possessed by those who worked there didn’t, and doesn’t matter to any black people; because they aren’t there. Unless something changes, they never will be either.

That is the problem with a racist past never being addressed by the “non-racist” present.
The group we belong to now, and what that group has or does, is a direct result of what the members of our group did before. So, if that office would like to stay Mormon forever, so be it. Who cares right? It is one company, one office, what’s the big deal? In the grand scheme of things there really aren’t that many Mormons, especially in New York, so why even bring it up? I bring it up because this office is how modern racism works. That office is Mormon not because the people there hate anyone; they simply have a set way of doing things. The same could be said for Ford, Bain Capital, Tiffany & Co., the United States Senate, NBC, CBS, ABC, Morgan Stanley, Stanford, any local police department, the carpenters union, and on and on and on. Wall street firms don’t have to hate black people, they only have to really like Wharton graduates. Wharton doesn’t have to hate black people, it only has to really like legacies. Legacies don’t have to hate anyone, they only have to really want their own children to get into a great school. It goes on and on, spirals down, down, down.

The only way things will ever change is if someone intentionally changes it. It really isn’t enough to simply not be racist. Not hating someone is not the same as giving them a chance. Really, what it will take, and I call out that Mormon office because my own personal bias tells me that Mormons, my people, should be great at this, is to think of someone other than themselves. Look at someone new and give them a chance. Do the uncomfortable thing. 

Open up and let someone new in. Realize that if people are people, then “strangers” deserve the same sort of favoritism we give the familiar.

Azusa Pacific University was founded in 1899 as the West Coast's first bible college. It started offering degrees in 1939.

Today the school, located a half hour East of Los Angeles, still has evangelical ties and all students take religion courses. Azusa has a student body of over 10,000 people making it the second largest evangelical student body in the country (next to Liberty University in VA).

Azusa Pacific also boasts the second best NFL running back to ever be a character in Nintendo's Super Techmo Bowl (next to Bo Jackson).

While mingling at a business event I saw a black man standing alone at a table. He wasn't talking to passers by and those who passed did not appear to notice him. I knew no one there so I walked over to say hello. As I approached I recognized his face, but didn't believe my eyes. I didn't believe my eyes because the face I recognized belonged on the body of a giant, and this man was exactly my size. I do not consider myself giant.

I got close enough to read his name tag, we all wore gigantic name tags, and there it was, written in Times New Roman, "Christian Okoye". Christian Okoye came to AzusaPacific directly from Nigeria. He went there on a track scholarship with hopes of making the 1984 Olympic team. When team selections id not go his way he looked around for something else to do and he landed on football. He did not know the game, but he knew how to run and he was a giant. This giant got drafted by the Kansas City Chiefs and quickly earned the nickname the "Nigerian Nightmare". It was disconcerting to meet a giant from your childhood and not only find him incredibly friendly, but also not so much a giant. Maybe he just looked bigger because I was 8 years old at the time.

I think he is the only nightmare to ever be associated with Azusa.

Dear White Guy

Dear white guy,

I know you think it is funny when you make jokes about serious things. By serious I mean anything unhappy that doesn’t, in your view, affect you directly.

Things like rape, racism, foreign countries, urban poor, are best dealt with by saying something negative and pithy. Negative because if you say everything is stupid then you aren’t being racist. Because you hate all stupidity equally. There is a lot of stupidity out there, everywhere really, and you hate it all.

I get it. You are right, a lot of things are not as they should be and a lot of those things, we created. I understand you are a hard working guy who probably has kids that whine and the last thing you need is adults who do the same. You wish those grownups would heed the advice you give your own, “shut up and get back to work.”

I get it. I get it and please understand I mean this sincerely-

You are jack-ass.

I do not normally name call and that word is not one I ever say out loud, but I thought it the best word to most concisely and accurately communicate to you, in words that you appreciate, how you are acting.

First, let me say that condemning everything accomplishes nothing. No. That isn’t true. It accomplishes the annoyance of all who come within earshot of your wisdom. Even worse, and more troubling is that such an attitude makes you completely tone deaf to issues that are in fact important. To you.

Let me illustrate with a story.

When my oldest kid was four she whined a lot. Every night at bed time we had argument and tantrums. Every meal was a negotiation. Every morning getting dressed was a display of dramatic energy, noise, anger, and trouble. It was more than annoying and my wife and I did our best to not only resist giving into ridiculous demands but squash their genesis.

On one evening my child launched into a screaming fit because the world had conspired against her and the clock had actually struck 8:00. Bed time. What injustice! She kicked, screamed, complained, and I ignored it all. I sent her to bed. She got back up asking for water. I sent her to bed. She yelled down the stairs that she needed a night light. I responded, “go to bed.”

“I feel sick.”

“Go to bed.”

“I need medicine.”

“Go to bed.”

“I can’t breathe.”

“Go to bed.”

She was persistent and she was loud. She began really holding onto this I can’t breathe thing, but I ignored it as she was yelling I can’t breathe in between blood curdling screams. Around midnight, because my softy of a wife made me, I took little miss I can’t breathe to the emergency room. The nurse at the desk didn’t ask a single question, just looked at the child and rushed us to the back room.

We spent three days in the hospital trying to get my daughters newly diagnosed asthma under control. We now travel with an inhaler and have to use it regularly.

Sitting next to that little girl for three days was humbling. The kid spent hours telling me she couldn’t breathe and I not only ignored it but resented it. I was quite the jack-ass.

The whole time my daughter was yelling things I assumed she was making things up. I ignored her. I bet if she would have yelled, “Dad, your laptop is in my bed,” I would have rushed upstairs just to make sure it wasn’t. If she would have screamed, “Wow I found a 100 dollar bill,” I would have rushed upstairs to reclaim it. Because to me and my life money and laptops matter. Going to bed at 8 and one little glass of water are silly.

Racism isn’t silly. Neither is rape or poverty. Many of you can go a whole lifetime without visiting the proverbial ER on these things because you aren’t black, a woman, or poor. Maybe you have never seen someone raped, surely never done it, never said the N word, and you work hard for the little money you get, so of course those things aren’t as big a problem as those whiny four year olds say they are.

How arrogant and selfish is it to assume that you know best in other people’s lives? How, when others are explaining, or screaming, about their experience, do you come to the conclusion that you know the truth about them better than they do? Why when someone is speaking or explaining about hard truths, would you mock and belittle?

Stop it.

Listen.

Stopping and listening is harder than ignoring and mocking. Because ignoring and mocking is stupid. The stupid thing is always easiest.

Mummers

It was the fourth of July our first year in Philadelphia. We went downtown to watch the parade and saw the strangest thing, a band of men wearing sequins from head to toe, carrying parasols, and playing instruments. The marched while playing saxophones, banjos, and even upright bases. I had never seen such a thing, and then a few floats later, there was another band just like the other. What was this madness?

“Oh those are mummers,” we were told . “What exactly are mummers?” we asked. “Ummm. Well, they are just, well THOSE are mummers. It’s that right there.”

That sort of non-explanation is the norm for mummery. They exist in Philadelphia and not so much anywhere else. There may be some variations in other places, but in Philly they are in every parade, have a long road filled with Mummers club houses, and every New Year ’s Day since 1901, there is the Mummers parade.

We went and watched the Mummers. They are above all else, fun. Watching the Mummers you will see kids, babies even, dancing down Broad Street, hundreds of people not associated with a high school or getting paid playing live instruments, and lots and lots of bearded men is sequined dresses. We loved it.

Our curiosity piqued we took a trip down to 2^nd st. and Washington in South Philly to visit the Mummers Museum. The art deco building housed costumed mannequins from parades past and some explanations for this Philadelphia oddity.

It is thought that the traditions grew out of the British Isles’ mummers plays. There are reports of mocking mummer plays being held in President Washington’s honor while he resided in Philadelphia. In the early 1800’s it was normal to find roving bands of men dressed as clowns causing a ruckus during the holiday season. The tradition was formalized into the parade in 1901, making it America’s oldest continuous folk parade.

I learned these things by reading faded signs on dusty displays in a museum whose heyday appeared to be at least a decade ago. In one corner of the museum I was able to try a costume on. I pulled on a long glittering skirt with feathers around the hem, donned a sparkly vest, and placed a tall multicolored feather crown upon my head. I danced and posed for my wife as she took pictures. Wearing this fine regalia I squinted to read a faded sign off in one corner. As I did I removed my crown and began feeling sick.

The sign explained the origins of the Mummers signature dance or “strut”. The dance is a variation of the cake walk, a dance or strut popularized in black face minstrel shows in the very early 1900s. The Mummer strut is traditionally done to the tune Oh Dem Golden Slippers, a blackface standard. The sign also explained that from day one, till a city order in 1964, the parade was done in black face.

Standing there in sequins and feathers I felt betrayed.

It was in a back corner of the Mummer Museum when I realized that in this very black city, I had never seen a black Mummer. It is possible one exists but I think the academic term for them is “statistically insignificant”.

I have met plenty of Mummers. Since reading that sign I have asked, and listened, to what Mummers say Mummery is all about. I have talked to people who have never read a thing I have written or have a clue to whom I am married, and not once has anything remotely racist been uttered. I hear lots of talk about tradition and fun. I have heard and read about music and family.

I like all of those things.

I have never read anything about black people or hate. It is as if anything racist was scrubbed off along with the black makeup. I have never even heard a mummer bring up the black face past. I am even willing to wager that most all of the Mummers under the age of 25 have no idea of the racist history or know what a minstrel show ever was. So in a very real way to them, and to most everyone, the Mummers are very much just family, tradition, music, and fun.

What a great object lesson about race in America.

The Mummers parade is fantastic, it is also very deeply and firmly sprung from racist roots.

So what is it now?

I am watching the parade now as I write this. I love it. I just saw a brigade perform a skit where a mass of commoners used a giant gold dollar sign to lure a donkey and an elephant into a trap where they could both be struck over the head by the liberty bell. I would encourage anyone and everyone to attend. It is guaranteed fun no matter who you are.

But were I ever invited, or had the opportunity to become a Mummer, I do not think I would do it. I cannot escape the memory of what I felt when all bedecked in glitter I read that faded sign.  Watching the parade today I have not seen a black face, painted or otherwise. The bands and brigades are formed as clubs and other organizations. Many are tied up in family traditions and bloodlines. Black people need not be barred for these sorts of things to stay all white. The white people need not really be racist for a black person to not feel comfortable or welcomed.

So in this way the parade is like most everything.

Does what something used to be, forever taint what it is now?

How do we enjoy today when maybe yesterday isn’t all the way gone yet?

Happy New Year… I’m spending the rest of today enjoying the parade.

Motherhood is Nuts

So why would anyone take the type of job that when the entire industry is honored, it is done so by allowing a person the luxury of not having to do that job?

Such is motherhood.

It is a sorority with the most severe initiation ritual ever devised, so much so that millions have died while pledging, yet a fresh new batch of applicants sign up every day.

If the initiation ritual for admittance to motherhood were replicated as a sort of guaranteed gateway to a million dollars, we would likely have less millionaires than we do now.  It just wouldn't be worth it. Yet not only do people sign up without the promise of a cash prize, but many pay huge sums to get in the club. Medical science has devoted some its best minds to the cause of allowing women the joy of enduring huge amounts of pain for little to no thanks, other than that one day a year when they are honored by being allowed to act like they aren't in the club for a day.

Now parenting is another story. One need not go through this initiation ritual to gain the title of parent. No, instead the intense pain of birthing labor is stretched out over 18 years in the eyes of the law, but in reality will likely last till you finally graduate into the grave.

There are those who join motherhood but decline to continue on to parent, there are those who never gave birth who then elect to parent, and then there are those who do both. Those who do both are insane, illogical, and the world owes them an inexhaustible debt.

I’m glad I hit the mother lottery. Come to think of it. I hit the lottery twice.

Law School, Palm Trees, and Pirate Treasure

Question:

What do you do if you are a slightly heavy ‘tween’, who despite his usefulness in finding hidden pirate treasure and fending off strangely friendly monsters named Sloth, but is constantly ridiculed and called “Chunk” by the likes of Rudy?

Answer:

You go to law school and become lawyer.

The first part happened on a movie set. That last part happened at UCLA.

That’s right, Chunk from the Goonies went to the UCLA School of Law and can now sue the pants off of anyone who clowns his girth. Though word on the street is he no longer matches that childhood nickname.

According to the data about 80% of the people who went to UCLA’s law school are capable of suing people’s pants off so be careful.

Better yet, don’t fight them, join them. There are palm trees, the beach, and at one time George Mastras the writer and creator of Breaking Bad. If you are a little less Hollywood you may appreciate that the former provost of Dartmouth, who then went on to be president of Occidental, was UCLA Law alum. Not too shabby.

I’m sure it is mostly due to Chunk, but the school does boast a top twenty ranking in US News and World Report. It’s lot cheaper thanYale. It snows a lot in New Haven. Just sayin.

I myself have no desire to be a lawyer, but in the event I need one, I know where to look.

 http://lowellmilkeninstitute.law.ucla.edu/

My Privilege

I am having an online “discussion” with some loose acquaintances over whether or not white privilege exists. I of course believe it exists but I fear I am not doing so well convincing the others.

 

I think they think I’m a left wing extremist who has drunk too deeply from the pools of white guilt  and become fully indoctrinated with a terminal case of liberalism. As I said before we are just acquaintances.

I am told that the idea of white privilege is simply an idea pushed forward to perpetuate a victim mentality and entrench a sense of racial division. It is argued that racism as an obstacle for black people is a myth and that the best course, the one supported by God and truth, is that we should all just be one people, work hard, and stop complaining about the past.

Stop complaining about the past. I hear that a lot. “How can we move forward if people refuse to forgive?”

Forgiveness is a hard thing to give; especially when it isn’t asked for.

Not only is it hard to give, it has nothing to do with the discussion. It has nothing to do with white privilege.

White privilege is not about the past, it is about the now. I didn’t learn this by reading it. I did not learn about this in some liberal college. I didn’t even learn about it by the name “privilege”. I learned about it when I was a Mormon missionary.

I learned it when for the first time I lived in a place where all the faces on billboards didn’t look like mine. I learned it when  I walked down the street and everyone would stop and stare at me. I learned it when people I had never met, including police officers, would stop me and ask what a white boy was doing in this neighborhood. I had my motives questioned at every turn. I couldn’t have one single solitary conversation without first addressing and justifying my race. After two months of this I was deeply and fundamentally worn out. I was tired after two lousy months. After two years I was callous.

There was more to it than that, and that was only the first half of my nonacademic education.

More than two years after those two years, I watched as my black wife experienced the very white world of Salt Lake City.

None of the faces on billboards looked like her. As she walked down the street people would stop and stare at her. People she had never met would always lead by asking where she was from and wanting to know how a black girl ended up in Utah. She couldn’t get anywhere with anyone without first explaining or justifying her race. People asked her to repeat herself, not because they didn’t understand what she said, they were just amused by the way she talks. After a couple months she was tired. After two years she wanted out. So we left.

Two more years after that came the real lesson. Two years after we retreated from Utah’s white world we were in South Carolina. I walked from one world to another, white to black and back again, and only occasionally was I questioned. My race sort of disappeared… unless my wife was around.

Her race never went away. She never brought, nor brings, it up. She doesn’t have too. Everyone else brings it up for her. She doesn’t focus on it. She just lives her life. But I bring it up all the time.

Why?

Because when I walk into a restaurant to have lunch with a client or my employer, they simply smile and shake my hand. When I don’t warn these same folks that my wife is black, there is a very tangible elephant in the room with us. They smile at me, then pause at her. The head tilts sideways just a little, confusion passes across their face, and they don’t really say anything for a minute. Once our lunch dates, our fellow church goers, our neighbors, or anyone we meet gains their composure it isn’t on to business as usual but rather the start of the side show. I am never as fascinating or entertaining when I am by myself, but with her in the room there is electricity.

Now make no mistake, she is quite electric, but when I walk into a room with my sisters or any coworker who looks a little more like me; nothing.

She does not complain. She does not act the victim. It is just her life. It is a part of her life that I never have to deal with unless I choose to. She cannot choose. For her it is as permanent as both her American-ness and her black-ness.

My white-ness doesn’t even exist unless I say something about it. Even then most treat it like it is only pretend.

How fair would it be for me to tell my wife that it is all in her head? How fair would it be for me to tell her that our experiences are alike and the same? Do I tell her to forgive and just move on?

Move on from what and go where?

She has to deal with something that I do not. Neither of us are dwelling in the past nor placing any blame. That has nothing to do with our differing experiences. Our parallel realities. This is what my privilege is.

She has to deal with something in life that I do not. I enjoy a privilege in comparison.

Why does this matter? Why is it important for me to acknowledge? Because  she is my wife. If the two of us are to have any sort of relationship, to live in the same house, to work together, we have to understand each other. Acknowledging our truths does not drive a wedge between us.

It is the only thing that can remove the wedge that already exists.

The Head and the Heart

The head and the heart while inhabiting the same body, don’t always seem to be connected. I live in my head. It receives messages from my extremities, wraps them in context, makes sense of them, and charts a course of action. Happy, sad, pleasure, or pain, all filter in, get experienced, logged, and filed away for future reference.

 Day to day, or rather every day, I know racism is real. I know White people as a body murdered, raped, and humiliated Black individuals in an effort to do the same to the Black community. Every day I know this, but rarely do I feel it.

When I can see it, I feel it. When I see it there is a glitch in my head. A message has come in from my eyes but went somewhere before reaching my brain. I felt it before my mind could register it. I know what it is, I know where the mental file folder is in which it will soon be filed. I know the context and the history; I even have several cross-references come to mind. I have all this and it still doesn’t make sense.

 I don’t really understand it. I’m not sure it can be understood, and in that gap left by not fully knowing is left only feeling. I often wish I could feel more, or at least feel more often. The older I get the more I have to fight off the slide towards being cynical and jaded. I know myself. I know that feelings come slow and fear that if not nurtured, they may stop coming at all. I know this is not just me, but most people.

 When it comes to race, we White people don’t normally feel it. Most of us don’t have a mental file folder for it, and when a mental message of racism shows up, it normally gets discarded, or maybe sent to some unreconciled “other” bin. Till we see pictures like this. When we see pictures like this, it is an idea no longer, it’s real. It isn’t “lynching”, it’s a two dead Black men hanging from a light post. It is crowds of White murderers laughing, pointing, and being proud. It’s a little boy beaten to death lying in an open coffin. It is systematic racism come to fruition, it feels evil, it goes right to your gut, then your heart, and if your head isn’t spinning by the time it reaches there… it’s too late for you.

 Some time ago I learned a lesson. It was black history month and I was enthralled by the series of programs on PBS. I was motivated, I was horrified, I was feeling. While I was experiencing this I realized my normal partner on the sofa was gone. My ever TV watching wife was not watching black history month. It was not just once but every night. I asked her why and she brought home a message I think I knew, but needed to hear. She said, “you need those shows to learn and to feel. That’s good. I don’t need those shows, I feel it all the time.”

“If you knew your history, Then you would know where I'm coming from, And you wouldn't have to ask me, who the H... do I think I am.” Robert Nesta Marley in Buffalo Soldier

The turn of the century, the one before the one we just had, is referred to by historians as the “nadir” of Black history. To the rest of us that means it was the worst period for Black people since the end of slavery. This was the period where White people mailed post cards picturing women and children grinning beneath Southern tree's strange fruit. This was the period in time when Black Americans were generations deep in being American but still generations from being legally allowed to be American. Think for a minute how that would feel. In 1900 the principal of Jacksonville Florida's largest public school wrote a poem. The school was the largest because it was for Black kids, Florida had a lot of those, but Florida did not have a lot of schools for “them”. The poem was to commemorate Abraham Lincoln's birthday and a visit to the school by Booker T. Washington. A few years later the poem became a song, and the song soon became an anthem. People over time sang it in churches, on busses, while marching, and in prisons. The song has words of hope, of liberty, of God, and patriotism. Patriotism. A Black song in 1900; patriotic. In or around 1812, America was attacked. From the vantage point of a ship in the harbor, a poet wrote a poem that then became a song, and later an anthem. At that time Black people were 3/5ths a person and 100% percent property. As American's first put hand over heart and sang of bright stars and broad stripes, they did not intend that the song would be for Black people, because “those” weren't Americans. It took more than one hundred years to change that. During those hundred years there was that other song. During those hundred years there were nooses, blowtorches, marches, murders, legislation, military occupation, sit-ins, speeches, there were tears and there was music. “God of our weary years, God of our silent tears, Thou who has brought us thus far on the way, Thou who hast by thy might, led us into the light, Keep us forever on the path, we pray,” were the principals words way back then. Later they were also the words that opened the prayer that followed a Black man raising his hand to be the leader of all Americans. Times change. Times change but human nature does not. Neither does history. These truths, together, next to each other, make up what, and who, we collectively are. Who makes up this “we” is important. Are we a “we” yet? When the White we learns that there is a Black national anthem, how do we react? When the Black we realizes the younger half doesn't know the song, how do we react? When we realize “we” aren't, do we react at all?

For Your Consideration

Now that the festivities on the fourth are done and the celebration gives way to recuperation, may I offer something for your consideration?

Imagine for a moment the year is 1776 and you are black. You are owned by a white man, a rich white man. He is riding off to fight for independence from England. He has fully embraced the idea of freedom and liberty and an individual’s right to determine their own destiny. He has not offered you your freedom and has taken certain steps to ensure you don’t try to gain it yourself in his absence.

How important would the fourth of July be to you?

Let’s skip forward a few years.

You are still black, but free and living inPhiladelphia, maybe New York. War has begun with the southern states which are fighting to retain the right to own your people as slaves. The white people around you argue over what they are fighting for, retaining the Union or freeing the slaves. Either way, you still aren’t allowed to worship with, go to school with, join the labor guild, or live in the same area as all these lighter skinned Americans. Even the unpopular immigrants, Irish and Italians, don’t appear to like you. They are coming over in droves.

How would you feel about America as you watch these newcomers become naturalized citizens, who then riot at the idea of a draft to go fight for black people’s freedom?

Soon the whole world is at war.

Germany keeps invading other countries and declaring themselves superior. You, a black person watch as the whole country marches off to stamp out the evils of Nazi racism and protect the freedoms of not just America, but the world. Meanwhile a law was passed saying you can vote, yet you still aren’t allowed to do so. You can’t testify in court against a white person, no matter who that white person is or what they have done, you still can’t join the unions or go to the same school as the white people, and all the police are white.

In such a situation what might you think when the Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor?

Then we go off to fight in Asian countries. We do so to protect against the freedom squelching powers of communism. Thousand upon thousands of American soldiers are shipped thousands of miles away to defend the relative freedom of citizens of Korea and Vietnam. Meanwhile you, remember you are black, still can’t send your kids to the good public school, ride in the front of the bus, join the union, see a white doctor, or live next door to a white person. Did I mention you still live in Philadelphia? A bunch of folks from all over are heading south on Greyhound buses and they are getting beaten senseless. The Police don’t protect them because they are the ones doing the beating.

How, with all this in mind, would you feel about America?

Would you be justified in being angry?

Would it make sense that you lack pride in these United States?

Might you resent this country and its promises applied to all except you and yours?

Maybe.

Lets consider how black people have reacted historically (go back to being white again). In the Revolution black people signed up to fight. There was a hope that freedom and liberty would one day trump the slave system.

In the civil war black people lobbied and pushed for the right to fight for the north, and once allowed, did so with vigor.

In the World Wars, black people enlisted. Knowing they would be relegated to being cooks and porters, they still enlisted to go fight for other’s freedom. Many even enlisted in foreign regiments to be able to fight. They did not relinquish their American identity, but had to join a foreign force to be allowed to defend home. They did defend it.

While the law would not defend black people at home, they were still drafted to go to Southeast Asia. They fought and died just like the white men.

All throughout American history black people have answered America’s call. From it’s inception, American’s with ancestral roots in Africa have stood up for the Star Spangled Banner and put their lives on the line.

Who can compete with this brand of patriotism? What group of people has better earned a right to complain or voice opinion on national matters? Most of all, who am I, a non military serving white boy from a solid middle class home, to ever cast doubt on the motivations or loyalties of these “others”?

On this, the day after our nation’s birthday, maybe we can think a little about where we have been and where we are now.

God Bless America and all those who call her home.

Are You a Racist Admiral Cod? Let's Talk.

There are on these interwebs, all sorts of folks. A free and open forum for which I advocate. You are free to say as you please, as am I. Because I am free to speak, I would like to bring up my good buddy Admiral Cod.

Once upon a time he would leave pleasant comments on my posts. He saw my site fit enough to list me on his blogroll. I would comment on his site from time to time, if I felt I had something to offer.

Then one day it stopped. It’s hard to pinpoint when or why. Let me forward some guesses.

Was it when I mentioned the taint of slavery on American historical locations?

Was it perhaps when I posted a picture of my wife?

Possibly it was my exposing myself as a teetotaler, or was it that one post you did. You know, the one where you stopped “approving” or posting my comments? You remember the post right? The one where you posted a video clip of an old movie where the English stave off a final attack by the savage Africans. You approved a comment by some chap who lamented that we cannot treat our modern “brown menace” in like fashion. I pointed out that letting such racially negative comments to go unanswered was bad form. To which your response was… nothing. You would not post my comment nor respond to my email.

I let it go. Some times things are best left alone. But yesterday you were at it again. I have looked around and find your site listed on other sites blogrolls, you list some fine ones yourself, and the extent to which your rants go unanswered, or even defended, concerns me. Hats off to the young man at Sartorially Inclined. You posted his concern, but again not mine. Who’s else do you delete?

Here is what you wrote http://admiralcod.blogspot.com/2011/05/harry-potter-and-race-replacement_24.htmlHere is what I wrote:

Racial acceptance is not a zero sum game. Perhaps the “others” are not welcome to you, but to assume your opinions are held by all is more than presumptuous.

You infer, and this is by no means the first time, that the decline of society as you see it, is hastened by the presence and or acceptance of minorities. You claim superiority in your Anglophile ways that is obviously tied to whiteness as you see it.

How sad.

You may think the proper order of the world, right side up as you put it, has whites at the top and others below, how do you propose this to happen?

What are you advocating or predicting?

Why, and this is more important, do you think this is the way it should be?

You portray yourself as cultured and learned, but this is simple ignorance.

No… I was wrong. You are neither simple nor ignorant, perhaps something worse.
Maybe it was I who was out of line.

So… was I?

Trick-or-tre... never mind

So the Mrs. and our daughter are handing out candy. A lady and her kids skip our house.
Our daughter calls after them that we do have candy for them. They ignore her. Our blonde neighbor hears the shouting, comes outside (our doors are less than 1 foot away from each other)and shouts after them that she has candy.

The lady came back, took candy from our neighbor, silently looked at my wife and daughter, then silently ushered her kid away... still not taking candy from my wife.

My neighbor was in shock with none of her usual excuse making and explaining things away.



Happy Halloween.

Brohammas Goes into the Fields to Find the “Angry Black Man” and Instead Finds Wayne Bennett

http://field-negro.blogspot.com/
There is a blog out there in the digital landscape where race is discussed openly. Names are called, fingers are pointed, and oft times naughty words are written. Sounds like my kind of place, except for the naughty words of course.

One should know that this is not the normal race baiting sort of forum. It is not the land of David Duke or even Farrakhan, but a place where things are looked at logically, pragmatically, frankly, and sometimes surprisingly fairly. What sets this place apart is that punches are never pulled, no matter who is getting punched. White, black, cops, lawyers, accused, and acquitted, all may find themselves targeted if the author deems it justified. This brings us to the author.

Any writer who will entertain my inserting Bob Marley quotes where they don’t belong merits my affection and this blogger not only allowed but occasionally encouraged them. Interesting. Through repeated reading I realized this blogger was local to myself, or possibly the other way around, so I decided to pull back the curtain and see who was running the machine.

I embarked on this fact finding venture unsure of what I might find, or rather, how my inquiries would be received. I, a devoutly religious white man raised in the heart of Republicanism, was arranging to sit down with a man who titles his blog in homage to a Malcolm X quote, and regularly rants against religion itself in his writings. This could go very badly… if I were meeting with someone else. I found the “Field Negro” to be decidedly friendly.

We met at Moriarty’s, an Irish Pub downtown, for lunch. He chose the place, possibly as a nod to my pastiness, but more likely due to proximity to his place of employ. You see, Wayne Bennett is not a professional blogger, he is a lawyer. He works for the Family Division of Philadelphia’s First Judicial District, “Support Master” being his official title. To the uninitiated this is pretty much a family court judge. He has the pleasure of listening to cases of child support, custody, and any other sort of domestic disagreement that progresses to litigation. How fun. He explained all this to me while waiting for the waitress to bring him his salad. I had some sort of meat sandwich that was decidedly less healthy. Our meal was not large, nor hard to eat, yet the time it took us to finish lunch was impressive. I would say how long but I would hate to cast doubt on Mr. Bennett’s dedication to the people of Philadelphia.

He, like I, is not a native of this fine city. He was raised in a respected Jamaican family where the likes of Mr. Marley were not simply listened to, but met; hence his allowing my itations to be entertained. He left the island to attend the University of Alabama on a track scholarship. Upon graduation he took a good job in California and began to enjoy life. As can often be the case when one is enjoying themselves, family stepped in to shake things up. Mr. Bennett’s uncle, a barrister, thought his nephew should be more like himself, and told him to attend law school. Which he did, at LSU. (I am thinking of convincing Bennett to attend my alma matter so we can get a national football championship, they seem to follow him.) Graduation, a job fair in Atlanta, and a phone call from a politician, landed Wayne Bennett in Philadelphia. Now we knew each other, our meals had arrived and been half eaten, and then we began to talk.

I was not present at Obama’s beer summit with Professor Gates and Officer Crowley, but I have no doubt it was not as productive as was ours at the pub. The two of us, assumed to be polar opposites, both love this city. He loves that it is close to both NYC and DC, has a small town feel in a big city, and that he can visit a neighborhood and know he will find black people, white people, Italians or Poles.

I like that I can eat somewhere other than Applebee’s.

I tend to talk too much.

When I asked him to tell me the one best reggae song ever, he gave me a list of eight.
His wife does not read his blog; neither does mine.

We were into some ground breaking stuff here. Lunches like ours are not completely unheard of, but lunches with those of our respective demographics do not discuss the topic I brought up next. I asked him why he blogs about race.

“People are dishonest about race. I wanted to have the real conversation,” was his answer. He believes that thanks to the computer, and people’s propensity to hide behind them, individuals finally feel they can speak freely. He has created a forum where they do.

He sees the black community as running in place. “Things are surely not as bad as they were 20 years ago, but we aren’t going anywhere. It’s the same old, same old.” I expressed a more dour view. I asked him why it seemed so many young black men were falling behind in Philadelphia.

In his animated way he told me a story along these lines:

“When I first started hearing cases I would get all these divorced families where Mom works some fast food job, dad works construction, and they spend thousands of dollars a month to send their kids to private school (I knew exactly of what he spoke as he described perfectly my whole neighborhood). The Dad would consistently be unable to keep up the child support payments and hence find himself standing before the bench. I used to think all these folks were sending their kids to private catholic schools to keep them away from black people (which knowing these people would not surprise me). But when I started to look more into it I saw how bad the schools were and realized that maybe this wasn’t racism but that these folks simply cared about their child’s education. Racism wasn’t the issue; it was that we need to do something about these schools.”

He contrasted this with how many limos he sees at high school graduations. “Since when was graduating from high school such a big deal? You haven’t done anything yet? Why is the bar so low?”

I asked him if race still matters. He said, “of course, but its class too. Hey, even rich black people hate poor black people.”

We talked well past the check. I was sitting at the table of a black man who blogs about racism as a way to unwind and relax from the work day, (what a way to relax, right?) and he made me feel completely comfortable. He was not angry; not even grumpy. In fact I rather liked the guy and he had the sort of demeanor that whether true or not, would make others think he liked them too.

He insisted on picking up the tab and we wrapped up lunch with the conversation feeling unfinished. Funny that as a reader of his blog, one might think the world of race relations spinning into a black hole, but having lunch with the author was the bright spot of my week.
There is hope for us yet.

Robert E' Lee's Slave

I once wrote, on another blog, a short piece that was slightly critical of Robert E. Lee and his fighting to defend slavery. Turns out even insinuating any flaw in Mr. Lee is almost as dangerous as me writing about black women’s hair.

A comment responding to my blog disturbed me to the point that I did not reply. Not till now at least. The commenter told a story about Robert E. Lee’s manservant who even after the surrender at Appomattox, stayed faithfully by Lee’s side.

The story of Lee’s slave was new to me, but the type of story was not. It is the sort of tale, or detail rather, that has led me to detest “Gone with the Wind” and made me almost incapable of having a reasonable discussion with most armchair historians displaying a southern lean.

If I may, let me respond now.

Tales of faithful slaves or loyal black people dot the landscape of southern histories. Some are true, some are not. One cannot say two words relating the War of Northern Aggression to slavery, or criticize the Confederate flag, without one of these tales, most likely a tale of a black confederate soldier, being immediately thrown back in defense. To this I simply say, “Are you serious?”

Sadly that is completely rhetorical and a bit inflammatory, as I know good and well that they are. These stories, or even historical accounts, of the happy Negro exist and most white people take them at face value as proof that we cannot judge historical values through our modern lenses. The stories are used to show that things weren’t really all that bad, and in some ways were even better. You see, the races, black and white, got along better back then. We even loved and cared for each other. Our children played together, black women nursed white children, and soldiers of each race even fought and died together. Obviously the “peculiar institution” was not as bad as we may think, and historical figures like Lee should not be judged so harshly.

How short sighted.

To read these accounts and come to these conclusions is to make simpletons of all black people and displays a complete ignorance of black realities. These tales do not show that things weren’t as bad as we think but rather display how much worse they really were.

Let’s look at the example of Lee’s manservant, Rev William Mack Lee. A short history of his life was published in 1918.

Rev Lee, who was by this time quite old, was touring the countryside to raise money to fund the building of his church. In his story he tells how he was born on the General’s plantation and stayed loyally by his side throughout the war. He told how all the slaves on Lee’s plantation were freed ten years before the war but all stayed put till after the fighting ended. The autobiography goes on to tell how the Rev. stayed by Lee’s side till the old General passed away, at which time Lee left $360 for the Rev. to “educate himself.”

William wrote: “At the close of the war I did not know A from B…I went to school. I studied hard at the letter, but my greatest learning came from Jesus Christ”.

So, at face value we have a former slave who was freed by his master but stayed with him. Years after his old masters death he is still singing his praises. Not only singing, but thanks to the generosity of the old master he is also writing and preaching. What a great man this master must have been.

Or maybe he was just great in comparison to all the other white people William knew. An oft ignored aspect of life in the mid 1800’s and earlier, is that just because a state, or a group, opposed slavery, one cannot assume those states or groups actually liked or accepted black people. In fact the popular proposal of those who opposed slavery was that black people should all be shipped back to Africa. Some even did just that, founding the country of Liberia.
A black person, who somehow attained freedom, was in no way guaranteed rest and peace. More likely a freed slave was now tossed into an open market that did not want and often would not allow, black participation. An appreciation for the difficulty and outright persecution faced by free black people would lead us to look closer at the choices historical black characters made.
Some chose to stay put, like those on Lee’s plantation. A benevolent master, who didn’t beat you, at least not that much, may have been a safer bet than the rabble beyond the plantation gates. More telling yet, was that knowing the scorn the outside society held in store, many, many, chose to risk life and try for freedom.

General Lee appreciated William's education so much that he financed it. How nice. But then again, if it was truly important, why didn't he educate Mr. William Lee himself rather than through a gift in his will? It seems many a gracious slave owner was mostly only gracious after his death.

The Civil War, with its Northern Armies marching through the heart of the south gave the biggest opportunity for slaves to flee the farm for freedom. Rev. William Lee did not. It may have been his loyalty to that great man, or could it also have possibly been that to stand next to Robert E. Lee was also to stand next to the very military might of the confederacy. There is a famous tale, the one retold to me by the commenter, of how directly following the surrender at Appomattox, Gen. Lee retired to his tent and did not reemerge for the space of a day. All the while William Lee sat loyal watch outside the tent without moving.

Might I inquire where he would have gone?

If I were a black man standing in the middle of 8,000 armed soldiers who had just been in the business of killing others to defend their right to own a black person, many of their closest friends having died in the process, and who have just received notice that they lost the war; I might just sit still on a stool counting the seconds till one of these men finds a convenient target on whom to express his frustration. I could either run out into the midst of these heart broken sharp shooters, or I could stick close to the side of the one who may protect me or at least someone who appreciated my services. One may think I could run to the Union troops, they aren’t so far away; but then again how am I to know that those Union soldiers like black people? Truth is many union soldiers resented black people due to the fact that they saw themselves fighting and dying for a whole race of people they saw as inferior and best kept away from themselves and their women. To automatically assume that I would stay put simply out of devotion is to ignore everyone else and everything around me.

Of course I was not there. I did not know either of the Lees in question. Maybe we should just stick with what was in Rev. Lee’s book.

Like the following:
“Still limping from a Yankee bullet, an old darkey, with a grizzled beard and an honest face, hobbled into the office of the World-News at a busy hour yesterday.
"Kin you white folks gimme a little money fur my church?" he asked, doffing his tattered hat as he bowed.
Typewriters tickled their hurried denial.
The aged negro cocked his head on one side. "What, I ain't gwine ter turn away Ole Marse Robert's nigger is yer? You didn't know dat I was Gen. Robert Lee's cook all through de wah, did yer?" Every reporter in the office considered that introduction sufficient, and listened for half an hour to William Mack Lee, who followed General Robert E. Lee as body guard and cook throughout the Civil War. When the Negro lifted his bent and broken figure from a chair to take his leave every man in the office reached into his pocket, for a contribution.”


Before you send me more stories of the happy slave, do me a big favor and go look up the term “shuck-n-jive” first.

Are They Called Negroes?

She was by far the oldest person at the family reunion. She shuffled around and everyone stooped down to explain, help, and give reverence to the reigning matriarch of the occasion. I’m not really sure how we are related, great aunt, great cousin in-law, I have never been all that close with this side of the family.

I found myself sitting next to her at a banquet table one evening. “what nationality is she?” she asked me, referring to my daughter, who was sitting near us.

“Her Mom is African-American.”

“Afro what? African? Amrination?” she struggled.

“Her Mom, my wife, is black,” I simplified.

“Oh. Well ya never know. Sometimes they adopt ya know. Now where exactly is Philadelphia? What is it near?”

I thought about how to answer her question and took the easy way out. “Its near New York.” I was not prepared for what she asked next.

“Now, there’s lots of Negroes in New York right?”

I don’t recall exactly how I answered. I think I stammered some sort of affirmation trying to be respectful to both an old lady and a whole race of people.

“Nancy says I’m not supposed to say Negro. Is it Colored? I just don’t know what to say. What was it you said earlier? AfreeMerin?”

She doesn’t hear all that well, so I thought it best to just stay simple, “just say black.”

“They used to be really mean to them I think. Wouldn’t let them sit on the busses, go to school. I just don’t know, but I think that wasn’t right. I just think it was mean. But it’s better now, right? That’s all done now isn’t it.”

I could have answered her a million ways. I could have been upset, could have just dismissed her entirely, or climbed high up on my horse and lectured my senior. I imagined what my wife’s face would have looked like had she been here to hear the whole exchange; mouth open, one eyebrow arched higher than the other, head slightly to the side.

“It was worse than mean. It was more than wrong. Things can still get better.” Is all I said.

I should explain something about this woman.
Earlier that same day the whole family had taken a trip to not only where this woman grew up, but where she has spent nearly all her life; Lyman Wyoming. I stood in front of a small wood home, looked right, looked left, turned all the way around and saw nothing but that house. Not a tree, not a building, nothing. Nothing all the way to the horizon in all directions. For most of her life she had to travel just to see another person. I think she may have met a total of 2.5 black people in her whole life. It has been a long life. Lest one think this isolation would amplify the affects of media, I should mention that for most of this woman’s life, they had no power. They had no power, as in influence, but mostly just in that they had no electricity. They lived “off the grid” as the hipsters would say today, but they did it in the 60’s.

What should I expect from a woman who lived in Wyoming with no TV during the 60’s? She is the equivalent of the average American today and our awareness of the state of indigenous tribes in Central America.

She is the generation of my grandmother. What should I expect her to have taught her children about race? Should I have expected her to address such an abstract in her world at all? We learn what we know through teaching and experience. On this subject she neither had, nor could give either.

Bishop William Henderson

See this post with pictures at http://www.brohammas.com

The door to the Michigan Street Baptist Church was closed, but it wasn’t locked. As I stepped inside I heard a voice from downstairs call, “hello?”

The voice belonged to a middle aged black man who introduced himself as Bishop Montgomery. I chuckled a little and introduced myself the same way. “Well aren’t we something? That over there is Bishop Henderson,” Bishop Montgomery said, pointing to a grey bearded man seated at the table.

Bishop Montgomery showed me around the small chapel. The pulpit is original. It is where Montgomery speaks on Sundays, and where Dubois spoke long ago. He showed me the progress of current renovations to the stained glass windows, and directed my attention to a small door leading to the attic. “That up there used to hide runaway slaves.” I was told about how hiding runaways was risky, even in a free state. If caught, the church would be shut down. But the church hid them still the same. We talked for a bit as we, walked back downstairs.

“This old guy here is the one to answer your history questions,” Montgomery said as Bishop Henderson slowly pulled himself up to his feet.

I haven’t met anyone quite like Bishop Henderson.

He took me to the back of the basement and into the bathroom. Here he pulled aside a curtain to show a small compartment, smaller than coat closet. He told me that people being ushered along the Underground Railroad would crouch here, hiding from slave catchers. He told me the place was special and he wouldn’t let the workers patch up the hole in the wall when they modernized the building. He told me how no one ever liked slave catchers, even people who didn’t like black people still didn’t like slave catchers. These holders of negative opinion included the city judge, the one the slave catchers would have to go to get warrants. This judge would start proceedings, excuse himself to use the restroom, and never come back, abandoning the court while in session. He told of how those running away had to rely completely on the goodness of others, others meaning white people, to usher them to freedom. Black people could only conduct at night. It was up to whites to open houses, drive wagons, row boats, as black people would all be targets of capture themselves. He told the stories with energy, conviction, and surprising detail.

I let him talk, he likes to talk, but one question started to distract me from all the rest. Finally I asked, “You are a Baptist Bishop, you were the pastor of this very church, why do you wear a star of David?”

He smiled as his hand moved up to the pendant around his neck. You see, my mother was African-American, but my Dad was a Jew. I used to hate my Dad, but as time has gone along, I have grown to appreciate him and the culture he came from. “So it’s an ethnic rather than religious symbol for you?” I continued. “Yes.”

Now I had a whole new set of questions.
“You are, shall we say from a generation before my own,” I began; “More like two,” he interrupted. “Was it difficult being raised the product of mixed parentage?”

He told me the following story:
“I wasn’t raised mixed. I wasn’t raised by my parents. A black family adopted me when I was very little and black was all I ever knew. My family was black, everyone at school was black, and everyone in church was black. I never knew of anything like prejudice till high school when I became best friends with a boy, six foot three and dark skinned… looked just like me. Wherever we went, people would say, there go salt n’ pepper. As I got older I would occasionally guest pastor at some other churches, black churches. I would stand up in front of them and watch as they started whispering around to each other, who is this guy and what does he have to say to US? I would just smile and say, my mom was black and my dad was a Jew. I’m not black or white, I’m a whole new creature created by God to preach of Christ! He said this always went over well.

I knew my Dad growing up; I just didn’t know he was my Dad. Our neighborhood was mixed back then, we had some of everybody. We used to watch the Jewish people walk to church on Saturdays. They wouldn’t drive, that was work, and they observed the Sabbath.
I had a dog, I loved that dog like little boys do; he was my best friend. One day the dog was hit in the road and I remember sitting there in the street holding my dog as it died, tears flowing as I cried. People were all gathered round, just watching, not doing anything. Then, through the crowd, came this man. He bent down and put his arms around me and held me, comforted me. No one else moved, just this white, Jewish man, and I felt a special bond with him from that day on. We all used to play in the streets and I would see him from time to time, watching from a distance. I didn’t know till much later that he was my Dad, just as I didn’t appreciate till much later that my father had no choice.
I was a child born out of wedlock and as such had to be cast out. It didn’t matter my race, I wasn’t allowed.”

He showed me a picture of his mother, who died while he was a child. He showed me a picture of his wife and grown daughter. I told him about my daughters. I told him about how my six year old was confused when told about segregation, with special places for white and black. She wanted to know where the tan kids sat. He smiled; he does that easily.

“Talk to your kids. You don’t have to tell them more than they are ready for, they learn bit by bit, but answer the questions as they come.”
“I warned you he liked to talk,” Bishop Montgomery interjected as he walked through the room. It was time for me to go.

I think Bishop Henderson would have sat and talked with me all day had I kept asking questions. I would have liked that. But the parking meter was still running, I had a schedule to keep, and wisdom does no good if we never step back into the real world.
I shook his hand, took his card, and he showed me to the door.

Al Allen

One Easter season Al Allen, a man from a previous generation, took pity on a young couple with no family in town, and invited us over for an Easter dinner. As we made our way down his stairs to where a larger than normal table was set up to accommodate us, we stepped into what could have been a Greenville County black history museum.

Every inch of wall space in the finished basement was covered with photographs, certificates, and various nostalgic paraphernalia. There was a young Al with a football team, with some man in a suit, with a group of men in suits, pictures of buildings I had never seen, and some pictures of buildings I had seen. The images were all in black and white, but the people were all black. He told me tales of when he met with so and so, or worked on a commission with you know who, none of who's names I knew then or can remember now; except Sterling Field.

I played rugby on Sterling Field three times a week. It was in the less attractive part of town, we had to share the field with local little league football teams, but it was the cheapest field around for a low budget sports club. "Used to be a great field," Mr. Allen told me matter of factly. "Yeah? What happened to it?" I asked, not really caring as I was more interested in the images on the wall than his list of unrecognized names. His answer to my half hearted question got my full attention.

He told me how Sterling High school used to have the best football team around. It was the county's black school and the pride of all who went there. The kids got a top notch education, the community loved the place, and to top it all off, they won football games. Then came integration.

Integration didn't happen all at once. Like most things, first rumors started, then meetings were held, and finally maybe a couple years later, something would happen. It was the late 60's and the writing was on the wall, the whole state knew it was coming. Word came that Sterling would not be closed, sending their students off to other schools, but rather white kids were to be sent there. This was a top performing school both in academics and on the field; it was going to be a great example and the Sterling community was guardedly excited. Then, the year before it was to integrate...

It burned to the ground.

It caught fire the night of prom and burned down to stubble. The school was never rebuilt, and in 1970 all the kids were bussed off to other schools.

As he told the story there was no anger or resentment in his voice. He was just an older guy telling a "back in the day" story. He moved right from that story to showing me his collection of R&B records. The rest of the night consisted of great food, his wife chiding him for trying to smoke in doors when a baby was in the house, and him later giving that baby a stuffed rabbit the size of a live horse. I've never been the best at keeping in touch and I have no idea how Al Allen is today. I wonder how he is, but I never do anything.

Travelers and visitors to Greenville would never know stories like this, and that is just fine. Everywhere has its ghosts; they need not be put on constant display. So if you ever find yourself half way between Atlanta and Charlotte, enjoy it. Visit the Reedy River with its stunning bridge, get some jewelry at the Beaded Frog, and as you look at the confederate flags. know that Sterling field used to be nice.

Tuskegee Airmen

An oft ignored or unknown aspect of post emancipation America is the systematic crushing of black dreams. Those of my generation have always known, or been taught, of the first black this, or first black that. The initial astronaut, millionaire, Oscar winner, or president, have been praised. They have been praised to such an extent that the significance and relevance of such achievements have been lost, rendering the names trivial. Those cynical, young, or simply white, oft find it difficult to not drift towards the all encompassing, “so what.”

I turned off my prescribed path to follow a sign announcing a Tuskegee Airmen Memorial. I was nowhere near Alabama, North Africa, or even a military base. I was intrigued. I found myself at an isolated South Carolina field that had at one time, just a short time, served as an airstrip servicing the squadron of black airmen while in training. There was a small statue under a tree, a couple of plaques explaining some history, and an old searchlight.
The plaques explained that in an effort to squelch the new squadron, officials required all applicants to have a college degree and flight experience. Those same officials were astounded at the number of men who qualified. To that surprise is where my thoughts wandered.

We have been taught, indoctrinated, with the ideal of the American dream. We have been raised with the expectation that in America if you work hard, if you try, you will achieve. I was told by my teachers, my parents, my politics, by my very culture, that I must learn, work, and try. If I did, my goals would be realized. All these African-American firsts helped to prove this. A memorial to the Airmen helped me realize otherwise.

Those surprised officials believed the dream. These Americans had misjudged their culture’s ability to elevate the able. They saw the lack of black doctors, professors, lawyers, and black professionals as proof that black people lacked qualifications. In the land of meritocracy it was assumed that the disparity in achievement was a direct result of who had, or did not have, merit. They were proved wrong. How did they get it so wrong?

Slaves were not allowed to read or write, yet there was still a Frederick Douglass. After Emancipation schools were opened and quickly flooded with students. Most of our books or lessons plot this point on the timeline and chart a vertical trajectory in dramatic fashion. The subsequent glossing over of all that transpired between then and the civil rights movement has left us blind to things we still don’t want to see. All those firsts were not the first qualified, they were the first allowed.

For every one who achieved there were many who had previously learned and worked hard only to be thwarted. They were not held back by inadequacy but by America. W.E.B. Dubois, the first black man to graduate with a PhD from Harvard, a man now considered one of the United States greatest sociologists, was commissioned by the University of Pennsylvania to do research and teach their students, but was denied a seat as professor. He could teach the students, but not be recognized as a teacher. Fisk, Howard, Morehouse, and even Harvard and Yale, produced black graduates long before the greater society produced black professionals. It seems the speed of work, education, and legislation, were outpaced by locked doors, hard heads, and burnt crosses.

America is the land of dreams, the land of opportunity? Yes, but it is, and has also been, a land littered with the remnants of crushed dreams and dashed aspirations. Our country has created for itself a dual past and a checkered present. Some were elevated and rewarded, others filled full of hope only to have it pushed back into the ground from which it sprung. Things were not fair. Things were never meant to be completely fair. That is true no matter one's race just as it is true that any man or woman stands a better chance of progress in America than any other land. We can hold our heads high but should never do so with eyes closed. If America is to pride herself in all the firsts she helped create, she must also admit that she is the one who stopped many other firsts from happening.

But the firsts have come. As I looked at the bronze bust of a brown pilot looking up at the sky, I smiled cynically. I smiled because it made perfect sense why these pilots showed no fear of German planes. It was obvious why they proved so adept at avoiding enemy flak. These were men who had a lifetime of having their dreams being shot down. They had previously been trained under ‘friendly fire.’ That is the real triumph of these airmen. I cannot, nor do I know anyone who can, tell me the name of any of these heroes. I can find no real record of any of them later reaching some notable milestone. They weren’t remarkable for any one event or battle. What made them special is that they existed and despite the anti-aircraft fire from home, they still had wings and flew.

Black People Are More Racist; Part 1 of Many

My wife and I were once asked to describe ourselves in five words or less. Mine went something like Mormon, husband, artist, blah, blah, blah, hers went black, woman, something, something, something.
If this would have been a few years earlier her answer would have worried me. It may have even upset me.

Race was not just on her list but at the top. Race? Black? Really? I had not even thought to list my color. In my own mind color had absolutely nothing to do with who I was as a person. Race shouldn't’t even matter right? Listing that as the top thing on your list is a problem right? Was it wrong?

I should back up a bit.

Growing up I felt I had absolutely no culture. I looked at my Hawaiian friend with envy as his family performed traditional dances and sang songs in another language. I spent considerable time with a group of American Indian dancers and always secretly, or not so secretly, wished I would one day be adopted into one of their tribes. My family name is Scottish and with little to no real knowledge of the foggy isle, I developed an appreciation for bagpipes that I maintain to the present day. I loved and appreciated everyone’s culture mostly because I felt I didn’t have one of my own.

Then I left Utah.

I went to a place where I looked like everyone else, but I was nothing like them. We spoke the same language but the accent was new. The people were every bit as religious as I, we even worshiped using the same words, but the meanings were no where near the same. I knew songs these new people did not. I even celebrated a holiday in July they knew nothing about. I discovered something. I discovered I had a culture all along, I simply did not recognize it when I was in that culture’s cradle. I hadn’t recognized my culture because it helped me blend in with everyone else rather than making me stand out.

As I spent more time outside my native place I became more comfortable. I learned my way and place with new groups, still I found myself more comfortable more quickly, with those who came from the same place I did. I found I could relate quicker to those who went snowboarding not out of some X Games adrenaline quest, but simply because it was what we always did. It was what everyone did. I am very in tune with my own mortality, so much so that while I snowboard, I avoid the half pipe at all costs. Those who only know of snowboarding from the movies or ESPN2 have trouble understanding this, or even believing it. I related to people who went camping for fun, because it was what we all did for fun. I was, and still am to some point, comfortable around others with this shared culture because they are more likely to understand little things about me. They are more likely to get past what I am to understand who I am.

At work I quickly became “the Mormon guy”, and rarely became anything more than that. I paint, read, write, travel, love to talk politics, love football, and love movies, but if my work associates ever tried to talk with me one on one, they never got much past “so you don’t drink at all? How many wives do you really have?”

Sometimes my culture brings me in direct conflict with the culture I live in. I will not eat at Hooters, I will not go to your bachelor party if it includes certain activities or locations, and sports or parties are not part of my Sunday. I find most people are respectful of who I am and what I believe, but they don’t understand it.

I have a deep and all encompassing culture and all throughout my youth I didn’t know it. I never saw it because it blended with everyone else. No one had to point out my culture because it was theirs as well.

That’s why it did not, nor does it upset me, that my wife wrote black on her list.

We white people don’t think our whiteness is part of who we are.

It is.

We don’t see it because largely, every one else we see is white too. Try going somewhere whites don’t go. A club, a neighborhood, an island, or even continent and see how long your whiteness remains a non-factor. It’s O.K., its part of who you are. Do it your whole life and see if it doesn’t begin to shape you.
See if you don’t begin to feel comfortable with those who also relate to being white when no one else is. See if you don’t enjoy the comfort of being with those who don’t need you to explain yourself. See if your color makes it’s way onto your list.

I know this now. Because I know this I am not upset or offended, nor am I afraid of or alienated by, a black person declaring they are black. I do not mind black kids sitting together at lunch, or mind that there is a channel or a caucus where race matters. I do not mind it and it is not inherently racist.

It’s O.K. To some point, I get it.