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I've wrestled pretty fiercely with the topic I'm about to write about today. I've been on various sides of the issue; I've had days worth of conversations about the issue; I've mistakenly blogged about the issue while my anger or sadness or frustration was still fresh; I've backed down and fired back. I've cried without knowing why over this issue, have been extremely sure of myself at times and extremely confused at others. And even during other moments, I considered myself to be very Zen-like in my "third way" approach. Here's another perspective.
I entered college with a chip on my shoulder, fueled by the voices of my elementary school teachers who prepared me for this moment:
You will face many obstacles and people will try to hold you back, but you need to look "them" in the face and overcome.
However, as appreciative as I was of the warning and as beautiful as it is that these teachers--sometimes white, sometimes not--were empathic and cared about our struggle and success, many of them were uttering an old doctrine of race, class and gender theory without making room for the fact that they too could fall prey to standing in our way, as more than a handful of professors and teachers of color stood in mine.
Sometimes more was expected of me because of my cultural/ethnic identification, sometimes not enough was expected of me. Sometimes what they expected was exactly right, sadly, and it was still not enough. Often my voice was given too much credence and spoiled me rotten. Other times my voice was not given enough space or acknowledged. There were times when only the racial part of me was allowed to speak, but not the gendered part, not the depressed part, not the adolescent part, not the Christian part and not the agnostic part. Sometimes it was the reverse.
I entered college with a chip on my shoulder, exhibiting every symptom of a kid who feels isolated. I burst in Gordon's doors with a fitted cap, baggy sweats and airforces, practically wearing a fruit-basket on my head to let you know that I am Dominican. I blasted my Hip Hop and salsa music through Gordon's silence and pumped it up extra loud if we were ever driving through the campus. I hid in the cafeteria behind the hysterical laughs of every student of color who sat on the Sunny Side of Lane. And oh yes, I played the race card once or twice--accusing fellow students of making assumptions about Black people when they were merely making fun of the stereotype; accusing a Black kid with a suburban upbringing of portraying "us" poorly.
Oh we played the race police at that table in Lane and added fuel to the fire by talking and laughing and "Ooooh Noo-"ing and "No he didn't"-ing. Was I being genuine? Kind of. I believed what I was saying at the time. But I had little time for reflection or perspective because I was immersed in the side of the cafeteria that both gave me a home and a whole lot of bitterness.
And then I decided that this environment was making me miserable and that it didn't feel true, and that I was actually lonelier than ever. I turned to organizations on campus and tried making friends with regular Gordon. In retrospect, this was not as easy as I made it out to be during my Mandela phase. It was not until I moved to Gordon in Lynn that I found my friends.
At the end of the year, we enter Annery's White-sympathy phase. I decided that the conversation around race was unfair and one sided; that white kids could not speak their minds and engage in true discussion because they were constantly haunted by offended participants and peers who would "OH NO" any thought or experience they might express. I also decided that we ignored the race card and condemned the race card, but did not talk about its reality. Even more so, we did not talk about the complexity of the race card, why folks (particularly first year college students from urban areas who feel isolated) feel compelled to play in the first place and why it's allowed at all. Let's talk about the origins of the race card, people!
I even mentioned this to Dr. Cornell West himself during a panel discussion on "Democracy Matters."
"Dr. West, we talk a lot about the oppression folks of color undergo but do you feel that there is room to legitimize and deal with the pain of White guilt?" In short, his answer was that White guilt was an excuse. I don't know that I agree with him. I still maintain that this is a real phenomenon and tend to side with Tutu and Mandela on this question.
Anywayz....
Towards the end of college I was a champion of what I called "the reconciliation" perspective. But there was still a small part of me that was concerned when folks of color also became sympathetic towards their White peers, but no longer thought that the particularities of their experience as people of color in the United States was relevant or important. We got so used to students who refused to go to "race chapels" to be lectured that we didn't want to be seen as the lecturers. So we stopped talking about what was important to us.
After college I moved to a house with the loveliest people in the world. I had so much fun, felt so much love and I hope that we will continue to be friends for a long-ass time. I can't say the isolation wasn't felt, though. I tried to engage it, find out its significance and meaning through conversation and I talked about it often, but I started to hush my feelings around the issue even further than I already had previously. My feelings were offensive to people. Plain and simple. And there was no foreseeable way around it. When I expressed my feelings about the minority achievement gap and how I was its product, I was met with skepticism and was asked to stop "playing the card"--indirectly, of course. Mostly, through the grapevine.
During this time I thought long and hard about "the stories we tell ourselves" and how some of these might not even be real. I thought about the stories of race I had been told all of my life. The way I was told I was a victim of a scary system of oppression that maybe, in the end, wasn't actually all that scary. Hang on, Cantabridgians...there's more to come. I heard one of my yoga instructors say something very wise, "The mind internalizes and creates stories. Yoga is about reconnecting with the heart." And if late night college conversations taught me anything, it's that when people start using "I" statements and saying "I feel" or "In my experience" I better shut the hell up and listen to this person's story (even in light of the overuse of the phrase "I just feel" in college).
[P.S.When people tell their stories they are typically speaking from the heart and being the most real with you. It's a sacred moment that no argument can trump. You can quote theologians, politicians, theorists and philosophers all day, but when someone says that they experienced x,y and z you better make room for the possibility of their truth, even if it contradicts the version you've heard and/or studied].
And here it was. I was so busy trying to see the issue from the other side (which was immeasurably important and still is), that I ignored my voice in the process. So that when people would accuse me of "playing the card" or "overusing my experience" I would find where I had been wrong. So much so that I didn't feel like I could stand up for myself when my story felt right.
But in order to do this I needed to know the difference between the stories I was told and the story i lived and felt and still feel and breathe.
Yes, I have played the card. But I've also been watching experts and teachers address me all of my life instead of my mother, the real parent and authority in the situation. Although some might disagree, this actually creates a dent in your development. Watching her feel ashamed that she cannot speak the language of her child stirs something in you. Not talking about the New York Times at the dinner table makes a difference.
And the subtle stuff causes huge ripple effects--the expectations authorities may or may not have of you, the projections they put onto you, the images you see as the only ones you can identify with in the media. And the subtle idea that your story is not the predominant one, and therefore invalid. All of the conversations in which the theorist was more right than you were, even though he or she failed to include you in the history books. There were no studies on you and the ones that exist are about incarceration and poverty and language acquisition. When we read about Latinos in college it was in the context of disenfranchisement--so that even the liberals were a part of this system.
The part of me that cries at the scene in "In the Heights" when the grandma sings, "Paciencia y Fe" as all the suited men point and yell, "Learn English!" The way the Indian dad, the Nicaraguan mom, the Dominican famiy look at their children during college graduation, with flashbacks in their eyes to wars and dictators and homes they fled and families they left behind, that cause my eyes to become pools and stirs the pit of my heart, filling it to the brim with feeling. This is that part of me that feels.
And let's not even talk about the Black experience in America.....
Ok. let's talk about it. But we might need a heck of a lot more web space and three or four more voices--since I myself am not Black.
WORKING CONCLUSION
The working draft of my 7/7/2011 conclusion on race (to be continued) is all of the above. It's all true. All the stages. But tonight, I'm correcting slightly. What I've experienced is true. I've felt bad that certain people were put off by it in the past, but today I am compelled to say, "I want to discuss it with you and I can be wrong and you can be right. But if in the end you are compelled to tell me that my version of this story is wrong, I am going to have to say I'm sorry I'm holding on to what's true to me."
And why is this relevant on a larger scale?
It seems that this conversation is all the more appropriate in 2011, three years into Obama's presidency. He has tried to make concessions to those outside of his party, but is still being accused of being inflexible. He has made immigration laws more stringent than ever at the behest of the Republican side. He has offered to make significant cuts on social costs despite the protests of members of his own party in the name of bipartisanship. And boy, am I a believer in bipartisanship.
I believe in the wisdom that everyone possesses no matter what affiliation, social status, ethnicity, etc. But I'm starting to see that sometimes people will be attached to their personal ideas that are local and indigenous to them without openness to compromise. Both this national and personal phenomenon has me thinking that it is important to concede to those whose experiences are different from your own, but sometimes they won't be willing to give in or see things from your side. And in that case, you might have to say, "I know you think that my story is in-valid and that's ok. But I'm going to take your recommendations, apply the ones that work and walk right on." So Mr. Obama, even though I love your bipartisanship efforts, if you don't believe that deportations should be at record levels under your presidency and that we need more nuance in immigration policy, I support you."
Note: I say all of the above from the bottom of my heart in a sort of Rortian way of coming to the table with your truth in order to encounter someone else with their truth to then have genuine discussion about it. If you've read this, please comment; especially, if you disagree.
