I won't say who it was but when one of the men in my family married a white woman he gave his then fiance profound insights into what was to become part of her life. Of the things he told her the words didn't click and make sense until after they were married. She told me his words were, "...if you marry me you will lose the luxury of a first impression".
She came to understand the first impression always belongs to white people. The impression Black people work for is the second one. That is the one that counts. That is the one that settles in dispelling the first and unoriginal one! That is where the real selling comes in to play with perception. I should start a series of stories on this, but I think there are more than enough circulating in memory to do the job of surfacing the deep seated prejudices that stir the proverbial pot whites and Blacks like to piss in to keep the dramas going.
the Story of of freedom fighting!
Danièle Watts, star of Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained, wrote on her Facebook page: “I remembered the countless times my father came home frustrated or humiliated by the cops when he had done nothing wrong, ” she wrote. ” I felt his shame, his anger, and my own feelings of frustration for existing in a world where I have allowed myself to believe that “authority figures” could control my BEING… my ability to BE!!!!!!!” But, that wasn't enough to use better judgement when the police approached her like she was a whore making out with a trick in public, who was actually her white boyfriend! If I read the story right she walked away from the first approach talking to her father on her cell phone. The second approach by two officers she refused to, or didn't show I.D. to the officers, which in their minds was justification for arresting her. Vagrancy is just enough of a charge to mark a spotless record. All 'they' want is one opportunity to blemish a name, and a vagrancy charge can, and countless times has been a reason to deny opportunities to Black Americans for well over a century or two.
With those memories and stories of her father deep within her what was her thinking process at that moment? Was she feeling the white girl vibe in Hollywood? Were the voices of her ancestors and her father's angst fueling the strong fight she owns? Or was simply being accused of being a whore worth fighting for; worth fighting against a superior attitude, and the assumption the surrounding area conceivably could have of her because she is Black and with a white man? It is fair to assume the area she was in was a white area. No other community would entertain the idea of the actress being a whore. There might be some Black men ticked off at the white boyfriend, and certainly the sisters would be giving her looks, but any disrespect beyond that would not involve the police! Calling the police because you don't like seeing someone kissing one of your own? That's a white people thing!
Should she be upset enough to level the thrust of her outrage to the surrounding community? After all, police reflect the attitudes, cultural bias, and assumptions of the community they serve. My last question is simple. Should she have just complied without complaint and found another way to voice the injustice of the officer's approach to their faces? There are questions about the legitimacy of women's rights to expression and interracial dating/marriage at work here. How we internally deal with the above raised questions are determinate factors of our nation's cup of perception!
- Gregory E. Woods, Keeper of Stories 9.14.14
Stop & Identify Laws
P I N K
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