Shades of America

A couple of observations about race are rumbling through my brain today.First, one thing the credible Obama candidacy has done is free African Americans from a lot of political baggage. Obama’s “yes we can” is as much about discarding a defeatist mindset in blacks as in the country as a whole. It’s no longer viable to see this candidacy as symbolic. The man is going to win, or this country is going to see cheating on a public scale we may never recover from.

As he continues to campaign effectively, across all demographics, his blackness is becoming both more and less important. More important to people whose withering options leave them few weapons except fanning hate, and less important to people who see the message and not the color. There are folks from all races in each group, but I think we are actually at a point in our development as a national community that there are more who are responding to the message than need the hate to continue.

As a nation, we can. It’s a powerful thing.

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Obama’s address today, in it’s entirety.

The transcript can be read here. I missed his speech on race and America..if you did too, watch it now.

 

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Pondering a post-bullshit America…

Angry Black Bitch hits hard..and I love it ~ Dusty

Let’s jump right on in, shall we?

We are not living in a post-racial political era.

We are not living in a post-gender era.

We sure as shit are not living in a post-bullshit equality for all, let freedom ring and the masses have our bread and eat it too era.

What we are living in…and some of us are suffering through…is the mess that results from decades of avoiding the issues of race, class and gender by embracing the school of tolerance rather than engaging in the hard work of social justice.

I am not a fan of the school of tolerance. It gives birth to the delusion that any one political candidate experiencing public support as she or he runs for president of the United States is somehow an indicator that American society has transcended a damn thing.

That interpretation of the 2008 race to the Democratic nomination has been debunked by the very election cycle currently being hailed as transcendent. How the hell can any pundit fix their face to ponder a post-racial America when Democrats beat Republicans in the rush to bait based on race?

How can anyone seriously discuss a post-gender America when I’ve yet to witness a political analysis of Senator Clinton’s campaign by the mainstream media that doesn’t trip over the fact that she is a woman?

Let’s keep this shit real Jeff Foxworthy style (wink).

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