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November 4, 2005
Acting White
Apropos Brian's recent post, there is a serious problem in the black community in this nation. The first problem, of course, is that many blacks see themselves as a separate community in the first place, rather than part of mainstream life. But arising from that are all kinds of subsidiary problems, one of which is the set of differentiators the mandarins of black separatism have used to enhance the feeling of distinctness. For example, many blacks have internalized the idea that achievement is "acting white" and ipso facto bad.
Not only does this tend to make racial demagoguery (a favorite passtime of such luminaries as Jesse Jackson, Louis Farrakhan, Cornel West and Al Sharpton) easier, it has the pernicious effect of ensuring the future poverty of those blacks who fall into the trap of believing it. You see, "acting white" encompasses such skills as reading for understanding, writing for clarity and succinctness, clear verbal communications, and any kind of skills that might lead to attainment in the sciences, mathematics, or other subjects not based on emotion. This means that by the time these unfortunate kids graduate — assuming that they do — they already have two strikes against them. Not because of institutionalized racism, as the demagogues suggest, but because of their own cultural aversion to success, as Bill Cosby frequently notes.
This also leads to the "beaten monkey" problem, which was described in an interesting scientific experiment some years ago. A banana was suspended above a mound, and monkeys were put into the room with the mound and banana. Any monkey getting to the top of the mound would get an electric shock. Within a very short period of time, any monkey attempting to get onto the mound would get pulled down and beaten by his fellows. Even after the shocks were turned off, this behavior continued, and new monkeys introduced to the room learned the behavior from their fellows, to the point that even after all the original monkeys had been removed from the room, and none of the monkeys in the room had ever been shocked, attempting to climb the mound would result in a savage beating. The "acting white" stigma in the black community has a similar self-sustaining quality to it, and leads easily to the tearing down of any black who succeeds on their merits, rather than being given a handout.
I don't know how this can be overcome, but our options as a society are to overcome it, or to confine about an eighth of our population to the status of permanent underclass.
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Comments
The outreach needs to come from people within the community. If this is done enough, then (ideally) an internal tipping point will be reached.
However, I really worry about how to accomplish it. Our society is becoming more and more specialized and stratified. Societal niches are catered to in magazines, news, radio, web sites, television, etc. Marketers and politicians continue to find ways to accentuate these differences, contributing to the cultural rift.
I'm really wondering how we get back to an "American narrative".
Posted by: Anonymous at November 4, 2005 12:16 PM
That last comment is mine - not sure why it showed up as Anonymous.
Posted by: Nemo ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.caerdroia.org/blog/nav-commenters.gif)
at November 4, 2005 12:57 PM
That's part of the problem: you have to be black to question the problems in the black community, and even if you are physically black, you're not "really black" if you disagree with the policies and attitudes that created the problems in the first place. That's why I say I don't know where to go from here: I certainly won't be taken seriously by blacks — even Bill Cosby cannot get taken seriously by blacks most of the time.
I think that a large part of the problem — a large part of the loss of an American narrative — comes from a combination of multiculturalism and glorification of supposed victims. Each alone is a pernicious doctrine; together they are social poison.
Posted by: Jeff Medcalf at November 4, 2005 1:07 PM
Is there anything more self-destructive than the idea that academic success is a bad thing, a 'white' thing? What's sad is that so many so-called black leaders, extremely well-educated and successful people, don't do more to squash this insidious mentality. But the sad truth is that, for many, their jobs are dependant on things being bad for black people. Successful, educated blacks don't need Jesse Jackson and company. But as long as they can play the race and victim cards, those trapped in poverty and misery by their lack of a good education will continue to believe they do need Jackson and his ilk to deliver them.
The change can only be made from within the black communtiy. It must be stressed that most black children will not be the next LeBron James or 50 Cent, preferably by those athletes and entertainers themselves. If someone like Lil Wayne, a popular gangsta rapper, who's also studying sports management at the University of Houston, were to come out and stress the importance of a good education, and others popular among black kids did the same, it would make a huge impact. One Bill Cosby can be written off, but scores of them, including those with direct appeal to youths themselves, can make a big difference.
It is heartbreaking to see generations of competant, capable children allowed, almost encouraged, to fail, to be consigned to a second-class life, brought about by the deluge of voices saying that their failure is the fault of racist white society but success is selling out and joining that racist white society.
Posted by: Brian Medcalf at November 5, 2005 12:01 AM