Your "Blackness" Questioned?????
 

Has anyone ever had their "blackness" questioned because you happend to have a particular stance on certain issues (i.e. Democrat vs. Republican) or maybe because of your profession or the neighborhood that you reside in. Today, I had a discussion with an old high school chum and she proceed to tell me that I have changed and become one of "them"now.:confused: I asked her how and she stated that since I moved to the "upscale" part of town and got my new job, I've been talking and flinging my hair back like some white girl, forgetting where I came from. She then proceed to tell me that because of "sell-outs" such as myself, this is why black folks will never be unified and excel. After a silent prayer (because I felt like beating that itch down with a bat! :eek: ) I explained to her that my "blackness" is not defined by the small limited scope of her mind. I suggested that once she ventures out into the world she will find that all black people do not fit into a steretyupical mold that she has been taught to believe. The nerve of that heifer! :mad: Anyway, has anyone else haas their "blackness" questioned and if so, how did you handle it?

It is people like the one you describe that provide the fuel for me to keep going. I have a more vocal way of handling mine though, I slowly turn their way, lift my head and tell them to F*CK OFF!!!

I politely tell them there is a time and place for everything. It is NOT called selling-out it is called PROFESSIONALISM (SP) and maybe they should try it.

I've gotten that. I usually ask them what exactly they think acting black means. If it has anything to do with physical or economic characteristics I can quickly point out numerous examples of black people who are anything but the stereotype, and generally tell the person that they should think about why they are willing to limit themselves and others so severely.

It's more amusing then anything to me, because it's just their ignorance. Not even worth getting mad about.

Re: Your "Blackness" Questioned?????
 

Oh Lord, the nerve of some people. Honeykiss, it sounds like this character was sippin' on some "hater-aid" :eek:! I too have had my "blackness" questioned by some of the music I choose to listen too and who I keep in my circle of friends. Those people who feel as though Blacks should only have certain people as friends, live in certain parts of town, and have certain jobs are limited in their thinking and need to explore new areas in life.
In my particular situation, the people who make those type of comments decided to stay home, find fast food jobs, and make babies. Everyone has choices and you made the choice to be the best you can be and have the things you want. Don't let HATERS :rolleyes: like that discourage you or hender you from going for what you've earned.

EXACTLY

Honeykiss, I can feel your pain.

My high school was not known for its black achievers. Most of the black students never actually graduated. They either transferred to a better school or just dropped out. I was among the two or three who graduated, received college scholarships, and did well at the university level.

When I came back after my freshman year at school, I got a very good internship with a major financial services firm. I was no longer interested in hanging out on the street corner and getting drunk. Because I actually had some idea of what I wanted to do with my life, I got talked about. People said that I thought I was better than everybody, and I forgot where I had come from, and yada yada yada.

Whatever! Being black is not defined by fitting into a mold. Black people are some of the most diverse people on the face of the earth. We are diverse in our culture, our appearance, our mindset, and our achievements. Instead of accepting and appreciating these differences, some black people would rather use them as a means of division between us.

Re: Re: Your "Blackness" Questioned?????
 

Excellent points. I've had the same thing happen to me for a long time, because I'm in my late 30s.

Just the other day, some eejit who apparently went to school with me -- I didn't recognize him --said, "Shut up, ST -- your name is ST, ennit?" when I screamed at a woman who was parked illegally in a handicapped space. :rolleyes:

I'm not making nice to those who drink 40-ouncers and loiter on the corner. I made my choice back in high school -- concentrate on becoming educated and keep my legs closed. Today, because I followed that plan, I've got a degree and can meet my basic needs. I'm not particularly affluent by SoCal standards, but I dress and act like it.
:p ;)

I have been struggling with a snappy comeback for a long time, I think that the next time someone comes at me like that I'm going to remind them that I am a descendant of slaves and my ancestors didn't suffer unspeakable horrors for me not to be a contributing member of society.

I dont know if this post was just for the ladies, but I have had a run in with this sort of thing constantly, especially since I joined a predominantly white Fraternity. It's hard to deal with at times, but to me its funny. The same people who sit there and criticize me don't grow up and do anything with there life. I had to tell people you can judge me by my organization all you want, but you are the iqnorant one still in HighSchool :)


Fraternally,
D

What the heck is "keepin' it real....?"
 

Sometimes I hate that term. Sometimes it fits the bill, but other times it's an excuse for ignorance. :mad:

I've had this happen before. Someone kept "joking" that I talked like a white person & that I ate like a white person. :rolleyes: How did I handle it? I put them on the spot. I asked them to explain how it was I was "talking" and "eating". When they tried to immitate me, I cut them off with, "So, you're saying that all black people can't enunciate their words and that all black people eat like savages, like we have no home training? Do you realize that's the same thing racists say?" :mad:

Shut 'em right up.

Like someone previously said, there's a time and a place for everything, or.... err thang! :p :D

GIRLFRIENDS
 

Oddly enough this is the very topic on Girlfriends tonight and how white people try to act Black.

Lynn's sister was on here, full white, accused Joan of not being Black enough.

Did y'all see Waldo from Family Matters as Peaches the hairdresser with DREADS!!

Go On Head Wit Yo Bad Self!!
 

You took the words RIGHT out of my mouth (except that I'm only 20yrs old)...I always get told that I "talk like a white girl"--whatever that is supposed to mean exactly. :rolleyes: Growing up I was always teased b/c I spoke correct English, did not frolic around with the guys around the hood, and maintained good grades while being extremely pretty at the same time!!! Plain and simple...while they're using all their energy talking about me, I am spending my energy studying hard so I can achieve all my dreams...

I've figured out that people are just HATERS!!!!!

I have had many experiences relating to this topic. What I find that works is silence. What it boils down to is, as long as you are true to yourself, you will come to realize it really doesn't matter what other people think. ;)

Re: What the heck is "keepin' it real....?"
 

Smack that person with a stupid stickhttp://www.plaudersmilies.de/rough/twak.gif because how on earth can one EAT like a white person? I might need a visual on that one!

Re: Your "Blackness" Questioned?????
 

I too have received this more times than I care to count. When speaking on the phone to people they "assume" I'm white so you can imagine the initial shock they must go through when they actually meet me :eek:

I have also received comments about where I grew up and went to school. Co-workers say things like "Oh, I didn't know black people lived there?"



I will have to use that because on most occasions, I just shake my head, or say whatever :rolleyes:

My point exactly.....since when has enunciation or having manners become a "white thing" ?


Yes, and it's sad to say but I have to agree with this as well.

Just some thoughts
 

We are having a similar discussion about Black Identity based on last night's episode of Girlfriends. This is what I shared with the list.

First the whole "acting Black versus acting White" issue is a divisive problem in our culture. For some acting Black is equivalent to KEEPING IT REAL, to me at times it means KEEPING IT REAL IGNANT. I think for some of our brothers and sisters, when we go on to achieve, that age old crab mentality kicks in and they have to throw some sort of insult at us to "keep us in check" hence the Acting Black/acting white comments that many of us may have been the target of. I remember the first time my former best friend and former stepfather told me I sounded white on the phone, I went off -- sounded BLACK then, I bet. Anyway I digress.

In today's culture/society, this hip hop culture dominates the way of thinking, living, and behaving. Too many of our Black brothers and sisters are trying to keep up with the Joneses and Big Willies and P Diddys. Not realizing or recognizing the inherent value in themselves.

I do believe that hip hop culture has made it "seem acceptable" for whites and other non Blacks to use the N word. I don't think so. My kids, white and Black, get it from me if I hear the N word. We must change their way of thinking. However it is hard when that is all they hear at home. Hell I heard it at home. It wasn't until I went away to college that I thought "WHOA!!" No more!! I still occassionally slip and use it but I realize that in using it I continue to give our oppressors power over how I treat my fellow Blacks.

Re: GIRLFRIENDS
 

Peaches had me on...the...FLOOR. :D

And I really appreciated this particular episode because this is the first time (that I can recall) where a "black" sitcom dealt with the myriad ways we can represent "Blackness", and to show that we're not the only ones who can love and fully embrace our culture.

Hello,
This topic makes my heart hang heavy. I have been hearing statements like all my life. Some of the reasons people said this was because:
1. I went to Catholic school:eek:
2. I liked to hang out at the library :confused:
3. I didn't use slang:mad:
4. I liked to listen to alternative rock every now and then
5. I am viewed as being "too happy" (I just don't have to complain about) :(
It is sad when people tell you that you don't act black and then stereotype themselves at the same time.

"Too happy" made you seem white?http://www.plaudersmilies.de/sad/confusedpp.gif

I think they've got the steretype backwards. I thought the steretype was that blacks were a happy, singing, smiling kind of people. I guess that happens when you have beaten too much with the stupid stick!http://www.plaudersmilies.de/rough/twak.gif

I totally agree, PROFESSIONALISM, IS THE WORD.
And there is a time and place for everything. Because just by "being black" in the office, just might cost you your job. And what's wrong with flipping your hair back, if it's in your face, IT'S IN YOUR FACE.:D My comeback always is, define blackness or whatever the word is. For example, I had one guy tell me I was ghetto, (my personality OUTSIDE THE OFFICE, HAS NOTHING TO WITH MY PROFESSIONALISM INSIDE THE OFFICE) WHEN I told him to define it! he became studdering man then. Just like grown folks use to tell me when i was younger if they can't define it then you don't need to be saying it. That fixed him.:cool: A quick comeback with a STERN APPROACH, WILL shut them right on up.

Shoooooooooo I haven't been called ghetto in a minute, let me start talking loud so i can see If I still got the touch :D *LOL*

I have had my "blackness" questioned since I was quite young. My response has always been "kiss my yellow behind"!!!!

Even my husband does this to me and I don't really care, because I am quite confident of my identity. I'm quite confident with myself and really am very happy that I am able to relate and communicate with other races. My husband really started taking it to another level last year when I found my birth mother and found out that she is "white". He was like "oh, I always knew you really are a white girl". Like I said "kiss my behind". I have no need to explain myself.

My husband even likes to take it further and say that I not only "Act White", but he says I'm also "Bougie". Whatever! Keep testing my patience and we'll see just how "ghetto" I can get!

Re: Re: Your "Blackness" Questioned?????
 

I have seen the shock on vendors' faces when they meet me. Many people do not realize how young I am or that I am black until they meet me.

I have been on both sides of this discussion. I will be more aware of how I respond to others whose choices are not what I consider to be "black".

Re: Re: Your "Blackness" Questioned?????
 

I can TOTALLY relate to this!! A few months ago when I was looking for another job, over the phone the interviewer would say nice things and go on about how much they loved my resume, yada, yada, yada.......

And then once they met me face-to-face, they would just look dumbfounded as if they were thinking "was that HER on the phone? How did she slip pass me?" *lol*

Re: Re: Re: Your "Blackness" Questioned?????
 

Every time I go to visit my father's side of the family I get bombarded with, "Oh you think you are better than us," or "You think you are a white girl." :eek: ?!?!! Do I not wake up every morning and see my brown skin? Let me know how I can "think" I'm a white girl. It always irks me that those remarks come from my family. They always have something to say about me yet when the time comes to reap the fruits of my being who I am (i.e. my GREAT job) they are always there asking for something (hook me up with a position, let me borrow a few (hundred :eek: ) dollars, cosign this car for me). :rolleyes:

How many times have I had that happen? I can't count the number on my fingers, thats for sure. I get a little trip out of how the interviewers behave during the interview. You can sometimes tell they are EXTREMELY uncomfortable in the situation. :)

Thank God it's not just me...
 

that had these sort of issues when I was growing up. I was always told I talked white because I spoke proper english and I ate like a white person because I used a knife AND fork! And because I chose to attend a predominantly white university (THAT'S A WHOLE 'NOTHER STORY). And the phone thing...E'rebody thinks I'm white over the phone. And me use slang? Someone asked me did I spend the weekend in the projects because I said "what's up" instead of "how are you doing?" Do people not realize that my dark chocolate skin is the first and last thing I see everyday? Don't hate on me just because I decided to take my potential and gifts to another level. Get to know me first......then I give you full permission to hate.

:D

I saw the Girlfriends episode and I, too am glad that the show finally shed the light on this topic that has been circled around for so long. A white woman to tell me I'm not black enough? That was a trip

Well, my sister (biological) had a similar experience as shown on "Girlfriends." A co-worker of hers whom she's fallen out with once told her: "There's nothing Black about your family."

WTF? :mad: :mad: My sister cracked back on her big time. And Ms. Afro Political Correctness Police deserved it -- ignorant binch.

BTW, my sister is in her early 50s and is a no-nonsense woman.:p

Re: Re: Re: Your "Blackness" Questioned?????
 

I remember one time my boyfriend had spoken with someone over the phone in regards to an add in the paper. (He was very professional). However, the woman over the phone told him that the position was filled, so he stated that that was strange because the add had just appeared. She proceeded to tell him that he must be mistaken because there was nothing available.

So here I go......I call up and ask the same question he did less than 2 minutes later. She begins to ask me when was I available to meet with her and that she was willing to accomodate me/my schedule and gave me the "rundown" on the
job. Needless to say that I wasn't interested and I was certainly mad :mad: :mad: Maybe they didn't want a man for the job, I don't know.....but this has happened in various phone coverstations quite frequently.

So now, for certain things he makes me call.

:rolleyes:The Isms of society:rolleyes:

Ladies, I hope you dont mind me posting in your forum, but I would like to respond to this.
I have been questioned about my blackness since I was in elementary school. Its ranged from being a straight A student, speaking properly to the race of my friends. It especially hurst when your immediate family is in one the "fun". And of course it didnt help that I joined a historically white GLO. I went where i felt the most comfortable, and my chpater happened to be diverse in race ( on a side not I would have joined AKA, but they werent on campus during my years. I appreciate your org tremendously b/c it gave me a scholarship through my City's Urban League :D).
Being black is part of my life and I have never denied that. Its a very important thing. But I am more about personality and being a human being more than anything else. And its ppl like the ones you all have talked about that make me mad and I want to be like its ppl like YOU who are keeping us from accomplishing more things and holding yourself back.

Well it seems like damn near everybody has had this experience.

Our society really needs to rethink what we mean when we say black. Black is a concept that is almost impossible to define because we are all so diverse. It doen't mean skin color because I know "black" people who are lighter than many whites. It can't mean facial features cause umm.. have you ever seen Iman? There are PLENTY of sisters out there that look just like that. It can't be economics, or speech, or political affiliation.

So what is it?

I guess I am still trying to figure that out within myself. Maybe it is simply acknowledgement- like you can't force black on anybody, even if they are as dark as midnight. Maybe it's about feeling that there is an OUR history and an OUR people, no matter what or who you think they are.

Hmm.

It is like the story of my life
 

I have been questioned about my Blackness since I was small. Being "light, bright and damn near white" has been fair game for attack my whole life. People assume things about my family background, about my attitude about what I must think about them. My brother, who is more brown and I used to regularly get asked if one of us was adopted.

Then to compound matters, I have two professional Black parents, lived in a middle class neighborhood, went to a predominantly white prep school and can speak the King's English. It was very difficult when I was young. I looked "white". I talked "white". I had white friends, went to a white school. I was smart and acted "white". I was accused of trying to "pass" :eek: People are ri-damn-diculous.

I have never and never would deny my background or ancestry. I am a very outspoken, successful, proud BLACK woman. People come up with these ridiculous definitions of Blackness. They cannot see, as another poster put it, that they spew the same crap as the racists running around the country. They buy into the stereotypes and decide to wear bad habits, behavior, grammar, lack of education and home training as a badge of honor.

I have never and never would deny my background or ancestry. I am a very outspoken, successful, proud BLACK woman. People come up with these ridiculous definitions of Blackness. They cannot see, as another poster put it, that they spew the same crap as the racists running around the country. They buy into the stereotypes and decide to wear bad habits, behavior, grammar, lack of education and home training as a badge of honor. Not realizing they are giving the KKK and the rest EXACTLY what they want. In fact they are saving them the work of us oppressing us by convincing us to oppress ourselves

Defining "Blackness" is becoming increasingly more difficult because the range of our experiences as individuals have increases exponentially in a relatively short period. My friends and I have pondered how to best raise a child with a sense of "Blackness" when a great deal of their acculteration will be in white schools and white neighborhoods. How does one give a sense of something that cannot be defined.

It can't be defined because "Blackness" is innate. It is something that has to be lived and experienced. There were five Black students in my graduating class in high school, but when people ask me how many, I usually say "3" because the other two were racially "Black" but not culturally "Black". "What is that?" you say. I don't know. I just know that the other two never felt comfortable around us. Never spoke to us. Usually avoided us. Anything that would have been pertinent to a Black person never seemed to matter to them. It wasn't about speech patterns, complexion, or superficial things.

They didn't live in Black neighborhoods, have Black friends, go to Black churches, eat "Black foods" or otherwise live the "Black Experience", they didn't even associate with each other, yet racially, they were Black. They couldn't tell you what Kwanzaa was, nor did they care. Harlem Renaissance? Join school NAACP chapter? Sit with another Black person at lunch?

Is there a universal Black Experience or Culture anymore? Not with this second generation of intergration. Some people don't want to be Black and that's their perogative.

"Blackness" can't be defined, but you know it when you see it

Great response.

I have had a very similar experience. There were three black people in my graduating class, or four depending on how you count.

The problem is that more and more, people do not know it when they see it- in great part because of the increase in diversity within our community. This is widening the ever-increasing gap in the haves and have nots. One of the strengths of the black community that came out of past oppression was our lack of concrete economic boundaries.

In the past, because of segregation black neighborhoods were very different. You were just as likely to have the doctor and the town ditch-digger or maid in the same neighborhood because there wasn't anyplace for them to go. Now that they can, the black professionals have moved out and that has had a great effect on the black poor. They do NOT live the life or even have any inkling of the opportunities that can be open to the black middle class (in terms of schools, scholarships and employment opportunities). The economic divide in our communities is increasing greatly because of this - that is why you get this idea that black=ghetto, or that black=bougie or whatever a given concept is.

The only way we can defeat that is through community sercvice and a willingness to acknowledge a blck identity, something fewer black people do because frankly, fewer people have to. You can choose to ignore that you are black. IT is an act of pure blindness and COMPLETE abandoning of your community, but it can be done and more and more is done.

A wonderful article that appeared in the LA Weekly about four years ago touched on some of the points that my Soror makes. In particular, it mentioned that the departure of middle-class blacks from South and South-Central Los Angeles has taken out social infrastructure that can't be replaced.

I believe in open housing laws. But it's still not particularly cool when neighborhoods lose families with one or two employed, tax-paying adults.

It's also good to reiterate that the economic divide is a big portion of what causes these "blackness" arguments.

BLACKNESS BEING QUESTIONED
 

After my first year of college, I began to hang around people that showed me that they were trying to make a positive difference in their lives and for their community. It was a decision that they made that would better themselves and their future. There will always be someone that will look down on you for the things that you do or say (ie, flinging your hair or buying expensive items) Only you know your true self! Brush the haters off and move on. They are not worth thw worry or the satisfaction of getting to you. ;)

TTT/NY Times article
 

A discussion on CC, of all places, led me to post this article about young Black kids who attend prep schools having their blackness questioned.
January 4, 2004
A City Upbringing, Prep Schools, and Students Now in Between
By SETH KUGEL

Not long after 14-year-old Chris Oyathelemi of the Bronx arrived at the Brooks School in North Andover, Mass., in the early fall, a classmate turned him on to the Beatles. So a Beatles disc was spinning in his CD player when he went out to meet old friends — hip-hop fans — in Harlem during a break from the preparatory school.

When he told them what he was listening to, they started laughing. " `Oh, you're a white boy,' they said, `you listen to rock,' " said Chris, whose father is Nigerian and mother African-American.

Janelle Fouché, a 13-year-old freshman at Choate Rosemary Hall in Wallingford, Conn., tried goat cheese for the first time while making pizza at her English teacher's house this fall. Then she made the mistake of defending it at a Christmas gathering at her mother's Brooklyn apartment. Her older brother Daniel, a student at Bishop Loughlin High School, was disgusted. But Janelle stood her ground. "Goat cheese is mad good," she told him.

The tiny percentage of ninth graders from poor and working-class New York families who head off each fall to boarding schools face some predictable challenges: academic stress, insomnia induced by chirping crickets, total strangers waving hello with abandon. But the travails of coming home for their first Christmas vacation, which for most ends this weekend, can also be trying.

For many, it is the beginning of an identity-shaping process in which they decide, consciously or subconsciously, which aspects of their New York City upbringing to hold on to, and which to shed.

High on the list of endangered tastes: urban fashion. In December, Xenia Zayas, 14, came home from Choate to her Dominican family in Corona, Queens, with far too many school-approved outfits in her suitcase and not nearly enough casual wear. Xenia likes the dress code at school, but her pink collared shirt with khakis elicited heckling from her city friends.

So did her formal enunciation of English words, and her tendency to want to translate English and Spanish into French, which she studied for the first time this fall.

And though she got used to the crickets chirpping at night outside her dorm window, Xenia has been having problems falling asleep in her family's home. The culprit: late-night Dominican guitar music on the stereo. "I'm like, What are they doing in my house?" she said. "It's not time for bachata."

Of course, public school students from poor neighborhoods who win scholarships to some of the best schools in the country are somewhat different from their peers to begin with. Those who make it into schools like Phillips Academy or Choate have nearly all gone through programs to prepare them for the world outside the New York City Department of Education.

Janelle and Xenia were admitted to a selective program run by the nonprofit group Prep for Prep, which offers a 14-month course for qualifying students starting the summer before eighth grade. Chris went through A Better Chance, another nonprofit preparatory program. And Bintou Ojomo, 14, who attends Phillips Academy in Andover, Mass., went to KIPP Academy, a Bronx charter school whose students have won millions of dollars in private-school scholarships.

For some students returning home to New York during breaks, just a walk through familiar neighborhoods can spur introspection. Chris, the Brooks student, noticed the change while walking around Harlem.

"Not in the environment around me, the loud kids and fighting," Chris said, "but I noticed a difference in myself, the way I reacted. When I lived in Harlem, I used to watch fights, or girls yelling, and now when I see it, I just mind my business and keep walking. That's not important to me anymore."

[B]The toughest, most ubiquitous issues are those of race and class. Some of the students come from communities where they had few or no white classmates. That is not as big a deal to the prep school attendees themselves, who said that for the most part, they had been well prepared for the change and felt welcomed at school. But to their friends back home, prep school students are still more abstraction than reality, they say, and the comments can be blunt.

Chris, who said he was getting used to being called a white boy, had one friend ask: "So, you're eating rich food? You're eating caviar now?"

He brushes it off. "I guess it's because they haven't seen a lot of white kids," he said. "I don't say it out loud, I just think to myself, I'm looking for something better in my life instead of staying around the same old people. I'm leaving my old lifestyle behind and I'm sort of changing and maturing into the person I'm going to be."[B]

Janelle, the Choate student from Brooklyn, said that while still at school, she received a message on the computer from a city friend asking, in utter seriousness, "Did anybody buy you a car yet?" That kind of comment led her to avoid her friends from home when she got back. "I haven't seen a lot of them yet," she said after the first week of vacation, "because they're acting negative."

Leaving city life behind has its challenges, too. Bintou, who lives with her mother in the Bronx, said her adjustment to Phillips Academy — one of the nation's top schools — and to Andover was going well.

The mile-plus walk to the nearest fast food store (McDonald's) is an issue, as is the lack of public transportation and the pitch-black streets at night. (She keeps her computer screen saver on, a poor substitute for the lights of East 161st Street, but better than nothing, she said.) She has also faced the occasional questions from peers: "Have you ever been in a shootout?" or "Have you seen anybody get stabbed?" But the difficult times are the exceptions, she said, and she calls her dorm a family.

As they do with Chris and Janelle, some comments from friends back home surprise Bintou. One called and said: "I can't imagine what it would be like to go to school with white people. I'd be scared."

But for now, at least, these students' ties to their neighborhoods remain strong, even as they live most of the year in small New England towns. Being away from the Bronx, Bintou said, has made her appreciate it.

"In Wallingford, you can't go to the corner store to get chips," she said. "You can't hang outside with your friends until 10 p.m.; you can't go anywhere you want. You don't realize how good something is until you don't have it anymore."

This was and is still me. I still get comments on how I speak, how I talk, etc. My oldest friend is white, she and I have been friends since we were 11. We both like rock music. I cant TELL you how many times I was teased for liking Motley Crue in High School. *sigh* It was heartbreaking b/c the people doing the teasing were all black. So I only talked to White people b/c they were the ones NOT laughing at me. Funny, once I got tired of it, and told one of the girls laughing to Shut the F up and get out of my business, every one who was laughing at me, stopped. These same people are nowhere near my level of success now, and i just laugh when I see/ hear about them.

I will not apologize for my speech, musical taste, nor anything else that makes me who I am. If you dont like it, turn around, KMA, and go on about your day.

Lets not even discuss family..:mad:

Ain't that the truth, my Triad Sistah! Have I been questioned about my blackness? If I had a dollar for everytime I was, I would be rolling in dough! :rolleyes:

And hell yeah it hurts when it is members of your own family. :( A damn shame!

The thing is, I know more about OUR history and OUR heritage than these sorry no account folx who have the NERVE to question me! :rolleyes:

The crabs in a basket BS mentality has got to go. It is attitudes like this that TRY to keep us down. Hell with attitudes like that, we don't have to worry about "the man" :rolleyes: keeping us down...we are doing a pretty good job on our own!

Great topic

While I have had people tell me that I "talk white" or act like a white girl because I didn't go to my neighborhood school or because I was the only black at my elementary school in the gifted program I choose to focus on those people who are secure in themselves and saw education and articulation as something to aspire to.

I made the decision to "rebel" in junior high and go to my neighborhood school (it was called Martin Luther King, you figure out the demographics! LOL) instead of the school that most of my elementary school classmates attended. I remember reading aloud one day and this guy in my class (who was in the same grade, but about 3 -4 years older) who was called "Ju-baby" (don't ask why) said "D@m! She shole can read good! How you learn to read like that? Read something again!" I was so scared I just started reading! LOL HE would even tell other girls to "leave that smart girl alone." I've always wondered what happened to him...

I have an aunt that when I started my first job out of college who would tell people about my "big office" (I had a cube) and how she didn't know what I did, but I was "in charge of a whole lotta white folks!" (I was only in charge of my self, and when I did become a supervisor I supervised 3 people--but they were all white!) LOL I have relatives to this day who will call me about legal matters, medical issues, etc. and assume that because I went to college I should know all of this stuff! Heaven forbid that I do know a little bit, they just beam and talk about how smart I am. My mother, who was the first in her family to go to college, is to everyone "the schoolteacher." As in "ask Virginia.. You know she's a school teacher."

I think that when somefolks say things like "you talk black" it is a mixure of regret (wishing they had the opportunities you did) and awe that is expressed in a negative way. Unfortunately we don't always know how to complement each other.

I also think part of the "black experience", if you will, is teasing. Look at the "Dozens" for example. If someone cracked on you about your taste in music, clothes, etc, you had to have a comeback to them whether their teasing was based on how "white" something is or just that it was plain ol' funny looking.