Journal

race

Last night I heard Saul Williams speak at my school, and he was f***ing incredible. I had already been thinking about racism and race in general a lot lately, and realizing how little I understand about it. I'm white and I come from a rich, homogenous suburb. I don't have to think about race if I don't want to, but not thinking about it is inherently racist, and I desire to be not only "not racist," but antiracist. My understanding of race is slight. I do not have to think about such a basic part of myself that I cannot control when I walk into a room. People liken the gay rights movement to the civil rights movement of the 60s, but being a person who is gay and who knows what it feels like I can say that I see harsh differences between racism and homophobia, although they are both, unquestionably, bedrocks of US society. When I walk into a classroom, I don't have to worry about people thinking about my whiteness; even though only about 18% of the world is white, the US sees "white" as default, white is not a race, white is not multifaceted or damning or hard to look at or deserving of praise or hatred or misunderstanding. White simply is. And being gay is hidden whereas being black is obvious, but I could announce my gayness, my deviation from our culture's gender norms, upon entry to each room I enter for the rest of my life--and it would still be utterly different from walking into a room and having my blackness visible. While I could announce "I'm gay. I like chicks" to each new face I encounter throughout my life, a black person would be misunderstood when offering their blackness on a plate. "I'm black. My ancestors were (or I am) from Africa. You can see it in my face and my hands, but rather than let you avoid it or feel uncomfortable or edge around my blackness, I'm coming out of the closet." I want to see whiteness as people see blackness, not with negative or positive connotations but as something that simply is. Saul said that "the only thing racial identity breeds is schizophrenia"--I am not a white, but I am a Person (who is white). But in the same way, "the blacks" are People (who are black). I want my whiteness to be visible, and I want People (who are white) to stop hiding from People (who are black).


-Rosie