Obama isn't black enough...

[headscratcher4]

Ok, so there is some sort of media made-up controversy circulating around attempting to suggest that Obama won't necessarilly appeal to black Americans because he didn't experience the Afro-American experience. In other words, white mother and affrican immigrant father preclude him from understanding 400 years of oppression herritage, etc.

Now, what gets me isn't the argument. I don't really care about it. But, I saw a woman...an editor of the on-line Magazine Salon ... essentially making this argument, straight faced on the Colbert Report (he, on the other hand, was having a hoot with it all). Anyway, she called Obama and African African American. That's about the point I threw the TV out the window. African African American...did she here herself? Did she have any concept of how stupid that sounded.

African African American.

Rant done.

 

[hgc]

I saw that, and actually I do think she knew it sounds absurd. She was trying to make some point about black American cultural heritage - something that binds them together is their shared history (west African slave trade bringing their ancestors to America, and all that followed). It is undisputed that Obama does not flow from that heritage. I was not upset or offended by that claim. It makes perfect sense.

What I think is going on here is that some black Americans may feel that their moment in the sun, if Obama is elected, is illusionary. It doesn't vindicate their rise from slavery to full participation in America to have Obama elected, because he didn't come from that tradition. As an outsider, I think they're mistaken. First, there's the racial angle, strictly speaking. Obama may not be one of them by "black" heritage, but he sure is one of them by appearance and being African. Furthermore, he's spent his adult life deeply embedded in their mileau as a community organizer and activist.

The masses of white voters who may elect Obama president will be little aware of the distinction, and if it happens, that says a lot about where the black American community has come.

 

[PogoPedant]

Can I be a European European Scandinavian Sami Indian? Since I have a hint of Romani blood from way back in the family, but I'm mostly vanilla with a twist of indigenous.

 

[Darth Rotor]

In other words, white mother and affrican immigrant father preclude him from understanding 400 years of oppression herritage, etc.

Now, what gets me isn't the argument. I don't really care about it. But, I saw a woman...an editor of the on-line Magazine Salon ... essentially making this argument, straight faced on the Colbert Report (he, on the other hand, was having a hoot with it all). Anyway, she called Obama and African African American. That's about the point I threw the TV out the window. African African American...did she here herself? Did she have any concept of how stupid that sounded.

African African American.

Rant done.

In the 60's and 70's, Huey Newton used to decry "boot lickin' Uncle Toms." Being called a "Tom" was a perjorative when a Black Panther, or any activist plugging away for the Black cause, uttered it. To some, a Tom is any black to succeeds within the system, rather than remaining a true believer in the need for revolution from outside of the system. I had hoped such sentiments were waning, but maybe my hopes are ill founded.

Colin Powell was harshly criticized among some Black political leadership, during the mid 1990's, when there was some question as to his running for the GOP in 1996. He wisely declined. The perjoratives of "house n!gg3r" and "high yellow" surfaced now and again.

An interesting comment on the matter here.

Two guys forced into a picture together​

Yet Obama’s charm and eloquence have not wooed the old guard.

“They are basically jealous,” said a Democratic strategist who has not yet decided which candidate he intends to support. “They’ve been toiling in the trenches for decades, and along comes this son of a Kenyan farmer and suddenly he’s measuring the drapes in the Oval Office.”

Sharpton, 52, is widely considered to have no better chance of winning the Democratic nomination than in 2004, when he never amassed more than a few percentage points in the polls but still made a national impact with his barnstorming performances in the televised primary debates.

When asked about Obama’s likely candidacy, the preacher, renowned for outrageous self-publicising antics, shrugged: “Right now we’re hearing a lot of media razzle-dazzle. I’m not hearing a lot of meat, or a lot of content. I think when the meat hits the fire, we’ll find out if it’s just fat, or if there’s some real meat there.”

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/article1292678.ece

Hilliard brought in outsiders to campaign for him -- from New York. Like the Rev. Al Sharpton, who said, "Everybody that's our color is not our kind. Everybody that's our skinfolk is not our kinfolk."

http://archives.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLITICS/07/01/pol.play.israel/index.html
(The ref is to the Hilliard-Davis race of 2002)
[URL="http://www.realcities.com/mld...urce=rss&channel=krwashington_william_douglas"]Here is a more recent ref.[/URL]

Sharpton urges blacks to vote issues, not skin color
'JUST BECAUSE YOU'RE OUR COLOR DOESN'T MAKE YOU OUR KIND'
By William Douglas
MCCLATCHY NEWSPAPERS

HAMPTON, Va. - African-American voters should judge Sen. Barack Obama and other 2008 presidential candidates on how they will handle issues affecting the African-American community and not on race, gender or ethnicity. That was the message of several key speakers yesterday at the annual State of the Black Union symposium. The two-day conference offered an examination of the progress the African-American community has made in this country and the problems still confronting it.

"I think the identity politics should not be based on race," said the Rev. Al Sharpton, a 2004 presidential candidate. "It should be based on agenda and policy -- who stands for our best interests. We cannot put our people's aspirations on hold for anybody's career, black or white."

As the conversation at yesterday's session shifted from health care to education to politics, it quickly went to Obama, who kicked off his presidential candidacy yesterday in Springfield, Ill. Among the panelists were two African-Americans who have run for president, Sharpton and the Rev. Jesse Jackson. Sharpton strongly urged the nearly 10,000 people who filled Hampton University's Convocation Center not to select a candidate next year just because they want to see an African-American or a woman or a Hispanic in the White House for the first time.

Without naming Obama, Sharpton added that "just because you're our color doesn't make you our kind." He pointed to President Bush's secretaries of State, Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powell, as examples of African-Americans he said haven't necessarily worked in the interest of the African-American community.

There was more, but this is enough.

Parochialism for fifty, Alex.

DR

 

[headscratcher4]

I this would make native Americans American Americans?

 

[bigred]

Did she have any concept of how stupid that sounded.

No stupider than "African American" in the first place, IMO. Hell I know dark-skinned people from Central America who live here and call themselves that, railing about "the man" and "reparations" (ad nauseum).

Really the whole "race thing" in this country has been laced - no, in fact saturated, if not practically defined - by stupidity from the get-go, and hasn't let up one bit. It just manifests itself in different ways (although the hypocrisy has grown exponentially). With such an emotional issue I can see that to an extent, but not this farcical extreme.

 

[Mephisto]

I think it's ironic that a racial group besieged by negative racial labels would stoop to using yet another label for an African born American. While calling Obama an African-African-American isn't quite like calling him an Uncle Tom, it does make a distinction with a negative connotation that can only hurt Obama's chances with Black voters.

Isn't politics a hilarious conglomeration of idiots? On one hand, Democrats are saying he doesn't have enough experience as a politician, on the other hand African-Americans are saying he doesn't have enough experience as a Black man because he's an American-African.

On the third hand )), Conservatives are saying they're "scared" of Obama in spite of their support of a President who has gotten us into a war without end, has ignored nuclear proliferation treaties, presided over the worst terrorist attack on the U.S., engaged in blatant cronyism, presided over major security violations during time of war, and who gets his guidance from, God . . .

And this is JUST the beginning!

 

[Mephisto]

I this would make native Americans American Americans?

Or simply Washington Redskins?

 

[Luke T.]

Obama is an African African American. At least going by the church which he attends.

We are an African people, and remain "true to our native land," the mother continent, the cradle of civilization.

A congregation with a non-negotiable COMMITMENT TO AFRICA.

Their caps, not mine.

http://www.tucc.org/about.htm

Not exactly the sort of thing that you want in a President of this country.

 

[Tricky]

Ok, so there is some sort of media made-up controversy circulating around attempting to suggest that Obama won't necessarilly appeal to black Americans because he didn't experience the Afro-American experience. In other words, white mother and affrican immigrant father preclude him from understanding 400 years of oppression herritage, etc.

Now, what gets me isn't the argument. I don't really care about it. But, I saw a woman...an editor of the on-line Magazine Salon ... essentially making this argument, straight faced on the Colbert Report (he, on the other hand, was having a hoot with it all). Anyway, she called Obama and African African American. That's about the point I threw the TV out the window. African African American...did she hear herself? Did she have any concept of how stupid that sounded.

African African American.

Rant done.

Yeah, I mentioned this in another thread. It was sad. Dickerson was probably the most humorless guest Colbert has ever had, and surely she realizes Colbert is a liberal playing a right winger. He was playing her like a fiddle. She makes it sound like being Black is a kind of exclusive group like the DAR (another group whose cliquishness I have no use for). How dare this Johnny-come-lately try to pretend he's suffered from racism at the hands of others too, I mean apart from Joe Biden.

And though she wouldn't come out and say it, it sounded strongly like she was calling him an Uncle Tom or an Oreo or something. She must have known that she was making him less appealing to Black voters. It was the closest thing I've ever heard to a real racist screed on Colbert, even from conservative guests. What a piece of work Debra Dickerson is.

 

[Mephisto]

Not exactly the sort of thing that you want in a President of this country.

Yeah, it's MUCH better to have a President whose administration supports torture, can tell whether a woman who has been in a persistent vegetative state for years is brain-dead, scoffs at science and the theory of evolution, ignores the environment, twiddles their thumbs during an impending storm that kills thousands in a major U.S. city . . .

 

[Luke T.]

Whites aren't the only ones who have a problem with Obama's race:

http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwas...urce=rss&channel=krwashington_william_douglas

Without naming Obama, Sharpton added that "just because you're our color doesn't make you our kind." He pointed to President Bush's secretaries of state, Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powell, as examples of African-Americans he said haven't necessarily worked in the interest of the African-American community.


Sharpton also chided Obama for making his presidential announcement in Springfield rather than before the predominantly African-American audience at Hampton, and said the Illinois senator needs to declare "what's his embrace of our agenda."

 

[headscratcher4]

Obama is an African African American. At least going by the church which he attends.





Their caps, not mine.

http://www.tucc.org/about.htm

Not exactly the sort of thing that you want in a President of this country.

As opposed to the secrete loyalty to Skull & Bones and Texas?

 

[bigred]

Obama is an African African American. At least going by the church which he attends.

Key words: the CHURCH he attends....ie not his denomination, which is not a "black" denomination (or specific to any ethnicity/color).

lol @ "We are a congregation which is Unashamedly Black" - ah the Great American Double-Standard, alive and well :thumbup: Nobody will blink an eye at that, but just let some church say "We are a congregation which is Unashamedly White" and watch the fur fly.

PS if he gets nominated, you better believe somewhere in the order of oh 95-99% of all blacks will vote for him...."forgiving" that he's part white (heck in this country, partly black means black anyway).

 

[Luke T.]

Yeah, it's MUCH better to have a President whose administration supports torture, can tell whether a woman who has been in a persistent vegetative state for years is brain-dead, scoffs at science and the theory of evolution, ignores the environment, twiddles their thumbs during an impending storm that kills thousands in a major U.S. city . . .

And this has what to do with the topic?

 

[bigred]

Sharpton added

You lost me at hello.

 

[bigred]

And this has what to do with the topic?

Been away from JREF for awhile have ya?

 

[Darth Rotor]

As opposed to the secrete loyalty to Skull & Bones and Texas?

Do you have a problem with a man being loyal to a state he was the governor of? If so, what is it?

I saw your winky smilie, but I stand by my question.

DR

 

[Luke T.]

Yeah, I mentioned this in another thread. It was sad. Dickerson was probably the most humorless guest Colbert has ever had, and surely she realizes Colbert is a liberal playing a right winger. He was playing her like a fiddle. She makes it sound like being Black is a kind of exclusive group like the DAR (another group whose cliquishness I have no use for). How dare this Johnny-come-lately try to pretend he's suffered from racism at the hands of others too, I mean apart from Joe Biden.

Stanley Crouch, black columnist:

What Obama isn't: black like me

So when black Americans refer to Obama as "one of us," I do not know what they are talking about. In his new book, "The Audacity of Hope," Obama makes it clear that, while he has experienced some light versions of typical racial stereotypes, he cannot claim those problems as his own - nor has he lived the life of a black American.

 

[Mephisto]

And this has what to do with the topic?

Even if he were a member of the Flying Spaghetti Church what could he possibly do that would be worse?