So an African immigrant sitting at a lunch counter in Mississippi circa 1955 would have been treated as “exotic, interesting and equal”?
Sure. While we’re at it, let’s discuss terms on a bridge spanning the East River.
On preview: monstro, it’s a cute anecdote, but do you really think Ms. Davis’ experience would have been commonplace?
" Right now, in this country, if you and I, 22 million African-Americans – that’s what we are – Africans who are in America. You’re nothing but Africans. Nothing but Africans. In fact, you’d get farther calling yourself African instead of Negro. Africans don’t catch hell. You’re the only one catching hell. They don’t have to pass civil-rights bills for Africans. An African can go anywhere he wants right now. All you’ve got to do is tie your head up. That’s right, go anywhere you want. Just stop being a Negro. Change your name to Hoogagagooba. That’ll show you how silly the white man is. You’re dealing with a silly man. A friend of mine who’s very dark put a turban on his head and went into a restaurant in Atlanta before they called themselves desegregated. He went into a white restaurant, he sat down, they served him, and he said, "What would happen if a Negro came in here? And there he’s sitting, black as night, but because he had his head wrapped up the waitress looked back at him and says, “Why, there wouldn’t no nigger dare come in here.”
Dewey, why are you so bent on winning a damn argument all of the time? It’s really not that hard to understand how black Americans and African immigrants have experienced totally different things. They have totally different cultures and cultural perspectives about this country and what it means to be an American. Like many immigrants, the Africans who come over here are quite wealthy and educated. Already that makes them “different”.
I have no idea how commonplace Angela Davis’s experience is. I do know that Americans in general hold different views towards “slave descendents” and recent African immigrants. On this very board people have pointed to the success of the latter over the former. On this very board I have heard people laud the latter for their work ethic and denounce the former for their laziness. In my personal life, I have heard people praise one group at the expense of the other.
From a distance, all blacks are lumped together. Diallo and Zongo were Africans but the bullets fired at them identified them as “black”. But the history of a people does not begin when they land in this country. It spans generations. This is what DtC and I mean when we say “Black Americans and African immigrants have experienced different things”. Why would anyone have a problem accepting this?
It may be a “different experience”, but their mistreatment based on the color of their skin is the same. Someone who hates “blacks” doesn’t give a flying rats ass where they’re from if all he sees is the color of his skin.
And I also think your definition of “African-American means decendant of slaves” is crap as well. Why? Because of all the times people get shit everytime they used the term black and someone shouts “African-American!” In the general use, the latter has replaced the former, and again, it really has nothing more to do with anything but the color of their skin. “Heritage” is a matter of personal preference, for the most part. Not every black person here in America celebrates Kwanza; not every one of them takes time to “celebrate their African roots;” and not all of them give a god damn what they’re called. It is true that those who can track their heritage back to slaves brought over have developed a certain culture that is theirs, but the way you talk about it makes it sound a bit like modern day Wicca. It’s something that’s a mishmash of various African cultures and post-slave tradition created to form a new culture. Hmmm…imagine that, a culture living here in the states creating their own, separate culture over time…kinda like those of European decent, huh?
Being an American, I used to think there was really no such thing as “American culture.” I used to think we were just a mixture of various other cultures and not really one specific one of our own. I was wrong. American culture is a mixture of a number of various cultures that, over time, has become something of it’s own. Is it wrong for Americans to celebrate that? I don’t think so. And I don’t think there’s anything wrong with white kids wanting to learn more and celebrate the cultures that make up their many mutt breeds.
What’s wrong with an organization being developed so that its members can look at their English/Irish/Russian/German/Yugoslavian/Spanish/any other European heritage, learn about it, learn of its contributions to the world (or specifically America) and how that heritage helped shape their own family and personal identity?
To say white people don’t have the right to create such an organization because they’re white and “have no culture” is a racist statement, and it doesn’t matter if you’re white and you say it, you’re still being a racist. Racism is any discrimination against another based on their race, it’s got nothing to do with a sense of “superiority”, as you put it.
Of course, I’m giving this girl the benefit of the doubt and guessing that she just worded herself poorly. Perhaps the sign in sheet was a simple note asking who would support a club, and once it was determined she could start one, she would have named it more properly (Euro-American Culture Club or whatever). I could be wrong, but I don’t assume the worst of every white person I meet.
Your final sentence does not appear to be supported, and would appear to be erroneous. The term “Foreign Born of African origin” would suggest that the person himself was born in another country - not that he descended from people born in another country. So that there are 700,000 or so actual immigrants from African countries. The number of people descended of post-1865 African immigrants (including any children of current “Foreign Born of African origin” people) could be assumed to be a whole lot higher.
monstro:
I don’t believe I ever claimed that such differing experiences did not exist. My argument has been limited to two things:
The term “African American” and “black” are commonly understood as racial designators, without regard to ancestry; and
That Diogenes overstates things when he says immigrants were treated as “exotic, interesting and equal.” Somehow I doubt Bull Conner would have been giving out dinner invitations to African immigrants.
And, in fact, I agree that there is a large performance difference between relatively-recent black immigrants and those with longer roots in this country. I just don’t think there’s a huge difference between the way the two groups are treated by those outside of their respective communities. Hell, outside of an accent (which would disappear within a generation or two), I’d have no way of telling if a given black person’s ancestors worked a southern plantation or came from Africa. I suspect that’s true of most whites, be they racists or not. I think the explanation for that performance difference must thus lie elsewhere.
How they’re treated is not the only issue. You’re ignoring the cultural trauma which is unique to slave descendants and how that affects the performance differences you refer to.
And your point is what, exactly?
(Although it’s pretty interesting that Jewish folks, who know a thing or two about cultural trauma, tend to be pretty successful on our shores.)
Jewish people haven’t had their cultural identity completely taken away from them. They haven’t had their kinship systems completely destroyed for multiple generations.
I would argue that Jewish resiliance in the face of trauma is largely because they have a strong cultural identity to fall back on. It shows that cultural identity, history and traditions are a powerful resource which can allow ethnic minorities to succeed in the face of bigotry.
African slaves had those things completely stolen from them. Their languages, religions, traditions, even their ancestry completely taken away, and taken away for centuries. Don’t you think that would have an impact on a group’s ability to “succeed” within the first few generations of getting their freedom back (a “freedom” which was still grossly limited until only the last half century or so)?
Don’t underestimate the damage that is done by the multi-generational destruction of families either.
That may all be true, Dio, but having cultural heritage ain’t going to keep a black family from having a cross burned in their front lawn in good ol’ Vidor, TX. To those of which skin color really matters, black is black, and here in the states, the general concensus has been that African American = black.
The point is that a strong sense of cultural identity can better equip a group to deal with acts like that.
The point is also that the experience of slave-descendants is fundamentally different than that of recent immigrants.
There already is such an organization at her school. It’s called “the library.”
Seriously though, there’s nothing at all wrong with wanting to learn about your heritage and the various cultures that went into making America what it is. And nobody in this thread has said there is. All that’s been suggested is that calling such a group the “Caucasian Club” is a bad idea.
**
Yeah, that is an offensive statement. Good thing nobody here has that.
It’s true that she may have had the best intentions, and I certainly think the reaction against her (harrassment, threats, and so on) were way out of line. But it says right there in the article that she wanted to call it the Caucasian Club. That shows, at best, a lack of judgement.
Well, aren’t you special. :rolleyes:
You’re comparing blacks to Jews?! Jews are all over the world. They’ve been through and seen everything, and have 3,500 years worth of accumulated mores and advice to guide them through whatever. Blacks are only 300 years old and still live in the country that once enslaved them! Yet we were able to leap from slaves to billionare CEO’s, national leaders, and definers of internation pop culture in just a couple of generations (sometimes within the same generation). Don’t try to belittle blacks by making such ignorant comparisons of ridiculously unequal scales. Compared to what Austrailia has given the world (science, technology, a tough guy image towards which we can all aspire), what have you personally done? Nothing! Oh wait, you’re one person and Austrailia is an entire centuries old nation. Maybe that’s not such a good comparison.
Er, that should read “…has said that.”
What…? I guess you mean that, the unique Americaninstitution of “Black” slavery is only 300 years old…althought it’s closer to 400. And “blacks” are all of the world too, not just the states…if only we can agree what black is, of course.
Yep, and they’ve had the everlovin’ shit kicked out of them at just about everywhere they’ve tried to settle down for a little while. You think a couple of hundred years of oppression is bad? Try a few thousand. **
Blacks are only 300 years old? Think before you type, dear. **
So why are you complaining about the cultural obstacles blacks face? If what you write is true, then it would seem those obstacles are hardly insurmountable – indeed, they can be transcended “within the same generation.” **
I’m not belittling anybody. I’m just pointing out that a long-past oppression is hardly an excuse for present shortcomings.
Maybe in a lot of cases African American can be interchangeable with Black, and probably in most cases in America. But African American means someone of African descent who has spent a significant amount of time in America. Not quite right, but close enough. So if I had a neighbor who had relatives visiting from Haiti, his relatives would not be “African American” but just “African” or even “Haitian”. So African American != Black in all cases. It just happens to work out in most cases in the US, but definitely not all.
you’re still ignoring the issue of stolen cultural heritage, Dewey.
BTW, what are you suggesting is the reason for the present “shortcomings” of black Americans.
Hello! That was excactly my point! Did you read what I said? A few thousand years of EXPERIENCE with hardship and just plain existance can help people out.
Well, I didn’t really complain about that, but…
There’s more to life than monetery success. Respect is much more precious (to me at least). JauanitaTech is wealthy enough to buy a “sweet Benz”, but the car dealer selling it didn’t want her “drug dealer money”. As long as the average black person conjours on sight more negative than positive feelings in the mind of an average American (black, white, whatever), then there’s something to complain about.