Dear Black Bigot;
Let’s skip the semantics of racism for a moment and talk directly to the heart of a matter, dear Black Bigot. Your existence is a bane to some Black Bigots, but I do understand some of your musings. You see, Black Bigot, I am aware of the societal mechanisms that spurred your very existence.
They say that the English language is one of the most difficult languages in the world to master. I’ll have to take their word for it seeing as though English is the only language that I have ever learned, but I am aware that the language contains certain nuances that make it difficult to understand exactly what a speaker is trying to communicate unless you are aware of that particular nuance.
For example, if someone who was completely isolated from American culture were dropped in the middle of the hood, he or she could easily come to the conclusion that the n-word’s sole purpose is as a greeting and a term of endearment. Oh, how their brows would wrinkle in confusion with the realization that this word is actually a term of hatred and disrespect. But the Black Bigot says it is the right of the racially oppressed to express their disdain for white supremacy in any way they chose. Unlike a right wing practitioner or gun nut, your rants are seldom of any consequence to the status quo. Chirping in the distance, as the mammoth construct of white supremacy rolls forward like an invisible socio-economic glacier. It can’t be wished away, but we all hope it will melt away with time. Lots and lots of time.
The double-sided nigger/nigga debate is apparent in the dialectic of the Black Bigot in that, for some, dominion over this word is the black man’s alone. Any and all other utterances are racist in theory or practice.
If the hypothetical foreigner were Caucasian, he or she would be forced to learn the hard way that it is not their place to utter it in the midst of the hood. In fact, I know of several stories in which Asian or Euro “homies” who were allowed to chill and spend their money in dangerous locales but are stomped out by hood folk who encourage the usage of the N-word, but reserve the right to violently defend against its usage whenever his or her mood or emotions deem he should. It's actually quite funny. Funny "ha ha" and funny "boo hoo" as well.
To be certain, “stomping out white boys” was a sport around the way. The only “honorary” blacks were those womb to the tomb, since the 1st grade type white boys, but even they knew not to engage in using the n-word.
But language is only used to reflect the ideas of a particular culture. If the language seems contradictory it is only because those who are utilizing it are contradictory.
Why is this relevant, Black Bigot? Because it is in these contradictory moments that we are allowed to act a fool.
There are many different contradictory things, which are indicative of this wacky thing we call American culture that I can speak of, but none is more convoluted than the idea of reverse racism. The literal definition of racism, for like the ga-billionth time, is a social philosophy in which practitioners, be their movements blatant or subconscious, are geared toward the belief that a particular race is more deserving of a certain treatment because of the color of their skin. However, for a race to impose this construct on another they would have to have leverage to do so.
The phantom nature of the current state of racism allows for it to be ignored or discounted as a real social construct by Americans of all ethnic backgrounds. White folks are then free to deny that their current standing in the world is the result of a history where they use words like "manifest destiny" and "divine providence" to describe a history.
But you know of these things quite well, Black Bigot. You’re knowledge of the history of white supremacy is usually quite extensive. It makes you wanna holla, and throw up both your hands like Marvin Gaye.
A dark history in which the United States, and the rest of the western civilization crafted the world in their image by attempting to exterminate an indigenously population and enslave another. Free land, free labor. Well, not exactly free. There was hard work to be done, a lot of killing and plundering.
After centuries of dealing with racism in America, black people with slave ancestry in the United States have developed a sensitivity to it that ranges from; acknowledging it in a historical context while denying its impact on everyday life, to being something of a racial clairvoyant.
This extreme sensitivity to racism in all avenues of life, as well as the gut-wrenching realization that other black, brown and yellow people who have come into contact with us also believe in the white supremacist world view as it pertains to American black people, is what makes you who you are. In 1959, journalists Mike Wallace and Louis Lomax produced the television documentary The Hate That Hate Produced. In the documentary, they tried to make the point that The Nation of Islam, and the Black Nationalist movement were, in fact, hate based.
"While city officials, state agencies, white liberals, and sober-minded Negroes stand idly by, a group of Negro dissenters is taking to street-corner step ladders, church pulpits, sports arenas, and ballroom platforms across the United States, to preach a gospel of hate that would set off a federal investigation if it were preached by Southern whites,” said Wallace as he narrated the show.
Though the message has changed in its intensity since then, both the liberal and conservative media portrayal of you leaves much to be desired, Black Bigot. But I know of you. History will not approve or disapprove of you. You are the aftershock. The knee-jerk reaction. But being totally reliant upon the very society that you disdain means having to make concessions with yourselves in order to make it in a white supremacists environment, least you end up going out like Mutulu Shakur. People talk about things, but the very nature of racism means the underclass will never simply be given the tools to uplift themselves. People have to do it themselves. In the interim, the aftershocks and convulsions of a people navigating a minefield of ill intent from blacks and whites because of their skin color will manifest themselves in stares, glares and "white people" jokes.
Black Bigot, you revolutionary brothers who will reason that it is okay to say how you much hate white supremacy, but love white women. And you sister girls that still get angry when you see a black man with a white woman, are a reflection of racism it seems, but is not racist in and of itself. The reasons for your existence are indeed understood. You are the natural reaction. The chill in the bones of America caused by the weight of big, cold white supremacy. But you pose little threat to the over throw of the status quo in this country.
