If you're reading this blog
If you're a fan of my bands
If you met me in Boston
I'm probably your "black friend"
Yes, everyone asks to touch my hair. By the time most people ask they are already touching my hair. I also get "is that your real hair," "your hair is so interesting/different/unique"and "how did you get your hair to do that" as people are reaching for or already touching my hair.
Yes people have told me I'm "pretty for a black girl." I've also been told "I never considered being attracted to you because you're black" and " I didn't know black people could be as pretty as you"
Yes, I've been followed around upscale retail stores by security. The last time this happened was in a store on Newbury street, while I was wearing $500 boots and carrying a $700 leather bag. I guess I was still more threatening than a group of white teenagers with large backpacks that were roaming freely around the store at the same time.
My white friends tell me "oh Rachel, you're not really black"
This is problematic and racist, because it is meant as a compliment. They are saying "it's cool, you're one of us because you like some of the same music as us and don't talk that inner city slang. You're not being loud and obnoxious in public, and you're not selling drugs on the corner so you're more like us than them."
Here are some random race related vignettes from my life:
My (white) ex boyfriend and I used to hang out with one of my (white) female friends. No matter how affectionate we were, people would always assume he was dating my friend. Always.
The first three weeks I lived in Boston...before I knew where Roxbury was, all of the black people i ran into were driving busses, sweeping floors, or begging for money. This was a shock as I had just spent 2 years in Washington DC at Howard University (the king of HBCUs) surrounded by articulate, successful, creative black people. I looked around and thought to myself "where is everybody?"
I teach orchestra in a predominantly white town. I have about 350 students. Currently I have 5 black students (1 high school, 1 middle, 3 elementary). The community probably thinks it's diverse because of its large Asian and Middle eastern populations, but it's not really. Often, my colleagues assume that I work for the METCO program (that's the bus-the-black-kids-from-the-city-to-the-rich-white-suburbs program) because I'm black. They're surprised when I say I teach orchestra. Then they ask if I'm new to the school and i say "no I've been here for 6 years."
I sell fancy shoes to people, mostly older and richer than me. They are almost all white. People don't always ask about my life but when they do they rarely ask where I went to college. This is usually one of the first questions my (white) coworkers get.
People are surprised when I say I went to college. People are surprise when they find out I have a masters degree. People are caught off guard when I can speak with authority about fiscal issues, world news, or anything else on NPR.
I dress nicely all of the time. And mostly it's because I like to look nice, but a small part of it is the weight of representing whatever minority I happen to mean to you (queer, black, left handed, violist, whatever). It's weird knowing that I'm probably the only one like me that you're going to interact with, and I feel like I should leave a good impression.
If you're reading this, you're probably in the same liberal north-eastern bubble that I am, and racism is still your problem. Just like it's my problem. It's not an issue from 50 years ago. It is happening in subtle and tangible ways all around us right now. It is definitely happening to all of your black friends, and probably the rest of your friends too...in fact...you are probably responsible for a little bit of it.
Own it. Talk about it. Change it.
Sincerely,
Your queer, viola playing, left handed, black friend.
#alivewhileblack
thanks for sharing Rachael. I'm somewhat affected by positive discrimination, people who like my accent as it's a bit foreign and the right sort of imaginary upper class toff. I'm fairly sure my easy journey through immigration had more to do with being white, male and British(tm) than any particular quality. :-/
ReplyDeleteA very different experience.
I think your hair is pretty awesome. But of course I would never ask to touch it because that's incredibly creepy. :-/
ReplyDeleteInteresting about the people assuming who is dating who in a small group. I've noticed that whenever I hang out with one of my guy friends, people assume we're friends... except for the one guy I hang out with who is very overweight (I am overweight also). People always assume we are a couple/married (except one time, a person asked if we were brother and sister). And it's not like we're giving off some kind of weird vibe because we're not even terribly close friends and there is zero attraction between us. I think there is a widespread assumption that people can only date people who are the same "kind" of person as them, whether that is race or body type or whatever. Also creepy...
Well said. Thanks for sharing.
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ReplyDeleteOwning it. Talking about it. Changing it.
Thanks for sharing.
You have a positive perspective about life, your words have warmth and acceptance! Is the world so skewed towards white? May be because what is fair is considered white! My favourite film is still "Remember the Titans" , where I found Denzel Washington, as a wonderful actor, as much as I found Meryl Streep, as an amazing actress! I feel happy to know, good people of any color! Probably, the world will change!
ReplyDeleteThanks for writing this. It did never occur to me how many prejudices people face just because of their skin colour and how differently they're treated in eveyday life. Thank you for giving me a little insight :)
ReplyDeleteAlso I didn't realize I was being offensive when I ask to touch the hair (but I do this with white people to, I love touching hair :D). But please excuse our (white people's) fascination with this hair type: my hair just hangs down, has no volume when it's longer then shoulder-length and I can't even make proper hairdos because they just fall apart, and your hair is soft and fluffy and you can do pretty much everything with it. It's just jealousy :D
Of course it still isn't okay if you aren't asked or if you are but there's already a hand on your head! But well, this has nothing to do with the skin colour - it's a matter of decency and politeness.
And I very much agree with the Sarah above: people seem to love to think in boxes and somehow they got the idea that the differerent box-contents should not interact with each other...
got here via amanda palmer on fb. thanks for sharing this, it's an eye opener! i'll share it, and all the best to you!
ReplyDeleteHello. I don't think we have ever met, so I don't suppose you are "my" "black friend", but I do have "black friends", although I don't think of them as "black friends", but simply friends who happen to have a darker skin (and let's be frank, it's not hard to beat my oatmeal complexion).
ReplyDeleteI think I can say I have been brought up in a very race-neutral environment. I've never tried to touch someone's hair, and never assumed that a person was poor/uneducated/violent because they are POC. When my sister started dating her boyfriend (whose family is Haitian), I didn't tease her about his skin colour or assumed things about his libido or the size of his genitalia. When my mother started dating her Colombian boyfriend, I didn't ask if she was helping him get citizenship or if his children were raised in the slums. I don't think of these examples as "not-racist" credentials, just as what a normal, respectful person is supposed to act like.
I am giving these examples because I have heard and seen family members, friends and colleagues ask and do these things, not even considering that they might be disrespectful. It baffles me, and yet I am familiar with the examples you give. My personal story is exceptional when it shouldn't be. Right now, it is not my perspective that matters.
What matters is expressing how you feel, explaining and describing what you've lived through. People think racism is gone because the laws doesn't explicitly condone it. People think racism is gone because there are no more slaves in America. What a joke. I wish all the POC I knew could speak up about their experiences like you did. It is not only important, but crucial. Thank you for sharing your story, thank you for fighting, not only for yourself, but for every person who suffers from prejudice and discrimination.
Thanks for sharing your experience. By the way, I am reading this from my western Canadian liberal bubble ;)
ReplyDeleteI also got here through Amanda Palmer's fb post, so I didn'tt know you before.
ReplyDeleteBut I need to thank you. Thank you for sharing this, it is very powerful in its semplicity.
I myself being a part of the privileged white society (though i have the feeling that it works in different ways in Europe than in the US) admit that I am appalled by some things my friends say about POC or other minorities. I am lucky enough that I grew up in a very respectful environment where I was taught to respect people as human beings regardless of their origins.
I moved to another country for work and I am lucky that I have never experienced racism in ways other did.
I have always wanted to be open to other cultures and not prejudices towards others and I consider myself rather successful in that but I must admit that sometimes I catch myself thinking or saying some unconsciously discriminating things and I get very disappointed in myself.
So I recognize myself when you say "It is definitely happening to all of your black friends, and probably the rest of your friends too...in fact...you are probably responsible for a little bit of it.", and I know that being aware of prejudice (even in myself) is the first way to fight it.
It's not always possible to get into somebody's shoes and understand what they are going through, but brave posts like this surely help.
Happily, your message is also reaching moderates in the south.
ReplyDeleteI wish you WERE my friend. You sound like an awesome person. You could be a black friend if you wanted, but you'd be far more unique as my viola player fiend. As a wind player, I never did get very friendly with many string players in orchestra. As a low clarinet player, most of those were cellists due to proximity.
I tried my hand at teaching high school band. It takes a special person and I'm not it. Ah well. Kudos to you for having the strength to survive and succeed in that, and thank you for being the amazing role model to our kids it sounds like you certainly are.
I am a champion for LGBT, for racial acceptance, and grudgingly even for south paws. Even so, every reminder I could do better is welcome. Like a trainer at the gym, many of us can use that extra push to improve beyond our comfort zone. Thank you for this week's push.
I don't know you either. I saw you play with Jaggery once. Wow, nice!
ReplyDeleteYou're left-handed? I strangely can't remember whether you PLAY left-handed. Odd, because as a violinist, that's the sort of thing I generally notice.
I, as George Carlin might have put it, 'happen to be white', but I grew up in a housing project and saw LOTS of Boston-style racism. We're ever so proud of our liberal heritage, but everything you mentioned rings very true.
When we got through the sixties, it felt like things were headed in a non-racist, non-sexist, non-homophobic direction. It's time to face the fact that we only went a short way in that direction, and get back on the path.
Thanks for your wonderful, insightful, courageous post.
And for your wonderful music, too.
I reply to my own comment. YouTube answers all. Left-handed person, right-handed viola. No bass bar modification required.
DeleteThanks for this! Someone posted this because I was told today at work how I was the whitest black guy they knew, by a while male nonetheless! I took it with a grain of salt this time, because I have heard this so much in my town (Minneapolis), that i decided to school this "co-worker" and lead him to water. Whether he drink and learns from what i asked him to read, is up to him. But the issue is that many of our white counterparts, see nothing wrong with these intrusive and insulting comments, takes, and figure abandonment. Yes, we need to educate to change, but how do we curve around the systematic placement of race and gender, without seeming ignorant or racist ourselves to that same group? We don't, we let people know its not ok to say certain things, group us as if we are the Negroes behind glass, and that we refuse to tolerate ignorance based on your up bringing! Your adult life is yours, own it! Thanks again Rachael!
ReplyDeleteI think you are Amanda Palmer's "black friend"!
ReplyDeleteWow! I never knew left handed Queer Violists could be so pretty! Could you mail me some hair to touch?
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing. I have to say, as someone who grew up in the northeast (with stints in New England), and moved to San Francisco at age 17 (I'm now 34) and never looked back, I can't help but notice that there's a general preoccupation with not only race where you are, but *category* in general. None of this is said to invalidate your experience; I'm a POC (Dominican) and have definitely been 'asked if I need help' 6 different times in 15 minutes in one store, and been asked, 'what are you? you look like you're something.' (uh... human?). However, it seems like there's an old, heavy fog, like a massive, dying ghost over those old cities that keeps people more afraid than I am now used to. It's so... awkward... there. For lack of a better word.
ReplyDeleteI've become accustomed to a type of understanding that, while is still has LIGHT YEARS to go to be 'right', seems to at least *want* to be right, or try. I'm not suggesting the grass is always greener, or that you should run from it, but maybe I'm expressing that it seems to be improving faster in some places, even if still not fast enough. Thanks again for sharing your story.
It is kind of surprising how racist of a city boston is, for being the capital of such a liberal state as Massachussets.
ReplyDeleteI find it sad and shocking you have to put up with these sort of comments and behavior. I'm white, and I know racism exists in many forms, it's around me all the time in one form or another, but the amicable, almost well meaning, slant on it you write about was something I didn't expect. It's not an experience of racism that I have had or seen around me, but I'm grateful to be made aware of it, for that additional level of understanding I have gleaned from what you have written here.
ReplyDeleteI'm from the UK and the racism here, that I know, has mostly been introduced to me by my father's family. It's been introduced to me in school, where the only black girl in my class got into an argument with another boy who thought all black people should be deported back to 'where they came from,' because that's what his parents said, and she had to explain she came from the same place he did...our tiny village, that she wasn't some alien other, just a girl with darker skin. It was the first time I had ever thought of her specifically as a black person, or realized that our experiences were affected by our skin color. It was a really horrible feeling, and left a discomfort that hasn't ever gone away.
I don't want my black friends or any black person to live in a world where at seven they are having these sort of conversations, or having to write blogs like this to educate white people about how they view and interact with them, or to feel grateful because I learnt something from it. I don't want to live in that sort of world, and I think changing that takes more than being self aware, and emphatic, and avoiding being racist yourself, despite the society or people you are raised by.
ReplyDeleteNobody ever said to me that I’m pretty for a white girl. Nobody has ever told me I am pretty.
When I was pregnant people would ask me if they could touch my stomach, after they had already put their hand on my stomach.
I don’t know if I have ever been followed in a store. There are so many cameras and undercover security guards discretely watching everyone all the time.
My children are mixed, half black/white. My son has told me that people have told him he doesn’t act black. It’s too bad that media highlights the troubles that plague our central city neighborhoods and schools. For some people that is their perspective of black people.What is your perspective of people who live in Applachia or Portland or Texas?
In the 1980s, when I was in my 20s my dear friend, who was gay (he has passed away) and I would go out together. People always assumed he was my date - even though it was quite obvious to me (from his mannerisms) that he was gay.
I spent my entire adult life teaching in a large urban school district. If any of our students had gone on to teach orchestra I would have been surprised. As a matter of fact I would be surprised if any white people I know taught orchestra--because I don’t know any white people who teach orchestra.
In the late ‘60s and early ‘70s I was a hippie. I dressed like a hippie and hung around with guys who had long pony tails. While traveling and camping in Kentucky we stopped to fish. A ranger came along, asked us for our fishing license which we didn’t have. We weren’t given a ticket but were all taken to the county jail.
We all make judgements about people based on how they dress. What are your assumptions of the 40 year old white man dressed in a suit and tie carrying a leather brief case?
My cousin is married to a woman from Thailand. He shares with me his stories of racial ignorance directed at his wife---and they live in Chicago. And life goes on.
Have I experienced racial prejudice with my two biracial kids? Yes. But I am not hypersensitive to it. I know the difference between people (including good friends) who say insensitive things without thinking first ( when my son had long dreads) and people who are truly invoking a racial bias into a situation like when we weren’t allowed to get on a plane to Mexico because they thought I was running away with my kids ( we all had passports).
Maybe it’s time to start being thankful for your blessings and knowing that you are changing the hearts and minds of ignorant people with your beauty and talent, with one hairstyle, one outfit, and one articulate polite comment at a time.