Interests:race, culture, politics, African Americans, assimilation and ethnic identity Expertise:Interracial relationships (specifically black woman/white man), writing Occupation:Writer. Author of four novels Industry:Entertainment, academia
By now you’ve heard all about John Mayer’s unfortunate remarks in his Playboy interview.What he said about sex with Jessica Simpson was unnecessary and embarrassing—for both her and us, and throughout the interview he revealed himself to bedeluded about his own “cool points” with African Americans.The biggest controversies however, have been over his use of the N word and his comments about his “white supremacist dick.”
N word issues will be with us as long as some of us are allowed to use the word and others of us are not. I reiterate my position on that: let’s all stop using it and banish it to history.Until that happens, however, Mayer and other unfortunate whites who don’t know “the rules” or think they are above them will get caught up in the firestorm about its use.That’s a game I really don’t play.
I do care very much, however, about the implications of Mayer’s comments about his preferences for white women and their resonance in the wider community. As the author of a book that encourages black women to look beyond race for dates and mates, I hear often black women say they prefer black men.Many times, however, just beyond that stated preference, lies a list of assumptions that accompany the preference.When we explore those assumptions and challenge them, reaching beyond what we believe about skin tone (or hair color or height or weight) to the qualities of the person beneath,the “preference” falls away.
But Mayer’s comments seem to validate something else I’ve heard so many black women say about interracial dating: “White men aren’t interested in black women—except for as a sexual conquest.”
On the surface, Mayer’s words seem to support what these black women believe about white men. But when you read the full interview, it’s apparent that Mayer knows his preference for white chicks is informed by his ignorance and lack of experience with women of color.Instead of racism, what I read in his words is an all-too-common malady among white American men: a shocking over-exposure to stereotypes that negatively portray black women and an equally shocking under-exposure to the real deal.The media image of black women is a loud, finger-swishing man in a dress…while the realities are closer to Michelle Obama.As a group, we’re known not for the qualities of compassion, determination, vulnerability or honesty…but for how those qualities can be distorted for entertainment purposes.
Crying “racist” doesn’t solve this massive PR problem—if it did, it would have been addressed long ago.Indeed, in some ways the “r-word” makes the problem worse since it adds “angry” the long list of assumptions made about who and what black women are. Unfortunately, once accusations of racism start, all opportunities for multi-culture education, appreciation and yes, racial healing-- are lost.And that’s exactly what we have here: an opportunity for healing.
So I ‘m glad John Mayer said some stupid and ignorant things to Playboy.And I’m glad he recognizes the hurt his words caused.But mostly I’m glad for the teachable moment his words offer.He—and we, me and my African American sisters-- need to seize this moment. Not for a chance to affirm that white men are still racists in America and a sister can’t get no love.But for the opportunity to show ourselves for the beautiful array of personalities, physical types and qualities that we are. We need to seize this gaffe to say to all American men: “We’re smart, we’re loving, we’re beautiful. We’re not what you see on TV or what you watch in movies.If you don’t take the chance to discover who we truly are, then it will truly be your loss.”
And John, you need to seize this opportunity to show all of us that Benetton heart you proclaim to have. Apologizing is the first step, certainly, but you have an incredible leadership opportunity here.I don’t want you to run out and get a hot black girlfriend—until you grow up a bit you’re really not ready to be a good partner to any woman of any race.But instead of hiding, you can use this firestorm to expand your knowledge and understanding of women from other cultural communities. You can do what I tell black women to do: ask yourself the hard questions about just what your preferences are based on and whether those sources are truly correct.You need to embrace opportunities to learn—far beyondyour alleged “hood cred”—because most of us don’t live there anyway. You need to see black women—and all women—as more than sex objects but as fellow travelers with hearts and minds and hopes and dreams. You need to see us as friends.
This is yet another opportunity for all of us to really reach beyond our knee-jerk responses and reach for greater common ground. I’m ready.Lots of black American women are. My sincere hope is that John Mayer-- and the millions of young American men like him—are, too.
I know, I know. You’re sick of hearing about it. About how many black women are unhappily single.About how many have never been married.About attractive, successful sisters who haven’t found their “special someone.”
You might be one of those lonely sisters.On Valentine’s Day, you’ll go to church and pray for the Lord to send you a “boo.”Or you and your girlfriends will get together and complain. Or you’ll just pretend you don’t care.You can buy your own damn roses and chocolates, thank you.
Everyone says you’re the problem. Too “independent.” Too “picky.”Over-educated. If you were more accommodating, if you picked up the check, if you didn’t insist Boo have a job and some ambition, if you were willing to be just a link in his chain or change his Depends—you’d be married by now.
You don’t want that? That’s why you’re single.
It’s ridiculous but you go along with it. It’s easier than acknowledging that the world is crawling with available men. The problem is that most of them aren’t African Americans.
According to Census figures, if every black man and woman in the US were to marry each other, there would be 1.8 million black women left over.The same Census says 14% of black men marry women of other races--- making even more “leftover” black women. Add the tens of thousands of black men who are gay, incarcerated, mentally ill or just not interested in marriage and there’s your answer.Black women are single because many refuse to consider any man but a black man and there just aren’t enough marriageable black men to go around.
The solution? Date men of other cultures. Date a rainbow: Asians, Hispanics and Africans and Native Americans. Date Chinese and Australian and Saudi Arabian and Pakistani men. And yes, date White men.
I hear you.What about slavery? What about my family? What about my brown babies? What about the brothers? What about the way people stare and the things people say? Besides, those other men aren’t interested in me… are they?
At least part of that answer depends on you.Men—all men-- like women who like them, who make them feel good, who are happy and confident and comfortable in their own skin.But cultural taboos have put black women and men of other cultures—White men in particular—in a kind of détente.We eye each other at work. We laugh and joke.We respect and admire professionally… but it goes no further, out of mutual fears of rejection and social stigma.We believe that in drawing that line, we stay loyal to the brothers, to the culture, to the memory of what our great-great grandmothers suffered during slavery--even though black men don’t seem to feel the same disloyalty in dating any appealing woman regardless of race.
And why should they? Love is hard to come by. If you find it, who cares what package it’s in. Right?
But of course, you prefer black men. But preference only takes you so far. Perhaps if a man has the qualities and character you’re looking for he might be worth getting to know. One thing is certain: there are a whole lot more White men in America than there are any other kind.Don’t get mad: it’s just the truth.
Is it possible that a man with compatible education, drive, religious beliefs and values… could be a white man? That a man who celebrates your unique beauty… could be a white man? That a man who loves his children and wants them to celebrate all of their heritage… could be a White man? And if so, are you open to pursuing that possibility… no matter what anyone says or who looks at you funny?
Because this is about you.You... and what you believe about men, about race, about your own desirability and who controls your destiny.Can you cross the “color line?” Do you believe you can find compatibility and common ground with a man… even if he’s not black? Are you willing to end the racial Cold War and date a rainbow of men in 2010?
Or are you waiting in a black box… even though Mr. Right might just be White?
When it came time to spend the money we'd been setting aside for the past year, my husband and I had a bit of a disagreement. I wanted a kitchen remodel-- you know, new cabinets and granite countertops. Something I would use every day. He wanted to sail the Mediterranean-- the kind of thing you do once in a lifetime. We discussed it and I (reluctantly) conceded when it became apparent that if I won, I'd have a new kitchen populated by one very unhappy man.
But now that our 14-days in Italy, Greece, Turkey and Egypt are behind us, I'm going to say the words that every husband lives for, and every wife hates to admit:
He was right.
The trip was amazing: a truly once in a lifetime experience that I'm thrilled to have had the chance to enjoy. I loved every second of it: winding through the narrow streets of Positano, Italy admiring the handcrafted tile and the Sorrento lemons; visiting the incredible ruins of Pompeii and catching a glimpse of life 2000 years ago; walking the streets of Mykonos and eating seafood straight from the sea, seeing the Acropolis in Athens and the pyramids and the Sphynx in Egypt. In Turkey, we visisted Ephesus-- the ancient city of the biblical Ephesians. It was the sort of experience that gives you a new way of looking at the world and a new way of looking at one's self, knowing that your life is just a flash in the ages of human history.
Our fellow passengers on our cruise ship came from all over the world, too. We met Canadians, Britons and Germans, Italians and Greeks, South Americans and Dutch. And of course, we met other Americans. But only a handful were black Americans.
By contrast on a typical Caribbean vacation, however, you'll see many African Americans. Why were there so few on our Mediterranean cruise?
Some will immediately jump to economics for the answer-- the Caribbean is closer and cheaper and more easily accessible-- and while I certainly can see that argument, I don't think that's the only factor at work here. After all, middle class black folks who have the money for vacations can choose to spend it anywhere-- the decision is made to travel. There are deals daily to destinations world-wide. As one of my globetrotting friends likes to say, "A black woman can fly to Europe for about what some of us spend on single pair of shoes!"
And everywhere we went, English was spoken, so language really can't be said to be a barrier.
In doing the research for my upcoming book "Don't Bring Home A White Boy (and other notions that keep black women single)" I interviewed a young black woman who told me about her family's reactions when she was offered to study a semester abroad. Her parents weren't impressed and her grandfather even said: "What you want to do THAT for? Ain't no black people in Europe."
Fortunately, this young woman ignored her family's skepticism and headed off to study in London, Paris and Amsterdam. Every where she went, she met black people, people of color who were citizens of those nations and-- with their permission of course-- took pictures of them and sent the home. "Black people... in Europe," she wrote on each photograph until the message was clear to the folks back home: look beyond your limited black American experience. Look beyond North America and the Caribbean. Find out what it means to be a person of color in a wider experience.
You can't view slavery in the same way once you've thought about it in terms of the Roman empire or of the Jews held in Egypt or the centuries old struggles between the Greeks and Turks.And, however cynical you are about what it means to be a black American, I doubt you'll feel the same after you walk the slums of Cairo. There's a lot wrong in this country, but there's a lot right here, too. Touring the oldest Mosque in Egypt, I found myself thinking of Malcolm X-- who left the United States a black nationalist Muslim but returned from his haj to Mecca just a Muslim committed to justice for all mankind. I think I understand.
If you're broke, of course, now is not the time. But if you're not, I hope you'll consider broadening your vacation horizons. The Caribbean is lovely-- but there's whole world out there, a world that technology makes smaller. A world that, if we're to thrive in as a people, we must explore and understand. It's worth saving money for, and worth spending it on. Black Americans have to reach beyond North American and become a bigger part of that broader world. We have to be willing to reach for more than the limits we so often perceive in this country-- not only for our own sake, but for our children's. While it might have taken me 45 years to set foot on the continent of Africa, I'm glad my daughter did it for the first time at 13. I'm glad she's been bitten by the "travel bug" at a young age... and when she told me she wanted to visit Japan next I couldn't have been more pleased.
Money is certainly an issue, but I've noticed that most people manage to find money for the things they value most: cars and computers, cell phones and, as my friend Nikki put it, shoes. Travel is now something I'm willing to put at the top of my list-- even if it means living without granite counter tops for the rest of my life.
I spent an hour or so yesterday completing the forms necessary for my family to travel on our Mediterranean cruise next week. The cruise line asks that you send in your passport information--- as well as certain details like your travel plans, your emergency contact and of course, your credit card number for on-ship spending. What I hadn't expected them to ask was for the primary racial identification of all of our travellers.
It's funny, I had completed that section for my husband, myself and my older daughter without really thinking about it. White, black, black... and then I came to my baby, who is bi-racial. I couldn't call her primarily white any more than I could call her primarily black. If she were old enough to ask, I would have written whatever she said. Experts on the subject say that it's normal for bi-racial children to bounce between racial choices: black at one stage of their growth, white at others. They may also insist on both-- or neither, claiming themselves to transcend classification. I've read enough literature to be prepared for Sommer's choices as she grows older.
But right now, Sommer's a little shy of 4 years old. At this moment, the choice was mine. We've never come across this before: she goes to a private preschool where the question was never asked. Perhaps in a year or so, we may confront the issue again on some public school form. But this was my first time-- my virgin moment-- with racial classifications in my own family-- and I was surprised my the conflicting emotions it brought up.
I re-read the form. This section was optional-- the cruise line was only interested for marketing and consumer information purposes-- but I hadn't hesitated or even questioned the use of their data for the rest of my family. Sommer's status made me re-think whether that was information that I cared to share-- or at least whether the cruise lines marketing database was a good enough reason to provide it. But righteous indignation aside, there will be other forms, more crucial ones. Medical forms, for example. What is the appropriate response for a child whose parents are of different races?
Organizations like ProjectRace.org have been focusing on this issue for years. They have lobbied against boxes like "other" and argue that, in our increasingly multiracial society, forms should allows to "check all that apply" instead of being forced into a single category box. The wisdom of this approach seems obvious to me: it allows a person of mixed heritage to honor all of his or her cultural influences.
But the larger questions remain about why any of this matters so much outside of the medical context (where certain genetic markers may affect compatibility of treatments). What does it say about our society when a cruise line collects racial information "for marketing purposes"? What does it say about our school system if racial heritage is important information to tracking the performance of a student?
The truth is, if I knew more about my own racial heritage, I could probably check every box on any form you give me--- most of us probably could. I know for certain there is white/Dutch ancestry in family, as well as English/Anglo Saxon blood. But I'm certain there is a far more rich story that I don't know and that that rich heritage is present for us all.
Perhaps the ProjectRace.org approach is the beginning: we check as many boxes as apply... until science and geneology make it possible for all of us to check all of the boxes. Only then will the necessity for racial categorization become unnecessary.
For today, I left Sommer's form blank... and when back and erased the categories for the rest of my family. We're a family travelling together and that's really all the cruise line needs to know.
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