“It Don’t Matter If You’re Black or White…”
-Michael Jackson, “Black or White”, Dangerous, 1991
That’s what Michael Jackson says. And he should know…
…he’s been both.
But what about the people that aren’t black or white…but, say… MIXED????
(***DISCLAIMER#1: I’m mixed. My dad is a black man from Alabama and my mother is a white woman from France. So I can talk about this shit if I want too.***)
(***DISCLAIMER#2: I’m primarily talking about mixed black/white kids. However, this does have relevance to any kid who is mixed with black and anything else.***)
Have you ever been channel surfing during the daytime and come to a talk show with a title saying something like, “Kicking Rocks in the Black and White World: Hell for the Mixed Kids,” or “Nobody Plays With Half-Breeds”? No…neither have I.
BUT…I have come across those shows that give mixed children, usually the offspring of black and white couples and usually girls, a chance to talk about the difficulties of growing up mixed (or interracial) in a world where almost black kids (because let’s be honest here, these kids are not almost white) have many troubles due to those race-mixers AKA their parents decision to make their lives a living hell.
Race-mixer. (noun) def. person who decides to challenge the status quo and what God set aside as the natural order of things, namely people who try to mix urban and suburban…er…black and white, to make curly hair lighterskinned BLACK children thereby reducing the number of white people in the world and integrating our once lovely and segregated lifestyles and damning us all to hell by drinking out of the same water fountains and even…HOLY SHIT…TALKING TO ONE ANOTHER.
But I digress.
Typical Talk Show Conversation b/w Host and Mixed Kid(s):
Host: What is it like to be…do you need a tissue, Becky-Shanquilta… what’s it like to be MIXED???
(collective gasp from audience)
Fucked up Kid AKA Becky-Shanquilta: The black kids won’t play with me because I’m too light, and the white kids won’t play with me because I’m too dark!! It’s sad because I can’t make friends. I just want people to like me!! It’s not fair…I get picked on in school by the black kids who call me “oreo” and “half-breed” and the white kids always want to touch my hair…
Most of the conversations (in summation) go something like that. And to be quite honest, this shit is offensive to me. They make me look bad. Now I’ve been mixed my whole life…and maybe I’m the exception to the rule, but I’m always thinking…WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH THESE BASTARDS???
And then it hits me…they don’t know that they are black!
Let’s get a few things straight. All mixed kids aren’t fucked up. But it would seem that a lot are. It seems as if a lot go through lifelong confusion issues such as trying to figure out who they identify more with, black or white, eventually realizing that they are…
wait for it…
it’s coming…
BLACK.
Amazing, huh??? Much to their chagrin sometimes. Then they go on these talk shows and/or focus groups and talk about the fact that life was so difficult for them and that they spent a lot of time alone because of their affliction, which is less about being mixed, and more about being mixed up.
FACT#1: Mixed kids are black. That was the case in the good old days, you know slavery days…its the same now.
For some reason, this little known fact seems to elude many mixed kids. Somehow, they didn’t get the memo. I got mine…though luckily I had the fortune of having my dad sit me down when I was six years old and have this convo (it was really short, he was wisest in his minimalist rants):
Poppa Duke: Boy, if you don’t remember anything I tell you in life, remember this…
Peewee Panama: Yeah daddy????
Poppa Duke: Boy, your mama is white…YOU ARE NOT! Don’t forget that shit and your life will be easy. Now clean up your room nigga!
Peewee Panama: *experiencing moment of clarity…it was amazing, everything makes so much sense* Okay daddy…can I have a quarter?
If more mixed kids were privy to these kinds of realizations at an early age instead of parents trying to tell these mixed (up) kids that they aren’t black or white, but mixed…maybe, just maybe, these fuckers would have somebody to play with because…
FACT#2: People don’t hate you because your mixed…they hate you because your an asshole.
A lot of these bastards probably play up on the fact that they aren’t black around the black kids, and try to play up the fact that they ARE white around the white people. We can blame slavery for the inferiority complex…I’m blaming parents for not being strong enough to tell the kids the damn truth. These kids spend so much time saying “I’m not black” to their black former friends that the black kids start to hate them. Black people come in all kinds of shades, we learn that early, so we as black people accept most black folks (except in some parts of the South where light skinnededed people tend to be loathed by some and loved by others), but these fuckers come along and say…I’m not black, I’m mixed…AND sound proud to not be black. Major no-no. That’s where that problem comes in and why black folks hate them half-breeds.
Now the problem from the white people…WELL…white people aren’t dumb. They know a non-white mufucka when they see one…EXCEPT in those cases where the mixed kid really does look, in fact, white (Imitation of Life, anyone???) sometimes confusing even black people. And white people are protective of their club AND hate self-unaware black people as much as black people do. Shoot, we hear and see it all the time on TV, “Jim, I was looking for more of an “urban” feel, and you just aren’t providing it so I’m gonna have to let you go. Go back to the streets and be more, you know…black, homie. Like that 50 Cent guy…”
So to run around calling yourself “half-white” to white people…well, it didn’t work in the 1860’s and doesn’t work now. You don’t want to become that black person that white people laugh about and refer to as, “not a black person…but one of us”, and feel comfortable saying stuff like, “those niggers, not you Benson, I mean Babatunde, er Brian…you’re one of us…” Talk about ending up lonely…black people can SMELL those mufuckas from far off. And we don’t like them either.
Assholes.
If you notice, I refer to myself as part of the “we” in that last sentence. I was raised black and have always referred to myself as black. Mostly because I have lived a black life (you know, raised with Luther Vandross, Motown, blaxploitation movies). But also because nobody who sees me thinks I’m mixed and I’m treated like I’m black by the world.
(***DISCLAIMER#3: Though I do claim to be black, I don’t shy away from being mixed. I’ll tell you in a heartbeat if it comes up. Most folks are surprised though since I seem so “black”…which to me means I have bass in my voice and actually still like to drink Kool-Aid.***)
What is treated like your black you ask?? Followed around in stores, harassed or bothered by police for no reason at least once, received a driving while black ticket, get looked at funny when walking with white women, listen to rap music…wait, that doesn’t count anymore, still get called a nigger in some parts of the south…just happen to be a smart nigger. And because, no matter what I achieve, I’m still a black man that achieved that. Not a man that achieved that…a black man that achieved that…and I’m flattered. Let’s be real…it’s cool to be black right now.
The real reason however…is because once I went to a KKK rally…somewhere in Iowa…and amidst the confusion, somebody said…
Klan Guy: You thur, booooy, what makes you think you kin jest be hur at this hur rally?
Me: I’m half-white.
And do you know they didn’t let me stay for at least HALF the rally! That’s the day I realized that half-white, makes you full black.
And my life has been easy ever since, well you know for a black guy. It’s really a shame more mixed kids don’t have this kind of experience. It was a real “cross burner”…
Get it “cross burner”…ya know, the cross, they burn the cross…ah hell…forget it.