The reason I started this post was to hopefully illustrate that racism isn’t what most people think it is. When people think about racism they think in terms of BIG incidents that are clearly and easily delineated as racist, such as burning a cross in a yard, posing with guns in front of the marker (riddled with bullet holes) of the place Emmett Till was pulled out of The Tallahatchie River or gunning down members of an all-black church that accepted a young white man with open arms. Nobody has a problem identifying those incidences of racism as racism and calling a thing a thing. However, racism in American society is mostly insidious and silent. You breathe it in and out everyday because it’s in the air, the soil, the water. It takes up space in every corner of this country because the country itself was built on the backs of black people after it was stolen from a myriad of brown people. So, today my post is about people of color being used against people of color.

The night before I wrote this post I watched a video on Twitter of a black woman who said, “this land wasn’t stolen it was bought.” She used as her first example, The Louisiana Purchase. Her theory, though ill-informed at best, wasn’t the issue, so much as her video being used by white people to say, “See! Not racist! Not stolen!” The silent nod being, “See! Your own people are saying it, so it must be right and it must be true! Now get with the program!” Now, mind you, this woman said, “I Wikiped-eed it” to start her video. I don’t give a good Got Damn who she was, that should have been a clue that her reasoning may not have been sound and anyone listening should go duly check primary resources. I don’t think it is liberal elitism to expect people to remember 5th grade Social Studies. At very least, it should have piqued something in people’s memories to go, “That doesn’t sound right.” But, it didn’t. Not even a little. 

This woman reminded me of the character Uncle Ruckus on the Adult Swim show The Boondocks. Uncle Ruckus is an old black man who hates black people and loves white people. He extols the virtues of white Jesus and hopes to get into white heaven. He often gives cover to white racism in ways similar to the above. His character is obviously ignorant, but he is listened to by white people because he believes their racism is necessary for the betterment of black people. 

Why does this phenomenon happen and why is it racist to take the ONE BLACK PERSON who agrees with your position or provides ill-informed historical cover? It goes back to everyday media images of black people. I will discuss this more in future posts, but for now, I am just going to talk about news coverage. 

Admittedly, I know longer watch the news, I prefer to read it. However, when I used to watch the news, especially growing up, if something, good or bad, happened in a black neighborhood, the news crew would do their damndest to find the one black person with no teeth who couldn’t speak a lick of standard mainstream English to describe the events in question knowing damned good for well that person didn’t see 💩 . Now, there could be a Harvard educated black person with a Ph.D. living in the same neighborhood who actually saw the events and they would SKIP right over them to find Uncle Damn Ruckus when an adult Huey was sitting right there! In my opinion, it’s done purposely because when we are seen, Uncle Ruckus is considered a REAL black person (read: because he checks all the stereotypes in one neat little package) while a Harvard Ph.D. is not. Being educated doesn’t make you less black, it makes you educated. Remember some of the oldest universities still in operation are in Africa. 

So, finding that ill-informed minority of black people who will tell you you’re not racist is par for the course. It’s what is breathed into the air by media images. Not only does it make you feel better, you now have proof from Uncle Ruckus.