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So I was talking to my undecided black-friend
Ok, so he's not really a friend, more like an acquaintance (and I'm white if that matters to anyone). But anyway we were talking about something and he mentions a show he was watching so I segue to the last debate (which he missed) and mention what a bastard McCain is.
"You think so," he tells me in a surprised way, which is when I find out he's still undecided. I suppose it's naive of me, but I can't help but assume that the intelligent, cool people I know (or are acquainted with) are democrats, or at least, as tired of the Bush and Friends bullshit we've had to deal with over the last 8 years as I am. And I suppose the fact that he was black may have had something to do with the degree of my assumption (though I do assume this of my white acquaintances as well).
He starts in with the spoon-fed crap about experience and Obama's flip-flopping (when the fuck did reevaluation and mind-changing become such a bad thing?), but the point that I thought was really interesting came out a little later in our conversation.
He said he was worried how bad tings are with the economy and with the country in general being so deeply buried in the steaming shit Bush has been shoveling on us for 8 years (not his exact words ;). He's worried that if Obama wins and subsequently is unable to dig us out sufficiently, and things just continue to get worse, as they may regardless of who's in office at this point, that Obama may be seen as a failure and people will say (or think): well there you go, that's what happens when you let a black guy run things.
Of course, that's a pathetically bad reason not to vote for Obama, but I thought it was an interesting point nonetheless.
"You think so," he tells me in a surprised way, which is when I find out he's still undecided. I suppose it's naive of me, but I can't help but assume that the intelligent, cool people I know (or are acquainted with) are democrats, or at least, as tired of the Bush and Friends bullshit we've had to deal with over the last 8 years as I am. And I suppose the fact that he was black may have had something to do with the degree of my assumption (though I do assume this of my white acquaintances as well).
He starts in with the spoon-fed crap about experience and Obama's flip-flopping (when the fuck did reevaluation and mind-changing become such a bad thing?), but the point that I thought was really interesting came out a little later in our conversation.
He said he was worried how bad tings are with the economy and with the country in general being so deeply buried in the steaming shit Bush has been shoveling on us for 8 years (not his exact words ;). He's worried that if Obama wins and subsequently is unable to dig us out sufficiently, and things just continue to get worse, as they may regardless of who's in office at this point, that Obama may be seen as a failure and people will say (or think): well there you go, that's what happens when you let a black guy run things.
Of course, that's a pathetically bad reason not to vote for Obama, but I thought it was an interesting point nonetheless.
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He's worried that if Obama wins and subsequently is unable to dig us out sufficiently, and things just continue to get worse, as they may regardless of who's in office at this point, that Obama may be seen as a failure and people will say (or think): well there you go, that's what happens when you let a black guy run things.
I think that paragraph hold the key to your friends seeming ambivalence. He is obviously concerned that there may be racist repercussions for individual African-Americans if Obama is seen as a failure. He's afraid that whites will hold all blacks accountable for the actions of a some single black, in this case, Obama. When the negative spotlight is shined on one it is shined on all.
It's a fear of white prejudice. So, while legitimate, his feelings are highly counter-productive to black social advancement. Instilling that kind of self-censuring fear has long been an affective tool of racists in stunting such advancement.
October 9, 2008 2:16 PM | Reply | Permalink