News & Views
Identity Crisis
Black History Month has never meant much to me. It was just another month that I paid attention to more than others because it was the month in which I was born, but other than that, I never gave it much thought. I thought that it encouraged a rivalry among the races. It also marked a sign of inferiority if blacks felt the need to celebrate it.
If you asked me why I did not recognize it, I would have explained that I don’t see color and that such a movement encourages that mindset. But recently, however, my paradigm is shifting. Dr. Timothy Jackson, Pastor of Greater First Baptist Church, showed me that the way I was raised played a big part in my perception.
I am not a typical “black person.” I am bi-racial, half black and half Mexican. I grew up with my mother in a suburb of San Diego County, California. Though San Diego is a lot more diverse than most places, it is associated with the “white culture” of beaches and health food and money. I grew up listening to the Beach Boys and Sting as well as Salt & Pepper and MC Hammer. Also there were very few black kids in the public school I attended. Most were mixed. It didn’t matter though because most of my friends were white or Mexican.
Underneath the surface were the experiences I have had with the “black culture.” Most of them were negative. My initial response was shock. I cried when I found out that I was black. My classmates discovered it too, and once more, I went home crying when a classmate called me a nigger. But I think as I grew older, I tried to reconcile myself to the idea. I did try to reach out to the black kids I met along the way, but that did not work so well either.
I remember moving to a new apartment complex. During the first week I went outside looking to make some friends. I spotted two girls, one white and one black. I asked if I could play with them. They said that was fine, that they were having a picnic. I ran back inside to get some sandwiches and my Barbies and raced back outside, but when I returned they were gone. Every time I saw them after that they would snub me. I suspected that it was the black girl’s fault. When the white girl was alone she would say “hi” to me, but the black girl didn’t acknowledge me when she was alone. That wound hurt deeper than I could say.
Another black person that shaped my perception of “blacks” was a boy that I met in elementary school. My mom always picked me up way after school was over. One day while I was waiting for her the boy came up to me, and we started talking. He made fun of me saying that I talked like the butler in the commercials for Grey Poupon. In other words, I did not talk “black.” He made it seem like I thought I was better than him because I used proper diction. The taunting continued for weeks, and it sparked a lot of conversation between my mom and I during my rides home about what the black culture was like.
The media only enhanced my perception. The women were always portrayed as moody, domineering and cliquish; the men as dogs who went from woman to woman. My mom’s choice of friends didn’t change that stereotype either. Her black friends liked to go party and gossiped about each other. They did not have lifestyles I wanted to emulate. In response to all of this I did not claim any culture as my own. I did not belong to any group. Mexicans were looked down upon as inferior immigrants who don’t conform to American rules. I couldn’t fit with the white people because even though they were the most accepting of me, I knew I was still stereotyped in their eyes. I especially did not fit with the black culture because I did not fit that mold either. I was a half-breed and as such I picked what I liked from each one and adopted my own eclectic style.
Though I am still an eclectic, looking back I still carried stereotypes about each culture surrounding me. I shied away from Mexicans. Because of the media stereotype I averted my eyes when any black boy looked at me, thinking they only wanted one thing. I only liked little white boys. Though I hated when people assumed that because I was black I thought or acted a certain way, I myself stereotyped these different groups. God was showing me my prejudice and opening my eyes to reality.
Interviewing Dr. Jackson was a revelation to me. He spoke of rethinking our position on culture as a whole because nobody represents their culture perfectly. Culture and our perceptions of culture are all a mixture of how we are raised and the environment we grew up in not our skin color. Go to New York and you will see white or Asian boys that can dance, rap and do the whole “black” thing as well as any black person. That’s an urban culture, not a black culture. We cannot base our perceptions of a race or culture on a few isolated experiences, like the ones I had. When I asked him about bi-racial kids and where we fit, he said we shouldn’t have to fit anywhere because we are both. We are making too big of a deal of our mini-cultures and not keeping in mind the big culture: the American culture.
Listening to Dr. Timothy Jackson speak I realized that God had been bringing me to that point from a totally different angle. I am proud to be a black Hispanic. I get the best of both worlds, but don’t pigeon-hole me. I listen to Salsa, some Rap and R&B as well as Rock and Indie. I love to tie-dye and want a Harley Davidson, but if you ask me to I will bust out Hip-hop dancing.
You may wonder what this has to do with Black History Month. I was a little confused myself as to what this all meant. On one hand Dr. Timothy Jackson was saying that Americans, black and white, were making too big a deal about race, but on the other hand he encouraged blacks to promote Black History Month.
The essence is that for too long blacks have had an identity crisis, like me (this issue is not particular to just blacks, but it is the most prominent in America). Black History Month gives that identity, but not in the way most people think. It is a celebration of their accomplishments yes, but more importantly what they have brought to American culture. It’s about informing them and the rest of America that they make up a part of that culture. Without blacks there would be no America, at least not the way it is today—and I don’t mean no one on welfare either. Black History Month—as well as Hispanic history or Asian history—is a celebration of American history.
Black History Month is not about black pride or power. It is not to prove superiority or cure feelings of inferiority though some blacks take it that way. It’s not about color at all, but what a people group, not a culture, have brought to the culture that unites it all: the American culture. How can a culture be complete if it does not know about a certain part of its history?
Black History Month is meant to unify the culture, not tear it down. It is the same with Asian and Pacific Islander Month, Native American history and women’s history. America is incomplete without it.
We, Americans, should not dwell on our own individual cultures so much that we lose sight of the bigger picture. However, because some of the other cultures have not realized this, muliticultural groups have to keep the rest of us aware until we realize that we truly are “a melting pot.” In the words of Dr. Timothy Jackson, “Until America teaches multicultural history, the multicultural groups will have to teach it.”
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