The Politics Behind the Politics of Being a Black Man

            The Politics Behind the Politics of Being a Black Man

“The country shouldn’t be worried about the Muslim movement-that’s not the problem. The problem is the conditions that breed the Muslim movement”-James Baldwin

I became familiar with former Lt. Colonel Allen West during the 2012 Presidential campaign between President Obama and Mitt Romney after reading some of his garrulous comments predicting that President Obama would lose to any “GOP presidential candidate” and hailed Newt Gingrich as “the smartest person out there” in terms of the GOP presidential hopefuls.[1]   More perplexing for me was West’s assertion that Mitt Romney had some serious “work to do” before he could be considered a “true conservative”.[2]  I must admit that I am always perplexed by some of the beliefs expressed by African American Republicans given the party’s history of vilifying people of color as lazy, welfare recipients who live off social support.

Perhaps, Allen West considers himself an exception to the rule. West for example addressed the United States Congress for Black History month to celebrate the history of Blacks in the Republican Party and praised the party for their long devotion to equality and freedom of all Americans. Interestingly enough, West glosses over the changing ideologies of not only the Republican Party, but also the Democratic Party as well and the racial makeup.  After all, the African American Republican Congressman Josiah Walls (who served in Florida) that West regards as his inspiration served in 1876; it only took the Republicans 134 years to elect another Black man-Allen West to that position-a minor detail Colonel West seemed oblivious to. Before I go any further, let me be clear, this is not about politics, but for me it is an analysis of the roles of Black men in America, and the fact that West fails to see him as good nigger that is merely stomachable in the eyes of white America.I will address Allen West again later. 

As I finished reading Baldwin’s Notes of a Native Son, I thought about the relevancy of the collection of essays as they were written in almost sixty years ago, and I concluded that the state of the African American, particularly the African American male has in fact not changed and James Baldwin’s writing are just as telling and important today as they were in 1955.  Life for the Black man has not changed very much at all.  They are still bound, first without, then within, by the nature of their categorization.  And escape is not effected through a bitter railing against this trap; it is as though this very striving were the only motion needed to spring the trap upon them (us).[3] In other words, regardless of how African American man strives to be seen as human and American, in essence he will only be seen pejoratively and within the box that society has placed him which labels him as nothing more than inferior and a nigger, which are labels that have been constructed by America.  After all, the nigger is an American creation, and sooner than later, every black person is slapped with the bitter reality that “black is a terrible color with which to be born into the world.[4]

When I entered the sixth grade, I was sent to a middle school outside my neighborhood.  My mother wanted me to attend a magnet school, and since there were none in our area, I was bused in.  The junior high school I attended was located in Bellaire, which is a very affluent, white neighborhood. The resources available in this school compared to the school in my neighborhood were worlds apart. During this time, I learned very quickly that the cliché “boys will boys”, was a double entendre; it meant something totally different for white boys than it did for black boys in our school. There was a different set of rules that governed the white boys than the African American boys.  When the white students engaged in obnoxious pranks such as hiding people’s clothes in the locker room, hiding the teacher’s chalk, rigging the water fountains to spray people or purposely colliding into people in the, it was all seen as good natured fun.  For the young men who were Black, there was a different set of rules.  For the smallest infractions they were written up and sent to the office or given detention. Even the intellectual capacity of the African American males is discredited, as they are only judge punitively. These young men the difference in the way they are treated.  The Black boy was never given the status of being a boy but rather was treated a man who was a menace that the school system sought to vilify.   It is this type unfair treatment and sense of inferiority that causes “the black man in our midst to carry murder in their heart, to want vengeance.[5]                        

Ironically, I saw the same thing when I taught high school.  The inequality in the distribution of misdemeanor tickets to African American young for things such as swearing, fighting, and insubordination compared to other ethnic groups was startling. In addition, African American males were disproportionately placed in alternative schools, which were run much like a correctional facility that never sought to rehabilitate the students, but sought to institutionalize them and prepare them for the penal system- a penal system that in many ways parallels slavery as it is still a way to strip African American males of their identity and their freedom.

So, this brings me back to Allen West.  Allen West is a former military Lieutenant Colonel who believes in the idea of each man working hard to pull himself up by his bootstraps to be successful in what he considers a very leveled playing field.  West asserts and believes we live in a post racial America and that the issue of racism being a problem in America are ploys of the Democratic Party and our first ever African American President Barack Obama.  West has gone through great pains to show his disdain and disapproval of President Obama with such fervor, when I was watching some of his speeches from Fox News, it was hard to believe he was African American, but as I watched the videos, I felt pity for him because I was reminded of Baldwin’s words about the education of the Black man to survive in our society that which is a great part of the of the American Negro’s education that he must make people “like” him.[6] Surely, West takes this sentiment to heart as he seeks to create a space for his "white" privilege at any cost, even the cost of other Black folks.

West would refute Baldwin’s assertion that “there isn’t a Negro alive that has not felt, briefly or for long periods of time with anguish sharp or dull, in varying degrees and to varying effect, simple naked and unanswerable hatred; who has not wanted to smash any white face he may encounter in a day…”[7]  But how can any Black person in America deny a certain cognitive dissonance they experienced under the sheer burden and weight that comes with being a person of color in America?  As a descendant of slaves in America, perhaps he has not realized that “no American can escape having an attitude toward Negroes.”[8] More disturbing for me was the posture he took after the controversial verdict in the Trayvon Martin case.  West stated the following:

“I don’t recall being followed in malls or shopping centers. I don’t recall car doors clicking locked when I walked across the street, And I definitely have not had women clutching their handbags and purses when I got on the elevator. I believe it comes back to being a respectful young man and maybe that’s something that was missing out of President Obama and Trayvon Martin’s life. But to try to play this and u try to make it a personal experience, this was just absolutely horrific.”[9]

Ultimately, Allen West blames Trayvon’s manner of dress and his lack of respect-things that are inferred to be characteristics of Black male-for his demise.  Therefore, Martin's crime was his failure to make himself a mirror image of the "normative gaze" that makes him palatable.Tragic indeed. While West takes a defensive posture in his assessment of President Obama attempting as an African American man to give a voice to the millions of Black men and boys everywhere who profiled, imprisoned, and murder for the color of their skin, it is cause for great concern that Allen West would refute the authenticity of the Black male experience by attributing the murder of a young man to a matter of being “respectful” and dress.  In that moment, I realized that West has separated himself from being Black and only considers himself an American, but this too is a falsehood.  True enough he is an American, but he is an American who was first a slave whose “past with taken from him with one stroke of the auctioneer’s pen on the bill of sale.”[10]  Regardless of how conservative or ‘white’ winged West is,  by and large he is still viewed as a second class American citizen by America, and to me people with the type of beliefs that Allen West espouses are dangerous because he professes white supremacist beliefs, but he is not white.

More importantly, what West fails to realize is that he may be American, and hold conservative American values, but “the idea of white supremacy rests simply on the fact that white men are creators of civilization...and that it is impossible for Americans to accept the Black man as one of themselves, for to do so would jeopardize the status of white men.”[11] Sadly, this is the lesson that Lt. Colonel West seems to have missed.  Since the beginning of African’s time on this continent there have been those who considered themselves one and the same as “massa”, and massa sees this and does not correct it as long as it is to his benefit because he know this slave will be more loyal to him, than his own.  While it may seem that I am being extreme, I have gone out and watched several clips of West where white conservative sing his praises for being well spoken, clean cut, a good American and educated-for a nigger (which is the part they leave off).  All the comments I read on West’s clips were most written by white conservative who sung his praise and lamented that he had not run for president in lieu of Barack Obama.  I guess the pain of having an African American president would not be so unbearable if the person this the way you do.  Sadly, even the white people who sing his praises, refer to him as a “good nigger” in their you tube post. 

So, I wonder what it is like for African American men like West who do not think with the “double consciousness” that most of us have been programmed to think with.  Is he more of a danger to other Black people because he is using his voice in a manner that does not relief the ideologies of his people or will he do more damage to himself when he realizes he will never just be seen as an American? Maybe Black Americans will see him as a white man in Black face.

I would like to interview West, Clarence Thomas, and Herman Cain to get their definition of what it mean to be a Black man in America and if they think their experience is any different that than of white males. It would be interesting to see how forth coming they would be.

In the meantime, I hope and pray that the veil will be lifted from the eyes of Allen Wests of the world because we don’t live in a post racial America, things are not equitable, and skin color does matter.  These are all problems that existed before we had an African American President, but they seem to be more prevalent now than ever.  And so I wonder what Baldwin would say about the state of affairs in America and our “Negro” leaders.  Would he be surprised that his prophetic words as just as relevant today as they were when he wrote.  I am guessing he wouldn’t be surprised at all, only saddened.

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[1] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/10/allen-west-obama-will-los_n_1197168.html

[2] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/10/allen-west-obama-will-los_n_1197168.html

[3] James Baldwin Notes of a Native Son (Boston:  Beacon Press, 1955), 20. 

[4] James Baldwin Notes of a Native Son (Boston:  Beacon Press, 1955), 30.

[5] James Baldwin Notes of a Native Son (Boston:  Beacon Press, 1955), 28.

[6] James Baldwin Notes of a Native Son (Boston:  Beacon Press, 1955), 161. 

[7] James Baldwin Notes of a Native Son (Boston:  Beacon Press, 1955), 38. 

[8] James Baldwin Notes of a Native Son (Boston:  Beacon Press, 1955), 170.

[9] http://www.blackyouthproject.com/2013/07/allen-west-attacks-obamas-speech-says-hes-never-been-racially-profiled/

[10] James Baldwin Notes of a Native Son (Boston:  Beacon Press, 1955), 169. 

[11] James Baldwin Notes of a Native Son (Boston:  Beacon Press, 1955), 172.