My Baby Girl's Post-
When my father writes this blog, as is the norm, the issue of the day is something far-reaching, something that ripples through the American political landscape and possibly, out into the world. Today, I am writing about a national issue that has suddenly struck rather close to home; in particular, has struck me.
A little background may help. We are a black family, and I am a daughter in my last year of university. When I graduate I will have my bachelor’s degree in physics, and may even be the first person of my kind to graduate from my university with that degree. I discuss politics with my parents and friends regularly, as do all of my siblings, and while the mainstream media is just now starting to get the point it became clear to us long ago that the birther issue is one of delegitimization. It is nothing new to us; it is something that black people, African-Americans of every position, social standing, and income level, face continually. I would venture to say that every educated black youth in America knows they will have to work harder to achieve than a white youth with the same credentials, simply because the lingering sentiment that we are ‘less than’.
It is a sad notion, close to 150 years after the Civil War, but one that I was, until this week, prepared to live under. Then I saw this clip from The Last Word, in which a biographer of the President reminds us that this attitude, this certainty that the blacks in this country have neither the mental fortitude nor the linguistic capacity to be equals with whites, is one that has pervaded our society from the time of its very founding. With the publication of the autobiography of one Frederick Douglass, considered now to be a genius, a white man had to write an introduction letter assuring the reader that yes, this man was black. Yes, he has written this book.
Almost two centuries later, the same tactics are in use. Yes, Obama was actually born here. Yes, he did write those autobiographies. Yes, he did get in to a lily-white Ivy League school. Yes, he was a magnificent student – or, at least good enough to become the president of the Harvard Law Review. Whether you agree with his policies or not or some-of-the-time the fact stands that Barack Obama is one of the great legal minds of his generation. It is only the color of his skin that prevents these birthers, these race-baiters, accepting his hard-earned accomplishments.
It is an idea that struck me terribly, and I am not ashamed to admit that I cried thinking of it, as my father and I looked on. Near two hundred YEARS after my ancestors were freed from slavery, I am still, in the eyes of many, ‘less-than’. The idea that someone as brilliant as our President can be treated this way severely damages my hopes for a future in this country; if the president of the HLR is being struck this way, what hope do I have?
My father saw me crying, and I believe it hurt him. He took the time to remind me that yes, I will have to work harder – much harder – to be considered equal in whatever field I choose, but that that is not the end-all and be-all of the conversation. With the same dedication to my craft as the Obamas have shown theirs, I can be anything I choose in the Land of the Free. That doesn't mean I won't meet people like these birthers, these bigots - only that, as ever, someone has paved the way for me, so that I may achieve in this country. That is the strength of our people, those of us that can be called African Americans. No matter how much is put in our way, we can always achieve.
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