Hopefully, I'll just write this in the way so that even if the people involved do read this site, late at night, they agree with how I depict them. I was at the bar tonight, here in Brooklyn. "This is the white enclave, the place where all the scenesters go," is how it was described to me by Y.- that's correct. It's been my local bar for two years. It's on the border between the huge hispanic neighborhood, Bushwick, and the huge black neighborhood, Bedford-Stuyvesant There's a bar every 15 or so blocks down the main street here, a few years ago, not even that. It's basically been vacant/residential around here, but it's slowly filling up with people and business, a lot of construction has been going on the last five years.
This guy D. played a show at the bar, I was waiting for someone just listening. Then he finished, I told him "good show". He was talking to Y., a woman who plays music here a lot. I've known her for a few months, she's friends with some of my friends. She was with my roommate and a friend of mine when they were beaten up in Bed-Stuy last week. I sat down with D. and Y. while they were talking and then she started telling the story about being with those two guys and how the situation happened on the street, and she was telling about black guys, when you're in a gang, how it's like a cult and you can't reason with them. Then she was saying something about oppression and D., who is a white man, said he had been a black woman in a past life. Y. said "oh, you know what it's like to be a black woman?" I didn't say anything, because I don't like to get involved in arguments, I also didn't know how well they knew each other, if they were old friends. It turns out they had just met. D. wouldn't back down from what he had said. As he mentioned to me later he was "from California." Several things happened and Y. was very upset, D. wisely left, and as he was standing in the vestibule finishing his beer, I went out and talked to him. The bar manager watched the whole thing, frowning, I felt like he was not happy with Y. As I talked to D. said he didn't know what he had done wrong, I told him it would have been better not to get into a conversation about race. He had told her she was "acting like a white man," (Y. is a latino woman), how he thought he was going to win that argument, I don't know.
After he left, Y. came up to me and asked why I had gone out to talk to him. I told her I thought he was upset. She asked why I hadn't asked to see if she was upset. During our conversation, I realized I should have said something to D., I had not said anything the whole time, I think I was a little afraid, and a little stunned by their conversation. But I was struck by her observation that, even though I knew her better, I had gone to console the white guy. I told her it was because he was leaving and she was still here, but I'm not sure that's the case. I'm a white guy, he's a white guy. I felt like his argument, whatever it was, was also my argument. Or it had the same motives as me. I talked for a while with Y. and apologized. "You should use your white male power to stand up for me next time," she said. "I know" I said.
The bartender told me she was drunk. She didn't seem drunk, I said. Then I heard she had gotten in an argument over similar things with the landlord of the building who had come by with some people earlier in the day. I said goodnight to the manager as I was leaving, he asked me what i thought about the fight. Is he asking me because I'm a white male, like him, and he values my opinion? I was thinking. Or is it because I'm just not a trouble maker, and I've known him for 7 years? I felt like really that was my real value. The thing was, Y. had just started working for the bar that week, and while we were talking she was saying she thought now she was going to be fired, because of picking fights. I tried to explain that D. had been sort of outrageous, and that Y. had explained it to me. I felt so odd, like I was under her control, but at the same time, the white man, the overlord, making things better. The manager laughed, and I felt like I had explained what had happened.
Not much of a story, but I liked a diary like this that I read about a fight on a bus I read a few days ago. That one was better. This isn't a diary that wraps everything up and explains something, or even makes a lot of sense. But if you have questions, I will try to answer them. I just thought I'd write it as an antidote to all the tedious, repetitive election stuff.
Down with super tuesday!