After a victorious day for Barack Obama with the Edwards endorsement, some of us at dailykos got sidetracked by big mouth Pat Buchanan. I think by now everyone is very aware of the now infamous exchange between Pat and Chris Matthews with Andrea Mitchell playing referee. My goal is not to rehash the debate but to help us all who are on various degrees of the racism argument spectrum to find a middle ground together with laughter. Last night after posting to various diaries my strong opinions in regards to Pat’s statements, I realized I needed to take a step back and absorb everyone’s perspectives. I am admittedly sensitive to people like Pat because as a 36yo black woman, I can’t remember a time when I didn’t have to be conscious of my race. Even today, I have to wonder if my race plays a part in my experience even with something as simple as buying a computer. Here is an example:
Just this past weekend I was out with my mother buying a computer at one of the largest electronic retail chains. I have shopped their dozens of time and they tend to be very busy on every occasion. After standing by the computer I was interesting in purchasing for like, forever, waiting for help, a woman and her children walked up and a sales person immediately approached her. Like a Post Traumatic Stress sufferer I immediately flashed back to the times when I was about 10ys old and a I was standing in line at a store and the sales clerk looked by me and asked the white person standing behind me for help. Ironically, they spoke up for me but when I told my mother, she was livid and she told me to never let anyone over look me again. She went on to tell me that people will discount me based solely on my race. It was my first experience with racial bias. After I shook myself out of my past, I took a breath and with a mind of an adult realized the sales clerk came from a different section of the store and had no idea I had been waiting longer. I will also add that earlier my mother and I were browsing the office furniture section and a sales person immediately came over to offer help, so I told myself to "chill out."
Sometimes I do think that as a African American, I jump to conclusions that my race plays apart in some situations when it doesn’t have anything to do with it at all. Not to say blatant racism doesn’t exist because it does. But that is not the point of my diary. To go there directly would detract for the reason I’m posting and it would require me to write a Dr. Cornell West type of dissertation that I am sorely inept at doing so I will leave it alone, at least for now. However last night I decided to go to the tube to find out what our brother in comedy the late great Richard Pryor would have to say about racism in light of Barack’s realistic bid to becoming the first African American elected to the Presidency. And I found this gem. Maybe this is what Pat is worried about. By the way embedding has been disabled so I can only post the link. Please enjoy and lets keep it light. I think we all deserve a break today!
President Pryor