I have been toying with this notion in my mind for several years. I no longer want this site to be considered a “Black” website.
Yes, we will still own and publish the articles that appear on these pages, but should the racial designation of the website owner determine the racial ethnotype of virtual community? I mean, what racial ethnotype should be assigned to the binary code that comprises the info contained on the server that feeds DP Dot Com? I thought that the internets was the first place that none of our racial designations mattered anymore.
That’s not totally true either. Racism still matters, but I was hoping that I could hide my Blackness on the internets. I wanted to sneak into your computers and create rants about society in general. Not from a Black man’s perspective but from a clear thinking man’s perspective. Clear thinking people hold no racial ethnotype. They simply see and understand our world better than others.
The real reason I have wanted to shed the notion of Blackness is because it describes a second class citizen in American society. Poor = Blackness. Undereducated = Blackness. Criminal = Blackness. Victim = Blackness. There is nothing good in the American diaspora that Blackness represents except maybe popular music, but even then I find that pop music has to exist in one of the sub-categories listed above.
Trying to change how people think of the words they use has been too difficult a task to implement. Therefore I choose to simply bow out of the entire racial blogosphere. You won’t see any banners posted here about DP Dot Com winning the Black Weblog Awards. Thankfully, we weren’t even nominated. Unlike OhWord, which is definitely a bigger and Blacker weblog than DP Dot Com.
you know, Beastie Boys can get corny but this line MCA said once has stuck with me.. something about having to fill out an application and selecting other in the “race” field and writing in “human”
but then again, I’m a cracka ass cracka, and a Polack too boot!
I dig what you’re saying D, but fit the sake of getting some discussion here –
Your blackness has shaped your perception of America and even in the most lucid moments of clarity, the views on that subject have been shaped in some shape or form in your racial identity. I totally understand the direction of not having every aspect thought and expression on the blogosphere be “colored” (pun intended) by being “colored”. But in the society that is America to cast off race is arguably harded than going androgynous.
However I don’t think thats a bad thing. I think we are moving to a point in life where your identity doesn’t end with your melanin content, for its just the cover of a more complex and lengthy novel. In fact I think the embracing of my race often provides a rudder for dealing in the expansive diverse world out there. I’d like to think I don’t clutch my blackness like a security blanket, but I think being “unapologetically black” isn’t necessary a thing of militance, racism, or prejudice. Basically its like “I’m black, and?” If the depth (or lack thereof) is limited to that surface tonality, then any of the post-racial thinking is for naught.
I think the challenge is to break open the societal pigeonholing of what is “black/blackness”. Its a challenge to ourselves and to non-blacks as well.
Hey, when u jus bullshytin check out my shyt…
http://onlyifitslyrical.blogspot.com/
My site ain’t winning any “Black” Weblog Awards anytime soon, either (no Schooly D). How many Black websites have authors looking forward to seeing “The Brothers Bloom”, “Choke” and “Appaloosa”?
Whatever man! © Redman
One.
DP – I like diversity, and I’ll read and enjoy your blog no matter what!
Hey….you saw the “Black in America”special on CNN right? You aren’t really black…..you are “black-ish”. You don’t fit all of the stereotypes.
Eff the black weblog awards. You don’t need validation. You have a loyal crew of readers that check in on you everyday.
I tried to end my blackness…but then i found out everything i did was called “what black people do” and gave up.
but its a nice discussion, ex. like UK calls it Black Music and we call it Hip-Hop…never got that
TRILLAAA!!!!!!!
First of MOTHER-fucking-ALL, Black is the new Black bitches. And co-motherfucking-sign Candice. Fuck them niggas from the south side!
wait…this is(was) a black website?
Reporter: Do you consider youself a “Black” Painter?
Basquiat: Nah, man I use lots of colors not just black.
we too black for the innanet
I think Fanon would agree with you, but I’m not sure DuBois and Ralph Ellison would. It comes down to that old question of whether or not there is a “good” Blackness. I think that there is a Black modern archive that is extremely rich and “good”. After all, look at how many white people are drawn to hip-hop for example. Sure, they mis-use it and mis-interpret it a lot of the time, hell, maybe ALL the time, but there is an undeniable fundamental energy that no “white” music has, a human element that connects with everyone. Blackness is filled with human richness I think, and that’s something to be proud of in my opinion.
^Amadeo, great quote.
Poor, Undereducated, criminal does not equal blackness. We don’t own the patent on those traits. As a demographic the picture is not so great, but blackness is so much more.
Blackness is “like satin and velvet made flesh.” – Susan Crain Bakos