She wrote:
"History, what do blacks know about history. After all, your always making yours up as you go along. Taking credit for things you did not create or invent. All you act like only blacks, made history, but guess what most blacks don't really have much history, unless they make it up, which they do all the time."
I can only imagine the conviction with which the statement was written. One shouldn't laugh at sheer ignorance, but some things call for that "Oh, poor thing" kind of laugh you experience when a toddler, with a straight face, strings together completely unrelated words and believes he, or she is making sense.
"History, what do blacks know about history. After all, your always making yours up as you go along. Taking credit for things you did not create or invent. All you act like only blacks, made history, but guess what most blacks don't really have much history, unless they make it up, which they do all the time."
I can only imagine the conviction with which the statement was written. One shouldn't laugh at sheer ignorance, but some things call for that "Oh, poor thing" kind of laugh you experience when a toddler, with a straight face, strings together completely unrelated words and believes he, or she is making sense.
As the daughter of an English teacher, the comment was scary enough, but I admit the grammar and sentence structure made me cringe, too. My laughter, however, didn't last long.
It was followed by a little sadness as I thought about my old "They Had A Dream" scrapbook (filled with the biographies of noted Black pioneers in every field of study.) I thought to myself, "She truly really believes what she wrote. Perhaps, in order to feel good about herself at all, she HAS to believe it".
I thought about something my grandmother used to say, "Don't pay them no mind. They don't know any better."
The Houston-based rant continued with the following:
"I got news for you. There are a huge number of blacks today, who think blacks use the race card way to much. I will say it to you, like I have said it before. Blacks are just as racist as anyone else. The difference is, we admit it, but blacks refuse to look at their own communities and see it in themselves. Look close because it is there."
Don't you love it when someone endeavors to speak for you when they have no clue about your experience, other than their oppressive role in it?
The Houston-based rant continued with the following:
"I got news for you. There are a huge number of blacks today, who think blacks use the race card way to much. I will say it to you, like I have said it before. Blacks are just as racist as anyone else. The difference is, we admit it, but blacks refuse to look at their own communities and see it in themselves. Look close because it is there."
Don't you love it when someone endeavors to speak for you when they have no clue about your experience, other than their oppressive role in it?
Readers wasted no time berating the proud daughter of Confederate ancestry, and questioning her schooling, and values.
One reader identified her as "a sheet wearing creature of the 18th century", another suggested she read her Bible, while another decided against replying altogether.
Undeterred, the writer pressed on with her take on Serena and Venus:
"The problem is she has not win, any big matches in over a year. She and her sister are not listed in the top 10 or even the top 20 anymore. That is the problem. Her career is almost over and she is in panic mode."
(Again with the grammar, hearkening for the days of the red ink pen. *sigh*)
I was born in Louisiana, and am the daughter of an eighty-four-and-a-half year old Black man. I have seen, experienced, and heard countless stories of overt and covert racism all of my life. I now understand the fear-based nature of it; the selfishness and desperation of it.
Undeterred, the writer pressed on with her take on Serena and Venus:
"The problem is she has not win, any big matches in over a year. She and her sister are not listed in the top 10 or even the top 20 anymore. That is the problem. Her career is almost over and she is in panic mode."
(Again with the grammar, hearkening for the days of the red ink pen. *sigh*)
I was born in Louisiana, and am the daughter of an eighty-four-and-a-half year old Black man. I have seen, experienced, and heard countless stories of overt and covert racism all of my life. I now understand the fear-based nature of it; the selfishness and desperation of it.
Some people underestimate God's ability to care for and love us all. They also fear that everything they've ever known has been a lie. The lie has to be maintained because the truth is too difficult to bear. Being wrong is too much to handle.
Saying, "I'm sorry" would be tantamount to poisoning oneself.
Asking, "Will you forgive me?" would be like betrayal.
Laying down the rhetoric and accoutrements of hate would mean an admission of ignorance and evildoing.
*Cue Yai Yai* "You are going to Hell."
When something is so deep and interwoven into the fabric of an individual, it's hard to extract. One becomes comfortable, and feels justified in their ideals and positions.
A hardened heart is a terrible, self destructive thing. It has the capacity to dictate that there is a way that things are supposed to be-- even if resorting to criminal, inhumane behavior are acceptable forms of enforcement.
When righteousness and justice confront and expose perpetuated evil, there is STILL a remnant that longs for evil to remain. That desperate remnant then teaches evil to its children, and the cycle continues.
Even when a person's lot in life is the curb, instilled hatred will cause them to insist that they are better and higher up than their fellow man--especially if that fellow man is of a different ethnicity.
Racism is so alive and well in America. Those who are connoisseurs of it try so hard to camouflage it, but it is just too darned arrogant, loud, and obvious to hide.
The mouth just can't hold back what is abundantly present in an individual's heart.
Hatred is so cunning, that it doesn't even allow a person to hear or filter their own words.
Hatred makes blind fools out of people.
Hatred makes blind fools celebrate and agree with the agendas of other blind fools.
Anyone who says that racism does not exist, or carps about race cards being played has either never experienced it, or is severely deluded. Hatred also cultivates denial.
Racism plagues our president. His election has NEVER been proof that racism is dead. It's just lends credibility to the argument that those who THINK they make up the so-called voting majority selectively forget to TOTAL the numbers of so-called voting minorities.
The idea that a Black man is the President of the United States sticks in the craw of so many people. No matter what he does, someone will find a problem with it--not because he is shiftless, lazy, uneducated, unrefined, rude, profane, irresponsible, or immoral, but because of the color of his skin. It's that skin color that drives bigots crazy. It's a reminder of secrets, lies, and America's great sin. It's a reminder that one look at a family tree may reveal that even they may not be who they think they are.
So many people cannot, and WILL not see past the President's hue to see or hear HIM. He could find a cure for Cancer, end hunger, AND achieve world peace, and some people would STILL only see him as another out of place, uppity nigger who upsets the balance of their world, and flies in the face of everything they were ever taught.
Likewise, in spite of their extraordinary skill, to some people, Serena and Venus Williams will never be more than two black intruders. They may as well keep having fun, shining, and breaking records in places that seemingly want to, but cannot exclude them.
Cocoa hue or not, those women are just phenomenal on a tennis court--whether it's Center Court, Court 2, or the court on the grounds of THEARC on Mississippi Avenue, SE in DC.
Jealousy is one ol' hate motivator! I guess it is possible for a person who longs to run, or hasn't experienced anything outside of their own community or state, to be envious of someone who not only runs, but sprints, leaps spins, lunges, dives, and jumps...and is celebrated worldwide.
Jealousy is one ol' hate motivator! I guess it is possible for a person who longs to run, or hasn't experienced anything outside of their own community or state, to be envious of someone who not only runs, but sprints, leaps spins, lunges, dives, and jumps...and is celebrated worldwide.
I simply HAD to see if the woman commenting from Houston was a REAL person, or just some random bot or hacker looking to start a message board riot. Who knew that bitterness can ooze from a Facebook page right through your computer screen?
I found that her favorite quotation is,
"Live and let live, but don't rub my nose in your life style, or then I get cranky, and tell you to shut the hell up, live your life and leave me alone."
Hmmm. Nice.
"Live and let live, but don't rub my nose in your life style, or then I get cranky, and tell you to shut the hell up, live your life and leave me alone."
Hmmm. Nice.
On her wall, in her OWN rebuke of the inappropriate behavior of someone named "Tommy" (who happens to be white), she wrote the following:
"Stirring the beans to make a good point is ok, but doing it just to get people fighting is unacceptable Tommy; and interrupting people when they talk is WRONG; and telling people they don't know something that happened, and IT'S ABOUT THEIR OWN LIVES, TOMMY is really, really, RUDE and JUST NOT DONE."
The latter portion of her statement leaped off of the screen. It always amazes me when people can't see that THEY are doing the exact SAME thing about which they criticize others! It appears that Jesus and a heart transplant are needed in the worse way.
"Stirring the beans to make a good point is ok, but doing it just to get people fighting is unacceptable Tommy; and interrupting people when they talk is WRONG; and telling people they don't know something that happened, and IT'S ABOUT THEIR OWN LIVES, TOMMY is really, really, RUDE and JUST NOT DONE."
The latter portion of her statement leaped off of the screen. It always amazes me when people can't see that THEY are doing the exact SAME thing about which they criticize others! It appears that Jesus and a heart transplant are needed in the worse way.
Is this the SAME person who wrote the provocative response to Couch's AOL article? It couldn't be!
I read some of the comments on her wall, and realized that much of her incendiary rhetoric has its roots in instability, loneliness, and disappointment. She made sarcastic remarks about Serena Williams' career, but it seems that her OWN career is threatened and has her in panic mode.
When one knows better, one does better.
If one lives ignorance, that's what one learns.
I realized that she can't help how she thinks. She could change if she wanted to, but she doesn't have to, nor does she think she needs to.
A pattern of hatred has probably been in her family for generations. By her own admission she is disabled and wants to get back into nursing. I hope and pray that she does, and needs the assistance a Black person, no, SEVERAL Black people, to help her or her mother very soon. I pray that through the interaction, she realizes that her ignorance and negativity has no merit, and has harmed no one but herself. She may not want my prayers, but I'm praying for her just the same.
The Williams sisters are laughing all the way to the bank. Readers of Couch's article, on the other hand, are defending Venus and Serena's right to play on a spot of land that is probably the size of one of their closets. They are living their dream, and demonstrating the skills they both learned and mastered long ago, no matter WHERE they play at Wimbledon. Even if they were lobbing balls on the parking lot, they're THERE while we, the readers of Couch's article, are sitting at home at our respective computers.
It is pitiful that in 2011, folks get downright irate at the successes of people of color. In 2011 people still would rather demonstrate unbelievable levels of stupidity and reject truth, than to shake off the hateful binds that strangle them.
The Williams sisters are laughing all the way to the bank. Readers of Couch's article, on the other hand, are defending Venus and Serena's right to play on a spot of land that is probably the size of one of their closets. They are living their dream, and demonstrating the skills they both learned and mastered long ago, no matter WHERE they play at Wimbledon. Even if they were lobbing balls on the parking lot, they're THERE while we, the readers of Couch's article, are sitting at home at our respective computers.
It is pitiful that in 2011, folks get downright irate at the successes of people of color. In 2011 people still would rather demonstrate unbelievable levels of stupidity and reject truth, than to shake off the hateful binds that strangle them.
I would love for the History Detectives to research the African-American side of the writer's family. I know quite a few non-white people with a similar surname. I wonder if they are descendants of slaves who took on the surname of their Texas slave master, but, after emancipation, decided to change one vowel? The writer's ancestors were a part of Stephen Fuller Austin's colony in Texas called "The Old 300". Between 1821 and 1823, he established a colony of families along the Brazos River. Of the nearly 1800 people in the colony, almost 500 were slaves. I wonder how many shared the writer's surname, and how many degrees of separation exist between them and the Williams sisters' family? I wonder if the writer is as white as she thinks she is? Maybe she DOES have authority to speak for Black people, after all, because she IS Black (by virtue of plantation shenanigans).
I know. I'm reaching, but I love it when truth, historical records and DNA put a muzzle on ignorance.
Sorry, proponents of hate and fear, but God is STILL no respecter of persons. We ALL can pick up a tennis racket or a BOOK, if we want to, and make the best use of our talents and intellect. We don't have to diminish or deny the accomplishments of others because our own lot in life isn't sunny and bright.
Why put others down, and then wonder why our own elevation--even employment, or good health are elusive?
Play on, Serena and Venus.
Play on, Colored, Negro, Black, African-American People of America.
Some things will never change, however, I have to believe that "in the end, Love wins".
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