Jenice Armstrong | Playing racial games

Jenice Armstrong | Playing racial games:

Posted on Wed, Nov. 08, 2006
Jenice Armstrong | Playing racial games THE "BLACKER-THAN- THOU" game. Sometimes it's all about skin color: Who's darker and therefore supposedly closer to his African ancestral roots. Other times it comes down to a round of the dozens in terms of how "down" someone is. In other words, has he lived an authentically black experience? As a kid growing up, were your relatives more like those on "Good Times" or "The Cosby Show"? If your answer is "Good Times," give yourself 10 points. When you're playing the blacker-than-thou game, being from the projects gives you extra street cred. Admit to living in the suburbs or being Republican and, depending on the circle you run in, you can be accused of being elitist, or simply not black enough. I got it just the other day from a male reader who accused me of being "uppity" after I wrote a column saying Flavor Flav's car wreck of a reality show, "Flavor of Love," is racially stereotypical. Racial one-upmanship goes on all the time. Ask any black suburban middle-schooler. At any rate, I'm recalling this disturbing practice in light of a piece I recently read by New York Daily News columnist Stanley Crouch. Now, I'm a fan of Crouch's work. He's progressive, level-headed and has a way with words. But in a recent column he brought up a topic that I really wish he hadn't. It was about Sen. Barack Obama's racially mixed heritage. Obama's mother is white and his late father is African. Crouch wrote, "So when black Americans refer to Barack Obama as 'one of us,' I do not know what they are talking about." Crouch went on to discuss the senator's book "The Audacity of Hope." Crouch wrote that Obama "experienced some light versions of the many negative assumptions based on his color, but he cannot claim those problems as his own, nor has he lived the life of a black American." Crouch's observation is that by virtue of Obama's racial makeup, his experiences haven't been that of the average African-American whose ancestors were slaves. Maybe so, but so what? Who really cares if Obama's experiences more closely resemble that of some West Indian, Africans, Latin Americans or others? When it comes to governing, what difference would that make in terms of what Obama's Middle Eastern policies might be if he managed to make it to the White House? How would his racial makeup address the way that he selects members of his Cabinet? When people go into a voting booth as they did yesterday, they want to know, "who's going to help my situation? Who's going to represent my interests, maybe lower my taxes and improve my chances of getting healthcare?" And as we've seen with the way blacks lined up behind Gov. Rendell instead of the GOP's Lynn Swann, voters can't be counted on to vote for those whose skin color most closely resembles their own. A national Associated Press/AOL Black Voices poll released last week bore this out. In a phone poll of 900 black adults, more than 80 percent said a candidate's race doesn't matter. Nor should it matter how they fare in the blacker-than-thou game. The Associated Press contributed to this report. Have you peeped a hot trend that hasn't been reported? E-mail heyjen@phillynews.com and let me know what you know.

THOU' game. Sometimes

it's all about skin color: Who's darker and therefore supposedly closer to his African ancestral roots.

Other times it comes down to a round of the dozens in terms of how 'down' someone is. In other words, has he lived an authentically black experience? As a kid growing up, were your relatives more like those on 'Good Times' or 'The Cosby Show'? If your answer is 'Good Times,' give yourself 10 points.

When you're playing the blacker-than-thou game, being from the projects gives you extra street cred. Admit to living in the suburbs or being Republican and, depending on the circle you run in, you can be accused of being elitist, or simply not black enough.

I got it just the other day from a male reader who accused me of being 'uppity' after I wrote a column saying Flavor Flav's car wreck of a reality show, 'Flavor of Love,' is racially stereotypical.

Racial one-upmanship goes on all the time. Ask any black suburban middle-schooler. At any rate, I'm recalling this disturbing practice in light of a piece I recently read by New York Daily News columnist Stanley Crouch.

Now, I'm a fan of"