Black Face, White Face

So... this Halloween
I dressed as a white guy, right.
More specifically,
I was Dave Chappelle as Chuck Taylor,
a white newscaster he played on his show.
I had my fake microphone,
my blue blazer,
my chuck taylors on my feet,
my blonde wig,
and of course white facepaint all over my face and neck.

Let me tell you about my experience.
Of course,
my friends, white guys, all liked my costume.
I kinda got the idea from them.
They're all pretty cool.
Then a few white girls came over.
I'm pretty sure I creeped them out,
they didn't look me in the face or even in my general direction the whole time we were in the room.
Then we went out.

When we arrived on the scene,
I received more looks.
People would often see me and immediately look away.
I got a few people who asked me who I was supposed to be.
Because I didn't feel like explaining it all,
I simply said I was a white newscaster.
The person would nod and walk away.
I didn't get any props for more costume.
Well, except from one guy who screamed,
"Hey, you're a white guy!"

I did see one guy in black face,
but it was actually brown.
He was rasta.

When I returned back on campus
and saw a few other friends,
they gave me props for my costume.

I don't know.
I feel like I may have offended the white folks while I was out.
Obviously, I don't care.
It was actually done to see how they would act.
I did put on a stereotypical white voice,
speakin all proper and what not,
commenting on lude acts as a disgrace,
making a few mildly racist comments.
I also danced awkwardly and requested for cous cous to eat.

I was simply performing a sort of modern day ragtag.
If I had seen someone out in legit blackface this Halloween,
I might have wanted to fight,
but I would have gone up to him and interviewed him with my mike.
I really wish I had.

To me though,
one race dressing as another race is just like
a guy dressing as a woman for Halloween.
Is it not?

Obviously, I wanna hear what you have to say on the matter.
Black, white, brown, yellow, red, whatever.
What do you think about someone being something they clearly aren't?
Let me know.

Word.

Current Events

Hello my good dear listeners.
I know some of you are a lil tight,
me not posting to frequently lately.
But November promises to be busier for me than October,
and I always seem to blog more when I don't have time for it.
So expect a flood load of monologues come next week.

But for now,
I thought I'd hit you all with an update.
I think I'm bout to start current events.

As some of you may have noticed,
I hardly ever touch on things in the news lines
or any thing that might pop off on the internet.
But lately, I feel as if I have more of an opinion on things.
Before I just felt as if I wasn't aware enough.
Also, I didn't like to deal with reality.
But I think I'm coming to grips with it.
This isn't to say that you'll see less of my topical rants and works of fiction.
No, it just means that in between
you'll see how I feel on issues that pop up on the day to day.
Thus creating more frequent post.
Haha, I feel like I'm back in 7th grade
when I had to stand in front of the class
and report on some news clippin I found the day before.
...Damn, that means I'mma have to start doing research.
Now I remember why I didn't do the news. Haha.
But yeah, that's all I wanted to let you guys know.
This is only a teaser.
However, below are a few of the best posts
I've published on Facebook while fixing kinks on Blogger.
See you all next week,
and have a reckless yet safe Halloween.

Word.

Why Are All the Black Kids Not Even Eating Lunch in the Cafeteria?

Some of you know the book
"Why Are All The Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?"
It's a good book.
I've started to read it, and it's true.
Allow me to tell a personal account if you will.

Here at Loyola,
we - blacks and other minorites - have a spot.
We all go to this spot to eat lunch or to just hang out between classes.
It's a place of hilarious jokes and free debates
without judgment from any outside sources.
It's a safe haven, if you will.
What happens there usually does stay there,
or at least between us.

However, as of late,
there have been classes held in our place of recreation.
Now, this is fine...
but our place is more of a lounge.
It's not really the place for a class.
The chairs are too comfy and the flat screen tv too inviting. Haha.
These classes are usually held during peak lunch time hours,
thus forcing the minorities to eat else where.

Today was the first time it affected me.
Eating down here in the cafeteria,
where I'm currently at,
is much different.
You don't have the freedom to just wild out and be you;
you feel constricted by your surroundings.
In our lounge, people will come in and out,
providing a wide array of characters.
Down here, you have to search.
Though the search is still easy.
We're all sitting together. Haha.
In fact, I don't see too many other minorities down here...
maybe two or three that usually don't come to the lounge anyway.
I also don't recongize any of the white kids down here,
and I know my fair amount of white kids. Haha.

But I think I see why there are classes in the lounge now.
I think this is a way to force us back into the cafe,
to have us not rely on the lounge as an escape.
We need to learn how to interact with everyone and not exclude ourselves.
Because when we exclude ourselves,
they - the whites - will exclude us themselves because they feel as if we want no part of them. Once we start eating in the cafe together,
maybe we'll start to invite whites..
and then maybe we'll branch off and eat with our new white friends,
while of course still reconnecting to have our occasional wild outs...
much needed ones, I assure you.
Because white kids just don't understand sometimes.

Word.

Case of the Mondays

[typical office space on a Monday morning]

Mary - [peaking over cubical wall] You don't look too good, Jack. You okay?
Jack - Yeah, I'm aight. Just miss this past weekend. It was so good!
Bill - [overing hearing from across the way] Sounds like you got yourself a case of the mondays to me.
Jack - A case of the what?
Mary - Of the mondays. You know, like--
Jack - Oh my God! I have to get to the bottom of this. [runs out of his cubical]
Bill - What's wrong with him?
Mary Ann - [shrugs] Maybe you should follow him.
[Bill looks off into the distance after Jack]
[Jack is in the bathroom now, alone, splashing water on his face]
Jack - How did these mondays develop inside of me? I didn't eat or drink anything out of the ordinary. ...Well, actually...
[scene goes dark and a spot light comes up on a friend]
Friend 1 - Hey, Jack! Bet you won't eat these chocolate covered ants I bought back with me from my trip to Africa.
Jack - But those are a delicacy. Perfectly fine to eat.
[1st spotlight fades as 2nd one rises]
Friend 2 - Hey, Jack! You wanna hit these 6 L.I ice teas with me in a row?
Jack - OKay, that was a bad idea that almost blacked me out.
[2nd spotlight fades; 3rd rises]
Friend 3 - Oh Jack... Why don't you follow me into this room? I've seen how you've been looking at me all night. [she winks]
Jack - And then she took a shot with me before I followed her in and that blacked me out. Did she... did she do anything to me while I was in there... like.... like shove mondays up my... What the fuck are mondays anyway? Ugh! I must still be drunk. Why did I invite my friends over last night?
[the bathroom door opens. It's Bill]
Bill - You okay, man?
Jack - Bill, what the fuck is a monday and how did it get inside me?
Bill - Umm... it's today.
Jack - Obviously it's today, but what is a monday?
Bill - It's today!
Jack - Bill, you aren't making any sense.
Bill - God, that is alcohol on your breath. Here. [hands Jack a mint] A monday is a day of the week. It comes right after the weekend. Today is a monday.
Jack - So how do I have a case of them? [gasp] Are mondays a type of beer, too?
Bill - No, dumb ass. You have a case of the mondays because you miss the weekend so much you seem disappointed it's monday. It's as if you recieved a case of mondays in your mail.
Jack - [stares blankly at Bill] ...oh ok.
Bill - You don't get it, do you?
Jack - I think I want a 30 case of the mondays for lunch.... or should I save it for tonight?
Bill - Go home, Jack.
Jack - Can I take Mary with me?
Bill- That's up to her.
Jack - Cause I don't think I can finish a case of mondays by myself.
Bill - Dammit, I'll go with you. You obviously can't drive anyway.
Jack - I took the bus to work today.
Bill - Well, good for you. Now come on.
Jack - OKay [starts to follow Bill out of the bathroom] Where are we getting the mondays from, though?
Bill - Shut up.

And thus,
a hungover caused by drinking on a sunday night became a case of the mondays.
Case closed.
Word.

Ashamed of the Types of Stereos

I'm really not one to put anyone on blast...
but sometimes it's hard to talk about something without doing so.

So...
let's just say I was at a gathering of mostly black people.
Everyone in the place is either a leader in their own right or a freshman.
I walk through the door and what do I spot not even 5 steps away from the door...
...but fuckin fried chicken.
Fried chicken and a few drinks.
Thank the Lord there wasn't any grape soda..
only orange for my man Kel.
A nigga such as myself just had to shake his head in shame.
It wasn't even in a bucket.
Naw, b.
It was in one of them white styrofoam containers inside a brown paper bag.
Worst of all,
white people came through too.
I was ashamed as shit.
I mean,
yeah I ate some chicken with duck sauce and hot sauce...
but I was still feelin ashamed.
The white kids ate it too,
but I know they was like, "....niggas" in their heads.
But come on, everyone loves fried chicken, right?
Now my good friends [and associates],
why is it that I felt so ashamed of having fried chicken at this gathering of black people?
Have I been conditioned to feel so?
Perhaps yes.
Anytime I see watermelon or fried chicken or rims or anything a black person may want stereotypically, I try to distance myself from.
In all honesty,
I don't really eat fried shit anymore.
My mom stopped frying food around the time I started high school.
But why must I feel ashamed?
Why should we let stereotypes control our lives,
stop us from doing certain things?
We enjoy the things we enjoy.
Simple as that.
I'll still laugh anytime I see a Jamician with a beef patty and pineapple soda,
but I won't critisize them for it...
cause shit...
I love them shits too.

As always,
I open this up to discussion.
Perhaps I can host an in person debate about this issue,
maybe even other topics.
I think I'd like that.
Hmmm....
Word.

Attendance

Hahaha.
Okay, so you know how college kids go to class, right?
And how sometimes they don't go, right?
....I forgot where I was going with that. Haha

But anyway,
I noticed something this week.
Teachers always learn ethnic kids' names faster than white kids' name.
Now, it's not because our names are different.
Ain't no way some old white man is gonna get Shaquisha or Tekino in one shot.
Naw, it's obv cause we don't look like anyone else in the class.
You know that one game Guess Who?
You remember how if you had one of the 2 black people you were fucked cause the other guy knew who you had?
Well that's what teachers do.
They remember a name, let's say Charles, belongs to a black kid.
They'll knock down all the white kids faces, then the ethnic girls.
Then he'll try his luck, get it right, and remember it.
The hardest to get are obviously the white girls.
They're so many of them and they all have similiar features if you group the right ones together.
[and yes, that was another one of my countless stabs at white chicks :-P]

I bring up all this to say this...
Do you now how hard it is for me to skip class!!!???
Even if the teacher doesn't take attendance,
they're gonna notice they're down a blackie.
A white girl can miss a class with a strict attendance taker and still get credit like she was there cause her friend'll say here twice, pointing her head in different direction each time.
[ranting mode cooling down]

I mean,
I guess I understand why attendance is important.
We are here to learn after all.
But let that be up to us.
We're adults.
If we feel like stayin in after a hard hard night, then let us.
Don't make attendance affect our grades.
Our poor tests grade due to the fact that we weren't in class for the notes will hurt our grades enough.

But ey, what do I know?
I'm just some preppy black kid with a new laptop and a lot of free time.
Word.

Affirmative Action

A very good friend and fellow writer of mines posted a status last week that disturbed me a bit.
"MOMENT OF IGNORANCE: white woman, just given birth to a healthy baby girl a few days ago, proclaimed on a christian radio show that she donated $1000 to planned parenthood to help pay for the abortions of "children of color" so that her child would not have to be cheated out of a job by affirmative action. She says she's getting rid of the competition. WOW......Lord, we need you"
Needless to say, I was ready to start a march on Washington after reading that.

Now,
affirmative action has been under debate for a minute now,
mostly by the whites that feel they've been cheated out by a lesser black adversery.
Boo hoo.
As if you all don't make up the majority of the U.S. and the job market,
the good jobs I mean.
You as a people have been groomed to be the best intelligentally.
As far as I know,
up until a couple hundred years ago,
we were groomed to be big and strong.
That's why we domimant sports now. :-P

Not downing my fellow brothers and sister,
no, not at all.
I'm just saying...
I actually do believe the white man's computing power to be better than ours.
Now, that may be part of my conditioning.
How this got in my head, I have no idea.
But it's these sorts of subconcious things that hold us back.

Affirmative action was created to give us a fair shot.
Cause head to head, the higher percentage of kids with 3.5s all through High School is definitely in the white community.
Us ignorant negros don't know nothing but rap lyrics and new dances. :-/
I'm exgerrating,
but my lack of spelling as seen above is no joke.

Black education systems,
as I've touched on before, are not all too good.
There are exceptions, but still.

We just tryna find a way to come up in life without having to rap or play ball.
Let us play catch us for a bit.
We deserve it.

And to that mother that supported the abortion of colored babies... if I ever see you in the streets, you better find a way to abort me from beating that ass. Viciously. Word.