News Commentary: Being Black On A Sunny Day

By Carl Jeffers

The best news about the Professor Gates arrest in Cambridge, Massachusetts and its aftermath is the very fact that it is news -- big news. And I believe that is positive. I think that too many White Americans thought that with Barack Obama in the White House, we could just skate through the next four or eight years without having to deal with this annoying and uncomfortable "race" issue, since Obama as president should quiet those kinds of unsettling issues. I warned sometime ago that I feared that too many black Americans thought that with Barack Obama in the White House, we could just skate through the next four or eight years without having to deal with a lot of "race" issues since his being president would somehow make things better and magically reduce the instances of racially motivated incidents in the country.

Nothing could be further from the truth. From country club swimming pool incidents in Pennsylvania, to "birthers" demanding to see the president's birth certificate because they "want their country back" quoting from one angry white female at a protest meeting, to cartoons about the First Lady with racial overtones, to -- how much time do we have here -- we have seen a nationwide outbreak of incidents that are or imply an extension of racially insensitive and hurtful motivation.

I have a theory about that which I will expound on further in another forum, but let's say it has to do with a society wherein if Americans really like an African-American, they like them more than anyone else -- Oprah, Tiger, Colin Powell, Michael Jordan. If they really don't like an African-American, they don't like them more intensely than anyone else. Right now, more and more Americans are liking Barack Obama less and less (thanks also to some prodding from talk show hosts and agenda driven commentators). Those who like Obama less are now more easily incited to transfer that dislike into racially motivated comments and smears. That's not everyone -- but it never is everyone.

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