I heart Huckabees, err, I mean Obama
I would like to refute Alex's post below by saying that in the three times I watched Obama's speech the fact that we was black hardly ever came up. The fact that he is an incredible orator did. The fact that his speech was all about uniting the country ("The UNITED States of America!") was mentioned. The way that he cuts through the last 30 odd years of misrepresenting liberal values (to the extent that some pundits mistakenly called his speech conservative simpyl because it didn't fit their parody of liberalism) most certainly came up.
The fact that he's black is nice, as it provides a good narrative and hopefully the civil rights landmark of our first black president. Limiting his appeal to that, though, seems like the very soul of racism-lite to me. Most of the liberal blogs I read have referred to him as a "post-racial" candidate. He isn't running on his race in the least. If you listen to his keynote address (I'll watch it with you Alex, it makes me so happy) he talks about his history, but doesn't go into the "as a black man schtick" and even goes so far as to say "there isn;t a white America and a Black America..."
The fact that he's black is nice, as it provides a good narrative and hopefully the civil rights landmark of our first black president. Limiting his appeal to that, though, seems like the very soul of racism-lite to me. Most of the liberal blogs I read have referred to him as a "post-racial" candidate. He isn't running on his race in the least. If you listen to his keynote address (I'll watch it with you Alex, it makes me so happy) he talks about his history, but doesn't go into the "as a black man schtick" and even goes so far as to say "there isn;t a white America and a Black America..."
2 Comments:
No, no, no. I saw Obama's speech and I liked it. And I don't think this poster says anything negative towards Obama himself. I posted his blog entry because of what it says about *how America approaches race* and how Obama's rise will surely expose how we are only interested in white and black. How despite Obama's amazing background, the mainstream media will simply whittle it down to "The black guy who's smart and speaks well." Sort of like how Tiger Woods had to fight to go from from "Great Black Golfer". The blogs (left and right) were great about tackling Obama as post-racial and 21st century. Anything that's "The Future" I like. What I don't like is the bizarrness of the American Identity that this blogger writes on.
Alrighty, that all makes sense. Yay!
I find the whole thing interesting too. Obama himself commented, when someone confronted him about being half black, that (I'm paraphrasing here) "If I were to be arrested the news reports would say 'black man' but since I'm running for senate you find it important to distinguish how much of a black man I am?" Of course he was much more eloquent about it, but the point stands. From a cultural standpoint if you look a little black then you're black, and that's the end of it. But what's the other option? Returning to the days of "mulatos" and "octaroons"?
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