Over the past few days, I\u2019ve read a variety of responses to Gaye Clark\u2019s Gospel Coalition article. I\u2019ve also read a lot of discussion about her article. The main point comes down to this\u2014by treating her daughter\u2019s interracial marriage as a struggle she had to face while stating adamantly that she is not and never has been racist, by treating her daughter\u2019s fianc\u00e9\u2019s blackness as something she had to overcome or stop seeing, and by suggesting that we shouldn\u2019t call Uncle Fred a racist because that would be too mean, Clark (unintentionally) reinforced the idea that blackness is inferior and that white people\u2019s comfort is more important than black people\u2019s humanity.<\/p>\n
Many people wondered, when reading Clark\u2019s article, what her black son-in-law, Glenn, would have to say of all this. What would this article have looked like written by him, rather than by the mother-in-law who had to stop seeing him as a black man\u2014as those his very identity was a problem\u2014before she could welcome him into her family? In light of this question,\u00a0I want to take this moment to highlight a number of the responses I\u2019ve read by African American\u00a0bloggers.<\/p>\n
The first piece<\/a> was written by Roni Dean-Burren, an African American woman blogger, activist, and educator. Here\u2019s an excerpt:<\/p>\n For years I prayed for the young woman who would marry my son.\u00a0 I asked to L-RD to make her funny, beautiful, smart, healthy, fertile and able to put her foot in a good pot roast and mustard greens!<\/p>\n I prayed hard! I\u2019d stand outside his door at night \u2013 smelling the stench from his very boy room \u2013 and I\u2019d pray for all the aforementioned traits \u2013 and pray that she knew how to use febreze because LORDT this boy could stink up a space.<\/p>\n I\u2019m sorry I digress.<\/p>\n But I prayed for her. I really did!<\/p>\n And because I believe G-D is a Black woman with a wicked sense of humor who loves to throw all kinds monkey wrenches in my plans \u2013 just so I can look up at Her and say , \u201cGIRL, you play too much\u201d \u2013 I should have known that She was going to play an epic joke on me!!!<\/p>\n This 53-year old mother, activist, professor, coon-buster, Black feminist and petty professional clapbacktivist did not count on G-D sending a white girl with limp hair named Rebecca.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Click through to read the whole thing<\/a>! What I love about Dean-Burren\u2019s piece is how obvious flipping the script makes the problems with Clark\u2019s original piece.<\/p>\n Then there\u2019s Sean Palmer\u2019s piece<\/a>. Palmer is more gracious than Dean-Burren, but pushes forward\u00a0nonetheless.<\/p>\n Most people don\u2019t think they\u2019re racist. Majority cultures define racism as clear animosity toward and determined detrimental behavior toward other races. We don\u2019t think of our implicit racial associations as racism. We\u2019re not racist when we move houses, schools, or churches to be \u201cgood neighborhoods.\u201d We just want the best education for our kids! We\u2019re not racists when we see escalating racial disparities in law enforcement or prison sentencing or economic gaps.<\/p>\n We assume there must be something behind all of this. That\u2019s not as easy to do when \u201cthose people\u201d are going to be at Thanksgiving dinner. Listen. It\u2019s okay to say, \u201cI was racist and didn\u2019t realize it. This event stirred something inside me that I\u2019d had the privilege of simultaneously ignoring and denying.\u201d<\/p>\n We are made better by confessing our sins rather than concealing them.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Bryan Loritts, a\u00a0black\u00a0evangelical pastor, pushes further<\/a>.<\/p>\n Since Ms. Clarke takes us back parenthetically to 1967, maybe I should begin there. \u00a0This was the year the landmark film, \u201cGuess Who\u2019s Coming to Dinner\u201d came out. \u00a0As you know this was to many a scandalous work, diving headlong into the subject of interracial marriage, as Spencer Tracey (It would be his last film) and Katherine Hepburn\u2019s San Francisco based characters are thrust into the subject, when their daughter comes home with a black man (played by Sidney Poitier). \u00a0After initial shock and hesitancy (especially on the part of the dad), they come around and finally embrace him, and you\u2019re left in awe of this\u00a0\u201ccourageous and progressive\u201d white couple who would stand so big while stooping so low as to accept a black man. \u00a0Think about it- in 1967 a mark of being what we would now call progressive, is accepting a black person. \u00a0So once the final credits roll what are we left thinking? \u00a0Oh those great and wonderful white people. \u00a0Boy isn\u2019t that big of them to accept us. \u00a0They\u2019re the real protagonist\u2019s, the real heroes, of this story.<\/p>\n And\u00a0that\u2019s exactly how I felt reading Ms. Gaye Clark\u2019s article. \u00a0Now whether or not she meant to do that is not the point. \u00a0I fully believe this was not her intention. But I can\u2019t help it, there is just an air of arrogance and paternalism here. \u00a0One can easily leave thinking,\u00a0\u201cWell isn\u2019t that just kind and big of her. \u00a0This white woman accepting this black man, dreads and all?\u201d \u00a0It\u2019s this subtlety that actually undermines Ms. Clark\u2019s purpose. \u00a0Instead of trying to fight against inequality, she actually entrenches it by unintentionally posturing herself as the Katherine Hepburn of this modern day,\u00a0\u201cGuess Who\u2019s Coming to Dinner\u201d.<\/p>\n \u2026<\/p>\n If I were to give Ms. Clark a mulligan, I\u2019d want to see more humility from her. \u00a0I\u2019d want her to put pen to the culturally conditioned consternation that was in her soul that lead to her surprise when Glenn came to her home for dinner. \u00a0Why were you surprised and implicitly filled with an initial angst? \u00a0What forces were at work in your own experience that made this even a significant issue for you? Oh yes they were there for you, just like they are for all of us. \u00a0I want to hear more about that. \u00a0Pull us into that pilgrimage.<\/p>\n And, given the reformed undertones of her article, which I love by the way, shouldn\u2019t Ms. Clark\u2019s\u00a0\u201cBig God Theology,\u201d lead to a robust anthropology. \u00a0She writes of accepting Glenn as if it was a part of God\u2019s permissive will and not his perfect will. \u00a0I mean she actually talks about the need to rejoice in the trial. \u00a0Is that what we are now? \u00a0A trial? \u00a0Seen in this light, her eight pieces of advice seem more like strategies in how to cope with some incurable forms of arthritis- you know something you can\u2019t get rid of, but you can take something to make you more comfortable with this less than ideal situation. \u00a0Oh how my heart breaks.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Read Loritts\u2019 full piece<\/a>! He doesn\u2019t save any\u00a0punches.<\/p>\n\n