Race responsibility

Jun 12, 2008

i wrote this children's book and i'm really proud of it. its not compleately edited yet and my illustrator still has some work to do, but for my part its mostly done. my mom asked me about the what race the little girl in the book was. Now she knows good and well with a 98% certainty that it would be a little white girl. how does she know this, she's my mother for gods sake she knows me. Im a Negro by way, thats kinda important to this whole story, and yes i could have just said black but that's not the correct term and its not a slur is analogous to Caucasian. anyway i say "she's white and my mom is like why not make her black, and i'm like (and this is a completely bullshit answer by the way) it's easier for Alex, the illustrator, to draw. and then my mom calls me on my bullshit and says how there are plenty of white kids in books and not as many black children in literature. and this has been a very long set up to the point of this post:

What do you owe your race?

Actually it could be expanded upon using gender, economic class etc. there are many villages from third world countries that take their best and brightest and send them to other countries to become teachers and doctors and scientist so that they can come back to help improve their home village. it's a smart idea and a noble one, and also kinda unfair to those individuals.

if i've had nothing all my life and then sent to a place where i have a lot and have an opportunity to continue this great life, how fair is it that i have to go back to the place with nothing and try to make something of nothing. sure i can do heart surgery in fully equipped hospital after sleeping in a nice apartment with decent food and hygiene; but if you put me back in a poor village where i live in a shack with passable food a wash bucket and a medical kit and a tarp/bamboo operating table, i could probably perform heart surgery on a 12 year old with a heart defect. best case scenario it's a McGuyver surgery, which means they would live, but could never leave the bed or sit up to fast.

yes that was a farcical example but it's to prove a point. many people feel that if you don't come from much or are not the dominate group that is generally positively portrayed, you have an obligation to balance the scale for your people. Now i'm not saying that you shouldn't, if people did not do that i might not even be able to write this post let alone speak freely or consider myself a person instead of property. I'm just saying that if someone doesn't, do not hound them or try to make them feel bad about it.

now why did i choose to make the kid white, it just seem to be the norm, i want to the book to sale and i want it to succeed so i have to opportunity to write more books. And, this is not a lame cop out, i think the story is more believable that way and relateable this way. (hopefully someday you can buy the book and judge for yourself.)

Some people would say "well it's going to always be the norm if no one changes it." and they are absolutely right, but why does it have to be me. hell i already wrote the damn thing if you want to balance the scales so much you do it.

i'm not going to lie i have many issues with my racial identity because i don't fit the mold of what most people or society in general would expect. comments like, "you are very articulate." yes that is not a made up cliche. or you don't sound like you're from the South and i didn't think you would be into that kind of music or You want to see Amelie but it's not in English you know you have to read the subtitles. and it's not from white people its from those of my race as well, more so actually.

most of my friends are white, women and pretty liberal. that's because i find them nonthreatening. for more than half of my life i had low self esteem and trouble opening up. these were the kind of people that i took a chance opening up to and befriended and they made huge impressions on me. sometimes i think too much. my friends alway joke about how I'm a teenage white girl in a black man's body. there not exactly right....its more like an amalgamation of the two. i love sports, action movies, comic books, rough housing and attractive women who will have sex with me, and sometimes just any woman who will have sex with me, the male sex drive evil curse of poor decision making but that besides the point. on the other hand i also love cooking, picking out furniture, making my home smell like spiced apples talking about my feelings and Gilmore Girls. Oh how i love Gilmore Girls. They are AWESOME!

My final point is its hard enough just trying the figure out who the hell you are and achieve something your proud of without feeling like you have a responsibly to use your talents mainly for the good of your people.
Wow....not really sure how i feel about posting this. oh well