I'm just sad

I can't imagine what the United States (or any other) Civil War was like.  I can't imagine what it was like growing up in the segregated South and wanting to end segregation.  I can't imagine being so strongly behind one position while everyone else was strongly for another.  All I can do - all I can do - is speak what is happening now.

It started earlier this week with Ferraro.  Her words were painful to the bone - that Barack Obama wouldn't be where he was if he were a white man or a woman of any color.  That's true - if he were a white man, he'd likely have the nomination sown up.  If he were a woman - it's doubtful he'd be here because let's face it - this is the first time a woman has been in this position and she had a pretty strong headstart.  Any other woman would have been left in the dust.

But to say that he was only where he was - that somehow being mixed/Black with a single parent in this country could help you become President.  Well, it gave me a laugh and I'll be honest - it also made me cry.

I knew then that the racism I see daily was just as strong as it has been.  There aren't lynchings - but then we look back to James Byrd and Jena 6.  There isn't segregation, I'm told, but then we look back at Katrina.  We look at the projects which are killing our youth, most of them Black.  The leaders of the following institutions of America are predominantly white:

-Banks
-Fortune 500 companies
-Military
-Federal Government
-State Governments
-Colleges
-Public schools
-Hospitals
-Police forces
-Real estate agencies
-Media outlets

No one, no one believed that this would be easy or that Barack would escape the racism in America in 2008.  But yet, I didn't think it would come to this.  I didn't think that friends back home in NC would IM me to tell me that Rev. Wright was "white-bashing" (I dared them and you to find a white-bashing passage).  They told me that simply saying that whites led to the situation blacks are in now was racist and we should forget about the past and look forward.  It's hard to look forward with a blindfold around your eyes placed by centuries of rape, murder and torture.

I was told that Barack was responsible because he was supported BECAUSE he was getting past race.  That Rev. Wright just showed everyone that Barack was just another angry Black man.  I must say - I've been to Trinity UCC 4 times now.  Not a single time, not a single time did this light-skinned mixed queer boy get told to leave because I looked white.  Not a single time did the white folks who accompanied me hear white-bashing.  Not a single time did Otis Moss III or Jeremiah Wright say that whites were to blame for anything.  In fact, most of the time, they talked about taking ownership of life and having Black folk make changes in the Black community.

This goes beyond the primary contest, beyond the general election.  This is the front-page of CNN.com, headline story on MSNBC - this is America watching the destruction of a good candidate.  I don't think it's consciously racism.  I do think it's fear.  Fear of what a Black President would mean.  Fear of what it would mean to not have complete power for 4 or 8 years.  Fear that a Black President of the United States will lead to Black CEOs across the board, Black Superintendents, etc etc.  Not an ill-intentioned fear, not a fear out of malice, either.  Just a fear of what has never been experienced.

Tonight, Barack Obama pointed out that he didn't agree with what had been said.  Still, people delight in finding ways to say he did.  Instead of trusting him, they want to believe that he's anti-White so that it confirms their fears.

Only Barack and the campaign know what to do at this point.  Politically, it's a tightrope that he needs to walk and I think and hope he knows that while this matters - what matters more are the millions of people without jobs, healthcare, housing, food and education.  What matters more are the sick and dying and suffering across this land and others.  What matters more is the destruction of the Earth and finding a way to stop it.  But before we can get to what matters more, we need to get past this.  We need to find a way to come together - as hurt and scared and angry and disgusted as we all are.

It hasn't been an easy road and it won't become an easy road.  It hasn't and won't be an easy conversation because we'll be forced to talk about hard and painful truths.  But we must find a way, we must look past our fears and toward our hopes of reconciling this nation.