To begin the change with this post, though, strikes me as being a big old cop-out, the intention of which would be to separate myself from the “racist” label. And with what I need to muddle through right now, I’m afraid that I need to keep that label as close to me as I possibly can.)

So now I have seen the film, and have a renewed energy for finishing the book. Not because I’ve fallen in love with the story, but because I need to wade through layer upon layer of confusion. I don’t even know where to begin to process this, although I do know enough to know that my gut instinct, wanting to talk through it to (and at the expense of) my blak friends, is the wrong way to go. I am sure I will still do it, but at least I will feel guilty about it. :-/

There has been so much talk about the film, and I have read all kinds of commentary about its message. Even if I hadn’t, though, I have been in this anti-racism work for too long to be able to go into it expecting to be able to see it as a “nice story”. I am accustomed to questioning everything, and in particular, I am increasingly hypersensitive to movies about black folks that prominently feature a white hero.

Now here’s the weird part. I don’t think that this movie had anything to do with black women.

Yes, I know, the premise of the book was that this white woman wanted to tell the black women’s stories, to give them a voice. And I know that the storyline was intended to bring out many of the nuances of 1950′s American apartheid, so yes, I get it that race was prominent here. But what I really saw in the film (we’ll see how different the book is) was the way that people can live in the midst of something that is so morally reprehensible and yet not be willing to stand up for what is right. The real story here is not the two or three “good” white people who dared to stand up for these women, but the dozens upon dozens (and historically, thousands upon thousands) who stood by and let such pure evil continue, and for such trite and morally bankrupt reasons. It is a story of betrayal of the worst kind . . . of women turning their backs on the most real relationship they have in order to save face in front of a heartless bunch of shallow wenches.

The question that came through the loudest for me, the thing I am wrestling with, is this: In which areas of my own life am I complicit in evil and doing everything in my power to justify my refusal to do what is right? Katrina Browne, the writer and producer of Traces Of the Trade, has asked this question in her own context, but it’s the piece of this that is most troubling to me. What am I lying to myself about?

The “easy” answers include things like buying clothing made in sweatshops, or eating fruits and vegetables that I have paid impossibly low prices for because the people who labor to bring these foods to me are not paid a living wage. And I can engage in all sorts of self-deception. I have to eat, right? I have to wear clothes. And anyway, the problem is too big for me to address . . . it’s just how things are . . . the extent to which we can justify our complicity in the face of so much injustice is beyond what I can fathom.

I want to believe that i am a Skeeter; it helps sustain my frenzied denial of what I know in the deepest recesses of my heart to be true, that I have the heart of a Hilly. Feel-good movie? Not for me, and not for anybody who wants to be honest with herself.

The elderly lady smiled at Elijah and asked him this seemingly innocuous question. I am certain that she had no idea how complicated this question actually was. I watched him, wondering what he would say. Most of the time lately, he will say, “I’m Moo-Moo” (TiTi Lena’s nickname for him from the start). When I call him “Elijah”, the name I’ve been calling him since before he was born, he answers to that name. But on this day, he turned to the woman and said, “Cecil*”.

And my heart sunk. Because yes, his name is Cecil. Cecil Elijah Davis (“Jr. III”, but that’s a story for another day).

Before he was born, Sara and I had managed to talk Mona into reversing the order of his names. Instead of Cecil Elijah, we had her convinced to call him Elijah, with Cecil as his middle name. “All of your other boys have names from the Bible”, we told her. And then there was what we didn’t say – that the Cecil he was to be named after was nowhere to be found. It was Elijah’s aunties who brought Mona to and from her doctor’s appointments in those long two and a half months between the time she found out she was pregnant and the time Elijah arrived. We were the ones who took her to her weekly non-stress tests. We were the ones who encouraged her to eat correctly when her diabetes was raging out of control. When the doctor told Mona, “We have to keep an eye on things because we don’t want your baby to be stillborn”, I was the one who had to ask her, “Mona, do you know what ‘stillborn’ means?” I almost came to blows with a friend of Mona’s who was goading her into mocking my assertion that hers had been a high-risk pregnancy, because I knew. I knew, because I was there.

A few days before the baby was born, Cecil Senior (who himself is also Cecil Junior; there’s a whole lotta “unclear on the concept” going on here) strode back onto the scene, with that toothpick dangling from his mouth and that creepy, controlling demeanor. When we wanted to visit Elijah in the step-up NICU,  we were not permitted to enter without him (or Mona) accompanying us. Nothing we had been through together mattered at that point. We were out, and he was in, and so was the new name. Baby Elijah was now Baby Cecil. (This was also the point at which I started calling the father “FOTY”, for “Father of the Year”, because he swaggered in acting like he was in charge and feigning great interest in the baby’s health issues while he was in the step-up NICU).

It’s been almost three years, and I’ve gone on calling him Elijah without giving it a second thought, until recently. By the time the above conversation occurred, this had already been nagging at me for a while. Part of the issue is that FOTY is in the picture to a much greater extent these days, and although I still feel like I need to wash myself in bleach every time I interact with the man, I have to begrudgingly admit that Elijah seems to do well with him. And although he’s never said a word about it, I am almost to the point where I feel like I’m being disrespectful by not calling the child by his given name in the presence of his namesake.

I think the hardest thing for me, though, is hearing my beloved Elijah refer to himself by this other name. When I ask him, “Who’s Elijah, then?” he points to himself . . . he knows that this is the name that Aunt Sara, Aunt Lorraine, and everybody in our circle calls him. But when he is talking more, and going into more and more situations where people will call him by his “real” name, I am starting to seriously question how I should handle this.

I can’t call him Cecil. I just can’t do it. He is, and always will be, “Elijah” to me. But I don’t know what to do about everybody else. When I signed him up for nursery at church, I listed his name as “Elijah”, and so his name tag does not say “Cecil”. I find myself waiting for the day when FOTY will show his true colors and fly into a rage about this, demanding that the name be corrected, and while I don’t think that avoiding a scene is a good enough reason to give in, I find myself more and more wondering what the “right” thing to do really is in this situation.

I know he’s not my child. But I don’t know what to do. What is the right thing to do in this situation? How can I be fair to his biological father while still acknowledging that I, too, am a part of his life, and that he has never been anybody other than Elijah to me?

What would you do if you were in my situation?

(*pronounced “Sea-sill”, not “Ses-sill” as in B. De Mille)

I’m glad that this white father of an African-American daughter is conscious of these issues, and cares about his daughter’s self-image. Still, I long for the day when we as white people will stop feeling like we get to be the ones to give black women ‘permission” to call the hair God gave them “beautiful” . . .

I was in the food court at the mall, and because I was still recovering from my ankle surgery last year, I was maneuvering with the help of Speed Racer. Sara had Elijah and was getting herself settled with him, and I was trying to get Chinese food and make my way back to the table. Yes, on one leg and while trying to maneuver a tray of food.

An African-American woman at the next counter over saw me struggling and had compassion on me. She told her son (who was about 9 or 10) to come over and offer to help me, which he did.

I was not paying attention to my surroundings, as usual, and so did not notice this sweet young man coming up to me until he was right next to me. When I realized he was trying to speak to me, I jumped . . . as I was trying to get his words to translate from my ears to my brain (something I tend to have trouble with under any circumstances), I looked at him with a panicked, forced smile and shook my head while sputtering something like, “no, thank you, I’ve got it, but I appreciate the offer”. I think I then said something about how I was shaking my head “yes” while saying “no” with my mouth–something like, “I know that I’m shaking my head the opposite of what I am saying”–but I don’t know. maybe I’m not remembering that part correctly.

I know I am remembering the forced, automatic and fake smile, though. My facial muscles still ache with self-condemnation every time I think about it.

I have so many excuses for why I jumped out of my skin when he approached me. Primary among those is the fact that having both ADHD and PTSD means that I both zone out easily and startle easily. One of my coworkers, after having seem me react that way one time too many, has taken to using very deliberate footsteps when she approaches me. I hate when I am jumpy like that, because it is never in any way the fault of the person who has (unintentionally) startled me, but people quite often take it personally.

But I have no excuse. This sweet, polite young man had absolutely no  reason to interpret the look of terror in my eyes, combined with the fake, plastered smile and meaningless words, as anything other than what I fear it really was.For this young man, and for his mother, my personal history was not even a factor. I am certain that they could only assume I was reacting in that over-exaggerated way because of a fear or a distrust of black men. How could it be interpreted any other way?

I still wish to this day that I had gone back to them and said something. I sometimes fantasize that I’ll somehow run into them again and will be able to make my apology, even though I barely remember what they looked like anymore. And I don’t want to give a complicated justification for my actions–”It’s unconscious–it’s a learned response”, blah blah blah, shut up, Lorraine . . . I just want to tell him how very, very sorry I am.

All I know is that in that moment, I wounded the heart of that little boy, and somehow sent the message that, no matter how many kind things he might do in his life, that there are always going to be white women reacting in unfounded fear at the very sight of him. And as I sat down for dinner with my own precious brown-skinned godson Elijah sitting next to me, my heart broke at the thought that he too will grow up in a world where people will instinctively and automatically jump in fear when they see him coming . . . even if he is the sweetest little boy in the world, and even if he comes with the most altruistic of motives . . . because at the end of the day, the inheritance we’ve all carried down through the years is one of mistrust, of irrational fear, and of unconscious, yet immediate judgments based on appearance.

I do not want Elijah to have to face the reality that I subjected this boy to . . . this young man who only wanted to be helpful, but who got only disdain and disrespect in return.

I can’t go back to that day and change my actions . . . all I can do is to continue to fight this monster of racism that rears its ugly head so often. I owe it to that young man to do so. I owe it to Elijah. And I owe it to myself, because this below-the-surface racism is a poison that needs to be eliminated from my body, mind and soul.

I’m so sorry, young man, wherever you may be. I’m sorry that you have to face a world filled with people like me. But I have to thank you as well, because your kind gesture taught me so much more than you will ever know.

This blog post captures so much of how I feel about international adoption, even though I have considered it myself. If I do ever pursue adoption, I pray that I will have the courage to ask myself the questions that this writer poses, and to look honestly at the answers. I KNOW that I would surround myself with people who could hold me accountable to respecting my child’s original culture.

You should read the whole post, but if you don’t, here’s an excerpt:

Let me try another analogy. Let’s say you live with your child in a house that burns down. You’re dazed, confused, and burned. Your neighbor says, “I think I should take care of your child”. You say, “Thanks for your offer. But my child really needs me now, and I think they wouldn’t sleep well in a strange house. If you could just give us a tent and some food and some bandages so we can camp out while I get better and look into rebuilding, we’ll be OK.” Your neighbor says, “that’s too logistically complicated and I’m concerned about the security situation. I just want your child.” You say, “Thanks again for your concern and I’m grateful for any help you can give me. If you’re so worried about my child, maybe you could let both of us stay in your guestroom for a while? That way my child could be safe and would sleep well too.” Your neighbor says, “No, we have an interdiction-at-sea policy and visa restrictions will not be relaxed. Just give me your child. Actually, nevermind. I don’t even need your permission anymore. I’ll just take them.”

Think about  it . . .

I already knew some of the history of how Haiti came to be. I also knew that the country has struggled mightily ever since. And while my local “Christian” radio station opined that the  DR has prospered where Haiti has failed because the former is a “Christian” country, I was more inclined to believe that the difference in skin color had much to do with it. I also couldn’t shake a nagging sense that there has been a “get back in your place, boy!” kind of attitude on the part of the white, Western world towards a black people that would dare assert that justice and freedom ought to be their birthright.

So I had to do some reading . . . and I found this article.

The part that took my breath away was this paragraph:

Haiti’s vulnerability to natural disasters, its food shortages, poverty, deforestation and lack of infrastructure, are not accidental. To say that it is the poorest nation in the Western hemisphere is to miss the point; Haiti was made poor–by France, the United States, Great Britain, other Western powers and by the IMF and the World Bank.

I want to read more . . . I want to educate myself further. Yes, please give to relief efforts, choosing wisely as you do . . . but stop and ask yourself just how we got here . . . not the earthquake itself (which was NOT God’s judgment on anyone!), but the tenuous infrastructure of a nation ill-equipped to face such a disaster.

We cry at pictures now . . . we whip out our cell phones and send ten dollars their way . . . but are we looking at ourselves? At our nation, and its role in paralyzing Haiti up until this point?

Not easy questions . . . but I will continue to wrestle with them, and I hope you will join me.

Seriously, though . . . I haven’t seen Avatar, though I’ve heard much about it. I did see The Blind Side, and went into it quite reluctantly, knowing that I wouldn’t be able to turn off my “anti-racism radar”. I was actually pleasantly surprised by a few things:

1) The mom took him shopping in HIS neighborhood for clothes. a) she wasn’t all, “EEK!!! THE INNER CITY!!!” b) even though his fashion style didn’t match the “norm” at their school (which crazily reminded me of NorthPointe), she let him be who he was in that sense.

(in contrast, when 20/20 covered the story, they included a story about a young man who “could be the next Michael Oher“. I about punched a hole through my tv screen when they said that this kid moved in with a white family because “they couldn’t bring him home to his neighborhood after football practice”. If you can’t go where he lives, then you have no business being in his life!)

2) There was definitely evidence in the movie (and this was confirmed in a 20/20 interview with the parents) that Michael Oher gave them as much as, or more than, they gave him. Although I wished that the 20/20 episode would have delved deeper into that*, and into the whole issue of the white folks being the “saviors” (another friend of mine pointed out that none of the black people in the film were shown in a positive light), I was glad to see at least that much acknowledged.

*they had the black journalist interviewing the family, but there didn’t seem a willingness to really go deeper into these issues. It was kind of, “don’t you think people will say, ‘why are you rescuing the black kid?’ and the mom saying, “It’s about love” and that was it. Okay, that might be a paraphrase.

but ANYWAY . . . Soong Chan Rah has expressed this much more eloquently than I have, so check out his thoughts on the two films.

A Christian publisher, Zondervan, apparently released a men’s book recently that had some pretty overt and stereotypical Asian content. Apparently the title of the book played off of this cluster of stereotypes, and to add insult to injury, the marketing campaign went even further.

A handful of Asian-American bloggers challenged both Zondervan and the book’s authors about the hurtful nature of these stereotypes. The part that really caught my attention was when Zondervan CHOSE TO DO THE RIGHT THING–they acknowledged that they had been wrong, and pulled the books. ALL of the books. (doing the right thing is usually not cheap, either.)

I read the blog entry of one of the people originally involved in the conversation about this, and found this blogger to be gracious, kind, and extremely generous to the authors. He had actually already reached out to one of the authors, and was hoping he would be able to meet the other one. Having come into this debate very late in the game, my sense was that this man was a complete gentleman and extremely gracious despite the pain that this incident had caused him.

I was almost in tears for Zondervan’s act of bravery, blown away by the fact that they had admitted their sin and had enough courage to remedy the situation. It was one of those moments where I felt a glimmer of hope for the future of the church, when for a brief moment, I wasn’t quite as weary on this journey as I so often am.

And then I started reading the comments on this gentleman’s blog . . . and as I did, that hope I had felt began to fade.

White (I’m assuming) Christians, oblivious to their white privilege and to the offense that had been caused in this situation, were spewing accusations TOWARDS THIS BLOGGER and towards the other Asian-Americans involved in this conversation. I usually don’t read more than a handful of comments, but I think I read almost 2/3 of them this time.

The accusations were ugly. Not only had these meddling Asians caused Zondervan to cowtow to the secular god of political correctness, they had also surely cost the salvation of millions of (purportedly white) men whose lives had been changed by this ministry. (Because Jesus is incapable of changing men’s lives without the help of one particular book/website?)

Oh, and also–the Asians made the Body of Christ look bad because they had dragged this all out in the public square, where millions of non-Christian Facebookers and Tweeters would see how horribly divided the Christians were.

(might the non-Christian world not instead be amazed by the testimony of humility and grace displayed in the resolution of this situation? And at any rate, I don’t think we have the option anymore in the 21st century to NOT be in the public square when it comes to social media. and one more thing–it’s my understanding that a bunch of people were Tweeting about what a stupid decision Zondervan had made . . . is THAT glorifying God?!)

I was flabbergasted by this backlash, until I remembered that the thing that keeps racism going is its invisibility. I was watching the wages of white privilege unfold right before my eyes. We white folks don’t get it–and we don’t NEED to get it. We are not “the other”, and that “other” makes an extremely convenient target when we don’t want to look at ourselves.

I know that I have a problem following up when it comes to this type of thing, but I really want to write to Zondervan and tell them how thrilled I am that they chose to do what was right, even at such a great cost (and I am speaking of more than the financial cost).

The reaction to this is proof positive that we have so far to go in fighting this disease of racism . . . and though I rejoice in small victories, I am still sometimes so overwhelmed by the seemingly never-ending road that we still have to travel.

My prayer is that more and more people and organizations will have the courage to do what Zondervan did–to admit to their blindness to the racism that wounds our brothers and sisters in Christ, and to take steps towards seeing, even when that seeing is painful.

But I was reminded again today of how insidiously racism has been woven into the fabric of our nation . . . and how easy it is for us in the 21st century to remain ignorant of our nation’s history . . .

Here’s an excerpt from the book  1904 World’s Fair: The Filipino Experience by Jose D. Fermin:

A driving force behind the 1904 fair, as well as with other major U.S. expositions during this approximate period, was America’s belief in the racial superiority of whites over darker peoples. By publicizing the supposed backwardness of nonwhite races for all the world to see, the 1904 fair organizers were able to translate the United States’s national and global accomplishments into grounds for acknowledging the transcendance of Caucasian races over their “colored” counterparts. Fermin writes in his book that “In measuring their technological achievements and national progress against those of other nations, Americans laced the fairs with racism.” Hence, they “considered themselves above the nonwhite peoples of the world and regarded them with a negative and demeaning attitude.”

It’s true that these “expeditions” were meant to showcase the best of the USA, and to foster pride in our nation, but even admirable steps (like the film at the 1964 World’s Fair, To Be Alive!) were hardly enough to erase a few hundred years’ worth of negative stereotyping.

(Ah . . . interestingly, the 1964 fair in NY was not an “official” World’s Fair. who knew?! It also seems like it was bogged down by lots of bureaucracy. In NYC?! no way!!!)

So what do you think? Were you aware of the history behind the 1904 World’s Fair? Is there something else you learned in school that you have since learned was wrong? (hint: the answer to that last question is “yes”–and if it’s not, then you just haven’t explored enough just yet!)

but I recommend that you watch this video . . . or this one.  (I can’t embed here, unfortunately.)

or if you want more information, you can read this.

So was any of this a surprise to you? thoughts?