Race relations

I love old black women. You know the ones with great words of wisdom who have such a presence about them. How I love to listen to them speak. They just really seem to get it, you know.

I was reading an article about how the general public felt about Rev. Wright’s recent comments to the media and how that is affecting Obama’s campaign. I noticed the article only focused on the opinion of black people. I’m not really offended by that, I just wonder why. I’ve heard that some black people are supporting Obama just because they want a black person in the white house.

I admit this seems backwards to me. Shouldn’t we vote for the person who is going to do the best job regardless of race? But I’m a hypocrite. I don’t know who is going to do the best job. I don’t know if Hilary’s plan for health care is better than Obama’s plan. I don’t know if McCain can pull together the economy or if Obama’s plan to get rid of the lobbyists is a good idea or not. They can talk to me all night long about these subjects, and I still won’t know. I’m not an expert. Most of us are not experts….even if we think we are. I have no idea what the outcome of their policies will be.

I voted for Bush because he said he was a Christian and had Christian values. I’m not a Bush hater or anything, but I fully admit that just because Bush is a Christian, doesn’t mean he makes good decisions for our country. It’s clear that many of his policies and decisions have been bad ones. So, lesson learned, vote for the person who will do the best job. At the same time, a person without those Christian values may make decisions that I don’t agree with. And frankly, I don’t like that.

This brings me to the Wright vs. Obama fiasco. People say we all have friends we don’t agree with. It shouldn’t affect Obama every time someone he knows says something that seems outrageous. I agree. However, this is not just a friend. This is a very influential man who has been Obama’s pastor for over 20 years. A pastor’s sermons greatly influence a person’s spiritual walk with Jesus Christ. Especially when you listen to those sermons for over 20 years. Obama claims to be a Christian. It’s part of his campaign for presidency. If he disagrees with Wright and he didn’t get his spiritual influence from him, then where did he get his spiritual influence? It disturbed me how quickly Obama tried to distance himself from Wright. Why didn’t he stand up for him? It was clear that Wright’s words were taken out of context. Obama’s response made me feel as though he is more concerned about his appearance in the public eye, than in the truth.

But here’s the other thing that I find interesting about this fiasco. Obama doesn’t want to make race a factor in the campaign for the white house. Yet, a lot of black people do. They want to vote for him simply because he’s black. Why? I think it’s the same reason Christians want a Christian in the white house. We want someone who is like us, thinks like us, acts like us.

I admit that sometimes I forget that we’re different. I’m not looking at the color of the skin. I’m looking at the person as a fellow human being, as a friend, as an individual. I know that’s good. But I think it may also be bad.

Being black runs so much deeper than the color of the skin. It’s an entirely different culture. As white people, I think we all know that. Black people often speak differently, act differently, think differently…as a race as well as individuals. But we forget. Or at least I forget. When I’m the only white person in a room full of black people, I admit I feel very awkward and out of place. I don’t know how to act or how to relate. It’s not bad, it’s just different, a different culture, one that I don’t really understand. And that being said, it occurs to me that white people, as a race, expect black people to adhere to who we are as a race, as though we are the standard to follow. We don’t think of ourselves as a race with our own culture. We think of ourselves as “normal.” – the industry standard. As white people, who are we? What identifies us as a race, besides the color of our skin? And how should we relate to others in light of that?