Must We Pit Race Against Gender?

While Ms. Winfrey is making it no secret that she has Sen. Obama's back, her mentor, Dr. Angelou, publicly endorses Sen. Clinton. As a result, much is being made about the significance race and gender are playing in these presidential primaries.

However, is it not extremely problematic to assume that one's politics are based solely on these categories alone? Would it not be the same as asking a person of colour: Are you more loyal to your race or your gender? In the case of Oprah Winfrey and Maya Angelou, the more specific question would be: Are you Black first, or female first?

Is this not a ridiculous question? How would one respond if put on the spot like this?

Well, Dr. Angelou was put on that spot. Having made enormous contributions to both the American Civil Rights Movement and the Women's Movement, CBC's Evan Solomon made sure to ask her where her true loyalties really did lie. But make no mistake, Dr. Angelou made sure to give Solomon some perspective on the true nature of her politics:

SOLOMON: You’re one of the great observers of America. If you were going to say where we’re at now, how would you describe it to me?

ANGELOU: To say where we are today...we are in the throws--and I love the word--in the throws of finding out who we really are…how courageous we really are…how intelligent we really are. Sometimes we’d rather bear the ills we have rather than fly to others, and we know not ours. Sometimes we will vote for the same people our families voted for knowing very well that it hasn’t served us very well.

SOLOMON: You have worked with the great champions of civil rights…

ANGELOU: Yes.

SOLOMON: Malcolm X…

ANGELOU: Yes.

SOLOMON: -- as you say…Martin Luther King. Now there’s a very good chance Barack Obama, a Black man, has a very good chance to become the President of the United States...that Dr. Maya Angelou would see this as the fulfillment of one of the great civil rights dreams, and yet you’ve advocated for Hilary Clinton.

ANGELOU: Yes…I don’t see that as a contradiction in terms. That is to say that I have advocated for the best person. And I admire Mr.…uh…Sen. Obama. I admire him. But I also believe in going out with whom you came in with. Mrs. Clinton has earned my respect, admiration, and even affections over the last twenty years. When she was the wife of the Governor of Arkansas, I liked her then. She came into Arkansas with a fresh voice. And she didn’t try to talk down to anybody. She didn’t try to appease anybody by what she thought they wanted. She was herself. And when she stood up in the after having become a kind of joke, and she stood up. She didn’t argue, she didn’t shout, she just stood up like a woman. I thought, hmmm…If decided to run for anything, I would back her.

SOLOMON: In America, can you take out gender and race from the equation? Or are both of those movements—both of which you’ve been so intimately involved with—crucial factors to consider?

ANGELOU: I’ve taken them out.

SOLOMON: But how can you?

ANGELOU: Well, I’m an intelligent person. I don’t have to follow what is done by other people. I have intelligence and so I act intelligently. What I do, is I don’t say of Ms. Clinton that she is a woman so I support her. No, no, no. I meant she is a full human being so I support her. I support her because I admire her. I admire what she has been…and been to people in our country. Her dreams about health for all Americans are really notable.

SOLOMON: I wonder if you’re old friends, Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, were sitting here and they looked at you and said, ‘We’ve finally have a presidential candidate….’ What would they say to you?

ANGELOU: I think they would say, ‘Good on you, Maya Angelou!’

**[The excerpt was transcribed from Solomon's interview, "Race vs. Gender Politics," that aired on CBC News: Sunday on January 12, 2008. You can watch the full interview HERE.] **

Fumbling Towards Equality

My first experience with racism occurred in elementary school. I was around 8 years-old at the time, and my mom had just dropped me off at the playground before classes started. On my way to the monkey bars, or tire swings, or whatever fit my fancy on that particular day, I heard this grating little voice heckling me from behind. As the voice got closer, I started to get a good look at the chubby kid taunting me, “You’re a n*****!” Honestly, I didn’t really know how to react to this little jerk’s comments. What I should have done, was walk right up to that mini bigot and kick him in the nuts, but alas, hindsight’s only 20/20. I knew he was calling me a really bad name, but I categorized it in the same way a child does for shit, fuck, bitch, etc. So as far as I can recall, the school day carried on like this little occurrence never happened.

That night, I somehow let the whole story slip to my mom. It probably started off like, “Mom, what’s a n*****?” And boy, was she ever PISSED—as in downright LIVID! If I’ve learned one thing in my 26 years on this planet is to watch out when a Filipino mom is angry! Seriously, they are downright scary! Needless to say, we marched right into the principal’s office the very next morning and my mom unleashed the beast. She did such a great job that not only did the little guy get that dreaded phone call home, but I scored an official apology out of the deal. Not a surprise considering I had the world heavyweight mom on my side of the ring.

But I wasn’t going to get off that easily. When I got home from school that day, my mom and I had a little sit-down. And that’s when she basically educated me on how cruel that “N-word” really was—how Black people were once treated like slaves and how that one word symbolized their years of oppression. She obviously gave me the simplified version at the time, minus the lynchings and the rapes and the KKK, but I still got it. But I somehow knew that after learning this dark truth, I would never be the same.

So now, as a Filipina Canadian in her late twenties, that certainly wouldn’t be the last time I’d have to deflect a racial slur. I’ve been called “chink” and “paki” since then, but to me, neither has carried the same weight as the “N-word.” And while I’m obviously not Black, and therefore, truly cannot understand the very magnitude of that word, I am deeply saddened when I think how damaging that experience would be for an 8 year-old Black child. Just to be minding your own business while playing in the playground and then BOOM—some dumb little kid, who probably doesn’t even know what that word means, drops the “N-bomb.” Then what? That dumb little kid gets reprimanded by the school, his/her parents get involved, end of story, right? Unfortunately, the world is a lot more complicated than that.

The bottom line is that hate does not exist in a vacuum. This is pretty obvious. I don’t believe that people are inherently evil and thus become the Hitlers, or Pol Pots, or top Klansmen from birth. It isn’t biology that spreads racism and intolerance, ideologies pursued in ignorance do. And whose minds are the most impressionable of such beliefs? Well our children, of course. We all know that kids are like sponges.

And the problem is obviously not just black or white either. There are Asians who hate Black people, Arabs who hate Asians, White people who hate Aboriginals, and Aboriginals who hate Whites. So what is the reasoning behind such racism? "All Black men are dangerous.” “All Arabs are terrorists.” “All Aboriginals are lazy drunks.” “All White people are racists.” Really sound logic, eh?

But that’s the kind of intolerance that’s easy to see. What about systemic discrimination--the kind of intolerance that often flies below the radar of the PC police? Well, it’s just as insidious. It’s the overrepresentation of Aboriginals in Canadian penitentiaries, while African Americans and Hispanics pack the prisons down South. And it's the disturbing way more than 40 sex trade workers (most of whom being Aboriginal women) went missing from Vancouver's downtown Eastside over the last thirty years--without so much of an RCMP investigation--until only 6 years ago. Like I said, systemic intolerance is insidious.

And while I haven't even touched on the implications regarding religion and borders, this post is already slipping into a state of doom and gloom. So instead, let's see how the glass looks when its half full.

A few years ago I had the pleasure of knowing an amazing youth group, known as Youth Against Racism (YAR), through the Intercultural Association of Victoria. Each of the youth fell between the ages of 12 and 18, and seemed to represent quite the multicultural mosaic which covered the map from China to Haiti to Russia.

YAR's big project during that year was to create their very own documentary. When I say create, these adolescents wrote the script, directed each scene, and starred in the short film aptly entitled, Sifting Through the Layers. And if you haven't already guessed, the film explored the realities of racism as seen through their own experiences.

And was it ever a success! These ambitious youth effectively tackled the complexities of racism and structural discrimination through a powerful commentary that came straight from their hearts. YAR explored the need for cultural visibility in media and pop culture, the distorted racialized messages sent by the beauty industry, and the undeniable power of education. In fact, Sifting Through the Layers has now become a DVD resource package in which teachers and youth workers can facilitate lessons around the subject. Ultimately, this really is a brilliant example of youth empowering other youth.

So as I bring this story to a close, I would like to go off with a bang with the help of Dr. Maya Angelou:

When we come to it

We, this people, on this wayward, floating body

Created on this earth, of this earth

Have the power to fashion for this earth

A climate where every man and every woman

Can live freely without sanctimonious piety

Without crippling fear

When we come to it

We must confess that we are the possible

We are the miraculous, the true wonder of this world

That is when, and only when

We come to it.

--from the last two stanzas of "A Brave and Startling Truth"

Still I Rise--Dr. Maya Angelou

This goes down as one of my favourite poems of all time, written by none other than the great Dr. Maya Angelou. As you may know, Ben Harper also did a rendition of her poem in his song, "I'll Rise," off the Welcome to the Cruel World album. Learn more about Dr. Angelou here...

Still I Rise

You may write me down in history

With your bitter, twisted lies,

You may trod me in the very dirt

But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?

Why are you beset with gloom?'

Cause I walk like I've got oil wells

Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,

With the certainty of tides,

Just like hopes springing high,

Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?

Shoulders falling down like teardrops.

Weakened by my soulful cries.

Does my haughtiness offend you?

Don't you take it awful hard'

Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines

Diggin' in my own back yard.

You may shoot me with your words,

You may cut me with your eyes,

You may kill me with your hatefulness,

But still, like air, I'll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?

Does it come as a surprise

That I dance like I've got diamonds

At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history's shame

I rise

Up from a past that's rooted in pain

I rise

I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,

Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.

Leaving behind nights of terror and fear

I rise

Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear

I rise

Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,

I am the dream and the hope of the slave.

I rise

I rise

I rise.