My fellow black DUers - when did you learn you were black?

[JustAnotherGen]

Serious question. What age? Was it in the past few years?

We're you in the US when this happened?

Abroad?

[Number23]

1. !!!!!!!!

[JustAnotherGen]

2. Ouch

[Glassunion]

3. It was a Monday.

Lol.

[JustAnotherGen]

4. A Tuesday

And it was way down in the fall - and I was wearing my coat of many colors my mam made for me.

No wait.

That's a Dolly Parton Song.

[Glassunion]

5. As I recall it was a stormy Monday.

But I hear that Tuesday is just as bad, and Wednesday is worse and Thursday is all so bad. I go out to play on Satuday, but I do go to church on Sunday.

[kwassa]

28. The eagle flies on Friday.

That's what T-Bone Walker told me.

[Glassunion]

33. Bingo.

I once saw a little lady (no more than a girl in my mind), she weighed about 80 pounds soaking wet. Looked like she was a teenager. She sung that song in a tea house in bound brook NJ about 20 years ago.

She blew my mind. I've never to this day, in all my 40 years orbiting the sun, seen such a powerful rendition of that song. I kid you not, she emoted such a powerful feeling of awe, that I can never do it justice in words. I get a little wet in the eyes just thinking about it.

[kwassa]

34. It is a great song, with many great versions.

[brush]

35. Nothing like the Blues

It all comes from the Blues.

That is a wonderful rendition of that classic.

Thanks for posting it.

[greatauntoftriplets]

6. I've always been a broad.

[Glassunion]

7. Cool! What country?

[greatauntoftriplets]

8. Sorry, bad joke.

I meant that old word for female. And I'm white.

[Glassunion]

10. I got it.

A broad... Abroad...

[greatauntoftriplets]

11. Thanks.

[JustAnotherGen]

12. When did you find out?

[greatauntoftriplets]

13. I'm so damned old that I can't remember!

[JustAnotherGen]

15. That's okay

I think I really knew when I told my mom I'd rather listen to Bad Girls as opposed to Rhinestone Cowboy.

She was displeased - I had a bad habit of singing it out in public when I was four.

[greatauntoftriplets]

16. Anyway, I was very young at the time.

My parents actually encouraged me to sing when I was about the same age, except they liked my rendition of a particular hymn. http://www.songandpraise.org/immaculate-mary-thy-praises-we-sing-hymn.htm

Oddly, neither of my parents was particularly religious.

[Behind the Aegis]

39. Let's see...I was 7 when I burst out with "I am Woman" in the back of the car.

How did they not know I was gay?! Between things like that, impromptu plays and stand up routines at the Passover table, and spinning around like Wonder Woman all the time, they really should have clued in! LOL! Of course, some people here still think I am a woman. I even included "male" in my profile for a few years, but to no avail. Finally, I just gave up...don't matter none to me. As for being black, well, I am not even sure what I am supposed to be as sometimes I am white and sometimes I am not and that's because I am a Jew. There was a dinner with a friend of mine, and I was the only...um...well, Jewish person and as the conversation amongst the 12 guests turned to racism by white people, it was an hour before someone said, "oh, we didn't mean any offense.", to which another diner replied, "He ain't white, he's one of us!" Here at DU, well I will simply say, some think I masquerade as a white person, which I don't get, but if it floats their boat, whatever.

There is a thread of belief which runs through DU which is very disconcerting, attacking many of us who know who we are, but somehow give off the impression, in their minds, we need to be told how to be a "good X" and what really constitutes discrimination against our respective groups!

[JustAnotherGen]

41. Thank you - you get it!

There is a thread of belief which runs through DU which is very disconcerting, attacking many of us who know who we are, but somehow give off the impression, in their minds, we need to be told how to be a "good X" and what really constitutes discrimination against our respective groups

!

And my op was alerted on for being homophobic. *sigh*

This experience runs across so many lines, doubles back, crosses over. Some folks have the empathy chip - some do not.

Some folks only want to hear the narrative they want to hear - some do not.

Happy New Year!

[Behind the Aegis]

42. Say what, now?

Homophobic?

(For the jury: I am not laughing at the thought of someone making homophobic posts. JAG is just not one of those people who would do it! However, for those concerned about homophobia, keep that in mind the next time a jury is empanelled referring to Lindsey Graham as "Ms. Graham" or references to his being a "prissy femme".)

Some folks only want to hear the narrative they want to hear - some do not.

That is painfully obvious with some of the recent threads I have seen, including those which start out acting like they are "just asking a question." I know I am tried of being "asked" a question, then immediately told "NO! YOU'RE WRONG!" almost always followed up with "See, this Jew/GLBT person disagrees with you!" Of course, my "favorite" are those who aren't Jewish/gay, who seem to know what those experiences are, better than me, despite not belonging to either group. Look at me, I am preaching to the choir!

Thanks for the New Year wish. Did you know apples are good breath fresheners for dogs?! Avoid the leaves, stem, and seeds as they are poisonous, and the skin, while not poisonous, can be difficult for little doggies to chew. Everybody got some apples and a bit of honey.

You know I got you back!

[JustAnotherGen]

43. You should tell that to this beagle

I had when I was a kid . . .

Champ ate one off the ground - much like the Emergency room was my parents back up plan for their kids -

The 24 hour vet office was the back up plan for Champ . . . who also got into a bag of Hershey Bars and almost had a heart attack.

6 beagles running around at that time and the one that my dad bought for my pet was the only one never doing the right thing!

On this note -
despite not belonging to either group

I don't technically belong to either group - but exposure has given me a knowledge of the apple and honey reference . . . And a strong empathy chip of trying to put myself in other people's shoes by SHUTTING UP AND LISTENING as well as a strong sense of 'fair is fair' is probably why I can give respect to the other.

I think it comes down to a simple matter of RESPECT.

It's sorely lacking around here.

[randys1]

54. This OP was alerted on for what possible reason? How could it be homophobic?

so iotherwords you are targeted, as are others, and everything you say is to be silenced somehow



this wont change by the way...guess who wins this way

[pnwmom]

61. It was a 4 - 3 decision, too -- way too close.

I was happy to be on that jury.

[randys1]

9. Throwing some serious in here for a minute

When Trayvon was brutally murdered, when Jordan Davis was shot down for having his music too loud, when Michael Brown was executed for mouthing off to a white cop, and when Eric Garner was killed for selling a $1 cigarette

Matsimela Mapfumo or Mark Thompson of Sirius/XM "Make It Plain w/Mark Thompson" had us call in and say

"My name is Trayvon Martin"

but it didnt end there, later we had to call in and say



"My name is Jordan Davis"

then that still wasnt enough so we had to say



"My name is Michael Brown"

but it didnt end there, later we had to call in and say

"My name is Eric Garner"

and sure enough it didnt even end ther

"My name is Tamir Rice"

On these days we are all Black.

[JustAnotherGen]

14. Randy I would Greatly appreciate it

If you would Answer the question.

Also MADem, lovemydog, steve, great aunt already posted -

Uhhhh - who else.

All of the Group Host HAVE to answer.

BehindTheAegis gets to answer.

Since bravenak, strong, heaven -

Oh bother! Everyone is on a time out.

[pnwmom]

21. My first grader son thought he was black.

The reason I found out is that he said half the kids in his class were black -- and I knew that didn't happen to be true. And he didn't think any were white. There was no one there whose skin matched a snowbank.

He had quite a range of kids in his classroom, including Latinos and kids from Japan, Korea, Samoa, and a couple kids from India or Pakistan with darker skin than many African Americans.

So when he began to hear about black people, he thought that meant "black hair," and that he and I were both black, along with half the kids in his class.

We have African Americans in the extended family, and he understood that they were black, too.They also had black hair.

Kids have a different way of looking at things than adults.

[JustAnotherGen]

26. My parents explained it to me as "faces"

Skin.

That's how they explained into me when I was very little.

I was very curious about why some peoples parents matched!

[NOLALady]

58. I thought that

Black and White was like religion when I was your kid's age. You had to ask if you wanted to know a person's religion. I figured you had to ask if you wanted to know a person's race.

I was confused. There were people in my neighborhood as well as family members who were whiter looking than white folk in the neighborhood. I heard terms like colored/white, but had no clue what they were supposed to mean.

[pnwmom]

60. The terms really make no sense. In the US, most "black" people have various shades of dark brown

or brown or tan skin, and "white" people range from brown to tan to a kind of pinkish- or bluish- bone color. No one's actually white.

[lovemydog]

64. In fifth grade

I was invited to a sleepover at a friend's house. I was the only white kid there. We had fun watching tv, boxing & goofing around. In sixth grade I became more conscious of it because I started hanging out more with my group of friends and they started hanging out more with their group of friends. We played on sports together but didn't hang out together as much. I didn't think about it a lot. It felt like a natural gravitation.

Looking back, I remember wincing when some white kids would mention that some of the black kids lived a 'project' as though that was some dirty word. I'm sure it came from their parents. Isn't it interesting that a lot of us here become conscious (or self-conscious, which is awful) of this stuff at a young age? I suspected at the time that maybe some kids' parents told them more about who they should and shouldn't hang out with.

Oh, and I miss bravenak, strong & heaven too. If you're reading here, hi!

[yardwork]

17. Please give us a hint. A link? Please?

[JustAnotherGen]

22. Just read through AfAm

We aren't supposed to know we are black at DU.

And our experiences are less valued here.

Funny - I didn't realize what black meant until we came back to America when I was five.

[rbrnmw]

18. Well I have a complex ancestry

I look white my kids are bi-racial. As a mother when you have children who look black and children who look white, it's evident that black children are treated different. We always visited my Aunt who is mixed married to a black man my cousins are black. We traced it back to Appalachia where my great great great grandpa was Black one his son married or lived with a part Shawnee Indian part irish woman, from there they had 12 kids some passed as they said back and lived as whites. It has always confused me. I was 5 when it was explained to us because my cousin was called a coon. It is kind of a confusing thing to grasp at that age. We wanted to know more so we studied black history since I can remember. So I am white with African Ancestry.

[JustAnotherGen]

24. I didn't realize it until I was five

What it meant.

I got that my parents didn't match . . .

What I didn't get was what it would mean to be a black American until I was five and had that . . .

Racey moment.

You get this thread.

[rbrnmw]

31. I had to see it up close at a very young age

So when you see racism that young it changes you.

Eta sometimes I don't indentify with how the world labels me. It's confusing

[JustAnotherGen]

44. What's funny - this private

Drinking club that invited my dad in - former SS Officers. . .

I grew up around those guys.

They learned.

It was a white woman in Western NY - about their same age that taught me what it meant to be black in America.


In Germany - just a cute little blondie locks little girl with tan skin.

America - "That child".

[rbrnmw]

48. That is the way America is

Alot of white mother's have to teach their black children how to be black in America. I guess I had some advanced training and didn't fit in their white/black catergories, but I still benefit from White Priviledge unless you know my story. It's a damn shame we are a nation of 4 years olds when it comes to race.

[JustAnotherGen]

49. Not my mom

This older white woman who didn't like little 'niggers' putting their hand in the mint bowl at a restaurant at the Hilton in Rochester NY.

My mom (white) - not prepared.

My dad (black)and the hotel owner - very prepared. The hotel owner was a white man (my mom eventually started a franchise hotel concept with him in the 1980s') who was young, hip, not a bigot and let the woman know what was what.

I.E.
THAT Child stays - you go and never return again.

[rbrnmw]

50. Wow

Did your mom ever change her heart?

[JustAnotherGen]

51. My mom's heart was changed

The minute she gave birth to my older brother.

But considering they left Kentucky (Fort Knox) a few months after he was born (they actually got run off the road by some racists down there - this is 1970 when she was near term) -

She got lulled into a deep sleep by the family atmosphere of the base in Weisbaden (especially among the Green Berets wives - they created a 'family' there) and the heart felt kindness of the Germans in West Germany.

It's not that they were without fault - but they had 'learned'. Something America has never quite had to do because we've never had to pay the price globally for our participation in the Native Genocide, Slavery, Jim Crow . . .

Actually - you ever notice how Great Britain, the Netherlands, Spain, France, Italy always seem to give themselves a free pass and wash their hands of what their Colonizers did in The New World?

[rbrnmw]

53. Yes I have noticed

However we can't even get a simple acknowledgement in US taught history that it happened that way. It's always literally whitewashed

[Starry Messenger]

19. I think it just happened this week.

I found I wasn't supposed to talk about racism if I'm white, even if the other whites around me are talking a bunch of mess about race. I got told I was whitesplaining, to whites, while white. I used to think that was just called "talking." I've seen the light!

[rbrnmw]

20. +1

[JustAnotherGen]

27. +1

[gollygee]

23. Off to try to find whatever inspired this n/t

[JustAnotherGen]

25. It's all right here in Af Am

A few out in GD - but right here in this group.

[kwassa]

29. I'm just passing.

About time I faced up to it.

[kimbutgar]

30. I was about 9 years old

I was very light skinned dirty blonde hair and could pass for white. I went to Catholic school and one day when I was walking home. One Irish boy and one Italian boy kept calling me nigger. I didn't know what the word meant but the way they taunted with it, it sounded bad. I got home and told my Mother. The next day she went to school and complained, that night our doorbell rang and the Italian boy and his father who was a gardener were there. The father made his son apologize to me and he said he hated being called a dago and wop and his son would never do it again. The boy never bothered me again. But the Irish boy never called me the word but used to be mean to me and pull on my pigtails. I got in trouble hitting him because I practically got whiplash from him pulling on my braids. I had long hair and those two pigtails were too tempting. I told the teacher why I hit back and she didn't punish me. She then moved him away from me in class( he sat behind me ). Years later I heard he dropped out of high school and life hasn't been great for him.

But before then I never knew I was different.

Recently I was organizing my important documents and found my birth certificate and it listed my parents as white ( they are both light skinned) I remember asking my Mother why she didn't have it amended and she having my race as white would make my life easier.

[NOLALady]

59. My son's first

day in first grade at a Catholic School, He came home and said he had a very bad day. He told the kids his name but they kept calling him something else. This was a Friday evening.
Hubby and I were at the school Monday morning. When they tried to direct us to someone other than the Principal, Hubby said we would take it to the ArchDiocese.

[sorcrow]

32. Next week!

Next week when I get the results back from 23andme.com.

Crow

[steve2470]

36. hm, let me see....

oops wrong thread

Carry on.

[gwheezie]

37. My grandson was 4 when he started talking about race

2 things happened. He went to vote for Obama when he was 4. He looks like Obama. My friends call him little Obama. He has pictures of himself voting for Obama. It was a big deal in my family. The 1st black president. He was very proud. I was in tears because he would grow up never wondering if a black man would be president.
The 2nd thing was that summer. My parents were living on their boat. It was docked in a kinda resort harbor with a motel and pool. My grandson was with my dad, my daughter and son in law at the pool My dad thought he heard someone make a racist remark about what was my family doing allowed there. So my old white dad jumped up to fight somebody. My son in law stopped him from an ass kicking. My son in law explained to my grandson he didn't have to fight with everyone who hurt his feelings.
My son in law is a strict dad, not in an unkind way but he's been shaping my grandson to adapt to being a black male who is at risk for getting killed for no reason.

[Jamaal510]

38. I found out

I'm Black the first time I started getting stares while going through an area that has no/few Black people. But who knows--maybe I just got stared at for being a good-looking guy!
J/K

[JustAnotherGen]

52. Naaah

It's because you are totally totally hot!

[Jamaal510]

63. ...

[Tarheel_Dem]

40. Some just learned recently. They've never given two shits about this group, but they've suddenly...

discovered they've been black all this time. I've known for over 50 years.

[JustAnotherGen]

45. I'm 42

It's been 37 years for me. And yeah - funny how that works.

NOW all of a sudden they want to claim the knowledge?

Not buying it.

And certainly not from someone who is not from here, does not have the experience, would blow her brains out if she had my money, and is decidedly NOT black by appearance or by her experience of being black in white spaces in America.

I'm just going to come on out and say it -

We get more respect from people like pnwmom and greatauntoftriplets and BTA and madem than we do someone who claims to be one of us.

Can't make this shit up. You just can't. But I look at it like this . . .

That person is harming their cause - they don't know it.

May the best person (Clinton or O'Malley) win.

[Tarheel_Dem]

46. Thank you. I grew up (part-time) in the segregated South, so I knew early on there was a difference.

I was in 5th grade before integration came to my small town, so being black has never been a question or an option for me. That's fine, cuz I love being black.

We have great allies, like the ones you named, but when I see an "ally" throwing around terms like "race baiting" & "race nagging", I run a mile, cuz I know exactly where they're coming from.

At this point, I'm ABS. We've got great "Democrats" who didn't join the party two minutes ago to take advantage of the party's infrastructure.

[betsuni]

47. Can't help thinking of "The Jerk"

"And I cooked you up your favorite meal: tuna fish on white bread with mayonnaise, a TAB, and a couple of Twinkies."

[randys1]

55. When I was old enough to drive, i drove to old town and hung out at AfAm

coffee shops where I listened to the music I was born to play and enjoy. (it was a weird combo of coffee shop and bar and I didnt have to be 21 to go in)

Talked to people who sounded and felt different, had a different cadence and tone, very new but familiar, somehow.




I relate to music more than anything.

[qwlauren35]

56. I think I was 5.

I grew up in a segregated city environment with no white people up until I was 5 - my father's side of the family is passing fair, but we were surrounded by brown skinned people, so I never felt odd. I just know that I looked like my dad. Then we moved to the white suburbs. I'm not sure I knew I was black, but I knew they were different. And I found myself gravitating automatically toward people who had darker skin (there was a dark skinned Italian, so he was one of the kids I gravitated toward.)

I'm sure there was a "conversation" at some point, but I don't remember it. I think I knew for sure by 3rd grade. And I got picked on about it by 6th grade.

[onpatrol98]

57. What the heck???

I'm fairly sure I always knew...

I have got to find the thread this is related to...

[lovemydog]

65. I know right?

So far I still haven't found it either.

[psychmommy]

62. I knew I was black but, I didn't know what that meant

I knew I was black and beautiful I grew up in the 70s. It was something to be celebrated in my insular little world of my family, my church and other black folks(friends of the family). As I started branching out and having different types of friends-I learned that I wasn't welcomed at all of my friends houses. One dad was so racist, that at his daughters funeral he was asking what is she doing here, and making a big deal, lol. So I guess it was elementary school age when I learned that my black was a problem for other people. But, I will always be black and beautiful. My mom gave me black dolls and books, she did a really good job of affirming me and my blackness. Can I share this with you, it makes my heart swell up with joy to see kids of all colors, carrying doc mcstuffins dolls and dora the explorer dolls. It shapes kids mindsets about race early.