Getting Used to a Black President?

[TiaCarrera]

Run time: 04:46 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjqskhnq-Wk   Posted on YouTube: October 23, 2008 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: October 23, 2008 By DU Member: TiaCarrera Views on DU: 926

 
This is an excerpt from "Color Blind: The 2008 Race and Beyond". Here's the link for the full video (click)

Political scientist Melissa Harris-Lacewell examines how Barack Obama may affect Americans' conceptualization of race and the Presidency, should he be elected to the position.

Barack Obama's success so far in the 2008 election cycle has fostered optimistic rhetoric in mainstream media about race relations in the United States. But does Obama's candidacy transform Martin Luther King Jr.'s American dream into a reality? A recent New York Times/CBS poll found that Americans are sharply divided by race on their views of Senator Obama and the state of race relations.

In addition, with an increased presence of other minority groups, issues regarding race in political and social life are no longer black and white.

What role does race play in the 2008 election and beyond? Can America ever truly be a color-blind society? - The Century Foundation

Melissa Victoria Harris-Lacewell is an American writer and political scientist and Associate Professor of Politics and African American studies at Princeton University. She received her B.A. in English from Wake Forest University, her Ph.D. in political science from Duke University and an honoris causa doctorate from Meadville Lombard Theological School.She is the author of Barbershops, Bibles, and BET: Everyday Talk and Black Political Thought on the methods African Americans use to develop political ideas through ordinary conversations in places like barbershops, churches, and popular culture. The work was awarded the 2005 W.E.B. DuBois book award from the National Conference of Black Political Scientists. Harris-Lacewell's writings have been published in the Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, Crain's Chicago Business and Newsday. She has provided commentary for NBC News, Fox News, Showtime, HBO, Black Enterprise, National Public Radio and other radio and print sources.

[liberal N proud]

1. It will be refreshing to have some intelligence in the White House

I guess I am color blind because I am looking squarely at the brains.

[TiaCarrera]

2. Of course, it's not the color that determines the brain!

After all, our brains have the same color.

[liberal N proud]

3. That thought is a great way to handle racist

[TiaCarrera]

12. Unfortunately, racists are brain-blind as well ;)

[waronxmas]

4. Yowzers!

Smart and pretty, is there anything better? I'm in luuuuuuuuuuuuuuv

[happygoluckytoyou]

5. easier than getting used to an IDIOT in the whitehouse...

[EnviroBat]

6. Wow! I think perhaps Melissa would make a great president!

Brilliant, pretty, experienced. I think she should consider running after Barack's second term is over...

[barack the house]

7. When I think president I think, Barack Obama. How cool is that.

[ecstatic]

10. I wish she had asked the question first because I think that's the image I would see too

Interesting clip ;)

[Poll_Blind]

8. What a great presentation! I'm watching the full version now.

Thank you for posting!

PB

[TiaCarrera]

11. Thank you for the feedback,

The full version is very interesting and it's worth the time watching it (and thinking about it). People's subconsciousness is often imposing the first reaction, like the one with the apple; I tried it for myself when she asked the question and my first thought was of a green apple too... I don't have a problem with having a black president (he's not even black anyway, as we all know) because I am open to the new and the different, as long as I know for myself it's the right one :) But I've seen too many videos now where ppl say: "Black? No way to vote for him (obviously he's not Caucasian)!! Muslim? No way (stemming from the name Barack Hussein Obama)!!" It's like when you think of chocolate, the first thing in your mind is brown cacao chocolate, not the white one ;) But that's different for the elections, people have enough time to think, to get to know each candidate, to decide which one is better for them. The sad thing is that many people stick to the known as it gives them more comfort and safety.

[kwolf68]

9. Liberal elitist intellegentsia

We dont nede no smert peeple hera.