Black Is More Than a Skin Color

Dr. Ben Carson

Dr. Ben Carson is the current darling of the Tea Party Republicans. They eagerly lap up the lies and distortions of their anointed "black" leaders such as Dr. Carson. 

I question their motivations for the seeming adulation that they confer on Carson. I have this theory that the Tea Party Republicans (TPRs) love Dr. Ben Carson because it's politically expedient to do so. Poor TPRs have been accused of racism on more than one occasion, and they have vehemently protested that there is not a racist bone in any of their bodies. Of course, it doesn't help their cause that they display images of the President and the First Lady as monkeys and apes, and frequently aver that the President should be impeached for being uppity enough to believe that his office puts him in charge of this country.

Here's the clever part. The TPRs have figured out if they have their own black folks, in limited numbers of course, then they can refute the accusations of racism and proudly declare, "We have our own black people; we're not racists!"

Carson, Herman Cain, Alan Keyes, Allen West, Michael Steele etc. are the proud proof offered by the TPRs that in spite of their failure to do anything to address the disproportionate poverty that impacts people of color in the U.S., including black people, and their repeatedly declared opposition to any efforts to address the economic inequities that are as American as apple pie, they are not racists.

Whoop-ti-do! I have news for the TPRs; being black is more than a skin color. Just because someone's skin is cafe au lait or dark ebony doesn't make them a black person. Black is a state of mind. Black is surviving and growing strong in spite of the yoke around your neck. Black is not living in the past but it is about turning your eyes on that past and seeing it unfiltered and real. Black is believing and knowing that we shall overcome someday. Black is grabbing on to today and turning it into someday.