How to Be Black

by Baratunde Thurston

  Maximize the Discomfort of White People

  White people’s comfort is not your concern. In fact, when around white people, you take great pleasure in making them feel uncomfortable. This doesn’t have to depend on them prompting you with some race-related question. It’s actually better if the subject of race is nowhere near the conversation.

  For example, when in an elevator with one or more white people, quietly but firmly say something like the following:

  “It wasn’t that long ago that people like me weren’t allowed in this elevator. The good old days, huh?”

  Don’t address your question directly to the white person. It’s more uncomfortable if you just let it hang in the air while looking in no particular direction. The age and location of the elevator are not important. You just want these white people to know that you know that their days of openly discriminating against black people are over, not that these particular white people ever did that.

  Another tactic you might try is to directly confront white people over how open-minded they are. It is perfectly acceptable to do this for white people you know well or barely at all.

  Perhaps White Jim is talking about a new bicycle he just got or his favorite television program. Your job is to throw a racial wrench into the operation with a question like, “Jim, I was just curious. How many black friends do you actually have?” This will have the immediate effect of throwing off Jim’s equilibrium and forcing him into a defensive state of mind. He’s sure he didn’t do anything wrong, but he can’t help feeling as if he must prove that point.

  If Jim has an answer, you attack: “Three? You actually keep count of all your black friends? Really, Jim?”

  If Jim says he has none, you also attack: “So you mean to tell me you haven’t found even one black person worthy of your friendship? Man, that’s just sad.”

  Regardless of what Jim says, you attack. That’s the point. Attack White Jim.

  Maximize the Discomfort of Black People

  Do not expend your rage solely on white people. Think bigger. From your point of view, your black friends and associates and even black strangers cannot be black enough. It’s not always their fault, but you do get tired of being the consciousness of the group. They’ve been so brainwashed by mainstream society, so mis-educated, that you understand it’s up to you to set them on a more correct course, especially if they seem to reject your solutions.

  Many of the black people around you act like race doesn’t define everything in the world. It’s your job to remind them that it does!

  Let’s say one of your black friends is having a problem with her boss. To you, it’s obvious that this is an example of The White Man holding a sister back. Your friend may try to explain to you that her boss isn’t white and that the problem stems from her poor performance on a previous assignment, but you’re not having any excuses like that. In America, a black woman just can’t catch a break, and you remind her of this at a very high volume by saying, “In America! A black woman just can’t catch a break!”

  When communicating with your fellow black people, make sure to sprinkle your speech with a lot of “my brotha!” and “my sistah!” language. This adds credibility to your case and builds a connection with any other black person around you at the time.

  So, when you see a black man reading the New York Times . . .

  “My brotha! I see you are filling your mind with The White Man’s lies again. The mis-education of the Negro continues!”

  The same style can be used in any situation. The point is simply to remind these Negroes that they are black!

  “You actually support a football team named the ‘Washington Redskins?’ My brotha, how can you be so ignorant?”

  “Skiing, my sistah? Are you so obsessed with whiteness that you must frolic in it?”

  “So, we’re eating Cheetos now, are we, my brotha?”

  And so forth . . .

  Your job, although it may at times appear to be purely symbolic and over-the-top, has real value. You will confront politicians, police officers, business owners, anyone. You are fearless. You’re an angry black superhero for justice. Remember that when people inevitably start to distance themselves from you. Being hated is part of the job.

  How to Be The (Next) Black President

  We need a new black leader. That’s why I hope the black leader we get is Barack Obama, the black senator from Illinois. That dude is cool. People say he’s going to be president someday. My question is, president of what? ’Cause one day there may be a black president, but there will never be a black president named Barack Obama! Ladies and gentlemen, that’s too black. That dude’s name might as well be Blacky Blackerson.

  —W. Kamau Bell, on Comedy Central in 2005*

  You didn’t think I could write a book called How to Be Black and not talk about the black president, did you? Come on, y’all!

  Getting the job of first black president was hard. Keeping it is harder. Prior to Barack Obama the only way Americans could experience a black president was through television and film. The most recent black TV presidents all had amazing flaws or challenges. On 24, President David Palmer (played by Dennis Haysbert) was assassinated after three failed attempts on his life. When his brother was elected, he was immediately targeted for assassination as well! In Idiocracy, President Camacho is a former wrestler and porn star. Need I say more? The Fifth Element’s President Lindberg was probably the coolest black president on screen, and he presided over the entire galaxy, but I had a hard time not seeing actor Tom Lister Jr. as his more famous, decidedly nonpresidential character Deebo from Friday. Maybe it’s my own fault but I kept expecting the galactic president to go around stealing people’s bikes and weed. Beyond these on-screen moments, the only other pre-Obama black president America experienced was the regrettable literary flourish of Toni Morrison, who dubbed Bill Clinton our “first black president.”*

  When Obama came along, I campaigned so intensely for him I felt like I was running for president. My friends jokingly referred to me as “Barackatunde.” When he won the Iowa Caucuses, I screamed, “We won!” I hit the road hard in Northern Virginia, Philadelphia, and South Dallas, canvassing, phone-banking, and occasionally speechifying. I personally experienced many of the frustrating racial ups and downs and hopes and fears of the campaign. In South Dallas, where I helped fix a voting machine no one had seen before, the elderly black election official exclaimed, “I think God sent you here to save this election.” On CNN just after Iowa, I shared a segment with Reverend Jesse Jackson and found myself in the odd position of trying to lift the mood after he exclusively focused on all the things that could go wrong.

  Online at Jack & Jill Politics, the blog I cofounded with Cheryl Contee, we were like a messaging army, especially when it came to the treatment of this black presidential candidate by the media, the opposition, and even traditional black leadership.

  In the beginning, Obama wasn’t black enough for some. Many white journalists excitedly pointed out how atypical Obama was with his biraciality, advanced degrees, and articulateness. But the idea that Obama wasn’t that black went far beyond out-of-touch media and infected out-of-touch (or jealous) older black leaders. Civil rights leader and former U.S. ambassador Andrew Young answered questions no one was asking when he claimed, “Bill [Clinton] is every bit as black as Barack. He’s probably gone with more black women than Barack.” Ha ha.

  As Obama’s victories piled up, he was too black for others. His relationship with Reverend Wright dominated media coverage for months, with folks painting this Harvard Law School graduate as some sort of radical black revolutionary. The man felt so pressured that he gave a special address just about race! Today, you can find more Obama-as-super-threatening-black-guy coverage in just about any report from Fox News. “Black president wants to kill your grandma!” “Black president wants to take your money!” “Black president wants to let the Mexicans eat your children. With salsa!” “Black president flew planes into the World Tr
ade Center!”

  Yet others took a measured but still optimistic tone in their endorsements. I recall such a moment at the Apollo Theater in December 2007, when I saw the Princeton professor Cornel West enthusiastically endorse candidate Obama. One of his main points was the risk of expecting too much from this man. As I wrote then of the event:

  With his trademark uneven afro, thin black scarf, black three-piece suit, and verbal dexterity, West brought historical context to the evening, reminding us of the long history of black activists and artists whose words and deeds found a home at the Apollo. He spoke of Obama glowingly: “It’s not because he’s intelligent and articulate. I expect black folk from Harvard to be articulate. But Barack is also eloquent . . .”

  Most valuable to me was West’s warning not to see in Barack something he is not: a reincarnation of some great black hope from days gone by: “We don’t expect Alicia Keys to be Sarah Vaughn, and we should not expect Barack Obama to be Frederick Douglass. He is his momma’s son and his daddy’s son,” and, West continued, he is who we need in this country today.

  Yet now that Obama is in office, West, too, has had a change of heart, referring to President Obama in 2011 as a “black mascot of Wall Street oligarchs and a black puppet of corporate plutocrats.” The man who embraced and praised candidate Obama’s biracial identity in 2007 attempted to undermine the authenticity of his American blackness in 2011 by implying that Obama’s white mother and lack of slave blood made him afraid of “free black men,” and bitterly complained that Obama dissed him at inauguration and spent too much time in the company of Jews.

  Contradictory expectations, perceptions, and criticisms come with the job for any president, but the special turmoil around race is a unique feature of a black U.S. presidency, and Obama’s campaign and first term should serve as a valuable model for those of you who might pursue that path someday.

  Unlike several of the other chapters in this book, this guide to the presidency is unlikely to be used in a practical sense by most of you. While we can all be employees and friends and spokespeople and angry, very few of us have any chance of becoming commander-in-chief. But just because something is unlikely does not mean we shouldn’t prepare ourselves for the eventuality.

  Most of us will not be in the room when someone is choking, but we have been trained in the Heimlich maneuver. Most of us will never find ourselves engulfed in flames, but we probably have memorized the “stop, drop, and roll” technique. And most of us will never know what it feels like to take the oath of office under the direction of the Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court on a crisp January day, but that is no excuse to avoid the lessons of a black presidency.

  What does the election of the First Black President mean for those who would be The Second Black President or Third or even, and this is crazy, The Fourth Black President?

  Despite your having lost the race to break the presidential color line, the odds of a black presidency are higher post-Obama than they were pre-Obama. He has established a precedent. Yet slightly higher odds do not imply ease. Know this going in, and remember John F. Kennedy’s words: “We do these things not because they are easy, but because they are hard.”

  The American presidency is one of the most important roles in the world. From this position, one can shift a nation’s priorities, drive the news cycle, and eradicate large groups of brown people overseas with the signing of an executive order. Granted, CEOs of multinational companies also wield similar power, but there’s still nothing quite like occupying the Office of the President. You get a plane, your own seal, and an honor guard! It could be you, and when you wake up handcuffed to a briefcase with the nuclear launch codes inside, you’ll be glad you read this guide.

  Ideal Conditions for You to Become President

  Let’s start with your campaign. In order to become president, you’ll need a bit of campaign luck. Every past president depended on a bit of luck to win the office, but you’ll require heaps of it. Any of the following conditions will significantly boost your odds of moving into 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

  1. An exceptionally mediocre sitting president

  When you run, you want the sitting president to have high disapproval ratings even among members of his own party. The entire country should prefer to have the president tarred and feathered while strapped to a scooter careening downhill into molten lava than commit him to signing another piece of legislation into law.

  Only in such an environment will people even notice you, and even then, there’s no guarantee they’ll take you seriously.*

  2. An uninspiring and dangerous general election opponent

  It will be an extraordinary event if you are able to earn your party’s nomination, but your real battle only just begins at this point. Your ideal general election opponent should be someone who feels exactly wrong for this particular moment in U.S. history. If the country needs new blood and energy, you want an opponent who is the physical embodiment of age and lethargy. Ideally, the public can better imagine your opponent telling a group of children to get off his or her lawn than they can picture this hypothetical president delivering an inspiring State of the Union address.

  If the country needs a calm, steady hand, your ideal opponent is rash and explosive. If the country needs worldliness, your opponent will be proud to have never left her state or speak foreign languages.

  You’ll know you’ve got an actual shot if your opponent or your opponent’s running mate feels plucked from the pages of a dystopian political satire. If your opponent’s vice-presidential candidate frightens the public more than the top of the ticket, this is great for you.

  3. The feeling that America is on the actual brink of collapse

  The country should be in an extremely terrible state. It’s not enough to have economic problems, wars, increasing international competition, and a global crisis. All those things may help you, but to get the maximum boost, you want a severe economic crisis the likes of which hasn’t been experienced for several generations, and just when people think it’s over you’ll want another one and then another one right after that. You’ll need multiple wars, none of which is going particularly well, but all of which are draining the nation’s treasury. You’ll be helped significantly by a general feeling in the country that it’s not progressing nearly as fast as the rest of the world on any number of indicators, and some Americans seriously considering emigration to unthinkable destinations such as France, Costa Rica, or Libya.

  And, the coup de grâce: your prospects will brighten if people actually fear the wholesale extinction of the human race, perhaps due to the recent discovery of an invading alien army or the catastrophic ignition of an Earth-destroying doomsday device by a megalomaniacal, evil super-villain. If people literally feel that they have nothing to lose, you could very well win!

  4. Your ability to “look presidential”

  Many smart, qualified people have run for president. Many smarter and more qualified people have never even tried. The difference between those who should be president and those who make it far in the process often comes down to who looks and feels like they could actually be the president.

  For you it means your résumé has got to be top-notch. It will help tremendously if you’ve got a degree from an Ivy League university, but it will help even more if you have five. You’ll go further if your family is attractive and has no known criminal record. I know some candidates with troubled family connections have made it far in the past, but the rules are more stringent for you.

  Clearly, this is a lot to ask for, but I’m just laying out the ideal circumstances. There’s no guarantee any of these conditions will come to pass, and only the direct intervention of God could explain if they all existed at the same time, but if you are fortunate enough to be able to run under at least one of these conditions, you’ll have a real shot at becoming the next Barack Obama.

  What Your Candidacy Means

  Politicians constantly make the mistake of thinking t
hat their campaigns are about them. They are not. Political campaigns are about the people and what they need or want at a particular moment in space and time. The candidate lucky enough to channel the mood of the people and feel authentically connected to it has a higher chance of winning, so it’s critical that you understand not what your candidacy means to you, but what it means to the people.

  The mere fact that you are running will always shine brightly as a symbol of potential racial reconciliation in America. It is to your advantage that no one expects you to run. Many will assume that Obama’s experience in the White House would be enough to dissuade any additional black contenders. In fact, part of his tough road may be designed to prevent you from running. America looks askance at black people who give back to the nation, because America knows she hasn’t been historically kind to her citizens of African descent. Expect there to be some suspicion about your motives for running. Really, why would a black person want this responsibility, again? At the same time, because you’re black and taking this on, you give significant numbers of people hope. You let them breathe a sigh of relief, if not about all black people, then certainly about you.

  America dodged a bullet in the 1960s when cities burned in response to the Vietnam War, assassinations, and large-scale police brutality. Since then, there’s always the concern that our nation’s black population will rise up Nat Turner–style and exact revenge through violent revolution. Much of this rage has been effectively muted and channeled into commercial hip-hop, unrealistic dreams of professional sports careers, and daily doses of poison masquerading as nutrition in the form of poorly stocked grocery stores and fast-food businesses in black neighborhoods. There’s just not a lot of rioting energy left, with so many distractions.

  By running for president, you’re demonstrating that you see politics, not violent revolution, as the appropriate arena for addressing these issues. You cause mainstream minds to pause and say, “Whoa, check it out. Black person’s running for president again. Black person hasn’t given up on her country. How ’bout that? We got another chance after all!”