No Excuses
Props to Matt Bors for suggesting the punchline.
Will Smith appeared on Oprah two days after the election and expressed almost exactly those sentiments expressed in the first panel of this strip. You can watch the whole thing at oprah.com. Here is the full quote of what Smith said:
The history of African-Americans is such that you want to be a part of America, but we’ve been rejected so much it’s hard to take the ownership and take responsibility for ourselves and this country. It was like, at that second, at that moment, all of our excuses were gone.
Smith is not alone among black liberal voters who have drawn this conclusion from the election of the first African-American president of the USA. CNN showed a clip of a young black voter celebrating in the streets on election night, exclaiming “No excuses!” And you can see a fuller explication of this meme on a subtly titled You Tube video “BARACK OBAMA WINZ! NO MORE EXCUSES 4 BLACK FOLK”:
Commenting on this video, “Ungodly Bastard” concurs:
I agree, as a black man and a Obama supporter I better never hear a black man complain about white America holding holding us down again! White America overwelmingly supported a black President. So you’re right, NO MORE EXCUSES!!!!!!!
The problem is: racism is not an “excuse,” it’s a condition of life, it’s built into the systems of finance, education, culture, and government that have evolved since Europeans brought Africans to North America and enslaved them, gradually displaced native peoples through invasion and genocide, and developed legal frameworks that excluded people of color from political, economic and social participation. People of color have fought back, they have struggled, and continue to struggle, winning rights, liberties and improvements in their lives along the way, educating white people enough so that, at the very least, a young bi-racial politician who didn’t act “too black” or “too angry” could raise $750 million dollars and fight for their votes.
I get what Smith, et al. are trying to do. Barack Obama is a role model, a positive representative of what young people of color can achieve if they work hard and make the right decisions. It’s a message that as a parent I try to impart to my own biracial daughter (as well as my “monoracial” son), because we worry about our kids, we want them to succeed, we want them to be tough and get back up when they get knocked down. We don’t want them making excuses when they don’t try, when they whine that they “can’t” or when you can tell they are just plain lazy. “Turn off the damn TV, read a book!” Every parent should have that command memorized. When they are confronted with racism, we want our kids to fight it, to confront “back” and to not tolerate it. And we don’t want it to affect their self-esteem.
But the election of Barack Obama did not magically undo the legacy of 500 years of racism and oppression. It was one more yellow brick on the road to Oz, to be sure; hopefully he will seize the opportunity to undo the social and economic affects of that legacy, while also addressing the class-based structure of our society that exacerbates racism. A few of the things mentioned in today’s cartoon — neglected neighborhoods, failing schools, predatory lenders and check-”cashing” establishments, poverty — afflict everyone in the working poor, a demographic that encompasses all ethnicities. Certainly people of color are hit harder by poverty and social injustice; and whites enjoy privileges that are more subtle yet no less advantageous. Nonetheless, as the middle class finds itself slipping into the ranks of the working poor, privileged folks like Will Smith or lesser privileged folks whom the economy has not (yet) punished should be wary of naiveté and assuming victim-blaming postures regarding the poor. Leave the “no excuses” lecture at home and keep fighting for social justice and equality.
November 11th, 2008 at 10:14 am
Thanks for this, Kevin! You are so right–this victory was only a step in what is still an ongoing fight. Plus, when you look more closely at how Obama won, it is clear that there are certain parts of this country and certain constituencies that did everything in their slightly dwindling power to prevent it. A 52% majority enabled by our screwy electoral college system means that there are still vast parts of this country who haven’t even taken this initial step yet. Lots to be done.
But I’m still never moving to the South.
November 11th, 2008 at 11:21 pm
Great post Kev. I agree completely that it is overly simplistic to equate racism with an “excuse.” I envision many Fox News pundits latching on that sound bite to further their campaign of marginalizing disenfranchised groups.
At the same time, I do see something positive about the “No excuses” sentiment, along the lines of what you said about teaching your kids to overcome obstacles. I work with queer youth at a community based social service agency. They are primarily from low income families of color, and I have seen how the election of Obama has already had a really unprecedented and dramatic effect on their perception of the world and of themselves. One of the most nefarious effects of oppression is the breaking of the human spirit. Youth have come to believe that their opportunities are limited because of their skin color. Some of them have given up or turned to ways of surviving that push them deeper into a hole. After the election, I talked to one young man, a former client of my program, who has been unemployed for many years. He said that seeing a black man elected president had inspired him to reevaluate his life. It was something much more powerful than years of therapy or positive relationships with adults had ever given him. And he used the phrase: “I have no more excuses any more.” We could argue over semantics, and of course only time will tell whether any sort of long term transformation has occurred. But I think, on a personal level, there is something truly empowering going on. As a white guy, it may be hard for me to understand completely. One way that I can relate is that I think if there was an openly gay president elected, I would probably feel that same sense of a bar having been lifted.
November 17th, 2008 at 11:01 am
[...] 17, 2008 · No Comments Last Tuesday I posted “No Excuses“, a cartoon juxtaposing the post-election meme about African-American possibilities with the [...]