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So much has been said on Barack Obama’s victory, his investiture, and whatever else he’s done, said or reported to have said in between, that I do not feel like re-hashing information that has already been written, printed, wired, RSSed, copied, emailed, and reduplicated countless times through various media… However, I am bringing up the subject in order to question just how far we’ve actually come seeing that much of the hubbub surrounding Obama’s election is linked to his racial background.

There’s no doubt (in my mind, at least) that Bush’s departure was reason enough to initiate much of the rejoicing and partying that went on, but let’s be totally honest – all the highly publicised parties and jamborees, not to mention the Oprah-sponsored-Obama-fest, all had a racial ‘flavour’ or undertone despite the euphemisms, abstractions or non-sequiturs that were being needlessly applied (blacks and minorities should be rejoycing).

But making a big deal out of something instantly delineates that ‘thing’ as being out of the ordinary. And I mean sure, being the first Afro-American elected for the ‘top position’ in the country is a big deal, but doesn’t the ‘big deal’ factor inversely allow us to grade just how far we are from accepting the ‘thing’ or ‘event’ as a common, everyday occurrence?
During the campaign, highlighting Obama’s skin colour in any way beyond questioning the impact this will have seems to me like a form of reverse-racism; equality and judging a man purely on his deeds is certainly not meant to entail that race becomes a topic and bait for the 'minority votes.'
For me, Obama was the best choice – once Clinton was removed – period. His racial background was a refreshing positive, but doesn't true democracy imply that race, sex and religion should not be a part of any campaign platform. In fact, in an article I’d written for another site about Obama’s victory , it was the editor who pointed out to me that I hadn’t mentioned anywhere that Obama was black, only that his victory “denotes a clear change in the American attitude and a possibility to snuff out their reputation as racists by moving them beyond a history of cruel racism.” I had done this unconsciously - his colour wasn’t even a topic. Nonetheless, the conversation with the editor went like this:
Him: You don’t even say anywhere that he’s the first black president.
Me: Why is it so important to point that out?
Him: Are you kidding?! That’s the news!
Me: Isn’t being elected president of the U.S. news enough?
Him: Yeah, but he’s black!
Me: So? Bush was white; no headline read ‘White asshole elected for President!’
Him: Don’t be a smart ass!

Will there be such festivities should a second Afro-American be elected immediately after Obama? He – as I fear we are still far from seeing a black female president of the U.S. – will, after all, be the ‘first’ to be the ‘second’ and hence represent the confirmation that a change has indeed occurred. But don’t bother trying to answer – the question is moot! Obama may be in office for a second term but one thing’s for sure: we ain’t gonna see another black man running for President immediately after Obama – white men will fear that ‘they’ are taking over…

And what about the homies, the ‘wazup’ crowd, the ghetto-ed gang members and gangster rappers - all those blacks for whom the N-word is nothing more than a jovial noun, verb, adverb or adjective when used amongst themselves but becomes the worst possible racial slur when uttered by anyone they don’t tolerate – the kind of people which, whether in L.A., Miami, Detroit, Chicago, Philadelphia, New York and everything in between, have participated in violent hate crimes against members of their own race which they saw as being ‘white-ified’; how do these people feel about Obama? To these people, shouldn’t he represent the ultimate “Oreo” (black on the outside but white inside) – the absolute traitor? As an extension of their own logic, shouldn't they, like white-supremacists and neo-nazi types (ignorance incarnate), be seeing him as the ultimate target rather than a hero?

What about the likes of the Afro-American League and all those anti-racist groups? Would they be shouting and snarling ‘discrimination’ and then provoke a succession of marches and rallies had John McCain been elected?

So is Obama’s victory a sign that things are indeed truly changing? That barriers are finally being removed and that the voice of the people is finally being heard? Yes, in a way it certainly does, but my paranoscepticynical self also leans towards the idea that the extremely WASPy fellowship of the mahogany-and-club-tie ol’ boys is still very much in power and, being comprised of disgustingly moneyed businessmen whose only involvements in politics are related to the manipulatings of politicians, Obama’s electoral win represented a wise financial direction – especially with the growing reliance on foreign investments – that they merely allowed the people to set course on…

Or perhaps this is merely an indication that the same ol’ boys club mentioned above is a tad less racist than it is sexist, and that a man, any man, is still preferred over a woman – especially one that has already had the gal to attempt standing up to them (re. health care) back when she was first lady… And the best candidate to counter another candidate who’s banking on the potential history-making aspect their victory signifies is one whose victory represents an even more momentous event. Is it really a coincidence that in the end the Democrats offered two presidential nominees whose very win, irregardless of what was to follow, promised a “change” – Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama? And why do you think McCain chose Pallin?

The question begs to be asked: If the U.S. had not been suffering a world-wide identity crisis and had the economic situation been ‘triple-A’ good, would Obama have been nominated for the presidential race?

Here is a funny post that was recently made on a joke forum which bluntly illustrates that idea:
Regarding Obama’s platform of “change”: I say, "what change?" because what's so new about a black guy being called in to clean up a mess created by a white guy?

And if things don’t get any better in the next four years, who are the voters and history going to blame for the sorry state of the nation? Is the average Joe and Jane Smith American really going to remember that it was a smug, manipulated, money-hungry, wouldn’t-have-gotten-anywhere-except-for-daddy son-of-a-bitch that really put them in the hole in the first place?

We’ve seen it in Quebec. The Liberals finally win a provincial election after it’s been in the hands of the Partie Quebecois for 12 years; they inherit a budget that, after careful scrutiny, reveals a 1 billion dollar deficit hidden by the PQ, and a few years down the road everyone’s complaining that the Liberals haven't kept their promises and forgetting why they couldn’t keep them. These same people complain about the Liberal’s lack of response to the need for more qualified professionals in our health care system while, again, forgetting that it was the PQ and Pauline Marois’ (and she’s now the PQ party leader – what’s wrong with this picture?) plan that saw the number of health professionals being drastically reduced and further, forgetting that it takes several years (and money) to train replacements…

So what’s going to come from this “historic change?” Only time will tell.

Keep on clicking!

PDL


© 2009, Pascal-Denis Lussier
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I like to observe. And I especially like to throw monkey wrenches into the ‘things’ I observe and participate in; playing devil’s advocate is another activity that’s top on my list. Why? Because it not only allows me to prove or disprove my own theories about society, it also allows me to formulate new ones and to get a better understanding of people. Let’s face it, in any given situation, at any given moment, anyone with a bit of wisdom knows that you can’t base your entire reality of things solely on what is being said; all other variables present have to be considered i.e. body and facial gestures, relationship with speaker, context of utterance, interpretative mechanisms and ambiguity, intersubjectivity, and the list goes on. That being said, if one is to navigate through the world with a better sense of what s/he is navigating through – one then has to try and understand people, and the best way I’ve learned to do this is not by listening to them, but by throwing monkey wrenches!

I suppose if I were to trace back the where and when I developed this attitude, that it comes from my dad, a successful DBA who devoted his life to studying people for business purposes...
I remember him telling me some years back: “If you want to know what kind of person you’re dealing with, give them a fork to mix their coffee; most folks get confused.” The comfortable and culturally rich childhood perks aside, the ‘gift’ I appreciate most from him is these little kernels of wisdom which he’d toss me at appropriate moments, giving me enough info to get the mental gears going whilst not providing too much so I’d be fooled into thinking I understood it all; a conclusion reached is much more powerful than an idea told!
The fork thing is just one such example. And how true it is! Yet when you think about it using a fork makes just as much sense and is in fact more efficient (the space between the teeth create whirlpools that help in stirring). Using a spoon is just some sort of empty convention we've developed based on historical origins. Yet these days, even within all the situations that don’t call for using a spoon to put sugar in one’s coffee and despite the widespread usage of pop-sickle sticks to mix coffee, give most folks a fork--especially the older generations--and you’ll get a confused look.

But why do this? Because these simple acts reveal a tremendous wealth of information about someone (and you can do this while you ‘listen’) and about people. Common reactions that stem from meaningless expectations say a lot about a culture or group, and if you’re really attentive to details, with time and performed on enough people, this is the kind of harmless experimentation that truly allows you to develop ‘grounded’ generalisations about certain behaviour types. And the reaction one has certainly says a lot about that individual, from someone who gets angry and refuses to stir his coffee to the one that says “cool,” and stirs his coffee without hesitation…
Further, these simple moments--whether disrupting the natural flow of things, countering expectations or playing devil’s advocate--force me and whomever else may be involved to get a better perspective on things, to think things out from many angles and hopefully break out of pre-conceived notions and opinions based on prejudices.

All this leads me to my latest ‘monkey wrench,’ one of the handles (ID) I use on the forums found on Craigslist: Alwayslooking99. For several reasons, the main one being tactical anonymity, I wanted users to think that I was a woman without making it obviously so since that would just be duping people i.e. rather than using a handle like hotbabe1 or similar (I'm against fraud, period). Call it intuition but--although by all logic it is a perfectly neutral handle--I had a feeling Alwayslooking would produce that effect. Why the 99? Simply because Alwayslooking and Alwayslooking1 were unavailable and I didn’t feel like working my way up the list. In retrospect I should have tried 69 but too late!

Whenever I can, rather than watch TV, I like to ‘hang around’ the jokes forum found on Craigslist; there are some pretty funny people on there and it’s a great ‘community.’
This blog is displayed in my handle profile and whenever I spend time on the forum, I have noticed that the number of hits instantly goes up. I review my site stats and sure enough, nearly all those hits have used the link found in my profile to lead them here.

As anywhere else, especially when anonymity is involved, there is some sexual banter between forum members. So my first thought was that my predictions had been right about the ‘sex’ users would assign to my handle since the people checking out my blog were guys (based on their handles or profile info) curious to learn more about “Alwayslooking.”
But then I got to thinking that since you can only include vids and pics from select sites and I prefer simply adding a link to an external site that already contains the material I wish to include, that perhaps the people checking out my profile and my blog may be doing so in order to see if I’m spamming. There appears to always be a moderator present but the members themselves do a pretty good job of monitoring posts and spam is usually briskly removed.
Or simply, were my jokes so good and my quips so clever that people wanted to know more about me?
Hmmmm... How to find out?
I created a new handle: pete2000! And guess what. Yes indeed, drastically fewer people were checking out my blog.
Oh we men! Sometimes we are so pathetically predictable!

All bets open as to whether or not the same men will read this post!


Keep on clicking!

PDL

© 2009, Pascal-Denis Lussier

Photo credits: "Looming" by Pascal-Denis Lussier
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