To Be a Black Snow-Rabbit in the Middle of Open Season:
Inequality and the Toxicity of White Fear
By Soraya Andriamiarisoa
I used to think that I had a better understanding about the chaos that surrounds our country. I thought I was learning to be a better person (and citizen) by listening to my family’s warnings regarding avoiding association with anyone darker than us as much as possible. I had such a hard time understanding my family’s views, but I did my best to be a good daughter in listening to my family’s pleas when they asked me to make sure my hair was extra straight and sleek and that my eyes were bright and shiny like the blue and green contacts I’d buy from Santee Alley, LA.
And my skin is dark Peruvian brown.
I say this because
Now, more than ever, the world is a strange place. We live in a dimension where “alternative facts” are introduced to the general public. We live in a dimension where human values are based on color rather than compassion.
We are beyond the obviousness of how severely divided our country is but the real issue is the extent to which this need to “purify” or “whiten” stems from.
What was and is happening right now has been going on for generations.
All the traumatic and silent relationships with the beautiful, rich, misogynistic white charisma I was trained to be with, inevitably snaps, takes over and tosses away with me when my color defies the Eurocentric parade I find myself wrapped in a psychological whirlwind with.
Nonetheless, the trauma never hits as hard as the story my mother told me about immigrating and establishing citizenship here in this country. She saved me, my father, and my sister.
History repeats itself and my heart truly broke when I suddenly realized what guilt my mother harbored when she slathered highly concentrated chemically induced anti-curling formula into my thick rebellious hair and cranium. Yet I recognize and cherish how much my family tried to protect me.
All those years, watching me grow, making sure I knew the customs of this country to ensure my safety and overall well-being among other American youth…
But I am a glass-full kind of girl, and I think every moment I share with my loved ones is in preparation for the cold, hard times between now and what lies ahead for all of us as a Nation.
The endless debate about ‘What it means to be an American’ and Whiteness spreads like a virus and has manifested itself into our current timeline which definitively ticks due to historical self-destructive tendencies to compartmentalize and essentially whitewash who and what we do not understand.
All in all, I am not the first person to address this and I am far from being the last person to challenge it.
And highly acclaimed novelist and editor, Toni Morrison captures the critical urgency of acknowledging and calling to action this toxicity of “Americanness” and its obsession with Color and Othering. Her submission in New York Times, “Mourning for Whiteness”, brings attention to the instances where immigrants, like my mother and father, have had to sacrifice themselves by prioritizing whiteness over their original identity to ensure our safety and success in this country.
As Morrison states:
“This is a serious project. All immigrants to the United States know (and knew) that if they want to become real, authentic Americans they must reduce their fealty to their native country and regard it as secondary, subordinate, in order to emphasize their whiteness. Unlike any nation in Europe, the United States holds whiteness as the unifying force. Here, for many people, the definition of “Americanness” is color”
This xenophobic outlook on life and materialism, which is the American Dream, aims to maintain supremacy whereas Morrison’s ideologies refute and rise up against it. We take into account for thousands of lost identifies and instances where minority groups are targeted as a result of white mens’ fear of losing control over others. This fear drove the under belly of America, which consisted of “…many white voters — both the poorly educated and the well educated who—
embraced the shame and fear sowed by Donald Trump. The candidate whose company has been sued by the Justice Department for not renting apartments to black people. The candidate who questioned whether Barack Obama was born in the United States, and who seemed to condone the beating of a Black Lives Matter protester at a campaign rally. The candidate who kept black workers off the floors of his casinos. The candidate who is beloved by David Duke and endorsed by the Ku Klux Klan.
(Morrison 2016)
“To keep alive the perception of white superiority, these white Americans tuck their heads under cone-shaped hats and American flags and deny themselves the dignity of face-to-face confrontation, training their guns on the unarmed, the innocent, the scared, on subjects who are running away, exposing their unthreatening backs to bullets. Surely, shooting a fleeing man in the back hurts the presumption of white strength? The sad plight of grown white men, crouching beneath their (better) selves, to slaughter the innocent during traffic stops, to push black women’s faces into the dirt, to handcuff black children. Only the frightened would do that. Right?”
(Morrison 2016)
Wise and challenging words, Morrison inspires me to rise above the fear and confusion this Country seems so insistent upon holstering. The pride of white-washing is unnatural in that it perpetuates a Nation that thrives on Supremacy, which is fueled by fear, and marginalizes others based on xenophobic insecurities that have long been stored away in the dark and more violent corners of America’s skeleton closet.
Alongside Toni Morrison’s powerful critique on the inevitable disassociation of identity that separates Immigrants from being American, the violent outcomes of white fear stems from a Nation confounded by an ideology that color is the determinant of its citizens’ value.Furthermore, in dedication to the sacrifices my family made for me, the pain and love my family gifted me have given me a better chance at understanding the difference between compassion and taking action about the inequality we face in current day.
