Twitter has been on fire the last few days over this, and I think my favorite response has been the attempt to capture Dolezal’s reaction to one simple question in gifs.

“Are you African-American?”

1. I’m slightly flattered, but WHY would you choose to be black in America?

Can one choose? Dolezal apparently did, at least until the lies she built up over her career collapsed in viral glory. She can go back to being white now. As for why, it’s certainly not for increased access to teen pool parties. Freddie DeBoer put it…

Your comparison of Rachel Dolezal to Caitlyn Jenner is stale and poorly reasoned. Race and gender identity are not analogous social concepts. They don’t form functional logical analogies.

And yes, you are boiling womanhood down to the socially acceptable female form. Second wave feminists, and gender deconstructivists in…

YES to all of this! I have had white men and women alike deny my identity my whole life — I am Arab. Especially right after 9/11, I had people I thought were my friends say “But you’re white…” What a slap in the face.

I strongly believe in the right of the individual to define their identity. If you asked my family, you…

“Rachel Dolezal & the Science of “Sounding Black””

“Since the language we speak comes from our environment rather than from our genes, the overlap between AAE and black ethnicity is blurry; not all African Americans speak AAE, and some non-African-Americans do. But like all languages and…