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The Blackness Project, this is not a clap back at the whiteness project even though that is what it may seem to be. But the Blackness Project is a story, an insight, a learning experience for the people who don’t experience. These people who spoke in this project are people who I relate to on a level in which the Caucasian community. This story is a story about what the African American race has been going through for over 265 years. From slavery to modern day mental enslavement. A story about the trials and tribulations of what we as a race go through on a regular day basis. A story on experience and pain, that pain that will be forever embedded in the African American people’s minds and souls. An insight on these people’s individual stories, these individual struggles that they endure. And finally, a learning experience, take it however you’d like but watching this should be a learning experience in a way that you try and put yourself in the shoes of the people who struggle, the poor, the mentally weak, the people who fall short of societal demands.
We all have a shadow; it is not always visible because sometimes it may be dark outside or there just may be no light where you are standing now. But our shadows are there, they are just something we live with whether they are behind you or beside you. The African American culture is constantly judged by the shadows of their past, “aggressive”, “thieves”, a whole bunch of names and things that people define the black culture as just because of the look of a shadow, something you can’t even see clearly. The black culture has been enslaved in many different forms, and yes, in my eyes black people are still enslaved. Maybe not physically but mentally, we wake up knowing that some societal norms and the way society talks about black people not being able to complete school, have certain jobs, or do certain things. Most of the African American culture has a feeling of not being able to do certain things because society portrays them to being incapable of holding certain positions and jobs. An article in the New York Times perfectly demonstrates and portrays the topics at hand. The article states that, “Ramon Ray, 46, a New Jersey entrepreneur, always dresses in a suit or a sweater. But he has still been asked by strangers to park a car or been handed luggage or a coat to hang up. The bias, Mr. Ray said, was an assumption that he was “the help.” He is also aware of the racist assumption that black men are menacing. It has prompted him to modify his behavior in ways that include keeping his distance from white female strangers, especially in isolated places like parking lots.” There is your reality.
I personally cannot believe that this is a conversation that is still happening, that this is a conversation that is held on an everyday basis. Lorna from the blackness project states “”I felt frustration, I felt frustrated because it is a clear indication that we are still having the same conversation that we were having when I was younger, I thought we would have advanced by now”. For years upon years this has been an ongoing problem throughout out many different generations of people. And all these people go through the same issues even when they are generations apart, they still relate to older generations problems. This shows how deep our blood runs, through suffering, mental and physically destruction, abuse, and every single African American soul is affected. That’s the deep story.
