In almost any conversation about issues facing the African American community, there is a great chance that respectability politics–the idea that black people can only speak, dress, and/or behave in certain ways to be worthy of respect–will be infused. There is still a significant portion of blacks who sincerely believe that good English, college degrees, racially ambiguous baby names and every black male wearing his pants on his waist will, somehow, solve problems. What I have found interesting, however, is that when questioned about how any of the things that promote will tackle any substantive issues, the respectability crew has very little to say. For instance, one woman with whom I was speaking is adequately against sagging pants. When I asked her how sagging pants directly related to the prison industrial complex, poverty, inadequate schools etc, all she could offer were red herrings such as “It makes them look like they just got out of prison”. On top of that, she called me “ghetto” and told me that I had some hard life lessons to learn simply because I refuse to police the way people dress and what they name their children. It seemed that she derived satisfaction from having someone to look down upon. That really got me to thinking. Why would people hold on to viewpoints that they can’t produce a valid argument for unless it provided them with something? I sincerely believe that much of the respectability crew feels the need to create this us/them binary within the black community because it allows them to feel superior to blacks that don’t have the amount of education, money, status or other privilege mechanisms that they have. It is no different than working class white people who vote against their own self interests and support people who could give two shits about their fate all in the name of maintaining the psychological comfort of white supremacy. Many black people who chide other blacks for everything from hair colors to sexual practices appear to do so not out of a desire to “uplift” others as much as the desire to exult themselves. For this woman to claim to love blackness and want to see black people “do better” to call me a “hood rat” and speculate about where I’m from and where I have or have not been–and keep in mind I have never met her outside of social media–is counterproductive to any type of mission of black unity or social responsibility. If you are an elitist, deal with those issues on your own. However, don’t try and pass it off as activism or concern. You are about black uplift but you would rather police an inner city teen girl’s hair color instead of teaching her about voting? You are concerned about black children but you rather scold a new mother about what she named her baby instead of writing your legislator to advocate for funding for prenatal care? You understand the crisis facing young black males but you’d rather stop him from “looking like a prisoner” than critique policies that aim to MAKE him a prisoner? Give me a fucking break. Learn to think critically and realize that respectability politics has never–Mary Church Terrell, Mary Mcleod Bethune and WEB Dubois all obtained college degrees in the 19th century–and will never eradicate racism. That is not to say that education and black people advancing to positions of leadership cannot be valuable tools in the fight against systemic oppression. However, the notion that white people will give up white supremacy willingly simply because they see a well spoken black man in a suit and tie is for the birds. That being said, instead of seeking comfort in how much better off you are than Tameika or Ray Ray, realize that you are all–even if in different ways–living in and impacted by White Supremacist Capitalist Patriarchy.

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