Jason (a proud gay man writing in one of the writing forums I'm also part of) wrote a rant based upon some experiences he had recently. It was so funny that I fell out of my chair reading it. Then, reading it again, I realized something: the things he was saying, have been said or done to ME as a Black man. So, I wrote my "rebuttal" to his rant, a "rant" of my own...and then some!

Jason!

As one of my Scouting friends would say to me....DUDE!!!!!!!

You think you're the only one who get those kinds of things done to them
because you're gay?? Try being a Black man for a few hours!!

Okay...here's the deal:

a. Universal list. When I am introduced to someone, or when I meet someone
(a female, mostly), I get the "black" version of your "make a connection"
game. "Do you know (whatever the person's name is)? He's black." Like you,
I respond with the "Sorry, the new Blackness book hasn't been put to bed
yet, and there's just *so* many new names in that book...I can't remember
them all!" Of course, you THEN get the ones who not only want you to "match
the name" but also "know the description"..."He's like, your size and
everything...a little lighter than you are...but yeah, I think he's black.
He said that he's from like Yemen or something. That guy..." Not only do I
have to get out the Blackness book, but now I have to get out the Yemanese
version of the Blackness book!! Like you, I smile and shake my head,
thinking "Ooooh boy, this is gonna be a GREAT evening!"

b. blind dates/hookups. I get a lot of these, particularily in my line of
work (for those not aware, I work for Uncle Samuel, part of your tax dollars
at work. I work a great deal with the public): for some reason people MUST
think that since I'm Black, I MUST have to be matched up with a Black woman.

Gotta be that Noah thing in people's minds...I have attended many dinners in
which like out of some secret trap door, I am rushed over to a side and
introduced to an (most of the time) attractive female who shares my skin
tone, hair color and perhaps my lip design somewhat. Never mind that she
could be a "black barbie", unable to say anything except a few "catch
phrases" (she probably memorized them beforehand) and could not share with me the name of or the author of a recent book she read. Book? What's
that?? Something you do to bet on something?? And don't get them started
on politics or entertainment...they know very little about politics other
than "Jesse Jackson" and perhaps "Marion Berry" and entertainment, they can
tell you about every rap and hip-hop artist but have no clue about
Funkadelic, George Clinton, or the Sugar Hill Gang!! And Run-DMC?? "Old
school".

Or I get the woman who wants to be the feminine Jesse Jackson.
Everything MUST HAPPEN either "because she's black" or "because she's NOT
white." The knife and fork switched on the table?? "It's because I'm
black!" She left her keys on the table at the dinner? "Because I'm black."
People looking at her while she's on her cell phone during the dinner?? "Of
course," she says later, shaking her head from side to side, "It's only
because I'm a Black woman. You see other people on their cell phones
getting looked at??" No, silly... Blackness has nothing to do with
stupidity, with an inability to THINK FOR ONES SELF, and nothing to do with
the accidental situations of OTHER PEOPLE. And for some reason (that "black
man's penis has to be long as a garden hose" thing!), if it's NOT a black
woman, it's some BLONDE BIMBETT who has the same about of brain cells as her chronilogical age!! "Mike, I want you to meet Barbie!" And I'm MARRIED!!

c. Blackness. Of course, since I'm Black, I just HAVE to have an intimate
knowledge of football, basketball and baseball. I have to know all of the Black players, their stats, what they like to drink and who they are sleeping with. I have to know all of my "black artists", and I have to know my "black lore", as in "Amos and Andy" and "that guy on the TV show who sells Jello." "Oh, you mean Bill Cosby?" "Yeah!! You REALLY know your roots, don't you?" *crossed eyes*

Oh yeah...I can't know anything about bowling, nor tell you about different
kinds of coffees, haven't a clue about hockey or skiing, and I've never been
on a snowmobile or motorcycle before in my life. But Hey!! Let's ask Mike
about what's the deal with J.Lo! Aw man...I'm going to have to REALLY read
that Blackness book and stop skimming!

d. Wardrobe. Are you kidding?? You think YOU have problems with people
bringing YOU stuff?? Of course, because I'm Black, I'm expected to KNOW all
of the latest trends in fashion...and they are surprised when I show up
wearing a teeshirt and a pair of jeans (my "after work" outfit). "Does this
go together?" "yeah", I tell them....I wouldn't know...I'm blue-green colorblind

(really, I am; I fail the Army's color depth perception test every single time....I can't see those blue numbers on green dots and I can't see the green numbers on blue or black)...I really cannot tell the difference between green, blue and black sometimes...which brings up some rather interesting discussions about my wife. She's not green, blue or
black. She's white...well...that eggshell white color that one gets when you don't get a lot of sun.

Seriously.

I get this question asked of me a lot: "Did you know she was white when you married her??"

Hummmmmm. Let me think about that one. Well, she wasn't the same skin tone
I was. She didn't have the same hair color I had, but hey, even Mary J.
Blige can colorize her hair any shade of red or yellow and still be Black.
She has those soft lips that don't really match mine. No, your honor, I can
say without a doubt that I didn't know she wasn't a black woman when I
married her. I'm colorblind, don'tcha know?

I have to add a couple more because of my situation in life; see if you can
match these:

e. Relatives. When I tell friends that I have a Lesbian sister, they look at
me as if I've just held them up and demanding a lung or liver or something.
"You sure she's a lesbian...after all, some girls just like to be around
other gals, you know." Yeah. I'm sure she's a lesbian. "Wow, I didn't know that black people can be lesbians too."

No, like they have a rule: you can only be a member of ONE group, and she blew hers by being black. Oh....she's NOT black, so I guess she can be a lesbian since she's white. "How's that? How can you have a white sister?" Hello...have you ever heard of ADOPTION?? Have you ever heard
of GENETICS? Just how many marbles do you have in that brain of yours??

"You have two grandfathers?? What's the deal there??" I swear that people
can be sooooo dense. Like Black people cannot marry and divorce and get
married again, and cannot have children from like, two marriages...."How
come your daughter is so light and your sons are so dark??" I guess, we
didn't bake my daughter long enough.

f. Work. Like the Blackness, as soon as people know that I work for the
military, THEY have to find someone "I know." And I MUST know these people, even though the military is SO DAMNED TINY and surely, I RUN INTO EVERYONE IN THE ENTIRE MILITARY SERVICE IN A TYPICAL DAY...don't you?? "I have a friend of mine who's in the service...he's a... I don't know what he does, but he's in the service. You heard the name "Johnny Jones"?

Yeah, coming from your mouth.

One of these days, when someone asks me "whether or not I know someone", I'm going to pull out my PDA, open it up, take down their name, and inform the person, "I'll make sure that when I run into him (or her), that I'll tell them I ran into you, okay??"

And because I'm Black, I HAVE to KNOW EVERY BLACK PERSON SERVING IN
"THE SERVICE." Hell, I can't recall the names of the 43 other Black people
working here in the building...it's a great thing that we wear name tags and
badges with our photos on them!!!

The last one, Jason, I have to share because it's SOOO DAMNED FUNNY. I'm a Boy Scouting volunteer, and people are STILL confused with this new uniform outfit that we wear. I was at one of those pump-it-yourself gas stations about two months ago. It was cold, I was standing outside with my Scout uniform on, complete with hat. It SCREAMS "Boy Scout", okay.

Anyway, this man came up, got out of his car, handed me a ten-dollar bill
and told me "Unleaded please."

I looked at this man. He looked at me, and before I could respond back, he
handed me another five and said "You guys do a good job here....thanks."

I filled the man with the fifteen dollars and never said anything more about
it. The man returned, got into his car and took off. When the clerk inside
came running out, thinking it was a drive-off (in Minnesota, they can pull
your license), I gave the clerk the money and told him "I was coming in to
pay for both mine and his."

It's one of my favorite stories about the Scouting uniform and perceptions.