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My parents are immigrants from Nigeria, so I guess that makes me "African", but I have nothing against black Americans or Caribbean Americans. We have a large black population here in Houston and Dallas and I've never noticed this friction. Now my parents are different story... but it's mostly out of ignorance.
I had the opportunity to get to know some students at my university who came from places like Kenya, Nigeria, Haiti, Cameroon, Jamaica, Ghana, Senegal, as well as a few Black people from England and France. Among the students, I got along with them well. I was told by one or two that their parents had some issues with Black Americans.
As for Houston, from what I've been told, Houston has the largest Nigerian population in the USA.
I know about this group of people. I haven't heard of this book, but I know what you're talking about. I know about the "paper bag parties". One had to be at least the complexion of a brown paper bag or lighter to gain entrance to such a party.
There has been an issue as a divide between skin complexions. There have been those who wanted to separate themselves from those who were darker.
Another thing to research is about Anatole Broyard. He was a literary critic for the New York Times. For a long time, no one knew he was Black. He was of Louisiana Creole descent. On one hand, he felt like he had little in come with other Blacks. On the other hand, he never felt like he fit in with the White population either. He married a White woman and raised his children as Whites. His own daughter didn't know she had Black ancestry until he gave a bedside confession. Anatole Broyard felt he looked "White enough" to pass for White. His sister couldn't pass for White, and suffered for it. He did what is called "passing" and labeled himself as "White".
That sounds interesting. I know about passing. There's a book about that, too, that I hadn't read, but I read the reviews and an interview with the author. Her mother was from a large family, and three of the siblings were living as white people. She didn't find this out until she was older. One of the women in the story was a "throwback child". Her parents were passing and her brother looked white, but she turned out looking African-American. Her parents sort of hid her, sent her to private school, didn't let the neighbors ever really see her up close, and her mother scrubbed the hell out of her skin every night trying to keep it light. It was sad.
As an adult, she wore her hair in braids and spent as much time in the sun as possible darkening her skin and being everything that her parents had denied in her, and in themselves.
In another of the stories, Macys made a big deal in the 1960s or 70s of hiring the first black sales associate. It turned out there was a black woman working there for years, but no one ever realized she was black.
In Edward Ball's book Slaves In The Family, he traced descendants of people who had been slaves on his family's plantations in South Carolina. He was from one of the families that originally settled along the Charleston River in the 1600s, and his family had kept meticulous records of their "property" and he was able to track down some of them. Of course, some of the descendants of the slaves turned out to be blood relatives. In one case, he followed a man and his wife to New England, and then they just disappear. The trail goes cold. He later found out from an old woman who had known them that they were very lightskinned and they probably disappeared because they decided to live as white and changed identity.
Oh boy, a lot to go through here. First off, let me introduce myself: Hi, I'm Eevee and I'm a first generation Haitian American female in my late 20's.
Look at what happened in Rwanda, what's still happening in the Middle East. It doesn't matter if you have 99% of things in common with another group, you will find a reason to go to war over the 1%.
To the OP, I think those two women just hate each other and are using obvious differences to stoke the flames. Let me give my opinion going off of the above quoted posts:
My dad is a cabdriver in Boston and often times is stationed in Dorchester, a large, diverse neighborhood in Boston. My dad, bless his ignorant soul, hates picking up fares from AAs in this area. He says that they never tip and he's worried about being stiffed or, worse, being robbed. According to him, he's been stiffed countless times, both by drunk white college kids and AAs living in Dottie and so, because of the former, he doesn't really deal with the college areas and, because of the latter, he really doesn't hang around Dottie any more other then to pick up fares going to Milton, a wealthy town on the border.
Ever since I was a kid, my parents has held some interesting views about African Americans. They really didn't understand the issues plaguing those communities. You have to realize that my parents were poor, borderline illiterate immigrants from the #1 poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere. And yet, as they so often like to express, they never relied on government aid, worked hard, and pushed for me to succeed in school. They didn't understand this cycle of poverty AAs seemed to be stuck in when they could just come into the US with literally nothing and make it. They didn't understand why so many of our neighbors were unemployed and living in Section 8 apartments while nearly everyone they worked with (my mom was housekeeper at a major Boston hotel) were immigrants. Yes, they called it laziness, yes, they even went as far as to suggest they were uncultured. Again, you have to try to see it from their point of view: they came here from country where many kids didn't survive due to lack of proper nutrition, where many kids didn't go to school due to lack of opportunity. To them, the US solved all of the issues plaguing countries like Haiti and yet AAs who were born and raised there didn't seem that much better off than the people they'd known back home.
I don't excuse my parents' ideas, but you can't help but wonder how that is. "Island blacks" are the result of the same slave trade as African Americans, went through the same plight of being ripped from their homes and cultures, still go through the same plight of racism (do you think Jim Crow had a little asterisk that said these rules didn't apply to blacks from the Caribbean? Do you think blacks from Africa or the Caribbean don't suffer from the same discrimination as AAs?). And yet, it seems like black immigrants succeed more than some segments of AAs in this country. I think in some immigrants' minds, AAs should be at the top of their game, shouldn't be living in projects and relying on the government, should be thriving just b/c they were born here and, therefore, got an immediate advantage over them.
Oh, and green_mariner, I get what you're saying. I went through my entire school years accused of being white, being called an "Oreo", and having my "black card" revoked. In school, I just couldn't really relate to my AAs classmates. Many of them didn't make it easy to do so and immediately called out my differences: I spoke with a strange accent; I didn't eat the same foods; I didn't listen to the same music; I read for fun; I didn't speak in slang; and so on. In high school, I had AAs friends, but some of my closest friends were 1st generation immigrants or were immigrants themselves, were Vietnamese, Brazilian, Chinese, Sudanese, and so on. Despite the difference in race, we had more in common due to our background. Immigrants are so, so keen on education, so insistent that education leads to a life of prosperity, to the point that many will insist that their children go to college to become doctors, lawyers, and so on. For many of them, a solid education was a dream most of them would never achieve but in America, where kids are guaranteed 12 years of free education, that dream seems realized.
It has little to do w/ TV and radio. Most poor blacks immigrating to the US end up living side by side with poor African Americans. They see first hand the gang culture plaguing many of these areas. Live in these areas long enough, where black teens are shooting other blacks, where the crack epidemic was destroying families, where kids drop out of school every day, where the cycle of poverty continues unbroken and crime was rampant, and is it any wonder they want to pack up and get the heck out of there and live in the "white" areas or in their own enclaves? No one tells the immigrants coming in from Sudan, Kenya, Haiti, or Jamaica that there are areas home to successful AAs with the same drive to succeed as they have, no one tells them that AAs are keen to denote the difference between blacks and "ni**as" (see the below quote). So they come to America, look at their neighbors, and assume this how African Americans are until they see evidence otherwise.
See, even among African Americans, there's division. How can you not expect black immigrants to assume ill things about AAs when they come in not knowing about this? Again, not making excuses but this is a phenomenon that's not even really explained or examined here in the US and is completely alien to immigrants.
First off, most black immigrants who either become citizens or 1st generation black immigrants consider themselves "black Americans", not African American or Caribbean Americans. "African American" is completely an American construct. I personally don't consider myself to be African American, especially when so many people in my family aren't even Americans (it KILLS me when the term "African American" is used towards those who aren't even Americans!).
As for taking advantage of the opportunities, many, many immigrants, black or otherwise, would ask why AAs themselves aren't taking advantage of these opportunities? Why do AAs only seem to rail against immigrants who seize these opportunities but don't ask themselves why didn't they make the attempt? It's like the kid who doesn't want a lollipop until another kid takes the last one and then the first kid throws a tantrum over it. It was there for the longest time right in front of you but you only paid attention to it when it was gone. As I mentioned above, one of my closest friend was a 1st generation Vietnamese American and her family ran a small beauty supply store in my neighborhood. Even her parents have remarked at the lack of entrepreneurship among AAs in the area and noted that the poor AAs in this area were being serviced by immigrants who were once poorer than them but aren't anymore. Contrary to your above comment, not all immigrants who come to the US had opportunities in their homeland. We're not talking about rich doctors, lawyers, and businessmen here. Yes, they tend to be more aggressive, more likely to be risk takers, but I would suggest that you can't survive in a country like Haiti without those traits, and you certainly can't emigrate out of that situation without that drive. One could ask if that drive, that aggressiveness is now absent among today's poor AAs (lord knows, it WAS there during the Civil Rights movement).
I've known a LOT of immigrants in my life, and yet I never knew a single one who took advantage of government benefits like social services (most don't even know about programs like SNAP until they are informed about it by doctors or teachers). Most even didn't do traditional loans. Most immigrants take part in a off-the-books loan program where a group of people pay in to a pot every month and after some time, that lump sum was given to one person. Eventually, everyone in the circle would get that lump sum. I can't remember the name of this type of loan system right now, but it's very common among immigrants. That money (I've heard that in some circles, the pot is as high as $50-100K), is often the seed money to open up businesses and purchase homes. Most immigrants, assuming they are literate enough and know enough English to even deal w/ a bank, won't for one reason or another, at least not in the beginning.
I think the main reason black immigrants compare themselves to AAs is because many AAs use racism as the reason they can't get ahead. And yet, black immigrants aren't immune to that racism and many manage to get ahead and thrive. Racism can't be the only reason why some AA communities in the US are in such decline, not when other minorities are making it. Black immigrants suffered through the slave trade, suffered through the institutionalized racism that came after, suffer today from rampant discrimination. And yet, while many immigrant enclaves are far from perfect, many of these immigrants manage to get ahead and succeed. They see this, they see valedictorians with names that speak of foreign lands, they see businesses run by people who barely speak English, they see ethnic enclaves popping up in suburbs, and wonder why isn't this happening w/ the AAs they see.
your post is mostly full of the ignorance, naiveté, arrogance, and apathy that affirms what the OP originally posted.
you're also full of contradictions. you say that immigrants don't take advantage of social services but also live in the same section 8 housing as poor Black Americans thats completely contradictory! you're either lying or confused!
the first thing you need to realize is that Black American (those of us who trace our lineage thru slavery in this country) is completely different from African American or Caribbean American. you are not a Black American! you may be a black American but certainly not a Black American; there is a significant distinction. you and your family have not suffered thru the generations of oppression and therefore are largely immune from many of the long-lasting consequences. just because you have dark skin does not mean you are in the same boat! i suggest you open your eyes and drop your pretentious pretense, because you really have no clue of what you speak!
if you and your family are such hard workers and exemplary people, then how come you didn't stay in your native country and try to change the very bad conditions there, become successful and eventually help your fellow native citizens? you did not! you all chose to come here and take advantage of opportunity, some of which was brought t you by the same Black Americans you seemingly disdain! you really need to check yourself.
Immigrants are usually different types of people vs their native counterparts. you all tend to be driven and risk takers and you tend to have the means to immigrate in the first place. judging all Haitians by your family and other 1st generation Haitian immigrants would be very fool-hearty. just like you and your family judging all Black Americans by the poor blacks you come in to contact with is ridiculously ignorant.
i suggest that while you are here studying at American schools and colleges that you might try to learn a little empathy. you certainly seem to need to learn that lesson.
your post is mostly full of the ignorance, naiveté, arrogance, and apathy that affirms what the OP originally posted.
you're also full of contradictions. you say that immigrants don't take advantage of social services but also live in the same section 8 housing as poor Black Americans thats completely contradictory! you're either lying or confused!
the first thing you need to realize is that Black American (those of us who trace our lineage thru slavery in this country) is completely different from African American or Caribbean American. you are not a Black American! you may be a black American but certainly not a Black American; there is a significant distinction. you and your family have not suffered thru the generations of oppression and therefore are largely immune from many of the long-lasting consequences. just because you have dark skin does not mean you are in the same boat! i suggest you open your eyes and drop your pretentious pretense, because you really have no clue of what you speak!
if you and your family are such hard workers and exemplary people, then how come you didn't stay in your native country and try to change the very bad conditions there, become successful and eventually help your fellow native citizens? you did not! you all chose to come here and take advantage of opportunity, some of which was brought t you by the same Black Americans you seemingly disdain! you really need to check yourself.
Immigrants are usually different types of people vs their native counterparts. you all tend to be driven and risk takers and you tend to have the means to immigrate in the first place. judging all Haitians by your family and other 1st generation Haitian immigrants would be very fool-hearty. just like you and your family judging all Black Americans by the poor blacks you come in to contact with is ridiculously ignorant.
i suggest that while you are here studying at American schools and colleges that you might try to learn a little empathy. you certainly seem to need to learn that lesson.
your post is mostly full of the ignorance, naiveté, arrogance, and apathy that affirms what the OP originally posted.
you're also full of contradictions. you say that immigrants don't take advantage of social services but also live in the same section 8 housing as poor Black Americans thats completely contradictory! you're either lying or confused!
the first thing you need to realize is that Black American (those of us who trace our lineage thru slavery in this country) is completely different from African American or Caribbean American. you are not a Black American! you may be a black American but certainly not a Black American; there is a significant distinction. you and your family have not suffered thru the generations of oppression and therefore are largely immune from many of the long-lasting consequences. just because you have dark skin does not mean you are in the same boat! i suggest you open your eyes and drop your pretentious pretense, because you really have no clue of what you speak!
if you and your family are such hard workers and exemplary people, then how come you didn't stay in your native country and try to change the very bad conditions there, become successful and eventually help your fellow native citizens? you did not! you all chose to come here and take advantage of opportunity, some of which was brought t you by the same Black Americans you seemingly disdain! you really need to check yourself.
Immigrants are usually different types of people vs their native counterparts. you all tend to be driven and risk takers and you tend to have the means to immigrate in the first place. judging all Haitians by your family and other 1st generation Haitian immigrants would be very fool-hearty. just like you and your family judging all Black Americans by the poor blacks you come in to contact with is ridiculously ignorant.
i suggest that while you are here studying at American schools and colleges that you might try to learn a little empathy. you certainly seem to need to learn that lesson.
Oh please
Honey, I'm black and I was born in America. That makes me a Black American. Same as any other black person born in America or is a citizen. All black people born in America or who are citizens of America are Black Americans; not all Black Americans are African Americans (do you need a Venn diagram to explain this to you?). Heck, there's a segment of the population out there that would tell you that not all African Americans are even black (i.e., whites born in Africa who gain US citizenship). Honestly, outside of a thread like this, I don't even bother w/ terms like "African American". Terms like "African American" or "Caribbean American" are American constructs, terms made up to classify a group of people. Few people use them outside of the USA. If I go to Paris or Cairo or Tokyo and tell them I was born in Boston, MA, they would say that I am a Black American. Just like I'm a Black American, my sister, who was born on the outskirts of Montreal, is a Black Canadian. I simply laugh out loud when people call my sister "African America" when she's neither African nor American!
My family are descendants of slaves forcibly removed from their homeland, just like any other black person in America. The only difference is that my folks got off the boat a bit earlier. Do you think forced slavery was any easier for black Haitians, black Jamaicans, or other black islanders as compared to blacks in America? Honey, black is black is black. I'm just as black as the folks descended from the slaves working the cotton fields in Georgia, I'm just as black as the folks currently living in Africa. If you think I've somehow escaped oppression and racism b/c my family are from the Caribbean, than you're obviously smoking some crazy sh*t. Actually, I find it sad that you even think this. To quote a famous line from a well known TV show: "We're running the same race and jumping the same hurdles, why are you trying to trip me up?". Again, black is black is black. We ALL struggled, regardless of where you got off of that boat. I'm not immune to any form of racism being dished out today. Immigrants weren't immune to the racism of yesteryear (unless the Jim Crow laws did have an asterisk stating that they didn't apply to black immigrants. Somehow, I doubt that). You seem to have this strange idea that black immigrants had it so much easier than African Americans, which is strange to me. Haiti may have tossed off the chains of slavery before the US, but that doesn't mean oppression and racism didn't still exist.
You ask why my family didn't stay in Haiti if they're such hard workers? Why not ask any immigrant the same question? Hello, have you not had even an iota of history lessons or social studies? It doesn't matter how hard working and disciplined you are if your country is starving, if your children are dying from malnutrition, if the tyranny of the politics of your country won't allow you to use your talents and drive to better yourself. You're talking about countries where it's practically illegal for young girls to even go to school, where the education infrastructure doesn't exist beyond, say, the 3rd grade. My parents were hard workers (my mom died a mere 2 hours after coming off of a 12 hour shift), but they didn't have the tools to change a nation, they never had the option to gain those tools. Hence why they immigrated to a country that would give their children those tools. They came here with nothing, had no special advantage over African Americans, in fact, had more disadvantages working against them. Yup, they came here to take advantage of opportunities, the exact same opportunities available to ALL blacks, ALL people living in the USA, and yet you seem so angry about this. Why is that?
Your reading comprehension is lacking. My family has never lived in Section 8 housing. You are aware of the fact that people have these things called vouchers where they can live in housing that isn't Section 8 based, right? We lived in housing projects growing up, but they weren't 100% subsidized (our rent was 100% market rate while some neighbors had vouchers).
My story is just that, MY story. I don't claim to speak for anyone other than the immigrants I have personally encountered (note, I've lived in immigrant enclaves damn near all my life, so I've met and known quite a few immigrants). I never once stated I disdained any African Americans. Again, your reading comprehension is lacking here. I've stated more than once in my original response that my parents' views were ignorant.
You're ignorance astounds me and yet you rail against me. You jump through conclusions based on nothing but your own misconceptions fueled by some serious anger. Really, just stop making a fool of yourself now. Don't be angry at me for telling my story.
I've definitley felt some friction between African immigrants than the local AA's out here. Africans tend to look down on us in general because we dont take advantages of the oppertunities we have in this country. But on the counterpoint, the Africans don't realize the hardships AA's been through throughout our history in this country.
Which is nothing but a ridiculous excuse. Carribean-American here. I'm of Haitian descent. 1st generation. My parents and grandparents were born and raised in the little island of Haiti. Came to this country when they were in their 40s and 50s with all five of their children LEGALLY. All FIVE of them (my mother, my aunts and uncles) are now college graduates. All master's degree holders. I believe one is a PhD engineer as well. I'm going to go ahead and let everyone know that it isn't hatred African immigrants have for African-Americans. It's more like a wtf-is-wrong-with-yall-and-why-you-can't-you-get-your-mess-together-after-200-years outlook. Almost all immigrants of African descent have had success in this country if they tried hard enough. If you know anything about some African and Caribbean immigrants is that education is a #1 priority when they come here. Look at Nigerians. They come here and are ABOUT their business. They put their kids in school but watch them like a hawk. They discipline them and make sure they are about their school work. Anything less than A's are unacceptable. Their kids go on to colleges and become doctors, lawyers, engineers, and other successful careers. They aren't taught they can't do anything because their black or dark-skin. They aren't taught that whites are evil. Nigerians don't let race get in the way of their success. Education and God are #1 in their households and they prosper. It was the same story in my family. There were never any excuses. And we didn't hate anyone. All my family has had a good level of success. The arguments African-Americans come up with for why they can't succeed or pull forward in life is ridiculous to us. Especially in 2013 when America elected a black president TWICE. There are no more excuses.
Last edited by allenk893; 10-03-2013 at 01:01 AM..
I've known a LOT of immigrants in my life, and yet I never knew a single one who took advantage of government benefits like social services (most don't even know about programs like SNAP until they are informed about it by doctors or teachers). Most even didn't do traditional loans. Most immigrants take part in a off-the-books loan program where a group of people pay in to a pot every month and after some time, that lump sum was given to one person. Eventually, everyone in the circle would get that lump sum. I can't remember the name of this type of loan system right now, but it's very common among immigrants. That money (I've heard that in some circles, the pot is as high as $50-100K), is often the seed money to open up businesses and purchase homes. Most immigrants, assuming they are literate enough and know enough English to even deal w/ a bank, won't for one reason or another, at least not in the beginning.
Going back to this point I made earlier, I found some articles that better explain this system of loaning money that is common in many immigrant communities:
Like I said earlier, this is how many immigrants get the seed money to start up businesses and buy property outside the constraints of mainstream banks.
I don't think the problem the OP posted is limited to just blacks, I don't think people (of any race) REALLY like other people all that much. Sure, we might be civil to one another, and we even pass pleasantries back and forth, but deep down, if push came to shove, we only care about people in our own families or close circle of friends. All other people are "just there", and are sometimes an annoyance. Sometimes even family and friends are not all that well liked either.
If you don't believe that statement, go to a grocery store when a hurricane is approaching and watch normally "nice people" shove their fellow man out of the way to get that last bottle of water on the shelf. Or, a less dramatic example, drive down any road and watch how drivers treat other drivers.
Humans are a strange lot. Wars are fought over dumb stuff, like a border, and we think nothing of blowing each other up if push comes to shove. If you read some of the posts on this forum, most of them deal with some problem one person is having with another person.....either at work, or in a relationship.
So blacks talking badly about other blacks should come as no surprise, we all do it.
Don
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thats completely contradictory! you're either lying or confused!
