Rihanna, Race, Real Life

As has been much discussed, a staggering 46 percent of a survey of Boston teenagers believed Rihanna was "responsible" for being attacked by her boyfriend, Chris Brown. Of the 200 teenagers surveyed, every single one had heard of the incident, which made me think about celebrity. I wondered how the survey would have turned out had Rihanna and Chris Brown been regular people and not icons to the 12-19 year olds surveyed.

Apparently other people had the same thought. Dosomething.org created this educational video that is a "re-enactment," featuring two non-celebrities, about what supposedly happened between Rihanna and Brown. In detail that is blood-chilling even if you already know the specifics from the police report, a young male repeatedly punches a young female in the face, chokes her, generally assaults her while a dead-pan narrator explains the scene. Seeing it played out without the gloss of US Magazine or the backdrop of an MTV soundtrack truly magnifies exactly what is at stake, exactly what the case against Brown is.

But I am likely preaching to the choir. Amongst every single adult I know, the immediate reaction to the entire Rihanna-situation is outrage and pity. Do you know one person who is entertaining thoughts that Rihanna "deserved" to be abused? Even Oprah has weighed in! Which is, of course, the most disturbing aspect of the Boston survey. How did the lessons we teach our kids--"use your words" and "don't hit" come to mind--translate to an acceptance of violence and, even more mind-boggling, a re-calibration of responsibility and blame?

In law school there was this entire jurisprudence that I called "starfu&%ing"--situations in which it seemed that the bench was treating people differently because they were famous. Sometimes it seems like we are harsher on celebrities because they are in the spotlight--think: ostracizing Mischa Barton or that girl from Party of Five for tiny bits of cellulite. Other times, I suppose, we give celebrities more leeway. Is that what's at play in the Boston survey?

And I wonder: How much of the issue has to do with race, if at all? What were the races of the teens surveyed? Does it matter? In talking about the whole thing with friends, I have repeatedly heard amongst some black friends clear overtones of disappointment that such young African Americans in the public eye are perpetuating old African American stereotypes. One friend, in defending Puff Daddy (or is he P Diddy now? Or Puff Daddy Redux? You know who I'm talking about) for lending the teenage couple his estate for a supposed reconciliation said, "Man, he was trying to do damage control for an entire race."

True? What do you think? What would you think if the story involved two South Asians? Anything different? What would the Boston teens in the survey have said if it involved two South Asians?

Obviously...I have no answers. My kids are little and I don't have to worry yet about the potent interaction between celebrities, race, icons, impressionable teenagers. But, especially just having had a girl, the idea of a world in which 46 percent of kids think a woman deserved to be hit? Horrifying. Absolutely horrifying. Hopefully one of you guys can figure out what we should do about this sometime in the next, oh, 14 years or so...

Monday Musings: Do Kids Know Their Ethnicity?

The other day, as I was picking up my son D from preschool, one of his teachers approached me with a furrowed brow and a solemn look on her face.

Uh-oh, I thought. D has obviously hit another child. Or peed in the birdcage. Again. Game face game face.

"Hi!" I said, with so much eagerness I sounded like I was trying out for the cheerleading squad.

"Hi," Miss M. said, as she put her hand on my shoulder with concern that was palpable.

"How are you?" I shrieked.

"I'm good," she replied, all hushed-tones. "D told us what's going on, it must be really hard for you with the 2 kids, and being pregnant and all," she said.

I laughed nervously in that way you do when you are going through the rolodex of possible puzzle pieces in your head. D told her what happened? Wait, something happened? Something that D could communicate? D can communicate? Beyond "I want Mamma Bear Pappa Bear" (which is what he calls The Berenstein Bears, his new favorite tv show, replacing Cailou--thank god for small miracles--but still driving me crazy)?

Miss M. charitably took the panicky smile on my face as a cue to further explain.

"About your husband?" she said, looking around the room as the other parents were coming to pick up their kids. "And how he left yesterday and moved to India?"

WHAT?

My first thought--I have to admit--was whether I was so tired that I had forgotten this had happened. (Like the time I told my husband about this "crazy dream" I had involving our kids spewing every bodily fluid on us in the course of one day, and he informed me that it wasn't a dream, it was last Sunday.) Then, I just laughed--in a more natural, non-stage-fright way--and told Miss M. that my husband was at home and had no plans to move, to India or anywhere else.

It was then Miss M's turn to laugh and look slightly puzzled: "D is non-stop," she said, as things like "natural comic" and other attributes that seem bizarre to pin to a 3 year old rolled off her tongue. Apparently in "circle" that morning, D had told his class and all his teachers, and I quote: "My daddy moved to India yesterday and my mommy and I are very sad but my brother is too baby he isn't sad."

After we exchanged a few more laughs and a bit of necessary awkward conversation, I collected my crazy D and all his stuff and drove us home. On the drive, my thoughts quickly turned from whether D was super imaginative or a pathological liar (I decided on the former) to something decidedly different: How did D make up that his daddy moved to India?

It still baffles me, really. Our race and ethnicity are not the usual stuff of conversation at our house (yet?) D hasn't been to India yet. In fact, I'm not sure if the word "India" has been used around D any more often than many other words. So how did he pick India as the backdrop for his daddy's imaginary furlough? How do we learn where we're from? Does D know he is Indian? He barely understands that "home" is a place, could he possibly understand that India is one? It's heady stuff, the way a child's mind works, and the way a child learns about race.

As is the natural corollary. If D somehow, implicitly, knows what "Indian" is, does he also know what other races are? And does he know that race makes people "different"? I'm reminded of my friend's 3 year old daughter who, when asked who was going to be the next President, responded "Obama! The black man!" My friend was somewhat aghast--especially as her daughter repeated the whole thing numerous times--and went out of her way to explain that she did not teach that particular qualifier to her daughter. So how did she pick it up?

I don't think racial identity and, by extension, prejudice are hard-wired. I am pretty sure you have to learn to hate. It's cool to see D play at his preschool amongst his "it's a small world" cadre of friends--Diego, Joaquin, Johnny (how cool is that? That Johnny is the one with the "weird" name...!) And yet: D's first friend at school was another little Indian boy, and D somehow selected him himself.

I can't tell you what that means but I'm pretty sure it means something. (Maybe I need some time in "circle" to figure it all out...!)

Obama vs. Brown ... vs. Brown

The continuation of the debate on race, sparked by Brown Girls, ignited by Sepia Mutiny, and spreading back to Devis with Babies, has us fascinated, perplexed and downright amazed. It seems a lot of people feel the need to have their say on the matter of interracial dating vis-à-vis the Obama candidacy.

In 1991, Denzel Washington and Sarita Choudhury brought the controversial topic of Brown + Black romance to mainstream America. (Who can forget that steamy love scene? Way to go, Mira Nair!) Guess what? Seventeen years later, we’re still debating the same issue. What’s even more incredible: A lot of us were teenagers ourselves when that movie came out, and thoroughly related to Choudhury's Meena as she professed her love for Washington's Demetrius to her parents. Now, as parents, a number of us seem to relate more to the Indian parents in the film than to Meena.

For the most part, discussion on this topic is good discussion. We need to talk/write these things out and understand one another’s perspectives. As I was reading all the comments, I thought of how a localized variation of this topic came to light in my own family twenty years ago, when my brother married outside our “community.” She was Indian and Hindu, as were we. But she was Telugu, and we were Gujarati. The union was met with caution from all sides. Her relatives questioned my brother’s lack of advanced degrees at the time; our relatives wondered if she would “fit in.” Looking back, all the concern was laughable. But at the time, South Indian/North Indian unions were less commonplace than they are today, and different communities viewed each other with a lot of suspicion. Today, I don’t think any of the commenters concerned about their kids marrying outside their race would mind them marrying outside of their ethnic Indian state.

Am I wrong though? Is this still an issue, in much the same way Indian/African-American dating is to a number of you, twenty years on? We all know the stereotypes we have of one another: Southies vs. Northies, Punjabis vs. Gujaratis, Bengalis vs. Malayalis. Does the personal Bradley effect exist even amongst Desis who share common religions and homelands, but who hail from separate states? How would you feel if your kid brought home someone from a different region of India? What’s been your experience with introducing your parents to a boyfriend or girlfriend from a different Indian state?

We'll get back to regular Devis with Babies programming shortly. But it’s clear our community has much to say on these topics right now with race/otherness in the national spotlight, and we want to hear you!

Monday Musings: Bringing Obama Home to Momma

It's been a busy weekend for the "Brown Girls." Last week's strip--centered around the idea that the personal "Bradley effect" is as much an issue in our cultural landscape as the political one--landed on the pages of Sepia Mutiny, sparking a debate that is currently 150+ comments strong. And those wacky "Brown Girls" have generated some of the most comments to-date amongst we Devis on this blog as well (thank you readers!)

Having written the comic, I of course love the idea that it prompted even one reader to comment, whether out of agreement, disagreement, anger or curiosity--in the ocean of media available to us, it is a rare category of material that causes any reaction these days, don't you think? (Then again, that would mean I would be impressed by "W" because its horribleness moved me to tears and made me bemoan two lost hours of my life...) That it has provoked so much conversation and that, for the most part, the level of dialogue on everything from assimilation, acculturation, and insidious racism has been amazingly impressive and enlightening--all the better. One of the many lines of commentary that struck me strongly was the thoughtful presentation for and against marrying non-Indians. In attempting to make sense of what, at first blush, seems like "racist older generation Indians," "NaraVara" on Sepia explained that "[c]ulturally I think our parents were raised under traditions that were geared towards thinking in terms of retaining a sense of community into future generations...My parents would not be comfortable with me marrying a White girl...That doesn't mean they would not accept her with open arms or love the grandchildren we have any less. But the fact is that if I marry a Desi girl they will be much more secure in the knowledge that our kids will be Indian. With half-White grandkids it's a toss-up. Call it retrograde if you want. But this is the mentality that allowed us Indians to retain our unique cultural identities over a thousand years of being ruled by foreigners..."

On this blog, "Shimarella" expressed surprise that the issue of Indian parental disapproval of dating outside the race was even still an issue: "I know Indians of my parents generation still feel this way. But seriously? Are there still younger brown desi divas who think this?"

From shock over racism to shock over people being shocked--an entire spectrum of opinion was presented with authenticity and candor.

Humor too of course. Perhaps foreseeing the hot-button nature of this penumbra of issues, "glasshouses" offered words of advice to any non-Indian interested in an Indian girl: "Run from desi girl and don't look back."

And what commentary would be complete without some vitriol. Check out "GetOffMyLawn," schooling everybody on blaming parents for everything: "Don't forget that the very values that many ABDs knock are the ones that have allowed South Asians to be the most successful minority in the West. Emphasizing family structure, respect for elders, respect for education, respect for one's body and sexuality and emotions, and above all, respect for the collective community rather than the individual are all why Asians can come from the poorest of regions during the worse of times and have their children in graduate schools within one generation...We have served you well. Show back some respect. Buying into facile discourses about race and identity and denigrating your own is an insult to those of us who came to a brand new country to give YOU a better life. This discussion about desi parents or community being racist is really disheartening...You may see us as old fashioned, racist, obsessed with color, etc. That may be true, but we are also obsessed with feeding you, clothing you, making sure that we, and not the school teachers, are parents, and we also took painful steps to make it in a country alien to us so that you can come on this blog and whine about not being able to openly date a black man. If you feel that you want to date out of your race, then have the strength of character to openly date that person."

LOVE all of this. I want to talk with "GetOffMyLawn" and ask her what she would think if her daughter brought Obama home to her. He emphasizes family structure, shows respect for elders, values education and I would guess respects his body and sexuality (Barack: I know you are reading, feel free to chime in...!) Yet I am willing to bet that an "I walked uphill both ways to school in the snow in Delhi where it doesn't even snow" guilt-trip would ensue nonetheless. Hence: The personal-Bradley effect.

The personal IS political.

Even on Sepia, where the audience is--I would hazard to guess--a bit more vigilante than the average Devi with Baby, the crux of the discussion centered around social issues and our parents. Why they think the way they do. How that affects the way we think. How we interface with them when we disagree with them. Taking this a step further and addressing you Devis--who actually are parents: What would you do if your daughter brought Obama home to momma? Would you be cool with it ("Is this even an issue?")? Want to be cool with it but not REALLY be cool with it ("I know alot of black people! They are some of my closest friends!")? Be REALLY uncool with it ("Over my dead body, and I make no apologies")? And is there a disconnect between the way you would answer this particular question, and how you view the issues of race and racism more generally?

It doesn't seem fair to pose these questions and not try to give some sketch of where I'm coming from so: By way of background, my parents called me the "United Nations dater" before I married my Punjabi husband. They were cool with it--but they essentially wanted to hold a parade when I went Brown. And I'm not alone. There are many of us out there who dated outside of our race but then ultimately married within it. Whether there was personal Bradley at work or not--definitely a part of this debate.

So what's my take-away. As much as I can read and agree with bits and pieces of so much that has been said in the back-and-forth on racial politics that the comic has provoked, I come back to the notion that it's horribly depressing that we think we have to "stick to our own" to preserve some sort of ethnic heritage; that an African American is for any reason unacceptable in our homes just because he is African American; that we can and do justify subtle racism in the name of "culture." Couching our concerns about race in the language of "cultural preservation" is, in and of itself, a personal Bradley effect. Taz, the original poster on Sepia responded to some of her critics by saying that she thinks it will become easier to bring a black man home if Obama is elected. I think she's right. As Manju said, "Obama will do for racism what Goldman Sachs did for anti-semitism on wallst, which is not to say he'll end it, but rather show us the way to overcome it." And, although Rahul is correct that "the the FDR presidency didn't create an epidemic of polio afflicted grooms," it begs to be noted that FDR (with the assistance of the press--can you imagine?) kept the extent of his handicap a secret from the public for the vast majority of his presidency.

Our buddy Barack's race is no secret. It's out there, looming large, for all of us and our personal Bradley-mechanisms to see, internalize, learn from. This can ONLY do good things for our little devis and boy-devis: The President of the United States--dark and "different"--is going to look more like our kids than those of the Smiths and the Jones. Yes it's superficial but so is discussing politicians' haircuts, Neiman Marcus shopping sprees, use of spray foundation, love of pretzels. Superficial isn't always as superficial as we think. Unpack a comic and you might find a debate.

Yes it's all very messy. Yes there are lots of considerations. But do I think we can weigh all the considerations and fix this mess, you guys? Hell YES WE CAN.