Obama is President, and Yet She Crossed the Street...

Monday, May 11, 2009

A good friend of mine (a young black man) was a bit shocked at a situation that recently happened to him: He explained that as he casually walked down the street on the Upper East Side in New York City (in his sports clothes, since he just finished playing basketball on a nearby court), a young woman who was walking her dog in his direction on the sidewalk decided to immediately cross the street upon seeing him. I did not want to automatically assume that this woman freaked out upon seeing a black man and crossed the street on impulse, so I asked him if he thought her decision had anything to do with his skin color. Unfortunately, it did - he explained that she was walking her dog, her head was looking down, and when she looked up, they made brief eye contact with each other, she noticed he was walking in her direction, looked startled/shocked, and she (along with her dog) then made a immediate sharp right turn off the sidewalk and successfully slid between two tightly-parked cars on the street to get to the sidewalk across the street.

Note: He is black, and she is Asian. They have never met before or had any type of interaction.

My friend was quite confused about the whole ordeal, and didn't quite understand how, in the 21st century, in the age of Obama, that this woman could possibly have an irrational fear of a black man. He wasn't necessarily mad about it - but he was definitely surprised that a young woman (in her early 20s) could have reacted to him (in my opinion, a nice-looking guy who happened to be dressed in his basketball-playing gear) in such a drastic and strange way. Now, admittedly, not too many blacks live on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, so perhaps he looked out of place, but there was nothing menacing or strange about his appearance. I do, however, believe that she most likely has been heavily influenced by an incredibly biased media that has done an amazing job at convincing people that blacks - particularly young black men - are people to be naturally afraid of on a day to day basis ("negrophobia"). And yet, at the same time, the media is currently promoting positive images of President Obama and his family. Perhaps she, along with many other people, view the Obamas as the exception to the rule - that perhaps, they could very well be the Cosbys/the "family next door." However, I have never viewed the Obamas as the exception - I saw them as the rule and the standard, and I consider the negative images of blacks on television as the extreme exception that has been blown out of proportion by a media desperate and eager to pigeon-hole blacks into particular categories.

Interestingly enough, my friend noted that he found it strange that this woman happened to be a minority as well (Asian) and decided to react to him in such a harsh manner, particularly in light of the fact that a older white couple was simultaneously passing by him without even flinching. When he asked me about my thoughts on that particular issue, I reflected back to the beliefs we choose to accept/reject about the "other" - and clearly, the young woman had absorbed a perception about black men that directly led to her decision to act so irrationally. I sometimes wonder if the Obama presidency will help reverse erroneous, idiotic, and obviously stereotypical beliefs about black people and potentially reverse the negative stereotypes that may be embedded in some people's consciousness/subconciousness. I guess only time will tell...