This afternoon I overheard the following conversation on the subway:
BLACK GUY (to WHITE GIRL dressed in faux Black Girl Outfit): “You know, because of the state of the country, the way things are and stuff, your parents owe my parents some shit. Like 40 acres and a mule. But you can make up for it by buying me a drink.”
WHITE GIRL: “That doesn’t make any sense. I’m a first-generation American. My parents are immigrants.”
SECOND BLACK GUY (to WHITE GIRL): “Your parents immigrated from South Africa.”
WHITE GIRL: “So? That’s like saying all Germans are Nazis. That’s hating.”
FIRST BLACK GUY: “I should just walk around Wall Street giving people invoices. ‘Here, I’m from the Corporation of the Freedmen’s Bureau, and you owe me 40 acres and a mule.’ I should go to NBC and give them an invoice. ‘You owe me 40 acres and a mule, or equal value. I’ll take a sitcom deal.’ I’d sure as shit be funnier than David Alan Grier.”
WHITE GIRL: “Yeah.”
It’s times like this that I wish I supported capital punishment.
I read your blog and love it, but please tell me what a ‘faux Black Girl Outfit’ looks like.
I’ve had bowel movements funnier than David Alan Grier, so that man’s aspirations weren’t particularly high…
Nonetheless, I doubt he’ll make it.
I’m worried that I’ve not had enough coffee to get your precise point.
A faux Black Girl Outfit is an outfit worn by a non-black girl that a) screams “I am cool enough to be black!” and b) I have never seen an actual black girl wear. In this case it involved a bandana, a messy hair knot, and some sort of skirt-type thing with patches.
I’m not sure I had a precise point other than that there was enough condescension and misappropriation of history and smugness and mental muddiness going on here to make my head spin.
Isn’t “emigrated” what you meant, rather than “immigrated”? I know how important grammar is to you.
If I had been speaking, I would have said “emigrated.” In this post, I was, alas, quoting.