The Way We Be

Okay, my first entry was going to be on the Ghetto Note Book, but that was all changed this morning when I went to get my hair cut. I stepped into the barbershop and to my surprise they were watching Larry King Live. That's right...Larry King Live. Keep in mind that this is a black owned and operated Barbershop in an all black neighborhood. A Barbershop that usually has its television set to BET and only BET.

As it turned out they were watching Larry King's interview with formal President Bill Clinton. Apparently Mr. Clinton has a new book to promote, but mostly he was talking about his wife and her candidacy for president. At any rate, one of the head barbers walks into the shop late and sits down to talk to me about a business venture he had cooked up in this little mind. All of a sudden he becomes aware that Bill Clinton is on television and he proclaims loudly, "Hey, that's Bill Clinton! You know he was our first real black president!" Then he goes on to spout off all of the wonderful attributes that Bill Clinton embodies that makes him worthy of being dubbed the "first" black president. I'm sure you've all heard them: "He plays the sax, he smokes weed and he got head in the white house. How can he be anything but black?" Of course, true to form, all the other black folk in the shop began to voice their agreement, spitting all kinds of ludicrous B.S. So, being a loyal customer to this particular shop I feel comfortable enough to pose the following question to the barber who set this whole thing off.

"Why is it that we want to call Bill Clinton the first black president?"I asked. "And then, in the same breath go on to list all of his negative traits? That ain't cool. I don't want my blackness associated with that."

All of a sudden the shop gets all quiet and I begin to fill like Two-Pac. You know...All Eyes on Me. And I'm pretty sure they are thinking, "look at this nigger." The barber in question looks at me and smiles and tries to say that everything he said wasn't negative. After all he did mention the fact that the man plays the sax and likes Jazz and how hard it is to play Jazz in the first place. What the hell? Look, I have nothing against Bill Clinton. As a matter of fact he did some pretty good stuff while he was in the White House. Even things that benefited the black community as a whole. So, why is it that when black folks speak about the man and want to give him his honorary membership into to black-dom, they never mention all of the positive things that the man did. Why is it that they only focus on the negative things? The things that lead to the man almost getting impeached during his second term in Office? Can someone please explain that crap to me? Is this truly how we see ourselves? Is this really how what we want to model ourselves after? Hell, don't we got enough people out there focusing only on our negative traits without glorifying them ourselves.

One man's opinion. Peace.