Religion is a Mental Illness

"Blackness” Is a Collectivist Control Tactic—Even A Child Could See It

With every lame comment about how “white” I dressed or talked, it weakened my resolve for pursuing other people’s acceptance.

wetheblacksheep.com

As a child, I never felt like I was “enough.” I wasn’t enough to keep my father involved in my life, I wasn’t confident enough in myself, and I wasn’t black enough for anyone’s standards.

I’ve never kept up with anyone’s standard of blackness, regardless of whether they were white or black, throughout my life. When I lived in the suburbs and rural areas, it wouldn’t be uncommon for me to be referred to as “White Adam” by some of my white classmates followed by a jovial laugh. I was the punchline of the moment but with every lame comment about how “white” I dressed or talked, it weakened my resolve for pursuing other people’s acceptance.

When I lived in neighborhoods that featured more children who looked like me, I didn’t quite fit in with them either. However, instead of mocking me, they often distanced themselves from me.

I lived in four states before the age of 18, and every time you move you must start over with gaining acceptance and galvanizing new friendships. The older you get, the more difficult it becomes.

When I moved to New Jersey from Upstate New York, I transferred from a middle school where I was one of only four black kids to one where nearly half of the kids were black. I remember noticing how I dressed differently than everyone else; this difference was inescapable.

To try to fit in, I bought some stereotypical hip-hop gear. Suddenly people liked me and treated me differently. Two girls thought I was cute and the black kids who previously ignored me were noticing my existence and complimenting my “upgrade”.

But I felt like a fraud. I was uncomfortable becoming someone I wasn’t. My makeover only lasted a couple of weeks before I went back to my old self and the dynamic between me and my classmates returned to its discouraging normality.

As a teenager, your identity and how you want to be seen are already some of the hardest things to navigate, but what makes it even harder is the pressure from others to become something unfamiliar to you because it makes them feel comfortable.

I was told that I hated myself, hated being black, and if I could’ve wished for anything, it was to be white: but of course, none of this was true.

If I dated a white girl, then it was allegedly because I hated all black women, but the truth was that black girls didn’t like me at the time: I wasn’t “black” enough for them.

My community’s objective was to shame me into compliance, become what they wanted, and ultimately relinquish my power of individuality for superficial group acceptance. They felt the need to gatekeep my interests, mannerisms, and romantic partners, or else I’d be excommunicated from “my people” indefinitely.

What was ironic about all of this is that I accepted their choices to express themselves as black people in whichever way they chose to, even if it was sometimes stereotypical. “Blackness” shouldn’t be defined by the group, but by the individual. You decide what being black means for yourself.

Humans are group-oriented creatures; it’s natural to want to find your tribe and conform to their practices. We want to find belonging within a culture, but this can go too far. When it does, we become rigid and authoritarian in what we deem as the acceptable characteristics for members of the group.

The group gatekeepers seek power via control and will use shaming tactics to make you second guess who you are. They know that black sheep have the power to overthrow them by inspiring the group to change their status quo behavior.

If you stick your neck out, take a social beating, and still remain resolute in your stance, people will notice.

For every failed campaign to destroy the black sheep, more people complying merely out of fear are encouraged to be brave enough to question the herd.

Those arrows that I took as a child only made me stronger as an adult, and I realized that I’m stronger than most because of the emotional bruising I took for my defiance in allowing them to define my identity.   

Defying social pressure to become something that I didn’t feel comfortable with as a child made me resilient to the shaming tactics of adults who actively attempt to make me bend into the figure they’re more comfortable with.

The people who gatekeep how I express myself politically based on racial expectations are no different than those grade school children who demanded conformity—both are uncomfortable when you choose yourself over the group.

Years of questioning who I am have led me to a conclusion: I love myself enough not to let strangers define me, and no amount of shaming will make me conform.

I am a black sheep, and I am enough. They can call me a coon, white wannabe, or an Uncle Tom, but none of these insults can inflict any pain upon me. Why? Because I know who I am, I love who I am, and nothing can shake this. I’m no longer the child who was insecure about my existence and waiting for people to confirm if I’m acceptable because I accepted myself years ago.