Comics / Spotlight / Black Astronaut

Even Harvard Negroes Sing the Blues (A Negromancer Delight)

By Leroy S. Douresseaux
July 27, 2009 - 09:21

In the novel Devil in a Blue Dress by Walter Mosley, the beloved character Raymond “Mouse” Alexander tells the following to his friend Easy Rawlins:

"You learn stuff and you be thinkin’ like white men be thinkin.’ You be thinkin’ that what’s right fo’ them is right fo’ you.  She [the titular character, Ruby Hanks a.k.a. Daphne] look like she white and you think like you white.  But brother you don’t know that you both poor niggers.  And a nigger ain’t never gonna be happy ‘less he accept what he is."

The recent arrest of Henry Louis Gates Jr., one of the nation's most prominent African-American scholars, on a charge of disorderly conduct, has stirred outrage and debate.  The first thing I thought of was Mouse.

Apparently, the Gates event began when he returned to his home in Cambridge (Mass.) from a trip to China.  He reportedly was unable to open his front door because it was jammed and gained entrance through the rear of the house.  Meanwhile, a white police officer, Sgt. James Crowley, was responding to a call about a potential break-in by two men at Gates’ home near Harvard University.

According to the police report, Gates was in the foyer when Sgt. Crowley arrived.  Crowley, 42, apparently demanded that Gates show him identification.  Police say Gates at first refused, flew into a rage, and accused the officer of racism.  The rest of the story involves conflicting versions of demands for identification and badge numbers and perhaps an invitation from Crowley for Gates to step outside so the 42-year-old officer could arrest the apparently belligerent scholar.  Gates was accused of “tumultuous” behavior toward Sgt. Crowley, but charges of disorderly conduct were later dropped.

The 58-year-old Henry Louis Gates Jr. is known as “Skip” to his friends (one of which is President Barack Obama) and colleagues.  Gates is the director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African-American Research at Harvard University.  He is also a literary critic, an award-winning author (The Signifying Monkey), and an acclaimed documentary filmmaker for PBS (the African American Lives series).

Skip Gates the mug shot

Who knows what happened other than Gates and Crowley?  They probably both overreacted, and Gates yelling at Crowley was, is, and always will be a bad idea.  As a rule, I avoid cops, and I don’t speak to them even if the opportunity arises, as I find many too prickly and overly sensitive when dealing with black men.  I’ve personally witnessed officers of the law beating unarmed black men on several occasions.  [I once had a job that brought me into proximity with police officers.]  But this article is not about that.

What struck me as the Gates story broke early in the week of July 19th was how many black people were shocked not so much because Gates was arrested, but because a so highly acclaimed, intellectual, accomplished black man was.  Some African-Americans were not only outraged, but also shocked and so deeply saddened; one woman spoke of tears coming to her eyes.  It seems as if some of us black people consider it normal for mean old white cops to abuse black street ruffians and your run-of-the-mill Negro, but Oh-Lawdie-No! it’s so abnormal and cosmically wrong for the police to arrest/abuse an African-American HARVARD PROFESSOR!!!

As Desdemona said to Othello, “Nigga, puh-lease!”  If we are to believe that cops (white, black, Latino, etc.) profile and treat black citizens (especially black males) with suspicion and prejudice because they’re black, it stands to reason that any black male regardless of social status will face the same discriminatory treatment from a bigoted cop.  So let’s beat our breasts and shed our tears for random Negro X being abused by cops just as we do for Henry “Skip” Gates: summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Yale; MacArthur “genius grant” recipient; acclaimed historian, Harvard professor and PBS documentarian; one of Time magazine's “25 Most Influential Americans” in 1997; and holder of 50 honorary degrees.

Let’s make Jaleel from the block getting a cop beat down a national issue.  But that’s not going to happen.  Some black kid getting his ass kicked by cops in Houston’s Fifth Ward or New Orleans’ projects (or Gotham City’s Crime Alley, hee-hee) just doesn’t warrant the same heartbreak as the humiliation-by-pig suffered by African American summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Yale; MacArthur “genius grant” recipient; acclaimed historian, Harvard professor and PBS documentarian; one of Time magazine's “25 Most Influential Americans” in 1997; and holder of 50 honorary degrees.  Why?

Part of the legacy of the Civil Rights movement is that many black people believed that if they had the chance to fit into mainstream society, all or at least most of the white people would learn to like them.  Black people wouldn’t seem so different, and we’d all sit around Dr. King’s Arthurian table of brotherhood and hold hands.  Why, if us darkies could only learn to speak whitey’s big words, read his canonical literature, embrace his culture, and get that college degree, then, we’d stop being nigras and start seeming like normal Americans.  Fat chance.

Black people have spent decades and likely billions of dollars straightening their coarse hair, bleaching their skin, being educated, and trying to mainstream the way they walk, talk, and act.  But even Merlin can’t hide the truth – that unforgivable blackness… or brownness… or duskiness of our complexion.  Our skin color, or “race” as it is incorrectly termed, shapes and defines us as it does no other group of Americans.  We don’t live in a kingdom of the blind, so black people’s social and professional status can’t hide their skin color.

It’s disingenuous for Bill Cosby to go around preaching that black people’s problems will be solved if they’d only start annunciating their “R’s” and “ing’s” and get a doctorate.  Getting an excellent education is an excellent idea.  Too many African-Americans, however, think that this should make them immune to bigotry.  They start to close their eyes to the plight of poor and under-educated black people, believing that plight has nothing to do with racism – that is until they’re ready to be down with people again the first time they feel slighted.

That’s why blacks from the middle and upper classes are so outraged by the arrest of Gates, he of the summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Yale; MacArthur “genius grant” recipient; acclaimed historian, Harvard professor and PBS documentarian; one of Time magazine's “25 Most Influential Americans” in 1997; and holder of 50 honorary degrees.  If this acclaimed Negro can be handcuffed and hauled off his property by cops, what does that mean for the rest of them?

This belief that Gates is somehow above the humiliation of (alleged) mistreatment by cops is why President Obama felt so very fine about putting his foot in his mouth and commenting on Gates’ arrest.  This from a man who as a candidate for President of the United States tip-toed around the Jena Six, and these young black men were the ones actually at the mercy of a white district attorney who was a black-hating racist bully.

Sgt. James Crowley is well-liked by his black peers, and in recent days, many have stepped forward to both praise and support him.  Obama, Gates, and Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick (who also “stupidly” jumped into this mess) will soon find themselves groveling for the sake of political expediency.  Republicans and conservatives are already portraying Crowley as a shining knight, even if for that one moment in time in Prof. Gates’ home, he might not have been so shiny.  But even an ordinary colored boy like me can correctly answer this question:  in a dispute involving (1) two Harvard-educated black men and (2) a white working class cop, which one is going to end up being portrayed as the victim?

President Obama says that this incident with Gates is a teachable moment.  He’s right, but I’d prefer that for this lesson my professor be Raymond “Mouse” Alexander.

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12