Not Quite Black and White

The hardest thing about being black is the inability to be invisible. Gosh it is so hard to explain just how much of a benefit being able to disappear into the crowd is.  I guess if you have ever been on holiday to somewhere where your sink colour is in a minority you may just start to understand. However, tourist are always afford a very different type of treatment be it adulation or harassment so the experience isn't quite the same and besides you know deep down inside that it is temporary - lasting only as long as your holiday - and things are so much easier to bear when you know there is an end in sight.

Because you can't be invisible, the second  hardest thing about being black is never quiet knowing when the different treatment you receive is because you are black or because of something else that isn't clear or immediately apparent to you.

The other day I was at one of my networking meetings and everyone had a set amount of time to introduce themselves. The order was determined by where you sat in the room and I was position about two thirds of the way, in terms of the direction imposed by the facilitator. As I listened to the people ahead of me, it was evident that many of them were 'stealing' significantly more time than had been allocated. Some deliberately, others just not as accomplished with their elevator pitch. Despite this nothing was said and the flow continued in this vein until I stood up. I launched energetically into my pitch and was happily taking the same liberty to extend my time when the facilitator gestured to me to finish by drawing an imaginary line across his throat. Cut it short !  So I promptly made a joke about being told to get off and finished. 

As I sat down, (feeling somewhat humiliated for not being as smooth and concise as I was during my practice session in the mirror, or as I was on previous occasions when I had both been on time and wowed the audience) I watched to see if anyone else, who was attempting to abuse the time restriction, was being told to speed up.  Perhaps, I mused in an attempt to anaesthetise my injured pride, as I licked my metaphoric wounds, we are running over time and we now need to speed up so everyone has to be quicker ie keep to time!  I set  an  imaginary stop watch to assess how much time others were taking and watched to see if they too would be told in sign language to shut up. Yes others ran over and no, no one else was given any silent cues to get off the stage.

So now begins the battle to quash the victim mentality. How many other reasons could there be for what happened. Ok I was the only black person, of African heritage, in the room, but there were two Asian men. Did they run over? Not really.  What about the other women who spoke?  Yes at least three of them were very long winded. Indeed I remember thinking 'gosh she is taking a long time that's almost double!' But she was before me so perhaps I was speeded up because she had used up too much time and I just had to pay for the facilitator’s earlier leniency. But at least two women who spoke after me were also over. One was clearly very witty and stopping her mid flow would have deprived all of us of the joke. But still, I was just looking for the gesture, not for her to be pulled off the stage with a shepherd's crock like they do in American talent shows.

So, I was long and boring that's why I got the sign. No I wasn’t boring I was engaged with the audience, I saw no eyes glazing over. It was just the time thing.  Perhaps I didn't appear to be coming to a natural end anytime soon. Maybe that was it.  Maybe I missed all the facilitator's earlier 'cut it short' cues, I hadn't been watching all the time. Yet I do recall looking at him when one or two of the worst offenders were over running and I hadn't seen any gestures   More to the point I hadn't observed any reaction in any of the speakers that might indicate that they has been told to wind up.

With my rational, logical head on, I can convince myself that the most likely explanation is that it was a combination of all of the above, which lead the dynamics of the situation to cause ME to be the one who was singled out by nothing more than FATE. The universe has ordained that I was to be the one that had to start the change of pace.

So, I can dismiss my feelings of being singled out because I am black and with my rational head on, I can make sense of my different treatment. BUT it is so much harder to shake of the experience and the deep nagging doubt that actually it is because you are black! Don't get me wrong I don't believe for even a moment that if, in fact, my different treatment on this occasion was because I am black: it was malicious or even conscious. Unfortunately, history dictates how society filters information about black people. How our actions are weighed up against the so called 'norm' of the more acceptable 'racial' groupings. (Deliberate quotes around the word 'racial' because there is only one race and that is the human race). And my experience is that this filtering works to my disadvantage. I am not able to make the same mistakes as my peers and I have to be significantly better in order to be perceived as ok. It's a huge pressure, feeling like you have to second guess everything you do to ensure that it is without fault!  And before you go thinking 'just another black chick with a chip on her shoulder' - remember chips are the natural consequence of continued injustice and it's not having a chip that is the issue but how you chose to deal with it.

As the person with the chip, I try not to let mine immobilise me and I don't openly challenge everything that happens to me or label as racist everyone who treats me differently. There are good moments when I can see the bigger picture and leave it at that and there are bad moments that really hurt and they take a while to recover form, i.e. they heighten distrust, making you suspicious of every action.