[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 127 (Tuesday, September 13, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: September 13, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
``RACE AND PERSONAL STANDARDS'' SKILLS AND VIRTUE TRANSCEND INFURIATING 
                              STEREOTYPES

 Mr. SIMON. Mr. President, recently, my hometown newspaper ran 
an article by Rachel L. Jones, an alumnae of Southern Illinois 
University in Carbondale, that appeared originally in the Detroit Free 
Press.
  Rachel Jones' article speaks candidly about something that is usually 
not discussed but should be.
  We want to create opportunities for everyone in our society, but we 
cannot do that by lowering standards. In fact, some of the attempts at 
lowering standards, clearly, are patronizing attempts at charity that 
do not recognize that all people have ability, regardless of race, 
religion, or ethnic background.
  I ask to insert the Rachel Jones article into the Record at this 
point.
  The article follows:

             [From the Southern Illinoisan, Sept. 1, 1994]

 Race and Personal Standards: Skills and Virtue Transcend Infuriating 
                              Stereotypes

                          (By Rachel L. Jones)

       Twelve years ago, Newsweek magazine literally gave me my 
     journalistic calling card, the proverbial foot in the door, 
     by publishing my opinion about the use of Black English in 
     America.
       I was 21 years old on Dec. 27, 1982, and the only valuable 
     possessions I owned were my mind and the ability to order my 
     thoughts in persuasive, cogent style. In that issue's My Turn 
     column, I wrote that although Black English is a valid part 
     of African-American history, young blacks must be proficient 
     in standard English to succeed in this society.
       I ended that column by saying, ``I don't think I `talk 
     white,' I think I talk right.''
       Then, I was a sophomore at Southern Illinois University in 
     Carbondale. More than a decade later, I'm left shocked by 
     this week's Newsweek cover story on Simpson, called ``Day & 
     Night.'' A so-called psychological profile, it is filled with 
     characterizations of O.J. Simpson's poise, charm and drive 
     for success as ``trying to act white.''
       Make no mistake. I'm not defending Simpson, and stopped 
     being interested in the minutiae of his murder case weeks 
     ago. But whether Simpson committed a double homicide or not, 
     that Newsweek allowed dubious, unnamed sources to decry his 
     fame and wealth as ``trying to act white'' makes me ashamed I 
     was ever published in that magazine.
       As a black woman who has spent my life immersed in 
     language, who has polished and developed my communications 
     skills to advance my career, I'm left thinking that maybe 
     Newsweek never really got it, never really understood what I 
     was trying to say, or forgot over the passing years.
       Even at 21, I had a strong sense that race was not the 
     defining issue when it comes to mastering communication in 
     this country. I consider myself very anchored to my 
     ethnicity, proud to be African American. I'm also determined 
     to exploit the tools this society designates as mandatory for 
     success.
       Because I was bucking the prevailing Afrocentric, black 
     pride sentiment surrounding the Black English issue, Newsweek 
     editors may have suspected that my heartfelt, youthful 
     opinion would help sell magazines. And maybe they were right. 
     I received almost 500 letters about that column, and 
     virtually all were positive. I spoke on radio talk shows and 
     worked as a student reporter at the New York Times and the 
     Washington Post because of that column. I still receive 
     reprint requests for it, for inclusion in college textbooks.
       I read this week's Newsweek cover story with a mixture of 
     dread and disgust. As a child, I heard the same chant over 
     and over: ``Why are you trying to act like a white person?'' 
     I was threatened and harassed because I liked to read, for 
     using correct English, and for striving to articulate my 
     words as my older brothers and sisters had taught me. To this 
     day, I'm grateful to them for darn near smacking me upside my 
     head to make me think and speak clearly, to communicate my 
     thoughts with confidence and clarity.


                            ugly assertions

       But then as now, the idea that these skills are the domain 
     of white people infuriates me. And if I get started on my 
     diatribe about how this mind-set is rooted in white 
     supremacy, and how labeling the standards of success in this 
     society as ``white' does irreversible damage to the self-
     esteem of young blacks, I know I'll be branded a neo-
     revolutionary.
       So be it. Painting American success as a white attribute 
     smacks of white supremacy. It's another not-so-subtle message 
     to blacks that being black, in whatever guise, will never be 
     good enough in this country, and that the only way to even 
     approach the pinnacle of success is to strip away that 
     blackness and mimic the ultimate standard--white people.
       The Newsweek editor who wrote the article, Evan Thomas, 
     says it was not meant to be a commentary on race. Instead, he 
     called it little more than a character sketch based on ``a 
     lot of reporting from a lot of O.J.'s friends and 
     acquaintances.''
       Two lead reporters were black, and based on two months of 
     interviews with several dozen people, Thomas says, he wrote a 
     piece ``intended to be a picture of a guy who was 
     tormented.''
       ``We weren't placing a value judgment on the way he was 
     behaving,'' Thomas says. ``But his attempt to fit into a 
     white corporate world where he had to change his style and 
     his manner of speaking was perceived by his friends as an 
     attempt to be white.''
       But the article went too far. Publishing anonymous 
     criticism of Simpson because he took diction lessons and went 
     to private country clubs is an absolute abomination. 
     Mentioning his ``taste for white women'' in such a tawdry 
     manner (Unnamed Source: ``Most womanizers I know go for any 
     woman, but not O.J.--it was white or nothing'') was so far 
     beneath what I used to think were Newsweek's standards that I 
     cringed.
       If we follow that logic--that everything he did was to 
     mimic whiteness--where does it stop? Was Simpson's penchant 
     for cocaine and random sex ``white'' behavior? Are his ego 
     and his domineering, violent nature acting white? And if he's 
     found guilty of the crimes he is charged with, was his 
     homicidal rage another offshoot of his manic drive for 
     whiteness?
       That's the irony of this issue. Because after you read that 
     article, you don't come away with the impression that the 
     violent parts of his behavior were attempts to act white. 
     Instead, all the negatives, the pathological, poverty-rooted 
     underpinnings, the drugs and wild sex, are decidedly black.
       Thomas doesn't see it that way. Newsweek reporters 
     concluded from their reporting that all this pressure to 
     erase his poor black background and fit into the ``white'' 
     world, and the attendant rejection by blacks, indirectly 
     contributed to his cracking up.
       ``O.J. lived two lives, and the constant switching back and 
     forth was an enormous strain,'' Thomas says.
       But I couldn't pin Thomas down on just what the two lives 
     were. Was the charming, affable, articulate Simpson white, 
     and the druggie, sexual predator black? He strenuously denies 
     that Newsweek had that intention, but you'd be forgiven for 
     drawing that conclusion, based on the reporting and writing.


                            a proud heritage

       I've wanted an answer to this question all my life: Who's 
     setting the standards? Most of my success as a journalist has 
     come because I've insisted on writing about African Americans 
     wherever I've worked. In health and fitness columns for this 
     newspaper, I make a concerted effort to write about black 
     professionals, and blacks who are active fitness enthusiasts, 
     because it's important to me that our images are prominent 
     and positive, and that our voices are included at the table.
       And while I haven't worn my dashiki recently, I consider 
     myself quite Afrocentric, quite aware of my blackness. I'm 
     certainly no Whoopi Goldberg, chafing at the ``African-
     American'' label and insisting on being ``Just American.'' 
     One look at my deep, dark skin, and it's obvious that a whole 
     lot of my ancestors came from somewhere on the African 
     continent. I don't need to unearth some Native American, or 
     Asian or slave owner's blood to try and make my blackness 
     more acceptable to white America.
       Basically, what I am is an articulate, professional black 
     woman who, like Simpson, pulled herself out of poverty. I 
     wasn't a gang member, nor have I ever had many violent 
     obsessions, but in some ways we were in the same boat at 
     birth.
       So am I trying to act white?
       I thought I was through answering that question after I 
     left junior high in 1975. I thought I was through even having 
     to think about that question. But the writers at Newsweek 
     felt comfortable presenting this flawed perception that 
     Simpson's rush toward success was ``white.''
       I don't know whether O.J. Simpson is guilty of murder or 
     not. But Newsweek is definitely guilty of setting the issue 
     of what's black behavior and what's white behavior back about 
     20 years. Following in Time Magazine's clumsy footsteps, 
     Newsweek has lent further credence to W.E.B. DuBois' 
     assertion that the biggest challenge we face today is ``the 
     problem of the color line.''
       And you can't whitewash that issue.

                          ____________________