For example, I have a friend who is a physician and a black American. He recently expressed to me, a "white," his apprehension concerning his acceptance and treatment by an audience to which he was to address on the subject of AIDS and its disproportionate impact on impoverished black Americans. This man had worked in the area of AIDS since its "early days" in Africa and continued to work full-time and then part-time in an inner-city community AIDS/STD/drug abuse clinic.
When I inquired as to the nature of his audience and even offered to accompany him, he explained that his audience consisted of members of a civic group of wealthy and influential black women in a Northeastern city.
I could not imagine how such would be a problem until he rubbed his cheek and pointed out that his extremely dark complexion would stand out in sharp contrast to the much lighter skin tones of his audience.
The problem, in short, as he stated it was that he was "too black." He declined my offer to support him my accompanying him.
He later related that his concerns had not been unfounded.
Accordingly, I was not surprised to learn of the present travails of Dr. Rice at the hands of a barbarian "black-activist" cartoonist....