Michelle, Meritocracy and Me

Washington Post ^ | July 20, 2008 | Theola Labbé-DeBose

[SJackson]

I last visited my alma mater, Princeton University, two years ago to speak on an alumni panel about the future of Iraq. Inside stately McCosh Hall, where I'd taken Constitutional Law more than a decade earlier, I spoke to a mostly white crowd about my experiences as a special Iraq correspondent in 2003, sharing the stage with an impressive bunch of alums, including a soldier who had served several tours in the Middle East and a former CIA station chief.

At the end, one of my fellow panelists turned to me and complimented me on my remarks. "What school did you go to?" he asked.

I was wearing a black shirt and orange linen pants, a dutiful nod to our school colors. It was an alumni panel, I thought. What school did he think I attended?

I've been thinking a lot about this sort of failure to be truly accepted as I've watched Michelle and Barack Obama recently. After all, a white couple with their accomplishments would be another one of those gilded couples that appear on the New York Times's society pages or in Town & Country magazine. Instead, these two earnest meritocrats wound up on the cover of the New Yorker last week in a now notorious fist-bumping caricature, complete with a Black Panther-era 'fro for her and traditional Muslim garb for him.

Seeing that cover made me wince -- and not because I can't take a joke. Like the Obamas and millions of other African Americans who have relied on the promise of American meritocracy, I've made a bet that hard work, study and persistence should be able to vault me past mockery and wariness.

[SJackson]

Barack Obama's quest for the presidency is a classic "See, I can be here too" moment.

For many voters Theola Labbé-DeBose nails it. I can be here too is the issue. Or they can be here too.

[AnAmericanMother]

If you've got a chip on your shoulder, you think everybody's trying to knock it off.

The other alum was probably asking about her grad school, for heaven's sake. I've been asked the same thing, but I never thought it was because I was in the second or third class that included women at Princeton.

Just relax, lady, and quit thinking that EVERYBODY is thinking about YOU. They aren't, they probably could not care less. Don't worry about it. Just fear God, love your fellow man, and do your work in the station to which you are called.

[montag813]

I've been thinking a lot about this sort of failure to be truly accepted

Perhaps Michelle would be more readily "accepted" if she had achieved enough academically on her own to attend Princeton, instead of--as she has admitted herself--relying on racial preferences to get in.

[dennisw]

LOL
This writer wants everyone to kiss her ass.
This writer also is NOT an African American
Her parents immigrated from Haiti
Why did they move to such an awful racist country such as America? (sarcasm)

So where does this idiot get off criticizing America the same way an American with slave ancestors would?

[Huntress]

Thanks for the new tagline!

(edited slightly for due to FR tagline space requirements)

[LibFreeOrDie]

I've made a bet that hard work, study and persistence should be able to vault me past mockery

So this person thinks that an Ivy League diploma should inoculate you from criticism? It wasn't her pic on the cover anyway. It was a couple whose politics and unsavory associations should be mocked.

[xDGx]

"I last visited my alma mater, Princeton University, two years ago to speak on an alumni panel about the future of Iraq. Inside stately Wayne Manor, where I'd taken Constitutional Law more than a decade earlier" Who teaches these weiner-tards how to write? This is the phiosphical detritus one derives from a lifetime in front of the idiot box. "Theola Labbé-DeBose goes on to whine about race (*shock*) samplings: "I spoke to a mostly white crowd" "I've been thinking a lot about this sort of failure to be truly accepted as I've watched Michelle and Barack Obama recently. After all, a white couple with their accomplishments would be another one of those gilded couples that appear on the New York Times's society pages or in Town & Country magazine. Instead, these two earnest meritocrats wound up on the cover of the New Yorker last week in a now notorious fist-bumping caricature, complete with a Black Panther-era 'fro for her and traditional Muslim garb for him. " " Like the Obamas and millions of other African Americans who have relied on the promise of American meritocracy, I've made a bet that hard work, study and persistence should be able to vault me past mockery and wariness. But episodes such as that cover make me worry that no amount of pedigree and personal polish will let us entirely escape suspicion, mistrust and jealousy. And I'm hardly alone in this: A New York Times/CBS News poll last week reported that 64 percent of blacks think that whites have a better chance of getting ahead in today's America. It's a painful lesson, especially for us blacks who chose majority-white universities as the means to achieving professional success. " "I've given a lot of thought to the intersection of race, education and meritocracy, based on both my personal experience and my job covering schools for The Post. Here are some of the questions I ask myself in private (and I suspect I'm not alone): " "These questions hit particularly close to home because, like Michelle Obama, I graduated from Princeton. We're members of the fraternity known as "Black Ivy," sisters and brothers who earned our diplomas at some of the country's most elite universities, places that have educated generations of political families such as the Kennedys and the Bushes. I've gotten very different reactions, from both blacks and whites, to my Ivy League background, from the over-the-top, I'm-impressed tone of voice ("Princeton? Wow!") to barely concealed envy ("Really? How'd you manage that?"). " "Some blacks have asked why I didn't go to Howard or another historically black college. Some of them must be thinking that about Michelle Obama, too. I can only say that choosing a college wasn't an easy call. At The Post, I've written about young people in the District who are determined to attend a black college. That choice is often driven by black pride or the desire to continue a family legacy, much in the way that attending such schools as Yale and Cornell is passed down in some families. But some of these young African Americans tell me that they also feared not looking like everybody else, or that they were pressured by family and friends not to venture too far from what they know. In some instances, the choice between Harvard and Hampton can be seen as choosing to accept or reject your race. That can make an Ivy League acceptance letter seem more like a burden than a break. But some of us still decide to go to "white" schools -- because it's a glittering line on a résumé, because we're compelled to try to own something that was once denied us, and because we hope that an Ivy League education may act as a kind of academic armor against misperceptions, assumptions and plain old bigotry. Like every other meritocrat, we're looking for an advantage, and we have particular reason to think that we may need one. " You can read the rest if you want, but it is pathetic bitching and excuse-mongering about race race race. How about this, Ms. Labbé-DeBose? Why don't you build your career on MERIT instead of whining about how you feel cheated, slighted,dissed, whatever. You EARN respect by what you do, not what your color dicatates. You do not find ANY Asian-Americans writing this type of whining tripe anywhere. ANYWHERE. Same for everyone else except for the professionally oppressed. Grow the hell up, Ms. Labbé-DeBose, and dispense with your whining about perceived insults and impress folks with what you can do.

Good grief can someone tell me an easy way to write in this forum without < p> and < /p>'ing every blasted paragraph. Honest to goodness I love this place but the format sucks. ARrrrrrrrrgh.

[Bahbah]

How can the Obamas list the same schools and the same jobs on their résumés as their white counterparts and still be seen as something to be feared? Isn't education America's Great Equalizer, one of the few ways we have of creating a society based on brains and talent rather than family background or skin color? Or does that promise of uplift and integration only go so far?

The source of their diplomas has nothing to do with it. And unfortunately, your Ivies are the "great equalizers." You all come out thinking and saying the same things, properly indoctrinated.

Also, the education at these institutions has been so debased that someone can write a thesis like Mrs. Obama's and still get into Harvard Law. So you all made it not mean much, and now you're mad about it.

[mkleesma]

Maybe you did make it on your own. The derision comes from the fact that many in the world of Affirmative Action did not.

[dennisw]

Clue-— This cry baby is the child of Haitian immigrants. Maybe she would be happier in Haiti where there is no “White oppression”

[tx_eggman]

After all, a white couple with their accomplishments would be another one of those gilded couples that appear on the New York Times's society pages or in Town & Country magazine.

Bullsh1t ... they wouldn't even be on the radar.

Outside of their connection to Chicago politics they have "accomplished" nothing ... and if they were white, they wouldn't have made a ripple in that corrupt little cess pool.

[AnAmericanMother]

My pleasure! ( probably should credit my Dear Old Dad, but I know there isn’t room. He is famous for his “original old sayings,” as he calls them )

[AnAmericanMother]

With a name like that, it’s a pretty good bet that she is NOT the great grand-daughter of Mississippi sharecroppers.

[mick]

Well, our girl Michelle certainly had a little help, which accounts for the chip I guess.....see an old post below

Michelle Obama’s Inferiority Complex

06/30/2008 6:17:27 AM PDT · by Kaslin · 67 replies · 1,632+ views
Townhall.com ^ | June 30, 2008 | Dinesh D’Souza

[headsonpikes]

You don’t have to use < > etc. to format on this site.

Just doubletap the Enter button for paras.
One tap for next line no space.

[TruthShallSetYouFree]

Another issue, above and beyond the fact that Michelle Obama took the place of a more qualified white or Asian applicant, is that, because of the very existence of affirmative action, a black person who is admitted into a prestigious college will never be able to prove that he or she could have gained such admission strictly because of qualifications, irrespective of skin color. They will always be viewed, just like the boss’s son is viewed, as someone who did not make it on his own. Until the unconstitutional abomination that is affirmative action is finally removed from our system, the author’s word—”meritocracy,” will remain an illusion.

[xDGx]

thanks!Ihavealwayshadproblemswiththissortofthing ;)

[Mamzelle]

Gee, lady, maybe they thought you were too smart to be a Princeton grad?

[pabianice]

After all, a white couple with their accomplishments would be another one of those gilded couples that appear on the New York Times's society pages or in Town & Country magazine.

How many white couples would have been gotten there via affirmative action?