Obama and the Black Elite (Clubby World of Debutantes and BMWs)

TheDailyBeast ^ | August 21, 2009 | 8:22pm | Patricia J. Williams

[fight_truth_decay]

Patricia J. Williams' Obama's Identity: Where Do We Start? (2007)"......He doesn't hate white people. He doesn't wear his hair like Al Sharpton. He is not the whole list of negatives that people like Chris Matthews or Joe Biden or a whole generation of f*****-up middle-class college students identify as "blackness"...."part of the reason I am anxious about the trustworthiness of Obama's widespread appeal is this unacknowledged value placed on his ability to perform "unexpected" aspects of both whiteness (as in, proud immigrant stock) and blackness (as in, his remarkable ability to discern that the sterling fish knife is not a shoe horn)."

[mrsmel]

Oh brother.

[bitt]

do they also say “wee-wee’d”?

[mom4melody]

This is stupid - we know plenty of blacks that live in upper middle and high class society. We go to church with several black doctors, lawyers and business owners. Things are more equal then Jesse and Al want the world to believe.

[pburgh01]

So, a little background for those terrified that the ship of state is about to be steered toward the shoals of Rush Limbaugh’s wildest fears

Another arrogant racist twit commenting with significant envy about other buppie racist twits.

[the invisib1e hand]

i’m not really following this thread but that quote is a hoot.

[AnAmericanMother]

Well, it's apparent from this article that Patricia J. Williams is not a member of the 'in crowd' . . . and wishes that she were.

These circles are no secret to most people with the least bit of social awareness. On some levels, the social-climbing classes of black and white cross . . . even in the South. And the authoress is dead wrong when she surmises that the black socially aware class is descended from house slaves. Nonsense. One of the most polished set of siblings I knew (a dentist, a teacher, and a nurse) were the children of a laborer at Chattahoochee Brick Company and the daughter of a sharecropper from Troup County.

But most of those who are well bred -- black or white -- don't have the TIME to mess with all the social climbing nonsense. When my daughter went to the local prep school (which is a good school but has way too many of the social climbers haunting its halls) she was worried because so many of the girls came from much more wealthy families than ours. I reminded her that she was as well bred as ANYONE at the school, and that she had my permission if any of the BMW set gave her a hard time to remark (with a smile) that the one thing that money can't buy is a grandfather.

Shuts 'em up every time, at least in the South, I don't know if it would work elsewhere.

[Sender]

I must admit, as a white guy, I have no idea what a fish knife looks like, unless it is a filet knife. I am familiar with a shoehorn, and I almost never cut fish with it. My grasp of protocol and etiquette would fit nicely in a small tackle box, along with a tin of Skoal.

If one wants to meet the black upper class, it is not necessary to travel to Martha's Vineyard, you have only to come to the Atlanta area, Roswell, Alpharetta etc. I don't know if they are familiar with fish knives, but they are well-educated and carry Blackberries and drive lots nicer cars than I do. I have never, ever heard the class-warfare term "boogie" used to describe them. It sounds like a Chicago term that community organizers might use to whip up the projects.

[RushIsMyTeddyBear]

Tuskegee Institute is one of the most EXPENSIVE (outrageously) unis in the US.

[Darnright]

This is a fascinating article. Ms Williams should use caution since publicity of a long established black upper class does tend to tamp down the “African American as the proverbial victim” stereotype.

[balls]

I looked quickly through the article and didn’t see a mention of the exclusive beaches the upper-crust blacks have carved out in Oak Bluffs on Marthas Vineyard. The New York Times did an article on this a few weeks ago and mentioned Inkwell Beach, the beach that is for the exclusive use of the black affirmative-action Wall Street elite and Harvard professors, such as Henry Louis Gates, the friend of 0 who threatened the Cambridge cop who behaved “stupidly”.

[tophat9000]

Geeee this writer is IGNORANT!... he just just discovered upper call black people?...(talk about a mind stuck in liberal mental/world view ghetto)

[tophat9000]

Geeee this writer is IGNORANT!... he just just discovered upper class black people?...(talk about a mind stuck in a liberal mental/world view ghetto)

[AnAmericanMother]

Don't sweat the fish knives. They're really a British thing and you hardly ever see them here, unless you're dining in state (with a separate fish course) at the home of a serious Anglophile, and then they'll be telling you all about them, especially if they're sterling silver.

The broad blade and the little hump in the top edge are the identifying signs. It goes inside the soup spoon and outside the dinner knife.

[kcvl]

designer-clad doyennes

Who would those be? They certainly aren't the Obamas!

[kcvl]

Patricia J. Williams, a professor of law at Columbia University, was born in Boston in 1951 and holds a BA from Wellesley College and a JD from Harvard Law School.

A law critic and a proponent of critical race theory, an offshoot of 1960s social movements that emphasizes race as a fundamental determinant of the American legal system.

[Mamzelle]

The black upper class has some origins in the slave-owning gens libre de coleur in Louisiana and other southern cities with Creole connections (Savannah, Charleston, St. Augustine). Pick up a Frank Yerby novel, or Anne Rice's Feast of All Saints.

The relationship between planters and free blacks in ante-bellum South is fascinating sociology. Planters would sign complicated contracts with free black women to keep them as mistresses, providing support for children and frequently sending the offspring from "placage" to France to be educated.

[Liberty Valance]

http://www.jillnelson.com/book-finding-marthas-vineyard.html

[Tainan]

"boogie" or more correctly 'bougie' is ghetto speak for 'bourgeoisie'...sort of taking the booj- waah and just pronouncing the 1st part as 'boo-jee.'

I've heard it used by blacks, most younger female, as a derisive term speaking about someone they thought was acting, striving or wanting to be 'above their station.

[Sender]

Thanks for the clarification. Wow, and I thought I was cool to have a matching set of eight Old Hickory carbon-steel steak knives, wicked-sharp.

BTW they do cut fish quite excellently. I generally place them outside of the beer and inside of the Cholula :)