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Why I Wouldn't See 12 Years a Slave With a White Person
The Atlantic ^ | November 27, 2013 | Enuma Okoro

Posted on 11/27/2013 4:45:00 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet

I’m not a racist. But I do have a race problem. I finally owned up to it as I was anticipating seeing 12 Years a Slave. In the weeks leading up to its opening in my state of North Carolina, I tried to think of whom among my friends I could see this film with. I have a number of racially and ethnically diverse friends and acquaintances who would love to see it, and yet, I knew I could only see this movie alone or with another dark-skinned person.

This is hard to admit. I will hurt the feelings of people I love. But isn’t confession the first step to being reconciled? I have good, healthy friendships with a range of people, but I could not think of one white person where I live with whom I would feel emotionally safe enough to see this particular movie about slavery. I did not want to have to entertain any of the likely responses from anyone who could not see themselves in the skin of the enslaved men and women on the screen. I had no desire to dissect the film politically and theologically, engage in well-meaning social commentary, marvel at the history conveyed through the movie, or grieve over what was done to black people.

I did not want the burden of the social translations that black people so often have to do automatically on so many internal levels while engaging in discourse with whites in this country. There are things we learn to do almost subconsciously in order to keep some whites comfortable enough around our blackness. Things like gauging their actual level of interest or understanding of black culture in order to know how far to take a particular conversation....

(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

The woman is a dolt… no an outright fraud just like obama. She claims to be such an earnest Christian and yet has no heart for those who do not look like her. She claims that there is none among her brethren with whom she feels ‘safe’ to share this movie. What a crock…she is an elitist with privilege written all over her biography. She is fundamentally a feminist marxist. I hope she finds no one to see this movie with


21 posted on 11/27/2013 5:10:35 PM PST by Nifster
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To: bert

Sounds like a movie which white people should ignore. They just won’t be able to ‘get it.’ I’ll wait to see it in the safety of my own home.


22 posted on 11/27/2013 5:11:28 PM PST by Misterioso
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To: APatientMan

Life after slavery. We knows it.


23 posted on 11/27/2013 5:12:48 PM PST by MestaMachine (My caps work. You gotta earn them.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

I am so sick of this shit and have such a case of fatigue I find myself continually thinking segregation is the only answer. I understand as a Christian we are all equal and God is no respecter of persons He made us all and no one need be ashamed of who they are. But... Why is it that this hatred for all things white and all our history and culture and wealth and identity and pride and Nationality must be overrun by all that is not white until whites are enslaved or dead or raped or put in their place - I know I’m rambling a bit but I and many others could go on and on and on. I talk to people out there and am too close to the hood myself and see and feel what the mood is out there and I’m losing any sense of compassion.


24 posted on 11/27/2013 5:12:50 PM PST by Sheapdog (Chew the meat, spit out the bones - FUBO - Come and get me)
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To: Errant

Sorry, I’m all out of sympathy. All they DO is talk about their “feelings” concerning race. I’m sick of it.

If they lived in Africa or Haiti or any other country where blacks are the majority, they’d quickly come to realize that some have real reasons to complain.

Meanwhile, blacks are assaulting whites in the streets, sometimes fatally, BECAUSE they are white, with virtually no pushback.

When it comes to their never-ending racial angst, they can shut up already.


25 posted on 11/27/2013 5:12:54 PM PST by CatherineofAragon ((Support Christian white males----the architects of the jewel known as Western Civilization.))
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

She needs to go back to school and re-take English 101: Never end a sentence with a proposition.


26 posted on 11/27/2013 5:12:58 PM PST by ought-six ( Multiculturalism is national suicide, and political correctness is the cyanide capsule.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

RIGHT ON!


27 posted on 11/27/2013 5:13:07 PM PST by HANG THE EXPENSE (Life's tough.It's tougher when you're stupid.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Grievance Queen, really!


28 posted on 11/27/2013 5:13:44 PM PST by Flick Lives (The U.S. is dead to me.)
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To: Errant

There was a time when I might have cared. Five years on, that ship has sailed.


29 posted on 11/27/2013 5:14:05 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet ("Of the 4 wars in my lifetime none came about because the US was too strong." Reagan)
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To: Errant

And those feelings will continue to stay hidden as long as smarmy elitists like Ms. Okoro continue to miss their ‘teachable’ moment. IF she truly wants to be able to have honest dialog about race part of the responsibility is hers


30 posted on 11/27/2013 5:14:09 PM PST by Nifster
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Ms Okoro, along with your upcoming research on the african muslim enslavement of European Christians please pay special attention to the enslavement of the Irish by the English.

I won't hold my breath waiting for a reply.

31 posted on 11/27/2013 5:15:57 PM PST by Eagles6 (Valley Forge Redux)
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To: MestaMachine

That is true enough. The difference is stark.


32 posted on 11/27/2013 5:17:22 PM PST by APatientMan (Pick a side)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Enuma Okoro.


33 posted on 11/27/2013 5:18:47 PM PST by JoeProBono (SOME IMAGES MAY BE DISTURBING VIEWER DISCRETION IS ADVISED;-{)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

There is no point arguing with this person. She found a gravy train and got on it for a ride that’ll last her a lifetime.


34 posted on 11/27/2013 5:20:27 PM PST by Revolting cat! (Bad things are wrong! Ice cream is delicious!)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Before the war of northern aggression, quite a few freed blacks owned slaves of their own in the old south.


35 posted on 11/27/2013 5:21:35 PM PST by dainbramaged (Joe McCarthy was right.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

8. Every African captured and sold into slavery was captured either by members of the next tribe up the river or by Arab Muslims. Before the modern antibiotic era, the life expectancy of a European in interior Africa was under a year.

9. The international slave trade in Africans, instigated by the above-mentioned other Africans and Arab Muslims, was for the most part ended by the British.


36 posted on 11/27/2013 5:24:53 PM PST by DuncanWaring (The Lord uses the good ones; the bad ones use the Lord.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

I know lots of white tax slaves.

There are lots of white sex industry slaves, too.


37 posted on 11/27/2013 5:25:01 PM PST by ViLaLuz (2 Chronicles 7:14)
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To: JoeProBono

It’s like the lady from The Chew and Michelle had a baby.


38 posted on 11/27/2013 5:25:12 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet ("Of the 4 wars in my lifetime none came about because the US was too strong." Reagan)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

One nice thing about freedom is not having to go to the movies with anyone you don’t want to.


39 posted on 11/27/2013 5:26:37 PM PST by mac_truck ( Aide toi et dieu t aidera)
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To: JoeProBono

Lipstick shade: Obama Purple


40 posted on 11/27/2013 5:26:42 PM PST by CatherineofAragon ((Support Christian white males----the architects of the jewel known as Western Civilization.))
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