Black Like Me

Like racism, cultural appropriation victimizes only nonwhites. But turned against Whites, it works so well that it can become historical and even *genetic* appropriation.

Much of human behavior is illogical. This is only to be expected; most human beings are driven not by truth and logic, but by a combination of reflex, habit, instinct, emotion, and intentionality, all coordinated by need and desire.

For most people, truth and logic are simply what they abuse in order to plan and justify their behavior, alternately greasing and sanitizing the path to wherever they want to go. Righteousness and rationality seldom have anything to do with it.

But when truth is officially subordinated to racial entitlement, perversely turned around backwards, and used to promote injustice, it becomes a matter of grave concern.

It is common these days to hear people of color complain about “cultural appropriation”, sanctimoniously defined as follows:

“Cultural appropriation is the co-optation of elements, customs, or practices of one culture by another culture without acknowledgment or consent. Usually, the appropriating culture is in a relation of domination to the appropriated culture.”

A frequently cited example of cultural appropriation is “blackface”, defined as the use of anything from black greasepaint to chimney soot to make the complexion of a non-Black appear black. It has led to the modern censure of various celebrities and personages from Al Jolson and Buster Keaton to Virginia Governor Ralph Northam and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, blackening their reputations along with their faces.

In short, like Indian war bonnets on football helmets, blackface is now considered about as politically correct as sauntering into a DEI conference in a KKK robe, singing Dixie and swinging a hangman’s noose.

Note the characterization of blackface as “insensitive and highly offensive”.

The consensus seems to be that any non-Black who goes blackface, and especially any White who goes blackface, is the scum of the Earth, cruelly mocking Blacks and robbing them of their distinctive traits, cultural symbols, and even their identities, thereby making a mockery of social justice.

"America has more governors who’ve worn blackface than black governors," laments Politifact. (What a tragedy!)

Personally, I’ve never worn blackface, nor have I ever wanted to do so. Yet I find myself experiencing a level of cultural appropriation that I’d never have dreamed possible: the media are literally substituting Blacks for my White ancestors, implicitly turning me Black on international television!