Meeting the parents – such an excitingly awkward experience. One particularly horrifying one for me included a home cooked meal and a major dose of Ignorant Parent. His mother served tacos I think, or it might have been burritos, and she apologized for not having proper “Mexican salsa” (they were served with ketchup instead). She expressed her disappointment that her son had taken French in high school instead of Spanish, “If he had only known that you were in his future, I’m sure he would have chosen to learn Spanish.” She wanted to know everything about my culture, and I think she would have been thrilled if I had responded by grabbing her son’s arm and breaking into an Authentic Latin Dance right next to the table. Instead, I had to endure her crestfallen face when I delivered the bad news that five years of classes had failed to make a Spanish speaker out of me, that not one of my family members lives or has ever lived in what is now Mexico, and that (oh the horror) we don’t even own a sombrero. (I know I have written about this already, but I couldn’t find it in a search of my blog – sorry for any redundancy).

Here is what Obama has to say about his experience with Ignorant White People (by the way, I finished section 1, through page 129):

Still, the feeling that something wasn’t quite right stayed with me, a warning that sounded whenever a white girl mentioned in the middle of conversation how much she liked Stevie Wonder; or when a woman in the supermarket asked me if I played basketball; or when the school principal told me I was cool. I did like Stevie Wonder, I did love basketball, and I tried my best to be cool at all times. So why did such comments always set me on edge? There was a trick there somewhere, although what the trick was, who was doing the tricking, and who was being tricked, eluded my conscious grasp.

I know I can’t presume to understand what it feels like to be a young black man being raised in a white world by white grandparents during a particularly volatile time in U.S. racial history. When he explains about trying to move back and forth between two worlds while secretly knowing that the one he lives in is not the one he belongs in, at least according to those who see him from the outside, obviously I cannot identify. But I do understand about sitting on the fence and not being allowed to fully join either side. Most of the Spanish-speaking kids in school did not see me as one of them (or they would tease me by speaking to me in Spanish anyway, assuming that I was trying to “be white” by pretending not to understand them. The Anglo kids included me, but I always felt different from them anyway – I was constantly surprised by things they would do or say; sometimes felt like I was “passing,” and I was ashamed by this. Now I am in Florida and people think I am Caucasian, and this bugs me to no end; it is a welcome relief going back home and being spoken to in Spanish by people in the grocery store – so my face hasn’t changed after all, the people here just don’t know how to recognize the more subtle features of my ethnicity.

Then I study racial inequality and social stratification, and I want so badly NOT to be part of the dominant culture. I am thankful for the value my mother has always placed on education, and that my husband has also valued education enough to encourage me to pursue advanced degrees instead of immediately entering the Florida job market upon my arrival here. I know that I am extremely blessed and incredibly lucky, and I don’t ever want to lose sight of the position other Latinos have in this country, because their blood is my blood, regardless of what language I speak.

More from Obama:

In fact, you couldn’t even be sure that everything you had assumed to be an expression of your black, unfettered self–the humor, the song, the behind-the-back pass–had been freely chosen by us. At best, these things were a refuge; at worst, a trap. Following this maddening logic, the only thing you could choose as your own was withdrawal into a smaller and smaller coil of rage, until being black meant only the knowledge of your own powerlessness, of your own defeat. And the final irony: Should you refuse this defeat and lash out at your captors, they would have a name for that, too, a name that could cage you just as good. Paranoid. Militant. Violent. N*****.

Some people still refer to the United States as a melting pot, and I don’t think they really understand what this implies: Immigrants are valued more if they assimilate, if they get “melted” into the dominant culture. Obama discusses the inner turmoil he endures while learning this. He talks about how minorities get swallowed up into “white culture” rather than the other way around. If a person of color attempts to fit in amidst the dominant “culture”, this usually means avoiding people who look like her/him, and pretending to be a colorless “individual” instead.

I have written a bit about my views on independence and extended family and have a few more things to say here. One hallmark of “white culture” (a very silly term, actually) is the value of independence. The more I think about it, the more I think the rest of us are manipulated into believing that our successes and failures are all our own (because we are independent, right?). In truth, we all stand on the shoulders of others, and, to me, it’s immoral to say otherwise. Our ancestors, living family members, mentors, educators, friends – when we look at a homeless person and say that “he did this to himself” is just as ridiculous as saying that someone like Bill Gates is extremely wealthy entirely because of his own merit. It’s easier, of course, to preach the gospel of “individuality” – then we don’t have to worry about our involvement in the misfortunes of others, but it’s also dishonest.

One more thing about this section: Remember when Bill Clinton said he “didn’t inhale?” Evidently Barack (Barry at the time) Obama was a little more successful at “inhaling” before he finally decided to get serious about his future and stop trying to escape his concerns about being a mixed-race individual. Reading this and knowing that is was written by the sitting U.S. President (long before he started running for major political office, of course), was kind of surreal. We have fallen into a pattern of elementary school-style “gotcha” when it comes to our politicians. We try to “dig up dirt” and see what we can “throw at them.” It’s ridiculous. Does this encourage would-be and current politicians to become sinless? Of course not – it DOES encourage them to hide any embarrassing fact about themselves, sometimes by any means necessary. We don’t value honesty and high moral standards in our politicians, only the appearance thereof. And if you do mess up young boy or girl, might as well just hang up any future political aspirations because forgiveness and fresh beginnings are NOT part of the “American way.”