They're My Color but They're Not My Kind

I love my people, I honestly do. If I had a choice of the race that I wanted to be born in, it wouldn’t change. I love the diversity that we have in our complexions, hair, styles, swag, etc. I love me; who I am, who my family is and who they were. I love being blessed with strong women that not only taught me but showed me how to love myself. My people…My uncle used to have a saying that it took me years to understand. He would often say, “They’re my color, but they’re not my kind.” I would later learn firsthand what those words meant.

“They’re my color, but they’re not my kind.” I wish that I would have done research on this for my final college paper in hopes of understanding why we change. Did it start in the Motherland between the tribes? Did it start on the plantation between the house slaves and the field slaves? Did the house slaves treat the field slaves with inferiority? I don’t know when it started but I do know that personal experience has changed the way I feel about some things. I remember when I started working for a minority organization; I was so excited to finally be around my people because I’d always worked in corporate America. I remember telling one of my Caucasian sisters that I was sooo excited about finally working with “my people.” It wasn’t long before the light grew dim and I found a saying of my own, “In Corporate America I knew that I was Black, but here I feel like I’m Black.” Even though my department was predominately Black my supervisor for seven years was not, so life for me was pretty much what I was accustomed to, but the organization as a whole was definitely a culture shock. Unfortunately things changed and it was then that I began to understand exactly what my uncle was trying to teach me. I also learn that an old saying of mine was true as well – “Even a dog will smile at you before he attacks.” OK I'll wait until you catch up...Time's up - think about it...when a dog growls at you he's showing his teeth so what looks like a smile is really a set-up. Yes, it wasn’t long before I told myself that Corporate America really wasn’t so bad after all. House slaves vs Field slaves; why have we taken on this attitude of superiority and inferiority? Why have we made ourselves out to be better than our “brutha?” Why have we allowed a title, degree or status to define who we are or who we will become? Why have we allowed a position to be the shoes that we use to step on and over those that we used to work with as friends or thought we could respect as bosses? Recently I was sharing with my cousin that I’m being more selective of whom I would like to work for and with from now on. Unfortunately she understood because a few years ago she changed positions and found herself one of only two sistahs in the department; guess who gave her the most trouble? Confirmation - someone recently made a general statement - "My people of color. Why do you make our jobs so hard?" “They’re my color, but…” While out shopping on Black Friday I overheard a “supervisor” speak to her team in such a degrading tone that I said to myself surely she’s joking with them; her facial expression told me that she was not. “They’re not my kind.” Even at church I’ve chosen to sit up top with the crew that I work with even on the Sunday’s when I’m not working. The anointing is different up top and I don’t have to worry with those that are at church every Sunday shouting hallelujahs when the pastor is preaching & watching but turning their heads when church is over to avoid speaking.

I’m sure there’s a lesson in this for me because God allowed me to associate this with something He showed me years ago. Ironically this revelation came during The Lion King era when I worked in Corporate America. In Simba’s Pride, Kiara, Simba’s daughter, told him during the fight between the have & the have not’s that they should stop fighting because “we are one.” What Kiara was saying is the same thing that God has told us all along in Gen. 2:7 “God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life and the man became a living being.” You see the dust had no particular color – it had no race, culture or social status, degree or position. It was just plain dust from the ground and with dust you can’t tell one particle from another. We are still dust, no matter what we have achieved. We are one…(Rom. 14:1) “Accept him whose faith is weak, without passing judgment on disputable matters. One man’s faith allows him to eat everything, but another man, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. The man who eats everything must not look down on him who does not and the man who does not eat everything must not condemn the man who does for God has accepted him.” WOW!! GOD has ACCEPTED him. Now when will we? TGBTG

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