In Polite Company

(Baltimore, MD) The first time I was called a “Nigger” I was riding my bike through a section of Baltimore known as Hamden in 1975 (to this day I am not a fan of the neighborhood). I had just finished my freshman year of college and was taken aback that the vile term was being spewed at me by a group of white men, riding in a car who felt like I was invading their space.

Fast forward to this week, I had to cover a political firestorm over Delegate Mary Ann Lisanti, using this same racial epithet to describe Prince George’s County as a “Nigger District.”

According to reporting by Ovetta Wiggins of the Washington Post, during a late night romp in Annapolis, Delegate Lisanti was with a group of fellow legislators at a cigar bar in January who overheard her say this and they said nothing.

After confirming the incident with several of those in attendance, Wiggins asked Del. Lisanti if she said this? The denial was obvious. When asked if she had ever used this term, “I’m sure I have . . . I’m sure everyone has used it.” It didn’t take long before calls for her removal became paramount to Black legislators and others. Instead of resigning (which she resisted), she was unanimously censured by members of the House of Delegates (2/28/19 the last day of Black History Month). She was removed as the Sub-Chair of the Unemployment Commission and taken off the House Economic Matters Committee. The only vote she will have is on the floor of the House. Despite this action, she has vowed to stay office. Then, in the bizarreness of this week Delegate Lisanti held court outside of the House chamber saying, “I don’t know if I used the “N-word.”

I have been asked by white colleagues if I was offended by the usage of this term. Yes! Let me give you some context. Recently, Michelle Singletary of the Washington Post posted this simple question,

“Have you ever worked for a racist employer?" She went deeper, asking, "If they said racist things behind your back?" I quickly thought of my late grandmother, Bernice Jackson worked/toiled at the Hotel Reuger in Virginia, a segregated hotel. She was a waitress in their famed dining room. Their restaurant was revered for its menu, its ambiance and its backroom deals of Virginia Legislators. I can imagine my grandmother enduring racial slights at the height of the Civil Rights Movement, holding her tongue as she served White men, some of whom were deciding the fate of Negroes. It is likely she was called a Nigger by those same men who didn’t like her service. As time went on, she likely heard the term “Colored” and “Negro” to describe her. When my mother was given an opportunity to work at this establishment, it was clear to my late grandmother she didn’t want her daughter to endure what she had witnessed. So why did she stay? My ancestors endured slights and “played the game” in order to survive. My grandmother wasn’t the only one to continue to toil in uncomfortable circumstances.

Context is great a sanitizer. Matriculating through college and on to professional life, I often heard “Nigger” whispered. The whispering is done so as not to upset “polite company.” I traverse through many different racial groups. I don’t want to become the arbiter of race/racism. One has to live in one’s own skin.

So, as I watched this whole saga unfold, I was confronted by several juxtapositions. A statue to United States Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall came out of storage this week and will find a temporary home outside the Maryland Court of Appeals in Annapolis. According to my source, Justice Marshall’s statue was housed in the same storage facility as a statue to Supreme Court Justice Roger B. Taney, which was removed (irony).

Lastly, I am happy to announce I have a new niece. Chloe arrived on February 27, 2019. Her birth is part of that unique innocence that children bring into the world. As you look at her picture, here’s hoping she will not have to endure the slights and the challenges her great uncle had to endure in a world that has so many possibilities.