On Elitism

In 1964, the Major Achievement Program was founded to meet the needs of intellectually talent students early in their educational career. The program was a first of its kind, and my mother claims that someone came to do a study on their class and that her picture is in the Smithsonian. She was the only black in the class.

My mother was the first in her family to go to college. In the early 1970's under New York State's Educational Opportunity Program. She was identified as young, gifted and black and was given money to go to school. She came from nothing and she often could literally not afford food to eat, or a bus ticket home. But she went to SUNY Buffalo, she finished in four years and years later earned a Masters of Education, passing her comps with distinction. She is elite. She is extraordinary.

I have a degree from Dartmouth, nothing to sneeze at, and everything in the world to be proud of when you look at where my parents started out. I have a JD, I got a high grade in Constitutional Law, I passed the Ohio bar exam on the first try and I received the highest possible score on my Con Law essay. You could say that I, a Connecticut housewife who looks no different than anyone else comparing baby ass creams at Target on any given afternoon, am elite.

NOW, the question is as follows: are we elitists? Follow up: are we qualified to be the Vice President of the United States? And finally, are we qualified to be POTUS?

Elitists? I say hell no. Veep material? No. POTUS material? Ha.

If there was a movie made about an ordinary black woman, born in the ghetto, and her road to the White House it would likely star Martin Lawrence in breasts or Tyler Perry's ubiquitous Madea. But, tonight we are expected to sit down in front of the TV and listen to a woman who is not a dreaded a elitist and every bit ordinary tell us why she is the right choice for second in command.

When you flip open the yellow pages to look for a good time do you choose the ad for Average Chicks or Elite Escorts? In the movies when shit goes down, do they call in the ordinary force? No. They call in the elite-special-teams-covert-super-specialist Delta Force. When you are being held hostage by mean, sweaty people with guns, do you want the helicopter to land with an elitist inside? Or a pitbull with lipstick?

Any black kid raised by a black mom in America has been told that they can't do what the white kids do and get away with it. We have to be 10 times better in order to be good enough.

Which brings us to a day when an extraordinary man is being charged with being an elitist, and a most dangerously ordinary woman is way, way too close to the White House.

Black moms are always right. But now not only do we have to be 10 times better, apparently they can turn it around on you and say that you are doing something WRONG. OMG! What do I teach Lauren now? I am at a loss.

I once saw Halle Berry on Inside the Actors' Studio. She was telling stories of growing up black with a white mom in the suburbs of Cleveland. Halle was elected homecoming queen, and then called into the Principal's office along with a blonde girl and accused of stuffing the ballot box, citing the blonde as the true winner. After discussion, the powers that were unfairly decided to flip a coin to decide the winner. Halle won the coin toss.

So, my friends, pray that the right guy wins the coin toss this go around. Because once again, the prettiest halfrican-american at the dance may not get a fair shake.