It’s funny that when you look at the above picture, you can’t help but feel how unreal it seems. If I had shown anyone this picture two years ago it would seem like it was from a movie or an old episode of 24. Who would have thought that a colored person with a funny name (read ethnic sounding name) like Barack Hussein Obama would become President of the United States of America? This isn’t a victory for just Black Americans, it is a victory for the American Dream. You know the dream that says if you work hard (and more importantly you work smart) you can achieve anything. Let me say that again, “YOU CAN ACHIEVE ANYTHING”.
People of minority ethnicity who tend to have “funny sounding” names that white people and white-washed colored people tend to make fun off have won. People with a skin color other than pinky white have won. And ultimately, America has won. New faces and presumably new ideas are entering the political realm at the highest levels which appear to only reflect the realities of the U-S of A in 2009.
How many of us work, go to school and have friends of different races, religions, and even sexual orientations? If you don’t, you really need to reexamine yourself. Having trouble pronouncing that Chinese girl’s name at work and prefer to give her an anglicized name? “Hi Jennifer“. How about you actually ask her the pronunciation of her Chinese name and make a serious effort to pronounce it correctly. Don’t understand why Hindus have many Gods, why not “google” it or politely ask a well informed Hindu person. You may also want to get down the pronunciation of their name as well. Think homosexuals are going to hell because your pastor says so? Ask your pastor if he has been to hell (or heaven) to know what those places are like. Think most Black men go to jail and Black women are single mothers? How about you attend a Black church and see real Black nuclear families and not just the ones on television.
Anyway, what the hell is this whole rant about? While I stood there in Washington, D.C. watching Barack Obama I couldn’t help but feel this entire flood of emotions and thoughts. This is what Martin Luther King Jr. said when he wanted to live in a world where people were not judged on the color of their skin but on the content of their character. This extrapolated in my liberal douchebag mind means that anyone who has felt oppression because of some superficial reason, and yes even those lovable white people, have made it.
America will come out of these troubling times because Americans have renewed their faith in the American Dream by really showing that “anyone can make it”. In most countries, the people with the money, power and respect all come from that country’s largest group. Barack Obama becoming President shows that Americans have rejected this old world “tribalism” and have sought to give the best man for the job a shot. Now lets just hope that he doesn’t mess it up.
