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http://www.jasmynecannick.com/blog/?p=1814
Obama, Pfleger, Trinity, Whites, and Black America
By Jasmyne A. Cannick
Sen. Barack Obama has now removed himself from Chicago's Trinity United Church of Christ, a church he had been attending with his family for 20 years.
The decision stems from the uproar around his former Pastor Jeremiah Wright, but more recently his longtime friend Father Michael Pfleger's sermon delivered last Sunday at Trinity, which mocked Clinton and used what some deem as objectionable language.
"Rev. Moss, when Hillary was crying, and people said that was put on, I really don't believe it was put on," Pfleger said from the pulpit. "I really believe that she just always thought, 'This is mine! I'm Bill's wife, I'm white, and this is mine! I just gotta get up and step into the plate.' And then out of nowhere came, 'Hey, I'm Barack Obama,' and she said, 'Oh, damn! Where did you come from? I'm white! I'm entitled! There's a black man stealing my show!'
Pfleger then mocked Clinton's tears.
"She wasn't the only one crying, there was a whole lot of white people crying!" Pfleger said to laughter.
After his sermon, Rev. Moss thanked Pfleger: "We thank God for the message, we thank God for the messenger, we thank God for Father Michael Pfleger," Moss said.
So let's address first things first, the Rev. Michael Pfleger.
Rev. Pfleger, who is white, would have been better off delivering that sermon in a church full of white folks who actually need to hear about their individual and institutionalized racist ways, but oftentimes have difficulty digesting it when it comes from someone a darker shade of brown. Instead he choose to preach to the choir. I already know about white privilege, most Blacks do, go run and tell that to your folks.
And while I can't speak for the congregation at Trinity, if I'd have been there, I would have done one of two things, gotten up and walked out in disgust or sat there and laughed with the rest of congregation…only not with him but at him.
Onto my man Obama.
Again, I am not happy about his choice to leave Trinity, but Clinton supporters take note: there will be no threats of abandoning the Democratic Party and voting for McCain over my disappointment. A few curse words maybe, but that's about it.
I'm actually more concerned about the bigger picture-Obama leaving his church of 20 years over the fact that there are some white folks who can't deal with Black folks-or in this most recent case-white folks who think they're Black, speaking up and out about the white privilege and racism that has colonized Black Americans since the first shackles went onto the first African slave. Is this going to be a reoccurring pattern?
Which brings me to my next point.
If all of the whites that ever found themselves in an environment where racist comments were being made about Blacks or any other race-albeit work, home, kids soccer games, over midday frappachino's, or while listening to radio shock jocks-got up and left or at the very least challenged what was being said, there probably wouldn't be any racism in America today. Add to that, Lou "Cotton-Picking" Dobbs and Pat "Blacks should be grateful for slavery" Dobbs would both be out of a job. And then I woke up…
Because depending on whom you ask, what both Dobbs and Buchanan said was far more incendiary than anything I've ever heard come out of Trinity's pulpit. But then again, it all depends on whom you ask.
Somehow, white America manages to repeatedly and yet conveniently overlook their own talking heads, instead choosing to zone in on Black America like we've committed some national crime. Which to me is quite odd, since for the most part we still live in a segregated society. So much so that if whites spent more time around Blacks, instead of trying to imitate and replicate them (tans, botox, breast enhancements, dredlocs, etc.), they'd know that far worse things have been said about them than what Wright or Pfleger ever said. I'm just saying.
But since they don't, this is what happens. National shock and awe because they thought it was all good.
I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it's not all good and it won't be all good, until this country learns how to have a honest conversation about race. Notice the word "honest," that's important because up until now, the conversation hasn't been. Americans of all races have bought into the notion that we don't have race relation problems. Although, I hope that myth was shattered with the "inadequate Black male," statement by one of Clinton's "angry supporters" this past weekend at the DNC rules and bylaws committee's meeting.
The way I see it, an honest conversation about race in America as it relates to Blacks, would have start with the admission of white America's role in slavery and the intended-and damn near successful attempts at the destruction of the Black race. From there, we can discuss what an official national apology would look like followed up by discussion on reparations (which is long overdue) and what that package would look like. I'm leaning more towards a free college education for any Black that wants to take advantage of it. Then of course, there's the issue of the continued institutionalized racism that Blacks face-we can start with the justice system and work our back from there.
Then and only then, it might be all good, but I'd have to get a consensus from the rest of Black America on if that's acceptable or not. After all, we did lose a lot of ancestors in the Middle Passage and an awful lot of us

were lynched, raped, and tortured. The wounds are deep.
But I think it's a step in the right direction.
Until such time as these things are up for discussion and as long as whites continue to turn a blind eye towards their own when Blacks are the target of the likes of Lou Dobbs and Pat Buchanan, and as long as the media continues to hype up a minister here, a sermon there, and whites allow themselves to get all bent out shape over it, I suspect this won't be the last time Obama will have to denounce someone.
Who knows, it might even be me. I am after all an Obama Mama.
Now run and go tell that.

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