As readers of the blog know, I’m African.
I’ve had my detractors, since moving to the US, about whether I can even make that claim.
Most bizarre, perhaps, were the charges by people, who should know better, that I couldn’t possibly identify myself as African because, as my photo attests, I’m white. I’ll note for the record that these detractors were not of my ethnic identity, not of my culture. They were American, and had never graced the shores of my beloved African continent.
I’ll note further, that in sharing this bizarre state of affairs, my African brethren, informed of my American colleagues’ epithets, were, above all, amused.
I told my story to a prominent national community leader in Zambia. He listened quietly and respectfully, as is the African way. When I was done, he asked me a question that healed my heart: “If you are white, and cannot be African, is it also the case that that, if you are black, you cannot be American?”
In a Johannesburg craft market, I shared the same story with a Congolese trader. He looked at me for many, quite uncomfortable seconds, eyes growing ever wider. Then, as is the African wont, he burst out laughing, shook his head, and told me that my story was so implausible that I must surely be making it up. Assured that I wasn’t, he shook his head and said, “I am sorry, my brother.”
Enough said.
I was reminded of this issue listening to Cindy McCain a few minutes ago, because she talked about Rwanda, and about Rwanda’s suffering in the genocide of 1994.
In 1994’s Rwanda, tribal identity was a lethal, and official disability: Hutu, you live. Tutsi, you die.
Cindy McCain acknowledged a guest in the audience, Ernestine, of Rwanda, a woman who had survived the genocide, and who works for healing and reconciliation, in spite of her painful past.
Making difference a disability is never right. Making disability a difference is no better.
