Uncle Tom?

Uncle Tom. Aunt Jemima. Clarence Thomas. For most white people, these names represent, respectively, a literary figure, a picture on a pancake box, and a conservative African-American Supreme Court justice. For those of us on the darker side, they represent something much more ominous. Being called one of these names is tantamount to being called a racial traitor.

Some years ago in Denver, two African Americans survived the mayoral primary to face each other in the November general election. Popular district attorney Norm Early appeared poised to beat career politician Wellington Webb, until a rumor swept through the black community that Early was an “Uncle Tom,” a “white man’s Negro.” Early’s crime? He lived in a white part of town and had an East Coast education. For many black Denverites, this was enough to prove that Early was not black enough.

In one of life’s supreme ironies, we African Americans often do to each other what we accuse white folks of doing to us: We measure each other through a racially distorted prism. We resent white people sizing up our ability to function and belong in the larger community because of our membership in a particular racial group. “How dare they,” we self-righteously proclaim. “Judge us as individuals,” we demand.

Yet, we often question the motives and choices of individual African Americans, especially if we suspect they are deviating from so-called mainstream African-American thought. For example, for many African Americans, marrying outside the “community” automatically places one’s “brother card” at risk. And, heaven forbid, if one should publicly air dirty laundry, as I have in previous columns discussing trashed neighborhoods or the increased gang activity in the predominantly black Jordan neighborhood, then some readers believe my brother card should be revoked altogether.

According to these self-appointed racial gatekeepers, those of us who address problems within the African-American community are suffering from the “Clarence Thomas Paradox,” an affliction that turns one into a racial Benedict Arnold. Unfortunately, most readers who are critical of me do not dispute the truth of what I’ve written. They simply resort to the same tactics that led to the demise of Norm Early—attacking my blackness. Since I’ve been compared to Clarence Thomas, I decided to read how he himself describes his views, something that I am reasonably certain the racial gatekeepers among us have never done.

In July 1998, Clarence Thomas addressed the National Bar Association, the nation’s oldest and largest group of African-American lawyers and judges. Showing up at all took a lot of guts. Many in the group had publicly called him an Uncle Tom and privately called him much worse. Some NBA members threatened to openly disrupt his remarks. Thomas quoted Harvard law professor Randall Kennedy, a liberal Democrat, who said, “If racial loyalty is deemed essentially and morally virtuous, then a black person’s adoption of positions that are deemed racially disloyal will be seen by racial loyalists as a supremely threatening sin, one warranting the harsh punishments that have historically been visited upon traitors.” Thomas goes on to make a very interesting point. “I, for one, have been singled out for particularly bilious and venomous assaults… I have no right to think the way I do because I’m black. Though the ideas and opinions themselves are not necessarily illegitimate if held by non-black individuals, they, and the person enunciating them, are illegitimate if that person happens to be black.”

Sadly, that is the very thing that readers who wish to revoke my “brother card” are doing. They are denying me (and other African Americans) the right to freely discuss issues confronting our world without first passing some sort of racial loyalty test. Such thinking is intellectually indefensible and morally bankrupt.

Now, I usually do not agree with Clarence Thomas the Supreme Court justice. I did not support his elevation to the High Court and believed Anita Hill. However, I wholeheartedly support Clarence Thomas the man. And if the African-American community is to fully reach its potential, we must stop shooting the messengers and allow ourselves to enjoy the same right as other Americans—to speak and write without fear of racial character assassination.

Clinton Collins Jr. is a Minneapolis lawyer and ABC Radio commentator. His email address is ccollins@collinslawfirm.com.