Black Mens Studies. Serie McDougal III
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we interviewed reported numerous examples of microaggression. Jamal, a 25-year-old stockbroker, works in a large office building. Even though he dresses well and looks the part of a young professional, he is frequently followed by security officers when he enters boutique stores in the mall of his office complex. When he rides the elevators, he can “feel the fear in most Whites.” Although he claims to have become “used to it,” later in our interview he expressed awareness of “being angry,” and that he has often wished he had “given them something to make them afraid.” The cumulative effect upon Jamal of the many microaggressions he has experienced is “hard to know.” However, one can argue that the toll has been enormous, as it is possible to trace much of his perfectionism and shame about mistakes to an underlying fear that he indeed might be “dangerous and untrustworthy.” (p. 52)
Racism can certainly produce an unhealthy perfectionism in Black males, leading to depression. Lambert, Robinson, and Ialongo (2014) conducted a longitudinal investigation into the relationship between racial discrimination, socially prescribed perfectionism, and depression among African American adolescents. Maladaptive perfectionism refers to holding excessively high standards, being extraordinarily self-critical. This kind of perfectionism has been linked to depression. There are other types of perfectionism, one of which is socially prescribed perfectionism. Socially prescribed perfectionism is different from self-prescribed perfectionism because it comes from other people’s unrealistic expectations imposed on a person. Some social scientists believe that this kind of perfectionism is worse because it is understood to be less. The notion of a “good Black man” assumes that this is a rare, exceptional condition. Yet the slightest misstep can land a Black man in the category of “no good” like all the rest, because this is the only other option which is implied in the popular anti-Black male phrasing “Black men ain’t shit.” Lambert et al. (2014) sampled 492 African American adolescents at grades 7, 8, and 9. At each grade the youth explained: (1) how often they experienced racial discrimination; (2) the extent to which they had socially prescribed perfectionist beliefs, and; (3) the extent to which they had experienced anxiety and depressive symptoms. The research suggests that the experience of racism in the seventh grade led to socially prescribed perfectionist beliefs in the eighth grade, which led to depressive symptoms in the 9thgrade. Implicit in Black men’s experiences with racism is the assumption that they have not lived up to the social standards or expectations of them. Externally imposed standards cause Black men to negatively evaluate themselves based on racist standards beyond their control—often leading to depressive symptoms.
Substance Abuse
Substance abuse can be a symptom of the invisibility syndrome associated with racism, according to Franklin (2004). The experience of racism is associated with a greater likelihood of engaging in cigarette smoking (Landrine & Klonoff, 1999). Hammond, Agyemang et al. (2014) explain that racism is related to risk behaviors like cigarette smoking, alcohol consumption, and other drug use, especially among adolescents.
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Consumer Orientedness
Due to being reduced to the statuses of wage earners and consumers, many Blacks adopt a consumer-mindedness, seeking status symbols to compensate for feelings of inadequacy. This only compounds the problems of unemployment, underemployment, poverty, and the poor quality of received social services.
Restricted and Conflicting Affectionate Relations
Internalized negative racist perceptions of themselves cause Blacks to be vulnerable to certain conflicts and fear in their affectionate relationships with one another (Wilson, 1991). While some Black males respond to racism by engaging in violence, substance abuse, and other risk behaviors, other Black males may respond by suppressing their emotions, hampering the ability to form strong friendships and partnerships (Evans et al., 2016).
Physical Illness
The experience of racism has been linked to increased aging and physical illness in Black men (Chae et al., 2014). Many hypertension-related illnesses (i.e., heart attack, strokes, kidney damage) are related to the experiences of racism (Hall, 2007).
Resistance Confusion
According to Pierce (1988), the chronic experience of racist microaggressions can lead to confusion about when, where, and how to resist oppression versus when, where, whether and how to accommodate it (p. 27). The old proverb of picking one’s battles can easily turn into never entering battle at all.
Liberatory Responses to Racism/White Supremacy
Franklin (2004) explains the solution to invisibility racism must happen as a result of a collective effort. Visibility is something that the Black community, and Black men among themselves, can create “by the sense of belonging provided by other Black men and the activities, institutions, traditions, and practices of the brotherhood of Black men that typify the uniqueness of being an African American man” (Franklin, 2014, p. 16). According to Franklin (2004), the keys to surviving invisibility and nurturing a sense of personal power are (1) recognition—the power of feeling you are being acknowledged by others; (2) satisfaction—the satisfaction of feeling rewarded for what you do; (3) legitimacy—the feeling that you belong; (4) validation—the power of feeling that others share your views and values; (5) respect—the power of feeling that you are being treated as a person of value and worth; (6) dignity—the power of feeling that you are a person of value and worth, and; (7) identify—the power of feeling comfortable with the way you are and with who you are. Franklin and Boyd-Franklin (2000) explain that Black males engage in microaggression repair and achieve visibility through many different methods. To heal from the multigenerational impacts of anti-Black racism, Leary (2005) suggests that Black people know themselves and/or restore their historical memory, identifying and building on their strengths. Daniel (2000) argues that it is erroneous to refer to the distress suffered by people of African descent using the term “post-traumatic” because racism has proven to be ongoing, not a specific, time-limited event. The following are several important factors that may be used to address the challenges of racism and White supremacy and to enhance the well-being of men and boys of African descent.
Knowing and Defining Self
During slavery, Black people who escaped were considered to have engaged in a theft of self because their escape represented loss of power and privilege, a financial loss, and a loss of knowledge and skill ←45 | 46→to their captors (Landers, 1990). This reveals that Black self-determination was and is fundamentally tied to a loss of power and privilege to those who benefit from their subordination. Moreover, one of the first aspects of Black self-determination is self-definition, which is an act of opposition. When African people were enslaved, many of the actions of their enslavers were guided by the effort to dislocate African people’s sense of self by separating them from their ethnic groups, their families, and their cultures and traditions. Knowledge of self may help diminish the ability of White supremacy to reward Black men for undermining collective Black well-being. The first step in challenging racial oppression is self-definition based on one’s own social-cultural perspective (White & Cones, 1999). This is a necessary step for a Black man to achieve his potential (White & Cones, 1999). Akbar (1991) explains Malcolm X’s emphasis on the importance of self-definition:
He was vehemently determined to define himself. He said (in words), “It is better to be called ‘X’ than to be named Williams or Smith or any other name they gave you on the plantation. It’s better to be an unknown quantity than to be walking around with your slavemaster’s name. Eventually, you’ll discover and take on some name that came from your own land, but in the meantime just be ‘X’. The idea is absolutely critical for you to define yourself.” Not only that, but he went on to redefine everything about himself. What should be eaten, when it should be eaten, how it should be eaten. He was the first one to teach us that the Black man was the original man. Everybody is talking about this subject now, but he was the only one who made it popular. The middle-class scholars looked at him in disbelief. They didn’t even believe what their own White historians had told them in passing. They didn’t believe that they were the original people of the earth. It was that message that became critical in changing the self-definition of the people who studied