A short while ago, Drudge Report tweeted out this quote: “When my friend told me his wife was Caucasian, I felt my spirit wince.” Intrigued, I clicked the accompanying link to find a column the singer Jill Scott wrote for Essence about her feelings on interracial dating posted in March of 2010. At first, I wondered why on earth Drudge Report was interested in a year old column by a singer. Then it hit me; she’s going to the White House, isn’t she? Sure enough, Scott is the latest guest of the First Lady’s poetry event to come under fire from the Right.
If you haven’t been following the story, Michelle Obama’s event is set to feature poetry readings by a number of public figures. One of the figures, the rapper Common, has come under intense scrutiny because of an old video in which he raps about carrying a gun and threatening police officers and then-President George W. Bush. The controversy also touched on a 2005 interview Common gave in which he came out against interracial dating as a detriment to “self love.”
Some industrious soul decided to search through the other attendees’ public comments and came up with Scott’s Essence article which is now being widely shared and denounced. The column did indeed cause a small controversy when it first came out, however, it’s important to look beyond the scandal then and the (manufactured) one now and see that it is actually a very thoughtful piece. If you read past the provocative quote that Drudge tweeted, you’ll see that Scott is actually analyzing the internal conflict she has between being raised to view everyone as equal despite the color of their skin and the subconscious discomfort she feels seeing a successful black man dating a white woman. In that way, Scott’s supposed racism in making these comments is about as real as Shirley Sherrod’s.
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