Whites, Black Middle Class Are Friends
In an Ad Age blog column entitled "Guess What, America? There Is A Black Middle Class," marketing exec Moses Foster puts forth the message: There is a black middle class. So stop talking to us like we're all gangsters! When Foster and a friend went to an ad conference a couple weeks ago, they had a conversation that went like this: "I expect that you two like white women." Why? "Because you talk white. You're so articulate." That's so racist! Everyone knows that white people aren't articulate. The funniest part of the story, though, is the comment section, which is split between minorities relating their own stories of discrimination, and sympathetic white people scrambling to fulfill every I-have-a-black-friend stereotype there is:
If you provide me with the name of that person's company... I will go above and beyond and ridiculously out of the way to NEVER... EVER.. buy on solitary item from them! I'm almost sorry that hip-hop as a culture came into being.
Hey Moses, great article that rings true with me. I am not black, but have many personal and professional friends and colleagues who are. Most of them have echoed your sentiment here one time or another. Of course I grew up in the melting pot of Los Angeles! I live in VA now and my wife is Hispanic. I think the Hispanic population often experiences the same stereotypes.
Great article, and I agree with the points, but maybe this message should be broadcast to the ones that continue to cast the shadow of perception by follwing the path of the stereotype associated with them. I live in Atlanta, so without need to say, I am around and work with numerous Afican American's (or as I prefer to say "people"). The people I work with are great, intelligent and dedicated to being hard workers and a better person. They do not dress or act "white", they act classy.
