Capitalizing the B when referring to Black people might not seem like a big deal. However, when editors at The New York Times, USA Today, and the Columbia Journalism Review all make a big deal of their change in style, it’s certainly worthy of comment.
Here is how the Times announced and rationalized its (belated) conversion:
‘We believe this style best conveys elements of shared history and identity, and reflects our goal to be respectful of all the people and communities we cover’ said Dean Baquet, the Times’s executive editor. …
The Times also looked at whether to capitalize white and brown in reference to race, but both will remain lowercase [and] white doesn’t represent a shared culture and history in the way Black does, and also has long been capitalized by hate groups.
(The New York Times, July 5, 2020)
But you’d be forgiven for finding me a little schizophrenic in this respect. Because, when referencing Black people throughout this weblog, I have probably capitalized as often as not.
As it happened, I began this “black-vs-Black” preference where the Times has now ended up. In other words, I used to always capitalize the B word.
But the woman who introduced me to blogging 15 years ago was a style Nazi. So, like a virgin, I thought it best to just follow her lead, which in all matters of style adhered strictly to the Chicago Manual of Style.
Accordingly, I soon learned that
Chicago mandates lowercase for both black and white people. period! No discrimination.
The irony was not lost on me.
That explains why I have switched back and forth over the years. With this new awakening, however, I shall begin capitalizing the B when referring to Black people as if I’m doing so for the first time. Moreover, I shall do so pursuant not to an order from the style Nazi but to the legacy of George Floyd.
Apropos of that legacy, one need only scan today’s headlines to decry the number of Blacks who die in vain every day in America. But frankly, when it comes to what most menaces Black communities, white cops killing Black men has nothing on Black men killing other Black men, women, and children (like Secoriea Turner, 8, in Atlanta, Geogia, Royta De’Marco Giles, 8, in Hoover, Alabama, Davon McNeal, 11, in Washington, DC, and Natalia Wallace, 7, in Chicago, Illinois just last weekend).
Such Black-on-Black crime grieves and bewilders me beyond words. But the killing of George Floyd is creating a legacy that might make a little sense of those senseless deaths. That legacy already includes
- cities removing Confederate flags and statues;
- sports teams getting rid of their racist names and logos (e.g., Washington Redskins);
- police officers getting arrested like common criminals for behaving like them;
- cities reforming police departments (a.k.a. defunding the police);
- “Black Lives Matter” slogan becoming so mainstream it adorns the plaza outside the White House;
- Walmart ending gun sales;
- Everyone from corporate CEOs to university professors and hysterical “Karens” losing their jobs for tweeting or getting caught on tape exhibiting once-acceptable racist behavior;
- Juneteeth heading for national holiday;
- NASCAR banning the Confederate flag;
- HBO purging racist films like Gone with the Wind from its archives; and
- NFL commissioner chanting Black Lives Matter and apologizing for dissing Colin Kaepernick.
And now this – mainstream media capitalizing the B. Because, as the father of race consciousness in Black America, W.E.B. Du Bois, would surely say, continuing to small letter Black folks would constitute a racial insult.
Except that, relatively speaking, that really is sweating the small stuff. Because, after 400 years of whites capitalizing on white privilege in every facet of daily life, to say nothing of that 200-plus years of slave labor, Blacks should be seizing this awakening to demand reparations.
After all, the killing of George Floyd has made even this demand seem reasonable and practicable. Nothing indicates this quite like Black Obama hater and Trump lover Bob Johnson not only jumping on the bandwagon, but going on Fox News to trumpet it:
Black Entertainment Television founder Robert Johnson elaborated on his call for the payment of $14 trillion in reparations to African-Americans.…
‘It is an atonement for 200-plus years of slavery, segregation, Jim Crowism, and the denial of people opportunity rights. … [U]nless White America recognizes the need for reparations to atone for this, this country will always be … ‘separate and unequal’.’
(Fox News, June 1, 2020)
Incidentally, one need only look at the disparate impact Covid-19 is having on Blacks to see the separate-and-unequal America Johnson is calling out.
I’m obliged here to confess my own awakening. Because I have written many commentaries opposing reparations. They range from “CARICOM’s Fatally Flawed Demand for Reparations for African Slavery,” February 16, 2007, to “Juneteenth and the Holy Grail of Reparations for Slavery,” June 19, 2019.
But I see no point in a full confessional. Instead I shall suffice to note that the killing of George Floyd got Mitt Romney, an old, white US senator from Utah, to march on the White House along with anti-racism protesters shouting Black Lives Matter. Therefore, it hardly seems a stretch that it would get me to change my views on reparations, no?
We are living through the most consequential times in race relations since the Civil War. And, yes, the racial conversion many political and business leaders are having seems more forced by public opinion than inspired by personal conviction.
Whatever the motivation, though, they all seem desperate to get on the right side of history. And, if it moves them to do the right thing (e.g., voting for reparations or affirmatively hiring Blacks), that’s really all that matters right now. Hearts and minds will follow.
Carpe Diem!
That said, in the Juneteenth 2019 commentary I cited above, I quoted former President Obama sharing my opposition to reparations. Therefore, I wonder if the killing of George Floyd triggered a similar awakening in him.
On the other hand, I am concerned about anti-racism protesters becoming so woke, they cannot abide anyone expressing opinions that differ from theirs. This is leading to a “cancel culture” on the left that is aping the fascist culture that enabled Nazism.
Instead of demanding conformity in the guise of political correctness, these snowflake guardians of BLM culture should consider the truth and consequences of their galvanizing slogans (like Defund the Police! and Safe Space!). Because the stifling of speech and dissent, whether from the right or left, can only be a harbinger of dystopian days to come.
Related commentaries:
Confederate monuments… Kaepernick…
defund police… reparations…
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