CNN’s Soledad O’Brien keeps own story under wraps while exploring colorism in “Who is Black in America? |
Tampa Bay Times
The Feed
2012-12-07
Eric Deggans, TV/Media Critic
More than any other, one moment crystallizes the confusing, sometimes comically absurd contortions built up around racial identity unveiled in CNN’s latest documentary Who Is Black in America?
It’s not the 7-year-old, dark-skinned black girl who turns to her mother and insists light skin is pretty. It’s not the professor [William A. Darity, Jr.] who cites studies showing dark-skinned black men suffer a 10 to 12 percent income inequality compared to white men.
It’s when Becca Khalil, a Philadelphia-based high schooler who is the light-skinned child of Egyptian parents, feels compelled to identify herself as white on a college scholarship application.
Declaring to CNN’s cameras that she identifies as black personally, Khalil is nevertheless challenged by a friend born of African-American parents, who says she hasn’t had a “black experience.”…
…When most of the youths in CNN’s documentary talk about being black, they mean African American. But [Soledad] O’Brien, who also self-identifies as black, has her non-white roots in Cuba, a Hispanic-centered culture that’s different than the environment for black folks raised in Atlanta or Detroit.
And unlike some of the kids she profiles, O’Brien doesn’t believe anyone gets to choose their racial identity.
“This idea that someone gets to choose seems odd,” added the anchor. “I’m lighter-skinned than the president of the United States, but my mom is black, my brothers and sisters are black, my mom has a short afro. I never thought I had a choice about how I identified … My identity was given to me very early by my parents.”…
…O’Brien’s documentary also doesn’t mention the most famous person navigating issues of race and identity in modern times: President Barack Obama. And the reason Obama isn’t featured is the same reason O’Brien doesn’t tell her story, even though the details — she was raised as an Afro-Cuban/Irish child in an all-white neighborhood where she felt “people like me weren’t attractive” — seems the embodiment of the documentary’s spirit…
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Tags: Becca Khalil, Eric Deggans, Soledad O’Brien, Tampa Bay Times