Kanye West and Taylor Swift

Instead of being mad and outraged at Kanye West, the boy needs your compassion. What I am about to write may sound like a broken record to those who have transcended or have never experienced racism. Racism is a disease (dis-ease) that can break a person's spirit and hope or it can turn you into a wall through which nothing passes without going through a racial lens.

Kanye's reaction to Swift's success was nothing personal. All he saw another instance thing being taken away from a black person and given to a white person. It's the racial dance or the racial boxing match that has been part of the American social landscape since the day slavery began. There is an underlying climate of distrust between blacks and whites.

Kanye is the opposite of the late superstar Michael Jackson. Jackson was intending on proving he was good enough for white people. He surrounded himself with white people, hired white people, produced white children and developed close friendships with many white people to prove that he was good enough. The impact of racism on many blacks is to constantly measure themselves against white people because for them that is the learned barometer of success - when whites accept them they have "arrived".

Kanye West do not seek that acceptance, he demands it and flaunts his power that comes from his success. He speaks for himself and does not care if he offends white people. He is saying to the world, he will not be a slave mentally, physically or emotionally. But it comes out wrong sometimes and he knows it. He is trying to find a way to balance his frustration and the hurt from the pain of racism, with civility since he is a public figure and a role model for children of all races.

Blacks have suffered a lot by American racism. They have lost many things. The credit that many deserved was stolen and claimed by white people. This pain carries over from one generation to the next and Kanye is showing symptoms of that pain by the way he acts at times. Yes, so sometimes he overreacts like a child who just wants to be heard and want recognized as equal with no ifs ands or buts.

It was childish of him to take the mike from Taylor Swift in the middle of her acceptance speech to say that the award should have gone to Beyonce. It was an embarrassing moment for both Beyonce and Swift but credit must go to Taylor for her mature response or non-response. The fact is Swift is a beautiful white blonde the epitome of the white American idea of beauty and she enjoys many unearned privileges. She could have responded any way she wanted and it would have been alright.

To understand the impact that racism has on many black Americans is to imagine living in the Sahara desert working all day in the hot sun and when you are thirsty and dying for water, you are denied water to drink while the privileged people are bathing in swimming pools of water and after they have had their full of it they offer it to you to drink, then they turn and laugh at you and call you dirty. It leaves you pretty angry and hurt. The hurt from the past does not go away. It is pushed aside for survival and sometimes it ferments and when the cork blows you get the likes of Kanye West reaction to perceived injustice.

Racism, both internalized and overt is an irrational response to some kind of fear. I hope one day America will be free at last from the plague of this mental disease.