It was a Friday, mid summer, in downtown Memphis.Normally, I would wait til Saturday to go shopping, but since I didn’t have to work that day, I thought , “why not”. I walk into The Wolfchase Mall, shopping heaven to folks in my small hometown of Helena, Arkansas, about an hour or so away from Memphis, and started looking around. But it seems to me, I wasn’t the only one looking. As I walk from aisle to aisle, roaming eyes mimicked my every move. Disregarding the eyes, I continued shopping. When going to reach for a sun dress, this white woman, approached me, and said,” do you need any help”. Replying, “ No thank you”, I turned away and walked out the store. At that moment I realized that I was being racially profiled.
     So what’s my point? How is it that for hundreds of years, going back to slavery, African Americans have fought for the natural rights of all humans, only to have our pride and dignity slammed in our faces? How is that we, African Americans, obviously humans, are portrayed as aliens in America’s society? How is it determined that a person’s race establishes their character?
Being a young female African American, I am surrounded by everyday adversity. Where the decisions I make, forces me to prove a point; where the job I have determines my position and the way I am perceived in society. We are constrained to an education as blacks. Obtaining an education validates our approval to simply approach the availability of the opportunities that our opposing race has. Even when blacks prove the “impossible” and sustain a job, an education, or occupation , we are still belittled and are labeled as imposters.
   But whites are not fully responsible for the attack on the status of African Americans. It is more so our fought. Just as one would ask “why are whites discriminating against the black race”? One would follow up and ask” why are we letting them”? It  is our responsibility as a race to understand our identity and in doing so ,we effectively deliver the message to whites that we are more than just a race, we are a system of ideas, that together innovate possibility. We are no longer in bondage, but we are free; free of captivity, judgement, and dissaproval;free of doubt that we are limited to become greater than the criticism that has been suffocating African Americans for so many years.
So how is it possible for it to be predetermined that someone’s character is resulted in their race? Just like you research the number of black minority that are incarcerated on a yearly basis, you also see the number of blacks that are aspiring doctors, lawyers, and psychologists. Just like you research the high school drop out rate of black minority, you also see an even higher graduation rates from the black minority in high school and college. Just like you voted for Kennedy, Bush,and Clinton, you also witnessed Barack Obama,be named the first African American President of the United States.
So when you hear the status of the African American race being denounced  by our opposing race, disregard it. Because when African Americans were disregarded, we accomplished something greater, and proved to the many who doubted us, that African Americans are more than a race. Maybe if we disregard what has been holding us captive, whites will realize that blacks are just as capable as they are.Then one can really become unified and innovate together and truly be called the “United States”.