Ignorance and Racism

Ben Smith made an excellent post on his Politico blog...

Nonetheless, someone clearly ignorant made the following ignorant comment:

"Good Observation Benny Boy, but i want to remind people that Obama is more white than he is black( bi-racial ) in his thinking and upbringing. He barely knows his father and was raised by his white family, apart from his two children Obama does not have any black blood relative in America, but he still has white blood relatives here in America, my point here is during the primaries a lot of people where saying Obama is not black enough but black voters who have consistently voter for white presidential candidates will surely be more than proud to vote for Obama a biracial with no blood black relatives in America period"

This comment is just ignorant. What is "white" thinking or "black" thinking? What is a "white" upbringing? Please explain this to me. Obama has undoubtedly been discriminated against at some point or another in his life because of the color of his skin, not because of some superficial definition of what it means to be black. (And I'm sure the person who wrote that isn't black anyway.) It's disgusting how, in this society, we attempt to shame black males who DO succeed in a predominantly white culture, while we tell those young black males in prisons and on street corners, or just struggling in a minimum wage job that they need to "make something" of themselves. And for what? So they can be criticized as not being "black enough?"

Obama is setting a positive example for Black, White, Latino, Asian, and Native American boys and girls, men and women across this country. People need to stop trying to infuse their ignorance into this campaign. It's disgusting and it's time to make a change in thinking in this country.