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Help Is on the Way …
By Lafe Tolliver, Esq
Guest Column
If you were to gauge the reaction to my recent article
entitled Cotton Comes to Toledo on the contents of its
response published by Deborah Carlisle, I believe that the
following should be immediately implemented with a minimum
of fanfare and should be viewed as an emergency to the black
community:
I propose: That we designate six to eight
secret safe houses in the City of Toledo so that the
participants in the Cotillion Ball can find a safe haven,
lodging, food and the best in sympathetic educators who can
swiftly deprogram those infected with the Cotillion Ball Bug
(aka: CBB).
The “CBB” has no known antidote except a copious reading of
black history books so the ball participant can regroup and
gain their proper bearings.
I propose: That all area churches commit
a time of earnest and intense prayer at their Sunday morning
gatherings to pray for those who are still in awe and
enthralled with the mystique of the Cotillion and its
purported transformative powers.
Sometimes, you must invoke the supernatural in order to
free people from ancient symbols of perceived wealth,
privilege and status that the Cotillion Ball attempts to
inculcate in its followers.
I propose: That funds be raised and spent
to place billboards and TV ads in the black community
warning any future Cotillion Ball followers of the mental
and emotional dangers of falling for any sappy nonsense of
they being introduced into “society.” (This is introduction
is one of the highlights of the Ball!).
I propose: That a thorough investigation is
made by local, state and federal (since some participants
may cross state lines to attend the Cotillion) authorities
of just what society these young black kids are being
introduced into.
There is so much yammering about these kids being
brought to a decorated ballroom under the pretense that when
they are “introduced” into society, that doors will open for
them and that life will become a bowl of Cajun fried shrimp
and a bottle of cold orange soda.
We need to know if the society that they are being
“introduced” into is friend or foe and where it is located
and who rules in it and what are the benefits.
Surely, as a responsible parent you would not allow
your impressionable child to be introduced into a “society”
that you know practically little about or a society that for
the most part has not been kind to your “kind.”
If, as a parent you are unsure of what questions to ask
about this “society”, here are some starter questions:
(1) Are their dues to enter into this society and to stay in
it?
(2) Can one leave at their own freewill?
(3) Will it guarantee me a job in this society?
(4) Will it provide a pass from police harassment?
(5) Will it diminish the chances of being a victim of
black-on-black crime?
(6) Will it decrease the chances of becoming a teenage
mother?
(7) Who runs this society?
(8) Where are its headquarters?
(9) If one’s name is Do’naquata or Tywane, is that Ok?
(10) What happens if this society rejects my child?
Now, those are just some starter questions and I am sure
that you may
have plenty of others to ask including the following…as
examples:
(1) why are we always following after white folks and their
social functions and we do not create our own without
waltzes and tuxes and white formal gowns?
(2) why are the waltz and white gowns and tuxes viewed as
the penultimate of
refinement and acculturation by the Cotillion organizers?
(3) don’t “we” have a society that we need to fix up so that
we can introduce our kids into it?
(4) where do you see any white parents trying to imitate any
black social activities for their kids so those white kids
can be introduced into “black society”? Or..is “their”
society regarded as first class and any “black” society
regarded as questionable?
(5) if white folks went out and organized a huge gala party
with German marching songs and kielbasa and the polka, would
we have our kids follow suit thinking that such was the
standard of civility?
I know…I know…the hidden presumption of the Cotillion
is supposed to be that our kids need refinement and some of
the rough edges knocked off of them and a good dosage of
Eurocentric waltzes and white ballroom gowns and rented
tuxes and bowing to each other should be just the ticket
but….really?
If the Cotillion organizers were so adamant about black
youths becoming a walking encyclopedia of Miss Manners, then
open up this Cotillion to everyone in the community and
without cost or restrictions.
Is mimicking a Southern plantation era social ball the
answer? Note: If white folks were “spoofing” black folks
doing a catwalk dance and the Cotillion was born out of that
spoof, why in heavens name would the Cotillion affirm those
antics and try to palm it off as a white cultural and
empowering event?
Call it what it is…a chance to dress up and feel you
are somebody and at the same time hoping that white society
will notice you and “let you into their society.”
No one is asking anyone to “resign to acting black.” You can
formulate your own soirees with pomp and meaning without
resorting to antebellum slavery times in order to find such
a bankrupt vehicle on which to express, “refinement.”
At the plantation ball, aka: Cotillion… black folks
were either slaving away in the kitchen fixing Massa’s
plate or tending the horses of the riders who came in from
the outlying plantations…and for this, we emulate, desire
and broadcast it about as being the refinements of a
civilized society that black kids need to emulate!
Oh really? We can do better!
For those who missed it, see the March 26th
edition of the Sojourner Truth @www.thetruthtoledo.com
regarding the Cotton Comes To Toledo article.
Contact Lafe Tolliver at
Tolliver@Juno.com |
