I don’t yet have a great deal to say about Deconstructing Tyrone: A New Look at Black Masculinity in the Hip-Hop Generation, the new book by journalists Natalie Hopkinson and Natalie Y. Moore ("the Natalies," as they call themselves at their blog). Mostly because I haven’t read the book, but also I have to do some serious thinking before I venture, as a white man, into the realm of deconstructing black masculinity.
I’ve never been particularly shy about writing about race. It’s my patrimony, in a way, as the son of a lawyer (now ex-lawyer) who specialized in race discrimination cases. Not that my dad has ever been presumptuous in the way he talks about black people, but I’m more presumptuous than he is, and I grew up talking about race over the dinner table. It’s become too much a part of my identity to squelch it in the name of political sensitivity.
That said, I’m suspicious of myself on this particular aspect of the subject. I think that I feel threatened, in some sense, by black masculinity. I feel threatened by black men. Not literally (with the rare exception), but I often feel judged, looked down on, disdained.
I’ll have to think some more about what I mean by that. In the meantime, here’s an excerpt from the book about the challenges of parenting a black son:
It’s a tricky paradox. As parents, we see it as our job to make sure our son doesn’t live down to fake notions of black masculinity that too often are epitomized in rap music. But we find it equally important for him to be unapologetically proud of the ingenuity, strength and vitality of black culture, which of course includes hip-hop.
My husband, Rudy, and I were born in the mid-1970s and are part of the hip-hop generation of parents. Cynicism is our biggest enemy. Rudy is that 30-plus-year-old who spends hours playing video games, watching the Cartoon Network and elbowing the teenagers in line each Tuesday for the latest hip-hop release. He’s the lawyer going to work in jeans and T-shirt, blasting hip-hop in his windowed office. Me: I’ve built my career writing about black youth culture and music, and still take pride in getting my groove on at the club.
Our kids go pretty much wherever we do, except the club, from the classroom where I teach college students, to Rudy’s office, to Sunday football with Uncle Celo, fight parties, housewarmings and barbecues. They are used to being the only kids there.
We named Maverick after an early 19th-century Texas cowboy, attorney and politician who refused to brand his cattle. He said if anyone found a cow without a brand that meant it was a "Maverick." That’s what I want for my son: to resist all the voices urging him to pick a brand — whether a brand of politics, of black masculinity or of sneakers. I want him to live up to his name and forge his own path — whether as a scientist, race car driver or MC.
