The Capital Letter
I keep seeing discussions about when and if a capital letter should be used when saying “Black” people and/or “White” people. I’ll be honest here, this was something I’d never really given a lot of thought. When I look back at things I’ve written, it seems that I do both but equally. If I capitalize “Black” then I will capitalize “White.” If I use a lower case for one, I also use a lower case for the other.
I thought about this for a while. It actually started to bother me. I tend to be a “Pleaser” so when I really dissected it, I think I did those things out of “Fairness” to each side. The problem I am now faced with is that, it is not fair.
In a previous post, I explained the differences between “white power” and “Black power” and how those things were not the same. As I was writing the words, I had a moment where I said…”Wait a minute?” You see, there is a reason that when talking about people, “Black” should be capitalized and “white” should not.
“Black” is our race. It is our heritage. It is the most we have to go on when talking about “Where we come from.” However, white is Polish, German, Swiss, Dutch, etc.
In theory, “Black” would be African. Before I started doing my own research, I would have agreed with that. Let’s forget for a second how vague “African” is. I mean, we aren’t talking about a city or a country. We are talking about a continent. Africa is big ya’ll. It’s real big. Still, let’s put that to the side for a second. What I am now realizing is that there were “Black” people from all over the world who came here to be slaves. When it was dark skin, it was all the same.
The Black Latinos and the Black Africans were exactly the same. As were every other “Black” person from where ever that landed here. It didn’t really matter “Where” you came from. It mattered that you were here, you were black and you were less than human.
Since our history has been greatly erased, all we have is a general “Black.”
“Black” must be capitalized when talking about a people because it is not a simple descriptor. It is a culture. Not a culture as in “The Hip Hip Culture.” It is culture as in “Heritage.”
Black is equal to Irish. Black is equal to German. Black is equal to Polish. Black is NOT equal to white. Black must be capitalized. Black is not a description, it is a heritage.
