Comments on: “You Know I Don’t Mean You”

By: No Offense « Miss Incognegro

No Offense « Miss Incognegro — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 23:29:57 +0000

[...] Tagged adolescence, jokes, Kevin Young, racism I found this poem posted here and here. [...]

By: Lu

Lu — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 20:20:57 +0000

Just saw this over at ARP, and I enjoyed it very much. I has never read the poem but I am sure I will be sharing it with my boys as they get older and undoubtedly face the same “no offense” jokes at school.

By: “You know I don’t mean you” at Anti-Racist Parent - for parents committed to raising children with an anti-racist outlook

Mon, 12 Jan 2009 11:32:24 +0000

[...] Crossposted from The Bottom of Heaven [...]

By: Conseula

Conseula — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 14:29:24 +0000

Great poem. Isn’t it great how “no offense” is almost assuredly followed by something offensive?

I love Kevin Young. I taught him for the first time last semester and now can’t get enough of him.

By: Harriet

Harriet — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 21:06:48 +0000

Wow…”this here Smigger

could care less yet could never care
more, that my blue
& brown body is more
than willing to inform
him offense is one hostage
I have never taken.”

That’s absolutely profound. I got in my fair share of scuffles when I was younger over childish issues like this. I agree with Carleen and Frieda.

It’s such a shame. I had to do a research project when I was still in college about how others view black and white. We had to make random calls and ask the person on the other end a series of questions. Then, at the end of the conversation, I had to ask the person on the other end if they thought I was black, white or other. Overwhelmingly, (98%) many thought I was white, citing how “well spoken” I was over the phone. As if diction and proper grammar is relegated to race.

Anyway, I digress. GREAT article!

By: Carleen

Carleen — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 17:34:38 +0000

Definitely strikes a chord. I think the attitude that “I don’t mean you” continues in the modern workplace too. Have you ever been “complimented” by whites who say “I don’t think of you as black”?! And it’s hard to write about in a way that makes the full impact felt. Poetry is probably the best way to do this. I heard a review of this book on NPR. I need to check it out.

By: Frieda

Frieda — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 01:20:21 +0000

Claudia,

This poem brought up so many childhood memories. I can understand Kevin’s poem so well. For example, I can recall standing in the lunch line in second grade (Yes, SECOND GRADE) and a classmate sang to me:

“Jingle Bells, shocking shells, granny had a gun…pulled the trigger shot the N****r…….”

I can’t tell you what came after that line because it was always a blur from there. And of course, I too, heard the line “No offense.”

That was the first experience that I could recall with race, but there were many more uncomfortable experiences like this. Like for example, “You don’t seem like all of the other black people.” At the time I can recall wondering what all of the other black people were like, but felt sort of grateful to not be included in the pool of “outcasts.” I can recall being asked “why my hair felt THAT way” and whether or not touching my arm would turn my white classmate, black. So many memories, yet no strategies to deal or handle it all at such an early age. Isolation and alienation in my predominately white elementary and middle school were the NORM.