The Visible Man: The Perilous Journey: The Psychological Pains of Forgiveness (Part IV)

The Battle of the Bulge

Roughly 2,500 African Americans fought alongside white soldiers?to repel the Germans in a wintry, miserable sequence of weeks. In the aftermath of the battle, the racial integration effort was well received, and the African American soldiers were evaluated as having done “well”.

Sacrifice: The 333rd Field Artillery at the Battle of the Bulge.

Manning 155mm howitzers, African American gunners sacrificed themselves to defend fleeing infantry.?Eleven of them were murdered by the Waffen SS, and then forgotten by the US Army. (17 Sept 2020) Warfare History Network

My Dear Readers,

I am currently in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, on the fourth portion of my travels. ?I bring you the fourth installment of The Perilous Journey. Before I begin contrasting the lives of Black & Brown Americans over the last 60 years using the essay of James Baldwin, The Fire Next Time, I want to acknowledge the significance of Memorial Day and the contributions, heroism and bravery of African American women and men in military service. Specifically, the “colored troops” serving during WWII.

The Wereth 11 Massacre

During the Battle of the Bulge, a well-known conflict that occurred during the height of WWII, eleven Black GIs from the 333rd Field Artillery Battalion, designated “colored troops” by the military, were the victims of a mass execution that went unacknowledged by the US government.

At 7:00 p.m. on the evening of December 17, 1944, the Waffen SS drove these 11 captured men into the forest.?There, they savagely tortured their victims with rifle butts and bayonets before cutting off many of their fingers and running them over with vehicles – whether this happened before or after the Americans were dead, was impossible to say.?Then they moved on, leaving their bodies behind.

The parents and wives of the 11 soldiers received letters from the military that their sons or husbands simply died in combat. Sadly, most went to their graves believing that lie. Unlike the atrocity of Malmedy, where 113 White American soldiers were captured and 84 killed, there was no investigation, no International Military Tribunal, and no trial. No such efforts were made to pursue the murders of the Black GIs in the Wereth 11 Massacre.

While other units fighting during the Battle of the Bulge received the Presidential Unit Citation, the African American gunners of the segregated unit, who sacrificed themselves to defend fleeing white American soldiers received…nothing.?

Moving forward…. The Fire Next Time (1963)

A foreword from Dr. Kane

At the writing of Baldwin’s essay in 1963, 331 years since the arrival of Africans into the American colonies, Black people had endured the psychological and physical oppressions of White people. Historically, there had remained the fear that one day the slaves would revolt, taking revenge: killing their white oppressors. Following the ending of slavery and the granting of emancipation, fear of Blacks by Whites of death and destruction remained. This resulted in the removal of federal troops and the protection they offered and allowed the disenfranchisement of former slaves and freemen and recognition of both the official codification by laws, administrative codes, and recognition of local whites to organize to control blacks within the local towns and cities.

The Raging Storms … Acceptance & Integration

James Baldwin in writing to his nephew, states:

“There is no reason for you to try to become like white people and there is no basis whatever for their imperilment assumption that they must accept you. The real troubling thing, old buddy, is that you must accept them. And I mean that very seriously.?You must accept them and accept them with love.?For these innocent people have no other hope. They are, in effect, still trapped in a history which they do not understand; and until they understand it, they cannot be released from it”.

Belief in the truth…the loss of identity

James Baldwin goes on to tell his nephew,

“They {White people} have had to believe for many years, and for innumerable reasons that black men are inferior to white men.?Many of them, indeed, know better, but, as you will discover, people find it difficult to act on what they know.?To act is to be committed, and to committed is to be in danger.?In this case, the danger is in the minds of most white Americans is the loss of their identity”.

Seeking the savory carrot…In a sea of Whiteness

For many of the veterans of the frontlines of the Children’s Crusade for equality and racial justice there was the savory carrot of acceptance and integration tied with hard earned validation and respect…we wanted it all so badly that we closed our ears and accepted emotionally hurtful phases from our “newly gained” white friends including:

·??????“You’re different.”

·??????“You’re not like the rest of them.”

·??????“I wish I had more Black friends like you.”

·??????“When I say negative things about them, I am not referring to you.”

·??????“When I look at you, I don’t see color.”

Scrapes from the table…The hunger and acceptance of NOT’s.

Yet in 2023, sixty years following Baldwin’s essay to his nephew, the savory carrot of acceptance and integration along with validation of respect still has not been achieved. When a veteran of the Chidren’s Crusades states not being impacted by micro aggressive comments arising from the sea of whiteness, it is an acknowledgement of achievement of the hard work in that person’s disillusioned mind that he/she has achieved acceptance and integration. Realistically, this individual has only acquired a status that is haltingly given to “a select few”.

This status is known as the NOT’s specifically:

·??????(N) Novelty-the quality of being new, original, or unusual.

·??????(O) Oddity-a strange or peculiar person, thing, or trait.

·??????(T) Token- acceptance and integration tied with hard earned validation of respect - a person who is included in a group, given the appearance that the individual is being treated fairly when this is not true.

In writing this section, in looking for an example I considered focusing on the behavior of the only Black Republican in the US Senate. Senator Tom Scott, South Carolina in the response to Biden’s State of the Union address in 2020, stated that “Hear me clearly…America is not a racist country”. Scott is now well received by white conservatives as he has recently announced his candidacy, running for the presidency.

Instead, I speak to my own experiences of the conflicts that resulted from the attainment of acceptance and integration and most importantly respect, following 8 years of hard work, microaggressions and sacrifice while attaining my doctoral degree in clinical psychology.?Foolishly and mistakenly, I thought I had…arrived!?Instead, I was to learn that rather than transformation, the lopsided playing field had simply become more…lopsided.

I remember the hurdles of the doctoral process in which my program included:

·??????four years of classroom study,

·??????two years practicum,

·??????two years of clinical internship,

·??????written six-hour clinical examination,

·??????oral examination,

·??????faculty presentation of a research proposal,

·??????and two-year research study,

·??????final writing of the research,

·??????defense of the research,

·??????and publication of the research study.

I accomplished these “pillars” while being a husband, a father of two and holding two part time jobs as a mental health therapist and an associate director of training and development at one of the 10 largest research universities in the US.

Acknowledgement- Dr. Laura Brown

As I write this, I want to extend my heartful thanks and appreciation to my dissertation chair and now colleague, mentor, and good friend Dr. Laura Brown who consistently challenged me to create scholarship that would withstand challenges of inferior work from other scholars/researchers.?She repeatedly rejected my drafts (eight times!) demanding, knowing I could offer more and refusing to accept less. After 8 years of intellectual study and sacrifice, I simply wanted “the road to hell” to be over and yet as a Jewish woman and lesbian committed to racial and social justice, she was very much aware of the future I would face.

Into the 21st Century: The Savory Carrot of Ascension to N.O.T.-hood

The savory carrot was initially bestowed upon me in my entrance into the doctoral program in which I would go on to earn my second master’s degree and later, the prestigious doctorate degree in clinical psychology. At the time, this was a new graduate school, and in my “historical” selection, I achieved numerous “firsts”. I was the first person accepted into the program, the first person of color accepted and later, went on to become the first African American to graduate, achieving the doctoral degree in clinical psychology.

As my ego and size of my head grew due to my achievements which as James Baldwin defined as the raging storms of acceptance and integration, I realized I was subjecting myself to a life of being observed, questioned, and challenged.?For the next 8 years, being bestowed as N.O.T., I would be poked, jabbed, etc.?For many of my classmates I was treated as the “first contact” from an alien world.?And yet within my professional world, I was resented by my colleagues for wanting more as I sought to achieve more education and professional development whereas they had achieved less and were satisfied at that level.

During my eight years of “rigorous” academic study while being the N.O.T., I became the focus study of the “Black experience”. I eagerly debated with my white classmates challenging them on the issues of the impacts of racism, inequalities in mental health care and, their silence on the issues impacting African Americans.?After all, who other than I, was best suited to educate them… just as in James Baldwin’s work about the Black experience in America.

Unfortunately, due to my naiveté, I failed to realize that as a N.O.T. I was being used and not utilized.?They spoke highly about their commitment to change however when called to act they failed.?As Baldwin so clearly stated:

?“To act is to be committed, and to be committed is to be in danger.?In this case, the danger is in the minds of most white Americans is the loss of their identity”.

Al Jolson Reborn: Mammy, Mammy…My little Mammy

One such situation of silence occurred was when a white clinical psychologist was visiting as a guest speaker and conducting his seminar in front of the entire graduate program including the Dean of the Graduate School.?As I sat in the front row, he stopped his presentation and in front of me did a full rendition of Al Jolson in well known song of “My Mammy”. At first, I was stunned, questioning to myself “WTF?” as in what does this have to do with clinical psychology or his presentation??And as God is my witness, this invited example of what I wanted to attain… did the full rendition of “My Mammy” again for the second time.?As I turned and looked at my classmates and the Dean, there was no reaction in the “sea of whiteness”.?Fully engrossed in anger and humiliation, I got up from my seat and exit the room.?Later to be consoled by some students “are you okay” and be avoided eye contact by others.

The Fall from Grace: When One’s Is No Longer…Needed.

There is a saying in the African American community “one day you are grinning with the white folks and the next day… they are gone”. Well, that was my experience; one day, I had, as James Baldwin stated: gained the acceptance, integration, and respect in the lives of my white colleagues and just like the childhood fable of what happened to Cinderella the princess at the stroke of midnight, following my graduation, most of those relationships ceased to exist. My fellow graduates were now returning to the realities of their world which in its sea of whiteness did not include the “stain” of blackness of me. Suddenly I was able to come to understand the role I played as an N.O.T. where I wanted to be utilized as a force of transformation, but I was simply being used.?I had been played and played well as I sought to be a part of … their lives where in reality, they had no intentions of having a role in mine.

A Painful Awakening… the unresolved wound.

However, a psychological wound that brings anger, remorse and unending sadness is the ending of my relationship with a white classmate who I had called a friend.?The ending of the relationship began following a disagreement in which I recalled stating, “You don’t know how to play in the sandbox”. Specifically, I meant as a white male he sought to lead me and not want to share the exchange of leadership in our relationship.?He responded by quietly stating “I want you to leave my home”. Being quite shaken, I realized that he was telling me as a Black man, a colleague and holder of a doctorate degree that I was being ejected out of his home.?I subsequently left and later as we continued the “friendship”, over the next two years, we never discussed the incident.

The Reckoning…

I have often asked myself why didn’t I speak up? Why did I not advocate for myself.?Why did I?allow this humiliation to stand? His actions and refusal to speak to them was a statement and yet what was it a statement of? And, then in reading James Baldwin, about his brother that “in the bottom of his heart he truly believed what white people thought about him”. Was that me??Did I believe that I was inferior to my friend?

Two actions held the relationship which now was dangling and shredded.?There was value in?his actions of being there as he stood by me during the illness and death of my beloved spouse and the termination from my position at the prestigious state research university.?It was my belief that loyalty held the friendship in place.?And yet, the silence, the unwillingness of him to speak of the actions of ejecting his friend a Black man? How could he not see the racism? Or at least the psychological traumatic impacts that followed?

The conflict of truths and being trapped in a history…that they do not understand.

I am awakened to Baldwin’s words about how white people are trapped. Yes, this person knows better; of the lies told of the inferiority of the Black man and the superiority of the White man, yet when challenged “you don’t know how to play in the sandbox.”?I believe for him, that the conflicts of truths and being trapped in history, emerged and collided.?As to the lack of his addressing the incident, one will never know the truths associated with this.?I expect this may be what Baldwin calls ‘the addressing danger of the loss of identity’ and may be the reason.?

This individual and I currently have a complicated yet clearly defined relationship, we do not have direct interactions as this will never reoccur until the wounding to the relationship has been addressed.?He follows my blogs and time to time; we occasionally trade comments on Facebook.?

And here is where I leave my beloved readership. It is early in quietness of the morning as I sit in the lobby of my hotel signing off to you as I now must prepare myself both psychologically and emotionally for my upcoming trip in a few hours to the home of Anne Frank, the young adolescent author who perished at the age of 15 the Nazi concertation camp.

Well, again, it has been my pleasure to share insights with my readership.?I look forward to the next segment of my journey subtitled The Perilous Journey: The Horizon & Walking One’s Landscape.

A good morning, safe travels, calmness, in walking your landscapes.?I bid you peace and wellness.

Dr. Kane

Until We Meet Again… I am the Visible Man.?