Listen.
Today my book, HOW TO BE BLACK is released, and I need your help.
This is my first book published by someone not-me (Harper Collins). It's like giving birth to a child except I don't have to start a college fund or move my home to find the best school district. In all other ways, however, the commitment is the same, and I'm writing to ask for your help in making this comedic memoir, satirical how-to and provocative conversation-starter a best-seller.
Remember that scene in The Godfather where the godfather tells the funeral home dude, "someday I may ask you for a favor?" Well, this is that day. I'm the godfather. You're the funeral home operator. Rival gangs have ambushed my book at a toll booth, and I'm asking you for a favor.
Here's how you can help.
BUY THE BOOK.
Right now. Just do it. If you've already got a copy, buy one for someone else! It's available in all formats including hardcover at your local bookstore, all digital outlets like Kindle, Nook, iBooks plus audio! I did the voiceover myself. Visit http://howtobeblack.me/htbborder Plus if you've ever enjoyed my free blogging, free standup, free TV appearances or free, awesome company, this is how you can repay me.
BUY MANY MANY COPIES
If you have access to a large group of people: company, school, criminal concern, buy 50 or 100 or more. Bulk orders are available at 800 CEO Read. Bulk discounts! Contact us about customization of large orders.
REVIEW THE BOOK ON AMAZON
Preferably with five stars. Do this as soon as possible. Do it now. People on Amazon do what other people on Amazon tell them. Be a leader.
SPREAD WORD OF THE BOOK
We’ve assembled a few useful messages in this blog post which includes a trailer, quotable lines from the book and endorsements from people like comedian Patton Oswalt and professor/TV host Melissa Harris-Perry. Please mention the book right now in your blogs, email newsletters and 3D social media content pipe-stream-nets.
On twitter, reference the book with the hashtag #HowToBeblack and mention @baratunde. On Facebook, like the book at http://facebook.com/howtobeblack, and tag it and me (http://facebook.com/baratunde) in your status updates. On Tumblr, like our blog at http://howtobeblack.me. We'll be re-blogging items tagged "how to be black," so post your thoughts on your own blogs with that tag for a shot at tumblr greatness
SHARE YOUR STORY
This book isn't some final statement on race and identity. It's the continuation of a conversation, and I want you to join it. The book is ultimately about "how to be," and we've built a platform to get people talking about blackness and identity in general. Starting with each day during Black History Month, we’ll focus on one question at http://howtobeblack.me, Go there, and submit your thoughts.
INTRODUCE ME TO YOUR PEOPLE
You all know someone that NEEDS this book, maybe a teacher or college student group, maybe a company executive, maybe a political office-holder or artist. Even if the book isn’t for you, you probably know a few for whom it is perfect and necessary. Please consider not just forwarding this post (which I assume you've already done because you're a good person) but actively introducing us to this person. Basically, I need you to introduce me to Halle Berry. I should have just said that.
SEND YOUR LOVE AND IDEAS
This project is a big deal. The book is incredibly personal. It represents years of work and passion and blood (some people don't know how to cooperate). If other ideas for how to help occur to you, let me know. But also know that I'd appreciate you just sending positive thoughts.
Oh, and I'll be on permanent book tour for now on. Check the schedule at http://howtobeblack.me/tour. Stop by, say hi, and get a book signed!
Sincerely, thank you.
Baratunde Thurston
#authortunde
Two years ago, YouTube's News & Politics channel sponsored a program encouraging people to read passages from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s life. I chose a passage from his "Beyond Vietnam" speech on budget/defense priorities and "spiritual death" and recorded the video at a parking lot in Pittsburgh, PA.
In the same year, Vanity Fair commissioned me to write this piece. It ranks high among the work I'm most proud of across my entire life: What Would MLK Make Of Twitter?
At this time every year, commentators across the United States engage in an exercise I’ll call Hypothetical King, in which we try to imagine what Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. would say about the war in Afghanistan, the bank bailouts, or Mo’Nique winning best supporting actress for Precious at the Golden Globes. We extrapolate from his words and deeds and hope we’re right but can never be sure.
I’d like to engage in an exercise that’s almost the reverse of that. Instead of imagining Hypothetical King in 2010, I’m imagining a world in which today’s tools exist in King’s day. Specifically, I want to know what Dr. King would make of Twitter, the insistent social-media service that asks its users to describe “What’s happening?” in 140 characters or less.
It's from an ESPN documentary about Jordan Burnham, a star high school student and athlete who suffered from depression and tried to take his own life.
In 2010 my friend Dr. Greg Feldman took his own life. It was an absolute shock to most of us. Greg was high achieving, high functioning, loving, personable and awesome. He also worked in the high performance, high pressure world of surgery. We missed the signs. He hid the signs. Now he's gone, and we've lost a friend, brother, son. You who've never met him have lost the potential for his goodness to enter your life. But it doesn't have to be an absolute loss. Take the time to watch this video. You may not suffer from depression or suicidal tendencies, but you may know and love someone who has, is or will. Increase your awareness.
Thank you.
Seriously. I didn't read it. But it looked weird enough I thought, maybe someone with more time and patience than I have will indulge. So enjoy or I'm sorry. Not sure which is more appropriate.
ARE THERE REALLY ANY BLACK PEOPLE? WHAT DOES GOD SAY?
GOD SPEAKS IN GENESIS ON WHO MAN IS; SPIRIT OR BLACK COLOR BEING:
And God said, Let us make man
1. in our image
2. after our likeness and let man have dominion
- over the fish of the sea,
-and over the fowl of the air,
-and over the cattle, and over all the earth,
-and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
27 So God created man
-in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
28 And God blessed them,and God said unto them,
-Be fruitful,
-and multiply,
-and replenish the earth,
-and subdue it:
-and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
"God is a spirit. Those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth." Jn 4; 24
GOD SPEAKS IN GENESIS ON WHO MAN IS; SPIRIT OR BLACK COLOR BEING:
And God said, Let us make man
1. in our image
2. after our likeness and let man have dominion
- over the fish of the sea,
-and over the fowl of the air,
-and over the cattle, and over all the earth,
-and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.
27 So God created man
-in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
28 And God blessed them,and God said unto them,
-Be fruitful,
-and multiply,
-and replenish the earth,
-and subdue it:
-and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.
"God is a spirit. Those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth." Jn 4; 24
Sounds pretty nasty right? See, it's right there on the Internet. Must be true.
UPDATE 2x:
I've created PoorBlackKid.com. Yep.
UPDATE:
Gene Marks' response: http://blackte.am/tTrP0L
ORIGINAL
I blame Jacquetta Szathmari. I was minding my business, not being offended by truly idiotic ideas, when I saw her facebook post and then blog post about this Forbes article by Gene Marks. I decided not to respond. Today, I broke my silence and posted a few tweets like this
Shorter: If I Were A Poor Black Kid, I wouldn't be a poor black kid #dumbestshitihavereadallyear
— Baratunde (@baratunde) December 14, 2011
and this
If I were a shitty writer, I would write "If I Were A Black Kid" #HowToBeDumb
— Baratunde (@baratunde) December 14, 2011
and this
#IfIWereAPoorBlackKid I would invent cold fusion.
— Baratunde (@baratunde) December 14, 2011
But I thought that would be the end of it. Then I got a request from CNN.com to write something about this nonsense, and so I thought about how I might take on this dumbshitteryTM (h/t, Elon James White). I opted to fight something that originally sounded like satire with satire. The full piece is over at CNN. Here's the setup
The following letter is a response from a hypothetical child to Gene Marks' article in Forbes, titled "If I Were A Poor Black Kid." While completely fabricated, the letter below has a stronger basis in reality than does Marks'. In his article, Marks, a business and technology contributor to Forbes, argues poorly that poor black children should use technology to improve their station in life. The article is terrible.
Yeah, this happened! It's part of an annual Christmas tradition known as Zwarte Piet (aka Black Pete), who is lind of like Santa's helper. More on Wikipedia. and Boom Chicago made this video.
I'm going to be hosting a video chat on Vokle with some folks here in Amsterdam to talk about the tradition, Dutch reaction and just what the hell is going on!
Chat is over but you can see it above here or over at Vokle: http://www.vokle.com/events/38346-video-chat-with-baratunde-from-amsterdam
Guests will include
- Kirsten Van Den Hul, UN Women's Representative for The Netherlands. Also badass poet and writer
- Gregory Shapiro of Boom Chicago
- Michael OT of Boom Chicago
- me! of america! and black dudeness!
UPDATE
If you couldn't make it or just need to hear Tarik say the n-word a few more times, here's a link to the recording: http://www.vokle.com/events/38346-video-chat-with-baratunde-from-amsterdam
I love Foursquare. I'm the reigning Mayor Of The Year, after all, so I've got a lot invested in the system. I've been really impressed with how useful the service has gotten since this summer, so I recorded a few thoughts on the matter which you will now enjoy.
Here's the deals/tip promotion I refer to in the video. Love the integration. Confused by the language. "50% off for free??" Just cut the last two words. You're saying "You don't have to spend money to get 50% off?" Guess what: if I don't spend money, that's actually 100% off for free!
Order from Amazon (Hardcover), Amazon (Kindle), Barnes & Noble, Powell's, IndieBound, Apple iBooks, or Audible (read by Baratunde!).
"Part autobiography, part stand-up routine, part contemporary political analysis, and astute all over, 'How to Be Black' might do more to expose and explore the shifting dynamics of race in America than all the Pew data of the past decade. Reading this book made me both laugh and weep with poignant recognition. Baratunde Thurston has given us a hysterical, irreverent exploration of one of America’s most painful and enduring issues. He captures the alchemy of familial narratives, community socialization, and individual volition that makes blackness a complex performance of the self. 'How to be Black' is the must read text of the so-called post-racial moment."
- Melissa Harris-Perry, contributing analyst for MSNBC and columnist for THE NATION
"As a black woman, this book helped me realize I'm actually a white man."
- Patton Oswalt, author of Zombie Spaceship Wasteland
"The funniest black guy on the Internet has written the definitive manual on how to make it in post-racial America as a member of a despised minority group. 'How to be Black' is guaranteed to infuriate all those poor, deluded souls, both black and white, who shuffle through life without ever managing to 'see color' (February)."
- Tony Norman, writer for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
"Baratunde, The Onion’s director of digital and cofounder of Jack & Jill Politics, offers a hilarious look at the complexities of contemporary racial politics and personal identity…[W]ith poignancy and humor…[h]e takes on the challenges of how to speak for every black person in the nation, how to measure degrees of blackness, how to take a break from it all."
- Booklist
"In this hilarious blend of razor-sharp satire and memoir, Onion Director of Digital and cofounder of the Jack & Jill Politics blog Thurston muses on how, generally, to be black in today’s ever-changing world. He’s quick to point out that his book is not a magic potion that will make readers instantly black (it is not How to Become a Black Person If You Are Not Already Black). Instructive chapters include “How to Be The Black Friend” and its corollaries, “How to Speak for All Black People” and “How to Be The Black Employee.” Thurston’s life was shaped by his mother, a force of nature who instilled in him a love of camping and bicycling, along with a fiercely radical spirit. As a teen, he participated in the Ankobia program in D.C. taught by Pan-African black American activists. This same woman also enrolled him in the prestigious Sidwell Friends school (home to Chelsea Clinton and President Obama’s daughters) and cheered at his Harvard graduation. In order to get a fuller picture of blackness in America today, Thurston assembles “The Black Panel,” consisting of artists and stand-up comedians who address race in their work. Questions he poses to the panel include when the members first realized they were black (most were very young), if they ever wished not to black (very few did), and what they thought of the idea of “post-racial America.” Using his own story and humor, Thurston demonstrates that the best way to “be” anything is to simply be yourself.
- Publishers Weekly
“If you don’t buy this book, you’re a racist.”
- Baratunde Thurston, author of How To Be Black
Have you ever been called “too black” or “not black enough”? Have you ever befriended or worked with a black person? Have you ever heard of “black people”? If you answered yes to any of these questions, this book is for you.
Raised by a pro-black, pan-Afrikan single mother during the crack years of 1980s Washington, DC, and educated at Sidwell Friends School and Harvard University, Baratunde Thurston has over thirty years’ experience in being black. Now, through stories of his politically inspired Nigerian name, the heroics of his hippie mother, the murder of his drug-abusing father, and other revelatory black details, he shares with readers of all colors his wisdom and expertise of how to be black. (Harper; January 31, 2012, $23.99)
Combining personal memoir, interviews, irreverent how-to, and resource guides to meet every reader’s blackness needs, this book offers practical advice on everything from “How to Be The Black Friend” to “How to Be The (Next) Black President” to “How to Celebrate Black History Month.”
For additional perspective, Baratunde assembled an award-winning Black Panel—three black women, three black men, and one white man (gotta have a control group. This is science!)—and asked them such revealing questions as “When Did You First Realize You Were Black?” “How Black Are You?” “Can You Swim?”
The Black Panel includes wisdom from:
- Cheryl Contee, co-founder of the blog Jack & Jill Politics
- damali ayo, author of How To Rent a Negro, conceptual artist and comedian
- Elon James White, creator of the web video series This Week in Blackness
- Jacquetta Szathmari, creator of That's Funny. You Didn't Sound Black on the Phone
- W. Kamau Bell, creator of the W. Kamau Bell Curve: Ending Racism in About an Hour
- Derrick Ashong, co-founder of the band Soulfege and host of The Stream on Al Jazeera English
- Christian Lander, author of Stuff White People Like
The result is a humorous, intelligent, and audacious guide that challenges and satirizes the so-called experts, purists, and racists who purport to speak for all black people. With honest storytelling and biting wit, Baratunde plots a path not just to blackness, but one open to anyone interested in simply “how to be.”
Baratunde Thurston is the director of digital at The Onion, the cofounder of Jack & Jill Politics, a stand-up comedian, and a globe-trotting speaker. He was named one of the 100 most influential African Americans of 2011 by The Root, one of the 100 most creative people in business by Fast Company magazine, and will be giving the opening keynote address at SXSW Interactive 2012. Then-Senator Barack Obama called him “someone I need to know.” Baratunde resides in Brooklyn and lives on Twitter (@baratunde).
Clear Eyes. Full Hearts. Stay Black.