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The New Yorker cover just took a back seat. Idiocy is on full blast today. Witness John McLaughlin.

I'm now reminded of the parable about the eagle and the chicken. I'll explain why in a moment, but first, some context.

Now, I know that especially in the election season, we tend to parse every word spoken by everyone a little more than perhaps we should. As a result, we tend to get offended a lot more quickly (and with greater intensity). There are some that even seem to delight in the oppression they withstand, as long said oppression gains them a platform. John McCain's campaign gave outrage over perceived slights a shot, but it didn't appear to stick. For in America, there is no greater social dilemma that perplexes us like racial identity does.

With identity comes community, and from community stems direction. I discovered this early when I, a private school student from K to 8, had trouble latching onto my African-American identity - at least on school days. I was not a leader, and it was a difficult effort to try to fit in with other students with whom I had little in common. To this day, many of these people are my friends. But the way I survived that interesting childhood was to assimilate the best I could. Duck your head, and try to fit in.

Public high school was a different story. There I was introduced quickly to the notion that studying hard, working on the school paper and having White friends could earn you denigration from other Black students. Having a shaky grasp on my African-American identity as it was, I twisted and contorted until I fit in the best I could. It was a difficult process, which I described in my final opinion column of my high school career:

Not only was I separated academically from most of my Black peers, but socially, I was always the odd man out. At my first Homecoming dance people laughed at my attempts at dancing, a skill that was foreign to me at my private school (and still is foreign). As I tried feverishly to keep up and learn the steps, one student looked over at me, laughed, and said, "Get off the floor, Oreo."

Same shit happened in college. Didn't matter that we were all in the Ivy League.

Back to the eagle and the chicken.

In October of 1992, I attended a lecture by Temple University Professor and African-American historian Dr. Molefi Asante at John Carroll University. He related a story in which a young eagle was raised in a chicken coop and as a result, believed and acted as if he were a chicken.

In high school, I was seen as the "eagle" by many of my Black peers - having been "raised in the midst of the chickens" for eight years at private school. Since he writes in his book Dreams From My Father that he consciously hid his white maternal parentage in order to better identify with fellow Blacks, one can only wonder how Barack Obama felt.

How alone did he feel? Did he feel as I did - that he couldn't have been further away from his African heritage though his melanin, hair and features connected him to the past during every moment of his life? I mean, adolescence is tough as it is - lose the lock(s)

Was he called "wanna-be"?

Was he called "snowflake"?

Was he called "Oreo"?

Speaking for myself, and not Senator Obama: "Oreo" is one of the most painful, most destructive slurs in the English language. And that includes "nigger" and other unspeakable names. I know its effects on someone first-hand.

And John McLaughlin threw it out there like it was Barack's name.

Three things are most insulting about his casual usage:

1) it implies that this White man is somehow capable of judging the level of Barack's "Blackness" by simple employment of rudimentary factors (parentage, educational pedigree, etc.) that really have little to do with the man himself;

2) like The New Yorker cartoon, it gives carte blanche to those who might use it as cavalier a fashion as McLaughlin did;

3) and the statement implies directly that Obama doesn't somehow meet the quota for (what Americans by and large) true "Blackness", and of course Jesse and the Soapbox Posse would be pissed! Obama's not as Black as they are!

Besides, who cares what Jesse Jackson thinks of Obama's election, should it come to pass? And who is he to judge who is and isn't Black enough to take the historic step into the White House? I mean, heaven forbid an "Oreo" get it, right?

I know how hurtful that word can be. Too bad McLaughlin didn't.

I still feel that the way I ended that high school column applies today:

"Acting Black" is a facade created by certain "niggaz" that only care to bring everyone down with them into their private hell in the name of their twisted image of "Blackness." Dr. Jawanza Kunjufu, noted author, asks similar questions in his book To Be Popular or Smart. "Logically speaking, if being smart is acting white, how do you act Black? What is Blackness? Being Cool?"

I say no.