Who Are You? Who, Who, Who, Who?

Who decides who and what we are?

Sacheen Littlefeather, at the Oscars.

Call her Maria. She was a Lakota woman, or so she said.

I met her in a Starbucks the other day. We got to talking about the complexities of tribal identity, and I mentioned the recent allegations against Sacheen Littlefeather, the woman who refused the Oscar on behalf of Marlon Brando in 1973. Brando, who was Irish, German, Dutch, and English, had won Best Actor for expertly pretending to be an Italian mobster in “The Godfather.” He sent Littlefeather to say “No thanks,” in order to bring attention to the mistreatment of American Indians in this country.

I remember watching it on TV that night. I was 11 years old, and it’s very likely that I was sitting crosslegged on the floor, wearing moccasins and a loincloth. That’s how I rolled in those days. You see, I was convinced that I was an Iroquois Indian who’d somehow been born in the wrong century, wrong family, wrong body, but right place (western PA). I came home from school and immediately changed into my buckskins, and stayed that way til bedtime, no matter who was coming over for dinner.

My parents were very patient people.

I didn’t mention any of this to Maria, as it would’ve been awkward, trying to explain that my cultural appropriation had been totally sincere. It would’ve been like trying to convince a black dude that “I’m one of the good ones.” Besides, I could tell that she was primed for offense, and already questioning if I was friend or foe.

But maybe I shouldn’t feel apologetic for pretending to be an Indian, because it turns out that Sacheen Littlefeather was probably pretending, too. After her recent death, Sacheen’s estranged sisters were contacted by a researcher who’d determined that Sacheen had made up her Indian identity. It didn’t take much to convince them that their big sister had been a fraud, as they’d never heard anything about their family being Indian from anyone but their sister.

I mentioned this to Maria, but she was uncomfortable condemning Littlefeather, as she’d died recently and “we should respect the dead.” So I asked her if she’d seen the documentary about Rachel Dolezal, which I’d found to be surprising and moving. Strangely, Maria found Dolezal’s behavior to be “creepy.” When I asked why, she said something about how Dolezal could never understand the experience of slavery of black people in America, so she had no right to claim that ancestry.

But do black people “understand” the experience of slavery purely by being black? Is this an innate understanding passed from generation to generation, genetically? If so, does that mean that I “understand” the centuries of Irish persecution by the British in a way my Asian friends can never grasp? I wondered whether Obama (our first “black president”) possessed this innate understanding of American slavery even though his mother was white, he was raised mainly by his white grandparents, and his father was born and raised in Kenya, his family tree totally devoid of any experience of southern slavery?

Maria pointed out that despite all that, Obama was properly considered black because “he couldn’t pass as white in American society.” This seemed to imply that our gender identity is self-determined, but our racial identity is determined by others — by how they see us.

“According to this ideology,” I said, “a person could have broad shoulders, big hands, an Adam’s apple and a hairy back, but if that person identifies as a lady, she’s a lady. But if someone looks white to most people, and their parents were white, they’re white — no matter what cultural background they feel most resonance with. Isn’t that logically inconsistent?”

I made it worse by saying that if I decided that I was a black woman, she and her woke friends (I didn’t actually say “woke,” but it was implied) would probably feel obligated to accept my self-identity as female, but not as black. The absurdity of this seemed invisible to her, and she was quickly getting the panicky expression of someone who realizes she’s in conversation with a crazy person, so I left it at that.

What’s my point? I’m not sure, to be honest. But I think it’s worth thinking about how strange it is to live in a time when gender and race are both increasingly discredited as useful, legitimate concepts, but we seem to be responding to their waning in bizarre, contradictory ways. Gender identities multiply, become increasingly fluid, and self-determined, while racial identities seem to be getting more rigid, and must not be self-determined. This is a condition that cannot last long. I don’t know where we go from here, but this ridiculousness is unsustainable. It seems we’ll have to choose: Are you who/what you say you are, or are you who/what the rest of us say you are? “Who are you?” has never been such a complicated question.

Happy Halloween. Hope you chose your costume carefully!

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Here’s a strange, charming video of The Lady Shelters covering (appropriating?) “Who Are You” by The Who.

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Finally, someone just sent me this short profile of Fin, a transgender, transracial person who was determined to live life without conformity. Quite moving.