Back in America

If you're tired of arguing with strangers on the Internet, try talking with one of them in real life.

Welcome to back in America, the podcast.

You are listening to the first installment of back in America. In this podcast, I explore unique, amazing American stories from my multicultural perspective. As you figured, I am French. Interestingly, I spent my senior year at Janesville High School in Iowa before moving to Washington DC while attending the University of Maryland where I graduated with a BA in journalism. After twenty five years in Europe, I am now back in America with my family.

I live in Princeton, New Jersey, between New York and Philadelphia. This episode is part of a series on masculinity in America. Here, I speak with Eric March, a black activist and social worker in Philadelphia. I reached Eric on his phone while he was driving between two events.

Donald Trump, he called the whole Me Too movement into account and said it was dangerous for men. Bullying. The Me Too movement against sexual harassment. Masculinity.

Is this the best a man can get?

Boys will be boys. Boys will be boys. Boys will be boys.

But something finally changed.

Allegations regarding sexual assault and sexual harassment.

News, politics, advertising. Masculinity is definitely a hot topic.

Hello?

Hey, Eric. How are you?

Yeah. I'm good. How are you doing, Stan?

I'm good. Thank you so much for making time for me today.

Oh, no problem. No problem at all. Actually, just getting out of an event on my way to another meeting. So I'll I'll I'll be free Okay. For a little so, yes, my name is Eric Marsh.

I am a father of five children. And my basically, my background experience both work professionally and volunteer has been primarily around fathers and families advocating for fathers and men, specifically black men in the areas of community work, advocacy around children's education, and community activism. And so that's a little bit about my background, basically. I'm also a cofounder of an organization called the Fathering Circle that is a peer support group for fathers that we actually examine male socialization in a group setting and look at how our socialization as men impacts not only ourselves and other men, but women and children as well.

How did you come to become an activist, basically? What what prompted you to take that way of life?

So what prompted what prompted it was primarily my role as a parent. I have an older son, Eric Junior, who is 25 now, And, I actually raised him as a single single father, from the time he was about a year, year and a half old, up until, you know, he left the home and went into the military and joined the Air Force. So my activism stems from my role as a single father, in trying to find resources and access to, you know, activities, getting to know my children's my son's schooling and the process of getting involved in different schools and activities. So it it really stems as, you know, being a single parent primarily. And and And then, of course, later on, I, you know, have have had other children, have been married, and other children.

And how did that experience as a single parent you know, what what happened then that made you realize that maybe other people would need your help?

Well, it was really from my own personal experience and the difficulties in navigating the system, navigating not only the educational system, but even at an early age, navigating, medical situations, taking my son to doctor's appointments and things like that. And then as well, at the time, I was actually working in a male dominated industry. I was a construction worker. So I was a union carpenter here in the city of Philadelphia. Actually, slightly after I got custody of my son, a few years after I got custody of my son, but in raising him as a single parent and trying to do that line of work, recognize some of the inherent difficulties and problems that I was facing.

Just being a man, being a parent, and working in an industry that was, you know, primarily male dominated.

That's a nice transition back into into the topic which is what it is to be an American man an American black man. And and do you actually believe that the experience is different from a white man?

Oh, absolutely. It is it is it is it's fundamentally different because the history of this country has primarily been relationship between black Americans and white Americans, and specifically black men and white men has primarily been the denial by white American men of the humanity and, the agency of black men. So at no point in time in the history of this country was a black man allowed to be fully seen and fully represent himself as a man, as a human being. I mean, that goes back to one of the one of the most common, insults or one common phrases that excuse me. One second.

One of the most common phrases used in The United States by white men to degrade black men was to call a man your age or older a boy. Right? And so that that right there is an an attempt to an attempt to put an attempt to put a black man in a in a in a subservient position. And so by denying him, a black man, his rights as a man and as an equal, it was an attempt by white America to stay in a position of superiority or authority. So, yeah, it's absolutely it's it's it's interwoven in the fabric of what it means to be American.

And and how do you think that illustrates itself today? I mean, you know, I could see white guy telling me, well, I mean, this is history. Come on. We need to move on. Blah blah blah.

Well,

I mean, we still are dealing with some institutional and systemic leftovers from, Jim Crow slavery. So for instance, you know, we're looking at, over policing of black communities where black men just gathering is seen as a threat. So whether it's on the corners or whether it's in communities, if it's not done in a way that white society deems acceptable, it's seen as a threat. It's seen as loitering. So it's it's it can it can easily be seen as against the law.

And then also, the over policing has is just a continuation. The over policing is a feeder system into the criminal justice system, the prison system, which, I don't know whether or not you know, depending on what you are familiar with with American history, the prison system is an extension of the plantation slavery system. Right? And so it's always this process, this ongoing process of trying to control black masculinity, black men, how they represent, how they show up in communities and in society, and managing that managing that relationship, managing what how a black man considers himself a man or or represents to the world is is his maleness and his masculinity.

That's interesting. How do you so I've got a question. I will come back to that. But I Mhmm. You know, I want to to talk about the politics of this country and how do you think that the election of Trump has impacted the black community and what it means to be a man for black people?

Well, I think I think it's a in a way, it's a slap in the face. Right? Because if you think about the eight years that we had with Barack Obama as the first black, president of The United States, for America to respond in this way, and and, you know, and the question is still out in terms of, you know, the election itself and how fair it was and, you know, Russian meddling or any of that. But the reality is that for black men, and I think all people of color in The United States, to look at Trump being elected president after eight years of the first black man being president, it's almost a a a overcompensation to so to speak by white voters, by white America, to compensate for a black having a black president for eight years. I mean, I I I think I think the world recognizes the absurdity in the swing from one direction to the other.

And I think just being being again, not just black, but any person of color is now you know, we've never seen immigrant communities, we've never seen black communities and brown communities targeted this way in well over two decades, if not longer.

So to come back to to what you were saying about the prison system and the incarceration and and all that, do you feel that your community is how do you I mean, you work with that. So how do you feel black people responding to to the Me Too movement and to this question of gender and social equity and and, yeah, violence.

Wow. Actually, I think it's an interesting dynamic. Right? Because there are if if you listen to the media, you know, if you look at, you know, television, news, if you listen to social media, listen to the radio, read the papers, you know, it's often portrayed as the, you know, the the LGBT community is primarily, you know, white. And often white male voices or white gay male voices are often the voices that are primarily centered when you hear or when you when you hear folks talk about the gay community, but that has been changing.

That's that's always been a a a balance in the black community. Right? So you hear, you know, some examples where folks will say, you know, that there's been a over that there's a homophobia in the black community. Right? Mhmm.

There's a lot of folks who are are gay and trans who don't feel safe or haven't felt safe. But the reality is that's American culture. So that goes across the board whether it's black or white. There are people who identify gay, trans, and non binary who've never felt safe. There's always been communities outside of the majority or mainstream communities.

In terms of the black community however, I will say this is what there there's also been quite a few activists and leaders in the gay and trans community, who have been people of color, particularly black people. So I think it's a tightrope walk. Like, and I think it's an it's a uniquely American experience. Right? That there is one faction of community that is embracing it and actually representative of the gay, trans, and non binary identified folks.

And then there was another portion of the community that struggles with accepting that. And I think that's just an example of the overall American Yeah.

Right. Yeah.

Culture.

Listen, I realize your time is precious. I might have another question if you're okay and maybe we can follow-up later on.

Actually, have some time. I've got quite a few minutes. I don't have to be Okay.

You're not rush.

Where I'm going for another half an hour.

Okay. Good. Are you familiar with the Hank Willis Thomas branded head photo? It's a picture of you see a a black man's head, cleanly shaved with a Nike swath on it. It's like a branded head.

No. So that photographer is a black guy, Wes Thomas, and he's trying to make a point about the commodifiable blackness, the the brand and the black. And so I read a story which was really, you know, asking the question of capitalism. The fact that on one side the black community sort of try to fight capitalism and yet embrace capitalist brands.

And

you know, and so it sort of begged the question, you know, you you want to revolve but still you want you know, you are buying in into this this culture. So again, what what's your what's your take on that?

No, I think that is Oh my God, like that's such a loaded question. I mean, is Wow. So goes back So let me just preface this by saying, in my conversations, I really don't ever, you know, make a point or try to stress a deliberate connection to slavery. But the reality is that there is a direct connection between slavery, the slave market, buck buck breaking, and, the black male body as a commodity. Right?

And so there's always been this this this practice of the black male body being a commodity. And and and, unfortunately, someone else is is is making money off it. Now even even today, there's even today, you know, it's a little bit different because we feel like there's conversation about artists being, artist athletes being, you know, super rich or making, you know, their own money or, you know, being their own managers. Because they're millionaires, somehow they have arrived in some kind of way. But the reality is that, they still have quote unquote managers, and they're still an owner of a team that is making more money off of them than they're making themselves.

So that's one. And then two, you know, there is this again, the prison industrial complex is really about free labor. Right? And so you have majority black men in these in prisons, working for pennies a day. And now there's more and more, private businesses, where you are leasing prisoners to serve as, you know, call center operators and and all these different positions that have, been woven into the prison industrial complex because of these private prison, these privately owned prisons, again, now we're back to, the black body as a commodity or as free labor.

So, you know, the image, the the the superficial image of the Nike swish on a man's head or it it really just speaks to the the masses who are less aware of their I'm a put you back. Hold on one second. It really speaks to the masses who are, just being, subjected to commercialization, like consumerism. Yeah. And that's a different type of control, but again, it's it's really it's pervasive and it and it touches so many different levels, but but yeah.

You're absolutely right. It's there is a this ongoing thread of the the the black body only having value through either being a consumer or being consumed.

Yeah. And and the story was making was trying to say that by being a consumer, by being able to procure those brand, men were trying to show their manlihood. Do you think there is something there?

Say that again, repeat it.

By being a consumer of those brands, by you know branding themselves with those high visibility brands, They are trying to show them masculinity in a way. Say

Well, I think I think so there's a there's a slight I don't I don't totally disagree with that, but I think that one of the things that has been historic in the black community and and any and actually in poorer communities in general, but the black community because it's been marketed to more distinctly and heavily over a longer period of time is that, you know, we live in a capitalist society. We live in a consumer based society. And so people poor people want things because those things are flashed in front of our faces and are symbolic of having achieved or having arrived at some success. Right? And so I say, I think the the flashiness, the the penchant for, you know, expensive things and fashion and a little bit of gaudiness, some of that is is just natural, flamboyant, creativity, self expression.

But when it becomes obsessive in relation to, you know, the cost of a thing or having the latest newest thing, that's an effort to compensate for the lack of.

Mhmm. No. That makes sense. Thank you. Okay, cool.

Well, Eric, have a good evening. Thank you so much. Speak to

you soon. Thank you. Yeah, have a good night.