Rachel Dolezal is a woman best known not for her activism and her work with the NAACP- but for the scandal that hit when it was discovered that the professor had been living a lie. Posing as a Black woman for years and sharing her “lived experiences” in order to educate using the voice of a Black woman, Dolezal was very sought out on the public speaking circuit and even named President of her NAACP chapter in Spokane, Washington. There was a problem, however, she isn’t black.
In June of 2015 her mother and father caught wind of Dolezal’s fraud and outed her as being Caucasian. Outrage in the communities she served ensued. She was accused of silencing the true stories of marginalized Black women to further her career and for her own gain.
When confronted in a now infamous interview, a flustered Dolezal struggles to answer the question if the man she claims to be her father, a Black man is who she claims him to be.
Since the revelation Dolezal claims to be near destitute and homeless, as her infamous moniker has blocked her from job opportunities.
In clear defiance and denial Dolezal has now legally changed her name to reflect her stolen and fraudulent Black identity: Nkechi Amare Diallo.
As reported Amanda Ulrich for Daily Mail writes:
Rachel Dolezal, the former head of Spokane, Washington’s NAACP chapter who claimed to be black before her parents ‘outed’ her as white, officially changed her name to Nkechi Amare Diallo in a Washington court in October, legal documents obtained by DailyMail.com show.
Nkechi, short for Nkechinyere, is a name that originates from the Igbo language of Nigeria and means ‘what god has given’ or ‘gift of god.’
Diallo, meaning ‘bold,’ is a last name of Fula origin. The Fula people are a Muslim ethnic group thought to have roots in the Middle East and North Africa, who are now widely dispersed across West Africa.
Since the revelation about her race two years ago, Dolezal, 39, has had a difficult time patching her reputation back together and providing for herself and three children.
After applying for more than 100 jobs, including a position at the university where she used to teach, she says that no employer will hire her. A friend reportedly helped her pay two months of rent and Dolezal said she expects to be homeless.
Shortly after her name change last fall, though, Dolezal employed her newfound identity to try to garner a small amount of positive attention.
She started a Change.org petition in October urging the TEDx organization to post one of her controversial speeches from April, 2016 at the University of Idaho. She listed the petition under Nkechi Diallo, never mentioning her birth name.
‘Rachel Dolezal’s TEDx Talk on Race & Identity…is still not available online. Please post her talk online immediately. She should not be censored due to her unique perspective. We want to watch this speech!’ the petition read.
Though Dolezal only received 30 of 100 required signatures, TED begrudgingly posted the video on November 2, along with a description of the politics surrounding her speech.
‘TEDx organizers host events independent of TED, and they have the freedom to invite speakers they feel are relevant to their communities,’ the TED blog read.
‘These volunteers find thousands of new voices all over the world – many of which would not otherwise be heard – including some of our most beloved, well-known speakers, people like Brene Brown and Simon Sinek.
‘What TEDx organizers have achieved collectively is remarkable. But, yes, some of them occasionally share ideas we don’t stand behind.
‘This particular talk has sparked much internal debate. For many on our staff, sharing the talk risks causing deep offense, and runs counter to TED’s mission of ideas worth spreading.
‘But for others, now that the talk has been recorded, refusing to post it would unduly limit an important conversation about identity, and the social underpinning of race -and would be counter to TED’s guiding philosophy of radical openness. There’s no easy middle ground here.’
In 2015, Dolezal, then a high-profile NAACP leader and part-time professor of Africana Studies at Eastern Washington University, was forced to step down from her leadership role when her parents Larry and Ruthanne told a local newspaper that their daughter was, in fact, born Caucasian.
For years Dolezal, 39, has been insisting she is black, even claiming on social media that a black man she had met in Idaho was her father and her adopted brother was her son. She gave this photo the caption: ‘L-R Me, my oldest son Izaiah and my Dad’
Dolezal’s mother also showed reporters this photo of her daughter’s 2000 marriage in Mississippi (she is pictured at center and her parents are standing on either side). She is now divorced but has three children
For years Dolezal had been insisting she was black, even claiming a black man she met in Idaho was her father on social media and styling her naturally blonde locks in traditional African American hairstyles.
She diligently studied the Civil Rights movement, black literature and attended HBCU Howard University for graduate school.
Despite a constant stream of threats and hate mail directed at Dolezal after her unique story made national headlines, the NAACP issued a compassionate statement about its former chapter president.
‘For 106 years, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People has held a long and proud tradition of receiving support from people of all faiths, races, colors and creeds.
‘One’s racial identity is not a qualifying criteria or disqualifying standard for NAACP leadership. The NAACP Alaska-Oregon-Washington State Conference stands behind Ms. Dolezal’s advocacy record.
‘In every corner of this country, the NAACP remains committed to securing political, educational, and economic justice for all people, and we encourage Americans of all stripes to become members and serve as leaders in our organization,’ the statement read.
Dolezal, who grew up with four adopted black siblings, still maintains that race should be a fluid concept.
‘I’m sure it’s hard to make sense of for people from the outside, but for me it’s been like a consistent, organic process of coming into who I am. As long as I can remember, I saw myself as black. I was socially conditioned to discard that,’ she told the Guardian.
‘There’s no protected class for me. I’m this generic, ambiguous scapegoat for white people to call me a race traitor and take out their hostility on.
‘And I’m a target for anger and pain about white people from the black community. It’s like I am the worst of all these worlds.’
Last year, Dolezal announced she was publishing a memoir, titled In Full Color, that will describe her path from the child of white Evangelical parents to ‘an NAACP chapter president and respected educator and activist who identified as black’.
The book is set to be released next month.
Being black and living the struggles of a person of color is not something one can turn on and off at a whim when it best suits you. Dolezal knows nothing about the true plight Black women face simply because she never was, and never will be black no matter how long she wishes to glamourize her “black face” and romanticize the black experience for her own gain. The longer she keeps this charade up, the longer legitimate Black women will be silenced and disenfranchised by the opportunities Dolezal takes in their place.
(Article by Tasha Sharifa)
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