Griffin’s Purpose

After having Tuesday’s class discussion, there seemed to be a lot of resentment for Griffin.  It offended many people that he took pigment pills and died his skin black, emerging himself in Southern culture.  Some of the comments were, “He can’t know what it’s like to be be black if he can just rub off the color of his skin whenever he feels uncomfortable” or “He can’t understand what it feels like to be black after just six weeks” or “He can’t get what it’s like to be black if he’s doing things an actual black person wouldn’t do.”

I understand all of these things.  Griffin certainly cannot understand what it’s like to be black.  But I think it’s unnecessary to take offense because he’s not claiming to understand the feeling of “being black.”  Griffin’s main goal is to catch a personal glimpse of Southern black life during the 1960’s so that he can become a political group between two races that seem to be unable to communicate.  With Griffin’s social experiment, he will know ENOUGH to converse with black people and acknowledge their grievances.  With his white skin, he will be able to communicate these grievances to white people and be taken seriously. 

Skepticism about John Griffin

After reading “Black Like Me”, I have lots of thoughts pinging around my brain. They are somewhat chaotic and scattered, but I have tried to sort out some ideas below.

I have some general skepticism in regards to the trustworthiness of the narrative voice of John Griffin. For starters, throughout the book, I found many moments when I questioned how much a white man disguised as a black man could give an honest perspective of the black experience; how is Griffin’s experience affected, knowing that at any moment, if the situation became bad enough,