14 July 2003


The very idea...!

According to the current issue of Harper's, damali ayo, a conceptual artist in Portland, Oregon, put up a website (Rent-a-Negro.com) and has received approximately 500 requests for her services.

The excerpted responses are absolutely astonishing. (Go buy Harper's!) Although, were I African-American, I expect I wouldn't be surprised. I'd probably be inured to the insensitivity, ignorance and downright bigotry of white people.

As a white person, however, I am shocked that society has evolved so little since the Civil Rights Movement. The very idea that someone would, in all seriousness, fill out an online form to "rent a Negro," for a social function!

(Brilliant art project, though!)