Welcome to another Buppie Fridaze! So glad to have you back! We have made it another week. Today, let us entertain, What Would a Buppie Do? (WWBD)

“I have found that at Princeton no matter how liberal and open-minded some of my White professors and classmates try to be toward me, I sometimes feel like a visitor on campus; as if I really don’t belong.” -Michelle Obama

Certainly many of us who have worked in Corporate America or attended  any institution, can identify with the sentiments of the FLOTUS.

A few years ago during a diversity boot-camp for the job, I learned the term FLOCKING.

Flocking is when the same type of people, group and socialize together in a multicultural situation or atmosphere.

Think about our daily buppie lives. All of our jobs or institutions have a multitude of different type of people. Yet at lunch time, in the cafeteria all the Indians sit together,  all the Asians sit together, and yes all the black folk TALK real LOUD… Together.

Well to support inclusion, as I learned at this bootcamp,  you are really not suppose to do that. *EYE ROLL.*

I am a self admitted FLOCKER. I am all about finding my black allies at the job or any place for that matter. I am open to others and I do experience all other groups as well. However, there is just not that many black folks in positions in the places I work or sometimes fancy.  I think it is important and of great value to know each, just at bare minimum for the good old “look out”. You never know what is in your Johari Window.

Nothing disturbs me more, than to walk into the office, see an unfamiliar black face and have that person look me in the eye and turn away. HELLO!!! It is almost as if we were back in Jim Crow and you didn’t want to be seen with the Negro who went to close to the white folk only line.

Why is it that we have to consider who we associate with at work?  We have to meticulously vet it out, and watch our surroundings, and even go against our instinct to be with our own? Every other race Flocks and it is hardly ever frowned upon. Yet some black people hesitate to do it  so much.

I am all about inclusion, but for some let’s admit, there is a comfort we get from being around people who resemble you. And don’t hit me with the

“DCBuppie you need to get beyond your blackness. Stop playing the race card.”

My response to that is #CHILDPLEASE! We can even go beyond using race. Consider this, I am single woman. All the married women at work flock together. I can feel excluded in that situation as well. A Married women could want to avoid the group, just the same.

So, What Would a Buppie DO? What do you DO? When you walk into a workplace, an organizational meeting, etc? Are you avoiding the other people who look like you? Why?