Rachel Dolezal, the former NAACP Spokane chapter president outed for not being black, went on the talk show The Real on Monday to talk about–what else?–her race. In a candid moment, she says that she was born white, but that she still identifies as black in the present day.
The clip, from Jezebel, begins with co-host Tamar Braxton asking Dolezal, “So you feel that you walk the walk of a black woman?”
“Absolutely,” Dolezal replies, saying that she “walks the walk” in a cultural, philosophical and a “pan-African” sense. “Is there a singular experience?” she asks Braxton soon after, when it comes to being a black woman.
“Even as successful as I am now, there are lots of doors that I can’t walk into that you can definitely walk into, so I just really want to know, like, have you experienced anything like that?” Braxton asks. Surprisingly, Dolezal replies that police officers mark her black on her traffic tickets.
Later on, Dolezal says that everybody should have the right to identify however they want. “You weren’t born black, so when you say you are black, it makes it hard for people to understand where you’re coming from,” Mai says. Dolezal replies, “Right, and that’s why I said I acknowledge I was biologically born white to white parents.” The audience cheering almost drowns out the tail end of her answer: “But I identify as black.”
(via Jezebel)