My Scary Journey Into ADOS, the Anti-Immigrant Movement Led by Black Folks
American exceptionalism and xenophobia cleaves the Black struggle once again
Scrolling social media feels like, at any moment, I’ll get pulled into one of those haunted houses I hated as a kid. I didn’t know what was in them but didn’t want to terrify myself looking. I fell into one such spooky abyss last month — ADOS — and I’m mangling my nails trying to claw myself out.
The acronym stands for American Descendants of Slavery, which is an awkward phrase: Since the country was built on slavery, anyone American is a descendant. It’s hard to understand how a person can descend from a system. (I could call myself a Western descendant of capitalism, but I digress.) It’s supposed to signify Black people whose ancestors toiled on American soil and whose families remain here. That’s a huge category. But ADOS doesn’t seek to include most who belong to it. The niche group has become a trenchant faction of bullies who issue Blackness tests. Whatever its acronym, ADOS has come to stand for anti-immigrant invective and petty diversion.
Late last year, during an idle night of browsing rooms on live-chat app Clubhouse, I saw one called #NotMyFredHampton that caught my attention. The upcoming movie Judas and the Black Messiah centers…
