All the Actually African people I've known (as in, born there, moved here as kids, or whose parents are) either have actual African names, like Tsitsi, Jafari or Amare and the like, or in the case of the first genners, proper English ones like Sebastian, Emmanual and Benjamin. to quote the parent of a friend who was born in Rhodesia, "We are grateful for being allowed refuge in your fine country, and we want our children to have good English names". It's almost like the people who were born in worse off parts of it and needed to get out, are happy to be somewhere safe and want to actually integrate and adopt the culture of where they end up.
Personally, I'm of a mind that they should never have to but on a personal level, the people I'm lucky enough to know like that? I'd take one of them over 10,000 Darqu'aans or Tarquarius' because the former are just good, decent people, and want to work, carve out their success, provide for them and theirs, because they've seen how genuinely shitty and scary life can actually be.
Edited cos doubleposting baaaaaaad:
I genuinely lost count of the number of times, when flipping burgers for Le Clown in College, some white SocJus bint would march up to counter, demanding to know whose hair was in their burger, only to see them deflate, pppppffffffffftttt, like a sad, sad balloon, when we pointed out it was a black person.
And
@benutz , Nope, I totally get where you are coming from. I just wish the right to be proud of one's heritage was afforded to all of us, irrespective of the colour of our skin. I have a younger male family member, and they are still in school. Some of his friends who are Jamaican and Kenyan, have actually been important in bringing them out of their shell, and telling them "naw, you need to be proud of your family and heritage".
It started with said friends Mum showing them cringeworthy family photos of their friend as a wee kid, but now my family member has, along with their mates and families, cooked traditional English/ Kenyan/ Jamaican meals for each other, dug out the cringey photos, and they've all, as a group learned about each other's cultures and may be poked fun at each other, but in that way teenagers do. It's actually genuinely, fucking lovely.
I dunno, maybe it's the wine, or the fact I have had A Week, but shit like that makes me feel not entirely lacking in hope. My family member's mates had moved here, or their parents did, and they're Britbongs now, but they still keep their own culture and have pride in it, and more important, they've taught said family member to be proud of who they are. That would piss off burn loot murder, and antitards, which warms my black, brittle, wizenend heart, but it's also a genuinely good thing.