What kind of Black are you?

Are you Barack Obama Black — with a Black father who wasn't around much and a white mother?

No. Scratch that question. Obama became president and, for millions of drooling right-wing Americans, became the blackest man in the world, carrying a huge load of unforgivable blackness.

No, once they compared Obama's family to a troop of apes, you knew he had passed the ultimate test of blackness, which is to be hated for something you can't help. He was Jackie Robinson Black. He was trying to vote in Mississippi in 1937 Black.

But other than that, if you are Black, are you Tupac Shakur Black, or are you cool Charlie Parker Black? Are you professor of history at a small Catholic college in Vermont Black, or are you three years into a 10-year sentence Black?

Are you housing project Black? Are you small bungalow in a Chicago neighborhood where Polish people used to live Black? Suburban soccer league Black? Are you Jack and Jill Black, African artwork in the living room Black? Is dad a doctor? Is dad a bus driver? Is dad long gone? Does mom shoot heroin or is she a Realtor? Which one of those things is the blackest?

Are you basketball Black? Are you golf Black? Are you pit bull Black or labradoodle Black? Does any kind of doodle on a leash make you a little less scary?

Are you a baby mama? Are you a baby daddy? Do you live alone in a small apartment that you hardly ever see because you're trying to make partner, or are you living in a crack camp near an abandoned Coca-Cola bottling plant? Which one of those things makes you blackest? Are you Brooks Brothers Black or Stacy Adams Black, nonsmoking or pack-of-Newports-a-day Black? Are you St. Ides Special Brew Black or Budweiser Black? Are you Cadillac Escalade with spinner rims Black or construction worker Ford F-150 Black?

Baptist or Muslim? African Methodist Episcopal? Are you big booty, hair weave, dagger fingernails Black? Lawyer Black or defendant Black?

Did one white ancestor own slaves, or are you pure back through all the centuries, past the Great Migration north and the auto plant, past sharecropping, past slavery, onto the slave ship after being herded down to some African beach like cattle?

Are you grits Black? Are you collard greens Black? McRib Black, or you-can-order-in-French Black? Is your first name Rakhwan or is it Dave? Is it Shawanda or Joyce? Are you throwback jersey Black or polo shirt Black?

White husband? White wife? Black grandmother and Hispanic grandfather? Hot sauce Black? Symphony orchestra Black? Cherokee? Haitian Creole? Dark-skinned Puerto Rican? Pick a side inside yourself, or someone will pick it for you.

Is there a little Kwanzaa in your Christmas? Is there a touch of cream in your coffee?

Kamala Harris, severe pantsuit and all, is now being sniffed over by millions of noses, each one trying to smell out the desired definition of blackness, each one trying to sniff out a negritude to be used as a whip.

Her Indian mother doesn't matter because who the hell is afraid of those people? Kinda-white- looking dad matters, and Jamaica matters, and all ancestors matter, because everything matters in the search for a definition of blackness to be understood by white people.

It's gonna take a while, this business of figuring out just how Black is Kamala Harris, though a number of people have already made their choice. The answer to the question will not be worth the answer, though it can be sung as a lullaby to put you to sleep in a screaming, changing America.

To find out more about Marc Dion, and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit www.creators.com. Dion's new book, "Devil's Elbow: Dancing in the Ashes of America," is a collection of his columns filled with the black comedy of race and the white light of truth. It is available in paperback from Amazon.com, and for Nook, Kindle, GooglePlay and iBooks.