Rachel Dolezal, a woman who was born a white woman but identifies as black, has sparked major controversy in terms of racial identity. Very involved as a civil rights activist, Dolezal was a leading member of her city’s NAACP, supported the Black Lives Matter movement, and even taught in an African American/Africana studies department at Eastern Washington University. She also raised her young black siblings as her own, and had mixed race children of her own. She claimed she always “felt black,” and being black seemed to be the only thing missing. However, one could argue that her involvement with the empowerment and advancement of the Black Community does not equate blackness, and that white person could be just as involved as she and remain an ally. Also, she did not experience discrimination or prejudice the same way a black child would (because she identified as white at the time), but only through her siblings and children. She took those experiences and tried to make them her own, trying to identify with them, when she never would be able to really understand on a personal level. White Privilege could also be another factor, because Rachel was able to recreate herself in a way that natural born African Americans feel they cannot. She was essentially given the freedom to choose, while African Americans must embrace their identity for their whole lives. The fact that she uses her children as a legitimization tool for her own “blackness” is dangerous in the sense that there are countless non-black women who raise black children. Using her children as validation only invalidates her stance on her identity further, because she feels as though she has to constantly prove herself. If she was a black woman, she would not have to feel the need to constantly prove herself, just like a non-racist should not feel the need to begin sentences with “I’m not racist, but… .”