AA means black but black doesn't necessarily mean AA. I'm black, I'm American. I was born in DR and became American thanks to my parents becoming citizens, but clearly the AA ID would not apply to me.
This thread is all over the place, but I'm glad the writer of the article came to her senses. My own struggle was not thinking myself above AAs but simply denying my black, and living in Miami didn't help I guess. I woke up as soon as I left, when I moved to Canada. Thankfully not by racist wp but by the simple solidarity I felt around other black people. The attention I attracted was mostly black and so society naturally woke me up. Sometimes I wish I had stayed asleep though because the things that used to go over my head no longer do and boy, who got time to deal with white America's daily racism upsets? My family (with a few exceptions) is still stuck in their ways and it's sad to see.
Maybe there's indeed something to the notion of the "exotic" black..? My bestie here in France is from Burkina Faso and boooy does she have ish to say about the white French, yet she reports nothing but lovely experiences with white Americans. However me, as a black (American) person I've had not one negative experience in France. My friend has her explanation for that however, as she sees a difference between her black and the "bright brown" black folks of slave descendants.
And I too didn't know Haiti identified as WI?? I would've never guessed, and we share the island!