It is summer 2016. I am mindlessly scrolling through Twitter at the end of the night. I start seeing the tweets. Black man shot in Minnesota by the cops. My heart stops. My brother lives in Minnesota. I text him and his girlfriend. I scour twitter for information. I am crying as hard as I’ve ever cried - I am doing it quietly, because I don’t want my mom to hear me. I don’t know want her to know yet. My brother finally texts me back. He has been at home all night. I drop my phone and really let it out. I tell my mom what happened, I tell her Michael is safe. It wasn’t Michael; it was Philando.
That was four years ago. The only reason I didn’t have a repeat of this exact situation earlier this week is because I have basically stopped using Twitter and because my brother has moved to Florida. I now only worry for his life because of COVID deniers.
Respectable folks want to say nothing happens because of riots. But, uh…have you ever been to a PRIDE event? You can drink your overpriced, water downed cocktails and fondle a gay man’s abs, because black and brown trans women had decided that they had e-fucking-nough with the goddamned police and did what needed to be done.
I am a “respectable” black person. I am your weird, quirky friend. I am the girl that has always been “pretty for a black girl”. I am your “oreo”. I am “not even that black”. And I’m sick of this shit. My Master’s Degree, my good job, my interracial neighborhood, and my allies have protected me so much as they can - but nothing can protect any person of color, any BLACK person, from racism in America. Dismantling racism is the only protection we will ever have. And if we have to dismantle this country for it to happen… I want my brothers and sisters to feel safe. I want to feel safe. Being respectable hasn’t ended racism. If it could have, it would’ve ended with Barack - there hasn’t been a more respectable black man…until Christian Cooper.
We know that black people in America can’t drive, get pulled over, go jogging, sleep in their own home, defend their home from unidentified shooters, sell CD’s, go bird watching, have a bbq, relax in their own home, ask for help after being a car accident, have a cellphone, leave a party and get to safety, play loud music, walk home from the corner store, play cops and robbers, go to church, walk home with Skittles and Iced Tea, hold a hairbrush while leaving their own Bachelor party, party on NYE, lawfully carry a weapon, breakdown on a public road with a car known to have car problems, shop at WalMart, have a disabled vehicle, read a book in their own car, walk with their grandmother, decorate for a party, ask a cop a question, cash a check, take out their wallet, or breathe freely.
To those of you that know me, would you be surprised to know that I can’t go to Disneyland, go out dancing, go to concerts, get my nails done, play make-believe, go to my best friends house, jaywalk, date, pursue my education, go to the bank, be in a “white” neighborhood at night, drive my car, excel in my profession, walk around my own neighborhood, or cosplay without experiencing racism? I’ve experienced racism doing ALL of those things, and I walked away with my life…because the odds were in my favor that day.
The whole world changed based off of one terrorist attack and drastic measures were taken almost everywhere that "inconvenienced" everyone for their own safety. Australia created and passed gun control laws after one mass shooting. But America still can’t figure out institutionalized racism? Excuse me? No one has any answers right now, except, “stop rioting”. What?
We are still in the middle of a pandemic. A respiratory illness with no cure and the police still think it’s necessary to shoot tear gas into crowds?? Address the problem. Eliminate the need for crowds to gather in a time when it’s not safe for crowds to gather. De-militarize the police. Retrain them. End systemic racism.
And speaking of the pandemic… it was an issue until people found out that black peopled people of color, old people, and “sick” people were the only ones dying. Then they wanted their shops open again. They stormed the capital building with guns and they were “good people”. If they been out there, protesting because our government left us out in the cold to DIE, instead of having a full staffed CDC to protect us and heading the warning of the WHO - they maybe I would say they were good people. They wanted haircuts and to get their nails done and to eat at a restaurant. They are not good people.
Black people protesting and rioting and looting are not THUGS. First of all - there’s so much evidence that it is NOT black people incited violence or looting at all - but white opportunists making things worse. BUT - even if it was black folks; riots and looting are legitimate and profound forms of protest against a system that values goods and services more than human life. America’s value of goods and services over human life has never been more apparent than now; when we end an epidemic because people need to get their teeth cleaned. Furthermore, Donald Rumsfeld empathized with looters in Iraq, “And while no one condones looting, on the other hand one can understand the pent-up feelings that may result from decades of repression and people who've had members of their family killed by that regime, for them to be taking their feelings out on that regime.” Let’s keep that same energy now.
As a society, we have no right to criticize or dictate how black people respond to over four hundred years of murder, oppression, violence, demonization, vilification, and being disadvantaged at every turn in a country that we built for free. Black people have peacefully protested over and over again, to no results. Where’s Collin Kaepernick’s job? Stop acting like Martin Luther King wasn’t assassinated.
Black people are angry. We have been victims to capitalism and racism our entire lives. We are grieving. Have you ever experienced grief? Grief doesn’t go away. It doesn’t end. If you’ve experienced personal grief, you know that it sits with you and bubbles over at the slightest provocation. Can you imagine systemic grief? Things can be replaced. Windows get boarded up, spray paint gets washed away. Black people, human lives, can’t be replaced. Black people have had ENOUGH. I am angry. I am grieving. I am TIRED. I am heartbroken. I have had ENOUGH.
#AhmaudArbery
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