on anti-blackness this week

29 May 2020

as i write this, tear are welling up behind my eyes. the sadness is SO heavy. i am listening to shoes by peter cottontale. i am so tired. my back is so tight. the grief is drowning.

this is a rant. if i had more energy, maybe i would craft it more strategically. if white supremacy weren’t sapping my energy and the energy of so many (including you), this would be beautiful. maybe it is still beautiful. i don’t care.

i am so frustrated by the same old responses. i want us to intervene differently. some thoughts:

white people protesting in solidarity downtown is good. white people protesting in wealthy suburbs is better.

white people supporting black business is good. white people challenging the anti-blackness of capitalism is better.

white people attending protests is good. white people organizing to dismantle the police and support community-led care and accountability is better.

white people reading books about the history of epic (and regular) black people is good. white people reading books about the creation of whiteness is better. whiteness is what must be deconstructed, not blackness. blackness only exists because whiteness needed a way to create “other.”

there is no such thing as other.

if you believe people should be allowed to marry whoever they want, regardless of their identity, george lloyd is the grandfather of your grandchild’s partner. breonna taylor is the great grandmother of your great grantchild’s elementary school best friend.

we are all inextricably linked. this is not hyperbole. if covid hasn’t proven that to you, i don’t know if anything will.

tony mcdade was murdered by the police in tallahassee, my hometown.

if you do not believe we are all inextricably linked, my ask is that you sit with where that belief came from.

i have a dream that one day when black people are murdered, white people with vacation homes offer them for weeks on end to the surviving family members. and maybe forever.

i have a dream that one day black people can live and thrive everywhere. if a black person wants to live only around black people, that should create thriving. if a black person wants to live around people of multiple racial identities, that too should create thriving. everything should be possible.

i have a that one day the world we will have is a world where many worlds are possible.

i have a dream that one day white people will create body barriers around black people grieving/dancing (can these actions not be the same?) in the streets.

i have a dream that one day, when a black mama is tired of cooking, her white friends will just order (fancy) dinner for her.

i have a dream of days where every window holds a black lives matter sign and those that don’t don’t get attacked. they get extra support in coming to see the truth: that their current worldview was created by people who hate people. and that there is still time. there is a pathway to love. it might be painful, but it is a good path.

i have a dream that one day black people moving slowly will be seen as beautiful.

i have a dream that one day, when whiteness is no longer, we will know each other by our ancestors and our relationship to land and our gifts and our dreams.

someday this dream will be out of my head.

until then…

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