This week’s opening thought: contrary to what many white folx and people of privilege want to believe, there is a difference between self-care and taking care of yourself. That difference lies at the intersection of privilege, white supremacy, socioeconomic status, physical and mental disability, and the generational trauma you endure due to the impacts of white supremacy and colonialism on your community.
TW: discussions of violence, gun violence, anti-Blackness, distortion of mental illness.
This week's opening thought: I grew up in Detroit, Michigan, in the 80s and 90s. At that time, Detroit was considered the most dangerous city in the United States. Its homicide rate was astronomical, with much of it attributed to gun violence. Growing up, my siblings and I grew accustomed to ducking and seeking cover at the sound of gunshots. As with most things related to the intersections of poverty, classism, systemic oppression, white supremacy, and anti-Blackness, politicians and pundits viewed gun violence in Black communities as an issue of values and upbringing. My community, Black communities, were told that the lack of fathers in our homes, a deficiency in morals, and a lack of “American values” were the catalyst for the gun violence in our neighborhoods. We were blamed for the gun violence in our communities, which increased the danger my community faced.
Then Columbine happened.
White U.S. Americans were shocked when the Columbine High School massacre happened in the Spring of 1999. As the news cycle ran with the story, the white shock became excuses and rationalizations for why two young white men killed thirteen people. White media ran with the narrative that these young white men had “lost their way.” Suddenly mental health and other conditions mattered because these young men “were raised by good families.” They were “good young men” who shouldn’t be judged too harshly for their murderous actions.
Fast forward to 2023, and the United States of America has had 199 mass shootings in less than five months. White men perpetrated all but a handful. The same excuses are used for their heinous actions over twenty years after Columbine. Meanwhile, Black communities are still facing the same hurdles with policing on physical and moral levels as poverty and generational trauma ignite gun violence in oppressed communities.
The wildest part of these two completely different narratives and treatments around gun violence in Black and white communities?
No one ever wants to talk about the damn guns.
In all this, the proliferation of and access to guns are never labeled as the issue they are.
After the past few weeks, with a mass shooting occurring almost every 48 hours, I'm confident that guns matter more than human lives in the United States. I'm more confident than I've ever been. Why?
Because whiteness has proven that it doesn't care about white lives over the right to own a gun and use it as you please.
And if whiteness will make excuses for white people gunning down other white people and white children while going out of its way to look past the elephant in the room?
Then the rest of us are chopped liver.
Once again, if whiteness won’t deal with its sh— and the harm it causes- we all suffer.
But you know, morals and a good upbringing and whatnot.
This week’s opening thought: on my way home from a job interview, I peered out the bus window and saw a white man in black and red Chinese linens, traditional Beijing shoes, and a straw hat with what appeared to be a sake or wine crate under his arm. He was walking down the street without a care in the world. He strolled down the sidewalk with all the confidence of a mediocre white man who thinks they are the greatest thing since sliced bread. When I saw him, I looked twice because I was honestly taken aback. I don’t know the context or story behind his outfit, but I didn’t need to know any of that information BECAUSE HE WAS A WHITE MAN DRESSED IN A CHINESE STEREOTYPE COSTUME FROM SPIRIT HALLOWEEN.
So yeah, racism, anti-AAPI hate, and cultural appropriation are all still a thing, just in case someone out there thought otherwise.
TW: Anti-Blackness, gun violence, white supremacist terrorism.
This week's opening thought: They're attempting to murder little Black boys because they had the wrong address.
They're shooting to kill through their front doors when they see little Black boys on their doorsteps. They have no hesitation when it comes to taking the lives of little Black boys, little Black boys who rang their doorbell by mistake because they had the wrong address.
They're aiming their guns at the heads of little Black boys who show up at their front doors with no hesitation, little Black boys who rang their doorbell by mistake, hoping to pick up their siblings.
They're stepping outside their homes and standing over the bodies of little Black boys they've wounded with no hesitation in front of their homes by shooting them through the front door, little Black boys hoping to pick up their siblings, little Black boys who had the wrong address.
They're stepping outside to finish off little Black boys who show up at their front doors with no hesitation, little Black boys who had the wrong address and rang their doorbell by mistake, hoping to pick up their siblings.
They're willing to leave little Black boys who had the wrong address to die on their front porches, aiming at their prone Black bodies and intending to end their lives as they lay on the pavement, hoping to take the lives of little Black boys who had the wrong address.
The neighbors in the neighborhood where little Black boys have the wrong address are more than willing not to help little Black boys who have the wrong address as they pull their severely injured bodies door to door, looking for someone, anyone, in the neighborhood to help them. Little Black boys are left crawling, bleeding from gunshots driven by the hatred of someone's white neighbor, watching as the neighbors of the person who tried to kill them refuse to help them.
Little Black boys who have the wrong address, who ring the wrong doorbell, hoping to pick up their siblings, lose their innocence and any faith in humanity they had in their souls because they now know how the world views them.
Little Black boys hoping to pick up their siblings but have the wrong address learn well before adulthood that white people who try to murder them get to sleep in their beds feeling justified in their actions and often facing no repercussions for their hatred-fueled actions.
Little Black boys with the wrong address learn that their existence means they will never get the justice they deserve because their lives don't matter to those with power, positionality, and a lack of melanin.
But the United States doesn't have a gun or anti-Blackness problem.
The United States doesn't have a white supremacist terrorism problem.
Everything's fine.
Everything's working as intended, right white people?
The Black people who work for you, with you, are working as intended today, right? I mean, it's Monday. They should be working for you and with you with smiles on their faces, right?
Everything's fine.
Everything's working as intended.
The Black people who work for you, with you, aren't physically laying in a pool of blood, clinging to life, looking for help. They're physically present at work, as intended, right? Sure. They're physically present.
But their souls aren't.
Their minds aren't.
In many respects, their bodies aren't present either. How could they be?
Black lives in the United States are inherently us ringing the doorbell and having the wrong address because it has always been the wrong address for Africans and their descendants still enslaved on unceded land.
They're attempting to murder little Black boys with the wrong address. Sometimes they murder the body, but they always murder our souls, hope, joy, and belief that we deserve to live.
But everything's fine.
Everything's working as intended.
To my Black people: take care of yourselves and your family and friends, even when your workplaces decide spreadsheets matter more than your body and soul. You matter, even if the world says otherwise.
This week’s opening thought to any of us who want to be viewed as “allies,” “accomplices,” or decent people: the moment you believe that there is no learning and listening left to do is when you become a liability to those communities you keep claiming you want to support and elevate.
Suppose you’re closed off to learning, unlearning, re-learning, and re-envisioning what you’ve been told is the right way to learn by the white supremacist concept of education you were subjected to in your formative years. If that’s the case, you will be another contributor to the problems those you claim you want to help have been trying to overcome for generations.
Suppose you’re unwilling to hear new perspectives from younger generations. Suppose you’re reluctant to hear experience-driven views from generations living and doing this work before yours. If that’s the case, you will be another person contributing to silencing communities that are historically and systemically held down and often rendered invisible.
Suppose you’re unwilling to be called in or out for your words and actions. Suppose your response to being called in or out is not to hear what is being shared but to go on the defensive. If that’s the case, you are as much of a danger to those you claim you want to support and elevate as the rest of the world around them that is intent on harming them.
Do you like considering yourself a decent person who helps others? Well, decent people spend their lives listening and learning from everyone they meet who feels safer and braver enough to share their insights and experiences with them. Then decent people take what they’ve learned and heard, process it, pay people for their time and emotional labor in human ways, then apply their learning to themselves to improve and push others who share their power and positionality to do the same.
There’s no half-assing learning and listening, especially not when people’s lives and safety are in constant danger.