This Week's Opening Thought: November 7, 2022

This week's opening thought, especially for those with power, privilege, and positionality in the United States: Vote.

Take the time to understand the measures and politicians in your area that could harm Global Majority and marginalized communities and vote against them.

If you haven't gleaned anything else from this country's past few election cycles, you have hopefully learned that your vote has legitimate weight. Making informed decisions that factor in human and environmental impact has weight. Voting not just for yourself and your best interests based on your class and socioeconomic status but as a voice for others who have been oppressed and harmed for centuries has weight.

I don't have any fancy slogans or stickers to motivate you to vote and care about your community and communities that are your friends, neighbors, and co-workers. I'm operating on the hope that you'll learn from history and respond accordingly, a hope full of swiss cheese-sized holes that I cling onto because the alternative is depressing. I'm expecting y'all to be decent citizens, to be the "good people" y'all claim to be. I'm hoping that some of y'all will live up to those "good white people" personas some of y'all gleefully tote around and vote outside of your ego and wants. I hope many of you will do better than using voting as a social media gold sticker participation award selfie. I hope you'll vote with empathy instead of for likes and retweets.

Hope.

There's that word again.

Hope is all many people in this country have left to hold on to. And some of y'all don't realize how your vote has eroded the hopes of so many.

I want to believe that people can be better than the images they show me daily. I need to think people can be better because, well, hope. Even with it in tatters, I wear it like a blanket against the elements.

I'm not the only one.

Vote like there will be no hope left to hold onto.

Because there might not be.

This Week's Opening Thought: October 31, 2022

Image description: A picture of Kool-Aid Man, a cartoonish human-sized pitcher of instant fruit punch with a stenciled-on smiley face, breaking through a wall. The words "Oh Yeah!" can be seen above him as the wall crumbles from the force.

This week's opening thought: if you see critiques of your industry from people, Global Majority folx, Black folx who work in your industry with ideas and solutions about how to repair these issues and the first thing that comes to mind is, "if you don't like [insert industry here] then you should get out?" Perhaps you're a part of the problem.

And please refrain from the whole "you're dividing our industry" jargon that people tend to trot out when they feel the need to defend their white supremacy ideology-driven professions. That's the response of someone who felt the words hit the nail on the head like a stake through the heart and don't want to sit with the discomfort of an honest evaluation.

If you've dedicated a part of your life to a career in an industry and you're not calling that industry to task for its lack of evolution and innovation or its lack of career progression and opportunities for marginalized, Black, Brown, and Indigenous folx, and Global Majority folx unless they prescribe to the throes of white supremacy?

You are drinking the Kool-Aid. It's not even good, Kool-Aid. It's Kool-Aid made with Sweet 'N Low. But you're comfortable conforming and toeing the line, so you're guzzling it like plants seeking water in the middle of a drought.

You might as well pour yourself another cup, continue sitting on the sidelines, and keep your opinion to yourself while the rest of us move our industries forward.

[Image description: A picture of Kool-Aid Man, a cartoonish human-sized pitcher of instant fruit punch with a stenciled-on smiley face, breaking through a wall. The words "Oh Yeah!" can be seen above him as the wall crumbles from the force.]

This Week's Opening Thought: October 24, 2022

TW: Antisemitism, hate.

This week’s opening thought: there has and will never be a justification for hate. There will never be a justification for antisemitism. There will never be a justification for defending a hateful and anti-semitic person as they inflict harm on others. Not mental illness, not some past experiences with one or two members of a community, not a narcissistic need for attention.

Nothing.

Please understand that justifying hate and antisemitism is more than just hanging a banner off the side of a Los Angeles freeway overpass while striking a Nazi salute. By not standing for the lives of Jewish communities, by not speaking up and being clear about your denouncement of this hate, you are passively supporting antisemitic rhetoric and views. Your stance is that the lives of Jewish folx in your community, of Global Majority communities in your city, aren’t worth your time and energy to stand with and support in dire times or any time. “Not wanting to get involved” or claiming you don’t have a viewpoint is you involving yourself and stating your viewpoint. And your “lack” of a stance? It is more than a stance. And it speaks volumes about how little you value the safety and lives of people in your community and workplace. Not standing in legitimate solidarity with your Jewish friends, coworkers, and neighbors is just as harmful as blatantly agreeing with and championing antisemitism.

Standing up and speaking out for those in your community who are receiving hate is not a stance; it’s a lifestyle. It’s a selfless lifestyle that does not seek ego strokes, constant validation from Global Majority communities, or gold stars and cookies. That is what being actively anti-racist and opposing hate and oppression in all its forms is.

Yes, we all need to be in solidarity and support our Jewish friends, colleagues, and neighbors right now. You also need to stand against and fight against antisemitism every day in every space, not just when it’s in the news cycle. Are you still going to stand up next week when newspapers shove the antisemitism to page seven? Or are you not planning to stand at all today, next week, or any day?

Your soul and humanity are about as holey as that one guy’s shoes.

To my Jewish friends, colleagues, and neighbors: I stand in solidarity yesterday, today, and every day of my life with you as you navigate these troubling times. You are not alone, and your lives matter.

P.S.: Don’t let the irony of a Black man with money and a need to be in the news cycle being patted on the back for championing antisemitic views and rhetoric by white people who hate his race pass you by. That’s the world we live in, folx. We should be working toward a better society, but we can't do that without acknowledging the generational trauma of hate that the United States was built on. You don't move forward without learning from what happened behind you.

On Social Media Scrolling and Inaccurate "DEI" Imagery

Image description: Two pictures. The left picture, labeled "equality," shows three people of varying heights (from L to R: tall, medium, short) standing on the same size wooden crates. They are all trying to look over a fence to watch a baseball game with varying success. The tall person can see the game; the medium person can barely look over the fence to see the game. The shortest person cannot see the game at all. The right picture, labeled "equity," shows the same three people watching the baseball game. However, this time the tallest person is not standing on a crate and can see the game. The medium-height person is standing on one box and can see the game. The shortest person is standing on two crates and can see the game.

Scrolling through my social media feeds, it is not lost on me that in the year of someone's Lord, 2022, some of us are still out here educating folx on the difference between equity and equality while watching some of y'all share that ancient picture with the people on the damn wooden crates, watching baseball, with one of your woke rants. Could someone please take that picture out back and put it out of its misery? It wasn't accurate when it was first rolled out to the masses 20-plus years ago and isn't an accurate visual depiction of equity and equality today. Equity and equality are more than standing on some crates, trying to watch a baseball game, literally or figuratively.

Let's break this down for what feels like the umpteenth time, shall we? Equality is typically defined as treating everyone the same and giving everyone access to the same opportunities. Equality, however, is not attainable without addressing the hurdles that intersect with white supremacist values and other discriminatory values and ideologies. These include but are not limited to racism, classism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia, and ableism.

Equity refers to proportional representation (by race, class, gender, gender identity, disability, etc.) in those same opportunities. To achieve equity, policies and procedures may result in a necessary redistribution of resources to eliminate and mitigate the impacts of the systems and ideologies that threaten equal treatment for all.

There is no equality without equity.

Do you still think you can sum up the difference between equity and equality with some people standing on crates? And don't get me started on how ableist this image is.

Everything ain't meant to be summed up in a couple of images.

Everything can't be whittled down to a few visual Cliff Notes, especially regarding the health, safety, and access to rights, resources, and privileges of marginalized and intersectional identities in a biased and segregationist society.

The oppression of others ain't a meme, y'all.


[Image description: Two pictures. The left picture, labeled "equality," shows three people of varying heights (from L to R: tall, medium, short) standing on the same size wooden crates. They are all trying to look over a fence to watch a baseball game with varying success. The tall person can see the game; the medium person can barely look over the fence to see the game. The shortest person cannot see the game at all. The right picture, labeled "equity," shows the same three people watching the baseball game. However, this time the tallest person is not standing on a crate and can see the game. The medium-height person is standing on one box and can see the game. The shortest person is standing on two crates and can see the game.]

On Fresh Baked Bread and Finding The Medium of Identity and Career Aspirations

Image description: A picture of fresh-baked herb focaccia bread. The bread has been sliced into squares.

As a melanated person, a Black person, in white-centered workplaces, I speak from experience when I say a great deal of energy and a sense of grounding and peace comes from not caving into the "norms" and demands of white supremacist workplace culture ideology as a means of survival. It is liberating to work toward finding the medium in your career that allows you to maintain your identity while thriving personally and financially. With that said, I can also say that by doing so, you open yourself up to a great deal of uncertainty in your future employment opportunities.

Everybody isn't going to be too keen on you maintaining who you are, even those who claim that's why they hired you. They'll expect you to be someone different, to change yourself, and make yourself "acceptable." They will verbalize these expectations, putting your job on the line and leaving you feeling like you're inadequate or a "bad" employee. There will be times when you decide to change yourself to protect yourself. Those moments will hurt, and you might find yourself harboring some resentment, anger, or disappointment toward yourself because you won't feel as protected as you thought. You might not feel protected at all. You may feel more unsafe than ever in your workplace. You'll feel alone.

But you're not alone, far from it.

So many people are flipping that same coin every day because of the world we live in and the workplaces our society has cultivated.

Please know that you are not alone. Please know that I do not judge you because I've been in your shoes and see the weight you carry with your decisions. If anything, I wish you the space and energy to find ways not to shrink who you are and what you bring to the workplace into a trail of crumbs instead of the fresh, robust focaccia you genuinely are. It's not easy, but I promise it is worth it.

Sending you energy and love as you navigate the quagmire of career employment.

P.S.: Yeah, I just compared you to bread. Focaccia, to be exact. Your future and needs are decadent fuel for your soul, like focaccia. You know what? Maybe you should have some focaccia and dipping oil and call it a day. You deserve it.