That’s the harrowing question that survivors of Tyre Nichols, a lanky 145 pound 29-year-old late – I repeat, late – father of a 4-year-old must answer. The other critical question is when will this senseless wiping out of Black people in America come to an end? Unfortunately, the answer to the latter question answers itself. You cannot erase history, can you?
So here we go again with another exhausting chapter in the convoluted history of race in the good ole USA. As the late civil rights icon Fannie Lou Hamer famously said, “we’re sick and tired of being sick and tired!”
Imagine this – you work for a popular, international retail brand that has spent an abundance of money on their marketing strategy across all platforms, such as social, broadcast, and print media. You are given specific, detailed distribution instructions to follow based on the elaborate strategies they have paid to create, yet you notice flaws in their plans. Do you alter their plan on your distribution end in an effort to correct the issues, or do you ignore what you know is wrong because it is technically not your decision? Does your opinion change if it is a diversity-related issue, and it becomes an ethical feeling that the brand should have done a better job?
Well folks, darn, he’s back in the limelight. Ben Carson that is. Can’t say that we missed him. Last we heard was when he left his gig as a failure as Housing and Urban Director under the previous administration.
Now maybe I missed the memo but for the life of me I cannot recall any grandiose retirement parties on “doc’s” behalf at the White House – or while he threw down on caviar and grilled mushrooms at Mar-a-Lago – before he slipped off to who knows where. What I do recall were high fives, fist bumps, “good riddance” and other sighs of relief.
Cultural expressions, icons, and the arts have played a major role in how we’ve seen ourselves and others in the past, and can play a major part in bringing us together in the future. Before social media, newspapers and black and white television exposed us to the lives of others, arts, and society. Whether it be negatively or positively, music, TV, and movies and the imagery they evoke will continue to impact our society and the way we view community.
As a Black woman, the images shown in movies, TV, and mentioned in music has had a major impact on me and my self image.Cultural expressions have seemingly been more negative than positive and date back to the runaway slave flyers posted around America a century or two ago. The image of the Black woman and Black man were usually exaggerated with a huge nose and a goofy-like look to depict ignorance. We have also seen the image of the angry Black woman plastered everywhere. Continue reading The Impact of Images – by Kenyada Posey→
“The Black Lives Movement wants to see the destruction of the nuclear family.” “BLM is a hate group that’s planning to destroy the police.” “Let us not be confused. BLM is nothing but a Marxist group.”
These are actual quotes – from politicians running for office (surprise, surprise, surprise) – that typifies how Black Lives Matter has become a convenient boogey man – a political wedge issue – these days. However, the words have moved from baseball caps and posters. They’re now painted in large letters on streets in New York, Washington, DC and other cities. You’ll even find the words on tattoos, and even engraved on protective masks to stop the spread of COVID-19.
Is this the beginning of a revolution that finally addresses racism honestly?
Part 2: The Present and A Way Forward
The continuum of violence against African Americans and the Black Community
What has happened in the past is not different from what continues to happen today because racism is generational. Racists who have committed crimes use all the tools of systems of privilege built in their favor to avoid being held accountable. In doubtful circumstances, lawyers have changed venues for trial to predominantly White communities where their White accomplice juries can unconsciously and consciously exercise bias.
Is this the beginning of a revolution that finally addresses racism honestly?
Part 1: Understanding Our Shared History
When people say, “enough is enough!”, Do we really understand why? Why is it that we consistently deny the traumatic experience of racism that pains African Americans every single day? Why do we vote for leaders who effectively support policies and practices that are racist or discriminatory? What propelled so many Americans of all ethnicities including White, African Americans, Asian American, European American, Hispanic Americans to come together despite the Covid-19 pandemic to protest on the streets? Why do African Americans continue to endure racist and discriminatory practices generation after generation? These are some of the questions we ponder here given the recent events and the Black Lives Matter movement that has taken the world by storm even as a pandemic rages, propelling people to deprioritize their personal safety in order to stand up against racism and a history of subjugation and discrimination.
I woke up this morning with recent events and names like George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, and Christian Cooper swimming through my mind and decided to take a walk to clear my head. As I stepped outside, I took a quick pause to consider my safety. Since the tornado on Easter, I have been staying with friends in a different neighborhood and I wasn’t sure of how I would be received.
As I started my walk, another friend’s Facebook post also crossed my mind. She posted her comments and a tweet from Quinta Brunson which says, “Being black is having a good day and then seeing another black person was killed for no reason. Then you have to think about/talk about that all day or don’t and numb yourself. It’s a constant emotional war. . . Meanwhile you still need to work and worry about everything else.”
My son’s an avid jogger. For him, circling the track in a nearby park enough times to reach his 4-5-mile daily goal is no big deal. Shucks, his jogging regimen was enough motivation for me to join him on that track; not as a jogger but, okay, as a 2 mile “fast walker.” Thus, I’d not given more than a passing thought on the inherent dangers of “jogging while Black” until the Ahmaud Arbery story went viral.
“That could have been my son,” was the disconcerting thought – and rage – that unsettled my mind as I watched that sickening video and heard those gunshots that snuffed out that young man’s life.
From 1868 (and a 14th amendment that gave birth to black “Americans”) to 1968 (which saw the brutal murder of a black Christian preacher whose elevated voice of the oppressed was silenced), 100 years of segregationist policies and practices protected and preserved white supremacy and oppressed nonwhites.
Those policies & practices didn’t die with the reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. They remain in place today, more than 50 years later, in every city in America.
