C-40
NEW AGE POSTING
Every few years, being black becomes a macabre spectacle. What is usually a complicated private identity becomes a public one. black man is killed by a white police officer in the United States, and suddenly the world is attuned to your race. Suddenly, the world is trying to help. It’s trying to amplify black voices. It’s posting Martin Luther King and Malcolm X quotes and videos. It’s donating money. It’s circulating videos of black protesters and black media voices.And it’s being humbled. It’s trying to learn. It’s ashamed that it wasn’t educated enough before about racism, and it is here to take a cue from black people ,your book recommendations, your understanding, your absolution. And it’s also here a little bit for the righteous feeling of proximity to you, to your virtuous victimhood, to your moment in history.
Let this moment help white people dispense with our constant need to be right. To not hit the comment button. To stop interrupting. To be quiet for a minute. Let us listen. When black people say they feel scared, attacked, watched, different, suspicious, lesser, criminal, let us resist the urge to defend ourselves as a response. Let us admit that our skin does not make things harder for us the way it does for others. Let us understand the spectrum between racist and not, that some of our behaviors, thoughts and feelings are so deeply ingrained that we need real time and effort to root them out. In a world where black people have to beg for their lives as the air leaves their bodies, it’s the least we can do.
Let this moment help white people dispense with our constant need to be right. To not hit the comment button. To stop interrupting. To be quiet for a minute. Let us listen. When black people say they feel scared, attacked, watched, different, suspicious, lesser, criminal, let us resist the urge to defend ourselves as a response. Let us admit that our skin does not make things harder for us the way it does for others. Let us understand the spectrum between racist and not, that some of our behaviors, thoughts and feelings are so deeply ingrained that we need real time and effort to root them out. In a world where black people have to beg for their lives as the air leaves their bodies, it’s the least we can do.