An imperfect post, because I am still learning the right way to speak up or shut up and amplify. And I need to do better. So much better. Even though it would be easy for me to do nothing. I can cry my white lady tears because I feel hurt and horrified for what’s happening but that’s just noise and distracting from the real danger and brutality facing Black people.
George Floyd. Ahmaud Arbery. Christian Cooper. Trayvon Martin. Tamir Rice. Sandra Bland. Philando Castile. Eric Garner. Freddie Gray. Botham Jean. Breonna Taylor. And on.
I’m doing my best to listen and learn what my job is right now. Starting with more education and conversation and showing up and giving and hell, something. We can do something when really we (white people) should be doing everything. It’s our system that did this and that kills Black people and that gives us a privilege in which we quietly benefit from each day. Silence is inaction.
Here are my imperfect thoughts today:
- There is no such thing as “one of the good ones” when we (white people) think of ourselves in relation to racism.
- A few good places to put your money
- We are all racist, it is something that needs to be consciously unlearned. We need to put our egos and defensiveness aside.
- Anit-racism resources for white people
- This video from Trevor Noah, watch the whole thing
- “Colorblindness” is outdated and not okay. We can do better.
- We never talked about race growing up. It’s something we (I) can change.
- Today I learned about the 1921 Tulsa, Oklahoma riots from my old college president, Lee Pelton: “in which Greenwood, then the wealthiest black neighborhood in America (called the Black Wall Street), was attacked by mobs of white residents because a 19-year old black shoeshiner allegedly bumped into a 17-year old white female elevator operator. More than 800 black people were admitted to the hospital, and 6,000 Greenwood families were displaced as white vigilantes deputized by law enforcement killed more than 300 hundred black people and destroyed more than 35 square blocks of Greenwood, some it carried out by private aircraft. It is the worst single incident of racial violence in American history, and I suspect not one in ten in Americans have ever heard of it.”
- I had never heard of it. Read his full letter here.
- I didn’t learn about the Stonewall Riots until well into college. Pride began with trans women of color, butch lesbians, and queer youth and sparked a movement rising up against police violence (x). Happy Pride Month.
- How can you say you must continue to actively speak out against racial injustice and support those who are fighting for justice in our own communities but balk at using the #BlackLivesMatter hashtag? That’s what it is. That’s what it means. Work made me cry today.
- I am scared of the million mistakes I have made and will make but I promise to try.
With Love,
Natalie