I have been relatively quiet on social media regarding this
whole topic, and the reason why is mainly because I see a lot of what appears
to be both sides—because pretty much everyone seems very divided—talking at
each other without anyone attempting to understand, and much of what I read is
full of anger, stereotyping—of minorities, of cops, of white people— and very
little reasoning. And of course I think
one “side” is more right than the other, because we all do to some extent, and
those of us who try to see things from both perspectives maybe feel that
chiming in is unproductive, or exhausting—I know when I scroll down my Facebook
newsfeed after yet another incident, and its filled with posts full of hatred,
blaming, and name-calling, I feel hopeless and heartbroken, and I try to
distract myself (quite easily) with the business of life.
But here’s the thing:
As the wife of a black man, as the mother of children of
color, I feel I can no longer remain silent on this issue. I feel it is my social responsibility to
speak up. As someone who largely
believes in the vast goodness of law enforcement officers, and has utmost
respect for our police and our military, I feel my duty is to try and speak to my
fellow white friends, many of whom I think have the opinions that they do
because someone they love is a police officer, and they are hurt when they see
their husband’s, wife’s, brother’s, son’s, cousin’s, WHOEVER’s profession
villainized. Please believe me when I
say, to most of you, I think I understand why you see things the way you
do. (Now I’m talking about those of my
friends who see things differently than I do, but who are attempting to share
their beliefs respectfully—not anyone who blatantly posts racist or hateful
messages or comments online—if you are someone who is unable to engage in
conversation about this matter without resulting to ignorant name calling and
racism, then you are obviously one of the main parts of this problem, and I
pray that God changes your heart).
But for the rest of you, many of you around my age: We grew up, a lot of us, thinking that we had
gotten past racism. If you are white,
like I am, you most likely never experienced direct racism yourself, and you
might not have witnessed it happening around you—you read about it in a history
book. If you had parents who raised you
decently, you treated people of all colors with respect. You may have claimed that color didn’t matter
to you, or you didn’t see race (although, I’m guessing most of your friends are
white—but that’s probably not your fault.
We’re socialized into a world that teaches us to make friends and
relationships based on cultural similarities, and reaching across racial lines
to do this is sometimes challenging).
Often, behind closed doors, if your parents are around the age of my
parents, and you grew up in a particular part of this country, some of the
older members of your family may have aired different views about
race—hopefully those comments bothered you, but you probably just shrugged it
off as, well, that’s grandma. Or Uncle
Joe. (S)he grew up believing such and
such because of etc., and you didn’t let it change the way you felt about
her/him, because you knew (s)he was basically a good person.
We elected a biracial president—I am proud that he
identifies as black, I am also proud that he claims a biracial identity—what an
example for my girls! We, most of us
white people, had no reason to think that racism was a major problem. We’d come so far, right? If the most powerful man in the world is not
a white man, doesn’t that prove we’ve gotten past all this?
I think, deep down, most of you suspected the answer was
no. It might be in the jokes you hear
sometimes, or the occasional news stories (I’m talking before the ones that
have taken over the media now). It may
be in the views expressed from time to time by an acquaintance that bothered
you just a little. But I think the vast
majority of us really thought, things are a lot better than they used to
be. They’ll continue to get better. And even when we had those hints that things
weren’t any better—maybe we didn’t want to think about it, because we knew we
weren’t blatant racists, so why should we shoulder the guilt? As a white male classmate of mine said once, “I
don’t want to be looked at and seen as a symbol of oppression.” And I get that.
And now, things are clearly coming to a head, and they’re
anything but better. They seem worse
than they did, even five years ago. I
am, quite honestly, not sure how to talk to my girls about it. This is not the kind of world I wanted them
to grow up in. I pray every day that we
can effect social change before they get old enough to experience the kind of
monstrous racism that is once again consuming our society.
It starts with the little things—I want those of you who’ve
never had to think about this to consider something—a couple months ago, my
husband, my girls, and I were pulled over. I had forgotten to renew my tags and
it was a couple days past the expiration day for renewal. The officer who stopped us was polite,
professional, and very friendly. He let
us off with a warning. Here’s the thing,
though: I was driving, and when we were
pulled over? My husband got asked for
his ID also.
There is literally no other reason for that to happen than
my husband’s skin color. In a routine
traffic stop, whenever I have been riding with a white girlfriend, my brothers,
anyone else in the passenger seat—no ID required. Driving While Black is a real thing. So, apparently, is riding in the passenger
seat.
This very friendly man who I believe has a good heart and
became a cop to serve and protect—he automatically asked for my husband’s
ID. It’s probably been his experience
that in pulling people over, a higher number of minorities in routine traffic
stops get arrested for drug charges or outstanding warrants. Maybe he’s even trained to do that, to ask
for IDs of non-white passengers. I
surely hope not.
Now some of you may be thinking that’s not a big deal. Maybe it’s not—my husband hadn’t done
anything wrong, and he was polite and compliant, so the situation didn’t
escalate. But the underlying assumption
that my husband could be doing something wrong, simply based on the fact that
he is black, is also, I think, the problematic assumption shared by the many
officers in these horrible videos that leads them to, perhaps, jump to
conclusions in situations in which ultimately, unarmed black men are tragically
gunned down. I haven’t watched many of
these videos—I don’t have the stomach for it.
I also believe the officers are innocent until proven guilty.
But what about the wives and children of those who, it
seems, didn’t get a chance to be presumed innocent until proven guilty? Have those of you who constantly jump to the
defense of the accused officers in these videos really taken the time to think
about that? Have you ever lost a
parent? Or a child? I’ve buried one of each, and it is the most
horrible feeling on this planet. The
widows of these black men, those parents and children of the deceased, are
victims of catastrophe, regardless of the outcome of the court case, and yet
they deal with turning on the TV or opening up a browser and seeing thousands
or maybe millions of people jumping to the defense of those who must (or at the
very least, should) stand trial to answer for the horrible tragedy that has
occurred.
And then it happens again the next week.
And when peaceful protests and a Black Lives Matter movement
or kneeling during the national anthem produces no change, just more angry
responses and more attempts of justification for the accused and more blaming
the victims—what do we expect to happen?
Seriously?
Violence doesn’t justify
violence. But Black Lives DO Matter!
Let me put it another
way:
My husband’s life
matters.
His brothers’ lives
matter. His cousins’ lives matter.
My husband and I, our
children’s lives matter!
And that doesn’t mean
that your life doesn’t. It doesn’t mean
police lives don’t matter. Let me say it
again: I have the utmost respect for law
enforcement. I have relied on and
reached out to them multiple times throughout my life, as has my husband: car accidents, medical emergencies, times
when they stopped what they were doing just to be good citizens. I know how essential our police are, and I
hate to see the entire profession disrespected or cast as villains.
But justice needs to
be served. And those of us who have
white privilege need not sound off and get in the way of that process.
Don’t think white
privilege exists?
When was the last
time you were asked for your ID in the passenger seat?
Can you leave a poor
tip in a restaurant, or be loudly obnoxious with a group of friends in a public
place, or come to a meeting late, and not worry about any of these things being
chalked up to your racial background?
Some people argue
that unarmed white citizens are shot by police also, and the media is trying to
create a race war. It’s true that there
are unfortunate and accidental deaths of people of all colors by the hands of
police—but the shooting of black men is disproportionate to those of other
demographic groups. Why can’t we all
just recognize this, and try to do something about it?
We’d rather spend our
time coming up with hashtags that indicate other lives matter, when the Black
Lives Matter movement never tried to insinuate that our lives don’t.
We’d rather fly into
outrage over the lack of respect of football players who won’t stand for the
National Anthem. Is that
disrespectful? Sure. But do black people feel respected, or even
safe, in their own country? Don’t they
have the right to feel that way?
I will always stand
for the National Anthem. I thought the
protests on 9/11 were in poor taste. My
father was in the military and would have given his life if it was required. My uncle—my mom’s only brother, my
grandparents’ only son—died fighting in Vietnam. His sacrifice was given for our
freedoms. So I will always stand for our
flag.
But more important
than that symbol, to me, is standing with our black brothers and sisters
now. And I respect their right to
protest the flag. That was one of the
freedoms my uncle died for. I love
watching football with my husband, but I hope that if nothing comes of the
kneeling, that they go on strike altogether.
Maybe if the NFL was shut down, white people would finally pay
attention. Does it have to inconvenience
your life before you recognize that a problem does exist here?
Let me close with
this. When I told one of my family
members about my now husband, then boyfriend, she began to cry. Not because she didn’t like him, she didn’t
even know him. She looked at me, tears
in her eyes, and explained that the world would see me differently.
I knew that then, and
I know that now.
My response to her
was that the love we shared was worth the cost of lowered opinions of me by those
who had such shallow conceptions of what love should look like. It was none of their business. And what the hell should I care—if someone
has such a backwards, hateful, close-minded view of humanity, I could care less
what they think of me.
I realize in writing
this post, I might lose some friends.
I’d like to say I hope not—I hope you are at least open to hearing what
I am saying. More than that, be brave
enough to change your opinion. To
realize that you can respect law enforcement and this country and still want
black people to be treated equally. We
need large scale social change. The entire
system is designed for minorities to fail—social reproductive theory posits
that schools cater to white, middle class ways of knowing, and that from the
very start, many students from other backgrounds must learn to survive in a
school culture that is different from their home life—and not all of these home
lives are bad, but many of them value behaviors and knowledge that aren’t
recognized as important in academic life.
Thus, the cards are stacked against many of our poor black students from
the beginning, since education is the viable way out of poverty. Poor schools in heavily populated minority
areas also suffer from fewer resources and less qualified teachers. Systemic poverty riddles many communities of
color, and intergenerational poverty leads to more children dropping out of
school and turning to the streets—which reinforces police assumptions that any
person of color is more likely than a white person to be guilty of something.
The system needs to
change.
And I don’t know how
to do that, but I know how to start:
Examine your own heart.
So many of my friends
are Christians, and yet I’m shocked by how they continually pass judgment on
victims—is that what Jesus would have done?
Love your neighbor—your
black neighbors. Your white
neighbors. Your military and police
neighbors.
But please
recognize—we are not talking isolated incidents. There is a problem here. Please, if you’re not trying to be part of
the solution—well, I think you know what you’re part of.
My children deserve
better than this.
Our children deserve
better than this.
