The urge to save humanity is almost always only a false-face for the urge to rule it. ~H.L. Mencken, Minority Report, 1956
i watched a video this morning of 3 black men - arguing. fighting. over shared pain. a 45 year old, a 31 year old and a 16 year old. all facing the same old systemic problems that unite them, infuriate them. and ultimately scare them. the 31 year old is trying to bridge the gap. and demands that the 16 year old FIND A BETTER WAY. because what we, as a society, and they, as a race, have been doing year after year after year is not changing anything. which we all know is the definition of insanity, right. doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. its no wonder frustration boils over. if we want to SEE change, then we have to BE CHANGE. and it starts with honest - hard, open - discussion. the time for go along, get along is over.
i'll start.
"we" (as in everyone i know) has always jokingly referred to josh as my "black" son. its starts as simply as his hair (which both his dad and brother also have - yet no reference there). but mostly its in his "choices". josh's friends are black. his taste in clothes, music and whatever else makes people judge us skews culturally black. and even tho he clearly also has white friends, and plays a predominantly "white" sport, he still carries that label. and in his "white" circle of friends was often seen as a bad influence, at least among the parents. why does that matter? it doesnt really. he embraces it, as he should. his friends are amazing and at the end of the day, its just who he is. BUT it has given me a teeny tiny glimpse into this world of inherent parental concern.
you see, i have often given the lecture. you know the one i am sure every black parent has to give regularly. YOU WILL NOT BE GIVEN THE BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT. its that simple. because of who josh goes to the mall, drives around or shoots basketball with, he will be looked upon differently by those in authority. its a very common, yet unspoken, KNOWN in our community. a black friend leaves school early without signing out -he's truant and gets ISS. white friend does the same, gets a warning. it happens over and over and over again. and so we KNOW. if josh gets pulled over with his friends in the car, it will not go well. when he says they are meeting at night to play basketball, he gets the very same warning - and it is always BE SMART. dont provoke. and call me. i can only imagine what his friends moms have to say every time their sons leave the house.
the sad part is that i have to issue that caution KNOWING it is wrong. knowing it isnt fair. i still tell him to be smart when he is with his white friends. but the warning is not the same. and we both know it.
Preconceived notions are the locks on the door to wisdom. ~Merry Browne
the problem is, we dont know how to change it. and by "we" i mean any of us. which leads to this generational frustration. which leads to pain. which boils over. violence is hard to watch. destruction seems counterintuitive. and its lets us judge those partaking in it. which then allows us to go back into our cosy corner of long held beliefs that these are "bad" people. good people dont do these things. the long history of this country actually proves otherwise.
now i am not advocating violence or destruction of any kind. i am just saying that history is written by the winners. often after bloody revolt, rebellion or even conquest. violence is a part of our history, and to ignore it - and the underlying reasons for it - comes at our peril. the violence of the moment allows us to focus on the tertiary issues, without confronting the causes. so the cycle continues. and makes it easy for things to stay the same. we need to find a better way.
white people need to acknowledge their part. their priviledge. and stop giving in to the stereotypical tropes perpetuated in our society. WHITE GUYS WITH AR15s ARE THUGS. the fact that they look like your redneck uncle does not make that ok. if you are ok with HEAVILY ARMED WHITE protesters, then you need to be ok with heavily armed BLACK protesters. but you arent. and you know you arent. because we have been taught or raised or convinced that white is inherently good, and black is inherently bad. and we need to rewrite that archetype. NOW. we need to face our own prejudice and preconceived notions. you dont have to like black people or their culture. and they do not have to like you or yours. but we need to figure out how to RESPECT each other and our differences. we need to stop letting COLOR be the lens that defines our opinion.
I am an invisible man.... I am a man of substance, of flesh and bone, fiber and liquids — and I might even be said to possess a mind. I am invisible, understand, simply because people refuse to see me. ~Ralph Ellison, The Invisible Man, 1952
i dont have the answers. but i am going to start looking harder for them. and being more honest about the part i play in keeping things the same. im going to encourage my kids to do the same. we need a generational shift. to stop the bullshit racism that is passed down - by default. by not discussing it. ignoring. hoping that because it does not impact us daily it is not real. we are all a part of the problem - and we have to stop pretending we arent.
"white flight" is the local microcosm of this generational default. my parents were born & raised in dc. they moved out to PG county when they had their kids. for "better schools". they probably believed that. at least i would like to think so. they left PG county for rural Charles in the late 70s. this time it was because of the "drugs". now i am not saying those things were not a factor. i know my parents did what they genuinely believed to be the right thing, for the right reasons. but i also know that an unspoken reason was that the neighborhoods were getting blacker. its the euphemisms that we, as white culture, use to explain our behavior. we arent racist if we are moving because of the "drug problem" or because the schools just "arent the same". or we dont like the way the county is "changing". and i only recognize it now because i see it happening in my community. white, suburban people by and large are not comfortable with being in the minority. and it shows.
The test of courage comes when we are in the minority. The test of tolerance comes when we are in the majority. ~Ralph W. Sockman
we can not begin to change how we talk about racism and culture until we are honest about it. we cant expect our kids to do better unless we show them our mistakes. or at least honestly discuss our concerns. i can remember one of the driving reasons that kris and i moved BACK to charles county was because very few people in arlington at the time seemed to speak English. clearly they did, but we felt like we did not belong in that community. rather than stay, maybe try to adapt, we left. this is how communities stay segregated. we go back to our safe corners and fold in to the comfortable. rather than embrace being uncomfortable and looking for a better way.
i dont have the answers. but i am going to stop hiding that i contribute to the problem. this is one of my favorite quotes - and i use it a lot. but it seems especially significant to this time, and this issue:
"Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.”
- maya angelou
we need to confront our own contributions to this problem. change has to start individually. but then we also need to reach outward. how can we be better friends, neighbors, allies? maybe the answer to that for you is simply being more tolerant of differences. attempting to be less judgmental. looking beyond skin color to the person inside. being white does not make you better - it just makes you more privileged. let's find a better way.
Our thoughts are unseen hands shaping the people we meet. Whatever we truly think them to be, that's what they'll become for us. ~Richard Cowper
