It is hurtful to be blamed for something you didn’t do. To be judged by a category you fall in
It is hurtful to be blamed for something you didn’t do. To be judged by a category you fall in to. It feels unjust. Why should I feel bad for the sins of others? This is the reaction I’ve had since the beginning of #blacklivesmatter and the conversation around White Privilege. I am not racist. I didn’t found America or its institutions or its policies. Why am I all the sudden in trouble for the actions of cops I don’t know and in neighborhoods I’ve never been to and in situations I can’t imagine. . Not to mention: I love this country. I love John Adams and history and farms and these things have charmed me since I was a kid. Meaning: they are tied to my identity. And no one wants the nostalgic building blocks of identity to be knocked out from underneath. . But the truth is the truth is the truth is complicated. And I live from a perspective that is not universally experienced. I live on one golden road under the false pretense that all are on my road too. . I’m sitting here feeling unjustly criticized, hurt and annoyed …while unarmed black men are being shot in the streets. While black families are marching. While they are told to stay peaceful, and then reprimanded for kneeling during the national anthem. While the median black household in America still has only 8 percent of the wealth of the median white household. . I’m over here annoyed. . I read a quote that embarrassed me. ‘When you’re accustomed to privilege, equality can feel like oppression.’ . The truth didn’t land until I had a conversation with a black friend of mine. . He is a handsome software guy from the South. He has lots of white friends. He has a kind smile that could launch ships. I thought he was just a quiet guy who kept to himself and quietly laughed at my jokes. . Then, finally, he told me his story. He told me that he hides inside himself because of hurt and pain and anger. He was carrying this weight around, forcing a smile, living each day possessed by pain. Terrified by his own anger. . One day he told me a few stories. (Forgive me my friend for paraphrasing you, because my memory is shit): . “I mentor some black kids. I want to show them a good example. Be there for them. I had a 9 year old boy, great kid, who I told to trust white people, tell me that his friends at school told him not to trust them.’ I said 'why’d they tell you that?’ He said, 'because white people are afraid of me.’ A 9 year old boy. Being told that he is scary. And I feel like I can’t mentor him because I have so much anger coiled up. And kids absorb it. It’s not simply that I think white people get second chances, third chances.. it’s that I never got a first chance. I came into this world a suspect. When I run in the park, I can’t run too close to a white woman because she’ll be frightened. I can’t go for a run at night. I can’t walk alone in a neighborhood. It’s the feeling that all eyes are on you. Questioning. Assessing. To feel like the world doesn’t trust you, thinks you’re dangerous, is poisonous to the soul. Imagine that. You probably haven’t. . "Those small things add up. And then the big ones land too hard. When I get pulled over, not if but when, I am frightened. When you’re pulled over, you’re annoyed. You give him sass. When another black body dies at the hands of the police, my other black friends text me, call me. We check on each other. We cry together. We talk about our anger and helplessness.” . "Not one of my white friends calls me. Texts me. And I thought these were my best friends. But not one asks. Makes me feel more alone. More separated. More invisible. If I had a white friend say, 'Are you ok? I’m here.’ It wouldn’t matter what he said after that. He can’t know, but he can suffer with me. I just want him to see me. To believe me when I say I’m hurting.” . I was crying. I realized I had never asked my black friends if they were ok. I’d been so busy defending my innocence, that I never reached out in love to the hurting. Their pain felt like an indictment of me, and so I turned away. How selfish. How can a decent man turn from his hurting brother to save his comfort? . And what I want you to know… is that after this conversation with my friend, he changed. He came alive. He was bright and large and playful and light on his feet. He finally felt safe around me. If not completely understood, befriended. He came alive because he felt safe. . Not knowing what to say or how to fix it, I think so many of us white folks get quiet. We wait it out, hoping we can slip back into the fiction of post-racial America we remembered in the 90s. Of course that wasn’t real. But we were lulled to slumber in a world without cell-phone cameras in black neighborhoods. . I don’t know what to say or do. But I am here. I cannot know what it is like to be you. But I can listen and I can be a better friend. And I should make sacrifices. I love you. And I’m sorry for my frightened selfishness. For my blindness, at first unconscious, and then chosen. . : @ulysses_o #blacklivesmatter . Check out the Insta-essays at @crusselsprouts -- source link