The Voices in My Head

“Please help me.

“Please… I can’t breathe, sir.”

“… Mama….”

(The final words of George Floyd.)

“Black lives matter.”

“All lives matter.”

“Then Jesus told them this parable: ‘Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Doesn’t he leave the ninety and nine and go after the lost sheep until he finds it?’ We are the ‘ninety and nine,’ and we must focus on the black community right now until they are safe. That doesn’t mean other lives don’t matter. It means black lives matter, too.”

(From a friend’s Facebook post. I have paraphrased somewhat. Thank you, Donna.)

“I pray that you might be shielded from the ignorance and stupidity of racists. And they are racist idiots as well. When a person tries to make every single issue about race they reveal their true nature. Sorry these folks are allowed to breed.”

(From a comment to a Facebook post. The man who wrote this was not addressing me, he was addressing his pastor, who had posted the notion that the family of George Floyd should not be allowed a large funeral, since churches in California are not being allowed to hold large funerals. The man who wrote this ‘prayer’ for his pastor is white. He was referencing me as the ‘racist idiot’ who should not be ‘allowed to breed.’ Oh, and, he thought I was black. So maybe go back and read his ‘prayer’ again and imagine you are reading it as a black woman, knowing that it is targeting you.)

“Burn. it. all. down.”

(In a text from someone I love dearly.)

“But why? Why are they marching? I don’t get it. George Floyd didn’t do anything. Except die. Accidently. He’s not a hero.”

(In a phone call with someone else I love dearly.)

“But I’ve seen black people at my job. I’ve seen black men in business suits. Do you really think they are oppressed?”

(My neighbor, in a conversation in my driveway. I responded with a few anecdotes about my sons being pulled over for Driving While Black. He replied with the following.)

“Your son, the one that comes to visit you here? I’ve met him. He seems like a nice young man.”

(There is profound but very subtle subtext here that black people will recognize right away but may be more difficult for some white people to pick up on. Maybe you’d have to hear my neighbor’s tone to catch it, but let me clarify what he is actually saying: ‘Wow, that’s outrageous that the cops would do that’ [given that your son is a nice young man]. If I had told him that my son was wearing a hoodie and sitting in his car at night, listening to rap music, and he was confronted by police and handcuffed with no probable cause (which is what actually happened), he would not have found it so outrageous. Because there is this history of black people—including my sons—being told they “fit the description…” and white people saying or thinking things like, ‘If you don’t want to be taken for a thug, don’t act/dress/behave like one.’

“The presence of the confederate flag at NASCAR events runs contrary to our commitment to providing a welcoming and inclusive environment for all fans, our competitors and our industry…The display of the confederate flag will be prohibited from all NASCAR events and properties.”

(From the official NASCAR Twitter account.)

“But I bet people can fly their rainbow flags all day.”

(A tweet in reply to the NASCAR announcement. Well, it is Pride month, after all.)

“NASCAR is a sport born in the south if you ban my flag you are stepping on my second Amendment right you also will never make another dime from me I will call all of the products I Buy and tell them Ian will no longer buy their products because of this you can kiss my southern ass”

(A tweet [copied verbatim] in reply to NASCAR—by a guy named George. I don’t know who Ian is. Also not sure how the right to bear arms got caught up in this—unless this guy is arming himself with a confederate flag. I want to say there were more articulate responses than this one in opposition to NASCAR. I want to say that. I did not find any, but then again, I did not read all of the 11.6 thousand tweets in response.)

“This is AMAZING! As a southerner with ancestors who fought for the confederacy, I think that stupid flag belongs in a history book/museum, not being waved around or hung in public as a sign of “pride.” Everyone KNOWS it’s a racist symbol at this point. Good job, @NASCAR!”

(Another tweet in reply to NASCAR’s announcement. There were many, many more like it. I had intended to include some of the more severely racist (you don’t really want to know anyway) tweets in response to NASCAR’s announcement, but with a new feature, Twitter users can “hide” replies. Which, in this case, is a really good thing, and someone whose job it is to hide them is working overtime at the NASCAR social media office right now.)

“Where is the outrage?”

(My friend Kelli posted this on her Facebook page in the first days after George Floyd was killed. This is not the first time she has felt like the lone voice crying out for justice for the black community in the wilderness of social media.)

“This is why I’m not on social media/Facebook.”

“I saw his racist comment but I choose not to engage with people like that.”

“I don’t know what to say, so I don’t say anything. I’m afraid of offending someone.”

“I’ll just be happy when all this is over and we can get back to normal.”

(These are remarks made to me by dear friends—all of them white—in recent weeks. I’ll be happy when “this” is “over,” too—and I pray that comes within the lifetime of my children. Also: I interpret “normal” as “status quo.”)

“You have to be willing to make mistakes. You have to be willing to put your foot in your mouth. Lord knows I put my foot in my mouth enough times when I first became involved in social activism, but that’s how we learn, from our mistakes, and we become better at articulating our message to others.”

(From a really cool gentleman giving an interview on NPR, and I’m sorry I didn’t catch his name but I was driving and listening and crying and hoping. But if somebody else heard it and knows who he is, let me know so I can credit him.)

“white people. do something.”

(On a sign created by Temple University’s Tyler School of Art graduate student Kara Springer. Her work was photographed and published widely online in the days following the death of George Floyd—and she has endured repeated ugly racist comments regarding it. Sigh….)

“We need a break in the action, Kay.”

(My favorite neighbor, after I remarked to him, “Things seem a bit calmer today.” My first response when he said this was to agree. I was worn out and worn down and had been doing my utmost to guide my own race toward love, acceptance and mutual understanding for weeks. But no. A break is exactly what we don’t need right now. We need momentum, and we need it to keep building. Please, for the love of all that is sacred in this “land of the free,” please, I beg of you, my white friends, do not allow us to return to status quo, to “get back to normal.” Because our normal is not everyone’s normal. Please do not turn away this time and return to the life you enjoy without first doing all you can to ensure that everyone has the opportunity to enjoy that same level of safety, security and happiness.

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.”

(Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in his “Letter from Birmingham Jail.” Thank you, Jennette, for reminding me of the beauty of his words.)

Black Lives Matter

(Written in black marker on white paper and taped in a window in my senior community. There are 554 occupied homes here and close to a thousand residents. It is the only sign in the entire community in support of Black Lives Matter.)