I am going to make this short and sweet because I am TIRED. And the more that I write, the more that I will cry.
It's so bizarre to me that even in the midst of the second deadliest pandemic, police brutality still reigns supreme. White supremacy still reigns supreme. Even after over 400 years of exploitation, Black people still can't rest in peace. But then again, we are still forced to...rest in peace.
The modern-day lynching of Black men and women has been happening for quite some time now, but the lynching that has occurred these past few months has been weighing heavily on the Black community. You mean to tell me that on top of not trying to catch the Rona-19 and trying to socially distance ourselves from other people, we have to worry about not getting executed, too? We can't go for a jog without looking suspicious. We can't cash a check without looking suspicious. We can't even sleep in our bed with our partner without looking suspicious.
In addition to dealing with this exhausting disease that we call whiteness, we sometimes have to deal with anti-black Black people or POC who bring up the irrelevant theory of "Black on Black crime" or tells you that you shouldn't be crying because you didn't even know the Black man or woman who was murdered by White folks. Does any of that even matter? How does that justify the killing of unarmed Black people? How does not knowing someone not give you the right to feel? If any of you have toxic people like this in your life or on your social media, do yourself a favor and remove them. Don't even argue with them or try to help them understand. They will never understand and that's only emotional labor for you. They also don't understand that the biggest and deadliest gang in AmeriKKKa is police officers. It has always been that way. The second deadliest gang is white people who use police officers as a weapon against Black people.
If you are a Black person mourning the loss...the murder of #AhmaudArbery, #SeanReed, #BreonnaTaylor, #GeorgeFloyd, and so many others that we may not know about, that's completely normal! Go ahead and mourn! If you need to call out from work, do that. If you need to lay in bed all day and binge-watch Netflix, do that. We need to normalize mourning the loss of innocent Black lives because if we don't, the world will continue to see Black bodies as disposable. If we don't mourn, we will suddenly become immune to the killing of Black people and begin to picture ourselves or people that we love being murdered. Most importantly, if we don't mourn and if we suppress these feelings of sadness, hurt, frustration, and anxiety, both our physical and mental health will fail. Racism is physically and mentally killing Black people, and there is data to prove that. I've cited one article below for your reference.
That said, Dear Black people- please mourn. Find your safe space and mourn.
Article
Williams, D. R., Lawrence, J. A., Davis, B.A., & Vu, C. (2019). Understanding how discrimination can affect health. Health Services Research, 54, 1374-1388. doi: 10.1111/1475-6773.13222