Ferguson

If you follow this blog, you know it sometimes comes in spurts. My work is seasonal. I find myself in time crunches and then with space. When I get breathing room, I'll sometimes write a chunk and schedule posts to be published in advance. This post was written on Sunday Sept. 14, 2014. Today, it's been well over 30 days since a cop shot Michael Brown in Ferguson, MO. In the intervening time, like so many of us, I've watched, I've supported activist campaigns, and been surprised at my own unending shock. Why be shocked that Black men are being hunted? Hasn't that been the case since Black bodies were brought over the Atlantic as slaves?

And yet, I keep hoping for more. As a white woman, I keep hoping to see white people, white government officials, white police officers behave as humans. Recognize the humanity of Black people, like Michael Brown, and now his family rightfully demanding accountability.

Instead, on Facebook, I read white friends begging for patience and understanding for the police.

I read Black friends expressing their fear for their children's survival.

So much has been written and well. There have been multitudes of compelling articles, particularly by authors of color, writing about experiences of white friends not believing the police harass or that racism is real and current. And I keep wondering, what will it take for white people to get it? 

I wondered when Troy Davis was killed.

I wondered when Tookie Williams was killed.

I wonder every time another person of color is killed.

Evidence amply demonstrates the brutal, fatal, murderous reality of systemic racism. Obviously, that's not enough. People operate from emotion more often than fact. What do white people have to *feel* to absorb the reality of Black experience?

I think that white people are feeling fear. And it's absurd, because the reality is that white supremacy and racism is creating TERROR for people of color. But isn't that often the case? The abuser lashes out over fear. The United States, harbinger of international power, militarily intervenes due to fear (founded or likely not). I think white people fear respecting people of color. I think white people fear that accountability means acknowledging slavery, lynchings, and the on-going incarnation of racism in our grandparents, parents, and ourselves. I don't think that white people know how to reconcile these horrors in people they love let alone themselves. I think this is the political and personal work that we have to do to evolve. 

I'm grappling with a lot of latent fear myself and finding where it limits me. The antidote has surprised me: it's loving myself. The gentler and more patient I am with myself, the less I fear being vulnerable, intimate, and exposed. This kindness is asking me to be stronger and more self-confident. 

I don't know how to enact this type of emotional work on a national scale. I hear that it sounds woo and perhaps a bit weak. Maybe it is-- there's a strong chance that I'm absolutely wrong. 

I am invested. I want hope for myself to be a different presence. I want space for the people I love, many of them people of color, to feel safe and seen.