UNCOMFORTABLE FIRES

As I was watching the “Fire next Time” become reality, I stayed mostly quiet, because I’m now at a point in my life in which this has become a racial “Mobius Strip”

I was getting ready for Kindergarten during the 1967 “Long Hot Summer,” which lead to a conclusion that our nation was heading toward “two societies, one black, one white—separate and unequal.”

25 Years later, I watched Los Angeles burn as the men responsible for Rodney King, the first nationally videotaped assault of a Black man at the hand of law enforcement, were acquitted.

And the roll call has continued:

Amadou Diallo,

Eric Garner,

Philando Castile,

Tamir Rice,

Freddie Gray,

Michael Brown,

The times and dates start blending together.

Black men (and one who didn’t get the chance to become a man), killed first and foremost because they were BLACK.  And those responsible receiving little or no punishment.

The response to these actions and the inevitable acquittals:  marches, riots and yes looting and the destruction of property.

And now George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery.

For all of my life, but especially over the last generation, some White people look in horror at the history occurring before them and immediately start seeking out the Black people they know—coworker, high school or college friends, rec team teammates—and start speaking the predictable banalities of shock and contrition, usually followed by “what can we do to change things?”

Some try to “educate” themselves by reading books and letting their children know about Martin Luther King, Jr. Malcolm X., Hank Aaron, Barack Obama, Rosa Parks, Harriet Tubman and feel like they are doing their part to raise their children to love, be unbiased and with no prejudice.

To me, at this point, all I see is White folks “checking the right boxes” so they can feel good about themselves.

Because the simply reality is that unless there is a SYSTEMIC change, we’re going to be back on that Mobius Strip. The world we live in is now a world in which everyone has a camera and these acts are not going to be ignored anymore because they will be broadcasted on Facebook, Twitter, and the growing panoply of social media platforms.

Whether it’s a cop choking out the life of a Black suspect, or a “Becky” calling 911 because a Black birdwatcher had the audacity to ask her to obey the rules, the micro aggressions that are all part of the subtle, covert racism woven into the history of this country are starting to be shown in high definition video.  And the inevitable response will continue to occur again and again.

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Which means that unless we start working on solutions yesterday, this cycle is going to start all over again, growing bigger with each incident.

Currently there is a lot of discussion about “uncomfortable conversations,” and that term has always fascinated me, because who are they “uncomfortable” for?

You want to know what uncomfortable is?

• Being in the 4th Grade and opening up your social studies book and seeing the words “Jigaboo” “Spearchucker,” and everybody’s favorite “N” word littering the chapter about Africa.
• Being a high school sophomore and finding out that you have a new nickname after friends had been watching Tarzan over the weekend: “Bomba.” When you tell them it has to end, they reluctantly stop, but there is a neat drawing in your yearbook with the bone-in-hair native wishing Bomba a great summer!
• Getting an offer for what you consider your dream job, working in the newsroom at the #1 station in your city, and wondering if the primary reason you got the position was because it became public knowledge that management at that station put on a performance in blackface and it had very few Black reporters and staff.        
• Having a U. S. Customs agent finger her holster as she ask you about the White woman in the back of your car, and having your brother and sister-in-law have to produce their marriage certificate to show that she was indeed married to one of the Black men in the car. We laugh about it now, but I’ve always wondered what would have happened if they had decided to leave their marriage certificate in Canada.  
• Being pulled over in Longview by a State Trooper who wanted a rundown of every city you stopped in during a vacation down the coast, and wanted to know where you worked.
• Having the sales clerk at the store in Alderwood Mall ignore you and your fiancé as you were shopping for your engagement ring, not once, but three times. I still joke that I should have had my wife (who is White) be the person to call the clerk over.
• Calling the police about the downstairs neighbor being attacked and beaten by their boyfriend, and having those police question you and ask if there was a reason you stopped attacking the woman?
• Having a parent of one of your bosses come up to you and praise you on all the work you’ve done to make the world a better place—and you having to point to the other Black man in the room and explain that is the man you want to praise.
• And having Prius driving, Obama voting White folks talk about wanting diversity—but only if it doesn’t affect their children.

THAT IS UNCOMFORABLE. And understand: every BLACK PERSON and PERSON OF COLOR has had similar “uncomfortable moments,” and those who claim they haven’t—I call “shenanigans!”

THAT IS UNCOMFORTABLE BY A FACTOR OF SAY 10,000 over the conversation you want to have with me (or any other Black person) about the privilege you have enjoyed all your lives, regardless of your economic position, and what you can do about it.  

So for now, if you want to share your discomfort—and understand, there are a lot of White folk who will tell you that have nothing to feel uncomfortable about and start talking about “not seeing color” of “All Lives Matter” as they say if only “those people” knew how to act—I think it’s time to stop seeking absolution from me and other people of color.

Start having those uncomfortable conversations with your parents about how they felt about school busing back in the day (and now), or about how they reacted when the first family of color moved into the neighborhood you grew up in.

It’s time to have the conversation with the friend who says “these folks need to stop killing each other in Chicago and LA before we do anything for them”

You need to call out the folks who get angrier about being inconvenienced by these protestors than they are about the act that caused the protests.

And finally, you need to take some quiet time to wonder about some of the things you have done, past and present, that have perpetuated the very things you’re asking for my help to understand and solve. Because, you see at the end of the day, Dr. King, in his letter from the Birmingham Jail was right:

“I must confess that over the last few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Council-er or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can’t agree with your methods of direct action;” who paternalistically feels he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by the myth of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a “more convenient season.”

Once you’ve had those conversations, give me a call.

Until Next Time.