Get it straight from the beginning and don’t let anyone else
try to interpret what I am going to say.
If you have questions as to my meaning, my motivation . my purpose, ASK
ME! These are turbulent and dangerous
times for a young black man. In the past
year these are the events that scare, in the vernacular, the living hell out of
me. A young father goes into Walmart
talking on his phone. He wanders through the toy section (as I have often done)
looking at different TOYS. I can only
guess at his thoughts….and compare them to mine. I am sure he noted prices (as all parents do)
because toys are not inexpensive…even at Walmart. I am sure he was thinking of his children and what he might able to buy with the available money
in his pocket. Lying loose and
unpackaged on a shelf…he sees a TOY
pellet (beebee….in my generation)
gun. Perhaps he had a similar toy
as a young man..who knows? Idly… he
picks up the gun…still strolling through the toy section…still talking on his
phone. Less than five seconds later…he
is dead….shot dead by a cop…..all because of a toy gun! One of my sons works less than a half mile
from the site of John Crawford’s death! The
Grand Jury found his MURDER justifiable!
As
a black woman, as a mother of black sons, I
am outraged. It has been over a year
and my anger has NOT dissipated, has not lessened. This incident which occurred less than 25
miles from my home, my supposed safe place wakes me in the middle of the night…seething
with rage and anger and the emotions are
coalescing into a fury I do NOT want to name. During this past year…so many
other names and faces have been added to this list of senseless, unjustified
deaths…the most recent of which also occurred less than 25 miles away from my
supposed “safe place.” Handling a toy
in a variety story, handling a toy on a playground, changing lanes without
signaling, selling loose cigarettes,
having a missing license plate (in a two plate state)….on and on and on
with a litany of excuses which ultimately fade to one excuse…being BLACK in
America…..because the dead are all black people and the perpetrators are white cops!
I no longer hope for JUSTICE for any of these prematurely dead folk
because I no longer believe in the corrupt social system that masquerades as
JUSTICE in a “civilized “ society.
I
have walked this earth over 70 years and what I see is modern day lynching…a
continuation of the “overseer” from slavery times. I see elements of white society deliberately
blinding themselves to reality, willing to hide behind excuses and obfuscations
so extreme as to be unbelievable. The
excuse I hear is…” I know (fill in the name
blank). He is good people…he wouldn’t do
such a thing!” REALLY? ARE YOU
SURE? I think of the wife who told her
husband (of another race) that one of his friends/coworkers had made an extremely
distasteful verbal pass at her and attempted to grab part of her anatomy. I think of the teacher who had taught one of
the cop perpetrators….who didn’t seem to know that this was the second person killed by this “cop”. I
think of the government official who was
warned about the racist tendencies of his town’s police department and
professed disbelief along with questioning the veracity of the person who
reported the incident. I think about the cop caught on video with
his knees in the back of a young teenage woman in a bikini after he hurled her
to the ground….the same person who pointed a loaded gun at the young teenage men who objected to his
treatment of their friend. I could go on
and on but I won’t.
WAKE UP AMERICA! My greatest fear at this point in my life is
for the safety of my family. I have
witnessed too much, I have heard the current lie “I was afraid for my life!” way
too often
