Culture

Systemic Racism Is Exhausting Black People. Here's What We Need


 

Tired isn’t even the word.

The same cycle is repeating itself yet again. People protest police brutality, politicians make promises, police continue with business as usual, and eventually another officer, vigilante, or white person afflicted with racism acts in ways that stoke outrage and anger.

Black people cry. Black people scream. Black people go to bed feeling anything but safe. Black people take to the streets. We yell out for solidarity. We argue on social media with apathetic or ignorant acquaintances and family members. We huddle in group chats offering consolation between some of our closest friends. We witness as some of the people in our lives remain silent. We educate our youth about the nature of racial violence and the history of racism in this country, and what they may need to do to keep themselves as safe as possible. On occasion, we get texts and emails from well-meaning white friends, coworkers, and people we haven’t spoken to in years, asking us how we are doing, sometimes in ways that feel too familiar or border on invasive.

And for Black LGBTQ+ people, the exhaustion compounds when the conversation isn’t inclusive of the ways that Black queer, trans and gender nonconforming people experience violence from a confluence of police officers, bigots, and even people within our communities who see our dual identities as a liability rather than as causes for love and celebration. It’s sighing upon recognition of people who uncritically post about June being Pride Month, with images emblazoned in rainbows, yet who remain conspicuously quiet about Black lives. It’s seeing outrage about the killing of George Floyd and Ahmaud Arbery, but little to no words about Breonna Taylor or Tony McDade.

I’m not the only one who is tired. These sad events harken back to the way things were in 2014 and 2015, when one Black person after another became a hashtag, when police unleashed tear gas and military-grade gear on protesters in Ferguson, Missouri, when it took waves of protest for police departments and public officials to even acknowledge the miscarriage of justice at hand. And yet here we are again, in the same situation, over five years later.

It’s tiring. Yet still, Black people push through to take care of our families, put on a brave face and voice for virtual work meetings (if we even have a job right now), run essential errands and do our best to tend to our spiritual, mental, and emotional well-being despite knowing full well that we are not feeling okay or up to doing anything.

Add the reality of the coronavirus pandemic, and it almost becomes too much to think about.

Before the steady drumbeat of news about anti-Black injustices, people watched at home as news emerged that Black and Latinx people were being hit hardest by COVID-19, as a byproduct of decades of systemic racism. Stark disparities mean that some people can’t socially distance because they themselves live in overcrowded home situations, or because they’re overrepresented within what a repressive presidential administration calls a “human capital stock” of essential workers who must face down uncertainty, fear, and possible illness in order to provide for their families.

Because of food deserts, Black people may have a harder time accessing fresh food. Because of income disparities, they may have issues attaining the level of healthcare they need. And because Black people face an unemployment rate at least twice that of white Americans in many states, they’re disproportionately caught in the crosshairs of massive layoffs.

Even as Black people tried to maintain safety and well-being amid the pandemic, bands of ignorant white people stood bearing guns and racist and anti-semitic signs at protests at state capitals and city squares across the country, all because they wanted to go get a haircut or eat their favorite cheeseburger in the name of “freedom” before public health experts said it was OK. Police officers stood by with extreme restraint, without pushing back, without unloading tear gas or pepper spray, as angry white people shouted in their faces, all of it supported by a president who fanned the flames by tweeting to “liberate” states from shelter-at-home orders.

Yet when it came time for protests in the name of Black lives, the double standard became quickly apparent. Before any white supremacists began attempting to escalate tensions, and before any rioting broke out from people who had reached their limit of grief and rage, police often turned up the heat on protesters — pushing them, beating them, and arresting them. Witnessing that, whether it be from the front lines or on the front room television, is an exercise in exasperation.

We were already tired. Perhaps that’s the point of systemic racism: to exhaust, distract, derail and dehumanize people who are inherently worthy of living with the same peace and prosperity as their white counterparts. Pushing forward isn’t only an act of resistance, but often one borne out of necessity, even when grief and exhaustion sets in, because there’s still something to be said for managing to survive. But for a people who have managed to survive for decades under the gun of discrimination and abuse, survival isn’t enough anymore. It’s about the ability to thrive, to not worry about whether or not a routine trip will result in a fatal encounter with police, or with a racist who goes out of their way to tell a Black person that they don’t belong where they are.



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