We're in this together, Truth will Save America: Kitiki #410
Democracy will not Die in Brightness
“You can’t handle the truth.” I said that July of last year. I’m saying it again as we deal with a new president, a normalization of rolling over, and a call to order that has not resounded so loudly since Lincoln spoke in Gettysburg. Words like weaponize and polarize had come to shade our politics and the checks and balances it was built upon in a way democracy seems to be dying.
With all the misinformation circulating, two truths resound: I’m hurt and I’m afraid. The truth hurts and the fear smothers.
I grew up in the south during the 60s. I went to a predominantly white college where I remember being call the n-word, and heard “Archie is a nice guy, but he knows his place.” Recently with all the vitriol weaponizing the spectrum from Twitter to Tik-Tok the memory of a cross being burned on my college door room surfaced. I’ve told this story before, being the only black who lived in this dorm. The person who came to my defense was someone who didn’t look like me. He was my roommate. He was Jewish. He’d been discriminated against before in America. Not because of how he looked but because of his faith. He stood up for me. Can you handle that truth?
Stories like that morphed me into a figure that has battled the subterfuge of insidious indignation for being who I am. Pommeled by lies, ignoring truths, I was surreptitiously assimilated until one day I finally realized being called a “credit to your race” was an insult. Today about 20 percent of Republicans are non-white. Being told that America is not a racist country as Senator Tim Scott [R – SC] stated at the Republican National Convention last year was hard to handle, especially when very few of the people at the convention looked like him or me. Over a year has passed. Is he blind or brainwashed? Does he not know history?
But many black people believe what he said.
Despite the fact people of color struggle daily for an identity to be equal, to put food on the table, we never seem good enough to claim a right that was never fully ours to begin with. Being three-fifths a person at the country’s beginning, we don’t even know what to call ourselves. Though we bleed the same blood, there is no guarantee we’ll get the same treatment for our wounds no matter how progressive our white friends think they are. They will never know what black pain is, like I will never know what white privilege is. They will never know that even Hitler couldn’t accept the one-drop rule eugenicist accepted in America. However, “The dream of a white, blond-haired, blue-eyed ‘master race’ didn’t originate with Adolf Hitler. This idea was implemented in the United States decades before Hitler rose to power by American eugenicists, who sterilized tens of thousands of Americans through the 1970s, barred the marriage of thousands, and segregated others.
“The Jim Crow laws, which lasted from the post-Civil War era until around 1968 … were passed to legalize the marginalization of Black Americans,” and “were also of great interest to Hitler. His lawyers “perfected” them to create the Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor and the Reich Citizenship Law. Together, these were known as the Nuremberg Laws, and they laid the legal groundwork for the persecution of Jewish people during the Holocaust.”[1]
Amidst all the rioting that has not stopped, as we saw in Charlotteville, the streets after George Floyd, among the chants of “we will not be replaced,” or on the steps of the Capitol on January 6th. The fear is there. It’s obvious people don’t want to talk about the real issue here. Racism exists. Will Smith once said, “Racism isn’t new, it’s being filmed.” [2] Putting professors like Dr. Stacey Patton on a watchlist [3] because of their passion for the truth. Racism exists.
I don’t want to say I’m angry. I want to control the narrative so I’d rather say I’m hurt. I’m hurt because my identity has been lost. I feel like I’m nobody because I’m not sure who I am. And when you don’t know who you are how can you relate to others honestly? If other people define you, you are forever their pawn.
I’m also afraid because of the lie. I’m afraid admitting the truth, particularly in any openly reviewed windowpane or forum like social media might get me fired or disciplined.[4] Once you are out of the hole, you can never ever go back into it. Once you have spoken the words, or the words have been heard, you can never unspeak or unhear them.
People lie. That hurts. Trust is irreparable. Our nation won’t heal until we admit its mistakes, accept the shit that happens and deal with it to heal it. Otherwise, wounds will fester and continue to kill.
So, the question becomes, not can America handle the truth, but rather, can we?
Whether it’s about racism, the Epstein files or the true relationship between Putin and the president as Senator Tom Tillis [R – NC] points out.[5] But first we have to tell the truth. It’s the only way we can be seen. And until we do, America will remain racist for some of us, and I’m sorry I can’t agree with Senator Scott, but Lady Liberty is crying for your lie.
[1] How U.S. Eugenics Policies and Racial Laws Inspired Adolf Hitler – Adriana Allegri
[2] Will Smith Says Racism Isn’t New, It’s Just Being Filmed
[3] Dr. Stacey Patton - Professor Watchlist
[4] A Broad Wave of Firings Followed Charlie Kirk’s Assassination - The New York Times
[5] GOP Senator Compares Trump Deal to Communism, “You’re Going to Have to Explain”