[UPDATE: Postscript and link to follow up chruch service at the end of this post]
I was interviewed by my church last week about the issue of racism.
This was a really hard subject for me to discuss as it’s something I’ve spent my whole life trying to cover up.
I’m not proud of this nor do I blame anyone. It’s just I’ve realised how incredibly adept and masterful I’ve become in this covering up process.
My brother wrote a powerful post following the Black Lives Matter marches (see beneath).
I guess I’m just sad that it has come to this and harbour a sense of shame that it has been something that has happened my whole life. Whether it has been my survival instincts or just how I needed to navigate life. It makes me sad.
There is a "however" though... something else...
... I believe that this sadness does not have the last word on this matter. Instead I choose to believe that hope has the last word on this... and faith is all I have to see this hope right now.
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I’m a lighter shade of brown than George Floyd, Breonna Taylor Ahmaud Arbery. I’ve probably never faced the intensity of abuse they had in their lives and I'm still alive. So why am I feeling so raw?
Even as I’m
writing this, I can feel the judgement of others, this is why I don't
post about racism. The truth is I've had so many racist experiences
during my lifetime that I can't possibly write them all down here. I
would dearly love to be heard but I feel that what I say will fall on
very deaf ears, like it has time after time. I don’t have the platform
that some of you who I’ve known for an age have.
I’ve experienced little incidents and microaggressions since probably the first day I went to school. From the teachers who thought I was not as intelligent as others with other skin tones and smiles turning to closed pursed lips, to those that tried to give me a chance to speak only to be ridiculed by my fellow classmates. By trying to say something, I’m normally talked over with a, "that doesn't happen rhetoric". This has been going on for so long that I almost stopped trying.
I'm exhausted from trying to make my voice heard. I have tried to say things on various platforms but how many have ever liked, shared or even read what I have to say? I have not been the popular person, the person who is sought out at the party, when there is a gathering is one of the first people make a beeline for or even on here, when something is important to me ever paid attention to?
The legal definition of justice is to act or to treat an individual justly or fairly, meaning that everyone should be treated the same way, independent of their race, ethnicity, creed, socioeconomic background, sexual orientation, or gender. Essentially, this means that everyone must receive the same treatment regardless of who they are. But I feel that this does not apply to me because of who I am. Let me make one thing crystal clear: I'm NOT feeling sorry for myself in the slightest, in fact I despise myself for even trying to say something because I feel I’m on a hiding to nothing. Yet there is that little voice that says please say something it deserves to be heard. That voice is trampled on by those that I thought would help. This is why I feel I have no voice and yet there is hope that some of you are in a more privileged position than me would at least back me, but from past experience I doubt that this is the case.
Yesterday those that protested did a wonderful thing: you risked your health for something that has been trying to be said for years, however will you still say Black Lives Matter, tomorrow, next, week, month, year, decade etc? I’ve been wanting change since a policeman spat at the feet of my father when I was probably only four or five, I can still see the look of horror and disbelief that it happened. He was holding my hand at the time. I have been told on the few times I have shared this, that this type of thing does not happen including adults in positions of responsibility.
To answer the big one. I lost my father last year and my elderly mother who is vulnerable and not in the best of health. I do not want to risk any chance of her getting infected by COVID-19 due to my actions in protesting with others. She is my only parent left and I don't want to lose her. You may see this as a cop out, fair enough, my mother too has been on the end of some pretty dreadful racial abuse, that's a story for another time which needs to be listened to.
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[POSTSCRIPT (27th July): there was a follow up church service that can be viewed here]
