(by @mater.mortem on Instagram)
The time has come once again to address an issue that doesn’t relate to Halloween, but is truly scary.
As a horror fan, I can think of many terrifying things. Just last night I shared the monster from my scariest childhood nightmare. The day before that I talked about a chainsaw-wielding maniac. But I don’t think there can possibly be a more horrifying concept in the world than having to fear for your life on a daily basis, solely for existing as a black individual.
As a white woman, I obviously can’t even begin to comprehend what it feels like, to experience the oppression and venom that black people have been forced to deal with, on a daily basis, for so long. But another thing I simply can’t comprehend is why such a horrific, ugly attitude toward our fellow human beings exists in the first place.
I grew up in a mostly white area. I was an only child with a strict Republican father. I can’t even recall how old I was before I had a classmate of color. But even as a small child with very little exposure to different types of people, the idea that some people were white and some people were black didn’t phase me any more than the fact that the girl sitting next to me in kindergarten may have had blonde hair vs. my brunette. It was just a fact of life. There were people with dark skin and people with light skin, and people in between, etc. I never thought twice about it, and it certainly never occurred to me, and still hasn’t, to think badly of anyone for having a different physical attribute than me.
Meanwhile, while I, as a small child, could grasp that concept with no real second thoughts, there are people in this world, in the year 2020, some of them given guns and badges, swearing to protect all people, who not only hate black people, but are needlessly attacking them, and in some cases, brutally murdering them.
(Art by @thisissianellis on Instagram)
It should go without saying at this point, but this is truly not okay. It’s in no way comparable, but I think about the times I felt bullied, possibly even threatened, in my younger years over not liking the same things as my peers. That feeling of being afraid to go to school because you never knew what the mean kids might say or do...and then I think of the fact that, there are people out there, every day, who are likely afraid to just exist in the world because on any given day, someone who doesn’t like the color of their skin, something they were born with and should be proud of, could decide they’ve done something wrong and cause their life to end. Look at all these cases. So many senseless deaths, caused by nothing more than people just going about their daily lives. I can’t even fathom the anxiety it must cause in a person, to feel that you’re never 100% safe in the world. To have to worry about how you look or how you move when out and about, for fear that someone may interpret you as “dangerous” and have you, at the very least, stopped and frisked, or in a sadly common worst-case scenario, killed.
This needs to stop, and it’s incredibly sad that there have been this many deaths before any real change has come about. I remember, at a young age, learning about slavery, and Martin Luther King Jr., in school, commemorating Black History Month, and thinking it was incredible how far black people and black culture have come. But the sad truth is, it seems the world is not as changed as I thought it was in my younger, more naive years. I only hope that this recent, awful murder of George Floyd will at last be the final straw. It is time for all of us to come together and fight this horrible monster known as racism.
It’s time for people to just be able to live, without fear of brutality due to the color of their skin.
(By @blackveiltattoo on Instagram)
Stay spooky, my friends. And stand in solidarity.
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