the strength that black Americans have to continue to thrive in any environment even with that burden of fear resting upon you?
And people are tired. People are tired of having to worry about it. People are tired of having to pretend that things are okay to their white counter-parts even when they’re not. Behind closed-doors parents are having conversations just like what we saw in “Blackish”. What are parents supposed to say when their ten-year old comes to them and asks, “Why is this happening to us?” Parents who are afraid that their teenagers who feel the need to fight the injustice are going to get involved in risky situations like protesting. Unfortunately, even the peaceful protests don’t always stay that way as we saw evident in Ferguson, MO. Either way there is concern and fear.
Regardless of how hard some of us have worked to have a profession and income to leave “bad” neighborhoods behind, we can never remove our color. And because we’re black (or brown) we’re afraid.
I have sleepless nights about what my brown-skinned children are going to face and I don’t even have children yet! I feel emotionally challenged because this is a concern that even those closest to me don’t entirely understand. My white brother won’t have to deal with this fear and won’t experience it because his child is white. I’m not bitter about it; I simply understand it’s a privilege that comes with his skin tone. Yet it’s a fear that I think about on a rather consistent basis.
Now I don’t mean to perpetuate fear, I just want to acknowledge what already exists. And I’m certainly not claiming that we should be afraid of all police officers. I know several personally who are wonderful people. I also pray for their safety because they willingly choose to put themselves in potentially dangerous situations on a daily basis.
However, while one can’t hide in fear it’s important to have a healthy sense of it! As a woman, I wouldn’t park in the dark shadows of a parking lot and then walk to my car alone. Healthy fear and common sense taught me that. Just as my mom who noticed I was an outgoing child at two, saw that I had virtually no fear of strangers; and she knew it was important to teach me a healthy fear of them. I can’t tell you how many kidnapping stories I heard and to this day (yes 30 some years later, I still am terrified of the dark!)
