Déjà vu. We’ve all experienced it, one time or another. Most people have learned to shake it off with the acknowledgment of that simple French phrase. When you begin to have the same nightmarish déjà vu as that of the collective black experience, though, you don’t just shake it off; it follows you around and you’ll eventually develop PTSD. Many of us have been walking around with PTSD since we can remember, and some don’t even realize it. We, the black people in America, are ‘all shook up’ and ready to explode like an unopened soda.
It appears, like painful contractions, that the time period between each [documented] killing of an African American by the hands of a police officer and/or a racist gets shorter and shorter. And I mean, just think about how many deaths have occurred that weren’t captured on film or circulated by social media. The names we do know, we repeat as often as possible; not only out of respect and remembrance but also to remind us how far away we are from a “post-racist society”. Remember that moment when that phrase became popular? The black community literally chuckled at the ridiculousness of that notion.
What is it with police officers and black people, you may ask? Historically, the early police officers in colonial America started out as “slave patrols” to keep control of the slave population. After the Civil War, groups like the KKK and local militia took on the job and were more violent than their predecessors. And though many city police departments “unified” in the mid-to-late 1800s under reformed ideals, you must wonder how many of the original ideals survived the evolution of the police department.
Black Americans carry a heavy load on our shoulders, which has been passed down generationally from our ancestors. Our ancestors had to carry the weight of building a nation after being forcibly removed from their own native land. They were ripped from their spouses, children, siblings and parents. They were pit against one another in a hierarchical system during slavery that American businesses today were modeled after. They had to grasp onto their culture for dear life, only to have it be lost, forgotten, stolen and appropriated. In short, we have had to watch our brothers and sisters being killed for centuries while enduring systemic racism, that by design seemed like it would never let up.
The Civil Rights Movement was a huge movement that shifted America into a new era, but there was always much more work to be done— work that would take generations. Our community has a long history of coming together in a crisis. After being in crisis mode for so long, however, it feels like we had become desensitized and maybe, used to being uncomfortable. We got used to what it meant to be black in America.
Growing up in the 90’s and 2000’s, I could easily spit off black facts, as was a requirement while living in a predominantly black county. I grew up in a black school system in Dekalb County, the 2nd most affluent black county in America (second to Prince Georges County, where I currently live). Over the years, my teachers made it their business to devote a section of their curriculum to recognize and acknowledge black excellence. I never wanted to be anything other than black. In fact, when I saw a Civil Rights documentary in maybe the 2nd grade, I was thoroughly confused as to why everyone couldn’t see what I could see all around me: Beautiful black royalty. The focus on learning our past was to be proud of who we were and the hardship we faced to “get here”. The phrase “get here” was thrown around like we were at the destination of equality. Nevertheless, I was just glad to have, what I felt at the time, was a fair shot at life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Each generation has had a defining moment to step into their power. For Millennials— it’s time. It’s on us. We look at this moment that we’re in and see a familiar unrest in the black community. Our collective grief (all 5 stages of it) has been tainted by a corrupt system that stealthily perpetuates some of the violence and property destruction that we see on video. Historically, Black movements and organizations that were willing to aggressively fight for basic human rights for blacks without the promise of “peaceful protests” have been deemed militant and un-American. What I was taught about the Civil Rights movement always centered on the work of Dr. MLK, the Montgomery Bus Boycotts, sit-ins and marches. The works and teachings of minds like Malcolm X and the ideals of The Black Panther Party, though, were only presented as opposing opinions about the way our civil rights should have been handled. And though Spike Lee’s Malcolm X dropped in 1992, I wasn’t old enough to see the movie in its entirety and understand his journey and his beliefs until much later. Before his assassination, Malcom implored Black Americans to create and pour into black businesses, elect black leaders for our communities, and to leave religion out of the effort to keep everyone unified under a common goal. His push for Black Nationalism seemed to be a drastic measure for many searching for a path to change at that time.
As a child and adolescent, it wasn’t pressed upon me to give back to the black community in school. It was more like, “fight for what you believe in”, coupled with teaching us pride in the ways that we had changed the world as inventors, artists and activists. I didn’t learn the importance of supporting black businesses and organizations and what it meant for my role in the community until I got to Howard University. During freshman week, it was a requirement to take a week-long entrepreneurship seminar (honestly, I’m pretty sure I fell asleep a few times, but I digress). Howard knew that it was imperative to begin with the importance of creating our own businesses and taking care of our own.
It’s time that a new movement was birthed, and let me clarify: By that, I mean a new approach. I see us; we are marching in unity with our allies and that’s a beautiful thing. But is it...progressive? Or does it seem too familiar? We now know that protests alone don’t remedy the issues with structural racism. Racism is a multi-dimensional monster that rears its ugly head interpersonally, internally and structurally. According to racialequitytools.org, structural racism is a system in which public policies, institutional practices, cultural representations, and other norms work in carious, often reinforcing ways to perpetuate racial group inequity. The reality of structural racialization is proven by the contrast of outcomes of family wealth, educational advancement, health or life span as it relates to race of the community.
In order to take a real step towards racial equity in America, people of color and our allies must understand “systems thinking”. Systems thinking analyzes the hierarchy of structures that give or take opportunity from specified groups of people, the timing of the interaction between these structures and the correlation that exists between them. Systems thinking encourages us to look at solutions as being as multi-dimensional as racism is. If we strategize and communicate with each other about multi-dimensional solutions, the next shift in our world can begin. It is important, as individuals, to find where we fit in the social change ecosystem. What is your role?
Once we know our individual roles, I believe the real work begins. You can start by ask yourself these questions: How can I use my role to incite change? How does my chosen issue interconnect with the other issues stemming from structural racialization? Racism must be attacked on all fronts for there to be a truly lasting change in the differing outcomes of opportunities for the oppressed in America. We’re on the move. You coming?
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