Saturday 26 January 2019

Often Misplaced, but The Anger is Real, PT 1


I’ve been asked by a couple of my Caucasian friends and while living in Africa a few of my African friends and other Blacks there from the Diaspora: “Why are African Americans so angry”? Huh, what!? The question took me aback and by surprise by all who asked me. Why me? Who declared me the spokesperson for my people? Who said we were an angry people? Since I’m African American did they see me as an angry person? Am I angry? Geez!

I thought about that question then and even more so as of late. I believe that now I have more insight into my answer. When one of my Caucasian friends asked me a few years ago I was kind of insulted. He wanted to know why African Americans were killing each other. Why was there so much violence in predominantly African American neighborhoods? I told him there were a myriad of reasons, but that I didn’t understand it myself. If this friend was still alive and asked me that same question today, I would be ready to fill in the gaps that were missing in my answer before. Why? Because lately I’ve felt the anger and the hurt. It reminds me of a Bob Marley line, “Who feels it knows it LORD”. Well I feel it, but my acts because of those feelings are constructive and not destructive. Thank GOD I have the coping skills, wisdom, faith and wherewithal to handle the anger and hurt.

Many of our young people, especially the young men don't have that wherewithal. They have not had the chance, the opportunity to experience so called, “home training” to develop the traits needed to deal with what life is hurdling at them. Many are born into stressful environments, and I’m talking about what’s inside the home first before they even encounter the stress of their communities and the world. It’s not their fault what their born into, but it begins to dictate their lives. Domestic violence inside many homes that they witness daily, drug issues with one or both parents, single parents that must spend more time at work than home, young uneducated parents that didn’t have a chance themselves to mature and be educated, and dependence on government systems. Too many have yet to learn that dependence means you’re not independent and that keeps you enslaved mentally and physically on what and who you’re dependent on. Once a person sees themselves as the dependent, then they can blame those that who they depend on. This helps in finger pointing and avoiding responsibility.   

And that’s just inside the home. So, if it’s in the home, where do you take that anger? Who do you trust enough to speak to the anger? Enter peers, gangs, clubs and the like that get where that person is coming from. Ahem, by the way this applies to all people.

Now let’s look at the assault that comes from outside the home environment. The media can be informative, but for a mind and emotions that have not fully developed the media is a dangerous ally. Poor education zoning and supplies, videos, movies, and music that promote and glorify killing. How you are perceived by many as a threat or a bad person because you’re Black. No matter what your lifestyle, educational background, financial status or high falutin neighborhood you’re still seen as Black. When you are driving, when you’re walking, and just going on about your business you can be stopped by the police and these days a few crazed people because for no other reason than that you are Black.

This is stressful y’all! And these things only scratch the surface off of the scab.

The injustices that are so clearly seen almost daily in our communities, the news, the justice system itself makes you cringe. You feel it in your gut. Deep in your gut like someone punched you so hard it makes you grab your stomach and double over. It’s an assault on your senses. You can’t hide from it or look away, because it can be you next or your family or friend. Why, because you're Black in American and many other parts of the world. 

When you carry all that stress and anger if you don’t have coping skills you explode outwardly and inwardly. To ease psychological pain many self -mutilate. Killing your brother or sister is self-mutilation and destroying yourself. This anger, this hurt is way past wanting to break something or hit a wall. It hurts so much that we are hurting each other. It causes destruction of our families and communities.

This is so sad. It hurts to the very core y’all.

So those who become afraid of our own, those that don’t try to understand what’s going on with all this violence begin to villainize many of our young men. Treating them so coldly or like they're invisible, and in turn they will do whatever to be seen. Or is it the reason so many wear the black hoodie, to be invisible? And maybe if so that indivisibility makes them feel safe.

IJS




Part 2 will explain in my opinion the anger in African Americans that Africans don’t understand.




Tuesday 8 January 2019

This May Be You!

Sometimes life can choke your creativity, even cause you to loose your voice. Other times it makes you want to shout so the whole world can hear your screams. Well I've been quiet for too long and I have a few things to say.


The Hate You Carry
You ought to put it down, the hate you carry. It’s heavy, it’s weighing you down the hate you carry.But it seems no matter how heavy it is you can’t put it down because it has become a part of you. To put it down would be for you like cutting off your own arm or leg, plucking out your eye. It’s under your skin and embedded in your brain, your very being. It’s reinforced, validated and told to you that is right by those you trust look up to or look to and respect or you are told to trust and respect.


The hate you carry is so heavy that it has caused a shadow to come over you like a veil.  That veil too is heavy hanging like a coat of mail (a jacket covered with or composed of metal rings or plates used for armor) all around you. Just the thought of lifting that weighty veil to see what’s on the other side is so frightening that you keep your distance from It, so you’re not even tempted to peek out from any side. It’s infectious the hate you carry because you transfer it to your children, family, friends and you even spew it out angrily like an erupting volcano to strangers, you live it.

What’s worse than that is when you choose to hate even though you were taught to love. Something happened that triggered that hate you carry, that weight you picked up. Maybe it was for something that happened in your life that you feel gave you this reason to hate. Was it some form of disrespect, a broken heart, a disparity or a lost opportunity of some kind? Did you allow an event or two in your life to forever poison you?

It can come on easily and hastily in some cases with one bad experience that hate. The hate you carry festers, grows into a monster living inside of you that breathes out a foul fire that not only consumes others, but has consumed you.

It’s not natural, the hate you carry. It was taught to you and those that taught it to you, well they’re carrying the same thing you are and maybe even a little heavier. It’s in school books, the media, some churches, associations and homes the hate you carry. No child is born with it in their heart or mind, it’s taught. When a baby is hungry it does not matter what ethnicity, race, religion or economic class the woman is that nurses it.  A breast is a breast. As a matter of fact, when in need neither does their mother.

The hate you carry is so heavy that you allow it to weigh you down, so far down you’ll let it kill you, take you to the grave instead of putting it down, or at least aside to live. Well maybe to live you may put it aside.  For a blood transfusion or transplant a few may put it aside, but some would choose to die clutching that hate. Many innocent people have died because of the hate you carry, you have condoned murder and even taken part in it either by commission or omission.

It’s like a willful blindness the hate you carry. It doesn’t allow you to see the truth, even If that truth is to your benefit. It doesn’t allow you to see the hurt or suffering it causes others when you hate like that. That blindness covers your eyes so that you can’t see the innocent or innocence. In fact, it has robbed you of your own innocence, your purity. For to be innocent means to be, “lack of guile or corruption”.

It’s not good for you or anyone else the hate you carry. It causes you undue stress which leads to a myriad of diseases and other health challenges. I bet you’ve even lost sleep because of it because you went to bed with vile thoughts.  You can’t enjoy life fully because of the hate you carry because it doesn’t allow you to embrace the full beauty of this world because your hate shades your views. You’re trapped by that hate. You can’t even be the best you could possibly be because you can’t grow. Once you’ve decided not to admit your wrongs or mistakes you’ve stunted your own growth, limited your own vision and choices. But I bet you blame others for that, point your finger at certain groups claiming it’s their fault when in fact it’s you in your own way.

Well I’m sorry for you. You are living a sad existence because you have decided to deny so much of what is good. I don’t hate you, in fact I love you, but I may dislike you because of your ways. It’s not entirely your fault, it’s what you’ve been taught or decided to pick up, but you have a chance to do better, live better and teach others better. I imagine that to change or to try and break free of that hate you carry is frightening since you will have to deny yourself, family and friends, education and this system we live in to rebuild yourself.

You can’t experience the fullness of love because of the hate you carry, so you can’t be embraced, can’t be fully loved because of your coat of mail.

If you let love of all be the root of who you are and what you do, I promise you the world will be a different place and a joy that you’ve never experienced will find its way into your heart.

It’s heavy, put it down, you’ve carried it too long, that hate you carry. Relax! Don’t get angry with me because I’m pointing all this out to you. You don’t know me or most of the people you hate. I have not pointed my finger at any one person, group, race, religion, gender or any social or economic group. In fact, if reading this causes you to be angry at me for this article then you’ve identified yourself.

If you have breath in your body you have the ability to change, to lay down the burden, to peel it off, shed the hate you carry and choose to love. I didn’t say like everybody, agree with everything, but love despite any one’s view, flaws, differences. You have a chance to be a leader of yourself and others.

The choice is yours and one thing is for sure, love or hate you will be held accountable for it as we all will one day.

Peace and blessings