Ken Rudich
Jul 22, 2017 · 1 min read

You seem to be using anti-violence sentiment as synonymous or interchangeable with the term “antiblackness.” I would speculate that, more often than not, the phrase “We have to do something” is focused on trying to curb the violence — and the spread of violence — than promote antiblackness. It takes a stretch of imagination to confuse these two in the manner displayed by this article.

Unfortunately, this form of editorializing taints the objectivity of a piece that could otherwise be deemed as reasonably objective and useful. The discussion about education, employment and mental health concerns is well within the bounds of fair, objective and reasonable. These issues would have been a great place to begin…and end.

Instead, you became just another in a long procession of people intent on delivering what has become a well-worn and now hackneyed message: white people are the evil root of all that ills the black community.

Saying it yet again makes it no more or less true. Saying it yet again doesn’t add to some white conversion rate. Saying it yet again doesn’t do anything to advance the conversation or raise the level of civility that surrounds it.

I can only imagine how many once sympathetic white people have now become inured to hearing it. It’s part of the human condition for fatigue to set in after a while. Especially when it’s used as blacksplaining, to quell open discussion rather than encourage it.

    Ken Rudich

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