Am I Doing Enough to Strive for Equality?

MAY 30, 2020 BY ANDREA AFUA KWAMYA

I WAS ALWAYS AN OVER-EMPATHIZER

Most days, as long as the sun is shining, my feelings aren’t complicated. I wake up feeling pretty relaxed with minimal worries, but in truth, I have been asleep for far too long.

Growing up, I was known to wear my emotions on my sleeve because every gut-wrenching report on the news broke my heart. It ached whenever I saw people dying from diseases, natural disasters, bombings, or kidnappings. To protect myself, I was encouraged to learn how to shift my emotions from empathy to sympathy, lest I always walk around through life emotionally drained.

LIVING IN A BUBBLE

But at some point, I must have gone too far into my protective bubble because I became what I now call a ‘safety player’. Whenever my phone buzzes, I feel a sense of discomfort. It reminds me of a time when my family would receive phone calls from Ghana in the middle of the night. Knowing that the sharp ringing meant we were about to receive another tragic report.

So I’ve learned to ignore my phone for at least an hour when I wake up. It helps me maintain a brief feeling of zen before I inevitably receive a barrage of notifications ranging from COVID-news, unread emails, lame celebrity stunts, and an extensive offering of free trials popping up in every banner ad.

IMPOSSIBLE TO ESCAPE OR IGNORE REALITY

The news is constant, and I cannot keep up with the various platforms. But above all else, the one thing that creates a feeling of terror, is when I wake up, sound-of-mind, only to learn that another black individual was mercilessly killed by a police officer or threatened by the cries of a performative white woman. I informed a friend of the occurrences, and they replied… “Oh, I’m not surprised.”

Is it ok that this is how so many of us react!? That we simply shrug because we see this mistreatment all the time, and we have convinced ourselves that it’s just the way it is in America? When we dig a little deeper we realize quickly that these victims could easily be our brothers, our fathers, our cousins, our uncles, or our future son or daughters.

HAVE I BEEN DOING ENOUGH?

But with every problem that I feel compelled to address, I believe I have to look inward first to understand my position, if only for a moment. After looking at myself in the mirror and evaluating my pain, I realized that I could have been doing more to contribute.

My whole world — my hometown, my colleges, every office I have worked in, and the majority of my friendships have been white, white, white, white, white. Despite having such strong and visceral feelings about mistreatment and racial instigations, I have not vocalized my opinions publically until recently. I believed that my peers would mark me as a trouble maker, in fear of changing the dynamics of long-standing relationships.

…I could have been doing more…

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve never shied away from a tempered debate on race and discrimination, but I would do so in the classroom or the boardroom, settings that I found orderly and easy to gauge. I would comfortably discuss issues of representation and misportrayals of black people in entertainment, but I have been avoiding reality because the stakes are so much higher.

PLAYING IT SAFE

When people would rally or protest, I would watch from a distance, justifying my lack of participation by saying things like, “I don’t think I have an activist personality.” I wondered if one extra person would even make a difference, weighing the potential risk to my life, or worse for a perfectionist, a mark on my permanent record.

One memorable example occurred during my fifth month in Los Angeles. The advertising team I was on at the time was sitting in an office at NBC waiting for a client. My former director and the senior male strategist take out their phones and begin to laugh over a LIVE streamed event that was taking place. They expressed that they were watching a video of a gang shooting. They vocalized their opinion on how stupid people can be, all the while watching this live stream for their own sordid entertainment. I remember feeling ill, only able to say something innocuous like ‘I don’t think that’s a funny or appropriate video to watch,’ and everyone readily ignored the comment.

I considered that they didn’t care to wonder if anyone in the room had trauma associated with gun violence, a privilege that most white men have. I wanted so badly to fit into this team that I silently sat through a moment that was painful and psychologically disturbing for an empath like me.

IS FEELING EMPATHY FOR BLACK LIVES REALLY THAT HARD?

There is a disconnect with the white communities’ ability to sympathize, let alone empathize, with the black persons’ plight. First, it would require reconciling with a history that was begotten by their own hands. No one wants to admit ignorance. It is the natural hubris of the western man never to admit fault, but the recent killings have made me realize how culpable I have been all of these years as the only black girl in the room, not wanting the pressure to be an authority, not wanting to be ostracised, not wanting to admit that some of my ‘best friends’ probably have secret beliefs that black people are just getting what they deserve.

Mostly I would smile for my friends and cry later for the pain and confusion I felt over the oppressive reality of being black in America. One could easily use the tu quoque fallacy and incorrectly argue, “Andrea, your life does not reflect oppression; you live in privilege!” Some aspects of this are valid. My parents busted their asses so that I could grow up in a beautiful house with a spacious backyard.

KEEPING UP APPEARANCES

But what white Americans don’t realize is that many of us are also keeping appearances to maintain credibility and get through life unscathed. When we lost our home when I had to work every year of my life since I was 15 just to scrape through college, trust me when I say that some of our white neighbors quickly disappeared as friends once our financial situation changed.

If I had to make a list of the times I slept on an egg crate because I couldn’t yet afford furniture or the moments where a kind colleague bought me food when they saw me skipping lunch because I had to prioritize rent/tuition over meals, no one would believe me.

So yes, I am privileged in some respects, but it’s from the sacrifices and discrimination that I and my parents had to endure to allow me to excel and present myself in a socially desirable way.

I WILL NO LONGER BE YOUR PUPPET

The truth is — I have been sitting with my thoughts for the past three days — writing and erasing, talking and listening, resting, and now finally waking up with a mind that is still wary but hopeful with new truths. Here is what I have concluded: I am tired of playing the model black citizen, and I simply won’t do it anymore.

Every time someone is surprised that ‘I speak so well’. Every time someone says that ‘I must be different from other black people, ‘I am not ghetto,’ that ‘I’m lucky I didn’t grow up in the projects.’ And all the moments when I am pressured in corporate settings to give black card approval for projects that are not supportive of my community, are no longer sliding. I refuse to have any more pieces of my identity stripped to play your game of what's acceptable.

I am tired of playing the model black citizen…

It is a scary feeling to stand up to people you have known and loved for many years, but if they do not acknowledge your pain, then it is a one-sided relationship. It is a relationship built on the efforts of black people in America constantly tending to fragile white egos for countless years — done to keep the peace and preserve our image.

WE’RE NO STRANGERS TO DEATH, BUT WE HAVE A RIGHT TO LIVE

Murder happens when someone’s desire for power exceeds their belief that their victim has value. Death by gunshot occurs quickly, instantly, enough that our minds don’t even process the gravity the same way, but this time, watching seven long and slow minutes of forced suffocation was the straw that broke the camels back for this nation.

I have had the misfortune of losing many friends and loved ones to death in my short life. From causes ranging from cancer, car accidents, motorcycle crashes, aneurysms, and alcoholism. The fatalities listed above are accidental, circumstantial, but the hardest action for me to grapple with has always been murder when my aunt, a young, vibrant woman, knifed down in the street. So I recognize first hand how gut-wrenching pain mixed with confusion. (If you listen to the 9–1–1 call for Breonna Taylor, you will understand what I mean.)

Sadly, society expects us to be polite and calm in the face of death, making us no different than a sitting duck. This movement is less about incorrect policing and more about the engraved perception that we are still enslaved and need to be kept in line and set an example of. Derek Chauvin, just a man, no longer an officer, had it in his mind that he needed to set this example.

But without their uniforms, without their badges, all officers are just men. Underneath the cloth, they are scared and fragile men that live in their imaginations about what a black body really is. In the same regard, there is no masks to take off with the black individual. They are average men and women, frightened of the system, terrified of what it represents beneath the surface. Shocked in their last moments of that, their life long attempts to be perceived as non-threatening was eventually all for nothing.

I DON’T ALWAYS FEEL STRONG, BUT I WILL CONTINUE TO TRY

There is a high likelihood that I am preaching my opinions to the choir. I am expressing my views now because we talk about acting, and we never discuss that awkward feeling of knowing you want to help but you are more scared and confused than you’d care to admit.

I often believe that my friends know the best places to find and receive reliable information, that I am out of the loop. I sometimes have the perception that everyone is more passionate and more vocal than me, and the thought that I am coward the moments that I stay quiet.

I know that I am not alone in having these feelings, and I am here to tell you its ok to feel insecure and hesitant but it’s time we dig our heads out of the sand.

“ …welcome to the revolution.

Thank you, to my friends of all nationalities who are retweeting black leaders, checking in with friends, and verbalizing their dissent for this radical mistreatment of a people. Believe me, when I say, it does not go unnoticed.

Above all things, I want everyone that I love and care about to be safe and fulfill a beautiful life, but we can’t grow if we don’t acknowledge our passivity. Our actions and our words are just the continuations of an on-going battle.

My black skin will continue being black, and I feel a responsibility more than ever to do my part. So to the sleepy-eyed version of me living in a fantasy, I want to say with kindness and grace, “Good Morning — Welcome to the Revolution.”