Revolutions and Revelations
Today is the sixth day since the non-guilty verdict declared Jason Stockley innocent of all potential charges he faced after killing Anthony Lamar Smith in 2011. For six years, Anthony’s mother has been waiting for justice and last Friday, she found out that it would not be served. I can’t imagine what that felt like, but I do imagine the verdict wasn’t a surprise for her. Out of everyone I’ve talked to the past week, not one person expressed any amount of shock or surprise at the news. This is simply business as usual for our justice system — one based on a constitution that was written for free white persons of good and moral standing. Amend it all you like, but those words are still there.
Though it was just another day and decision for our city’s courts and government, it is no longer business as usual for thousands of people in the community — across many communities to be more specific. Many of us have been out marching in the streets multiple times over these few days, making it clear to anyone watching that this is a movement (not a moment) and it will not be ending any time soon. Indeed, it may feel like it’s just getting started for many but the truth is that its roots go back all the way to the beginning. The thread of resistance is as old as the one of oppression — the faces may change but the river is always flowing; jump in when you can.
Though nothing really changed between last Thursday and Friday, something does feel different. Perhaps it’s that so many people (myself included) have come out to stand and march for justice more than they had before. The feeling of community that has been present in the streets is something that I’ve felt in few other places and times in my life. I feel a heightened sense of obligation to be present, to show up, to stand, to march; and unfortunately to bear-witness to and (as a white person) provide a buffer against police aggression. In the midst of all that, I have been struggling to maintain anything that resembles balance this past week. I have now started to write this post at least three times, and given that writing is what I proclaim to be doing with my time, I’ve felt like I’m failing the movement. My anxiety has been high, my eating has been sporadic, my sleep hasn’t been great. I’m exhausted and find it hard to complete simple tasks around the house or feel like there is any point to doing normal work right now. I can’t help but think that all of us belong in the street right now. Whatever jobs we all returned to on Monday are simply manifestations of the same system that didn’t give Anthony’s mother justice on Friday. The same system that took him away from her 6 years earlier. The same system that did the same thing to Michael Brown’s mother three years ago and had many of us out in the streets then too. It’s the same system that Martin Luther King Jr. marched against. It’s the same system that committed genocide against the Native peoples who lived on these lands before we did.
Six days and I’m exhausted and asking where do we go from here. Six days. Not six years. Not a lifetime, like every person of color has had to endure in our country. Just six days. I was raised a white, suburban catholic; a socialization where the supremacy of normalcy reigned and still does. There’s an impossible-to-silence voice deep down inside me asking when will life look normal again? When can we all get back to our lives? The reality is that we will never go back because there’s no “back” to go to — normalcy is just another myth created to get us nice white folks to look the other way when something makes us uncomfortable. Normalcy is our cloak of comfort that doesn’t allow us to see the brutal reality lived by people of color in this country — Every. Single. Day. Normalcy is our blanket. It’s time we grow up and ditch the blanket, folks. Discomfort lies ahead, as does anxiety, and exhaustion, and an entire array of confused feelings about purpose and the meaning of life — but isn’t that better than a lie? Isn’t the messiness of actually living preferred to a mythical, made-up, buttoned-up show for the neighbors? There’s nothing normal about the road ahead, it’s messy; but there wasn’t any normal behind us either — by most accounts it was messier.
Get in where you can in the fight for justice. We’re not going away and we don’t care about the “normal” life you hoped to have. We want you to have a real life, and we want everyone entitled to have a life that matters. As long as Black people in this country are killed indiscriminately at the hands of police, and no justice is served, there will be no peace. Until Black lives actually matter, the phrase “all lives matter” is a falsehood that shall not be used. Until outcomes can no longer be predicted by race, your life is subject to disruption wherever you are. We do not care about your concert plans, your peace and quiet, or some broken glass. We care about broken families. We care about real lives, and people keeping theirs, and we want you to care as well.
A few minutes after the verdict was released on Friday, my social media feeds flooded with similar statements and feelings of disgust, sadness, and non-surprise; and then the time and place. I finished my coffee and left to join those already in the streets, at the doorstep of our city and courts. It was only 10:30 but a sizable crowd had already gathered and begun to march. In less than an hour there were no less than a couple hundred of us, chanting, holding hands, being present and supportive, and resisting the state-sanctioned racism that led us into the streets in the first place. For the next five hours a steady stream of humanity added to our numbers and by four in the afternoon, there were more than a thousand of us.
Tomorrow, I hope, there will be more of us.
