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Our Thoughts …

Tamara Crawford
The Lift Up Podcast
Published in
6 min readJun 2, 2020

Our Dear Readers and Listeners,

We wanted to share some thoughts with you here as over the weekend we have been processing everything happening in the US over the past week, if not the past couple months.

Given our podcasts are recorded and posted in advance, we haven’t had the opportunity to update before release, but even if we did, we didn’t think a 5 minute snippet at the beginning of a literary podcast would give sufficient time and gravity to say what we want to say. We wanted the freedom and space to share our thoughts. Some of our subsequent podcasts will continue to explore these thoughts through our book choices and discussions. Please be patient as we pivot our reading schedule so we can continue to be relevant to what’s going on around us, the stories that are being told, the histories that need to be elevated. We appreciate feedback on what else we should be reading, and we appreciate those who have shared with us so far.

What we are seeing is an outpouring of frustration of Black Americans not being seen or heard with equanimity for over 400 years. No matter the methods used. No matter who is in charge. This is tiring. Every single time. Over and over and over. To continue to see the manner in which our lives are expendable on a regular basis is too much to continue to bear. The long list of names of dead Black Americans who were only trying to live their lives or denied legal due process is too much to continue to bear. Inequality; income disparity; discrimination; barriers to opportunity; police brutality; Covid-19… It has to stop. Enough is Enough. We’ve read a number of articles, posts, and comments that have eloquently tried to convey the passion and the scourge underpinning this crisis. Over the weekend co-host Tamara tried to put her thoughts down on a private post to the people in her life to give them the ability to understand how she feels as there are many people in her circles whom she knows are unable to relate. She’s included a truncated version below:

The only thing we have ever wanted is the ability to live, be, and thrive equally and without fear. Why is that so reprehensible? How does that make me a threat to someone else’s existence?

What I am tired of is the consistency, entrenchment, and normalization of racism, injustice and inequality; crying; hashtags; excuses; inaction; people not trying to understand because it’s too uncomfortable to their own existence, etc., etc., Et. Cetera….. Living is just constantly tiring….We do it and try to make the most of the one life we are given, but still… can you understand that?

What I am encouraged by is the global outpouring of disgust, global solidarity, and the movement to positive action; The people who continue to post, to share, to debate, all in the manners that works best for them: I see you, love you, support you, and encourage you to take care of your mental and physical health; The people who are generally silent, realizing that silence is a damning indication of complicity, and starting to speak out; And the public figures who aren’t staying silent and highlighting that this isn’t about one “incident”…

What continues to scare me are the people who don’t care or don’t want to care because it doesn’t personally affect their immediate lives; The people that don’t want to admit to themselves that they harbor some of these racist thoughts and do the work to fix that; The people who make excuses to perpetuate the existing cycle; The people who believe there is no right to equal existence; The continued silence and normalization of these behaviors; The impact to people we care about…

I am NOT fine… I want to know that I’m not alone in doing the hard work… and that the people in my life will start to examine how they have directly or indirectly benefited from and contributed to where we are as a society now within their own circles…

We started this podcast to help bridge the gap on who tells who’s story, and the use of literature as a medium to illuminate the world around us and make it accessible, regardless of whether it is poetry, fiction, or nonfiction. You will find in June’s podcast we sound excited and jovial for our very first episode, but we are here in pain, crying, standing, fighting alongside for a more just America, a more just world, a more just existence. We’ve chosen to create this platform and our promise is to use our voices to highlight the stories that should be shared.

We want to share resources with all of you that we have been collecting over the past week. Please utilize them, create a dialogue around them, and insert yourself in meaningful ways. There is a great quote floating around social media that says, “When you are done: educate yourself. This doesn’t go away once the topic isn’t trending.” It’s hard work, but we all need to do the work.

With love and solidarity.

Places to donate (where we have contributed):

Books on antiracism, Black history, and Black liberation that we recommend (click on links below to purchase titles through The Lift Up’s shop on bookshop.org):

Articles and other resources we found helpful:

Resources for Children and Youth:

Additional Videos:

Culture
Life
Race
Books

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Tamara Crawford
The Lift Up Podcast

Written by Tamara Crawford

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