Where I belong

2017 was chock-full of examples illustrating racism in America

“What one does realize is that when you try to stand up and look the world in the face like you had a right to be here, without knowing that this is the result of it, you have attacked the entire power structure of the Western world.” —James Baldwin

I, along with many other Americans, spent months in disbelief after the 2016 presidential election.

How could the voters who elected Barack Obama for two terms elect a racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, swindling, misogynistic, alleged rapist? How could people who claimed to be allies of marginalized populations and care about social justice and civil rights vote for him or abstain from voting, allowing into office a blow-hard television personality who incited violence at his rallies, ridiculed the disabled, and insulted American veterans and their families?

This was not just a difference of political opinion. It was a betrayal. At first, I was more disturbed by this than I was by the upsurge of ill-informed white supremacists and misogynists who want women to return to the kitchen and minorities on bended knee.

I’m a black woman in Oklahoma. I have always known that racial hatred and belief in white superiority didn’t disappear after the Civil Rights Movement. They just took off the hood and put on a suit and tie, exchanged the white robe for the judge’s or minister’s robe, put down the burning torch and picked up the redlining, gerrymandering pen. We have seen this reality played out in the media all year long—for instance, 45’s pardon of Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who was convicted of criminal contempt for racial profiling, or when 45 refused to denounce the racists in Charlottesville.

In the beginning of this year, I harbored a vain hope that 45’s incompetence and elementary level of knowledge about—well, just about everything—would somehow keep him from being sworn into office.

White supremacist rallies and rhetoric increased during 45’s campaign and continued to rise after he was elected. An FBI 2016 report stated: “The number of hate crimes triggered by bias against a person’s racial or ethnic background rose to 3,489 from 3,310 a year earlier … Half of those episodes were motivated by racism against black people.” Those increases happened immediately before and after 45’s election. Studies have not yet been completed for 2017.

As an adult, I have never worried about going anywhere I choose. But, not long after the Charlottesville incident, I went to meet some friends for dinner. I was suddenly overcome with a sense of panic. At first, I didn’t know why I felt so vulnerable. It took me a moment to analyze. The tables were full of white people whose faces had turned toward me when I walked in. I had grown used to institutionalized, under-the-table, behind-closed-doors racism with only the occasional outbursts of ugliness. Recent events and their public exposure heightened my awareness. I never dreamed I was a person who could become complacent.
I had.

It was temporary.

I was born in Jim Crow Tulsa and segregated my entire childhood and adolescence. All four of my grandparents were survivors of the 1921 Greenwood Massacre. They escaped and came back to Tulsa to rebuild. My parents’ generation was shushed. Few dared to speak up about the racial injustices witnessed and experienced in the years following the conflagration. Threats of a repeat invasion were ever-present, often whispered: “We burned you out before. We can do it again.”

Everything in my life was about being black. I lived in a black neighborhood, attended all-black schools and churches, and shopped only in neighborhood stores. I was insulated against the racial discrimination my parents and other adult family members surely endured. I never even heard of the Greenwood pogrom until I was 20 years old.

All of my educators were black, and they came from a generation that was taught we had to be better to be equal. But they were wrong. It doesn’t matter to most of our non-black contemporaries, even if they stand as allies, if we are better educated, better spoken, better dressed, better behaved, better skilled. We are still black, and that often matters more than anything. Our skin color is considered a defect or something to be overlooked.

Even now, in 2017, I have been told by white people:

I don’t see color. I just treat you like anybody else.

You’re not really black.

My great hope is that the vileness of exclusionary legislation, police brutality and murder, and verbal and physical assaults by whites on people of color have awakened apathetic Americans to the reality of the depth and breadth of racial bias. Before true change can begin, those who benefit from the oppression of others must bend their stiff necks to listen to the oppressed— and believe them. Those who are oppressed must stop believing they have no power.

And, in 2017, I still know that wherever I am is where I belong.