Will anything change after this hate shooting?
I guess we’re supposed to talk about the Buffalo tragedy but I just don’t know how to discuss this anymore. How many times can we reveal our Black humanity in an appeal to whiteness? How many times can we spell out our quantifiable worth to all things cultural, spiritual, and economic to this country? An infinite amount of times, really, and we should never expect anything to ever change by doing so.
Nothing fits anymore.
Even the most liberal think pieces are pointing fingers at 45 and Tucker Carlson. I gotta tell you, that’s some real pre-George Floyd bullshit that I’m just not buying anymore. Yeah, sure, it used to be pretty easy to lay the blame at the feet of the most obvious hate-filled right-wing monsters. But we’ve been well past that for a minute.
May 25 will mark two years since George Floyd was murdered. We all watched millions of people take to the streets in protest on an entirely unprecedented global scale. Politicians promised to defund the police and corporations pledged tens of billions of dollars in the name of racial equity. Then those promises were all broken. The money never showed up; support in general quickly became less than before George Floyd was murdered. Then the new president funded police more than the previous one which led to the very obvious result of police killing more Americans that year than any other year on record.
And there’s no end in sight.
Just last week our democrat president urged cities to redirect their COVID funding to the police. And since COVID disproportionately kills Black people, as do police, the likely outcomes are again obvious if not guaranteed.
But, sure: The future of Black lives is entirely dependent on America’s most hate-watched pundit and a failure-defining ex-president.
The truth is that if my rights can be legislated according to my identity, then my identity is a political one. If I face violence based on that identity, then that violence is political regardless of its source—state agent, terrorist, or other. The maniac that killed those people in Buffalo is a political terrorist.
Political terrorists don’t exist in a vacuum and political problems have political solutions. Tomorrow democrats could address gerrymandering, voting rights, the filibuster, the senate, the electoral college, any and every other part of institutionalized racism within our political system. They could virtually rid the institution of racism in one presidential term. Really. And while that wouldn’t necessarily shrink the amounts of maniacs in this country, it would certainly draw lines around what is and isn’t politically viable.
Think of it like forest fires. Sometimes they’re deliberate, but you rarely have to hear about some dumbshit pyromaniac’s manifesto. This is because pro-woodland arson is not a politically viable stance.
But democrats will not act. Instead they’ll send out fundraising emails on the heels of tragedy explaining that they need just enough votes to outdo the republicans or Kyrsten Sinema or Joe Manchin or eventually the endless amount of right-wing democrats hiding right behind them.
In the days and weeks ahead we will hear democrats talk about everything but the very clear and obvious things they could do to stop this kind of political terrorism. They will talk about gun legislation and internet censorship and how all these poor little hapless and helpless white boys are being brainwashed by the evil of evildoers doing evil. And then they’ll turn to you and explain that come November it will be your civic, moral, and holy duty to walk into that voting booth and piously Vote Blue Lives Matter No Matter Who.
Like I said, that’s some real pre-George Floyd bullshit. If our leaders don’t figure out how to make a post-George Floyd country, there isn’t gonna be much of this country left to lead.
If this piece or this blog resonates with you, please consider a one-time “tip” or become a monthly “patron”…this space runs on love and reader support.
Comments will close on this post in 60-90 days; earlier if there are spam attacks or other nonsense.
The post Will anything change after this hate shooting? appeared first on Black Girl in Maine.
Make some noise!
We are living in strange times, as if it wasn’t enough that we are living through a never-ending plague where the people in charge have just given up. Those of us who possess uteruses and live in the United States are reckoning with the fact that the government thinks we are too incompetent to manage our own bodies.
Or is it just that the plan to keep white supremacy alive is to force white folks with uteruses to make more white babies, and turn us Black and brown uterus-holders into wet nurses and indentured servants?
No matter what the plan is, women and all who possess uteruses are rightfully pissed off after learning of the leaked Supreme Court draft opinion recently. Granted, for Black and brown women who have been leading the charge of reproductive justice, that leak wasn’t exactly unexpected. It was clear under the Trump years that the Supreme Court was going to take us back as best it could—and as far in time as it could. Well, it appears that day may be upon us.
Granted, Roe v. Wade is intact at the moment, and abortion is still legal (though legislative language has already been drafted in many states to change that in response to the leaked opinion), but right now is where our voices must be heard.
But in the midst of fighting to maintain our bodily integrity and autonomy, there are those who are concerned that it is happening in the wrong way.
Say what?
As protests have broken out in front of Supreme Court Justice Brett “Gimme a brewski” Kavanaugh’s home, there are those who feel that lines are being crossed.
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki tweeted that President Biden abhors “violence, threats, or vandalism,” and that judges “must be able to do their jobs without concern for their personal safety.” The Washington Post wrote an entire editorial piece on why the justices should be left alone in their homes.
We live in a country where two-thirds of Americans want Roe v. Wade left alone, and who feel that overturning it is a step in the wrong direction. At 49, I can’t even imagine a country where safe and legal access to an abortion is determined by where you live (and the GOP is already suggesting passing a nationwide ban on abortion). If the majority of the Supreme Court has its way, abortion will be hard to access in at least half of the states. And then you have some states like Mississippi, where the governor is talking about banning contraception. These are extraordinary times. A small radical and powerful group of privileged people want the ability to control everyone else’s life.
Excuse me, what year is it?
Given that these powerful and privileged people who want to control reproductive rights aren’t tuned into the masses and that no one elected the folks who are overturning Roe v. Wade, strong measures are needed. These are a clear minority of people who have the power to determine the fate of a a clear majority of Americans, and so they need to be reached by any means necessary.
If that means showing up at their door and making some noise, make some damn noise.
Voting is already becoming a difficult tool to keep the conservative extremists in check, what with gerrymandering and voting restrictions. But the Supreme Court is another matter entirely. Unlike elected officials, we don’t even have the option to vote these people out. So, any notion of enforcing “civility” in this instance is one more way in which our white supremacist system upholds and protects itself. By demanding civility of the people most negatively impacted, we are silencing people and taking away their last means of making change.
Clearly, the five justices in favor of overturning Roe v. Wade are not listening to the masses. And sometimes, if people won’t willingly listen to you … well, you have to make them hear you.
Our white supremacist system places a premium on decorum and civility. As long as someone is seen as a “class act” and never shows a hint of emotion, smiles on cue—all the while sticking knives into vulnerable backs—our society will hold said person in high regard. It’s one of the many reasons that people find it hard to be critical of Barack Obama the president, because Barack Obama the man was a class act. It’s why others struggled to see Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination to the court as an existential threat, because she seemed so pleasant and nice. I mean sure, we knew the deal, but she was so pleasant.
Decorum and civility is what keeps well-intentioned white people in relationships with abhorrently racist and xenophobic people in their families. It’s too hard to tell Uncle Rusty the Racist Trumper that he is an asshole, because the pressure to keep sweet and be civil runs high in white spaces. It’s why the idea that these justices are being disturbed at home is off-putting to some.
At the same time, no one cares about how the tools of white supremacy disrupt other people’s lives. What about the neighbors when cops break down the wrong door in communities of color? What about the neighbors when Black people are harassed and sometimes killed by agents of the state?
But somehow it’s so much more serious when a political figure has people protesting outside their house than when an innocent person gets killed by agents of the state.
Rarely are the uber-privileged and powerful inconvenienced—and, no doubt, having a while lot of angry people showing up on your idyllic tree-lined street yelling feels bad. But that’s kind of the point.
In a situation like this you need to be made to understand that you hold in your hand the power to make millions of people’s lives hard and to know that your actions will lead to death and harm, all to appease a small group of people and to advance your own selfish insistence that your beliefs are more important than everyone else’s autonomy.
Whether one believes abortion is right or not isn’t the issue. After all, if you don’t want one, don’t get one—and don’t do anything that puts another person in the position to even having to consider it. But when a very clear majority of the people in a country want access to abortion and you decide to play God in a country that has no family-friendly policies or real social support systems, expect to encounter angry people. Expect to hear from lots of angry people.
That said, as a locally elected public official who happens to be a Black woman, a recent late-night exchange with a constituent revealed a special intersection of civility that can be encountered when we ask the most marginalized people to occupy public decision making spaces. So, stay tuned to part two of: When sometimes you need to be quiet.
As soon as I sent this piece to our editor, I saw a notification from CNN that the Senate had passed a bipartisan bill to expand security protection to immediate family members of the Supreme Court justices, in the aftermath of weekend protests at some justices’ homes. Given the raggedy state of America and with COVID surging unchecked, it is just another reminder that our leaders are often not here for the people but are often here to keep the white supremacist capitalist wheels churning and to protect their own elite circles over the interests of the masses.
Sigh.
By all means, let’s not put anyone out. Or scare them. Let’s make sure they can live in the most insulated bubbles while they do whatever they want—the will of the people be damned.
If this piece or this blog resonates with you, please consider a one-time “tip” or become a monthly “patron”…this space runs on love and reader support.
Comments will close on this post in 60-90 days; earlier if there are spam attacks or other nonsense.
Image by yass SEDDOUG via Unsplash.
The post Make some noise! appeared first on Black Girl in Maine.
The end of BGIM? …I hope not
And just like that, we are in crisis mode here at BGIM Media.
This is not a post that I thought I would find myself writing, but it seems the same reality that is killing off independent media and content creators elsewhere has abruptly and unexpectedly landed on my doorstep. It was very sudden, and regardless of the reasons, I have to be blunt: this is a crisis.
As I wrote to the BGIM team earlier today, the editorial calendar for May will go on as scheduled, but for June—barring an infusion of support from readers—some nasty changes are ahead. Because, at present, while I can cover our expenses for May. June, though, is not looking too good.
It’s a moment that feels surreal, because between April 30 and May 1, we lost in excess of 50 patrons. This abrupt and unexpected drop means we are down over $1,000 a month, which for a small operation like this represents a lot of cash. Cash that I can’t easily replace, as I have not been doing as much contract consulting work, due to my political work (unpaid, mind you) on the Portland Charter Commission.
I just spoke with a friend who also runs an indie publication, where she works with some of the best-known writers in the industry. She said she is seeing the same thing. Like me, she’s keeping her operation afloat with personal resources and sheer determination.
It is not an understatement to say that I view this site as my third child. BGIM was created in 2008, when my daughter was three and I was trying to figure out my career path, as I was having a 30-something-year-old crisis. I worked with a life coach who suggested that I start a blog as a way to indulge my writing desire beyond what I was doing at the time for the Portland Phoenix.
I have said it before in the early years: readership was low and it was a labor of love done solely for the joy of it. This site was started as a way to park all my feelings about being Black in Maine and raising my kids here.
But it was 10 years ago, in 2012, that the site started to experience an uptick in readership which has continued for a decade straight. My posts have been read in classrooms across the country and have been cited in multiple books (also here and here). It was only when my marriage crashed in 2015 that I realized that I would either have to let this site go, and take on a second job to survive, or I could take a gamble. I could work to create a revenue stream given the popularity of the site. I chose the latter, but because of the subject content, advertising or traditional methods for monetizing social platforms have never been viable options.
Instead, I decided to use the patron model, but making the unusual choice to not put the work behind a paywall. I also made the decision to expand the platform and bring on other writers, all of whom have always been paid. If we are serious about change, then both aspects are important—accessibility matters, as does compensating people for their work.
The intersection of racism is capitalism is challenging. I chose to offer my work as well as the work of the other writers to the world freely—this is one way to help create change, as it is an acknowledgment that not everyone has the means to pay. That decision has left me open to the occasional trolls and hackers, but despite the personal annoyance, it has been worth it. I don’t regret it, even when the stats showed that the majority of our readers do not financially support the work at all.
I have always felt that despite never hitting our financial goals, as long as we bring in enough to ensure that all financial obligations are met, that’s fine. The last year has been rough because we haven’t seen much growth—a typical month involves five or six cancellations but adding three or four new patrons and one current patron increasing their giving. Given the economic realities, and knowing that inflation is hitting everyone’s button line, I could make it work, even though it has meant picking up more work on my end.
To give you a peek into our operations, there are three writers in addition to myself. We have a back-end editor, who handles all editing and assistance with pieces and social media curation. We have contract tech support which includes site security, as well as professional services since we are an LLC. There’s also the cost of paying for our infrastructure and subscriptions to publications so we stay looped into the larger world. Oh yeah, there is also our tax liabilities; the IRS gets its money, too.
Despite my full-time job, parenting and homeschooling a teenager, consulting work. and serving on the Charter Commission (which takes up a lot of time and pays nothing), I still do at least half of the social media curation that you see on our Facebook page and all the invisible-to-you tasks like managing the operations. Last year, I brought on someone part-time to assist, but it was clear that it was an expense we couldn’t afford. So when the person left, I didn’t look to fill that position again. Keeping our operations super-lean has allowed us to keep on doing the work.
This super-lean model, while tiring, has been sustainable until today, when our payment arrived from Patreon and I saw the sudden drop-off.
Patron cancellations are straightforward, and many patrons do take the exit survey when canceling their support—those who do have almost all have indicated a change in their financial situations. I understand it; times are hard.
But declined cards are harder to grasp. It means that a patron’s card was declined and while they were given the opportunity to update their information, they chose not to. I can predict cancellations to some degree, but a massive uptick in declines can’t be predicted. Consider the fact that the previous month only saw $10 in declines, which is typically our norm.
While I know that the media world is being hit hard, this decrease in giving is across the board. In my day job, we saw a decline in giving in our last fiscal year. I have spoken with colleagues in other organizations, and they are seeing the same thing. Colleagues who offer anti-racism training work have seen their bookings decrease. Colleagues who have written anti-racism books have seen a steep decrease in book sales.
Sure, in hard times, we cut the fat from our budget—but what does it mean about our commitment to social and racial change, if those are the cuts we make early on? Clearly, we have not fixed racism yet, and the pathway to change requires resources. And let’s face it: the Elon Musks of the world are definitely not interested in funding those endeavors.
Friends, the bottom line is that I need your support and I need it now.
I need to make up a thousand dollars a month, and as much as I wish I could take it from my personal resources, I can’t do it long-term. I am doing it this month, but I can’t do it next month. We could certainly do it with one very generous benefactor—and I swear if you exist, I will schedule a personal call with you every month—but something tells me that is not going to happen.
So, short of one supremely generous soul, that means I need people who have never given to give now. The stats on the blog say that there are lots of you out there who consume this work for free, and I am asking for your help now even if that help is modest.
One-time gifts via PayPal or Venmo are certainly appreciated, but the only way I can plan ahead is with monthly patrons. If you grab a few drinks a week or more—be they lattes or wines or a smoothie or something else—could you consider BGIM Media as the equivalent of one or two extra drinks each month? I don’t want anyone putting themselves in a bind. But I am asking that many more of you to make a small monthly commitment to ensure that BGIM doesn’t meet the fate of so many other platforms.
And if you truly can’t afford to give, can you share this site and our Patreon information within your social circles? I am working on some perks I can actually deliver regularly, since I have heard feedback over the years that people want the perks. One perk will be a weekly round-up that will include my personal reading of the week, as well as a curated list of articles.
Lastly, if you work at an organization or are involved with community groups doing anti-racism work, consider booking me. The new site should launch in the next week, and it will have a section that clearly speaks to all of my speaking engagements and offerings. But in the meantime, here is a snippet of some of my work.
I have always known that a time would come when I may need to sign off as far as BGIM Media. But I don’t think this is that time. There’s too much work left to do; too many pieces that still need to be written. Our fate lies in your hands: Will we live or will we die?
If this piece or this blog resonates with you, please consider a one-time “tip” or become a monthly “patron”…this space runs on love and reader support.
Comments will close on this post in 60-90 days; earlier if there are spam attacks or other nonsense.
Image by Neil Thomas via Unsplash
The post The end of BGIM? …I hope not appeared first on Black Girl in Maine.
Elon Musk and our continued hypocrisy
I have been involved in social change work since my teen years; my earliest memories of social justice work are getting involved with raising funds for The Committee in Solidarity with The People of El Salvador. That was my introduction to how US imperialism has both shaped and harmed others, at least outside of my experience as a descendant of enslaved Africans. It was that early work that led me to actively protesting against the first Gulf War and defending the right to burn an American flag.
My late teens and early 20s—despite getting married at 18 and having a child shortly thereafter—were spent devouring books and hanging out in leftist and Black bookstores, learning from elders and dreaming of change. Even my adult son, who is now 30, has told me that some of his early memories of childhood were our almost weekly stops at the local Black bookstore and how I used to spend way too much time talking to the owner about pan-Africanism.
I share this to say that there has never been a time for me when I wasn’t aware of how unfair our world and its systems are. The last time that I ever said the full pledge of allegiance was at 14, and even when I was sworn in for my current position as a member of the Portland Charter Commission, I had to sit with the words that I would uphold the Constitution, as I think it most certainly is a contradiction.
While I did spend a few years in my early 20s working for corporations, the majority of my professional career has been spent in the non-profit sector. A sector I discovered after my brief stint as an AmeriCorps Vista. While the sector no doubt has its issues, the majority of people that you find in non-profit work actually have a deep commitment to social change. So much so that we pretty accept that—barring winning lotto tickets, lucrative side hustles, marrying well, or family money—we are taking vows of poverty.
But with over 25 years of experience working everywhere from facilities for the unhoused, people struggling with substance abuse disorder, kids in need, people of color living with HIV and racial justice, I can say that most of our work—while needed—is often a bandage and that the real change we need has to occur at the structural level. But—and you knew there was gonna be a but—structural change is harder to achieve because that requires a blowing-up of systems and mass discomfort. To be frank, most of us, yours truly included, are hypocrites who care but aren’t going to intentionally inconvenience ourselves in a sustained fashion. Especially in our current climate of comfort as self-care.
Unless you have been living under a rock, no doubt you have heard that the world’s richest man, Elon Musk—a man so loathsome that he is a walking advertisement for most of the worst traits that plague white manhood—intends to buy Twitter. The sale, of course, hinges on Twitter’s shareholders actually agreeing to the sale, along with a few regulatory agencies giving their blessings. This is important to note, since the mainstream media’s reporting leaves one to assume that Musk passed off a fat check for $44 billion and took possession in the same fashion that one buys a new car or the neighbor’s old lawn furniture.
I have to say that as someone whose personal and professional life has been enhanced by Twitter, the idea of Musk at the helm is scary. His idea of free speech is the stuff that brings out and gives voice to the most heinous who walk among us. Twitter is a unique platform. In the last decade-plus, we have seen social movements take shape on Twitter. It has reshaped modern journalism and has allowed those with the least access to media to use their voices for the greater good. Yes, the undesirables live there too, but like any tool, it can be used for good or bad.
For many, the announcement that the Twitter board—which includes Twitter founder Jack Dorsey—had greenlighted Musk’s offer for their town square left millions of Twitter users loudly declaring that they were leaving the platform. In some cases, they were looking to jump over to new platforms such as MeWe and Counter Social, whose origins are still unclear. In other cases, as I witnessed, people deleted their Twitter accounts and proudly announced it on Facebook, eager to tell everyone of their resistance to Musk and his antics.
That would be lovely except that every major social media platform and almost every remaining media outlet is owned by someone who has far more money than they need and in some cases, such as with Facebook, the platforms are hardly paragons of virtue. It isn’t hyperbole to say that Facebook, for example, has definitely rearranged our society in ways that don’t benefit us. Or that Facebook’s domination was partly because its founder helped to snuff out the competition. I mean, Instagram and Whats App are also part of the Facebook family and other than TikTok, almost all new social media innovations have lived at the fringes with no little to no chance of going mainstream.
So, leaving Twitter for another platform isn’t the win that some are making it out to be, and it isn’t even a protest. It’s performative activism at best. much like the big storm a few months ago over Spotify allowing Joe Rogan to stay on their platform. Many canceled their Spotify accounts only to shift their music streaming accounts to Amazon Music and Tidal. In the case of Amazon Music, it is still owned by Jeff Bezos. The same Jeff Bezos who isn’t exactly known for treating his employees well. The same Jeff Bezos who also owns the Washington Post. The same Jeff Bezos who was married to MacKenzie Scott, and whose divorce made her one of the world’s richest women—though unlike her ex-husband, Scott seems to be a sincere and dedicated philanthropist.
The thing is, we are living in the era of outrage where there’s so much to be pissed off about but people want quick fixes. Hence, taking “actions” that feel like something in a moment but upon a second look don’t move the needle—they just make people feel good about themselves. If you aren’t connecting the dots, look no further than the George Floyd protests and 2020. Global protests declaring that Black lives matter, calls to defund the police, anti-racism books selling like hotcakes. It seemed like we might really be on the cusp of change.
Fast forward to 2022, and almost all the calls and offers to defund the police have proved to be empty. In fact, we are seeing a reversal of that energy—in many jurisdictions law enforcement is receiving even more dollars to combat the “growing” crime problem even though the crime isn’t really growing like pundits, politicians and police unions claim, and spending more on policing almost never reduces that crime.
Where are all those people who were demanding transformative justice? What happened to defunding the police? Do Black lives even still matter? It was almost exactly two years as I write this that the world exploded with a new social consciousness and yet here we are: Most people have moved on. Sure, people will post a supportive article on Facebook, but are they showing up? Are they moving material resources to aid the most impacted? Are they living their stated values? Or is it a matter of picking and choosing and doing as little as possible to avoid be inconvenienced?
Back to Twitter and Elon Musk, though. I posed the question the other night on Twitter: “Would anyone consider paying for a more just and safe social media platform?” And almost no one said “yes.” While not scientific, this definitely aligns with the known fact that most ethical and independent media platforms are dying. Just this past month, independent and feminist powerhouse Bitch Media announced they were shutting down. The reason? No money. As someone who discovered Bitch magazine in my 20s and has been a supporter for years, this wasn’t a surprise. I see the letters they have been sending out.
In fact, over the past year a number of platforms that gave voice to the marginalized have ceased operations. In every case, it is a lack of financial resources that caused them to shut down.
As I have said before, paying for your access to the internet does not give you access to everything on the internet. Real live people are creating content, whether it is a blog, a magazine, newspaper, or social media platform. Those real live people also have expenses and desires for food and shelter, just like you. But unless those people are working for the handful of insanely wealthy people who now control most of the media landscape, and whom we mostly all agree are evil, how exactly do you expect those people to live?
Every time you read those sites, or engage on platforms without thinking about how the people are getting paid, you are essentially saying they don’t matter. But at the same time, you blast the super-wealthy for not doing more. The super-wealthy in most cases are super-wealthy precisely because they don’t care about the greater good. The sooner we all accept that and stop wishing for these people to do better, the better off we will all be.
Instead, we can look at what we each can do, individually and collectively. Who can we support and how? No, we don’t all have the means to offer support, but in that case, can you amplify voices so they can get support elsewhere? Can we examine our own expectations around why we expect entertainment and knowledge to be free, especially when we are willing to be nickeled-and-dimed by the zillion streaming platforms.
I am old enough to remember when one bought a TV, turned it on and there were things to watch. No cable boxes, streaming services or special antennas required. You just turned on the TV and there was stuff to watch until TV took a break at 3 a.m. and went off the air for a few hours.
Now, though, we know that watching TV requires either paying for cable TV or streaming services. We’ve accepted it and yeah, it sucks. But we also realize that in this case, the funding model has changed and the trade-off is that not only can we watch shows when we want but in many cases, we even get to avoid commercials.
We are in a place where everyone wants ethical and just behavior but far too few people are committed enough to make it happen. Thus, whether we intend to or not, we make it easier for the oligarchs to take over our lives.
While Twitter has changed a lot of things about modern life, for all the bad things about the space, it has seeded social movements and many careers for folks who previously did not have access to mainstream access. I include myself in that category.
But a money maker? Twitter hasn’t turned a profit in eight of its last 10 years. As someone who went to graduate school for management, I absolutely understand the board of directors accepting the Musk offer. I am pretty sure that while the board recognizes the cultural importance of Twitter and how it has served as a vehicle for change, they also know that no one, even its most devoted users, are interested in paying for it. I suspect even Musk knows that too. So the perfect storm was created. It remains to be seen if the Musk sale will happen, but this moment is larger than an overgrown man-child looking for a shiny new toy.
At what point do we actively decide to create the world we want? Or will we allow these people to control every facet of our lives?
We are all hypocrites on some level. I live on an island, and by choice I don’t own a car, and I use Amazon Prime. Using Amazon Prime is bad, but not driving is good. We all have decisions to make, and none of us are going to be pure. But we can strive for consistency and work every day to live our stated values.
If this piece or this blog resonates with you, please consider a one-time “tip” or become a monthly “patron”…this space runs on love and reader support.
Comments will close on this post in 60-90 days; earlier if there are spam attacks or other nonsense.
Image by Kenny Eliason via Unsplash
The post Elon Musk and our continued hypocrisy appeared first on Black Girl in Maine.
What’s in a name? And what’s it got to do with Twitter and Musk?
If you’re a white person, I’d like to give you a window into Blackness just for a moment. Let me give you just a tiny glimpse at the many layers of things happening all around you that you probably miss. I’m going to do this by talking about names.
My name is Samuel James. Pretty simple. You could probably make some correct guesses about me from just seeing that name printed. You could also make some wildly inaccurate ones, and those guesses could be dependent on whether or not you’re Black. For example, if you are white seeing that names in print might lead you to guess that I am quite a bit older than I am. If you are Black however, you’d likely know the importance of tradition in Black first names and so you’d know that age isn’t really detectable there.
Allowing you a further look into that window, I can tell you that as a performer, my name gets said a lot. It gets announced. It gets printed. What I couldn’t possibly tell you is the amount of times a white person has said my name as “Samuel L. Jackson.” It’s been said onstage by white presenters; printed in ads and flyers by white venue owners. Yes, with the “L” and everything.
But I have it easy. Black folks with African-derived names? Holy lord, that drops into a whole other level of power dynamics. Spelling is a big one. Language itself is meant to be spoken, but as the desire to retain and spread information grew, printing language became necessary. Access to information has always been policed and spelling is a common way to do that. It’s a touchstone of permission. You’re very unlikely to see a comment thread anywhere that doesn’t have at least one person attempting to invalidate an entire point of view by pointing out a misspelling.
All languages are fluid. Words get added all the time. Some words change definitions entirely—sometimes to include their previously opposite definitions. Correcting someone’s spelling isn’t so much an informed action defending language as it is an act of asserting oneself as the arbiter of right and wrong.
Now imagine if your name was allowed to be wrong. Not wrong like Madysen or Maddyson or Maeddaessaen. Wrong like wrong for this college or this job kinda wrong. Wrong like you’re in the wrong neighborhood kinda wrong. Wrong like longer sentences for the same crime kinda wrong. Wrong like your voice. Wrong like your hair. Wrong in a way that reveals all the rules about behavior and hard work and merit are only there to hide the actual rule: the existence of your Black self is wrong.
And, all together, everyone from elected officials to your average worm on the internet can give themselves plausibly deniable permission to laugh at all the ways this world abandons and destroys you just by pointing at the spelling of your name.
Let’s put a pin in that for now.
As of this writing Elon Musk is meant to buy Twitter. He might back out or he might do it. I don’t know, but either way we all know where this is going. His fascist views on “free speech” are no secret and the ubiquitous racism throughout the companies he already owns predicts a certain outcome.
As I write this “Bye Felicia” is trending on twitter. If you’re not familiar, it’s a joke reference from the 1995 movie Friday starring Ice Cube and Chris Tucker. The intent of the phrase is to dismiss someone who is annoying to you. But it’s not being tweeted by fans of Black cinema. Just the opposite. It’s being tweeted by Elon stans at twitter users who are worried that Musk will turn twitter into 4chan.
OK, so, with all that I’ve told you, please peer with me back into that window of Blackness. As you look, think about all that is implied—intended or otherwise—by the Elon stans or the culture at large when they type out “Bye Felicia.” Think about the what it means to not only defend a billionaire, but one that continuously perpetuates a culture of racism within his companies. Think about what it means to defend that particular billionaire with a catchphrase from a Black movie. Now consider how much deeper the matters of agency get when you learn that the two Black writers of Friday spelled the character’s name as Felisha.
If this piece or this blog resonates with you, please consider a one-time “tip” or become a monthly “patron”…this space runs on love and reader support.
Comments will close on this post in 60-90 days; earlier if there are spam attacks or other nonsense.
Imge by Hadi Basirat via Unsplash
The post What’s in a name? And what’s it got to do with Twitter and Musk? appeared first on Black Girl in Maine.
|
