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[frowzyspeaks]

Dear Police Officers

Dear Police Officers,

When Ralph Ellison wrote Invisible Man, he was speaking for a community of people whose voice had been excluded from history for far too long. His novel depicts the black experience as a nightmare, which is essentially still our cruel reality today. Progress is the ultimate goal of the United States of America, and it has been since the day the land was stolen from the Native Americans (but that’s not my point today). To progress, one must change, and to change, one must understand the wrong doings they have done so that they can further themselves into a better them. Invisible Man is a depiction of Ellison’s time, the civil rights era. Not much progress has been made since then, and it has been almost 70 years. Where is the change?

Tod Clifton. He was dead before he even realized it. His name literally means death, which was a clever use of word manipulation on Ellison’s part. Clifton was murdered after he struck an officer, which is an undebatable sign of a resisting of arrest. But is resisting the loss of freedom over a doll probable cause to be shot down in the middle of a Harlem street? Although he is a fictional character, his presence in the novel represents a much bigger picture than merely just a character in a book that Ellison made up. To blacks, this is a reality.

Tod Clifton was breaking the law. He was selling Sambo dolls on the street without a permit, resisted arrest, and got shot. He was not even given medical attention after he was shot—he was left laying for all to see. He deserved to be charged criminally in court. However, he never made it to a trial or even to the back of a police cruiser. According to Encyclopedia Britannica, it is your duty as an officer to “[maintain] public order and safety, [enforce] the law, and [prevent, detect], and [investigate] criminal activities.” When do you officers decide that it is also your responsibility to convict a man and give him the death penalty—to assign yourself as the judge and the jury? To become an officer, one must attend a police academy, where the correct way to deal with assault and other unarmed situations is taught and engraved. Yet and still, many officers choose the quick route when it comes to black men, and shoot when the situation gets even just a little bit out of hand. Are there no more batons? Tasers? Stun guns? Bean bag rounds? What about the black man has inflicted fear upon officers? Blackness is not incriminating nor intimidating, yet it has been depicted that way for quite a while.

Eric Garner. He was a black man in Staten Island arrested for illegally selling cigarettes, soon put in a chokehold as he begged for breath almost a dozen times, and let out his final words: “I can’t breathe.” This happened in 2014. Why have we not progressed since Ellison’s era? Do we not strive for progress anymore? Are officers becoming more and more incompetent for their jobs, or are black men becoming more threatening? Garner’s murderer was convicted of homicide eventually, but that was only a small step forward in the corruption that is the law enforcement system. Most officers are not convicted, simply because you all are often given the benefit of the doubt before the case is even explained to its fullest extent. This is done by posing black men as an immediate threat, a sort of threat that cannot be dealt with by the court system. You all are painted as the victims because you put your life on the line every day to ensure the safety of the community, but no one seems to think about us. You chose to be an officer and risk losing your life every time you put on that badge and uniform. Our blackness is not something that we chose. We cannot go home at the end of the day and take it off—it’s something we are born with and are forced to live with. Our blackness puts us at risk every moment of our lives, and we cannot even be given the benefit of the doubt when we are dead. This causes our community to live in constant fear that we can die at the hands of anyone and our murders will get away with it, especially if our murderers are the ones who are supposed to ensure our safety—you.

But what is police brutality? Some officers seem to believe that since they are the image of the law to ordinary civilians, that they are above the law. This leads to them acting out of impulse rather than logic, and results in an excessive use of force and sometimes death when dealing with people who are not even posing an immediate threat. Police brutality has been a major theme of the black experience in the 20th century and seems to have carried itself into the 21st century with an alarming amount of cases. When the ones who are supposed to be protecting us are the same people who harm us, who do we turn to? Distrust in the police departments sprung about organizations during the Civil Rights Movement like the Black Panthers, an organization designed to police the police. In modern times, we have formed the movement #Blacklivesmatter. Since then, black bodies have been put on display as examples of how not to deal with the police, yet we seem to do all the other things that white men do when handling police officers. To debate this, police officers usually point out that whites are murdered by officers far more often than blacks and other minority groups, but we only compose a small percent of the population compared to our white counterparts. If blacks and other minority groups were to be murdered at the same rates as that of whites, we would eventually be wiped out.

Learn how to deal with us when we are angry. We are not angry simply because you are a police officer; we are angry because we fear every encounter with you. Rather it is for a broken tail light or a routine traffic stop, we become alarmed every time we are near you. We should not have to tell our loved ones to keep their hands on the steering wheel when being pulled over or to warn you about where we keep our registration and insurance papers so that we will not be shot. Talking back is not us “asking for it,” it is simply us exercising our rights and letting you as an officer know that we have had enough of the injustices and that we are tired of living in fear that our black skin will get us killed. We should be able to have faith that our law enforcement system will protect us, not harm us.

But don’t get me wrong, for every corrupt officer, there are plenty of officers who carry out their duties exactly as they are supposed to. However, we cannot praise cops for not killing; we have to penalize cops who are not correctly carrying out their duties to promote a healthier relationship between the black community and the police force. As blacks, we often believe that you all treat us all the same due to the color of our skin, so in turn, we tend to assume that all cops are going to treat us as if we are criminals. As a community, yes we do have room to improve, but as an officer, it is your responsibility to ease us away from this stereotype. Prove us wrong.

Sincerely,

A Sister

[frowzyspeaks]

Hyper masculinity has plagued the Black community and the Hip Hop community at large. How do we recognize and understand the ways that our culture relies on the superficial strength of Black men?

[frowzyspeaks]

Dear White People

Dear White People,

As much as I’d love to sit here and inform you that at the end of this we will be able to all come to an understanding of one another—I cannot. As a white individual, you will never fully understand the struggles of being black in today's society. The factors contributing towards the struggle of being seen and treated different are beyond our control. The most you can do as a white individual is try your best to understand how your actions affect our struggle. There are some things that are done in complete oblivion, however, when an issue is presented, you cannot choose to be ignorant of it.

Our culture cannot be appreciated and glorified only when it is convenient for you, nor can you take credit for styles we created. For centuries, our ‘nappy’ hair, flat noses, big lips, wide hips, and dark skin were ridiculed. In order to assimilate to our surroundings, we convinced ourselves that our features were undesirable since they were seen as eye sores to our oppressors. Our indigenous features and styles were a symbol of strength, beauty, and pride back in the Motherland, and they were robbed of us for the sake of comfort and conformity. Quite frankly, there is nothing that you can do today to apologize for this rift that occurred centuries ago—it is not today’s generation of white people’s fault or problem to deal with. It does become a problem when the very features and culture you were disgusted with become the next trendy thing in white America. Our culture is not your latest trend; it is our roots; the roots your ancestors tore from underneath us. The cornrows that we wore in the fields to save us from heat stroke, the cornrows that we wore as children when our mothers need a break from stressing over our appearance, the cornrows that were seen as ‘ghetto’ somehow became the latest fall trend. The same full lips that we were born with and ridiculed for the majority of our lives, should not be the same lips that get surgically attached to white girls, nor should they suddenly become aesthetic and add sex appeal. Our big ‘nappy’ afros that you tried to convince us were unprofessional and dirty are imitated and should not have become a ‘new’ hairstyle that our white peers can wear. When we embrace our own culture, it becomes a problem, but when white people steal it from us and wear it without fear of negative comments it is extolled. Our culture is not for the white population to alter to their needs, as it is based on our natural state and how we adapted to our environment. It is not your job, nor your right to flaunt our features as your ‘style’- it is for you to allow us to keep for ourselves and do with as we please. Our culture was the only thing we had when we came into the new world, now alongside our dignity and freedom, it has become another thing we cannot have.

If you choose to use our culture for the sake of aesthetics, take all that comes with our blackness. In the words of Paul Mooney, “everybody wanna be black, but don’t nobody wanna be black.” It ultimately becomes a slap in the face to see white and white passing celebrities use our blackness as a way to appeal to other non-people of color. Yet they refuse to take a position when it comes to racial matters. The celebrities that choose to appropriate our culture more often than not, use blackness to sell an image. Yet they rarely choose to acknowledge the trials and tribulations that come with being a black person in America. It is completely disrespectful to only use this image for the sake of beauty if you cannot deal with the ugliness behind it.

We are not black when it is convenient for us to be black. Many white people naively attempt to ‘compliment’ their black peers by telling them that they do not see them as black. The problem with a statement such as this one is that regardless of how you may view us, we will always be black. Being black has shaped us from the very moment we were kidnapped and brought into this country and we take pride in the fact that we are indeed black. Blacks who are “not seen as black” are usually labeled that way because white people feel comfortable around them and do not view them as a threat to their privilege and power. The underlying issue within this is that black people are not obligated to hide our blackness in order for you to accept us and for once “not see color.” Our blackness is utilized when a white person is being dubbed as a racist. In this moment of time, the same friend that you label as colorless becomes your “black friend” to prove that they are in fact not a racist. This may be true, but the fact that you unknowingly only have this black friend because they conform to your standards of blackness is a racist principle in itself. The only way we seem to get positive recognition for being black is if it is beneficial to our white peers.

When blacks are murdered in cold blood by the cops, we take action and are seen as animals for doing so. This in itself is a hypocritical act because our methods stem from your ancestors in colonial America. During the American Revolution, wealthy white merchants committed treason by revolting against their monarch simply because they did not want to pay taxes. They overturned loads of British tea, smuggled, and even lynched to get their point across. The white faces of the revolution are revered in modern textbooks and their acts are seen as the epitome of liberty. In today’s society, black people are murdered by cops in exponential rates. When we protest, our acts are labeled as criminal behavior and are often seen as a pest to society. This hypocritical view that is imposed on us leads us to follow movements such as ‘Black Lives Matter’ because our rights are being altered. We enforce this statement because when we protest over a wrongful death of one our brothers and sisters, we are not taken as serious. Not as seriously as we would be if we were wealthy white men complaining about paying taxes-- a duty almost as inevitable as death itself. In addition, the black people that are murdered are often painted as criminals to provide a basis for their deaths. 17-year-old Trayvon Martin was armed with a bag of skittles, a can of Arizona tea, and a hoodie on his head and the media began to arm him with another deadly weapon-- his blackness. They depicted him as a ‘super predator’ due to the color of his skin and the way he carried himself. When the media attempts to twist images based on prejudices in order to justify murder, it showcases just how corrupt American society is. When a police officer murders another human being in cold blood, they are not aware of the victim's criminal background beforehand-- they are the only aware of what they can see, which is the epitome of prejudice. Prejudice directed towards the color of our skin should not be the basis of murder.

I do not expect you to alter the views that have been etched into your mind your entire life after being informed on why African-Americans are upset. I do not expect you to fully understand the anger and how deeply-rooted it is, or the extent of the effects of your actions has on black people. To do that you would have to be able to feel the full effect of being black by either being black or harvesting love for a black individual such as a child or spouse. And even then, you will never be able to relate to the struggle as it was never directly inflicted upon yourself. All we can expect from you is to accept that there is a problem. When you are informed, there is no way that you can argue that you were unaware of the issue at hand. If you still cannot identify with our struggle, ask yourself a simple question: if you could come back as any race, would I come back as black?

Sincerely,

Black People

[frowzyspeaks]

Kinks and Geeks

Every month for 84 months, I dealt with 350 degrees of heat scorching at my scalp in the name of beauty. I was undergoing a ‘new’ hair styling mechanism called a Brazilian Blowout. My scalp felt as if the devil himself had whispered all of his sins onto it. As I coughed through the cloud of smoke, my mom combed through my newly straightened tresses and followed it up with a sleek, blue flat iron. This evil was all so common to me, persevering through the pain was not even the reason I would soon decide to rid myself of this torture.

For 144 months, I was ashamed of where I came from. My naturally kinky curls were a constant reminder to my young mind that I looked nothing like the faces on television that I had grown to love. The Brazilian Blowout’s that my young scalp endured were what held up my self-image. When I came home from my hair appointments with my mom, my dad routinely jumped for joy. “No more nappy hair!”, he’d exclaim. I’d then force a fake smile onto my face, because now I had ‘good hair’.

For nearly 300 years, there has been a very deep-rooted self-hate embedded within the minds of the African-American community. Tightly coiled hair is referred to as ‘bad hair’ or ‘nappy’, and is subject to elimination in order to feel acceptable to our white peers. African-Americans eliminate their hair features with techniques and chemicals such as relaxers, perms, blowouts, and texturizers. Frequent use of this technique ultimately results in hair becoming weak, which more often than not ends in hair loss.

In one hour, I was bald. My mom had completed my routine Brazilian Blowout; however, this time, I was in tears. Staring at the pile of my broken hair on the floor, I knew it was time for a change. My mom held onto me as I realized what had happened.

In one minute, my mom gave me a lecture that I will never forget. She spoke to me of how beautiful me and my hair were. Running her fingers through my broken tresses, she asked me if I wanted to go natural. “Natural?” I questioned, with a bit of an attitude in my voice. That was a completely foreign idea that I had purposefully steered away from most of my life. “Natural!”, she replied, fumbling for her phone. She showed me photos of gorgeous women of color with different textured hair, women who looked nothing like the women I admired on television. Her idea still seemed a bit foggy to me, so she washed my hair to show me my curl pattern without the heat damage. After a few snips, six inches of hair were gone, and I instantaneously felt bald. At the age of 12, I was bald. She had chopped off the ends of my hair that fell straight due to years of damage, which I would soon learn is called a ‘big chop’. I was left with a teeny-weeny afro that had sculpted my young face beautifully. However, I failed to see this. I believed that I was still ugly, and I feared what my dad would say after I came home with hair barely longer than his. During the car ride back to my dad’s house, my mom gave me a another long pep talk about how my dad was going to flip out, but that I could not let his words get to me.

In seconds, I was in tears. At the time, my dad gave me no reaction whatsoever, but I knew what was running through his mind. I just knew that in his mind, he was just as ashamed of my hair as I was. Being that he worked at my middle school, I feared the comments he and I would receive the next day. The majority of the comments made were negative, using words like ‘nappy’, ‘ghetto’, and ‘ugly’. After a while, I began to believe that these opinions were factual, and my self-esteem was completely crushed. However, I overcame this obstacle.

After 48 months, I’m beginning to love myself. As my hair flourishes, so does the knowledge that I have of the world. I now know that my kinky-curly mane is a major component of what makes me special-- no one can say that they have the same hair as me. Over the years, my hair has become a symbol of my strength and a constant reminder that I am unapologetically me- a ‘nappy-headed’ black woman. Embracing my ‘nappy’ hair has not only taught me that my hair comes with prejudices, but that it is my job to defy these prejudices.

In 10 seconds, I try my best to ensure that another black girl will not be ashamed of her roots as I once was. Whenever I see a young princess of color, I compliment her on her tresses whether they be kinky, curly, or wavy. I believe that your hair is your pride and that after overcoming this deep-rooted self-hate, I feel as it is my job to remind them that their hair is also what makes them unique.

[frowzyspeaks]

Women As An Imaginary Whole

Equality has served as a recurring theme throughout the relatively brief existence of America, “Home of the Free”. Birthed from the foundations of racism and shouvanism that make America the place it is, rebellions and movements have inevitably occurred in effort to salvage America’s (but most importantly, the white man’s) image and the well-being of minority groups that fight to exist within it’s realms. The Civil Rights Movements of the 1950’s and 60’s seemingly resulted in a major shift of power within society by leading to landmark decisions such as Brown v. The Board of Education, The Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the Nineteenth Amendment. Inherently, black women have been an undeniable catalyst for this change as they have always been, but we are seldom given proper praise due to the “feminist” movement. White women semi-consciously label our prominent female figures in African-American history as “feminist” in a phenomena dubbed Black Feminist Revisions History Project or BF-RHP due to their lack of actual white feminists who have contributed significantly to the progress of women, an imagined whole, as a result of interest convergence theory.

Black Feminist Revisions History Project enables the backdoor appeal in order to make feminism seem as if it is universal and made for every woman-- transcending beyond  race, ethnicity, sex, religion, and socioeconomic status. BF-RHP is the practice of indiscriminately reclassifying historically significant Black women feminist, often posthumously. They usually did not self identify as feminist based on the available historical record. This revision appears to be a direct consequence of Derrick Bell’s interest convergence theory that essentially states that white people only do things to advance Black’s if they reap some sort of benefit from it and will abandon their promises once they have received their benefits. Interest convergence applies here because if white women are able to claim black women as feminist heroes, it masques how mediocre their efforts throughout history truly are. This is proven by their hesitancy to claim black women as allies pre-civil rights movement era and then their readiness to suddenly accept us after death. The relevancy of this phenomena should serve as a reminder to Black women that white women are not our allies, but rather secondary supporters of white supremacy.

If these black women are not feminists, what are they? This is a question that self-acclaimed feminists may ask an Africana women who have questioned the true essence of the “feminist” movement that white women try to universalize. White women utilize feminism as a movement to make themselves equal to their male counterparts, simply because that is the only barrier they face in their journey to liberation. The white race has a women problem because the women are oppressed. Black people have a man and a woman problem because black men are as oppressed as their women. By making men as a whole rather than specifically white men seem like our enemies forges false bonds between us and white women and erases race as the root of our oppression, which allows white’s to control our narrative and allows space for white supremacy to flourish uninterruptedly.

Black women should take on the label of Africana womanist in opposition to feminists to maintain the true essence of our plight for equal rights as a separate entity and an extension of the advancement of our people as a whole rather than as an agent of white-based motives. Africana womanists strive to primarily uplift their race as equal or to equal conditions of our white peers because our race will always transcend our gender in the society that we live in. Our first enemy is not the men who have slaved in the fields with us, the same men who have persevered through the cruel circumstances of racism.  Africana womanism views feminism, the suggested alternative to these problems, as a sort of inverted white patriarchy, with the white feminists now in command and on top. Our enemy is indisputably the white race as a whole, not just the men that serve as the face, but also the women who contribute to our seemingly permanent second class citizenship. Classifying our struggles as women’s issues rather than Black women’s issues or more simply as Black issues only creates a platform for white women to use us as a stepping stone to their longed-for seat next to white men at the top of the oppression pyramid.

In conclusion, Black women should remain wary of the ways of our white “allies” due to their underlying goal to promote white supremacy and to paint themselves as victims as opposed to agents of oppression themselves. My knowledge of interest-convergence theory allows for me to label their suppression of the advancement of Black women as yet another ploy to put themselves on top, as well as allow for me to realizes they will do everything in their power to convince us that their movement is our movement as well. Meanwhile, white feminists are actually “bra-burning man-haters” as their efforts are miniscule in comparison to the efforts of their Black “counterparts”. Black women should take a stand to reclaim our history as our own and empower ourselves as a race first rather than our gender because our anatomy is not what has hindered us for centuries.