Rude Awakening

From municipal buildings flying Confederate battle flags, to cops murdering young black men in cold blood, the resurgence of racism is open and unapologetic. We see it almost daily on the news as  violence and hate speech begets more of the same. I live in a predominantly black neighborhood and in my liberal white girl ignorance I thought I had an idea of what this exploding racism meant to black Americans.

Tonight, a simple encounter hit me square in the face with reality.

After an evening at the symphony, my husband and I were leisurely walking the deserted downtown streets when a voice behind us startled me. “Coming up on your right” the young man shouted. I turned to see two young black men on skateboards heading towards us. One was dressed in summer clothes, and the one who called out to us was in a red jacket, hood over his head, big grin on his face. I smiled back as he came up closer to us. As he passed us, friend in tow, he said “I just like to let people know I am coming…especially when I have my hoodie up. You never know who is packing around here and I don’t want any (pause) “misunderstandings.”  My reply was, “You’re fine. Don’t worry about having a “misunderstanding” with us.” He gave us a nod and he and his silent friend took off past us.

I watched their forms grow smaller as they made their way down the dimly lit street, my gaze attached to the boy’s hooded head.

I was suddenly overwhelmed with anger; blinding rage really. The feeling of injustice raised my blood pressure. The fact this kid felt he had to announce his presence to avoid being shot because he was young, black and had a hoodie on went from the abstract indignation to real anger.

I was angry at a society that shoots young black men in certain states of dress for imagined crimes they have committed or will commit. I was angry for the boy who felt he had to justify his presence in a country that is supposed to be free of such restrictions, and I was mad at myself, for having ever thought I might even remotely understand his life.  In that moment of clarity I understood that there would never be any way for me to completely understand what his existence is like. At that moment I was embarrassed to call myself a liberal because, in our quest for justice and equality for all, we have dared to believe we somehow know what it is to be one of the victims of bigotry and hatred. We have the nerve to assume that because we are outraged at the injustice that this allows us to magically understand the world young black men live in.

As his figure got smaller and smaller I had to fight the urge to run after him and apologize to him for the society he lives in, to apologize because he feels he needs to let white people know ahead of time “hey, I am not going to hurt you so don’t shoot me please”. It’s disgusting that I ever thought I had a clue, that because I am liberal and open minded, good hearted and all that crap that somehow that made me able to magically understand what others go through, be it a young black man in a hoodie or a single mother on welfare. How dare I? That is a mistake I will not make again. Thanks for the humble pie kid.