I’m at a loss. My heart is heavy with despair, grief and unimaginable rage that can’t be contained in words. It’s rare that I speak out publicly on the things that happen in the world, I try to be non-polarizing, even keeled but strong in my personal opinions and faith. Within the confines of my personal relationships I’m very vocal about the things of God, geopolitics and the like. But I’ve kept my opinion to myself for too long and I can no longer with a clear conscious keep it all to myself. Enough is enough and we are tired! I didn’t live through the Civil Rights movement, my mom was a young child at the time but the struggles, the fights, the death and anguish was passed on to me so that I would not forget. We are not so far removed from the abolition of slavery and the Civil Rights movement that we couldn’t easily slip back. I was told that I could be anything I wanted to be, I had the freedom of choice and should be free of fear. And yet I am fearful and I both want and need answers.

To those who hate Blacks (African-Americans) or anyone else of color, I have this to ask:

What is it about me that makes you hate me so very much? What about my countenance, my cadence and continuance that incurs such wrath in you that you feel the innate and pressing need to abuse, maim and murder? Is it the color of my skin? The cafe ole to sensuous dark chocolate hues that insight your anger? The same coloring that you try to mimic by laying out in the sun, tanning bed and mist on tanning products? Is that the one? You do realize that your skin has melanin just like mine does?   I just so happen  to express more of it than you do. It’s the same beautiful brown hue that beckoned master to the slave quarters under the cover of darkness. Is it my full lips, hips and thighs that make you curse my existence? Strange if it is as women, and men alike, pay thousands of dollars for lip fillers, fat injections and butt implants to give them more voluptuous curves that come naturally to many women of color. You mimic but denigrate that which you attempt to imitate. The underpinning of your hate is that we are inferior and unworthy. Yet when no one else is around, no one else is watching, I guarantee I know what’s on your computer screen late at night. When you’re sequestered in your little hole of a room, darkness surrounding you and hiding your vices… you’re looking at someone who has the same colored skin as mine and you lust behind it, just as your ancestors did. Though you will never admit it to anyone, never let anyone know that you secretly like what you say you hate.

We’ve been called monkey, ape, porch monkey, jiggaboo, spearchucker, nigger… and such deeply ingrained hatred and racism has colored our society since the enslavement of the new world. To those who feel that your country is being taken from you, I have this to say to you: This isn’t and NEVER was your country. This country belonged to those who resided here thousands of years before you “discovered” it. But you took that which was never rightfully yours, displacing and killing the original inhabitants and settling in a “new world”. The framework of this nation was built on the backs of indentured servants and slaves who were ripped from their homes and transported as chattel. But we aren’t the only ones who were slaves. Some of humankind are slaves to their hatred, beholden to the irrational racist belief systems that have left them limited and stunted in their emotional, spiritual and societal growth.

Racist, fear and hatemongers are to be pitied and prayed for, as incredibly difficult as those two things may be. John Stewart mentioned in his broadcast last night that we still have this gaping wound of racial divide that we are choosing to ignore and do nothing about. He’s right. The chasm that exists between races and socioeconomic classes in this country is almost insurmountable. The wound of racial divide continues to fester and ooze, infected further every time another person of color is verbally and/or physically beaten, abused, maimed or murdered.

It’s OK to be angry, to be mad, pissed off and belligerent about what continues to transpire, time and time again. I’m mad, I’m sad, angry and confused. But hate breeds hate. How can we transcend our differences if we are mired in what makes us different? We love despite the hurt, we love despite the hateful words; we love because it is what we were commanded to do. We are to love those who would be our enemies and pray that they see the error of their ways before it is too late.

Food for thought my darlings.