In Plain Sight

I often ask people why they're glad to be an American and the most popular  answer is, "Because I'm free."  That couldn't be more wrong.  Just because certain liberties and freedoms that you may presume to be privileges haven't been stripped away from you doesn't mean we have it better. The same things people fear like wearing burkas or population control goes down here too, just in different forms. Or slightly similar ones. You get chided in America for  wearing certain things and there is DEFINITELY population going on, just because they aren't out in the open with it like in China does not mean it isn't happening.

I've never actually enjoyed being an American, never felt any real connection to this place. Although I've never lived in another country I have never felt welcomed here. People often forget their history or don't even bother to know it. I knew something wasn't right when they didn't want me to read. As a a little black girl that enjoyed reading and going to new and far away lands through paper and ink, I couldn't understand why they didn't want me to have that opportunity. So I read as much and as fast as I could to try to figure out what they didn't want me to know. I came across the Willie Lynch letter on my own around nine. I couldn't believe people felt like that about other people, why would you want people to behave like that? Break families apart like that? 

Fast forward twenty years. Black people killing each other over the dumbest shit imaginable, Babies being killed in the streets and watching it all unfold before your eyes because of the information super highway  is mind boggling. The Ferguson situation right now is fukking terrifying, just seeing despairty of the people. The force and practices of law enFORCEment are showing us what martial law is going to look like. We are all watching and subconsciously and psychologically being conditioned for this shit. Ferguson is a prerequisite to what America is about to go through. Seeing what will make people mad, in what areas, how militant are the civilians so we know how much and what they can handle.

I know people will say "Well the blacks are killing the blacks TOO!" so I guess that makes it ok for a police to drop a kid in the street because he was embarrassed? Nah. I worry  about the future. I'm an optimistic realist so I want things to get better for this angry ass world but not everybody feels like I do.

Gold Bird