Not your Negro

Hey Lollies,

I have tried all week to put into words the anger, hurt, and sadness my heart feels over George Floyd's murder. I have been doing alot of spiritual healing, and working with allowing the universe to do what it does and, ride the wave an take its cues. Tonight, I planned to watch Malcolm X, but the universe brought me to a movie, 'I am Not Your Negro'. Its an account of the author James Arthur Baldwin's 30 page notes of America, and his 3 murdered friends, Medgar Evers, Malcolm X, and Martin Luther King Jr.. As the documentary starts, I am drawn to James instantly because of his gorgeous smile, and his views on Christianity: not wanting to be conformed to the religion because so many talked the talk, but did not fully walk the walk. He also did not want to be Black Muslim because he didn't believe that all white people were the devil. He also didn't join the NAACP because up north where he grew up it was associated with only those Blacks who where of a certain class. He naturally had an altered outlook on many things. ( Below James' Picture in Paris, France)

The film begins with James being interviewed, and the interviewer asks the question; 'Why aren't the Negroes optimistic? They have Negro mayors, Negros are in all sports, Politics, and on TV. Is it getting better, and still hopeless'? James reply's; "Not much hope for it. The real question is what happens to the Country, not Negro/Blackman". As my mind sat with it on paused after that statement because, We know what happens. I don't feel completely hopeless after seeing the many protest, in solidarity of injustices Blacks face lately. However it seem almost like clockwork; yearly, this country finds a way to hurt, anger and depress my race, as whole. No sooner I un-pause the tv and there are scenes of riots from the 60s, on the screen, and I am saddened that those scenes look like all the protests, and police using unnecessary force as Americans walked, and protested the murder of George Floyd today.

The documentary goes on to talk about his closeness with his three friends and how mentally we think the elder of the group is the one who will pass first. He shared how he outlived them and the sadness that these great men, weren't around to see how they impacted so many people. I was glad that he shared how, MLK, and Malcom X ; towards the end of their lives were more and more on the same agenda. In a clip of Martin Luther king Jr, (during the Montgomery Bus Boycott) MLK speaks about how " Blacks don't have a right to sit next to a white person on the bus. Black people have a duty to sit on the bus next to a white person." Society is always quick to label Malcolm a terrorist, and Martin a lesser evil out of the two of them. This comes from the continued lack of getting to know the minority, prior to placing them in a stereotypical box. These men; Medgar, Martin, and Malcom gave their lives for a change and or for their people, who betrayed them.

Baldwin goes on to speak about how he felt watching news while in France about 15 year old Dorothy Counts, as one of the first black students admitted to the Harry Harding High School, in Charlotte, North Carolina. After four days of harassment that threatened her safety, her parents forced her to withdraw from the school. He shared how he felt pride, tension, and anguish watching this child be tormented, and spit on! Yet this 15 year old girl walked with silence and unutterable pride into school. He shared how he was angry that 'One of Us, should have been there with her.

The documentary then goes into a commercials, where Blacks are depicted as maids, cooks, and,entertainers only. The song playing sings a tune ' If your white your alright, If your brown stick around, but if your black get back, get back, get back'! Baldwin talks about growing up and never seeing real life resemblance of the Black man in film. Most of the Blacks that where on the big screen in his childhood were portrayed as lazy, stupid, slow, or jive-talkin coons. Portrayed heavily by Lincoln Theodore Monroe Andrew Perry, better known by the stage name Stepin Fetchit, an American vaudevillian, comedian, and film actor of Jamaican and Bahamian descent, considered to be the first black actor to have a successful film career. Baldwin did not know any Black men that fit the stereotype he seen on the big screen. "That man certainly did not resemble my father", he stated. The men who did resemble what his father was to him where all White men. They were portrayed as heroes, and worked and had high standards. Yet his race ( My race) was always depicted as lazy, or less than. He goes on to say how television destroyed sense of reality with its influence. ( Just like today, when the media speaks about Blacks looting, not simply saying looters which we can all see are of many races not just Blacks. It is several races, protesting and looting collectively raising up against injustices. Our current news mis-informing the public of protestors turning violent but omitting that the police are setting off tear gas with no provocation. I'm sitting here watching this film astonished, thinking to myself, shit has not changed!

Bringing my thought back to James' reply to the interviewer asking is it getting better, yet still hopeless. I feel maybe it is hopeless! Society has made it very clear where they placed my race, and years later still insist on continuing the biased view points. What's worse is wrongful accusations, just as we seen happen in Central Park with the white woman, Amy Cooper, who called police and said that there’s an African-American man threatening her and her dog, her voice getting more and more agitated. However, Cooper’s sister posted the video on Twitter, where many people pointed out that saying that a man was threatening her life when there is no indication that he was doing so put Christian Cooper’s ( the man she called the police on) life in danger. ( WestSiderag.com) The very idea that some Whites are using false accusations to ether create harm, or project their wrong doings on Blacks is like rewinding the time to when a White person could say anything and automatically be believed but a minority was guilty until proof of innocence. Like the youth pastor, Christopher Keys who told his friend he was carjacked at a CVS on and held at a motel by two black men. Truth resurfaced that he was actually in hotel with a male prostitutes. In their investigation, deputies say they discovered that the married pastor "had been a frequent visitor to the Regency Inn and Suites since January." Based on the investigation, deputies arrested Keys and charged him with solicitation of sodomy. ( Fox5 news)

These real life situations make the reality check Baldwin spoke of very factual. He spoke of a destroyed sense of reality, when you realize your color, is the same as the villains in westerns. That reality check comes thru real clear, when you see the whole system does not have a place for you, as a Black person. " I want American history taught, but Unless I am in that book, you aren't there ether!" James tells Dan Georgakas in an interview. This is a reason why slavery should not be taken out of the books! Harbors, Ports, economy especially in the south would not be able to stand without cheap labor, and slavery! They sold infants at 1200!! ( Same amount of Stimulus payments, that we are saying that's not enough to live off of! Was once the price of a Black infant!) " Its a terrible thing for an entire people to surrender to the notion that 1/9th of its population is beneath them." James stated during one of his lectures, adding that we need each other. The root of all these issues, are from a stigma, and not only that but the conditioning of my race, in our portrait of who and what a Black person is for YEARS. This is why there always seems to be a need to validate our killings. I cant even say Killing of Black men because they are also murdering our children, and women. It give me a sense of unsafety that I already had growing up, but in the back of my mind I always had the hope that these things were of the past.

My fathers murder in 1983 by a police man in Texas hurt but we as a nation have changed and those things don't happen anymore. My naïve thoughts were crumbled when I learned about Travyon Martin (1995-2012), then again when Tamir Rice was killed in 2014, my heart broke when I learned about Darvis Simmons, Amir Brooks, Christopher Mccray etc. etc.. When Ahmaud Arbery was gunned down, by White men who FELT they had a right to shoot him, for suspicion of a robbery weeks prior. People taking the law into their own hands, and not being arrest!! WHAT IN THE ACTUAL FUCK! WHAT ERA WAS I IN!!! Then when I learned about George Floyd, and finally almost a week later watched the video of his crying out to his strongest ancestor his mother as he was dying. As a police man used excessive force on his neck while other officers pinned him down as well! I cried, and thought What the fuck did I just watch!! In a protest only a hour away from where I am sitting a police man sprays tear gas in a CHILD's eyes!! The root of a Black mans hatred is rage, rage not hate! Rage for injustices and rage to get hateful Whites away from our children. The White mans rooted hatred is rooted in fear. Mr. Baldwin goes on to say that he had a discussion where the person said to him, they needed us to pick the cotton, now that they don't need us, they are going to kill us all off, just like they did the Natives. Wether any of you believe that statement, doesn't matter. Let that thought sit with you for a moment. They brought Blacks here to serve a purpose, the purpose is gone, they failed at keeping us in the bubble they designed/deemed acceptable for Blacks. (Segregation, low income housing areas, poor education, crack epidemic, racial profiling, lynching's, mobs, KKK etc.) We as a country said no that's wrong, because in time as we worked in your houses, took care of your children, you got to know a Black person, so the them vs Us slowly went away. We began to be seen as equal...BUT only certain Blacks, that fit the idea of "wholesome".

I think the biggest take away from the documentary, and current events is that had George Floyd, been any other race, his death would not of even happened. James Baldwin said that when anyone other than Black says 'give me liberty of give me death', White America applauds. When a Black person says that word for word he is judged a criminal and treated like one, and everything possible is done to make an example of this bad nigger, so there wont be anymore like him.

" What white people have to do, is try and find out in their own hearts why it was necessary to have a nigger in the first place, because I'm not a nigger, I'm a man, but if you think I'm a nigger, it means you need him. The question you have to ask yourself, the white population of this country has got to ask itself, North and South bc its one country, and for a negro there is no difference between the north and the south. There is just a difference in the way they castrate you, but the fact of the castration is American fact. If I'm not the nigger here and you invented him, you the white people invented him, then you have to find out why. And the future of the country depends on that" ~ James Baldwin

thanks for reading,

leah logic

xoxo