It’s been a while since I’ve blogged here but if there was ever a time to dust off the proverbial keybord and end a 2+ year blog hiatus, now is the time.
I’ll leave this here below and state what should be obvious and self-evident but clearly isn’t based on the happenings the past day/week/month/year/decade(s)/centuries.
Black.Lives.Matter.
Not, All Lives Matter. Not Non-White Lives Matter. Not People of Color Matter. But Black.Lives.Matter.
I am posting this to show my support and that my heart goes out to the black community in the US and around the world that are subjected to racism daily.
While the black community certainly doesn’t need another white male offering his support or problem-solving abilities – my white friends and community might benefit from some resources.
A while back, at the encouragement of my better half, Hannah, I read White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo, a book about “Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism“. Criticism of the book acknowledged – I thought it was a good starting point to open my eyes to what is going on around us and why many people (including myself) always jumped to the defensive “but I’m not racist” or took a systemic problem personally (well, we should). It’s not enough to be quietly non-racist.
This weekend, feeling a lot of emotions, I started ‘How To Be An Anti-Rascist’ by Ibram X. Kendi to “arm” myself with some new knowledge and perspectives. The idea in this book is that it’s not enough to just be quietly “non-racist”, but we need to be actively anti-racist.
If you haven’t seen this video of Killer Mike’s Emotional Speech at Atlanta Mayor’s Press Conference or are struggling to put this into words, I recommend watching this clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vy9io6VEt58&ab_channel=BringingDownTheBand