20 November 2016 "13th"

As a sophomore in college, I took my first gender studies class. Because I was simultaneously taking a Sociology of Sexuality course, I was very attune to issues involving masculinity, and to the idea of intersectionality between race, class, and gender.

It was during this semester that the Freddie Gray murder occurred. The most I remember about this was the resulting riots that I watched on TV, the requirement by Loyola that we students stay safe on campus in our dorms, and the heated discussions that ensued in my gender studies class whenever the topic of Freddie Gray and the riots came up. I remember feeling a sense of confusion, of separation from the issue entirely, and a sense of frustration at the people who simply cried  “race!” as if that explained the problem entirely. I specifically remember arguing that socioeconomic status has more to do with police targeting than does race; I think I even brought up the example of a black man walking down the street in a suit, as if that proved anything.

There’s something important that you should know about me before I go any further—I’m a quarter black. And what this means is that I have one black grandparent, three white grandparents, one white mother, and one half black, half white dad. The rest of my family members are a mishmash of racial percentages, and depending on which side you examine, a mishmash of skin tones, cultural experiences, and awareness of inequality. I’ve always grown up in a weird, middle ground of racial awareness—the way I look lends almost no clues to my race, and so people tend to place me wherever it’s convenient for them. This is both a gift and a curse—it allows me to fly under the radar, but it also places my identity at the hands of the people I’m with.

I think this was my problem sophomore year. I was in a predominantly white school, having just come off 12 years of education at predominantly white private Catholic schooling, and had no reason to feel attached to a black man I had never met. All my friends (white) agreed with me that there is more to police brutality than race, and nothing in my life had ever forced me to challenge these beliefs. Over a few years, a few more classes, and a semester studying abroad in South Africa, where race is even more poignant in everyday conversations, I’ve learned a few more things, and become more educated about the importance of race in debates about police brutality and the Black Lives Matter movement. But I still placed myself in a sort of outside territory about the movement in general. That is, until I watched a documentary called 13^th.

In short, the documentary covers systematic racial inequality through the lenses of economics and politics. More specifically, it covers the pattern of incarceration, and examines the recent BLM movement that emerged out of a clear-cut problem of racially based police brutality. It provides a striking parallel between the system of inequality today, and that during the time of Jim Crow laws, segregation, and overall brutality between citizens who were white and citizens of color.

Because of the way I look, I’ve never really had to face the negative implications of being black the way some members of my family have. I’ve never really had to understand what it means to face systemic racism that some people claim doesn’t even exist anymore. Sure, I’ve imagined what it must be like for some of my cousins, and my dad throughout my life has made it very clear what it was like for my grandfather as he grew up in times of lynching and segregation. But I’ve never felt a personal tug towards the BLM movement, any more than as a person of humanity who is obligated to stand up for the rights of others.

But this documentary tugged at a part of me that I still can’t really identify. For the first time, I really understood the implications of race, and how these implications have been affecting people just like me for centuries. I fear for my family, I fear for my friends, but for the first time, I also fear for myself. The motivation behind this feeling is selfish, and I’m sorry to admit that it took a fear for myself for me to finally realize the call to action that the BLM movement has always cried out for. For the first time, I saw pictures and video that didn’t feel so far away from my own experience anymore. For the first time, I recognized that this experience isn’t far from my world, it’s happening all around me. And for the first time I realized that I am not as far from this movement and its causes as I thought. Systemic racism has forced its ugly presence on people a lot less black than me. And this thought is absolutely terrifying.

The documentary ends in a way that is extremely powerful, and extremely effective in drawing on its overall themes and presenting its overall message. It features a montage of clips from Trump rallies and from the Jim Crow era—placed over this is a voiceover of Trump saying things that pair eerily well with the mindset of racists in the 1960s. It made his comments all the more threatening and all the more supportive of white supremacy. It also really opened my eyes to the implications of a world in which Trump supporters may openly desire to return the U.S. to a time we have no real business returning to at all.

I guess the point of writing this response is a bit for my own sake. In a way, it’s the acceptance of a realization that I should’ve come to terms with much sooner. But more than that, it’s an important pairing of my own unique experience with that of a movement that is so much bigger than just me. It’s the recognition that regardless of differences in experience, we all really aren’t so different after all.