Hello World,
I’m a hashtag away from jumping, head first, from a bridge…Okay, I’m so I’m being a wee bit dramatic…But I am a hashtag away from falling sideways from my desk chair onto the carpet below so that I won’t be able to see any new hashtags sure to pop up on my social media accounts on my laptop computer…
I’m still stuck on #PrayforCharleston and since then, the hashtag activism world has moved on to #SandraBland, #SayHerName and as of this week #SamDubose. Let me be clear, in my President Obama voice (Chile, what’s going to happen to us when he’s longer in the White House?), this post is NOT about trivializing any of these horrific incidents, diminishing the unfathomable grief these families must be experiencing right now nor downplaying the inspiring activism that has been organized to address these and similar incidents…This post is simply about my #fatigue and skepticism about various commentaries relating to these and similar incidents…
And I feel like an Internet traitor for feeling this way…Whenever a new horrific incident has transpired, we cannot wait not one beat before countless eloquently written diatribes are disseminated with the quickness…Just some knee-click responses if you ask me…It happens so predictably that I have to wonder if this #Internetoutrage is really true…And I have to wonder if I saw these people in real time, would they be ranting and raving like the way they do on the Internet…Sometimes, things that transpire are so terrible, so egregious, so tragic, there are no words that should be said and or written (outside of the basic news) for a while…
From what I’ve gathered from reading various blog posts, Facebook posts and tweets, it seems the popular sentiment is that black people should be walking around or driving around in fear of being stopped by the police or having any contact with the police altogether…It’s like an NWA song come to life…Truth be told, I tend to not care for the police, but my feelings about the police go back a long time way, way, way before a hashtag was created, when a hashtag was just a number sign even…Why, you ask? Well, #1, I don’t care for anyone telling me what to do (a character flaw), and #2, sometimes, I get the feeling that police officers and criminals are opposing sides of the same coin…However, that being aside, I refuse to live in fear of the police….My God, yes there are some racist, vile police officers out there, but I’ve also known some decent ones…
And maybe I’m not down with every aspect of the #movement because of my overall aversion to pain and discomfort and my ability to see good in almost anything…I wonder what I would been like if I had come of age during the Civil Rights Movement…I just can see myself marching with Dr. King and nem and after a while saying, “You know what? My feet hurt, and I’m ready to go back home to my mama’s house. I got rights there.” Or if I lived during slavery, when Harriet Tubman was trying to get folk to get on the Underground Railroad with her, would I have been the one who asked, “Do they have any snacks on the Underground Railroad cause Massa got snacks at the Big House?”
I jest…But seriously I do have #Fatigue…
***
Now on to this whole Confederate flag debate…I feel like this a classic case of “Come get yo crazy cousin.” Erebody has a trifling cousin that just won’t do right…That cousin who asks you for a loan but hasn’t paid you back from the 50-leven he or she has already asked you for money…That cousin who is always bragging about all of the moves they making when the last move he or she made is the move back to your auntie’s (mother of said cousin) house…That cousin who is hopelessly, undeniably, matter-of-factly stuck on stupid…I feel like rational people of all races realize the Confederate flag is about hate not heritage, but some white people refuse to see what everybody knows…I don’t care how you whitewash it… So to rational white people, I say, “Come get yo crazy cousin” because they are not listening to us (black people)…
Speaking of us…Case in point…Seen at a Confederate flag rally in Stone Mountain Park yesterday…An alleged KKK member wearing FUBU tennis shoes…The FUBU acronym means For Us By Us and is the creation of Daymond John, the black millionaire on “The Shark Tank.” If that ain’t a case of “Come get yo crazy cousin,” I don’t know what is…
And if the flag is about heritage not hatred, what’s up with putting Confederate flags outside of Ebenezer Baptist Church? Yes, that Ebenezer, the Ebenezer Baptist Church of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and at the Martin Luther King, Jr. National Historic Site? Allegedly, the culprits were two white males.…How are black people supposed to take that? “Come, get yo crazy cousin.”
***
Now on to this Cecil the Lion…As someone who loves the Cowardly Lion in “The Wizard of Oz” and Simba in “The Lion King,” I get the international outrage about dentist Dr. Walter Palmer hunting down and killing Cecil the lion…I guess it seems so inhumane because Cecil was big as a human being, and I just think there is something wrong with killing other human beings…I don’t see people being upset if Palmer would have stomped a million cockroaches to death or used his hands to smash a million mosquitoes although cockroaches and mosquitoes are also living creatures…#alllivesmatter, remember?
That being said, the #blacklivesmatter activists and the animal rights activists need to join forces because the animal rights activists are bout it bout it….they don’t play…they gets thangs done, you hear me?!
Actress Mia Farrow got gangsta with it and tweeted the Palmer’s address! He has had to close his business for fear of folk avenging the death of Cecil the lion! And now senators have created a bill dedicated to the the Cecil the lion according to The Huffington Post…
The Conserving Ecosystems by Ceasing the Importation of Large (CECIL) Animal Trophies Act would extend current U.S. import and export restrictions on animal trophies to include species that have been proposed for listing as threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Act. Read the rest of the store here.
Here is one thing that black people can do to gain the sympathy of animal rights activists…
LOL…I jest…truly, I jest…but there may be a kernel of truth here…
Alright, I’m done…
Any thoughts?