On Tuesday, April 20, a jury in Minnesota defied our weary expectations and convicted a White police officer of murdering a Black man.
Let the bells cry hallelujah! Justice is not dead! When confronted with overwhelming evidence, they didn’t turn a blind eye and do the thing we feared they would do, and they deserve our profound gratitude.
But we have so much work to do. I know, after every little victory we have still had so much work to do. But maybe it’s happening. Maybe we are turning the tide and reaching the hearts of people with the message that everyone is a beautiful child of Whatever You Wanna Call It and deserves respect, care and love; and that Black folks have been so badly treated for over 400 years that we need to offer them a little extra love and protection until everybody gets it that yes, We Are All One. The bells can ring out hallelujah on that day, too. But until then, we have to continue to remind some slow learners that actually, Black Lives Do Matter.
The work is ours to do. You know how you can’t change somebody else in anything but a superficial way? You can’t get an okay partner and decide you’re going to mold them into the perfect partner and expect anything like that to happen. Well, you can, and it’s called brainwashing and it is frowned upon. But, to quote the late great Sir Terry Pratchett, “A leopard will never change his shorts.” You can only change yourself — and only if you truly desire to do so.
Some people are capable of responding to new information with curiosity and interest, and changing their minds when they are wrong about things.
And some are not.
We can choose to meet change with curiosity and excitement. Change is frequently good. Maybe not always, but often enough. Learning something new is always beneficial. Taking on a new perspective will reward you in unimagined ways. But being curious is really one of the most powerful things to be. Looking at the unknown and saying to yourself, “Huh, that’s interesting, I wonder why it’s like that,” beats the hell out of looking at the unknown and running away screaming – or shooting at it until it . . . stops.
Fear is the driver of intolerance, bigotry, racism, sexism; its manifestation is the push to keep certain people “in their place.” Under the jackboots. Knees on necks, so to speak. It’s like any control freak, they just want everybody to do what they say so they can make sure they’re all safe – for a given value of safe, which isn’t necessarily what a control freaks thinks it is. It’s the desire to fight fire with gasoline. Totalitarians are terrified little people, not “strong men.” Sad, frightened, broken little bullies screaming at what they refuse to try to understand.
How do we move people from fear to curiosity? Education. And encouragement. Helping people overcome fear to embrace living a richer life is a wonderful thing to do. It’s not easy, and requires endless patience, but if you can do it, you have done something major. Lead by example whenever possible. When something comes up that seems like it might be scary, get curious. Most things are not that scary. (The exception here is when you are actually in a life-threatening situation when someone wants to assault or kill you and you need to punch them in the throat and get the hell outa there. Don’t be curious, be punchy.)
Oh, dear Readers, we have so much work and so much healing to do. So much healing. We have to face our own fear, our own brainwashing and programming, our unconscious bias, and yes, our privilege — stare it down, and work every day to learn how to be a better ally by using our privilege to call out racism when we see it, especially when we see it in the mirror. It’s hard and lonely work, but I completely trust that we’re up to it – especially if we support each other through it.
With strength, love, and hope, we walk another baby step forward. May we learn to run, and soon. Peace.