Seize This Moment Now

IGNORE THE RACIAL CONCUBINES WHO SELL YOU OUT FOR WHITE ACCEPTANCE AND SOCIAL-MEDIA LIKES.
THEY BECOME RELEVANT IF YOU GIVE THEM OXYGEN.

“I could have accom­plished more against my ene­mies but I have had to use one hand fend­ing off my friends.”[Paraphrased].
As we expe­ri­ence the events that suc­ceed­ed the ghast­ly killing of George Floyd, we have seen peo­ple of all stripes stand up and pay their respects to the mem­o­ry & fam­i­ly of Mister Floyd.
Speaking for myself, I am still unable to look at the video or watch some of the emo­tion­al images with­out cry­ing uncontrollably.

I have no idea why I can­not stop cry­ing for a man I have nev­er met? I have no idea what made me close my busi­ness, pick up a video cam­era, and stand with pro­tes­tors in my city?
Neither do I know what prompt­ed me to brave a line of heav­i­ly armed police offi­cers, to tell them in no uncer­tain terms, tears in my eyes, that what they are doing across the coun­try is wrong?

In all of the events that occurred, with all of the shock­ing images we bear wit­ness to, of police act­ing out aggres­sive­ly & bar­bar­i­cal­ly against cit­i­zens, I saw hope. I saw hope for a bet­ter tomor­row.
I saw a pos­si­bil­i­ty for the man­i­fes­ta­tion of the dream as Dr. King saw it over [60]years ago. “I have a dream that my four lit­tle chil­dren will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the col­or of their skin but by the con­tent of their char­ac­ter.”
I saw it in the mil­lions of young and old white peo­ple who turned out to march, lit­er­al­ly plac­ing them­selves in har­m’s way, at extreme risk even at the per­il of death. In many cas­es, they out­num­bered black peo­ple by wide mar­gins.
Many have been bru­tal­ized and even killed by police. Let us nev­er fail to rec­og­nize the sac­ri­fices of our white broth­ers and sis­ters who stand, and have stood with us, and have suf­fered, even though they did­n’t have to.

Even as my heart swells with hope at the prospect of a white awak­en­ing, I am cau­tious and con­strained in my expec­ta­tions of what will come from this momen­tous event.
For far too long many in the black com­mu­ni­ty have used these events as oppor­tu­ni­ties to gain per­son­al recog­ni­tion for them­selves.
Let this not be anoth­er event for the self-absorbed to jock­ey for atten­tion. Let it be the defin­ing event that will char­ac­ter­ize the begin­ning of the end of white supremacy.

This is a moment that must be har­nessed for the greater good. It is an inflec­tion moment that has peeled away the thin veneer of nor­mal­cy that had for four hun­dred years plus, cov­ered the igno­ble and hor­rif­ic night­mare that is white American racism.
It is time to step away from those who would [“what about”] us to death. It is time to walk away from those who would side­track what we are about as a peo­ple, demand­ing equal­i­ty and jus­tice, fair-play on a lev­el play­ing field.
Yes, that includes those with black skin.
Those who have found a kind of sick and dement­ed com­fort in [“Massa’s house”], whether as his maid, but­ler, or as his [con­cu­bine].

There are some who have black skin but white hearts, they sold their souls to the dev­il, and have made the tac­ti­cal deci­sion to speak ill of black peo­ple as a vehi­cle to gain likes on social media.
Understand, that some would rather be sub­servient on their knees in def­er­en­tial servi­tude to their oppres­sors, than face the dan­gers of stand­ing on their own feet towards a path to true freedom.

It is for those rea­sons that Harriet Tubman report­ed­ly car­ried a gun, not for the white slave-catch­ers but for those negroes with white hearts who would run back to [Massa]. Those Israelites who berat­ed Moses because they did not have meat.
The events that we wit­nessed after the lynch­ing of George Floyd’s death have illu­mi­nat­ed the brutish & mur­der­ous pro­cliv­i­ty inher­ent in American police.
For all intents and pur­pos­es, they have demon­strat­ed that they are the oppo­si­tion, they are [the tip of the spear of black oppres­sion], (as if we did­n’t already know)?

The vast major­i­ty of white men in America’s police depart­ments have revealed them­selves as ene­mies of the black com­mu­ni­ty.
But for a few excep­tions, they have become a counter-move­ment to the strug­gles of black peo­ple’s fight for black auton­o­my, they are the counter-move­ment.
They have revealed them­selves as race-sol­diers against the black com­mu­ni­ty, some­thing African-Americans have been say­ing they are for gen­er­a­tions and generations.

The hard­est part of this bat­tle is deal­ing with those in black skin who would jock­ey for [pow­er & place] on the back of a tragedy. Worse yet, there are those who are quite will­ing to be sub­servient race con­cu­bines. Those we sim­ply must ignore and hope they will dry up and blow away.
They are rel­e­vant only when we give them oxy­gen. Like a tiny flick­er­ing flame, place a jar over it and it dies a nat­ur­al death.
They are rel­e­vant only to those they serve, they are not rel­e­vant to us.

Mike Beckles is a for­mer Jamaican police Detective cor­po­ral, busi­ness­man, researcher, and blog­ger. 
He is a black achiev­er hon­oree, and pub­lish­er of the blog chatt​-​a​-box​.com. 
He’s also a con­trib­u­tor to sev­er­al web­sites.
You may sub­scribe to his blogs free of charge, or sub­scribe to his Youtube chan­nel @chatt-a-box, for the lat­est pod­cast all free to you of course.