Bear Witness, I Beg You

I just watched the video of Tyre Nichols being brutally murdered by five Memphis police officers.  When the alert crossed my phone about 30 minutes ago I went to my computer, took a deep breath, and pressed play.

My God.

Given the onslaught of warnings prior to the release of the video, we knew it was going to be bad.  Like really bad.  Like Memphis Police Chief Cerelyn Davis describing it as "acts that defy humanity" bad.  Like Tyre's mother stating she could not watch it in its entirety bad.  And then going on to do what so many black parents of police-murdered children do - as if it is some backass, heinous responsibility on them - she urged the public to show restraint in their response, bad.

Quite frankly, as a parent, I could not fault her if she demanded the public burn it all down.  The grace that she, and so many before her have shown is astonishing.  

The title above is "Bear Witness, I Beg You" - and I am directing that squarely at every white person who crosses this blog space.  Black people know all too well what they will see on that video.  They have either experienced some degree of it firsthand, lost someone they care for to violence like it, or have had "the talk" with their children because of this daily, grinding, breath holding reality in their lives.

I am begging you - DO. NOT. LOOK. AWAY.

To look away; to ignore the story and the video; to casually hide behind a delicate constitution is privilege of the worst kind.  It reeks of indifference to your fellow man.  It screams that you cannot, will not even try to relate.  And it goes to the very heart of the words BLACK LIVES MATTER.

My white ass, your white ass, his, hers, their white asses - we move through this world cloaked in the protective covering of skin cells that just happen to contain less melanin.  By virtue of two white people fucking, we walk freely into stores.  We survive traffic stops.  We are not immediately suspect on a street corner.  And the chance that we will ever star in a cop snuff film like Tyre Nichols?  GTFO.  We have a better chance of winning the Powerball without ever buying a ticket.

If you find yourself chafing at my words, ask yourself why?  I realize 'privilege' is a dirty word these days, much like 'woke' - both having been assfucked into something completely different by a corrupt, racist, bigoted, ignorant political party - but privilege exists.  And if you are white, you reek of it.  I reek of it.  My children reek of it.  Even my transgender son reeks of it.  Because what the world sees first, what employers see first, what store clerks see first, what police officers see first - is that they are white.

The world is automatically an easier place because of an accident of birth.  No, having white skin does not mean you won't struggle, won't be poor, won't lose a job, won't go into debt - but what it does do is insure you aren't starting the race with one leg tied up behind your back.

I am not asking anyone to feel guilty about being white.  After all, you did not do anything to come out this way.  <----But I am asking you to acknowledge that YOU DID NOT DO ANYTHING TO COME OUT THIS WAY.  Your skin is not some God given tonal hierarchy.  Your pastiness is not a gift from on high that confers with it some betterthanness.  Again, you are simply the result of two white people having unprotected sex.  So get over yourself.

And watch the video.

Bear witness to a young man being horrifically beaten by five police officers.  Listen as he begs for his life, as he calls for his mother.  Imagine the pain, the desperation, the point when he understood he may die.  Then imagine his mother trying to watch even a small portion of her child's murder.  My heart cannot even begin to come close to imagining the soul tearing pain of hearing your grown child so scared, so hurting, so disoriented that their mind plummets back to being a child, to hollering wordsf beseeching the one who has always protected them - the one who has been there from the beginning - MOM.

As I sit here typing, tears are falling freely.  For him.  For her. For his family, for his friends.  For every black parent, every black person who lives with this possibility every single day.  

And for this country.  We are well and truly fucked.  There is no other way to say it.  Because there should be no reaction but shock and horror to this video, but there will be.  There are already the "he should have complied" apologists bleating.  He did.  There are the murder porn enthusiasts who love every bloodletting moment because they sit at their computers in front of their confederate flags, stroking their Nazi paraphernalia, and wearing their All Lives Matter t-shirts.

And do not bring up the fact that the five now fired officers are black as if it is some defense.  In the ranks of police officers, this shit exists in every color.  And it must be ripped out by the roots.  (Note: This is not about hating all police officers.  It is not about painting them all with one brush.  It is about acknowledging loudly that within their ranks there are so many bad ones who are coddled, protected, and passed from one department to another, allowing them to continue to terrorize the public.)  The only thing about them being black that is notable is the speed with which we have had this video released, and the consequences that have been brought down on them.  Change their skin tone to peach and this video evidence would be hidden and release obfuscated for a year at least.  When the next officer murder of a black person happens, pay attention to the response time and department interference/excuses should the officer(s) be white.

Tyre Nichols should be alive.  No one should come to international fame because they are murdered in such a jaw dropping dearth of humanity.  Tyre's name should not be a Twitter hashtag, but it is because the circumstances of his death are such that a decent person's mind literally short circuits while watching the video.  

There will be fallout.  There will be others who will be injured or even lose their lives in protests.  To pre-emptively grieve has become second nature.  But with silence, with looking away, with wishing it away, wishing it different, comes complicity.

And worse - an abdication of our own humanity.

Bear witness, I beg you.  And then consider how you, how we all, must stand together and force change.

#TyreNichols

(Please know that I am not advocating anyone with psychological trauma, who could be triggered by the violence, to subject themselves to watching the video. I am, however, begging everyone to pay attention to what happened to this young man. Do not turn away from his life, his death, this story.  As Americans, perhaps if we regularly saw the results of others' actions, and our inactions - police brutality and murder, public mass shootings, school shootings, etc - there might actually be a solid push towards desperately needed change.  )

Comments

[Julia Silva]

Until we get the clowns out of local and federal government this won't get better as mass shootings aren't getting any better.My state,Florida,is trying to ban African American History from being taught.Can you imagine?It is a scary possibility that our governor could become President and then I dontknow what will happen.Blue states like Cali aren't faring much better:huge homeless crisis that makes San Francisco,Los Angeles look like a third world with people now turning hoses on homeless people in freezing weather,people that just need help.The only way to fix this is to get government officials who are not working for the people out of office:Republican mainly but some Democrats as well.Remember we couldn't get reform after George Floyd.My hope is that people like yourself will keep writing about these issues and invoke the better angels in people and at some point we will say enough is enough.