Goodmorning 😊. F&$% MICHAEL JACKSON!…

That was a clickbait ass title.. I don’t actually mean f&%$ Michael Jackson, but I do mean f&%$ what he did and I do not support anything associated with him. This man’s home was a child molestation station, but we give him a pass because he’s “Michael Jackson”??

Imagine being one of the children he’s molested?… You have to spend your life walking on this planet being reminded every time one of his songs play that the person playing the song cares more about Michael Jackson than you who’s been molested.

We excuse him for sooooo many reasons–conscious and unconscious!….

We excuse him because he was abused himself!.. But there are so many other people on this planet who’ve also been abused, but they decided not to perpetuate the same violence! Instead they got therapy, practiced art, exercised, etc… It is 1000% possible to break cycles of violence and abuse. I know because I’m doing it and there are other important people in my life that love me who’ve also been abused, but have never abused me.

We excuse him because subconsciously we hold ageist beliefs and believe children should be “seen not heard”, but this is a violent, old-school, western way of thinking. Children have souls and feelings and thoughts just like you and me and they deserve to be protected and respected.

We excuse him because we have not accepted the molestation that’s happened in our own lives… so if we say that what happened to these children isn’t okay, that means we also have to admit that what happened to us wasn’t okay.. so I’m here to remind you that, YES!… The shit that happened to these kids wasn’t okay and the shit that may have happened to you ALSO WAS NOT OKAY!…

Black people excuse him because… we were (and still are!) desperate for a positive representation of someone that looks like us!… Michael Jackson became popular during a time when black people were going through a lotttt…. Regan was elected and reversing a lot of the victories achieved during the Civil Rights Movement. The government implanted drugs into the black community and created a crack epidemic (source). Queer black men/black trans women were dying like flies at the beginning of the 80s AIDS epidemic and no one was giving a f%$# (watch any episode of the show, Pose). Violence between gangs were at its bloodiest, again, also caused by government infiltration. (Did you know that the bloods and crips both originally started out as community organizations? source)..

What I’m trying to say is that IT WAS A WHOLE LOT… so I get it, black people!… Some cool, shiny dude who can sing and dance and is confident comes out and the WHOLE WORLD LOVES HIM… black people, white people, folks in China!.. EVERYBODY.. But guess what? We can still do better!… I promise we can. We didn’t deserve everything that happened to us in the late 70s and 80s–and we also don’t deserve to be molested!… I promise you you don’t deserve that. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

I have compassion for Michael Jackson. He was black and rich as f%$& in white spaces that he was “never supposed to be in”. He was abused. He was constantly stalked by paparazzi.. and who else knows what else… BUT THIS STILL ISN’T OKAY. Survivors of child molestation deserve better. People like Michael Jackson deserve better–they deserve an opportunity for someone to positively challenge them so they can grow and heal. The world deserves better.

 

“Bravery Is” – A Poem.

Bravery is

Asking a new friend to hang out for the first time

Telling people you struggle with depression and suicidal ideation

Going inward to find love within yourself

Breathing into the parts of yourself that hold onto pain and release it through body twitches

Sometimes I think, who am I without this pain? Who will I become if I love myself so fiercely?… I won’t need anyone.. Will people still love me? People are so used to me being insecure and looking down and they like me for that, right? They like me because I give too much. They like me because I’m not too big in a space. They like me because I don’t take up too much room. But that’s not fair. They don’t really like me. That’s a false version of me. 

Bravery is replying to people and job opportunities that may never get back to you

Bravery is saying no to hanging out with someone that you want to like you

Bravery is staying off social media and focusing on yourself even though (you think) some people might laugh at you

Bravery is breathing in deeply and letting yourself be as exhausted as I need to be

Bravery is going to the bank and getting out money to support your dreams even though you’re not sure that they will ever come true

Bravery is not allowing someone to discard you via text message 

Bravery is trying your best even though you’re not sure that everything is going to be okay

Bravery is writing a poem even though you’re not sure it should be considered a poem

Bravery is being nice and knowing that everyone’s doing their best even though you  might feel hurt sometimes

This makes me think about Jen. I’m hurt, but I don’t have to be around her anymore. I can love her from a distance. 

we can find love in places we least expect

I have been debating about posting this for months, but this is a story I need to share. My best friend while traveling was an Israeli man named Michael. I met him while I was traveling to a city in Thailand. I needed to take a few shuttles to get there and Michael was the 1 and only person in the first shuttle I stepped in. My first thought was “White man. Be weary..” The 2017 Charlottesville rally of white supremacists was extremely triggering to me. I was terrified and very angry with white people. Despite this, I still engaged in conversation, exchanging the usual, “what’s your name?”, “where are you traveling to?”, and “what have you done so far?” The conversation was pretty normal until I asked where he was from and he said “Israel.” I was already weary, but this information was the last nail in the coffin. I’d been reading about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and was mortified and disgusted by the way Palestinians (like many of my black and brown friends here in the United States) are being displaced and murdered by zionism and white supremacy. I was not blatantly rude to him, but I immediately got somewhat cold and distant.

We arrived at the next stop where we had the opportunity to choose a few shuttles to ride in. I tried my best to get away from Michael by walking really slowly and finding a different shuttle to get on. “Good riddance, take care..” I thought. “I don’t need people like that in my life.” Unfortunately, the shuttle I tried to get on was full and the driver told me I’d have to wait a few hours for the next one. I felt disappointed and that’s when I heard a voice behind me say, “Hey! She’s with me. We’re riding together.” It was Michael who was already on another shuttle. Apparently, there was some last minute room, so I could get on. I forced a smile, but immediately thought… “AW FUCK… I’m gonna have to sit next to this racist, frat star for FOUR HOURS…” And, thankfully, that couldn’t have been further from the truth.

We talked about everything from dealing with breakups, to our love for our nephews, to our gratitude for the practice of yoga and how it’d been a healing tool in both of our lives. After we arrived to the city, we exchanged phone numbers and emails and then headed our separate ways. We both thought it would have been lovely if we saw each other again, but we didn’t make tentative plans since we were staying in different places and didn’t know how long we were going to be in the city. That evening while I was walking around a street fair, I got lucky and saw Michael!… I was so excited to see my new friend, but when I said hello, he was very cold and did not say much to me. I was a little disappointed, but decided not to take it personally and messaged him the next evening to have dinner and he agreed!… Turns out that he was being cold to me the evening before because he’d just gotten in a minor motorbike accident. From there, our conversations continued to flourish that evening and throughout the next couple of days we traveled together. We talked about even more things like how Israelis are forced to be in the military (I didn’t know this), my involvement with Black Lives Matter and its importance, and I even came out as queer to him!.. (out of the dozens and dozens of people I’d met while traveling that month, he was the only person I felt safe sharing this with).

I learned many lessons through Michael’s friendship. The first was that we should never make assumptions about others. Michael could have decided he wasn’t going to help me get on the shuttle after I was cold to him or I could have assumed that Michael was an ass for ignoring me at the street fair, but we didn’t let either of those things stop us from making a genuine soul-to-soul connection with each other. I also learned that I have to think for myself and political issues are not so black and white. I was highly defensive from the years 2015 to 2017. I very much operated in an “I’M-ON-THE-LEFT (AND-CORRECT) SIDE-OF-HISTORY-SO-YOU’RE-EITHER-WITH-ME-OR-YOU’RE-OUT” mentality. And let me make it clear, I in NO WAY.. support displacement or violence against Palestinians or any group of individuals, but… I wasn’t doing the deep research for myself! I was just following and repeating whatever my most “socialist” and “radical” friends on Facebook were saying. I mean.. I didn’t even know there was a forced military draft happening in Israel!… It was not as simple as Israelis saying, “no, I’m not going to support zionism”… it requires unlearning decades of nationalist and white supremacist brainwashing. The final thing I learned was that I was very judgmental.. I would often sit on my high horse typing, “IF YOU’RE AREN’T DOWN WITH ME, YOU AIN’T DOWN WITH THE CAUSE..” on a phone that was made in slave labour conditions.. while wearing clothes that were likely manufactured by children in a sweatshop.

Let’s spend less time looking for the flaws in others and the beauty in ourselves and more time seeing the beauty in others and the flaws within ourselves.. We’re all walking contradictions, life is not black and white. As we strive to make the world a better place, let’s be easy with ourselves and each other.

Self Reflection-Empathy

The Paris attacks were a tragedy. When I read the news, I immediately thought that the violence was sadistic, senseless, and barbaric, but…. to my own dismay, I found it hard to have empathy for the victims. Despite wanting to feel compassion, every time I read an article where the author expressed outrage and called it an act of terror, I immediately got angry and thought about how these same journalists refuse/d to use the same language when reporting the sadistic, senseless, and barbaric murders of unarmed black and brown people by the hands of the amerikkkan government.

But after stepping back and evaluating my feelings, I realized that I should not be angry at the victims. They were not the ones who wrote those insensitive, dismissive articles about the domestic terror against black and browns in america. Who knows, one of the victims could have been someone that was on the front lines of the blacklivesmatter movement.

Now I am happy that these attacks are being internationally acknowledged and mourned. That is what the victims deserve. I realize now that wishing that their pain is dismissed and ignored just because that’s what is happening to black people is not going to help anybody. I guess it was just a classic case of feeling miserable and wanting the rest of the world to feel the same. Misery loves company.

I stand in solidarity with Paris and send love to the victims’ families and friends.

My first steps

I’m not sure if anyone’s going to read this, but I can’t care about that anymore. I just finished reading about the threats to Mizzou University students and learned about another black baby murdered in cold blood and felt so overwhelmed. I’m here because I know I need to write. I know I need to share. I’m not sure what these words will do, but it is my only tool at the moment and I have to seize every opportunity I’m given to enlighten and enrich. I can not afford to hide from the violent, bloody reality. My silence is literally killing me.

I [very recently] became conscious about navigating the world as a black, queer woman. The transition has been difficult–not because life was easier when I was ignorant (some things were easier and other things were harder), but because I was suddenly realizing how backwards the world was. I started writing because I was interested in sharing my story, but also because I wanted to influence a change of mind and a change of heart in my readers. I was passionate, but also naive and impatient. I felt empowered when I gained a lot of positive responses to the thoughts I was sharing on Facebook, but after several weeks, I saw the interest declining. I was devastated. Did people only care because it was the “trendy news topic” in their faces at the time? I mean… how could you not care about black lives? Why aren’t you concerned about the lack of affordable health care? Why wasn’t anyone there for me after I shared my story about abuse? Those were the sorts of questions that ran through my mind. Then I began to doubt myself and thought what was the point. Who was I, a college graduate without a job (who did not major in Afam), to share my opinions about race? I got really discouraged about the movement as a whole. So much so, that I deactivated all of my social media and withdrew from a lot of people that I care about who have supported me. I realize now how self-centered this was. This movement isn’t about me gaining attention as an individual person.. it’s about fighting for the liberation of all oppressed persons. I realize now that this is way bigger than me. Now I don’t care who likes what I have to say anymore or how many comments I get. It’s actually probably a gooood thing that my opinions are not popular since society is backwards as fuhhh.. Not having a popular opinion means that I am critically thinking about my environment and challenging the status quo. I’m just gonna keep doing me and sharing my truth. I just want better for humanity, y’all.

a reflection

Self-care and taking time for yourself is important and I have gotten very good at it. Or so I thought… This week my anxiety levels have been extremely since the news headlines about the Baltimore Uprising started circulating and I have made sure to take the time I need to center myself and relax, but…. I know that I’m taking more time than I need. I have 2 exams that I need to study for this weekend. Typically, my anxiety levels are pretty high around exam time and I think that I am using the uprising as more of an excuse for myself. “If I don’t do well on the exam, I have something to blame.” I have also been using it as an excuse to keep people distant from me. “Oh, I did not get a chance to hang out with people that love and care about me? It’s because I’ve been distracted by the Baltimore Uprising.” I’m using excuses to protect myself. If I fail and if I end up without friends, I have something to blame… Lol… Aw man, I don’t want to live my life like this anymore though. It’s definitely not serving me. Alright, I’m gonna try again, y’all. Logging off of social networks and getting back to work.

bigotry hurts everyone

The last few weeks have been pretty rough for me, with last night being particularly hard. Over the last few months, I have done a good job at minimizing the amount of news that I consume. I used to be informed about politics and global issues, but as negative articles about blacks began appearing, my mental health started deteriorating. After both officers that murdered Mike Brown and Eric Garner were acquitted, I found myself displaying symptoms of depression for about a week. I felt isolated, alone, and very angry. The feelings intensified after my brother came to visit from New York. My Brother is diagnosed with Schizophrenia, lived in foster homes where he has been subjected to abuse, and has had a very difficult life overall. All of these experiences have made it difficult for him to assimilate into mainstream culture and sometimes he will “act up” publicly. My biggest fear is that the wrong cop will encounter my brother and blow his brains out for being black. Everyyy time I see a story about another black male being murdered I see my brother…. How fucked up is that? So… naturally, I have tried to limit the content I read, but I’m finding that I cannot escape from the stories. They appear all over my Facebook newsfeed, in reddit, and in everyday conversations. I can’t hide from them. I was at the gym trying to improve my self-care game when I saw a news story [on CNN lol] covering a #blacklivesmatter protest and they used the words “enemy forces” to describe them. Lol, like what? How are we the enemy?…

I have no words to describe how confused/angry/sad I’ve been. Last night, I did not spend any time doing the studying I needed to do for my midterms next week. I was so anxious by these stories that I started reading articles about what has really been going on in Baltimore and then I found myself reading about other forms of institutional racism like this one about “professionalism” in the workplace. Although I did not mean to, I spent hours reading. I was craving this content. My anxiety decreased after each article, so I can tell that it was something that I needed–I am not used to reading stories that describe women, people of color, and people that are on the LGBT spectrum as humans.

Even if I do not do well on my exams next week, I am not going to worry about it. Maybe if I did not have to worry about my brother being murdered all of the time, I would not be as distracted and do better on my exams. It’s just so crazy… the media and these politicians think that they’re helping themselves by slandering the image of blacks, but what they don’t realize is that everyyyy time they murder and spread their bigotry, they’re not only killing the lives of one person, they’re killing the dreams of thousands. Thousands of people that could have found the cure to the cancer that they’re going to contract in a few years. Thousands of people that could have been the next scientists to discover a way to reverse the damages caused by global warming…

my very valid black rage

I did not expect to be writing a second post so soon, but there’s been a lot on my mind. I shared a little bit about some of my frustrations as a victim of abuse, but I did not share all of my frustrations. I have been  angry about the silence I have been subjected to as a victim, but I have been just as frustrated by the way that black people have been portrayed in the media.

Okay, let’s really take that in….. I have felt jusssst as frustrated by the way that black people have been portrayed in the media as I have been as a victim of abuse…..

It sounds ridiculous, but it also makes perfect sense… In both situations, I did not have control over what someone did or said about me and in both situations, I have been told not to share my [very valid] feelings of frustration and anger. I have been scared to talk about my frustrations as a black woman for fear of stereotype threat, but I am not a cartoon character. I have a wide array of emotions. Sometimes I’m angry, sometimes I’m sad, sometimes I’m happy… I am a human. If you only want to be around me when I’m feeling positive, then it’s clear that you’re trying to see me from an angle that’s most convenient to you and you’re not trying to understand who I really am.

A lot of my content will be on issues pertaining to my frustrations about black people, women, and people that are on the LGBT spectrum. If this is not something you’re interested in reading about, stop now. Also do me a favor and stop talking to me in real life. It’s difficult enough for me to share my feelings as an individual who’s a member of multiple oppressed communities and I do not need another person telling me that I am being “too sensitive.”

this is my voice

Alright. Here I go. First post ever. I’m terrified of opening up. BUT….. what I am even more scared of is remaining silent. This anxiety is eating from the inside out and it has taken away time from my family, friends, jobs, and the activities that I love. But, I won’t let this happen anymore. So here it is, y’all: I’m a survivor of child sexual abuse.

The abuse has always caused me to have this intense feeling that I do not have control over my life, which has caused anxiety and also a spout of depression 5 years ago. But I’m pretty tired of feeling tense all of the time (and I also never want to be depressed again). It’s crazy, but I have been more concerned about what my family members think and have been more worried about my father’s reputation than my own mental health and physical needs. I mean, really. It’s outlandish! I, myself as the victim, have been more concerned about the reputation of my perpetrator. WHO IS DEAD, I MAY ADD… but dat is another story….(our brains are strange).

Well….. I’m not going to protect my father’s reputation anymore–sorry, y’all. He was a great dad who taught me how to be independent and to never give up, but he also did shitty things like… abuse me. In the past I tried to justify the abuse to myself by saying that it ONLY happened once, but now I realize that it should not have ever happened in the first place. I’m definitely not “over it” and still have moments where I experience a flashback or slip into problematic cognitions about myself that happen as a product of the abuse, but I am at a much better place and have been moving forward. I want to thank you for reading because writing this was the first step I needed to take to get to a point where I’m able to have these conversations in person. One day I hope to speak openly to an audience and work in a field where I have the opportunity to empower other survivors (and thrivers) to speak about their experiences.

***PSA: If you or someone you know is a survivor of child sexual abuse, please know that there are resources available to help you and the abuser!

http://www.d2l.org/site/c.4dICIJOkGcISE/b.6069289/k.E356/National_Resources_Related_to_Child_Sexual_Abuse.htm

Y’all are not alone <3.