Black Lives Matter

George Floyd. 

Breonna Taylor. 

Ahmaud Arbery.  

Eric Garner. 

Trayvon Martin.

Tanisha Anderson.

Michael Brown. 

Tamir Rice. 

Sandra Bland.

Stephon Clark. 

Aiyana Jones.

David McAtee. 

During my sophomore year of college, I applied for a job with a local non-profit. I’d never heard of the organization—the Illinois Disciples Foundation—by name, but living on the university campus, it was hard not to be familiar with their work protesting the school’s Native American mascot, providing a safe space for women, and running a vegetarian food cooperative.

The application asked one question. “What does peace with justice mean to you?”

In 1993, and at nineteen years old, I’d never heard this term, but it immediately made sense to me. We all want peace. Who doesn’t want to live in a blissful utopian valley? Problem is, we don’t live in a utopia, so we’re left working to fix a whole lot of injustice while we make our way to that land of milk and honey. We were working on it in 1969 and we were working on it in 1993, and we’re still working on it now. The road to peace isn’t a bypass. It’s a long slog through a hell of a lot of inequality, oppression, and systemic racism.

I wrote my essay, and I got the job. I became a student spokesperson for the movement against Chief Illiniwek. Anti-racism and social justice work became part of my personal narrative. And because my mother was an anti-racism organizer and educator right up until the day of her death (and after, since she asked that her funeral donations go to anti-racism education programs), it was part of my family narrative as well. I considered the message implicit every time I opened my mouth and talked about “privilege” or “sustainability” or “social responsibility.”

I tell you all this, because I’m not a corporation making a statement, but an individual on a journey. This week, I’ve learned that “implicit” isn’t good enough. We’ve reached a point where the message must be explicit. We’ve actually been at that point since long before I was even born, and I failed in my duty to acknowledge it. 

I’m acknowledging it now. Black people are being murdered on my watch, due to a system that values my life over the lives of people with darker skin. Over the past week, I’ve been reading news, contacting legislators, donating funds, and expanding my filter bubble, both online and off, to include more diverse voices. That’s not the end. I’ll also be making changes to my mission statement to directly address systemic racism, unlearning my own implicit racism and microaggressions, and working to specifically amplify Black voices in the resources I share with my readers and mailing list.

You will see the changes. This is important. I stand in solidarity with those marching in the streets. Black lives matter.