some kind of justice

As the mother and champion of an uncommon child—a boy who is nonverbal, legally blind, incontinent and suffers from a serious brain anomaly, cerebral palsy, developmental delay, autism and chronic epilepsy—I can describe instances of being neglected, unheard, misunderstood, dismissed, marginalized, patronized, and maligned by public servants, medical experts and society at large. I know the anguish of having a child who is sometimes treated as insignificant, undeserving, fringe, and in ways scorned and feared. I know what it feels like when others, whose care he is under—doctors, teachers, aides, nurses—don't hold themselves accountable when he gets hurt. I get angry, frustrated and indignant at what I see as injustice. Yet despite the struggles, heartaches and miseries of being Calvin's mother, I've never felt unsafe, vulnerable, discounted or mistrusted merely because of the color of my skin.

On Tuesday, I held my breath awaiting the verdict in the trial of George Floyd's modern-day lynching. Finally, I heard the words describing the homicidal defendant: Guilty. Guilty. Guilty. I exhaled and wept. I thought to myself, finally, some kind of justice, for another unconscionable offense amid generations of neglect, condemnation, oppression, abuse and murder of African Americans. 

Yet, Tuesday's guilty verdict doesn't mean the end of injustice, in the same way electing a Black president is not evidence that we are in a post-racial America.

Equity remains elusive for millions of Americans in this nation of so-called liberty and justice for all. Injustice and barbarism are the foundation of this nation's mostly-white wealth built from the ills of white supremacy, on stolen indigenous land, by generations of the enslavement, exploitation, abuse, terrorization, torture and murder of Black men, women and children. Today's mass incarceration of African Americans is a relic of slavery and Jim Crow, a way to continue profiting off of their bodies, to subjugate, disenfranchise, disempower. White supremacy and racism in this country are not superficial; like some tumors, they're pervasive and malignant, must be strangled or cut out.

Consider that many Black Americans are still fighting for: the right to vote; the right to live in decent neighborhoods and homes; lead-free water; proper healthcare; decent educations; affordable apartments; fair loans; decent jobs, raises, living wages; executive desks and seats in the boardroom; the right to move about freely; to safely drive, walk, jog, birdwatch, nap, barbecue and breathe; the right to take a knee in peaceful protest against their abuse and murder at the hands of vigilantes and the police. All because of the sound of their names and/or the color of their skin.

So, too, Black Americans are still fighting against being racially profiled and therefore unjustly suspected, stopped and frisked, pulled over and assailed, followed, stalked, interrogated, bullied, roughed up, falsely accused, arrested, jailed, unjustly sentenced, choked or shot before they even have a chance to state their case.

Today, we can breathe a sigh of relief for some kind of justice done in a Minneapolis courtroom last Tuesday, but the nation at large—with its toxic white supremacy infiltrating our military, police forces, conservative media, and halls of Congress, and its harmful racist policies and practices from healthcare and housing to law enforcement—is far from fulfilling its promise of liberty and justice for all.

Celebrating the guilty verdict in the trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin,in George Floyd Square on Tuesday.Credit...Victor J. Blue for The New York Times

indifference

stuck at home nursing a stiff, achy back and a sick, feverish kid. outside the earth is parched. too little spring rain for trees and shrubs to drink. watching bits of a minneapolis murder trial while calvin sleeps.

seeing video of a white cop in a blue uniform pressing his knee into the neck of a black american for nine minutes sickens me. the black man cries out. says he can't breathe. what i can only imagine to be his urine streams from under a police vehicle, like when people seize. maybe it's the car's condensation. still, the fact that i even wonder matters.

bystanders plead with the officers to show mercy, but none of them is moved to acquiesce or aid george floyd, the man in distress. he is succumbing to their pressure. they remain an unmovable, emotionless threat. the white cop leans hard into the black american as if he doesn't matter. the victim's bloody face is ground into the asphalt, arms wrested, the intolerable burden of three big men leaning on his back and legs, his chest compressed. the knee in his neck shimmied into prime position for eternal silencing. the white cop indifferent to the pleas of his victim. contemptuous of onlookers. hands casually in his pockets as if jangling spare change. passing the time. as if nothing he does matters. callous as hell.

as with all things just and unjust, i think of my little boy calvin; he has no voice, is misunderstood and sometimes swept to the margins. goes unseen by many who avert their gaze or pretend he doesn't exist—to them he doesn't matter. he's different. easy for others to neglect. not in a position to help or defend himself. could easily get knelt on in the wrong circumstance. this makes me think of the boys and young men somewhat similar to calvin who have died under the weight and watch of those in uniform. autistic. misjudged. misunderstood. misapprehended. falsely feared. wrongly accused. bullied into final submission. insignificant. in some realms—because of their difference—they are thought of as mattering less and are treated as such. 

this black american—and too many like him—was deprived of blood to his brain and oxygen to breathe, vitals denied by a public servant paid and sworn to protect. in broad daylight. witnessed by other beseeching human beings. captured on cell phone video. white mass shooters and dogs fair better.

words provoked by the bully in blue come to me: 

mister charlie. monster. bigot. predator. inept. unjust. lynching. white supremacy. relics. vigilantism. corporeal punishment. systemic racism. apathy. grievance. abuse. hatred. contempt. ignorance. othering. difference. indifference.

the last five words make me consider calvin again. mostly, though, i think of countless dear friends with black daughters and sons. they have to give their kids the talk no parent of white kids does. the talk about being innocent and unarmed. of being suspected, feared, stalked, pulled over, apprehended, gunned down—even in their own homes—too often just because of the color of their skin. they tell their kids: do as you're told; be respectful. keep your hands visible; make no false moves. in this so-called liberated america, following these instructions can mean the difference between tasting oxygen or earth. black people know this. too many die while living it. the difference and indifference is sickening, malevolent, criminal.

at one a.m. calvin's fever spikes. he's restless, inconsolable. little can be done to ease his misery. we tend to him as best we can. crawling back into bed i hear the rain begin to fall. it's coming down sustained and heavy. a deluge. I wonder what would have happened if it had rained that day in minneapolis. wonder what the bloodless cops kneeling into george floyd would have done if the sky had opened up.