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My anxiety is not over death. It’s not to lose everything I’ve worked for from flipping and openly bodying something, just off the rage. What will my people say? Those who have supported me this whole time. How do you see through the bullshit? From my [Independent] point of view, it looks like everyone (Lebron James, Candace Owens, and Royce Da, 5’9) is right in this exchange. The predicament I see is miscommunication and wrong timing. Racism exists. That’s not a question. I’m sure even Candace Owens has her stories. The puzzle is, how do we identify it correctly? Let me tell you my story that happened just a few days ago. Maybe I can use that to illustrate my thoughts on this matter.
I was in a predominantly caucasian city in Germany, and right off the rip, I’m getting a lot of attention from both white men and women.
Everybody knows I have this ill spot in Berlin, Germany, which I occasionally revisit. Germany is an awe-inspiring federal country divided into sixteen great states. Berlin, the German capital, is one of the largest metropolitan cities in the world. Like Singapore, it is both a state and money simultaneously. I was here in February when the global lockdown ensued. Since I did not want to risk traveling or quarantining afterward, I stayed put. I’m by the border of the city-state close to another state called Brandenburg. Alright. A few days ago, I went to a town called Oranienburg, about twenty minutes from where I stayed in Berlin.
Oranienburg is one of the main towns in the state of Brandenburg. I’m a 6’2, dark-skinned black man who is about 235 pounds. That day, I had dressed in an all-black business suit with intelligent dress shoes. That day, I also wore my glasses. We drove to the parking lot, parked the truck, and walked to the nearby crosswalk to cross the road. German crossroads are epic. Immediately after exiting the whip, I noticed that a couple of white mammies walked passed and gave me the eyebrow-tilted staredown. Was it the swag? I didn’t think so. If there’s one thing I know for a fact, I’m not a pretty boy. I’ve never walked around feeling like a billboard. Mind you, this is not Jersey City, Toronto, or Brussels.
I’m moving solo to Germany. Being the North American I am, conscious of racism, I felt very uneasy. After all, it is often sporadic when I run into other black people when I dive this deep. Except for this day, I was in a state known in German politics to house extreme Right-wing supporters. There are fabrications of racism and harassment, mostly of Africans and Arab immigrants. I was, going about my grind and getting stared at as if I had just stepped out of an advertisement. It’s less nerve-wracking when the onlookers are dotting women, but when generative Hill Billies, who reek of toxic masculinity, slow their pickup trucks down to have a stare, a brother gets a little agitated.
If Candace is saying that by acknowledging acts of racism as lynching or a hate crime, we empower the psychological continuum”
I walked off, nodding at the middle-aged gentlewomen every time they saluted. In my head, I’m asking myself, why are all these people greeting me? I was in a predominantly caucasian town in Germany, and right off the rip, I was getting a lot of attention from white men and women. My moms would call it “favor,” but I felt very awkward. I mentioned my experience to my host when I arrived at my destination. Don’t get me wrong. Candace Owens could be an idiotic asshole. That’s possible. But after listening to her statements, I have been compelled to ponder. Come on. If you had half a brain, even if you were the most liberal asslicker on the planet, you’d step back and ask some questions after knowing the situation. Why is this black woman not down with the program? Is she a spokesperson for all those black girls who only date white boys?
You’d have to want at least to understand her story before casting her off to the wolves. Then again, if you dissect this toad from an Independent perspective, it is possible that you’d stumble on another conclusion. Is there a psychological effect on all the racism happening in America? What if the attackers meant these crimes to send a subliminal message of our weakness worldwide? If that message was to resonate, would it serve to diminish our status and set us back by hundreds of years? If Candace is saying that by acknowledging acts of racism as lynching or a hate crime, we empower the psychological continuum of racism, then she is a genius. In that case, it would be imperative that we see such crimes as mere crimes instead of racial attacks, which we are powerless to prevent. In my example, I was unable to tell what was what.
That brings me back to my story. As black people, the question could be, how do we identify racism before it is too late? How could I have known if the “white person” was being rude or not? Given the fact that they come from a culture where they killed each other for centuries. I mean, have you read up on European history? These people have been murdering each other for ages. As black people, it is not always the case that people we don’t know are kind to us. We do not accomplish something great and get a standing ovation. Usually, we are faced with obstacles, rejection, violence, and suspicion. So when we do run into trouble, our first impression is that it happened because of our race.
These people have been murdering each other for ages. As a black person, it is not always the case that people who we don’t know are kind to us. We do not accomplish something great and get a standing ovation.”
Now, bite me for this, but could there be other reasons why shit happens? If a white person was to start an argument or a fight, should we automatically assume that it is because of the color of our skin? Going back to Ahmaud Arbery, one could argue that it is strange that he was a frequent jogger, yet his neighbors did not know him. Or, he could have been jogging, saw the house under construction, went in to take a look, and then came out to suspicious onlookers. Royce Da, 5’9, is correct in that even if Ahmaud Arbery acted suspiciously, the father and son had no right to attack and kill him. My question is not if this crime was motivated by racism; it is about whether we should remove the stigma by considering such attacks as ordinary crimes that could happen between races of people.
In my story, it turned out that on that day, in Oranienburg, those people were being nice to me. They seemed to appreciate my charisma and were open to having a nosey chat or maybe even a sit down over a cup of coffee. That is not unusual in Germany. Strangers often meet in public after striking a connection and slurp a quick cup of coffee before figuring out where that connection will take them. Even while dressed in some serious threads, having pulled up in a 2020 ride with some change in my pocket, I was still insecure. I was even left to question if perhaps it was I who was racist. Or maybe not. Maybe all those smiles were a cloud of smoke in the mirror? How could I tell the difference?*
