No, Not Today...

There is a new show out by the Goddess Ava Duvernay, "When They See Us." The show is about the Central Park 5 boys who were falsely accused and convicted for the crime of gang raping a white woman. Certain racists even put full page news paper articles calling for the death of these 5 boys. LITERAL BOYS who were walking in Central Park. It took 30 years for these men to gain their freedom after DNA test revealed they were not responsible for this rape.... but that is not what I want to talk about either.

For many Black people, this show is not something we can watch. But, I think Ms. Duvernay did not recreate the story for us (Black people) to see. She is one of the few Hollywood women who is able to tell stories the Black community has dealt with since the stealing of this country but also be listened to by the community who stole it.

These boys, minding their own business, were caught in a system that is built on putting them behind bards and awarded by private prisons for keeping them there for life. Our kids grow up with a target on their backs and it only gets bigger the older they become. I live everyday with the possibility that this could be my reality at any moment in time.

"When They See Us" isn't entertaining, it is the silent terror that all Black people walk around with in the back of their minds. It is what W.E.B Du Bois described as double consciousness; "a peculiar sensation, this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes of others, of measuring one's soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity."

By existing

I am

contemptible.

When [will] They See Us [as human, young boys, as innocent]

No, I cannot watch this show... Not today...