“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the
age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it
was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of
Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had
everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to
Heaven, we were all going direct the other way…” – Tale of Two Cities, Charles
Dickens 1859
In the 1950’s I rode the back of the bus traveling to
Virginia, and was chased, punched and called the N-word by my white Catholic
classmates in the Bronx NY. I was
traumatized, like most humans who saw it, by the Jet Magazine photograph of
Emmett Till’s mutilated body at his open casket service – when he was murdered,
I was 12, and he was 14. I was summer
farm-handing at the family homestead in Virginia; he was summer-visiting family
at his Mississippi homestead from Chicago.
In the 1960’s, Little Rock happened; Freedom riders were
attacked throughout the south; Medgar Evers was assassinated; Four young girls
were murdered in a bomb attack on a church; Goodman, Chaney, and Schwerner’s
bodies were discovered; James Meredith was shot by an assassin; the
inter-racial married Loving’s were arrested for miscegenation in Virginia; The
Orangeburg SC massacre happens; Bloody Sunday happened in the same month I was
shipping out for Army boot camp, having volunteered during the Vietnam
War. While serving in the Army… Watts
Riots happened, along with many other anti-war and race riots – a double whammy
for a Black GI. I was also steered to
black housing in Virginia by the Pentagon housing office upon returning from
overseas deployment. I watched
Washington D.C. burn (up close and personal) after Dr. MLK’s assassination a
few days after my Army discharge.
In the 1970’s things went well for me personally. I had
several great Federal jobs in the Defense Intelligence Community. The GI Bill
helped me get my B.S., and our first house.
Affirmative action helped me to get an entry-level position at a
prestigious firm. I had a nice compensation and benefits package, great work,
great company, and great atmosphere. In
the meantime, nationwide anti-war and race-based civil unrest continued:
Augusta, Jackson State, Asbury Park, East L.A., Camden and the Boston MA
‘forced busing’ riots. We discover the
Tuskegee syphilis experiments by the U.S. Public Health Service.
In the 1980’s as my family grew matured, (mostly law-enforcement
and/or racial) unrest continued: Miami FL; Crown Height NY; Overtown, Miami FL;
L.A. CA-Rodney King acquittal. Michael
Donald is lynched in Mobile AL; White mob chases Michael Griffith into traffic
and to his death in Howard Beach Queens NY, and later, another white mob kills
Yusef Hawkins in Bensonhurst Brooklyn NY;
In the 1990’s even while my career flourished: we moved to a
new suburban neighborhood; lived life; and paid for kids’ college … there were:
the Black and Puerto Rican riots against NYPD during the Democratic Party
convention; St Petersburg FL rioting against racial profiling and police
tactics; the unrest around the Amadou Diallo police killing in NYC (50+ shots
reaching for his wallet), along with Abner Louima’s broom-handle rectal rape by
NYPD (police eventually found guilty).
In the 2000’s as my grandchildren entered the world; … more
unrest in Cincinnati’s Over-the-Rhine section; Oakland CA’s Oscar Grant
police-murder unrest; Harvard shows that public schools are resegregated; white
students hang nooses from gathering tree in Jena LA; and [coming full circle
from the Loving’s case in the 1950’s & 60’] in 2009 Keith Barwell, a
Justice of the Peace in LA, refused to issue marriage licenses to interracial
couples.
Now, in the first half of the 2010’s, there was the Treyvon
Martin and Michael Brown killings; subsequent Ferguson MO citizen-police unrest,
Eric Garner choke-hold killing in NYC; Cleveland OH’s Tamir Rice (kid-in-park-fake-gun)
police killing; the John Crawford (toy-gun-in-Wal-Mart) police killing…in OH…
an open carry state. It also has now
been documented by DOJ, that Ferguson MO, police-courts-municipal government
system had a business practice of legally shaking down Black folks primarily
for revenue rather than for ‘protecting and defending’ the citizenry. With ubiquitous miniature phone/cameras and
surveillance cameras, and email archives, we’re getting more and more evidence
of continuing racial animus and infection among the Millennial/Gen Y generation
born between 1980-2000.
I lament that this many years after my “Silent Generation” and
the “Baby Boomers”, and “GenXers”, that Millennial college kids and their house
mother are voluntarily videoed cheerfully spewing racist chants;
I lament that law enforcement, judicial, municipal and state
governments in Ferguson MO and elsewhere continue to act in ways that continue
to treat Black Americans as lesser citizens.
In a few weeks I should celebrate 50 years since I tentatively,
but proudly entered the U.S. Army during hot Vietnam hostilities, but honestly
I can’t regard it as a celebration since it’s clear that in the America that I once
served, my grandkids will STILL face the same kind of discrimination, animus, attitudes
and violence that has infected and festered in America for my lifetime.
I’m tired of seeing litanies like this one;
I’m sick over America’s metastasizing infection of racism;
I’m tired of waiting for America to “have a serious conversation
about race”;
I’m sick that my “GenZ” grandkids will endure this
multigenerational disease;
I’m tired of America’s continuing ‘surprise’, denials, and
inattention to racism;
I’m sick and tired of being sick and tired.
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.
