By Drew
What a year last week this morning has been. You read that right. Kobe and his daughter are in heaven, Trump is (still) president, we’re going through a goddamn pandemic, murder hornets are a thing, monkeys…..fucking MONKEYS stole covid-19 test samples and, just when I thought 2020 was done 2020’ing….
…lol….how funny would it be if Batman was to show up on the sce-
(Notice that Captain America and his, I assume, All lives matter ass ain out there helping but Marvel fans aren’t ready for that conversation so I digress)
George Floyd was murdered, America is on fire, Trump is literally in a bunker and no black person with any empathy is ok right now and we need to talk about it.
Firstly let me say Rest in Power George Floyd.
When I first saw the video it was sent in a whatsapp group I’m in. If you know anything about Bahamian whatsapp groups there are no captions or appropriate warnings for what you’re about to see because niggas don’t take shit serious. If Bahamians had whatsapp when Moses parted the red sea niggas would have been in the group talkin bout….
George Floyds death did not bother me the way it should have upon first watching the video. In fact, if I’m being honest, I truly sat there like, “Yeah….they’re gonna kill this nigga”.
Know why?
Because how many videos have we seen? And I’m not even talking the big stories. Spend enough time on youtube and see it’s FLOODED with videos of people that look like me being shot, bitten by dogs, abused, cursed at like animals, beaten etc. Its to the point now that we’re numb to it. We’re numb to everything at this point.
At the beginning of the video I was just..….numb.
Expecting him to die.
Expecting the white officers to get away with all of it.
Expecting the hashtags to start and for the “ALL white people are the devil” niggas to show up. They walking different now because they feel like their hate has been validated.
I expected it all.
Then he screamed for his mother. A woman who died a year to the day that he was murdered. Do you know how deeply saddening and fucked up that is? Do you know the level of desperation a grown, large black man has to be in to scream out for his dead mother? Do you know how much (most) black men LOVE their mothers? To scream out for your mother in that moment with that energy, in the fleeting moments of your life…….that broke me.
Something in me snapped.
And through my tears I felt rage. I felt angry. I have never in my life been that sad and angry at the same time. Science has proven that niggas who cry when they’re angry are capable of murder and that is a fact I learned in high school.
Imagine being in America right now. Imagine living IN Minneapolis. Can you imagine if that happened here? Can you imagine if that type of atrocity or something like it happened here in our beautiful Bahamas? Downtown would look like this…
PLP & FNM been screwing us to death lil while now…y’all wasn’t gonna do shit but slap up on social media…while at work….on time…..on manners
I’m not getting deep into how Bahamians have been wronged and screwed over by people that look like me and you. That’s for smarter minds and better men.
Or….you know….
We may not protest over what our people do to us and I honestly don’t know what our reaction would be if we had our own George Floyd situation happen and do you know why?
Because we have Bahamian privilege.
Please do NOT misunderstand me when I say that. You are a nigga here just like you are a nigga in Europe, America, Canada, Australia etc. Please don’t think that because you’re not African American that you’re any less of a “nigger” to any one beyond our waters. That being said, Bahamian privilege quite simply means if the Bahamian Police pulls us over, we don’t have the instinctive fear that African Americans have and chances are if you ARE nervous about being pulled over by a Bahamian police officer you probably doin shit.
In fact, I’ve cussed policeman out before. I think we all have a story of being spicy with cops.
ALL of us.
My mother called a policeman a “jackass” to his face once. My mother is not big and I know for a fact that people who use the word “germane” in sentences can’t fight so she didn’t even have that edge.
The luxury.
The privilege to be pulled over by people that look like you, act like you, probably went to school WITH you and can profile you to the point that they know if you’re in a tight T-shirt, wearing flip flops and not in a Honda you probably not with the shits.
Meanwhile, in America, THIS nigga got the cops called on him….
We have to acknowledge that, unless you have traveled beyond our islands, we are safe with law enforcement. And please miss me with your one off police story when you was at some party with drugs and crime and the police tag you up. Always some fake woke nigga trying to be contrarion to get applause from gals that never intended to have sex with him in the first place.
Black America is angry.
Black Europe is Angry
Shit….even Germany is supporting…
Black Bahamians are justifiably angry too. And to all of you wondering why we’re posting so much about this, why we’re livid, why we’re miles away from this scenario and friends/family are crying and depressed by this:
Its because he is us.
The only way I can explain it is like this: You know how Bahamians have that special power to sense another Bahamian in a Walmart in Florida? You know that feeling when you just know? I don’t care if you Conchy Joe….we can just sense you’re Bahamian.
Black is black and we are all connected in some way, shape or form. So George Floyd was my mother’s son, and your mother’s son.
And, make no mistake, black Americans are fighting for us right now.
No?
You disagree?
Every time a black Bahamian goes to America you think they’re looked at ANY differently than George Floyd?
Dakarai, Nal and I did a podcast the other day. Nal ended the podcast by telling us how he had to explain to his son, Kaizen, what was goin on in the world right now. His son is going to be an athlete one day and aspires to go to America to pursue that dream.
Kaizen is fucking 10years old.
That’s a conversation Nal had to have this with his 10 year old son.
Nal had to explain to Kaizen that Tamir Rice, a black kid at the age of 12, was gunned down and murdered by a police officer in a park for playing with a toy gun.
Kaizen apparently broke into tears and was inconsolable.
Which then caused me to break down in tears because this is our fucking reality and if you can’t see that, if you don’t understand how fucked up it is that my parents, and I’m sure several of your parents, had to have “the talk” with you about going to America then where the actual fuck have you been all this time?
My mother warned me on how to speak, how to dress, how to act, how black to be in certain scenarios….she even got upset that I was big and she literally BIRTHED ME.
And, beyond our visiting America or doing time in college etc. understand we have Bahamians not only working in the U.S. but they are on the front lines of the goddamn pandemic DURING A NATIONWIDE PROTEST…..with looting, and arson and Trump.
But, because Bahamian women especially are amazing, they are protesting and outraged just like us at home.
We have to stan the young island queen Noelle…
We must stan the young island queen Ramanda Lee who is a nurse on the front lines of this…..
My cousin Barry is protesting and documenting this whole thing and showing us whats really good out there…
We should all be affected by this and we are all in some way shape or form DEALING with this on a level.
But please don’t condemn people for NOT posting about it or NOT saying anything. Understand that some people may not know WHAT to say. I had to learn that because I was out here on some…
That was legit me.
Then I went by Johnathon, one of the founders of 10thYearSeniors….
….we spoke about the protests and he, very plainly yet very soberly said, “I honestly don’t know what to say, bey. This hurts and its bugging me”. ….then he made me curry and white rice because John is John.
I am not ok.
I’m crying as I type this because I just popped over to twitter and it just won’t end.
Check on your black friends. Check on your black men. Pray to whoever you pray to. Heal however you want to heal. We don’t choose the things that fix us.
We are allowed to be angry. We are allowed to feel this. We are allowed to say “Burn the fucker to the ground” and we’re also allowed to say “Looting and arson is wrong”. But we are NOT allowed to tell African Americans how to grieve. We are NOT allowed to tell other black people how to feel…..yes I’m talking to you niggas as well as you conchy Joes.
Y’all fake woke niggas getting on my nerves right now.Y’all wanna be oppressed SO BAD for the applause. Y’all would post shit bout Jesus in Heaven for the likes if you could.
We will get through this…..we just refuse to remain numb.
Rest In Palaces, Beloved.
Give your mother a hug…..from all of us.
