This week, on June 1st specifically, I felt more than just uneasy. I began to feel downright panicked. My son and I surveyed our neighborhood and more businesses have closed or boarded up their windows. Escalation between protesters and some police continued. Helicopters flew overhead each day. COVID-19, already an unprecedented pandemic that has left more than 100,000 Americans dead, is now overshadowed by political unrest. The evidence of the senseless killing of people of color in police custody without immediate justice made the weight of these times practically unbearable. Among the worrisome new developments: - Peaceful protesters were attacked, including dispersed by tear gas and shot at with rubber bullets in D.C. to make way for a pointless photo-op. - The so-called "commander-in-chief" issued a directive to "dominate" the protestors, followed by a call to occupy the "battlespace" from his military top brass. This aggressive and militaristic language is inappropriate to the situation and the constitutionally-protected right to peaceful protest. - Then then the unpopular president called "antifa" is a terrorist organization (antifa literally means "anti-fascist" and the alternative must be what the president embraces...fascism). - Finally, a bill to condemn lynching failed to pass the Senate in 2020 in the United States of America. More than 20 years ago, Gloria Steinem wrote an essay titled "Supremacy Crimes" and what she wrote then is as, if not more, important today. Steinem's essay focuses on the fact that most “impersonal, resentment-driven, mass killings” are committed by white, non-poor, heterosexual men. Steinem's prescient essay gets to the heart of the brutal treatment of people of color, the deaf ears to cries for justice, and the stubborn fact that white males are raised to feel entitled. Writing in 1999, Steinem said: “White males—usually intelligent, middle class, and heterosexual, or trying desperately to appear so—also account for virtually all the serial, sexually motivated, sadistic killings, those characterized by stalking, imprisoning, torturing, and “owning” victims in death.” She names the concept of "supremacy "as the culprit that routinely allows these sorts of crimes to occur stating it's a “drug pushed by a male-dominant culture that presents dominance as a natural right; a racist hierarchy that falsely elevates whiteness; a materialist society that equates superiority with possessions, and a homophobic one that empowers only one form of sexuality.” In the midst of a chaotic week of racial tension, I watched a a video clip of Senator Kamala Harris make an impassioned plea on the Senate floor to finally pass an anti-lynching bill. I later learned that the bill had stalled due to the "private objections of one Republican, Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, who has succeeded for months in preventing it from becoming law." One would be right to wonder how one man could stand in the way of such an obviously needed piece of legislation at a time like this. And one would be further justified in thinking it unreal that an entire nation of protests is not enough to pressure this one white male into doing the right thing. So, what we see is a culture that is producing adult white males who feel justified in carrying out acts of violence against people of color; young white males with guns who have taken their frustration out on unarmed innocent people; and the prevention of laws to stop all this by powerful white men in government. It's enough to drive one crazy from grief and anxiety. The antidote to this may be to turn to the people who's voices do matter but who may go unnoticed in a news cycle such as this—the writers, poets, artists, entertainers, and activists who are addressing our collective nightmare and offering us their work. IN the coming weeks, I hope to feature some of them on this blog. Today, I have been reading a chapbook of just-published poetry titled Shadow Black by Naima Yael Tokunow. Tokunow writes poems that are both searing and sensitive. Reading her words provides a deeper, visceral understanding of what it means to live in a culture that allows supremacy crimes to proliferate. "I always thought my pretty would save me flash dimple and toss hair and not die and maybe it’s shameful to say that out loud because every black body moments before becoming dead was exquisite and they weren’t saved" — Naima Yael Tokunow So far, 2020 has been a time that calls for us all to reflect more deeply on what is happening all around us. Art can help us in this moment. Maybe art cannot solve all of our problems, but it can slow us down and help us process, understand, and make meaning of the onslaught. Shadow Black is one notable work that shows us the way. Shadow Black is published by Frontier Poetry and is available as a free downloadable chapbook from their website. Copyright © 2020 Naima Yael Tokunow Supremacy Crimes was excerpted from: Joy Ritchie. “Available Means.” Apple Books. https://books.apple.com/us/book/available-means/id911935639
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About this BlogWritten by Hannah Onstad, unless specified otherwise. Occasionally, posts here have been previously published elsewhere, and if so, that is noted at the top. Archives
June 2020
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