By Danny Sellers
Donald Trump is our President. Despite losing the popular vote to Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump (as far as we know) won fair and square. This isn’t really meant to be a political post. This is a post about ethics and our country. And after Tuesday’s results and the endless cornball Facebook statuses, I’ve come to the scientific conclusion that some of you mother fuckers are lying about your relationship with people of color, LGBTQ communities, and people of other religions. Being a minority (anything other than a white christian) is pretty tough in America these days.
Some of you mother fuckers have been lying. Some of you love our music, our jokes, our art, rhythm and culture. But hate our skin. I know hate is a strong word, but trust me it’s even stronger when you’re receiving it. You might not ever verbally say a discriminatory thing towards a person of color in your life. But aiding or not stopping it is just as bad. You can’t pick and choose what's relevant or a serious threat. Or pick and chose to support one statement Trump has made but not others. A bigot is a bigot (you can’t be 3/5th bigot, sorry).There are millions of people, good working people that are shaken to their cores from Tuesday’s results. And most of them barely give a damn about it being Republican or Democrat. People care about ethics and that a person can lead this county after marketing his presidency around a plan to separate this country.
“People care about ethics and that a person can lead this county after marketing his presidency around a plan to separate this country. ”
I have been around white people the great majority of my life. I have had a lot of white friends. Friends, Teammates, Classmates and Co-Workers I felt that I could trust. But some of you Mother Fuckers been lying:
Some of you Mother Fuckers just like the thought of having a Black Friend:
Yea, I know our culture is pretty dope. Most of us can dance and a lot of times we dress pretty cool. Having a black friend is cool, right? If you can’t even have the empathy for your friend of color then you (we) aren’t really friends. One or both of you all are playing yourselves; sleeping at night knowing you never purposely tried to hurt your minority friend, but instead chose to support ideals that hurt them and their people. You hurt them mentally, financially and physically for generations.
Black folks have been getting mistreated by the police for hundreds of years (now we just have camera phones):
As a Young Black Man, I rarely ever feel safe around the police. And those feelings didn’t start after a couple Facebook videos a few years ago. Maybe it’s because I don’t need a twitter video to see profiling when I can witness it first hand. I’ve never been arrested or in any kind of legal trouble ever. Those feelings I have had as a boy aren’t from a Twitter feed. So some of you mother fuckers have been lying for the simple fact that you can’t acknowledge that my fear or disdain is from a genuine and accurate experience. It might be new to you, but driving while black has been a crime way before hashtags.
Just because you don’t wear a Klan Hood doesn’t mean you’re not racist:
People. Supporting someone who has marketed his whole campaign on the displacement and targeted bigotry towards race and religion is sickening to be honest. It must be pretty convenient to be able to sweep someone's ignorant bias aside when it doesn’t affect you. You don’t have the right to say what Donald Trump says isn’t that big of a deal! He isn’t talking about you! You choosing to have selective memory or hearing around the racial, sexual and degrading things Donald has said publicly is just as bad as you saying it yourself. So some of you mother fuckers are lying, if you support somebody like that, you are racist my friend!
“You choosing to have selective memory or hearing around the racial, sexual and degrading things Donald has said publicly is just as bad as you saying it yourself.”
When was America Great(For non-white guys)?:
When has America been so great for people other than white males? I know for Black folks, great is a large stretch. If your memory fails you, the whole slavery thing from 1619-1865 wasn’t great. Segregation wasn’t too great from 1896-1962. And I’m sure Native Americans, Muslims and even Japanese during WWII have their two cents. I’m sure women don’t want to be denied access to safe abortions like they were before 1973. So please, enlighten me when America was so great? Or do you only care about it being great for you?
“My family is hard working...these immigrants...blahh blahh blahh”:
We are all immigrants in America. (The only Christopher we acknowledge is Wallace). What does an illegal immigrant look like? Who is that person? According to Donald Trump, that person is a violent thug and is ruining our economy. Is it because they are coming in our country and ruining wages?
A couple things about jobs: 1) preventing immigrants from becoming legal citizens forces them to work under the table, which allows employers to pay them a lower wage due to lack of regulation. 2) many jobs that you think are being lost to “others” are actually being shifted with technological advancement and globalization. And neither of those are stopping any time soon.
Why is it ok that you and your family came to America and worked hard but not ok for another group of people. Yes, there need to be ways to legitimize folks but kicking them out and building a wall isn’t humane. Keep in mind that laws change--it used to be legal to own black people. People are spending decades in jail because it was illegal to smoke/sell weed, and now it’s legal in multiple states. My beloved Hennessy was once illegal. So these “laws” that are in place change and half the time frequently favor one subset of people.
“Your people had a few hundred years of a head start.”
So sure your parents or grandparents might have bootstrapped their way to achieving generational success. But because of that, you now have a support system to fall back on (emotionally and more importantly financially). You have no right to tell a minority, “If all of you worked harder, you can do anything you want”. Your people had a few hundred years of a head start. Our grandparents and great grandparents were direct offspring of slaves. Many of our grandparents couldn’t go to the same high school as yours. Sooo guess what, some of you mother fuckers have been lying about us having the same playing field. Well we might have the same field but you got a metal bat, up 3-1.
Photo Credit: Lee Champan