I've been thinking a lot abt this video & because I've been working on a chapter about slavery I cannot keep my mind from going back to the centuries-long conditioning we have to not treat black people like other people, black mothers like other mothers.
theguardian.com/us-news/video/…
theguardian.com/us-news/video/…
I try to picture a white woman who is holding a baby for four hours and no one at the government office -- which exists to serve the people -- offering her a chair. And then I try to imagine police being called because she is sitting on the floor, which is not illegal.
Then I try to imagine police trying to rip the baby from a white woman's arms, with no concern for the mother or the baby. And I cannot.
This treatment is insidious. This belief that one must instantly react not with humanity, but to control, to demean, to punish, when it comes to black people is something that has been stamped into our national DNA, and black law enforcement often buy into it as well.
I am literally writing a section about how even free black people during the time of slavery suffered the taint of slavery bc you cannot say the enslaved are real estate with no recognized familial ties, emotions, rights, and then acknowledge their humanity once they are free.
The carefully constructed beliefs abt black humanity that sustained the institution of slavery in what posited itself as the greatest most liberatory country the world had ever seen did not simply dissipate with slavery's end. They are our inheritance and this video our legacy.
And this mother, who fought not to have her baby ripped from her arms, sits in God-awful Rykers as I type. Because she had to wait four hours to get help with childcare so she could work, got tired, and sat on the floor. This is racial caste.
Those pointing out that the workers and police were black, I pose this question: Would black workers have called the police on a white mom for doing this and would black police have handled a white mom this way? Black people are indoctrinated into white supremacy as well.
*I know I misspelled Rikers.😐
