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Bethany C. Morrow Profile picture
@BCMorrow
Jun 20, 2020 • 5 tweets • 2 min read • Read on X
It's Juneteenth but I just found out my brother was denied release today. Black man, six years for a non-violent crime, and EVERY variable must be weighed except the one about them putting him in jail with adults when he was 16. Who pays for that. #AbolishPrisons
I'm trying to imagine the emotional and psychological torture of being denied on the day you thought you were being released, of applying 30 days later, knowing a yes can still become a no. Who can survive this, and if they do, to become what. #AbolishPrisons
This isn't his first stint. He's in his 30s now. And it took an embarrassingly long time for me to realize who started this cycle. Then one day I say his 1st mug shot and I fucking broke. He was a baby. And folk make millions off weed now. But where's my brother. #AbolishPrisons
If I had my way, I’d be Ella, and he’d be Kev, and we would burn it down. Image
I took a moment away, but I wanna say: if you need a perfect victim, my brother isn't it. He's lived rough. He's caused pain. And what's being done to him is still unjust. This system is still predatory. They're still responsible for marring his life and ours. #AbolishPrison

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More from @BCMorrow

Bethany C. Morrow Profile picture
Sep 17, 2020
Don't point to white women pretending to be Black as proof that it is in fact "more advantageous" to be so. Blackface isn't new, isn't designed to uplift/empower Black people, is in fact whiteness continuing to dominate and profit by taking on the veneer but not the oppression.
I remember as an undergrad reading case studies of white people who "took on" poverty, homelessness, any number of marginalizations and experiences, and guess what they always had? A home to return to if it went bad. A salary, a network, a privilege. I can't lay it down.
It is easier to be a white person pretending to be Black in primarily white spaces (like academia), because you carry none of the generational traumas/stigmas, your humanity is never offended, your mental and physical health do not carry the scars. You're cosplaying.
Read 4 tweets
Bethany C. Morrow Profile picture
Sep 2, 2020
This (readers not having the range) is why it's important to call it what it is: cultural incompetence and illiteracy. Readers gorged on western, white-centering storytelling will think you failed at something you were never attempting, because they can't identify YOUR story.
The only solution to this is to correct the imbalance by producing more of our stories--but in the meantime, we will face criticism from folks who've been taught that they decide what is and isn't correct storytelling. Even when they're not the target audience.
Because it's important to recognize how things connect and perpetuate inequity: that incompetence/illiteracy is ALSO why it's harmful for white authors to be paid to write BIPOC stories.

It's not as simple as swapping out skin tones. We tell stories differently.
Read 4 tweets
Bethany C. Morrow Profile picture
Aug 22, 2020
All the way up to adulthood, society successfully got me to eschew or feel uncomfortable with honors specific to my racial identity.

Yes, me. I tell y'all these things to let you know how thorough socialization is and how desperate the need for deprogramming in all of us.
The jig of course is that white supremacy (the western world) is built on affirmative action. Measures that correct for intentional oppression aren't that. Which is why "free, white, and 21" was erased, and whiteness went invisible.

When we correct, it looks like an advantage.
So for the boo-hoo crowd over all dope ass lists like the one in USA Today, I get why you're so upset. You haven't done the reading, and you're used to being coddled. I used to be sensitive to your feelings, and if EYE can change....there's hope for you yet.
Read 4 tweets
Bethany C. Morrow Profile picture
Jun 29, 2020
We need to have a conversation about the flimsy arguments anti-Blackness employs, and why folk keep falling for it.

I do not have to read a book with an offensive premise to know that the premise on its face is offensive and inappropriate. (See: Confeder@te and HBO.)

Sit down.
Remember this? Read it again, and tell me why as a descendant of enslaved ppl whose oppression has continued unabated, and whose heritage and identities have been stolen by the same oppressors, I should pretend I can't see an attack before it lands.

This is as asinine as saying, "Lemme stab you and we'll see if this knife is sharp." I'm good.

I know it when I see it, cuz I've seen it before.
Read 5 tweets
Bethany C. Morrow Profile picture
Jun 27, 2020
I'd just like to once again bring your handiwork to your attention, PW and Kirkus. I'd like you to take note of other Black women named. Almost as if this same narrative has been weaved before. I hold you responsible. ImageImageImage
The writer of this post (who I've hopefully edited out) notes that they got my tweets from Kirkus' article, but that I haven't taken them down.

Explain why I should mute my opinion when the issue is that 2 publications chose to frame a cancellation as being down to me. Pardon?
Where are the free speech, we're not victims parties when a BW is being attacked because I told you what I will KEEP THINKING and a ww made a decision about a book you wouldn't have known existed. You're powerful but also I control your destinies?! H A L P.
Read 6 tweets
Bethany C. Morrow Profile picture
Jun 26, 2020
I wrote a whole book about the abuse and vitriol leveled at Black women for speaking, and while folk celebrate the book, it's truly something to be simultaneously experiencing that vitriol myself.
I am 100% unapologetic about resisting a culture that gives time and space to white authors to speak for the rest of us. I will speak on it. They shoulda been grateful I replied and didn't quote-tweet. Becuz my point wasn't to incite a dragging, but a reconsideration.
As usually happens, the cancellation was unnecessarily announced.

We need to talk about this, white folks. Why do you need to announce an action meant to DECREASE harm? What can we point to in our ugly shared history that blinds you to the virtue signaling occurring?
Read 10 tweets

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