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sheshe2

(83,889 posts) Thu Nov 27, 2014, 12:14 AM Nov 2014

T. Thorn Coyle: An Open Letter to White America

I am sending out a call for compassion. I am sending out a call for reason. I am sending out a call for an expansion of our presence with one another. I am sending out the remembrance of the threads of our connection. We are not isolated beings on this planet. Collectively, in our gorgeous variance, we make up this living organism we call life… This morning, a Black woman tweeted that she thought she was okay, until she saw a group of children walking to school and burst into tears. I don’t know what it is like to live inside that sort of fear, anguish, grief, and pain. But it doesn’t take much for me to imagine it.…

The extrajudicial killing of Black and brown people by police is not a sometime thing. It is said that every 28 hours a Black person is killed by police or security agencies. Just looking at the news, and at my Twitter feed, this is not so hard to believe. Are all cops bad people? No. Are all cops racist? No. But the system they work within is. This is the system that stops and frisks Black and brown men in large cities every single day. The system that incarcerates and disenfranchises Black men at horrifically high rates. The system that tells Black women their bodies are both loathed and admired, but are not their own to hold and keep….

…When the system has not only failed you, but has actively put your well-being and your life, and your families’ lives in danger, how exactly are you supposed to respond? By trusting in that system? I don’t find random property damage done from grief and anger to be helpful or useful as a political tactic. That said: human life is worth more than human property. Always. In the United States? Particularly in White America? We seem to have reversed their importance, placing property over humanity, at least when those humans have darker skin…

snip

White America has a problem, and that problem is ourselves.

Our myopia, our lack of empathy, our inability to see the ways in which we live in arrogance, is literally killing people in the streets.

Please. I entreat us all. Do your very, very best to understand this. Because we are failing miserably at the task of community. We are failing miserably at the task of building something fine. We are failing to be fully human.

Read more: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/thorncoyle/2014/11/an-open-letter-to-white-america/#ixzz3KEsJRicB

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6 replies

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T. Thorn Coyle: An Open Letter to White America (Original Post) sheshe2 Nov 2014 OP

Thank you. raging moderate Nov 2014 #1

Racists: If you don't want us to mention it, then stop doing it. raging moderate Nov 2014 #2

Kicking for awareness. Time to move forward again. freshwest Nov 2014 #3

"That said: human life is worth more than human property. Always." bemildred Nov 2014 #4

In theory theory and practice are the same, in practice they are not Fumesucker Nov 2014 #5

Which is why we need to put an end to the notion of accumulation as the model of success in life. bemildred Nov 2014 #6

raging moderate

(4,308 posts)

1. Thank you.

Reply to sheshe2 (Original post)

Thu Nov 27, 2014, 02:06 AM

Nov 2014

I am out of words. After walking door to door a lot during this last election season, I am out of hope about my fellow whites. I found so many who admired bullies, criminals, and psychopaths. As long as they were rich. As long as they were handsome. As long as they preyed upon poor people and nonwhite people.

As long as they were white.

raging moderate

(4,308 posts)

2. Racists: If you don't want us to mention it, then stop doing it.

Reply to raging moderate (Reply #1)

Thu Nov 27, 2014, 02:07 AM

Nov 2014

My New England roots tell me:\

If it ain't pretty enough to say, then it ain't pretty enough to do.

freshwest

(53,661 posts)

3. Kicking for awareness. Time to move forward again.

Reply to sheshe2 (Original post)

Thu Nov 27, 2014, 04:57 AM

Nov 2014

bemildred

(90,061 posts)

4. "That said: human life is worth more than human property. Always."

Reply to sheshe2 (Original post)

Thu Nov 27, 2014, 06:10 AM

Nov 2014

People are more important than your stuff, or your money.

Fumesucker

(45,851 posts)

5. In theory theory and practice are the same, in practice they are not

Reply to bemildred (Reply #4)

Thu Nov 27, 2014, 06:19 AM

Nov 2014

Property in the end is the only thing that has rights and then only when there is a very considerable amount of property, enough in fact that through a force akin to the way sufficient mass will warp the very space around it, sufficient property will warp the social fabric around it for its own ends.

bemildred

(90,061 posts)

6. Which is why we need to put an end to the notion of accumulation as the model of success in life.