There’s a lot of pretending in blackness. It is the result of our circumstances.
Everywhere we exist, we pretend that it’s fine. Sometimes it actually is, when we’re entrenched in our black communities in the Black metaverse.
But when we’re next to each other, next to non-black people, we know we’re not equal. And so the pretending begins.
I’m making as much money as you, I’m going to pretend, while knowing that the statistics say that white wealth is ten to hundred times, on average, bigger.
I’m as free as you are, I’m going to pretend, while knowing that the statistics say the reality is that I have five more times chances to get arrested for any reason.
Pretending allows us to live, while it poisons our souls. It poisons our existences.
So people pretend to be disrespected. On a Sunday night around a dice game in a nice neighborhood, someone pulled the trigger, probably faking outrage under the blanket of alcohol intoxication. And so a 28 year old black man died for the most absurd reason: none.
It was unnecessary, it was probably an accident. He is gone and we’re back pretending that it is just how things are.