by Linda Rodriguez
Friday
saw Dylann Roof, who in 2015 murdered nine innocent people at a
church prayer meeting in Charleston, South Carolina, sentenced to
death. This brings back the horror of that event and so many since.
It
ties into a current situation where two teen brothers from the Mohawk
Nation (Haudenosaunee) were pulled from a college tour by police,
warned to keep their hands in sight, searched (probably illegally),
and questioned because a white woman on the tour called the police,
saying they were “too quiet,” “creepy,” she “knew” they
were lying, and they made her “feel sick.” The police uniform-cam
video shows how tense this confrontation was and how frightened the
teens were, fearing they'd be shot for a false move—as has happened
so many times recently. The tie-in between these two events is the
irrational fear and hatred of the Other, as well as genuine ignorance
about anyone other than “their own kind,” to quote West
Side Story.
I've
been trying to move past anger, thinking and thinking and trying to
come at this whole situation and the vast rise in hate crimes, and
now, above all again, the massacre at Mother Emanuel AME Church in
Charleston from a place of love and understanding and a sense of
optimism I've had to struggle mightily to maintain. This is what I've
come up with.
I’d
like to focus on the nine people whose lives were cut short in Mother
Emanuel AME Church on June 17, 2015. I think it's too easy for us to
forget them, especially since there have been so many others killed
in the ensuing years. I fear that they all start to blend together,
and I refuse to let that happen. I’ve linked to an article about
the nine citizens whose lives were cut short at historic Mother
Emmanuel Church here.
I
didn’t know any of these people personally. I live half a continent
away from them. But I feel as if I do know them when I read about
them—their hard work, their devotion to family, their community
leadership, and especially their devout Christianity—because they
sound just like my neighbors and friends. I’ve owned a a home and
lived in a predominantly African American neighborhood in one of
America’s most racially segregated cities for over 40 years (and
yes, it was already almost entirely black when I moved in). These are
the African American people I know, the ones I never see in books or
on television or in the movies, the ones who sometimes work several
jobs so they can send their kids to a good private school since our
urban public schools have become a disaster, the ones who are
teachers and librarians and nurses and bankers and managers and
supervisors, the ones who go to work during the week and to church on
Sunday (and often Wednesday night prayer group or university night
classes) without fail, day after day, week after week.
I
have seen the long double rows of black men standing up before a
packed congregation to pledge themselves to mentor and help all the
young boys of the area, not just their own. These are the men who
coached my kids’ Little League teams and helped dig out our car
when it slid into a snow-filled ditch. These are the men I pass
mowing their lawns and trimming their bushes and, sometimes, playing
their musical instruments on their lawns, always giving me a polite,
friendly greeting and wave. These are the men I never see on the
media with its focus on the idea of the African American man as
scary, violent criminal.
These
are the women I’ve had coffee with and traded recipes with and
joked with about our men and worried with about our kids. These are
the women who bring casseroles and pies when someone’s sick or
someone’s died. These are the women who work in the church food
pantry, serving white and black families alike. These are the women
who are professionals out in a world that constantly disrespects them
as African Americans and disrespects them as women, and these women
still carry themselves with dignity and pride through all of it.
I’ve
been to AME churches and other black churches quite a bit in my life,
and I’ve always been made welcome in the warmest, most loving, and
truly Christian way. My heart breaks every time I read that the
murderer said he almost couldn’t go through with it because the
people he killed were so nice to him. I know those people. I’ve
lived with those people for over 40 years.
And
what I want to say is not to the white supremacists and vicious
racists out there—because they’re mostly not going to change—but
to the news media and the writers and filmmakers and television show
producers and directors. Why aren’t you showing us these people?
Why can’t I ever see wonderful people like these nine beautiful
human beings and my neighbors in any of your productions? Why do you
persist in showing only a negative minority of the African American
population over and over, so that all the white people who live in
all-white suburbs and work in all-white workplaces think your
stereotypes are what African American people are and all they are?
And
to my white friends I say, don’t let them do this any longer.
Demand to see the reality of African American life, which is full of
humor and music and parties and laughter and love, as well as all the
other stuff of all lives. They do this to Natives. They do this to
Latinos. They do this to everyone “different.” So that those
white people (an unfortunately ever-larger number) who live carefully
segregated, all-white lives only know these negative stereotypes
about people from other cultures than their own. Don’t let them do
this any longer. More than anything else, more even than the
disgusting hate speech, this eternal lopsided presentation is what
feeds the ugly racism that underlies America. Demand that it stop.
As
writers and readers, we have the power to change this terrible racist
rot at the heart of our society. We simply have to muster the courage
to insist on truthful, varied portrayals of real human beings, the
courage to reach outside of segregated suburbs to learn about people
who are not just like us, the courage to call out false, bigoted
remarks and portrayals when we encounter them. Let us be part of the
solution and no longer part of the problem, actively or passively.
Let us bring our society closer to the ideals we claim for it.
Writers
shape the way our nation sees the world. Let us shape that
perspective with truth and empathy.
Linda Rodriguez's Dark Sister: Poems
has just been released. Plotting the Character-Driven Novel,
based on her popular workshop, and The World Is One Place: Native
American Poets Visit the Middle East, an anthology she co-edited,
were published to high praise in 2017. Every Family Doubt,
her fourth mystery novel featuring Cherokee campus police chief,
Skeet Bannion, and Revising the Character-Driven Novel will
be published in 2019. Her three earlier Skeet novels—Every
Hidden Fear, Every Broken Trust, and Every Last
Secret—and her books of
poetry—Skin Hunger
and Heart's Migration—have
received critical recognition and awards, such as St. Martin's
Press/Malice Domestic Best First Novel, International
Latino Book Award, Latina Book Club Best Book of 2014, Midwest Voices
& Visions, Elvira Cordero Cisneros Award, Thorpe Menn Award, and
Ragdale and Macondo fellowships. Her short story, “The Good
Neighbor,” published in the anthology, Kansas City Noir, has
been optioned for film.
Rodriguez is past chair of the AWP
Indigenous Writer’s Caucus, past president of Border Crimes chapter
of Sisters in Crime, founding board member of Latino Writers
Collective and The Writers Place, and a member of International
Thriller Writers, Wordcraft Circle of Native American Writers and
Storytellers, and Kansas City Cherokee Community. Visit her at
http://lindarodriguezwrites.blogspot.com
