I am Sandra Bland.
What Can White America Do About Racism in America Today?
The story goes…
I was driving home after buying some groceries, excited about my new job at my alma mater, and getting ready to celebrate with my friends, when a police car in the lane behind me began to speed up and come very close behind me. I changed lanes to get out of the way without using my turn signal.
The lights of the police car flashed once, and I pulled over feeling irritated and also wary of potential for problems. The officer, a white male in his late forties or early fifties, stood at the window of my car and said to me, “You okay? You seem very irritated.”
He was right, and I explained why I was irritated since he seemed to want to know — I said that I had moved over to get out of his way because he was speeding up behind me. I said all of this calmly. I also said that I recognized my irritation with him didn’t mean he couldn’t lawfully still give me a ticket.
When I was done answering his question, he said to me in a snide tone, “Are you done?”
Since I had only explained by irritation in answer to his question, his patronizing and sarcastic tone irritated me further, but I explained again, “You asked me what was wrong and I told you.” “Okay,” he said to me. And then, “You mind putting out your cigarette, please?”
To me, this just seemed like a jerk move on his part. And I said to him, “I’m in my car. Why do I have to put out my cigarette?” I probably should have just put out my cigarette. But, like I said, I was irritated.
Clearly, it wasn’t just me that was irritated because suddenly the police officer went from being patronizing to being aggressive and told me to “Step out of the car.”
Everything got much worse from there.
I was found hanged by the neck in my jail cell three days later.
Pick a Side
For those of us who are white — and self-identify as not racist —we often want to argue we have no role in the stories of violence, terror, harassment, and intimidation that are getting reported in our country with increasing frequency. I am sure there are many reasons for refraining from engagement on the issue.
At the same time, history reminds us that when good people stay neutral in times of injustice, things can get ugly.
Importantly, the moral courage required to engage in the story of Sandra Bland, is not a moral courage that carries a risk of bodily harm, for most of us. There is essentially nothing to lose and everything to gain. The only thing we have to lose is our own blind spots.
When I am trying to process events, I usually resort to the practice of placing myself inside the story-line. But the story I just told is the story of a black female, and as a white female, I cannot imagine being stopped for not using my turn signal, and ending up in jail. It is not within the realm of things that would happen.
If I play the story of her traffic stop in my head and take a place in the story, as either the officer or Sandra herself, every fiber of my body revolts at the thought that I am the police officer.
Understand the problem better
First, we need a more nuanced understanding of what racism really is — an understanding of racism beyond our grade school definition of racism as “using the n-word.”
A good place to start is the book, Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates (Spiegel & Grau, 2015). Jack Hamilton, reviewing the book for Slate calls Between the World, “…an attempt to sever America’s ongoing romance with its own unexamined platitudes of innocence and equality.”
Ta-Nehisi Coates' Between the World and Me checks in at a trim 152 pages but lands like a major work, a book destined…www.slate.com
Another good starting place is the group called Showing Up for Racial Justice. They describe themselves as “a national network of groups and individuals organizing white people for racial justice.”
Take one small step
White people in America who consider themselves moral people are the people most responsible for creating change, with regard to racism in America. And to do this, we must begin by placing ourselves inside the stories.
The reason why Sandra Bland got pulled over for a minor traffic infraction and ended up dead in her jail cell is because white America has not yet self-identified as being part of the story.
I choose to see myself as part of the story of racism in America today. I choose to examine my own prejudices and correct them as much as possible.
I have inherited a world where I belong to the dominant group of people on the globe. This is my heritage and this is what my ancestors have given me.
What do I do with it? Do I congratulate myself? Do I imagine that I am the victim when others accuse me of benefiting from my inherited power? Do I accentuate my power, and flex my muscles? Or do I use my power to help others?
In the wake of Sandra Bland’s death, I challenge all white people who identify ourselves as not racist, to change our Facebook profile pictures for just one social-media minute so that we stand with Sandra Bland — clearly, loudly, without equivocation.
It does not matter if the police officer uttered a racist word. It does not matter if Sandra Bland was acting irritated. It does not matter if all of the evidence is in. It does not matter whether she committed suicide. We stand with Sandra Bland.
Because — in very real and important ways — we recognize that racism was part of the story whether it was implicit or explicit, and we recognize that as a culture, it affects us all when racism is present. We recognize that in very real ways, we are all Sandra Bland.
It really boils down to this: that all life is interrelated. We are all caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied into a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. — Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Directions
Here’s how you make your profile picture, the Say Her Name picture of Sandra Bland. (The Say Her Name campaign did not originate with me, and is an effort to keep the personal focus on the victims of racism and misogyny, and to challenge the ways in which the perpetrators would rather have the victims disappear.):
1) Right-click on this picture and save it to your computer, if you are on a PC. Or find the picture online (it’s on my Facebook profile) and click on “Options” in the bottom right corner of the picture, and then to “Download” to save it to your computer.
2) Log into your Facebook account and click on the little picture of a camera in the bottom, left corner of your own profile picture. You will see an option to “update profile picture.”
3) Navigate to the picture of Sandra Bland that you saved on your computer, select it, and save it.
4) Share this article.
