A Special Message from the Lady Geek
Greetings dear readers and happy Memorial Day! It has been quite a while since last I blogged about the wonderful and exciting world of Technology and I am glad to say that I’m back, hello and I missed you all. There is an official ‘Tales of the Lady Geek” article here, but right now, I’d like to share the reason I’ve been gone for so long. On February 20th I lost my fifty five year old father to complications associated with Sickle Cell Anemia. After fighting his disease well past the doctor’s life expectancy of twenty years my dad was able to participate in my siblings’ and my lives as well as witness and love his four grandchildren before his time on earth ended. That is the way life is supposed to go, isn’t it? You’re born, you grow, you have first loves, marriages, children, grandchildren, and when your time comes, you’ve lived a hopefully full and marvelous life and are ready for the next stage.
It’s right, I think, that I should return on Memorial Day, a day of celebration and remembrance of those gone protecting our country and our rights as well as those unable to protect themselves. This is a day that we remember all of those who especially went before their time, Today I’d like to make sure we keep in mind some other people that our country lost well before their time, two young boys, one fourteen years old named Emmet Till and the other barely seventeen named Trayvon Martin. I hope you all remember these young lives and the families left unbalanced for no conceivable reason at all. With them in mind, I wrote the following essay in hopes you will keep in mind today.
Someone’s Sons
When Microsoft patented their new GPS app that allows pedestrians to know if they're around criminals, the media was outraged and dubbed the app "The Avoid Ghetto App".
When George Zimmerman comes out as Hispanic, despite using the term 'coon' it can't be a racist remark because he's a minority.
When a black person says something rude and ignorantly stereotypical about white folks, they "can't be racist because I'm black."
When a white person uses the term "You people", the folks at the NAACP are ready to gather in outrage.
When the politicians are talking about the negative people on "Welfare" it is universally accepted that they are addressing the minorities actually using public assistance as opposed to the whites who use it.
Newt Gingrich says that inner city (minority) children don't have a work ethic that doesn't involve slinging drugs.
Yes, racism still exists in this day and age, if you think otherwise you must be a fool. However this isn't a story about racism, I could write books on racism. This is the story of a child.
A child like Emmet Till.
His crime was whistling at a white woman. She pulled a gun on him, he ran. She told her husband who got a group of people to threaten all of the black people who came into their shop until someone gave up the kid's address. The husband decided to break into Emmet's cousin's house in the dark of night, threaten violence against those people if they called for help, and dragged the terrorized child from his bed before driving to four different properties with Emmet tied in the back of their truck.
They beat him at each property with sticks and chains while demoralizing him and calling him racial slurs. At the forth property, they gouged one of his eyes out, then they dumped the tied, bloody, terrified child - still screaming - into the bed of the truck, drove a little more until they came to a river, dragged him from the back of their truck all the way to the edge. Beat him once more and then shot him with one bullet to the temple before dumping him into that river. Three days later some kids found his body.
All of that because he could whistle in the summer of 1955, a whistle, by the way, that was a compensation trick used to help him with his stuttering problem.
A child like Trayvon Martin .
Trayvon Martin was a seventeen year old child whose only crime was that of believing that the above mentioned type of violence couldn't possibly live in the twenty-first century.
He left the safety of his father's house and walked to a seven eleven where he purchased a bag of Skittles and an Iced Tea while talking to his friend on the phone. As he attempted to walk back to the house, a man saw a little black boy in a hoodie as we heard quite clearly on the 911 tape, and decided to follow him, getting flustered when Trayvon noticed George Zimmerman following him.
The little boy became scared, as he told his friend on the other line of the phone and, though she begged him to run, he insisted on “fast walking” away. He was frightened, he was terrorized. There was a man following him and he was scared so he walked as quickly as he could until he thought he’d lost him. Then she said Trayvon turned around and the man was right behind him. She heard him ask what was wrong, she heard a thud and then his phone went dead. Five minutes later the police arrived to answer a call about gunfire in this gated community.
Zimmerman said it was self defense. Florida law said, "Oh. Okay." and got to return home to his family and friends and live his life free and clear until we as a country did something. We fought, 2.2million of us signed a Change.org petition created by his mother calling for Zimmerman’s arrest. We protested and eventually George Zimmerman was arrested for the murder of Trayvon Martin. We rejoiced, as we should have.
Trayvon's family is still waiting for him to come home from the Seven Eleven.
These are the facts as reported. I won't go into more detail, we all who have been following the case have a basic idea of details and the truth will ultimately be decided in a proper court of law. My opinion of George Zimmerman? He wanted to kill someone and had his eyes set on a child who looked out of place in a gated community. So that's what he did.
This could well be a tale of racism. Given that I’m a woman of color, I have no blinders on concerning racism in America during the Obama administration. That’s not who I am. Who I am is a mother raising two multi racial, honey colored boys in this America. They both look like Emmet Till and Trayvon Martin to me. They look like Joseph Kony's child soldiers to me. They look like cop targets to me. They look like my beloved and precious beyond all that is holy sons to me.
If they're lucky, the most they'll have to deal with is not being able to catch a taxi in Philadelphia as adults. If they're not taught caution, they can very well become the next Trayvon or Emmet, cut down before the natural conclusion to their story. This is the reality I deal with every time a racial slur accompanies an act of violence or discrimination.
A while ago, my oldest son was trying to assist an elderly Italian woman by putting her bags into her shopping cart for her after she'd asked the security guard to help and been ignored. When he helped, she freaked out. Slapping at my kid and telling him to "Keep your dirty hands off my bags!" all I could do was grab him away and say in 'good humor' so that my other children wouldn't get more upset than they were already becoming, "For the love of God, don't you know your color rubs off? Leave that poor white lady alone before she catches black!"
My dear friends of all races, my multi cultural, multi racial family members, I'm not hurt and afraid because this is a 'hate crime' as defined: a crime from one race/culture committed against another.
I'm terrified for my boys, for my children because this is a 'hate crime' against humanity and cannot be allowed to be swept under the rug. This isn't 1955 any longer. This is 2012. The truth of the matter is every parent with children should see Trayvon in them. We raise our children to accept everyone and to only be afraid of the crazies. Guess what, I've seen Zimmerman's picture. He doesn't look crazy to me.
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| Does he look crazy to you? |
No, dear readers, this isn’t a matter of race to me. No, to me, the Lady Geek, this isn't a matter of anything but of a mother and a father who had a baby boy emerge from a demonstration of their love into a bright world full of butterflies, happy dreams and a future. They loved the baby, prayed over the baby and watched the baby first walk, then talk.
He had a first day of school, a first love and for too short of a time, he loved them back. For so few years, they poured their hearts and their souls into a beautiful creation of a person about to emerge into the adult world. These parents had hopes of college graduations, of watching their son fall in forever love, of attending his wedding, holding their grandchildren and dying long before him, content that they had lived a full life.
Emmet Till's parents loved him for fourteen years and allowed him to visit his family in Mississippi.
Trayvon Martin's parents loved this little boy for seventeen years and allowed him to go to the store....
So on this Memorial Day, I ask that in addition to those service men and women who went before to assure us the freedom and rights of America, that we keep in our hearts the memories for Emmet Till and Trayvon Martin. That we keep the hope for justice of Trayvon Martin, the boy in the hoodie on a rainy February day.
Sincerely,
The Lady Geek
This is my second time reading this article and it still brings me to tears. There are a many people who need to read these words and take them to heart. If we all can gather as a nation to celebrate and remember these children and all the soldiers who have lost their lives fighting for this country we can all come together to create a better America.
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