We were in the car on our way to the movies when we heard the news about the mass casualty event in Waukesha. After the shock and sadness set in, our next immediate thought was "please don't let him be black." Initial reports were that he was white, which gave us a sense of relief albeit short lived, because we now know differently. He is a black man. Our fear and angst have returned along with our grief.
If you have been in this space for any amount of time, you have probably done the same thing, hoped over and over that some violent attacker was not a person of color. Every time there is a mass shooting or casualty event of any kind, this wish is universal to those of us involved in anti-racism work. If you don't know why, let me explain…
In her ground breaking piece "Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack" first published in 1989, Peggy McIntosh put it best "I was taught to see racism only in individual acts of meanness, not in invisible systems conferring dominance on my group." She goes on to list 50 examples of white privilege including:
I can talk with my mouth full and not have people put this down to my color.
I can swear, or dress in second hand clothes, or not answer letters, without having people attribute these choices to the bad morals, the poverty, or the illiteracy of my race.
I would add "when someone of my race commits a heinous act, I won't be lumped in with that person. His act won't reflect on my entire race. I won't have to worry about retribution towards me or my children because someone of my race committed a horrible crime."
I spoke with a black friend today who was so upset by the incident because she's a mother and wonderful person, but also because of the race of the driver. She fears for her children always (because growing up Black in America has its own danger) but, she is now riddled with fear because this driver was black, but also because of the Rittenhouse acquittal, which basically gave the green light to white vigilantes to take the law into their own hands. "In a sick way, this (the driver's race) reinforces what these people want to believe." And with this reinforcement, comes their anger, their want to hold onto white dominance rather than to recognize that this horrible act was committed by a bad actor, not by an entire race.
As I expressed on Saturday, I feel hopeless at times that anything will change, that our country can ever shed the shackles of institutional racism, that our activism will ever lead to any real change. My heart is heavy for the families who lost loved ones, for all the people who experienced this trauma, for the children who have lost their innocence forever. For a country that may never be able to shed the institutional racism it was founded on. My heart is heavy.
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