You realize how much this nation sucks the joy out of life for Black people when your wife changes a description of the things your child enjoys because White people think even Black children are thugs.

Literally, until the quarantine, my wife and I refused to buy our son a Super Soaker. Not because we don't like Super Soakers (we do), but because I fear my son one day becoming the next Tamir Rice.

My nephew, now a tall teenager over six feet tall, is no longer allowed to wear hoodies. Because we all fear him becoming the next Trayvon.

I think about all the times my grandparents disciplined me. I think about the times my mother and her sisters were disciplined. I think about the discipline of other relatives. All because if they didn't learn to behave, they could lose their lives.

White Supremacy tries to steal the joy from Black children. It sucks the fun out of being Black youth. It works to make Black parents the enemies of their own children. The slaveowner's whipping of the Black man and women are reflected in the corporal punishment in Black homes.

I am thankful that my mother and my grandparents allowed for me to have as much joy as possible in this White Supremacist nation and shield me from the worst of things. My wife and I work hard to shield our son as much as possible from the joy-sucking of this nation.

But there are a lot of Black families who lack the resources, especially the ability to move to a middle-class predominantly Black community, to let their children have a little more joy than this nation wants to allow.

It isn't the cops murdering Black people with impunity that is the saddest part of being Black in America. Or the everyday legacies of bigotry that continue to harm us. It is the fact that Black children are often not allowed to be children because to have joy is to risk death.