Read on Twitter
*Thread*
So let me start off by saying this, in my home state of California, 75% of black men don’t meet state reading standards. From K-12, I attended only Oakland Public Schools, and can tell stories of being in high school and witnessing teachers ask my peers to read out loud
So let me start off by saying this, in my home state of California, 75% of black men don’t meet state reading standards. From K-12, I attended only Oakland Public Schools, and can tell stories of being in high school and witnessing teachers ask my peers to read out loud
and watching them struggle to read unfamiliar, multi-syllable words. This has informed my perspective on ‘meeting people where they are’ and sympathizing with those who this system that we’re trying to dismantle has impacted in the worst kinds of ways.
Taking this into consideration, I try and make sure that when educating others, I check my own privilege and understand how I can welcome and educate those who may quite literally be illiterate (and yes, even though 3 out of 4 of my brothers were incarcerated, my dad and brother
were both shot, and I’ve carried caskets of friends who were killed under the age of 25, I still have privilege, mostly stemming from being male). Intellectual elitism is real, though, and I need y’all to understand that ‘engaged’ or ‘woke’ twitter is an unrealistic
representation of our most vulnerable black people. I can’t condemn another black person and tell them to ‘read a book’ or ‘educate themselves’ when systemic inequality is to blame for them not being able to fundamentally read. It’s a systemic issue.
And they are ignorant to these issues because the system is designed for them to be, and clearly, it’s working. (This is not the same as actually being able to educate yourself yet choosing not too, though this has it’s own set of nuance).
When I approach having conversations with people who may not be as up to speed as I on political and social education, the first step is understanding my goal: to educate them and allow them to understand, alongside myself, how and why this system has harmed them (racism,
patriarchy, capitalism etc). But I do not want to be condescending or humiliate that person, who to no fault but being born in poverty/failing neighborhood schools/food desert/social isolation, etc, may not know what I know.
Because I also know my people. And I know how quick we are to get defensive when we feel attacked for not understanding. And I’m not here to stroke my own ego online to get pats on the back from educated peers who say ‘yeap, you sure told them’.
That doesn’t do anything for me, or for our community as a whole. (I’ll add, most of my conversations happen offline, without cameras, b/c I could care less about Twitter’s opinion of me).
I say all of this to say, be aware of your own privilege, in whatever form it may be, and also go into these conversations understanding what the end goal is. Now obviously, this is a blanket statement and every interaction and person has its own set of complexities,
but all I’m saying is control the controllables (your own actions) so that we can all uplift one another in a respectful way and not divide ourselves in the process. The enemy is this racist, capitalist, patriarchal system that we’re living in, not ourselves.
