I'm working through some thoughts on how far we've gotten from community, how nothing is valued anymore, and how we exist in a space of constant critique we call "accountability" and "growth" but that is never rooted in love. We subsist on bitterness and pretend it's promise.

I've been thinking about this a lot in regard to how we talk about "Blackness" #onhere. How common it is to talk abut Black people in terms that vilify and blame our ancestors for how they fought, how they failed, how they were victimized and what they didn't know.

As more people delve into "theory" and use newly developed language and frameworks to recontextualize our histories, there's a fixation on what those who came before us did wrong that is then used to invalidate all of the work they did and sacrifices they made.

Instead of "wow, I wish our ancestors had been in the position to explore this understanding of self and expand their thinking of what Black liberation involved with this knowledge" it becomes "how dare they not have known these things and have fought in these ways."

Our mothers and grandmothers become "mules" and "mammies" who stupidly wasted time and energy loving, protecting and guiding us because patriarchy exists. Nevermind the ways they tell their own stories or speak to their own experiences and willingness to sacrifice for us in love.

Our revolutionaries and leaders become self-invested liberals who championed capitalism, or oppressors who never cared about Black people because they tried to embody the man and womanhood that was imposed on them. Their flaws become greater than their commitments to us.

More on this later.