Note: Spoilers for Watchmen in video below
I’m tired, so damned tired. I’m tired of seeing these videos of us being harassed by “Karen’s” and “Brian’s” (take the name if you want). I’m tired of seeing videos of us being hunted, shot, and killed by “concerned citizens”. I’m tired of seeing us being choked out on the ground as we plead to live. We live in a time where the victimization and the torture of black bodies and souls have become primetime viewing. Yes, it shines a light on the fact that **SHOCK** racism still exists. I’d be lying though if I didn’t say that seeing the murder of black folks on repeat hasn’t been messing with my mental state.
We continue to live within a non-ending cycle of murder and harassment at the hands of those who simply hate us for existing. And it gets extremely frustrating, taxing, or whatever fed up adjective you’d like to use. Because-nothing-ever-changes. Racism surrounds us everywhere we go. Try to refute it as much as you want, and say it’s only isolated to the current crop of headline-grabbing news stories that are to be found in the existing news cycle. You’d be wrong to believe that. Like completely, stupidly, and utterly wrong. Racism is as natural to this world as the air we breathe. And that’s sad as f&^*. Take the words of Octavia Butler from her great work Parable of the Talents,
Beware:
Ignorance
Protects itself.
Ignorance
Promotes suspicion.
Suspicion
Engenders fear.
Fear quails,
Irrational and blind,
Or fear looms,
Defiant and closed.
Blind, closed,
Suspicious, afraid,
Ignorance
Protects itself,
And protected,
Ignorance grows.
There are very solid think pieces about what effect viewing such murders and harassment has on black people. There are even better studies that focus on the racism that people of color have to deal with every day. I recommend checking those out. This op-ed piece is a bit more immediate and visceral. And a bit rambling.
Though it won’t solve the everlasting and deep-seated racism which permeates every corner of this planet that we live on, I wanted to bring some catharsis to our readers. Video and images (though from a fictional source) that might counterbalance the cycle of murder and harassment which have been flooding our social media feeds and newscasts over t he past few months. Here at BlackSci-Fi.com, I’m going to do my damndest to inspire, and show that we are not just victims. I’m going to do it with speculative fiction though. Sit back, relax, and watch some racists get the s*&^ get beat out of them courtesy of Watchmen.
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Robert Jeffrey II is an Atlanta based freelance writer who has worked for such clients as DC Comics, the Centers for Disease Control, and Nitto Tires. He is the co-writer of Radio Free Amerika, the writer of RET: CON, the creator/ writer of the Glyph Comics Award winning/ nominated Route 3: Vol 1, and the creator/writer of Mine To Avenge: The Book of Layla. He’s contributed to the Dark Universe: The Bright Empire and The Scribes of Nyota prose anthologies. He is a graduate of the 2017 DC Comics New Talent Writers Workshop. You can reach him at www.robertkjeffrey.com
