My country is beautiful and free -

For those who are sheltered by white picket fences and white skin

 

My country believes in inalienable rights -

For a very select few who can prove themselves deserving

 

We pride ourselves in our immigrant heritage,

Telling stories of brave ancestors at Ellis Island,

But when given the opportunity -

We spit on and degrade those who do the very same today

 

Once a year, we honor the man who forged the Civil Rights Movement,

but his children and grandchildren are MOURNING

 

and we do nothing to help.

 

“He shouldn’t have talked back”

“He should’ve kept his hands where the officer could see them”

“He shouldn’t have worn a hoodie”

 

LOWLIFE

CRIMINAL

SCUM

 

Not the man who is bleeding on the cold pavement. 

Not the CHILD who has been shot to death.

ME - the one who allowed this to happen.

 

shoving the blame on someone else

The System.

 

We the privileged love that word

The system is so messed up

Nothing I can do about it.

 

This system functions on my privilege

It survives and feeds on my white feminism

Its cold claws dig into my back with pop of the car door lock

as we drive into the poorer part of town

 

we never think we are to blame

we are not racist

we have that black friend

we can’t be

we aren’t

Impossible 

 

Intersectionality without actuality is a word

hinging on no meaning

 

I live in a country that touts pride in diversity

without recognizing how many token minorities came here

In Chains

and live in chains today

 

I am the privileged race

I have powers I am unaware of

The power to end a life and suffer no consequences

The power to be assumed innocent

The power to keep my natural hairstyle

 

There are powers I will never use,

but that does not change the fact that they are there

I live in a country that grants me these powers

a privilege I earned through the color of my skin

 

I am trying to listen, 

but my country drowns the voices of the oppressed

 

I am WEEPING,

but no longer shall I shed a tear of white guilt

a waste of my time, and of yours

My tears are full of RAGE

 

I am angry with my government,

that will not listen or defend half of its people

I am angry with my neighbors,

who proudly display Confederate flags on their car

I am angry.

I AM FURIOUS!

 

and I am still safe.

For my skin color tells me so.

 

I am the privileged race

and I have never known oppression

I have never known what it feels to lose

a son, a father, a brother to senseless brutality.

And I probably never will.

 

I do not want to speak over you

my problems are MEANINGLESS

Please, use my privilege to speak THROUGH ME.

I will be your stepping stone.

Not because you are weak, 

but because you were born into a lower status in life

due to the color of your skin

 

This is not the time of the white savior.

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This is the time of the ally.