Delma Jackson III

You have been told that, even like a chain, you are as weak as your weakest link. This is but half the truth. You are also as strong as your strongest link. To measure you by your smallest deed is to reckon the power of the ocean by the frailty of its foam. To judge you by your failures is to cast blame upon the seasons for their inconstancy.

—Khalil Gibran

When considering Black/Indigenous solidarity, I consider ways our collective histories can serve as a magnet, for better and for worse. They can pull us together or repel us, depending on which side is facing outward at any given moment–our healing selves or our re-traumatized selves….

On any given day, I can oscillate between these less-than-distinct versions of myself. My personal traumas and triumphs dance continuously with one another–a spiral rivaling the very Milky Way in scope and scale. When I consider this, I’m reminded of RW Emerson when he writes: “Men imagine that they communicate their virtue or vice only by overt actions and do not see that virtue or vice emit a breath every moment.”

When our personal dance of trauma and triumph is compounded by community, we must be forgiven and forgiving when we trip over our own feet in the quest for an intentional community.

This is often easier said than done–for when our trauma is front and center, our capacity for forgiveness is greatly diminished, if not outright forfeit. Per Maslow, when we don’t feel safe, the self-actualization necessary to forgive can feel practically unobtainable.

To complicate matters further, “safety” is a subjective, ever-moving goalpost. As any facilitator can attest to, one person’s sense of safety can vacate another’s. Our sense of safety is rooted in both individual and collective experiences. Given that we all show up with differing hearts, there is no one-pacemaker-fits-all approach.

All of this came to a head for me in the context of Afro-Indigenous solidarity as I was driving the other day. I was listening to an episode of 1A on NPR wherein journalist/host Jenn White welcomed award-winning authors Stephen Graham Jones and Darcie Little Badger to discuss sci-fi through the voices of Indigenous authors.

At one point in the interview, Ms. White, invited Ms. Little Badger to reflect on how she’d define the “genre” of her writing–noting that while they’d been using the term “speculative fiction” throughout the interview, the question remained of how best to define her work. Ms. Little Badger briefly reflected on her upcoming work before noting that she’s found the term “Indigenous futurism” helpful.

I felt my heart sink.

I found myself waiting on Ms. White to ask if there was a connection between that term and Afrofuturism.^[1] In short, I wanted to feel seen. I didn’t want to relive erasure in such an audio-intimate space of exclusively Black/Indigenous folks. I wanted the contribution of African Americans to be named.

However, I was simultaneously gripped by a larger question: are a people rendered practically invisible by the West even capable of then erasing another?

Real erasure requires access to power–particularly the power to shape stories. This requires holding the levers of mass media–something Indigenous brothers and sisters do not have in this country by ANY stretch of the imagination.

I noticed my sensitivity and I immediately felt guilty. Do I get to feel like yet another cultural product is being hijacked–this time by an Indigenous author–while few so-called minorities have been rendered more visible throughout American history than Black folks (for better and, far more frequently, for worse)? And, conversely, few so-called minorities have been made more invisible than Indigenous folks.

So why was I so upset? The answer–I fear–is rooted in what I understand about white supremacy and cultural hegemony. Ironically or not, the term that comes to mind is “Columbusing.” According to NPR’s “Code Switch,”, “Columbusing is when you “discover” something that’s existed forever. Just that it’s existed outside your own culture, nationality, race or even, say, your neighborhood.” The term is both a recognition and a condemnation of the way mainstream education has for so long credited Columbus for supposedly “discovering” America. While this term can apply to anyone from any culture, it most often focuses on the financial/cultural impacts arising from the fallout when white folks engage in it.

Why?

A very astute question!

When white folks “discover” something and get excited about it, their collective access to resources can turn a relatively obscure cultural product into a multi-billion dollar, global industry–too often, without the cultural context which produced said product. Everything from Yoga, and various musical genres (i.e. jazz and rock), to avocados and gentrification are arguably examples of Columbusing.

I was upset about the lack of real-time recognition from Ms. Little Badger because I was scared that some white listener with resources would be inspired and start an avalanche of cultural productivity and industry without any of those resources going to the very people who inspired them. Paranoid? Sure. Within reason? All. Day.

However, Columbusing is not the fault of Ms. Little Badger. In fact, given the origin of the term, one could argue that she tangentially represents people who were its first victims. Therein lies my guilt. I am not ignorant of this complexity, yet my understanding doesn’t always save me from my visceral reactions.

The larger question for me is…what to do with that.

If Black/Indigenous solidarity is to be realized, how do we prepare for the inevitable oppression olympics that is bound to arise in various spaces as we come together? How do Black folks hold the pain of being both torn from the land of our origins and feeling such a challenged sense of “home” with Indigenous folks’ experience of being “home”, often without a sense of autonomy and visibility therein?

How do we set aside the very real fears of prying white whims and resources long enough to stop fighting for the proverbial scraps under the table that we’ve gotten so accustomed to and adept at preparing and consuming?

One does not get to be resilient without navigating trauma. How do we leverage our collective resilience–a resilience built upon centuries of brutality–without succumbing to the traumatic knee-jerk reactions that made that resilience possible?

How do we bring our shared fears, traumas, addictions, internalized hatreds, stereotypes, and tropes to the table and co-create an altar upon which we might place them and ceremoniously say goodbye?

I don’t know the answers.

What I do know, is that if we don’t figure this out, our destinies are bound to continue running in parallel without ever intersecting. And that would be a tragedy, for us and for the rest of the world. As long as the US media still holds a powerful role in shaping the stories we globally share, there is still time to broadcast a very different story to the world.

There is still time to envision a world wherein whiteness does not have to be centralized. There is still time to show the world that healing is possible, solidarity matters. When people come together with intentionality, we can move beyond this westernized, narrow vision of living free. There is still time to export something more than fast food, carbon emissions, and faux-freedom.

The populations of so-called “western” countries will continue to shift toward a reflection of the world at-large. In 30 years, the US will no longer be a white-majority country. White supremacy has effectively mobilized to hold onto power as long as possible in part because it’s much easier to fight “for” something than against it.

While we continue to encourage white folks to take up the fight against white supremacy, the rest of us had better put some serious thought into what we want instead. Afro-Indigenous solidarity movements make sense because they center the two largest non-white populations at the founding of the US and place them squarely in the driver’s seat for this post-white majority landscape we are heading toward.

There is poetic justice in that.

It is the full circle.

To wax biblical: “The first shall be last, and the last shall be first.”

Working together to secure reparations for both populations would be a start in the right direction. Such solidarity would go a long way in embodying the sort of world we want to live in–a good faith gesture broadcasting to the world that the scarcity mentality plaguing western civilization for so long will no longer serve us.

However, if we are to send out such a message, we must first come together to heal–as individuals and communities. There is so much work to be done, but I have no doubt the world will be better for it.

---

^[1] Dr. Grace Dillon is credited for coining the term Indigenous Futurism and credits Afrofuturism for her inspiration. Furthermore, the term “Afrofuturism” was actually coined in 1993 by Mark Dery, an author of Anglo-Irish-Scottish descent. 

Delma Jackson is a Senior Fellow with CWC. His focus is on facilitating system change on campuses and in institutions through transformative practice and the power of story. He received his undergraduate degree in African-American Studies and Psychology, and his Masters in Liberal Arts with a concentration in American and African American Studies at the University of Michigan. He regularly lectures on a variety of socio-political topics with a special emphasis on intersectional approaches to social justice.

*In 1758, the Lenape Nation (of what is now the eastern coast of both southern Canada and the northern US) was one of the first nations placed on reservation in the US. Today, private property on reservations is rare. Since 1619, Africans from multiple nations were forced to cultivate private land they did not own. Today, the legacy of redlining sees many African Americans without property. In a capitalist country, land ownership is often key to building wealth. 

For the last 20 years, I’ve been exploring the concept of justice in various forms through the lens of the old proverb (29:18): “Where there is no vision, the people perish.” It’s partly why I was so taken with the work of Marcus Garvey’s United Negro Improvement Association when I was in undergrad. 

“Africa for Africans” was such a bold vision that when combined with the racial climate of the day, may explain why–a century later–it remains  “the largest mass movement in African-American history.” That was the other reason I was taken with the movement. Regardless of what you think of Garvey’s vision, the fact that it remains the largest single movement in African American history I’d never heard of remains astonishing. 

Likewise, the first time I saw Wakanda on the big screen, I was reminded again of the power of story to capture the hearts and minds of people. The history of Africa’s fictional “hidden gem,” with no interference from colonial powers, and the resulting combination of tradition and tech embodies everything I love about the power of story. Chadwick Boseman’s role in bringing the story to life will enshrine him as a King forevermore. May he rest in power. 

Be it Marcus Garvey’s vision to take African Americans back “home,” MLK’s dream of racial accountability and solidarity, or Ryan Coogler’s artistic interpretation of Wakanda, story moves us beyond pragmatism and affords us a glimpse of a life limited only by our imagination. 

Justice doesn’t have to be strictly pragmatic, but it will take funding to explore the possibilities. It took funding to bring those aforementioned visions to the collective imaginations of the people. If it takes funding to share a vision, you KNOW it’ll take funding to bring it to fruition. I’ve made it no secret that I want to see reparations as a means to both. 

The bigger the tent—the more space we create for everyone’s liberation—the closer we come to the mark. As I consider white supremacist-patriarchy’s impact on the African diaspora, I am coming to understand that there’s something in the story of Indigenous Nations that may hold the key to Black liberation and viceversa. 

There are so many historical narratives between Indigenous Nations and the African Diaspora that mirror each other, I can’t help but ask if “the case for reparations” couldn’t/shouldn’t be broadened to include willing Indigenous peoples. 

I say this because…

I want to live somewhere rooted in the highest ideals of pre-colonialism and sustained by the best that all-inclusive civil engineering, green infrastructure, and general innovation has to offer.  

I want to live in a place where matriarchy is a legitimate form of government–not patriarchal-ly mocked as “the power of the pussy” with a nod and a wink.  

I want a fuller life that distinguishes insulation from isolation.  I want shrines to practice collective silence joining the spaces of praise and worship.

I want restorative justice to be a foregone conclusion and universal health care taken for granted. I want policies born of our morality instead of moral posturing per policies mandates.

I want to see my ancestors in the way my grandchildren move through the world. 

I want help to see and be seen.

Because I’m tired…and I’m FAR from alone. There are whole communities suffering from generational exhaustion. 

I’m tired of subsidizing the white-body-supremacist fantasies personified in the mediocrity, callousness, and cruelty of this so-called leader.

My hands grow ashy from drying the tears of my daughter’s understanding of the Blackness she embodies. 

From the projects and tenements to the reservations and trailer parks…I know a ghetto when I see one.  From Warsaw 1940 to pick-a-spot, USA 20-now, “it is,” as the president says, “what it is.”

And as so many have asked before, how long must we wage a hearts and minds campaign? How long must we continue to disproportionately suffer while those in power play their inglorious game of thrones? 

In the meantime…

How many children have been lost between us…?  How many parcels created, carved, and sold away between us? How many languages, histories, stories died on the lips of our ancestors. 

How many of us have known the pain of sending our children to school knowing they’ll receive an education that does nothing to fill in the blanks? How many of us know the pain of wishing we were someone else’s children only to hear our own say the same–the multi-generational curse of self-hatred to either be overcome or internalized?

How many of us know the pain of seeing our representation being narrowed to tropes for the consumption of fragile white egos whose one-dimensional ethnicity relies on a superior/inferior paradigm. 

How many of us have languished in the indignity of poverty in the midst of great wealth–even as we watch our cultural productions commodified and mass produced. 

How many of us have known the indignity of whimsical autonomy–forced to live where we’re told, only to see what we build again burned to ashes…again. 

How many of us know the pain of journeys long in the making that we never wanted to take–from the trans-Atlantic slave trade to the Trail of Tears? 

We’ve known terror. We’ve known trauma. We’ve known erasure. 

Maybe there’s something to be gained by swapping stories. Maybe our children would benefit from learning who they are–together. 

Maybe there’s something to be gained from healing through celebration and commiseration. 

Who knows…

Maybe we can build something new together. Maybe we take the pain of systemic violence and turn it into a commitment to living in greater harmony with each other. No community thrives without a story to rally around. And we have one helluva story to share. 

And maybe, just maybe, there’s a place where conversations about reparations and reservations begin to blend. Where the questions about autonomy in the past provide answers about autonomy in the future. 

With enough resources amassed, two of the most isolated and impoverished communities in the US can become one of the cleanest, greenest, most educated, peoples in the world.  

Since there’s a shared history, maybe it’s worth exploring a shared future? This upcoming season of my new podcast Dive In-Justice, I’ll be exploring that very question–examining what’s been done, and asking what more we could do. 

The Dive In-Justice (DIJ) podcast is created by and for those who’d see justice in the world but don’t always know what it is or how to get it. DIJ explores what we mean by “justice,” and “community,” and why it’s often SO hard to work with the very people we want to liberate…including and especially ourselves. 

Join us for Sseason 1, where we’ll look at justice through the lens of Black/Indigenous solidarity movements past, present, and possibly future.  What’s worked? What hasn’t? What were the goals? How close did they get? And, perhaps most importantly, when things fell apart, “why?” 

---

Delma Jackson is a Senior Fellow with CWC. His focus is on facilitating system change on campuses and in institutions through transformative practice and the power of story. He received his undergraduate degree in African-American Studies and Psychology, and his Masters in Liberal Arts with a concentration in American and African American Studies at the University of Michigan. He regularly lectures on a variety of socio-political topics with a special emphasis on intersectional approaches to social justice.

It’s freedom for everybody or freedom for nobody.

—Malcolm X, Human Rights Advocate

The following is written in response to a FB post from a friend of mine. She posted an image with the words: “Why Queer Rights and Black Rights are Inseparable.“  Below the image she wrote: “Is this true?”  

There were roughly 120 comments, many of them expressing disagreement with this sentiment. While not surprising, it was still hard to read. This very topic had been on my mind.  It’s been central to the work of CWC as we continue to widen and deepen our scope of what a “just” society actually means.  This post, and the ensuing conversation it started–gave me the kick in the pants I needed to finally write.  

I’ve often heard it suggested that any simultaneous discussion of patriarchy and/or LGBTQ+ rights with the rights of Black folks is counter-productive. I empathize with the sentiment, for it comes largely out of the fact that when America talks about “the LGBTQ+ community”, they are, in fact, talking specifically about white, cis-gendered, gay men. However, you don’t hold the whole LGBTQ+ community responsible for that. 

That’s white supremacy in action. It shows up in every community, every movement. The fight for LGBTQ+ rights is no exception. 

Every time we respond to another life lost at the hands of the state, we have another opportunity to be better than these oppressive forces. Too often, we squander it. With each movement, I hope we’ll seize the chance to show the world a different way.

We have historically silenced Black women and Black LGBTQ+ folks since the days of the UNIA. The SCLC and the CRM made that mistake. The BPP made that mistake (although Huey Newton came around). Academia continues to make that mistake.

Homosexuality is a sickness, just as baby-rape or wanting to become head of General Motors.

Eldridge Cleaver, Minister of Information for the Black Panther Party

Today, Black men too often sacrifice Black women and/or Black LGBTQ+ folks at the altar of patriarchy—attempting to reassure systems of power that we don’t want an end to white supremacist patriarchy.  We just want “next.” 

We will protest to the point of endangering ourselves in order to make the world understand that Black lives matter. But when we lost Breonna Taylor to the same sort of senseless violence that killed George Floyd, too many of us shook our collective heads and kept it moving. When we lost Riah Milton and Dominique Fells–two Black transgender women, I didn’t see so much as a #hashtag outside of the LGBTQ+ community. 

When we collectively think of women as half our population, and not half a heterosexual man’s popularity, we will have gotten closer to the mark. 

We are demanding that white America take us as we are, while refusing to accept ourselves as we are. I fear we are doomed to repeat the shortcomings of every social movement that has come before. 

We have the chance to demonstrate that when you say “BLM” you mean it—without exception. You don’t ask some members of our community to “wait their turn.” You don’t say to them, “let me get mine first.” 

You intuitively understand that if we get that Black, queer, disabled, muslim woman in the heart of Mississippi secure, then the rest of us gucci af. In other words, we can see ourselves “whole.” 

You amplify those very voices. You move them to the front of the line. You demonstrate to the world the very cultural conditions you want to see for yourself. You show white America what solidarity looks like, instead of fighting for freedom using their “me-first” playbook.

Don’t worry. Black LGBTQ folk won’t “replace” you. This ain’t an alt-right march in Charlottesville. Is it?  

Do we just go ahead and order our tiki torches and khakis rn? 

Freedom is, by definition, collective. When Malcolm X said it’s freedom for everybody or freedom for nobody, he wasn’t making a threat. It was an observation.  

If BLM, let’s accept the nuances that come with Black identity. All of them. 

I identify as a heterosexual, able-bodied, Black man (a label that I recognize as outdated, and yet still subscribe to). And in order to ask the world to truly see me, I HAVE to truly see that aforementioned sista in Mississippi. And every sista. And every brotha. And see them whole. The way I want to be seen. Hear them whole. The way I’d be heard. Otherwise, I risk a highly visible hypocrisy that could undermine my movement before it even begins. 

Understanding any and all plights in our community gives me greater context for the struggle ahead. Elevating every voice strengthens my own. Centering every story makes mine all the more powerful. Then, perhaps, the world will be moved.  

It will one day ask us why we did that.  And when we respond that we looked within and saw only ourselves, the world might finally begin to understand what equity means. 

Peace to the LGBTQ folks who organized BLM rallies across the country. Peace to those who used their PRIDE parades to center BLM. Peace to those disproportionately forgotten despite your best efforts. I see you. 

Peace to my ancestors, elders, and contemporaries: Bayard Rustin, Langston Hughes, James Baldwin, Angela Davis, Alice Walker, Audre Lorde, Moms Mabley, Marsha P Johnson, Alvin Ailey, Lori Lightfoot, and to BLM founders Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, & Opal Tometi….

And to all the other Black LGBTQ+ folks who reminded us of our whole beauty even as we denied parts of your own. 

Peace to those who think l’m full of shit. I see you too.

---

Delma is a Senior Fellow with CWC. His focus is on facilitating system change on campuses and in institutions through transformative practice and the power of story. He received his undergraduate degree in African-American Studies and Psychology, and his Masters in Liberal Arts with a concentration in American and African American Studies at the University of Michigan. He regularly lectures on a variety of socio-political topics with a special emphasis on intersectional approaches to social justice.

But to be honest, I’m not even talking to you right now. 

This is for all my dangerous white liberals. 

I’m watching Atatiana Jefferson get gunned down in her own home by a police officer who was supposed to be doing a “welfare check” after a neighbor called a non-emergency line because Ms. Jefferson’s door was ajar.

The officer crept into her backyard, peeped through a window, failed to announce himself as an officer while yelling to see her hands, then fired a single shot…killing her in front of her 8-year-old nephew. 

I’m watching institutions of health continue to fail Indigenous, Black and Brown bodies as Covid-19 continues to ravage our communities at disproportionate rates. I’m watching this same institution fail us with disproportionate outcomes in multiple measures including: maternal and infant mortality, chronic illness, pain management, and access to care. 

I’m watching as Breonna Taylor, an EMT, and nurse-in-training is shot no less than eight times in her own apartment by Louisville police officers executing a search warrant for a man who didn’t live in her complex and had already been detained. 

I’m watching the story unfold of two DA’s in South Georgia who chose not to pursue arrests in the murder of Ahmaud Arbery. I’m watching claims of “self-defense” employed yet again to prolong and/or outright protect armed white civilians from charges as they brazenly confront and execute unarmed Black men. 

I’m watching the institution of law enforcement crush the life out of George Floyd in the latest in a long string of Minneapolis police murders of Black men.   

I’m watching Amy Cooper attempt to leverage these long-standing dynamics of disproportionality to coerce Christian Cooper into “his place” for daring to hold her accountable to the rules. I’m watching her use a panic-stricken affect to hasten the response of law-enforcement. 

I’m watching white folks on social media respond to this story with shock and outrage…for Amy’s dog. 

You’d continue to ignore us in the hospital and doom us to premature death? You’d defend those who’d kill us in and under our cars, in our own bedrooms and living rooms, while exercising on our streets? You’d terrorize us by weaponizing law enforcement because you feel inconvenienced? 

Some of you show up armed and wave the flag of a failed, treasonous, slave-based agri-society, in the name of patriotism. You scream, “all lives matter” while refusing to wear a mask during a pandemic. You scream “my body, my choice” while you actively fight against a woman’s right to choose. 

But to be honest, I’m not even talking to you right now. 

This is for all my dangerous white liberals. 

You surround yourself with Black, Indigenous, &/or people of color (BIPOC) and refuse to engage with other white folks because you count yourself “progressive” and you just can’t stomach how “backwards” they are. You’re the type who was surprised when Trump won. You treasure civility over progress and can’t stomach so much as a raised voice in the room when it’s coming from one of “us.”

…we’re done watching and waiting while this invention called whiteness uses and abuses us, burying black people out of sight and out of mind while extracting our culture, our dollars, our entertainment like oil – black gold, ghettoizing and demeaning our creations then stealing them, gentrifying our genius and then trying us on like costumes before discarding our bodies like rinds of strange fruit.

Jessie Willisams, 2016

You hide behind our work while refusing to do the work in your own communities because it scares you. You move into the communities that red-lining created and gentrify them with your race-based-subsidized dollars–rendering our communities unaffordable while you usher in high-end grocery stores and roof-top beer gardens. 

You move here to feel “cultured.” You travel widely, consume, and catalog cultural practices and throw the word “authentic” in front of err-thang. You hang up artifacts and brag about your Hibachi recipes, Hip-Hop paraphernalia, and Himalayan folk music collection. 

You buy up long-abandoned buildings and turn them into overpriced coffee shops to feed your financial/entrepreneurial aspirations. When the neighborhood regulars come around asking for loose change, you put them out because it makes your clientele uncomfortable. You immediately hang up, “NO LOITERING” signs. You destroy our communities and call it good. 

You don’t call your conservative relatives and friends anymore. You hate the arguments. Instead, you find Black folks to call your “bestie,” “brother,” or “aunt” and pat yourself on the back for not being like “those white people” anymore. You need us like progressive thermometers. 

You collect us to replace them.  

You regularly attend (as have I), “diversity” training. You always make it to the annual MLK Day event in your area. You nod your head emphatically when you hear the horror stories of BIPOC but you rarely name how the racism you’re currently carrying contributes to the conditions that made their story possible. Because nothing, NOTHING, scares you more than being called racist. 

You’re not worried about losing your life every time you step out of your home. You’re worried that your wig might slip and your white suprema-psoriasis might show. You’re worried your relationship-litmus tests might leave you. No one will be there anymore to assure you that you’re still one of the good white people.    

Your Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (DEI) initiatives are NOT helping anyone but you. None of your progressive posturing makes my community any safer. We’re still dying at the hands of the very institutions ostensibly created to serve us. 

I don’t want your diversity diversions. I don’t pine for equity on par with your mediocrity. And I damn-sure don’t want inclusion at your wobbly-ass, three-legged table with under-seasoned food, half-baked analysis, and kiddie-pool-shallow conversations.  After the centuries of systemic oppression, mass murder, and continued kleptocracy — that you often acknowledge you benefit from — you still refuse to acknowledge the most basic implications of this economic reality. 

It is your collective wealth that creates and perpetuates these conditions. 

You really want to help? Tell you what…

Call your representative and tell them you support H.R. 40. Research the numbers around stolen property (land, intellectual, et.al), and labor since the forced removal of Indigenous people, the institution of slavery, the various medical experiments and resulting treatments for profit. Account for inflation. Study the role of redlining in the creation of white wealth in this country. In other words, add a commitment to securing resources for BIPOC as a priority in your justice work. 

Help find and invest in the best BIPOC talent in green agriculture, engineering, infrastructure and manufacturing, education, health care, restorative justice, arts, and sciences. Make the appropriate investment on the appropriate land. Be prepared to physically and politically protect the investment from those who would visit interference, if not violence upon us, and watch us become the envy of the world in just a few generations. 

I don’t need to sit, stand, pee, eat, drink, or live next to you. I need to be safe. In a capitalist system, safety means capital investment. Meanwhile, you have your own work to continue. Connect with those you’ve refused to. Make the case for reparations on our collective behalf. Organize, write, protest if you like. But firstly, raise the finances to secure and protect us. Commit to THAT and then talk to me about justice. 

---

Delma Jackson is a Senior Fellow with CWC. His focus is on facilitating system change on campuses and in institutions through transformative practice and the power of story. He received his undergraduate degree in African-American Studies and Psychology, and his Masters in Liberal Arts with a concentration in American and African American Studies at the University of Michigan. He regularly lectures on a variety of socio-political topics with a special emphasis on intersectional approaches to social justice.

A dream you dream alone is only a dream. A dream you dream together is reality.

Yoko Ono (via John Lennon), 1980 

It will be very hard for people to watch or consume something that has not, in some sense, been tailored for them

Eric Schmidt, 2010

I’m sure that everyone out listenin’ agree, that everything you see ain’t really how it be.

Yasiin Bey (Mos Def), 1998

It is what you read when you don’t have to that determines what you will be when you can’t help it.

Charles Francis Potter, 1927

When I was in my early 20s and fresh outta undergrad, I just knew I knew everything. Then, someone hipped me to the notion that there were a handful of secret societies controlling everything we experienced. These secret societies worked in tandem with governments and international agencies all over the world to create a veneer of “reality” that served to pacify, manipulate, extort–if not outright kill–the masses. September 11th, 2001 was then the most recent example, and there was no shortage of slick-graphic-production videos with a host of facts, figures, and experts who pointed out all of the holes in the 9/11 Commission’s version of events. 

For the next five years, I ingested every conspiracy I could find. In many ways, my mainstream education had made it inevitable. 

I’d spent my K-12 years learning that Columbus discovered America, Thanksgiving was just that, Lincoln freed the slaves, and MLK and Rosa Parks were the only notable negros in existence. I’d learned that America was a meritocracy and if you weren’t wealthy, it was your own damn fault. In sum, I learned that education itself was irrelevant to my lived experience–thus, pointless.

You can imagine the validation of my identity experienced taking my first African American Studies course. Imagine the cranial expansion I underwent reading US history through the lens of Howard Zinn. For the first time, I began to understand that vantage point is everything. 

I spent so much of my early education feeling lied to about…everything that I was ripe for all the surprises. I spoke of The Matrix like it was a documentary–directed by Werner Herzog. 

Good times….

Twenty years later, I’m still as interested in a good conspiracy theory as any red-blooded American, but I’ve fallen back on some basic principles of research: checking the sources and resources for possible agendas, identifying my biases up front, and actively seeking opposing views. I’d argue that these are good principles both of research and media literacy in general. 

But these days especially, I have to take my heart into consideration along with my mind. In 2020, there’s TOO much information about this virus, its origins, trajectory, mortality rate, fluctuation, political responses, etc. Not only that, but information now, more than ever, is tailored to what I already want to hear, based on any number of factors. When Spotify does it, that’s just good customer service, but when it’s Google, it’s only a hair’s breadth from “madeupmonkeyshit.gov.” 

Accordingly, the single most important question in relation to engaging the media during this time is: How do I want to feel?