Miner Queries | Cherie Miner
Events the last few weeks have had me shaking my head and pondering the different ways we perceive events, particularly in matters of race.
As I was ruminating, an Ancestry.com ad came to mind – one in which they promote their DNA testing service to learn your ethnic heritage. It’s the one in which actress Lezlie Mitchell notes people would ask her multiple times a week, “What are you?”
“How rude!” I think each time I see the ad. It brings to mind my Japanese American friends from Texas who heard that question frequently when growing up.
They were kids. Lezlie Mitchell is a person. What are the people asking that question?
What are you? I think too many of us fear the answer. Racist, privileged or biased? Probably yes and yes and yes. We all are.
This comes up now because I’m trying to understand the implicit fear and/or offense I read in some of my white friends’ response to Black Lives Matter. I struggle with the lack of empathy; the inability to imagine life in another’s situation. As my mother always put it, “Put yourself in their shoes.”
It was about this time that one of my friends shared a Facebook post: “What it’s like to be black in Naperville, America,” with the comment, “This isn’t just about being Black in Naperville. It’s about being Black in almost any place in America outside of urban areas.”
The post was written by Brian Crooks and parts of it were later published by the Chicago Tribune. And it’s gone viral.
In his post, Crooks shares a long list of experiences, living as a minority in white America. They include nearly weekly traffic stops during high school and being stopped one block from his parents’ home when returning from college.
The officer on that occasion detained him for 30 minutes even though they could see his house from where he was pulled over. The officer refused to believe Crooks’ driver’s license, showing that address, was real. Unable to find any reason to detain Crooks, the officer watched as he drove home, into the garage and closed the garage doors.
After 31 years navigating life in Midwestern America, Crooks writes, “When we say “Black Lives Matter,” understand what that actually means. We aren’t saying that only Black lives matter. We’re saying ‘Black lives matter too.’ ... If a Black person kills another Black person, and we have it on tape, the killer goes to jail. If a White police officer kills a Black person and we have it on tape, the entire judicial system steps up to make sure that officer doesn’t go to jail.
That is why Black people are in such pain right now. The deaths are bad enough. But having the feeling that nobody will ever actually be held accountable for the deaths is so much worse.”
I encourage you listen to or read others’ real experiences with discrimination. I encourage you to imagine walking in their shoes. Instead of being offended by Black Lives Matter protests or reacting with fear, consider how protestors’ life experiences may be different, especially if you’re white. Then imagine you are they.
Otherwise, you’ll never understand.
Cherie Miner is a local parent, community volunteer, freelance writer and artist. In a former life, she was a corporate writer and public relations professional. Contact her at news@redoakexpress.com or on Facebook.