Article by:
Dr. Gerald D. Curry
Over the past few months our country has been jolted by a myriad of serious jaw-dropping issues and concerns that have unnerved our citizenry and shaken us to our core! The rapid advancement of the COVID-19 virus has wreaked havoc on society with over two million people contracting the virus and 120,000 people falling victim to its symptoms. The United States’ late response to the virus caused unprecedented unemployment, potentially possibly hundreds, if not thousands of lives being lost, and the highest levels of medical confusion ever witnessed in modern times. If the COVID-19 virus were not enough to create pause, it was the reprehensible death of Mr. George Floyd by Minneapolis Police Officers. The death of Mr. Floyd awakened centuries of pinned up pain, abuse, and mistreatment of black people from around the world. People across the nation have flooded into the streets marking their protest of mistreatment by white-racist police officers, and a society that has allowed institutional racism to cover the fabric of America.
For generations black people have shouted at the top of their lungs, “I can’t breathe, I can’t move, I can’t grow”, because of your foot is on my neck! For centuries black and brown people have tolerated a racist society, and put up with senseless killings, the raping of our women, and being ostracized by white America, that many of us started believing the abuse was okay. We have been indoctrinated to just tolerate the misery and pain, because we thought, they really do not mean it, and then we start justifying their actions with our complacency. We became somewhat brainwashed and learned over the years that we just need to keep them comfortable and everything will be okay. Well, the nonsense is over, and it’s about time we wake up!
I do not know about you, but I am tired of being viewed as less than! I want the world to see my true potential and allow me to live out my destiny. I no longer want to wait until white society is comfortable with what I look like, or what I want to say. I want to be able to wear my hair anyway I decide, and just be me. While being accepted is important, I really do not care if you do not like the color of my skin, or the shape of my nose. But don’t you dare hold me back from my deserved opportunity! I worked just as hard as everyone else, and probably even harder than most!
You see the things that may make you uncomfortable, maybe because you do not value me. You do not see me for my brilliance, and uniqueness. All you see is the color of my skin! Regardless of how many degrees I might have behind my name, the size of my bank account, or the businesses I own, you only see me as a black man. You have been conditioned to immediately devalue my very existence before you even know me! I am sick and tired of this treatment, and I demand more from you. I require you to start seeing me as me!
I know you’ve forgotten that it was my people who initially birthed civilization, built the pyramids, created math and science, initially taught people how to read and write, and conducted the first medical surgeries that were ever recorded. It has only been over the last five hundred years that you created this sociological concept you called racism, so that you could exploit me and all that I stand for. Well, I hope you enjoyed yourself, because racism has outlived its usefulness, and will not be allowed to exist anymore.
My days of walking in my discomfort is over! I am now taking a new stance on life and whether you decide to join me or not, my new day is here to stay! So, take your pinned-up frustrations, heritage of lynching, and white superiority and be gone! Your practices will not be allowed to exist. I am putting my foot down, and will no longer tolerate your unjust, unethical, unfair, prejudiced and discriminating self, and demand you change the way you see me. A new day has arrived, and one of my first actions is to vote your President out of office! The next election will be pivotal, and I will vote my interest in the local, state, and national elections. Either you can be on the right side of history, of you will be cast to the side. Today is my day! Let us go out and vote!