As the nation is digesting a Missouri grand jury’s decision not to indict Ferguson police officer Darren Wilson, a man who admitted to shooting and killing a Black teen, Michael Brown, Aug. 9, many took to the streets and to social media to express their dismay at the decision.
“It’s hard being Black. It is a heavy experience. From the time we are born and start watching cartoons we are bombarded with subliminal images telling us we aren’t good or good enough,” said Ashley Brooks, a senior at Florida Memorial University, via Twitter, lamenting the self-loathing engrained in some people of color from an early age. “It’s taught to us. You know how stressful it is to hate yourself and not know you’re hating yourself?
“And then you get older and started school and learn about slavery and Jim Crow and realize everybody else hates you, too? And then you get a little bit older and racism becomes a little more covert and you finally feel better about life and then Trayvon [Martin] happens? And then you finally get over it and are able to sleep at night and feel like tomorrow will be better and Mike Brown happens?”
Brooks went on, “Meanwhile, in African-American History, the only class that caters to you, you’re learning about lynchings from the ’30s that sound extremely similar to the Trayvons and Mike Browns even though there’s decades between the incident? … And the schools suck and they only talk about Black people for 28 days out the entire year and it’s the same 6 or 7 every time.”
Brooks’ sentiments are not unlike those of many around the country ― and around higher education, which is a microcosm of the society in which we live.
Dr. Bryant Marks, an associate professor of psychology at Morehouse College and director of the Morehouse Male Initiative, said that he was “disappointed, but not surprised” by the decision, announced late Monday night.
