Don’t say silence prevents Race Wars if we don’t live in Racial Peace.

Onyx Contributor:  Johnny Silvercloud (@JohnnySilverclo)

The city of Charleston just suffered domestic terrorism.  Nine civilians were gunned down by a young white extremist.  Of course, Fox News and right-wing affiliates attempted to play duck and cover for the young white supremacist murderer.  Their deflection and denial in action, even when the murderer specifically told a victim precisely WHY he was killing black people in a church, borderlines clinical insanity.  The President gave a word on… not racism as a problem (ideology), but gun control (weapon rights).  Eric Holder once stated that America is a nation of cowards in regards to the racism discussion.  I’ll leave the irony right there.

Of course, many people took up to their Facebook pages to voice their thoughts, voice their hearts.  One of my friends had a very pensive status post.  I wondered aloud on his status thread, “Why don’t you make this an article?”  Someone, presumably one of his friends, then answered, “Well that’s because the media wants a race war.”

Really?  Well that’s an interesting take.

I often find this type of talk interesting, and it usually comes in three flavors:

  1. The passive-aggressive threats from the gonna-take-my-country-back conservative whites;
  2. The scooby snack blacks who are employed to do the racial pandering for conservative whites, and;
  3. The fearful caution from black people and others who are empathetic to the survivors of this sociological trauma.

It’s fascinating, and not a surprise that in all the race war talks I’ve seen, it’s always the whites ready to kill nonwhites and the nonwhites never ready or even wanting to kill anyone in a mass which would constitute a war.  This sociological power dynamic leaves me to only conclude that race wars are something that infinitely white people do to Others, and is something that happens to those Others.  As much as Fox News attempts to fabricate, there’s no grand scale contingency of black people with tons of guns and training manuals, sitting in the backwoods plotting and planning for race wars.  There is however, vast amounts of right-wing extremists sitting in the backwoods, with tons of guns and training manuals who are in love and lust with the idea of eradicating black people and Jews.  The “race war” posture of black people, if not totally helpless, has always been a posture of self-defense, but if you look at gun laws in the United States, even black people are systematically unarmed via government policy.

The problem I identify with that one fellow’s assertion about race war, is that to think something may promote it, there has to be a presumption of peace.  Peace, is the specific and direct opposite of the term War.  So to suggest that talking about this, mentioning this, will provoke a race war, one must obviously presume this is an era of peace we are living in.  And I’ll say that person is obviously delusional.

 War huh?  Well does Peace exist first?

This is a very valid question.  Before we even pretend that race war is imminent, one must define what is race peace, respectively.  So what is racial peace?  Racial harmony?  Has that even ever existed in the States? 

“If you are silent about your pain, they’ll kill you and say you enjoyed it.” Zora Neal Hurston

Well if we begin to analyze the concept of peace — racial peace — specifically, you’ll realize that there’s many flawed concepts of what “peace” really means.  The white community for hundreds of years considered “silence” peace.  This means the fact that black people had no voice allowed whites to lie about what they were doing to those black people, which in the end help self-perpetuate it.  White people also seem to consider never mentioning race or racism, peace.  If you look at the top photo, you’d might be taken off-guard if I asked you do those white males in the photo look like they are at peace.  Based on the expressions on their faces, yes they are.  Their families are most likely also at peace.  Much like how the Islamic terrorist attempts to find peace in killing infidels, white people seem to find peace in killing us.  This would explain the sheer comfort the white community has with looking at authority figures kill unarmed men, women and children without any moral filter.  I honestly don’t think our modern day whites are that far removed from the whites in this photo.  Why gather in a mob when you can allow the police to do the job for you? 

Next question would be, do the black people in the photo look like they are at peace?  Do you think their families are at peace?  I don’t think so.

Overall, this narrative descriptive to how the United States operates would suggest that “racial peace” has largely been defined by white comfort…. not black comfort or if any nonwhite communities are comfortable with race relations.

So honestly NO there isn’t peace; there never was.  Black people have NEVER seen a state of peace in America, throughout this nation’s entire existence.  Even after American Slavery, policy after policy was made to strip black communities, and control where they live, place them in prisons.  Black people suffer 20% harsher penalties for the same crimes as whites, while less likely to get the job as whites if it looks like they have a “black sounding” name on an application — all while having the same qualifications.

Peace is harmony; meaning everyone gets along, without any erasure of being.  This means that everyone is treated with dignity and respect on their own terms, not based on how someone identifies.  This means respecting differences instead of pretending everyone is alike, because we are not.  Tolerance, does not equal “not racist”.

So in the end, I will continue to discuss these issues we are having modern day.  I will also continue to urge others to talk about these issues.  I’m not going to be silent, forgive me if I broke your concentration (on denial).  I will be angry, sometimes, for I no longer find “not being angry” plausible.  I am an Abolitionist meaning that I will not let anyone get a break until the system, breaks.  So please don’t tell me that mentioning, referencing or critiquing current events will provoke a race war.  Much like the class warfare, you must be an idiot to think it hasn’t already begun.



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