How We Win

 Hii everyone! My name is Barbara and this is my first post for the Inspiration section and I thank Evelyn for the opportunity. Here’s the thing: I have been having a very difficult time being inspired lately. It is summer, my birthday is coming up (July 10th, holla at your gurl, I take MAC and Target gift cards) and I am heading to graduate school in the fall (I also take tuition payments) and I should be ecstatic. However, in the past couple of weeks, every intersection of my social and personal identities as a young black Haitian Christian woman has been attacked.

My skin crawled as I read about Rachel Dolezal, the former President of the NAACP Spokane chapter. Dolezal lied about her racial background in order to pretend to be black. I reflected on all those times I felt unwanted and unnecessary in white spaces, where I would have lied about what I was if I could and step outside of myself like Rachel did. Only white privilege could afford her this “transracial” title while the rest of us can only afford to be...racial.

My head throbbed as I could not fathom the plans for an ethnic cleansing of Dominicans of Haitian descent. In the pictures journalists shared of these Dominicans, I saw in every woman my mother- sweet and funny and caring. She could have easily been one of the Haitian people who went to the DR for more opportunities only to be met by a hostility only rooted in hate of her rich, deep skin and heritage.

My heart fell when I learned that 9 human beings were targeted and murdered in their house of worship for choosing to pray at the wrong night service and for, simply, being. In my mind’s eye, I saw the four little girls from Birmingham before their futures exploded into the deep south. I saw crosses set ablaze with the insatiable bigotry of its arsonists outside of sanctuaries; I saw safe havens becoming a trap for black and brown prey.

So I am left to wonder, why can't we just win? Why can’t people of color just have the luxury of dealing with the regular ebbs and flows of life. I would love if we could just have to think about painful dentist appointments and heartbreaks just like everyone else. Our problems are not only sullied by racism but can only be appropriately contextualized by an evaluation of a history of systemic, systematic racism from the underbelly of the world economy, culture, and politics. What has been left sacred on this earth? And in thinking about all of this madness, I am tired- emotionally and spiritually exhausted. In short, I have not been feeling very inspired.

So I prayed and offered these thoughts up to God and was reminded of a few lessons I had already been taught about this life. Alice Walker once said, “Activism is the rent I pay for living on this planet.” It is clear to me that my existence on this planet cannot be left to be validated by the very ideologies that seek to kill me. 

I have to actively fight to win. 

To be silent is to forgo my payments. To not show up for my community is to threaten eviction. To side with the very oppression that plans to displace me is to be homeless. We must fight. Who are we? We are the spiritual beings having a human experience, who still know that light stamps out darkness. We who believe that love invariably overcomes hate, no matter how ugly it rears its head. And, by the very act of fighting, we win. If we live or if we die, we will still win because this is not the end goal.

     For those who hate, this life is the conduit for their hatred. This is all they have. All they can do in their poverty is scramble for artificial power by attempting to crush the marginalized. But we who exist on a higher plane cannot be killed even by death because eternal life is the destination. We are passing through a world that is both beautiful and destructive- a result contingent upon what humans decide to do with their free will. Let us rebuke what is evil and destructive. Let us indulge in what is beautiful, inspiring and relevant and remember that we are just passing through. We are sojourners journeying to leave this space better than how we found it. So as long as I am here and fighting this fight, I will carry this last lesson from Audre Lorde close to my heart- “caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.”To be prepared for this battle, I must protect myself with knowledge of all types of warfare, including self-care and self-love.

    If I take care of myself, I can have the strength to go on and smile while doing so. What does an enemy hate more than a smiling opponent? Thus, in spite of the hate that might meet me, I plan to travel this summer and travel far. In spite of the many reasons to continue to mourn for the state of this world, I will celebrate my birthday weekend with dancing with my best friends, followed by a classy, bottomless brunch. Finally, I will end the weekend in worship of the mighty God I serve for giving me this life to live now, not after racism, classism, sexism and colorism is exposed and expunged from society, but now. I will continue to enjoy life, not as an escape, but as a necessity to living beautifully in the face of it all.

Barbara Florvil