Ranting: Leaked Supreme Court Draft Opinion…in a pandemic…and more…
I feel like today is Friday but it is Wednesday. This week started off with off-putting, jarring, jaw dropping, devastating and tragic news. Monday night we all saw Politico publish a leaked draft opinion by US Supreme Court justice Alito. In the opinion he rails against supposed “made up rights”, including access to abortion, same-sex marriage, and marrying outside of ones race. He said Roe v. Wade should’ve never been. The precedent that has been upheld for 49 years is being systematically stripped away right now. In real time. I think that this is unfathomable, to say the least, and people who will bear the unimaginable consequence may not even realize it yet, or might not even be born yet! This is an assault on people in the United States, our rights to control our own bodies hangs in the balance. This is hard to believe but it is so reasonable. In a global pandemic, post Trump regime it seems we are all just trudging through a vortex, making ends flirt. Not meet. Hardly touch, rather. Whether you’re hardly paying rent, falling behind on utilities, scraping by on not-enough-food-stamps, in a never ending pay-day loan cycle, sleeping in parks and in cars, working 3 drops, working a professional job and delivering food for DoorDash at night, etc. etc. You feel the burden everyday. You realize that this system is crumbling right before your eyes. You know that simply voting won’t do any good so what will? Even those who go to every protest in their city, sometimes feel like they’re screaming into a void, a bottomless pit of facts, stats, and endless accounts of the horror that is working class United States. Feeling far from united as everything we see and hear seems to want to further divide us. Take “culture wars” for instance. I had seen Symone Sanders state they aren’t the distraction they are the playbook. and WOW this is so on point. This is on point because think about it. the term “culture wars” implies two cultures are at war but there is simply an attack on the “have nots” by the “haves”; I won’t pontificate on the WHY but I will take note of the how. We watched Trump’s base get riled up, we watched black, latino, indigenous, LGBTQ+ be berated, harrassed, targeting and killed. We watched whites in a frenzy about what they believe to be an infringement on their own freedoms, oh the irony. I am not all doom and gloom. We also saw our state almost take back the governor’s mansion in 2018, which was a true testament to community organizing, great communication and messaging and an overall great candidate. But, the political horror film still drudges on. We voted, overwhelmingly, to return the right to vote to felons once they complete their sentences, then that following session we saw our state legislature roll that back; they said FIRST make sure they pay off all fines and fees to the court. That proved arduous and insidious, many likened it to a poll tax. We even saw the Stand Your Ground defense laws widen to include college campuses. This year has undoubtedly taken the cake, with pro-viability abortion bans cropping up all over the country, in Florida the bar being set at 15 weeks, without an exception for rape, incest or human trafficking. Laws, elections and decisions as gruesome as this seem to be surreal. But they are very real. The rent throughout our state are soaring and the minimum wage is still at an incredible low, the cost of living and everyday necessities high as well. Our governor is giving millions in tax breaks to wealthy corporations while our unemployment system is in shambles leaving people to try to figure out how to pay for basic needs. Black folk are left to wade through this unsavory political waters and figure out where we fit in, how to fight the good fight, how to educate ourselves and our peers, and how to stay alive while doing it. All the issues them other folk got and them so (other folks of color included). So it is a lot to unpack. there are quite a few organizations and coalitions of good people doing the good work but alas, it can easily seem that the cards are stacked against us. I know that Facebook seems to be on the decline in popularity but I am on there often still (LOL), I see that folk are talking, and black folks in particular are always wanting to figure some of these things out. How do we connect, how do we fight back and how do we preserve ourselves, our families, our legacies, our culture? I know that building power takes time and patience, and is not only attainable but is integral and necessary to life period. In order for us to thrive we must take up space, we must grow freely, and we must own our power. We can do that in our personal lives and in our communities as a whole. We can work together to mend our education system (also under attack), healthcare system, political process, economy, how we take care of each other and the planet, and so much more. I believe and know that we can. The work just continues.