Why race NEEDS to be discussed with our kids…

Those of you not following me on Twitter may think that Trayvon Martin’s murder doesn’t matter to me. But I’ve been retweeting links from other writers as the story plays out. I’ve watched in horror as white reporters ask blatantly racist questions to a grieving mother, as a white police chief erases the racism of the murderer to try and make a bullshit claim of self-defense, and as thousands of white people downplay this as “a black problem.” And I recall how right after Obama was elected, many of those same white folks declared that we were all over race, and clearly we don’t need to discuss it anymore.

But race is not a topic that can ever go away, because all it takes is not talking about it for a few years before white supremacy takes over again. And the sad fact is, whites don’t perceive granting equal rights to other races as equality, but rather as a loss of their position in the world. Enforcement of white supremacy is so important, white people will belittle every black issue and ignore reality whenever they can. So even though Trayvon was a good student with better grades than I ever had, his value as a person is limited by the color of his skin.

And to give you an idea about how fucked up some peoples’ priorities are, There’s mass outrage from white gamers over the ending of Mass Effect 3, which has resulted in Amazon issuing refunds for the game being “defective.” (Which is bullshit, but this is so not the right time for that rant.) So white gamers can generate rage over a game not ending well, but they can’t generate much give a shit for a child murdered by a documented racist and white supremacist, a man who had formerly assaulted a police officer, and who shouldn’t have been allowed to carry a gun, or to appoint himself as a vigilante of his neighborhood. But Zimmerman can do whatever he wants, because he’s white.