How does it feel to not be a target for abuse and neglect?
...I've felt like a target most of my life.
Not just the ever-present paranoia, but also a sense of deepening disenfranchisement which permeates my confidence in almost every endeavor with an almost certainty of unfairness.
It's definitely worsened in the past few years, and I'm now resigned to what might be my final chapter (a long one, I hope), fighting ghosts of the civil rights era which had always before presented themselves to me as past transgressions of this nation, now threatening to become a permanent fixture in the remainder of my life.
There's always been a very fine line drawn between me and full citizenship, even though I was born in Brooklyn. I felt that divide distinctly when Rodney King took that beating and prosecutors initially failed to hold the police responsible accountable. Felt it again when Mike Brown was shot and killed in Ferguson.
No explanation needed for what's stirring up the acrimony in me today. We can all see the diminution of comity and respect that had been conditionally extended by this nation to it's minority inhabitants over the decades since Reconstruction; since the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts offered the protection of the federal government to ensure those rights afforded by the Constitution and in subsequent amendments.
Equal opportunity and equal protection are two important challenges we struggle with, but what about public accommodations like transportation, housing or medical care? All of these are diminished along with the degradation of decency and mutual respect.
Long route to this report today, but it speaks to every fear I have about this nation including me in its promises. I'm quite used to statistics which predict an earlier demise for me than my white counterparts and compatriots.
I'm all the more alarmed this morning to find government officials acquiescing to allow black and Latino communities' Covid-19 infections to rise uncontrolled in the interest of furthering an extremely dubious 'herd immunity' plan which most experts predict will kill millions before any such result is even possible. This in the face of an already wildly disproportional number of infections and deaths in already struggling black and Latino regions of the country.
I feel pretty much like I've felt most of my adult life. Like a target.
...thread:
Link to tweet
CDC's New Numbers Show Black Americans and Other People of Color Dying at Higher Rates From COVID-19 Than It Previously Reported
____The agency previously said Hispanic and Black Americans were dying at a rate of about one and two times higher than Caucasians, respectively.
The updated analysis also shows that American Indians or Alaska Natives have died at a rate 2.6 times that of White Americans. The CDC previously put that figure at 1.4 times as high as White Americans.
The CDC’s previous infographic, which downplayed the disproportionate burden on communities of color, was widely shared, including in the agency’s “Framework for Equitable Allocation of COVID-19 Vaccine.” The CDC appears to have updated the analysis on Nov. 30.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/opinion-cdc-acknowledges-black-and-latino-americans-dying-at-higher-rate-from-covid-19-than-it-previously-reported/ar-BB1bF0XR
= new reply since forum marked as read
One theory I have read as to why the disproportionate # of serious cases & deaths in poc.
Apparently, the darker the skin color, the less vit D is obtained from sunlight.
I am not a med professional, but have been disturbed by the reports of elders & poc stats & have been seaching for answers.
Vit D deficiency has been reported in both populations, for different reasons.
I hear you and feel your pain, my friend! And I realize your comments go much deeper. Racism is a stain on our country that has caused so much injustice & suffering!
So I am not discounting what you have said, only focusing on what you can do to stay healthy!
I couldn't agree more!
Add food deserts to the list of injustices! 
"It really is unconscionable that Black people are, in many ways, bearing the brunt of COVID-19," says AARP's Edna Kane Williams. See why medical experts think #coronavirus is proving more deadly for older Black Americans.
Link to tweet
https://www.apmresearchlab.org/covid/deaths-by-race
