Will you rembember me when I am gone?
My name is Cordell Garrett. Some of you on democratic underground may know me, some of you may not know me. I am a published author under the pen name Robert James Winchester. i am a huge sci-fi fan as evident by the three books I have written so far. I am of a mixed race back ground. My great, great, grandfather was a white man, my father was black and my great, great grandmother was a Native American. I am very nervous and afraid to write this letter because of all the censorship of people of color going around. My intentions is to not inflame or upset anyone but I want you to understand the consequences of what will happen if you let your hatred of people of color take over. As Yoda once said about fear, “Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.” That being said, I like to pose a very serious question to those of you who hate me because I am black. I want to tell this story from two viewpoints, a white person who supports us and does not want us to vanish into history and the view point of the racist who gets offended at everything we represent. This is a post that I like to title, "Will you remember me when I am gone?"
The first part of this is from our Alley's point of view.
Imagine for one moment that you wake up in this brave new world. You are a white man or a white woman. You start your day out early in the morning. Maybe you are one of those physical fitness nuts that enjoys getting up in the morning. Going for a two mile run (god bless you for doing that, i never could) or maybe you like doing 100 sit ups and push-ups. You like to show everyone how touch and macho you are. Then you turn on the television. Every channel you see are people that look like you, white, some men, some women. But there are white.
You don't even notice that there aren't any people of color or you don't even notice their are no Asians, or Chinese, or Japanese people. But the main thing you start to notice right away is that there are no black people. On your way to work, everywhere you look there is nothing but white people. Only 24 hours earlier, you saw us walking about. You saw us playing basketball, you saw us debating the President on television. You see us arresting criminals or in some cases shooting them. But then all of a sudden we are gone. You know deep down in your heart something is wrong.
So being the curious mind you are, you start looking through the history books for any mention of people of color. The text books mind you are written to reflect that we never existed. That the human race is pure. The human race is white, just the way god intended. You know deep down inside of you that something is wrong. You go to another source to find information on us. Again, nothing but every bit of your memory is telling you that we did exist and someone is trying to suppress the world from finding out about us. So you go to some information brokers, they not only can provide you proof that we existed but proof that certain folks do not ever want to see black people again because in their minds, we are evil, we are the devil. Some people see us as the demon. No matter what you try to do to get people to remember us, you are stopped.
Now, let's take this from the racist view point. Twenty four hours ago you were part of a vast conspiracy to wipe out every person of color on Earth. You succeeded because the next day, we all disappeared. Our hopes, our dreams, our passions, the projects we were working on, the novels we were writing on were never finished because someone's hatred of us did not want us to continue. You wake up proud to be in a world where there are no people of color. You proudly go to work happy at what you accomplish until you hear our allies are trying to help us remember. Of course nothing is never enough for you, you got to even silence the ones trying to help us. You go on a never ending quest. You scour their social media accounts hunting them down and you succeed.
I know what you are thinking, this is a bad plot to a Saturday morning cartoon that I just wrote, but what I have written is exactly the future we are facing if we don't stop targeting people of color. My Democratic Underground friends, what people like me face is the cold harsh and I would go so far to say hard reality that people like me face every day. We face the reality that we could go somewhere and do what you guys take for granted every day and not come home.
When we are killed by the police or killed by the klan and yes the Klan wants people of color dead. They have already threatened us publicly and on social media, but make no mistake they want us dead. How will you remember us? Now, I am a big guy, I am 5'11 and I weigh 300 pounds, I am a big guy. If I were to be shot and killed by police for doing nothing than minding my own business, how will you remember me? Will you fall into the trap that I know corporate media will write about me? Here is Cordell Garrett, shot and killed by police for doing nothing than just standing around watching a family member being beaten to death. Will you follow the narrative that will be written about me accusing me of being a criminal felon that police had every right to jump on me and beat my butt silly?
Will you jump on the narrative that says he was taking social security when he shouldn't have? He was getting paid social security every month. His fat butt was a drain on our resources, that money should go somewhere else. Will you jump on the narrative that accuses me of being on drugs even though some of my own parents were on drugs when they had me?
How about this for a narrative.
Should I meet my end at the police, would you remember me for the three novels I have published?
Would you remember me for the fourth novel I am working on my first crime novel that I'm super nervous about trying to publish?
Would you remember me as someone who just wanted a better life for himself that was tired of always having to get by and not enjoy life?
Would you remember me for trying to make people understand that even though i am a black man, I'm also a gay man who just recently got his rights to marry anyone he wants?
The point of this post is that myself, the people of the African American group, the Barrack Obama group, and the ones whose voice you have silence are not your enemies. Many of you will never know the pain, the fear people of color face every day when we get up, you'll never have to worry being killed for being in the wrong place at the wrong time around police. You will never have people talk about you how good you have it because you are not black.
In closing, let me just say and thank Democratic Underground for allowing me to be a member here. I know many of you won't get what I'm trying to say and that's fine. I can live with that. I also realize I may be offending someone who doesn't like what I have to say. I just want you all to think about what you are doing. Do you really want to run everyone of color and the ones who support us off Democratic Underground? Because what I just wrote in my little scenario is exactly what is going to happen if you keep silencing us. We are not doing this to make you feel inferior or anything like that, we are trying to get you to see things through our eyes.
Thank you and be blessed everyone, sorry I interrupted your Saturday.
= new reply since forum marked as read
family scapegoats develop empathy for the underdogs, as we have always been one in this life...
Thank you, jwirr. She is so lucky to have you.
You've broken my heart. 
I work with people of color, many different colors and nationalities, in fact. My local shopping center has about an equal number of black, white and brown people, both shopping and working there. The restaurants in my town are both frequented and staffed by people of a variety of skin color. Same with our schools. The shows I watch on TV are both black and white and in color, pun intended. Our president is black. My grandson is dating a gorgeous little girl of mixed race, but that won't last because she is much smarter and more mature, and soon she will realize that. I don't think that you are on the endangered species list.
I don't mean to make light, because racism is a real and ugly thing. But there are many communities like mine where people of all races and ethnic groups live and coexist and are decent and helpful and friendly. I hope you find one of these soon.
You are valued. You are honored. You are cared about. You are dignified. I say this for all people of color.
Love, Unity and Peace.
I believe you and accept how how feel because of your experience as a black person. I was so shocked and appalled when cases like Eric Garner's death in New York, even after a video showed an officer using an illegal choke hold, was dismissed.
But...I do not understand why you would address this to your fellow DUers. You may accuse me of looking at DU through white coloured glasses, but if there were anyplace on the internet where you could find a collection of people of every ethnic, racial origin that support your concerns and empathize with you, and even attend rallies and write letters to reps...it is here.
You write:
"Will you fall into the trap that I know corporate media will write about me? Here is Cordell Garrett, shot and killed by police for doing nothing than just standing around watching a family member being beaten to death. Will you follow the narrative that will be written about me accusing me of being a criminal felon that police had every right to jump on me and beat my butt silly?
Will you jump on the narrative that says he was taking social security when he shouldn't have? He was getting paid social security every month. His fat butt was a drain on our resources, that money should go somewhere else. Will you jump on the narrative that accuses me of being on drugs even though some of my own parents were on drugs when they had me?
…………………
The point of this post is that myself, the people of the African American group, the Barrack Obama group, and the ones whose voice you have silence are not your enemies."
In answer...No, most all of us would NOT fall into that trap. It may be presumptuous to say that, but this is the place where you will find the most broad support for minority rights than most any other forum. You will find people who are, dare I say, more informed, more sympathetic to the systematic racism that still exists.
I do not understand what you mean by "..the ones whose voice you have silence(d) are not your enemies." Where are your voices silenced on here? My only guess, and forgive me if I am wrong, is this is about the incident about the woman and her cohorts that represented BLM that interrupted Bernie in Seattle. And the negative response to her afterwards from especially Bernie supporters. I too don't understand why she would go after one of the hardest workers in the Senate for social justice. And all that turned into a huge distorted Fox News level of catapulting fake outrage. I still do not understand why it is wrong for Bernie to have a platform to help ALL those who are minorities, disadvantaged, etc.. through economic and justice system reforms. Simply demanding the police behave themselves, or taking away their military toys, and only focusing the incidents that involve White cops shooting Black citizens is great, but its only a bandaid solution. And would not last. Bernie knows that the only way to create a permanent solution is to help lift up those that slip through the cracks, and reform our justice system that views all equal, but some more equal than others, which would naturally include many from the black community because of systematic racism. This is a much more sustainable solution.
But this approach has been somehow twisted into he is dismissing the concerns of BLM and the black community in general. When in fact it is the most productive solution. But more than that, even though prominent members of the black community have denounced Marissa Johnson's actions and question her motives, it is somehow taken as an attack or an attempt to "silence" those from the black community if she is not supported by those she blindly insults.
https://www.change.org/p/blm-activists-want-the-women-who-interrupted-bernie-sanders-to-apologize-to-him?recruiter=358375400%20%20on%20change.org
This petition, created by #BlackLivesMatter activists, demands that Marissa Johnson and Mara Willaford publicly apologize to Bernie Sanders.
Anyways I support all the aims of BLM. And criticizing the motives and tactics of one ex-Palin supporter, who has more loyalty to the more radical organization outsideagitators206, does nothing to diminish that. In fact the reason why she was rightly criticized, even by those within BLM, is that she is damaging the movement. And I for one do not want that. You write about falling into a trap. I see a trap of listening only to the loud voices of those that want to build a wedge in the progressive community between different races, and espouse the belief that ALL whites are the enemy. We must work together, not against each other.
Thank you for doing it so well. It needs to be stated over and over.
You once called me your sister. So here is a for my brother.
KnR!
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. In response, let me just say that I don't know if anyone is alert-stalking black DUers -- maybe so, maybe not. I very rarely alert on anybody.
Not that anybody cares what I'd prefer, as it isn't up to me, but the only people I'd like to see the back of on DU are those who are consistently and deliberately abusive to others, via a number of commonly seen tactics around here. Just as one pertinent example, one of those who I have found to be so, from my interactions in the past and observations of the exact same thing with others, is someone who is highly revered in the AA group.
As Skinner always says about posting and juries "you take your chances"... meaning one jury may hide what another doesn't; it may be ok to say a given thing today but not tomorrow. I will say that there are more hides now since we went to a 7-person jury. Many of the 4-3 hides would have been a tie before, and ties were not hidden. Many of us were opposed to that change, but so be it.
But returning to the case in hand, that poster in the AA group that I was referring to chose to be nasty to others, and now if some are following them around and alerting on posts that aren't actually objectionable in themselves because of past interactions, well the choice was made to be that way and chickens come home to roost. It may well be that poster has simply pissed a lot of people off, and they are individually alerting on those posts -- it doesn't necessarily need to be a coordinated effort.
There is a prevalent mindset these days (case in point the BLM Sanders event) that being a member of a minority group (the same thing occurs in some others here too) entitles someone to be as nasty as they please to others, and it's A-ok. Sorry, I don't buy that. We have had lots of discussions here over the years going round and round the tree, trying to get these people to clean up their act, but they always insist that they are entitled to act that way. Yes, they state that outright.
I don't interact with any of that type of person anymore. I prefer to remove the oxygen from the fire so to speak. Others may react differently, I don't know about that.
But the point is, being nasty to people will not make them like you or support you. Some here just can't get that through their heads, and insist on continuing that behavior, simply SHIFTING the blame for not being liked or supported onto those they are being abusive to. That makes it 10 times worse. It's a sneaky type of slander blackmail and it's bullshit. A bad reaction to that is not very surprising. It has nothing to do with race or misogyny or homophobia or any other group identity (not that those things don't exist too), it has to do with people feeling entitled to bully others.
I don't care what color bullies are, I don't like them. I just wanted you to know what may be going on here, since you took the trouble to write your thoughts about it.
I wish you the best, Cordell, and enjoy your writing. 
