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Sunday, May 28, 2017

Talynn Kel

writes and posts on her website: Breaking Normal: Living My Life As Authentically As I Can. 

She's an excellent writer and recently wrote an essay that she posted on Medium titled: "If I Were White".

I like the essay, a lot. I especially liked these questions: "Would I be someone capable of the reflection necessary to divest myself from whiteness? Or would I meld with that identity and embrace the monster U.S. society encourages white people to be?"

That first question is one way of asking whether someone is capable/willing to examine what their ancestors told them (their history) about life and the world and "how things were" and then choose to reject lies that resulted in harm to others.

It's a good question. 


I was thinking about this and it occurred to me that not many ever even ask a question like this....much less act upon it.

Sometimes it's an ordeal all on its own to even become aware enough ask the question, much less to then put forth the effort necessary to work toward change. 

I wonder if part of how awfulness keeps reproducing itself from generation to generation to generation isn't because it's so difficult even to figure out to ask the necessary questions?

Maybe that's a manifestation of invisibility.

It's a good essay, read it. 

If you're white and it results in your feeling attacked, that's your ancestors white supremacist conditioning that's been bequeathed to you and it's still working.

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