I woke up this morning, as I do most mornings in a ridiculous amount of pain. I had been crying in my sleep again, my eyes swollen and nearly stuck shut. I needed to sleep, to rest, to just be. But of course in today’s America, we are not allowed to sleep or rest. Because then we are seen as weak, not working hard enough, not pulling ourselves up by our own bootstraps. We all buy into this illusion that if we work hard enough, sacrifice enough that we will get ahead. The hardest working people I know, in fact have ever known, are not “ahead”. They are the ones busy caring for your children, stocking your shelves, cleaning up your messes, serving your food, caring for your parents and grandparents….emptying the bedpans.
I too have had big dreams. Had. Now, I try not to day dream at all because the let down is too much to bare. The reality of capitalism creeps in and snatches what it wants, and is still wanting more. Even as a child, in my beloved library, I would go through every world travel book and guide I could find. Knowing I was never going to see theses wonders in person. Even then I was fully aware of what financial position I was in and likely to stay in. That is a heavy burden for a child to carry. Millions of them do, every day, in this “land of plenty”.
Even as I write this I can hear the “right” say, “Well at least you can drive here,” “Well at least you don’t have to wear a Burka,” Well at least we you can vote”. As if this ridiculous standard is somehow supposed to make us all feel blessed that we are not under religious rule. But we really are under religious rule, just one that most people are okay with. That ideology infects my life everyday, and I am in fact forced to cover myself in public, walk with my keys between my fingers so that in case I get attacked, I may have a small chance to fight back. I do not go out alone at night, not even for a simple walk around the block. I have to ask others (men) to walk me to my car if I dare to go out at night. Their religious bent tells them that they can do anything they want to me and just tell their god they are sorry and it’s all fine.
They make us pledge to a piece of fabric that is now, more than ever, a symbol of racism and want me to include their god into my sense of loyalty and duty to…what? I do not know and am afraid to ask.
I had dreams, but they have been erased by my gender, my race, my religion. I can not have what they have because I am not them. Capitalism has chosen who will be rewarded. Those folks do not look like me.
I paid my taxes and worked full time since I was fourteen years old. I did everything I was supposed to do. I experience sexism in the workplace and live the wage gap. I know because my job has all salaries posted as a matter of public record. When I compare my pay to a man with less education, and way less seniority and he makes more than I do, I see it and feel it. I am no longer shocked or surprised anymore. I am too tired to even be angry. The harder a person works the more likely they are to fall behind, or so it seems.
People say, “Things are changing,”. That change is too little too late for most of us. Those who have always been chosen, scratch and claw and bite those of us struggling to stand. The chosen keep taking what was never theirs to begin with. Fairness is not a difficult thing, yet it is the impossible thing in a country where all of your value is placed on your gross net pay. The less you make the more taxes you pay. The more you care, the less you are paid. The more you serve the less you matter. This is all compounded by a thousand fold if you are brown or black or female. It is made worse if you are not the common religion, and gods forbid any combination of the above.
That fabric….the one with the stars and stripes…symbolizes repression, violence and the systematic genocide of 9 million people that the schools will never teach you about. It has been built on the backs of slaves, and mistreated women and children since its inception. It was supposed to be about freedom, but these days we have so little. We have little choice when leaving a job that makes you miserable, because that job holds your health care. Women do not leave abusive marriages because they can not make it financially on their own. So they are punched and kicked and pushed and screamed at and they take it, to care for the children that they would not be able to support on their own. They roll over on their sides and wait for it to be over because children need a home. When a person gets pulled over, they only ones who fear for their lives have darker skin. The folks whose dreams are systematically crushed by net profit and gain.
They wonder why people riot? Because violence is the voice of the voiceless, fire is the reflection of those who have no reflection, anger is the last resort of the oppressed. They tell us what to wear, when to go out, where to walk, how to walk, not to make eye contact, or to make eye contact, to be prepared for attack at anytime, pull over, do everything they say, does not matter if you are a twelve year old kid playing in the park, when they shoot you anyway…..well…somehow it will be your fault. Because you were not among the chosen few who have everything and are grateful for nothing.
Because its always been profit over people, especially people who are not you.
Words that must be heard 