Life is about storytelling — about the stories we tell ourselves, the stories we are told and the stories we buy into ... Meghan Markle, Duchess of Sussex
white on white
this snowy day
a voice lurking
in dim corners of her mind,
the baby's skin color?
we're very much
not a racist family ...
in winter chill
a black man mutters
at least a bit
I guess Covidiots love company -- paraphrasing Cynthia Hand
the Idaho sky
darkened by columns of smoke ...
Burn the Mask
FYI: In other words almost all whites will always be at least a bit racist . This perception , which can take hold particularly at times when white workers aren't fighting racism.
-- Malcolm X: Socialism and Black Nationalism, p. 42
1 The hottest place in Hell is reserved for those who remain neutral in times of great moral conflict."
12 In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends."
The following is a relevant excerpt from the interview:
ReplyDeleteHarry: For anyone it’s not going to end well. Because the way that I saw it was there was a way of doing things but for us — for this union and the specifics around her race — there was an opportunity, many opportunities, for my family to show some public support.
Oprah: Mmm.
Harry: And I guess one of the most telling parts — and the saddest parts, I guess — was over 70 Members of Parliament, female Members of Parliament, both Conservative and Labour — came out and called out the . . . the colonial undertones of articles and headlines written about
Meghan: Yet no one from my family ever said anything over those three years. And that . . . that hurts. But I also am acutely aware of where my family stand and how scared they are of the tabloids turning on them.
“what is different to me was the race element,” Harry explains. “Because it wasn’t just about her but it was about what she represents and therefore it wasn’t just affecting my wife but it was affecting so many other people as well. And that was the trigger for me to engage in those conversations with senior palace staff and with my family, to say, ‘This is not going to end well.’” He said that although there were “many opportunities for my family to show some public support” for him and his wife as they dealt with an onslaught of racism from social media, the press and institutions, “No one from my family ever said anything over those three years. That hurts.” In a clip that aired on CBS on Monday, Harry says racism played a “large part” in their decision to leave Britain, also stating that he was warned that the United Kingdom was bigoted and the press would destroy him...
DeleteDuring the broadcast, he said that he thinks his family is “controlled by fear,” “scared…of the tabloids turning on them,” so much so that if they “are willing to wine, dine and give full access to these reporters, then you will get better press.” And furthermore, he believes “My father and my brother, they are trapped” within the royal system, saying, “They don’t get to leave and I have huge compassion for that.”
For the royal family, its staff and advisers, the interview was an unmitigated disaster, as they face multiple accusations of being racist, callous, uncaring and downright cruel. “How do you feel about the palace hearing you speak your truth today?” asked Winfrey. “I don’t know how they could expect that after all of this time we would still just be silent if there’s an active role that the Firm is playing in perpetuating falsehoods about us and if that comes with risk of losing things, there’s a lot that’s been lost already,” responded Meghan.
-- excerpted from "Meghan and Harry's interview: A royals expert on what we did and didn't learn," accessed at https://www.macleans.ca/opinion/meghan-and-harrys-interview-a-royal-expert-on-what-we-did-and-didnt-learn/