Please, stop reducing this ongoing tragedy to just sound bytes, or clipped reactions, or shots of teargas canisters and protesters. Please stop trampling all over the humanity, solemnity, and serious consideration this situation demands with your childish avoidance, inane 1-liners, empty vamping, and willful ignorance. PAY the respect that is DUE to the lives and lived histories of ALL the people enmeshed in the murky past, weighty present, and fearfully uncertain future of Ferguson.
You are NOT free to carelessly cast about your shallow emotions and obviously oblivious opinion about this matter. This is NOT Monday night football you’re chatting about over coffee, that is NOT a SportsCenter highlight clip you’re pulling up on your phone. You and I are able to do just that and then go about our stupid and infinitely little lives because we are hundreds or thousands of miles away, or because we are privileged enough to be able pick what we will stuff our face with at lunch, or because we are privileged enough to not have to worry about walking down our street, or because we are privileged enough to not need explanations and reminders about preventing police targeting and brutality, or because we are so privileged to have so much access that we scoff at the suggestion of privilege altogether… But you and I don’t have to silently support such a sickening and disrespectful circus. We don't have to be perfect or sorry, or even ashamed either. Those feelings are worthless.
Instead, we can give this our attention – we can *pay* the dedicated attention that is long overdue. This is not your Comedy Central attention, but your REAL focused fucking attention. Regardless of the particulars in your life, you and I, at the very least, can recognize, question, and discuss the situation in Ferguson for the infuriating, devastating, heartbreaking, and revealing complexity it really is. At the very fucking least, we can carefully read the grand jury proceedings wherein Wilson was questioned. We can solemnly read Mr. Brown’s autopsy report and listen to the opinions of the coroner. We can *invest* some of our time into learning the historical context in Ferguson, listening to the narratives of its people, trying to understand the culture of its communities, framing and tracing the relationships between its citizens and its public servants - all of this before we come to the increasingly troubling conclusions that pepper our media sphere today.
We owe a deep and terribly incurred debt of serious attention and critical reflection to all of those beleaguered people, and we owe it our closest friends, and to our neighbors, and we owe it to our co-workers, and to our children, and to their young friends, and even to our ourselves a little. We don’t have to be patrons jeering in the media coliseum – we can be better if we want to be.
You are NOT free to carelessly cast about your shallow emotions and obviously oblivious opinion about this matter. This is NOT Monday night football you’re chatting about over coffee, that is NOT a SportsCenter highlight clip you’re pulling up on your phone. You and I are able to do just that and then go about our stupid and infinitely little lives because we are hundreds or thousands of miles away, or because we are privileged enough to be able pick what we will stuff our face with at lunch, or because we are privileged enough to not have to worry about walking down our street, or because we are privileged enough to not need explanations and reminders about preventing police targeting and brutality, or because we are so privileged to have so much access that we scoff at the suggestion of privilege altogether… But you and I don’t have to silently support such a sickening and disrespectful circus. We don't have to be perfect or sorry, or even ashamed either. Those feelings are worthless.
Instead, we can give this our attention – we can *pay* the dedicated attention that is long overdue. This is not your Comedy Central attention, but your REAL focused fucking attention. Regardless of the particulars in your life, you and I, at the very least, can recognize, question, and discuss the situation in Ferguson for the infuriating, devastating, heartbreaking, and revealing complexity it really is. At the very fucking least, we can carefully read the grand jury proceedings wherein Wilson was questioned. We can solemnly read Mr. Brown’s autopsy report and listen to the opinions of the coroner. We can *invest* some of our time into learning the historical context in Ferguson, listening to the narratives of its people, trying to understand the culture of its communities, framing and tracing the relationships between its citizens and its public servants - all of this before we come to the increasingly troubling conclusions that pepper our media sphere today.
We owe a deep and terribly incurred debt of serious attention and critical reflection to all of those beleaguered people, and we owe it our closest friends, and to our neighbors, and we owe it to our co-workers, and to our children, and to their young friends, and even to our ourselves a little. We don’t have to be patrons jeering in the media coliseum – we can be better if we want to be.
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