A letter from my Heart - Sandy Holman

💜 Sandy Holman  www.cultureco-op.com

Friday if you have loss someone or many: please read and slowly on the mend 💜💜💜💜It is Breanna’s birthday and instead of celebrating,  she is with the ancestors due to excessive and grave police force and their mistakenly and aggressively entering her home. She and all the African American people over 400 years plus who have been killed due to Racism and white Supremacy that is entrenched in our country and the world,  have been silenced and these murders have been catastrophic to millions.  I am most concerned ,though , about good every day people who are comfortable, well provided for, complacent, extremely privileged, and though they did not cause slavery, they have benefited , tremendously , from the legacy of slavery and the continuation of the laws, practices, and normalized modes of operation , that give them huge advantages in life , and which often makes individuals, communities, organizations, institutions, our country and the world, ignore the plight of black ,  brown, poor, and other exploited  people. These good people , subconsciously , or consciously,  make excuses for police and community folks , who have regularly taken lives based on the color of ones skin. Through their silence, inactions, and isolating themselves in comfortable bubbles, and poor historical education in schools , they live life without much regard to what is happening in poor,  and people of color communities , and especially in black and native communities. Except for the occasional march, candle ceremony, social media post and outcry, things go back to the same when things die down . No one can really deny we have heard and seen these murders happen countless times within our life time. If you want to begin the journey of real change , start by watching “ the Cost Of Darkness Documentry, reading Stamped Form the Beginning and White Fragility, as well as “ Essays from the Browder files , and than let’s connect and do true, honest, hard, painful, you may not like it , work. I promise to do it with tons of love,  but to be honest,  and you will have some foundational grit to start this hard journey.  You have to commit too , and no more crisis driven, stop and go, cuddling my white brothers and sisters, only lighting candles,  but than going back to the same way of being, or trying to create experiences which allow you to check off a box or say you did something , but with no change to show for it. No more staying in research bubbles on campus without your work reaching hard hit communities , and no sharing of the funds you get in grants. Get into those communities where they are at and share those funds. When the journey gets tough, no sabotaging the efforts or claiming you ran out of funds to continue critical efforts and to support our young people. Make this a priority. The frog is past boiling, it’s burnt to a crisp , and if we turn back to more of the same , the future will not be good. It is already a disaster for people of color . We should not continue the status quo , and it should not have been ignored this long, these huge deadly injustices and institutional Inequities , and yes, it means anyone with historical privilege will have to change and share more. It is the right thing to do beloved and long overdue. Enjoy your lives but not at the expense of the exploitation and marginalization of multiple cultural groups. Doing these things would be a start and a  heavenly happy birthday to millions of lives murdered or neglected. We can make a difference 💜💜💜💜💜💜💜💜🌺🌺🌺🙏🏿🌺🌺🌺🎁🎁it would also give our young people a fighting chance for a better future peace and love🌺 Thanks to you all who are already truly on this journey 💜

💜 Sandy Holman  www.cultureco-op.com