The Black Friend Read online

  Preface

  Introduction

  1

  We Want You to See Race

  2

  We Can Enjoy Ed Sheeran, BTS, and Cardi B

  3

  Certain Things Are Racist, Even If You Don’t Know It

  4

  You Could at Least Try to Pronounce My Name Correctly

  5

  This Isn’t a Fad; This Is My Culture

  6

  So Your Friend Is Racist. What Should You Do?

  7

  No, You Can’t. No, You Shouldn’t. And Don’t Ask That.

  8

  No, I Didn’t Get Here by Affirmative Action (and If I Did, So What?)

  9

  Let’s Not Do Oppression Olympics

  10

  We Don’t Care What Your Black, Brown, or Asian Friend Said Was Okay (F.U.B.U.)

  In the End: We Don’t Need Allies; We Need Accomplices

  An Encyclopedia of Racism

  People and Things to Know

  The Black Friend Playlist

  Source Notes

  Acknowledgments

  To My Reader:

  I finished writing The Black Friend in 2019, but so much has happened in 2020, I feel like I have to address it. Though we are only six months in as I write this, this year has already had a historic impact on the entire world.

  When I wrote this book, I had one goal in mind: try to help make things better. In the case of racism and white supremacy, the word better is difficult to define. This is because, as discussed throughout this book, racism and white supremacy influence literally everything. Therefore, better is always a matter of perspective based on what a person is dealing with.

  Racism and white supremacy are the root causes of world-altering moments, such as the murder of Michael Brown in 2014, as well as subtle moments, such as a white woman clutching her purse closely when I enter an elevator.

  In the first case, better would be defined as the police no longer murdering Black people. In the other, better would be defined as white women no longer leaning into racist stereotypes about Black men.

  Though they are both racist moments, it’s obviously difficult to compare the two. But both cases do share one common denominator: the humanity of Black people being stripped away.

  This may all be difficult to understand for some—but that is exactly why I wrote this book. Its success will be defined not by how many copies are sold, but rather by how much better people are for having read it.

  My hope is that this book will be a tool to help others see and understand the obvious and not-so-obvious ways in which racism and white supremacy not only have infected our society but are actually the foundation of it. That it might spark the flame in someone who one day helps burn down the historic oppression we have faced.

  But a lot has changed (and so much has stayed the same) since I wrote this book, and while I still hold those same hopes, I am also tired. So incredibly tired.

  As I sit here contemplating the words I might use to explain to you how detrimental 2020 has been to the souls of Black people, I find myself unable to write them. Not because there aren’t countless thoughts floating through my mind that could be shared. But rather because I don’t want to give them to you.

  This isn’t an attempt to be disrespectful, as much as an attempt to explain just how tired I am. In this book I’ve already given my readers so much—my pain, my trauma, and my life—in hopes that maybe future Black generations won’t have to do the same.

  I don’t want to use the very little energy I have left talking to non-Black people about this moment in time.

  Instead, I would rather help Black children understand it. Children like my eight-year-old brother.

  So I will write to him, and you may take from it what you will.

  My Brother, Brandon:

  By the time you read this, you’ll likely be about twelve years old, though you’re a very gifted child, so maybe you’ll be a bit younger. Either way, I hope I’m still alive to see it and to talk to you about it, about why I felt compelled to write it. Though, with the way things are going, I’m not sure I will be.

  I saw you recently in the midst of everyone trying to survive the pandemic and protesting for social justice, and as usual you didn’t have a care in the world. As it should be for an eight-year-old.

  I wish that I could make it so that your life was always that way, but it won’t be long before the stress of being Black in this world finds you.

  I am heartbroken by this unchangeable fact.

  As I write this, you are still too young to understand that to be Black in America is to be left with two options: either you pretend oppression isn’t happening or you fight back.

  I say pretend because there is no way that any Black person who is born in this house, which is on fire, and always has been, doesn’t come to realize that smoke is filling their lungs.

  That smoke is the reason, when you were six years old, our mother had to report one of your teachers for looking at the labels of your clothes to check whether they were real. Because she couldn’t fathom that a Black child could be the best dressed student in a predominantly white class in the suburbs.

  That smoke is why at such a young age you had already been taught to assess when a white person was doing something so blatantly racist.

  That smoke is why I have so many stories to tell about my own traumatic moments. Far more than any person should ever have.

  But the smoke is just a symptom. What’s destroying the house—what’s destroying us—is racism and white supremacy.

  You deserve better, and I deserved better—and now, I demand better. Which is why I’ve chosen to use every resource at my disposal to fight back. As long as I have a platform, I will use it to make our voices heard. I will write, so long as it’s the truth. And as our people put their lives at risk marching in the street for justice, I must be with them.

  But by choosing to fight back, I have only increased the likelihood of being taken from you, as so many of my idols before me were taken from their loved ones. Such is the reality in this land where Black people are murdered for simply existing.

  While I haven’t said it directly to her, I feel a deep sorrow for the position I’ve put our mother in, or rather the position this country has put her in. She must live with the gravity of loving me, and of loving our people. Which means she understands that she may be forced to sacrifice something.

  I’m sure who I’ve become is no surprise to her; she raised me with the values that got me here, that made me the loud, staunch, and aggressive anti-racist I am today. This is why she has never asked me to stop my work, as fearful as I know she is. Why she understood me protesting when police murdered Akai Gurley, even though I was arrested for doing so. Why she didn’t object when I told her I was going to write a book to help white people unlearn white supremacy. Why she simply walks away in silence when she hears about the weekly emails I receive calling me a nigger.

  But having been through all of that, 2020 is still different for us both. The weight is heavier, the sacrifices are greater, and the fires are as large as ever.

  Before, when Mommy and I would talk on the phone, we would end our conversations with a goodbye and an occasional “I love you.” Now we have an unsaid agreement not to hang up without saying that we love each other. We both know we are living in a time when we might not get another chance to say those words.

  This is particularly true in my case, as we are living through COVID-19, a global pandemic that has taken the lives of hundreds of thousands of people—especially people like me, who are immunocompromised. The same pandemic that has ravaged the Black community more than any other, because of the historic inequities in America.


  It’s a humbling feeling to go to sleep every night hoping to not get sick. Which is why I’ve been extremely diligent and careful during this time for my safety, because I understand how serious it is, and I want to be here.

  “Are you wearing a mask? Are you using antibacterial soap? Are you staying away from other people?” Mommy has called me every day for the last four months asking me the same questions, trying to make sure I don’t get sick. Trying to make sure her eldest son doesn’t become another victim of a virus that has already disproportionately decimated the Black community and furthered the health, wealth, and education gaps in this country.

  The feeling that your life may potentially be lost at any moment to a virus is a frightening one, though it’s not much different from the feeling of any Black person who fears they may never see their loved ones again whenever they step outside. Not because accidents happen to Black people but rather because hatred happens to Black people.

  Hatred happened to Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, George Floyd, and David McAtee. They are the most recent high-profile cases of Black people who have been murdered by white supremacists, and their deaths are the reason why millions of people around the world are risking their lives to demand justice.

  Protests aren’t new; neither are marches, or riots. But this moment we are in is unprecedented. Never before have we seen people so overtly weighed down by this many oppressive systems at one time. While we have to worry about losing our jobs and feeding our children during a pandemic, we also have to worry about those same children being shot by the police while playing outside.

  More people than ever have had enough and are fighting back. I’m proud to be one of them.

  This is inherently the burden of those who are oppressed. As I write this, there is no vaccine for COVID-19; people are still at risk, getting sick, and losing their lives. But Black bodies being left hanging from trees or dead in the street is an older and more insidious problem, and the opportunity to defeat it has once again presented itself.

  As a Black man, I don’t get to worry about being immunocompromised during COVID-19, not while a police officer kneels on George Floyd’s neck until he dies.

  As a Black woman, our mother doesn’t get to tell her son not to go protest for justice, not while Breonna Taylor is murdered by police officers as she sleeps in her bed.

  We don’t get to unpack our fear of white supremacists lashing out while at these protests, not while Ahmaud Arbery is gunned down by white supremacists for simply jogging.

  White supremacy. Racism. Police brutality. A global pandemic. Staggering job losses. A white supremacist in the Oval Office. Only halfway into the year, and 2020 has already been the combination of everything that is wrong with this country happening all at once.

  But as they say, it is darkest before dawn.

  In every state and around the world, people have begun to rise against the tyranny of white supremacy.

  Ultimately, that darkness will take some of us, as it always has. None of us know what’s going to happen. But I wanted you to know that when things got so dark and so bleak and we were pushed against the wall—we pushed back.

  No more police brutality. No more white supremacy. No more Black bodies.

  We were prepared to pay the costs, prepared to make the sacrifices that were necessary. I don’t know whether I will be sacrificed, and believe me, I don’t romanticize the idea. I want to live. We all do. Don’t let them tell you any different.

  But if sacrifice means victory, a chance for liberation, a future in which you never have to write a letter like this, then it would have been well worth it.

  Love,

  Your Big Brother

  June 2020

  One of the most important lessons I learned when I was younger was that being a Black person in this world usually means that at some point, you’re going to have to do things you don’t enjoy. Even more important was learning that many of those things are going to involve white people.

  For me, that has meant spending a lot of my time as an adult discussing white supremacy, white privilege, and the negative aspects of whiteness in general.

  If you don’t know what a bolded word or term means, don’t worry: I’ve defined it at the back of the book. Yes, friends: it’s your very own Encyclopedia of Racism.

  Anyone who truly knows me would tell you I’d much rather spend my time tweeting about the Lakers, watching rom-coms, or sleeping. But, as I learned a long time ago, there aren’t enough people addressing societal issues, so here I am.

  Because of how publicly critical I am of the impact white people have, and have had, on people of color and on the general world around them, some people have gone so far as to say I hate white people.

  Honestly, this deeply offends me, as I’ve been to over ten John Mayer concerts and at least two hockey games; there’s no way a person who hates white people willingly attends the two whitest events on earth multiple times.

  That said, my one actual problem with white people is that many just don’t have any sense of accountability when it comes to people of color. Accountability not only for the things white people do that often make interacting with them the most frustrating and tumultuous part of our days. But also, accountability for the historic and current inequities and disparities plaguing Black people and people of color as a whole.

  Which is why I’ve written this book. Not because of the fame, fortune, and chance to meet Oprah—though those would be pretty dope. But, as a Black person, I speak on behalf of people of color (except those of us on Fox News) when I say: WE HAVE A WHITE PEOPLE PROBLEM.

  My aim is to help you go from being a person who is learning and unlearning things about these problems created and perpetuated by white people to someone who actively works to solve them. This is called being an anti-racist.

  I define anti-racists as people who understand that white supremacy isn’t something to empathize with Black and brown people over. It’s a destructive system and existence that white people created, and anti-racists are actively trying to end it.

  While many believe there is no way to change the problem, because they believe there is no way to change white people, I disagree. Because after sitting with and talking to many white people throughout my life, I’ve come to realize that there are white people who do care and who I believe want to make change. But these same white people often don’t understand the negative impact they are having or how to be better, because many of them have never had the conversations necessary to know this stuff, either in the classroom or outside of it.

  Let’s face it: Black people and people of color are taught in school, in the media, and in everyday interactions to be empathetic and understanding of white people and their history. But most white people never have to do the same for us.

  You’ll notice I don’t capitalize the w in white when referring to white people, though I capitalize the B when referring to Black people. This is a personal preference, because white people are simply defined by the color of their skin, while Black people are a cultural and ethnic group.

  For example, I’ve never met a white person who doesn’t know who Christopher Columbus was (even though he didn’t discover anything). But most white people can’t have an informed conversation about the indigenous people who were already in America and the lingering impact on indigenous people today of so many of their ancestors having been slaughtered by people like Christopher Columbus. Nor do most white people know anything about the white supremacist massacre of Black people in Tulsa, Oklahoma—though most white people can tell you that Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook played together on the Oklahoma City Thunder.

  To put it plainly, we have to learn a lot of white crap, including white history, much of which is not even true. Meanwhile, white people never have to learn about us, because doing so would force white people to be held accountable for the many ways they’ve mistreated—and continue to mistreat—people of color.

  This book is an op
portunity to change that. To provide some of the context and history that is so often lacking for white people.

  Heck, we even added the Encyclopedia of Racism because my white editor pointed out that many of you reading this might not understand some of the terms that I’ll be using, some of the events I refer to, or why certain things are racist.

  I hope you already looked up white privilege, from page 1. Here’s another opportunity to use the encyclopedia: if you aren’t familiar with the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, go to the back of the book and learn about it.

  But to the point about people who think white people can’t change: I understand, and have met those white people, too. These are the types of white people who will say things like “Black people need to get over slavery” or “We had a Black president; there is no more racism.” These are people who want white supremacy to continue because it benefits them. They are the same people who will say this book sucks, never having read it.

  But this book isn’t for those white people. It’s for the ones who want to do better, who want to be better. But where do white people start? How does someone learn empathy? Is it by watching a specific movie? Listening to an album?

  I think it starts with understanding.

  I’ll never forget the first day of my sophomore year of high school. I had just transferred from a school that was primarily Black to a new school that was far more white. I was prepared for the shock of just how many white people there were going to be in my everyday now. What I was not prepared for was how shocked they were going to be by me. There were other people of color in the school, yes, but I was one of the only Black transfer students. Being one of very few transfer students was probably enough to make me stand out, but being a transfer student who wasn’t white pretty much guaranteed that I’d be noticed.

  Because I transferred at the beginning of my sophomore year, the students in my school had already grown accustomed to one another, and everyone seemed to have their role. I quickly learned what people assumed my role would be.