All your faves are problematic. I know this makes it harder to love anyone. I know it makes it harder to support each other. It feels like we are constantly expecting for the other shoe to drop. For the problematic shit to hit the problematic fan. That’s the fucked up, problematic world we live in. No one is free from their own set of internalized hatred. It’s a box set we receive at birth and it comes with our parents. They received it before you, and their parents before them, it’s all the collective trauma literally passed down into our very DNA.
No one is above being called out for it either.
When we engage in insensitive/hateful phobic behavior it needs to be called out, for the safety of us all. When this happens, in my experience, the best thing to do is concede that our impact, no matter the intention, was hurtful.
Especially if multiple and mutual people are asking that we consider the misstep. We all make mistakes, our pain is so deep seeded. We are all programmed to hate and every time we reach out, no matter how honestly, we defy that programming.
It is an act of love when we care enough to call you out. When we could easily, block you out and walk away without a word or a care. It is after all what we are conditioned to do. Calling each other out on our ugly behaviors is living out loud. It’s brave and it is beautiful.
It is also uncomfortable, especially when the ugly is coming from a favorite person or personality. It is hard to draw lines with people we love and/or admire. It is an act of love and it should be received as such. It is your village, catching you when you fall. It is good for us and sometimes what is good for us is the exact opposite of what we want.
However, I challenge us to ask ourselves, “do I want to be safe space for the most vulnerable among us or not?” We can’t make ourselves safe and be recklessly dangerous, while also being above reproach.
We don’t heal ourselves unless we can stop hurting each other. We can’t do that until we examine how we were conditioned to hurt. It is from this place of unconscious pain that we transfer trauma to others. One needs to be willing to drag their demons out into the light.
A call out is the opportunity to call that unconscious hatred into being, to give it life, to make it real, and then to slay it, forever. It is not you we are dragging to hell, it’s the demons you’ve given birth to through your personal bias.
I will admit it, I want to murder your bias and the trauma it’s caused you and others. I want to murder your hatred, burn it, and erase it from the planet, and then help you hide the remains. That’s what good accomplices do.
Every single one of us, no matter how “woke,” is dragging their own demons around and with them the potential to cause real, actual harm.
Be absolutely accountable for your energy. Reduce your risk to harm. We turn ourselves into safe spaces by listening when we are told we’re being dangerous.
Ask for help. Humble yourself to admit, you don’t know what you don’t know. In earnest. Be brave, and let us help you exorcise your demons. Apologize for the pain you’ve caused. Then, be better, be great even because you can because you’ve been liberated.
Peace and love to you all.
💋💋💋
J
Brown Girls Out Loud 