Untitled
We are nameless avatars anyway
How are we supposed to feel safe or valued in a society that honors those who murder us?
That is not a rhetorical question. That is real life for many of us and it only became more apparent with news this morning that JD Vance has invited Daniel Penny to be his honored guest at this week’s historic Army-Navy football game. Penny will be the guest of Vance and President-elect Orangeface McFantaskin.
Daniel Penny, you know, the guy I wrote about the other day who got off after murdering Jordan Neely in New York. If you missed it,
A Penny for Your Thoughts
Remember Black Lives Matter? Remember that subsequent phase of or corporations, agencies, random white people on the street, etc all making big prophetic claims of listening and learning?
So Daniel Penny gets away with murdering a Black man and is immediately hailed as a hero.
I guess Tupac was right again.
If you didn’t click to listen to the link..it is supposed to start at the part where he, referring to police, says
“Pull a trigger, kill a nigga, he’s a hero”
Granted he was discussing police but the same concept applies. Actually it is part of it. In situations like Penny, white men are empowered by the overpoliced nature of Blackness that they take it upon themselves to act as vigilanties to aid the police. Mind you, the police get all the resources in the world and don’t need help, but white men often feel like it is their duty to intervene and aid in policing Black bodies.
And why not? You kill us and if you do manage to get arrested, nine times out of ten you get to go home a hero and become pretty well compensated. Those people are then quick to be trotted around the country as a symbol of patriotism AND they get contracts to be keynote speakers and contributors on Faux News and the like.
Kill us and you become a wealthy superhero. Does it have to result to murder? Not always but then the lines are a little more drawn and fragile. Caitlin Clark emerged as the non-violent hero last year and became the right’s avatar for supremacy. White dudes jumped at EVERY opportunity to defend and protect her against all those “mean Black women” in the WNBA. But earlier this week, Caitlin finally acknowledged her status benefitting from white privilege and—well…the racists are mad and they dumped her within the hour.
So— state an obvious fact about Black contributions and you get cancelled within the hour. Sorry CC, we tried to tell ya. Welcome to the Woke World Caitlin.
But back to the killers. Daniel Penny is not the first or last murderer of us to be trumpeted as a hero. Remember George Zimmerman?
George killed a Black KID. Trayvon Martin and what happened? He was celebrated by those people and his gun, the one with which he murdered a CHILD, he sold it for $250,000.
It pays to be a racist killer I suppose.
There are dozens of other stories just like these that continue to belittle our mere existence. And to make a finer point, you don’t even have to kill just us. You can kill people who are acting in support of us.
Kyle freaking Rittenhouse. After fake ugly crying on the stand (see below) dude became a right-wing hero and keynote speaker around the country.
Even in my home state as recently as a month ago dude was still getting checks to show up and be adored by those who haven’t yet killed one of us but desperately wish they could.
As a lot of the country was focused on the alleged killing by Luigi Mangione of the UHC CEO, this thought of white protectionism was on full display. Watching CNN, via a clip because I have stopped helping their ratings, I saw where guy who knows me very well from serving on 3 boards with me and doing a group project together but pretends not to, Scott Jennings, was celebrating the actions of Daniel Penny and bemoaning the alleged actions of Luigi.
Weird—
Murder + poor Black man = hero
Murder + wealthy white man= villain
This math is hardddddd.
If you don’t want to give it clicks here is an image still:
Literally labeled them good guy bad guy because Scott is so creative and talented and deserves all the money being thrown his way.
America, boy I tell you.
But that gets me back to the original point. In America if you murder someone like me, you can become famous. Not infamous…famous. Because our bodies have been relegated to faceless nameless beacons of badness. We are okay to kill because we aren’t human. We aren’t worthy of protection or dignity. We just have to hope we don’t cross paths with a Penny Zimmerman type character. So our stories are yet to be written and remain untitled, because in America, who cares for us?