All this unrest! Can’t we all just get along? Can’t we just forgive and forget?

 

We would if you’d stop killing us.

 

Well, maybe you shouldn’t have run. Or worn that hoodie. Or driven around with broken taillights, or questioned orders, or obeyed orders, or moved your hands, or stood with your hands up, or looked at the officer, or avoided eye contact with the officer, or picked a BB gun up off a shelf at Target, or played with a toy gun in an open carry state, or looked so darned suspicious while walking down the street.

 

???!!!

 

Okay, we can see how it might be confusing, but can’t you just get over it and pull yourselves up? Better yourselves? Work hard and keep your noses clean like the rest of us?

 

 

Perhaps, if things like selling cigarettes and CDs weren’t so hazardous to our health.

 

No, we mean get a real job.

 

That would be great, if we could get an interview.

 

Well maybe you need a better education.

 

Maybe, if we had access to stronger schools.

 

Well, okay then, you should move to better neighborhoods.

 

Maybe we could if you’d let us. But there’s also that getting an interview thing.

 

Well, if you didn’t have so many children, you’d be in better financial circumstances to lift up your own neighborhoods.

 

And maybe if legislators were less concerned with restricting access to birth control and more concerned with improving public education, we’d have better results for everyone.

 

Well, maybe if you went to college and put off having children you’d be in a better position.

 

Yes, it would be nice to go to college without sparking lawsuits forcing universities to burn through money (that could have gone to scholarships) on legal fees to uphold the legitimacy of affirmative action.

 

Well, now you’re just being overly sensitive. We’re offended. Our rights are being trampled. All lives matter!

 

We can’t keep explaining this to you. We’re exhausted.

 

There, now everything’s quiet. Everything’s back to normal. And isn’t it nice?

 

With a BA in English and an MA in German Language and Literature, Tara Campbell has a demonstrated aversion to money and power. Tweet her up at @TaraCampbellCom.