Why Saying "All Lives Matter" is Racist

#BlackLivesMatter — that’s the conversation we’re having. The conversation is not #AllLivesMatter. I'm talking to you, my kind, liberal (and conservative!) friends who vote and eat college-educated meat and read the New York Times and believe gays should get married if they want to register at Target for a waffle iron they'll never use. You are against racism. I know. Let's talk about why #AllLivesMatter is just wrong. 

(If you left an “all lives matter” message on my Facebook, thank you, friend. I know what you meant by it, and I think you’re darling. Yes. We want all beings to be happy, safe, and well. People of all races, genders, and sexual orientations suffer harassment and deserve better. But we shouldn’t co-opt this particular message, and here’s why it’s dangerous and inherently racist to do so.)

The BlackLivesMatter movement was started by three queer black women. Their message was simple—

#BlackLivesMatter doesn’t mean your life isn’t important–it means that Black lives, which are seen as without value within White supremacy, are important to your liberation…We’re not saying Black lives are more important than other lives, or that other lives are not criminalized and oppressed in various ways.  We remain in active solidarity with all oppressed people who are fighting for their liberation and we know that our destinies are intertwined.

When we drop the word Black, we further the racist legacy of erasing black lives, something our country has always done. 

The conversation we are having this week is about the 9 killed in Charlotte, North Carolina, at Emmanuel AME Church in a terrorist attack (defined as: the use of violence to intimidate a segment of a population in furtherance of a social objective).

The conversation last week was about unarmed black children being held down forcefully when found to be in the wrong space. The conversation before that was about Tamir Rice. And before that, Michael Brown. And before that, Eric Garner. I won't go on, but of course, I could. 

“There are black people in America dying because of racism.” W. Kamau Bell, a comedian who lives in Oakland, said this six months ago. 

In January, you may have heard, he was book shopping while his wife and child ate at a sidewalk cafe with some friends in Elmwood. He stopped by to show them the book he’d bought. He’s black. The women he was talking to were white. Let's make sure we understand this: 

He was a black man standing next to a table full of white women, talking to them. 

Then employees of the restaurant told him to scram. To git.

He was told to leave the property because he was a black man, harassing the white ladies. They tried to chase him away from his wife. 

He was recently on This American Life, talking about the community meeting he organized after this happened (worth a listen, or fascinating transcript here). 

At that meeting, UC Berkeley professor Nikki Jones asked everyone to think of the world in terms of black space and white space. She said that people have ideas about black space: that it’s poor, that it’s the ghetto. Just about everywhere else is white space.

And this: Black people have a special burden to bear when they are in white space—black people have to prove they are worthy of BEING in white space. 

How rare it is, she said, for white people to have that experience, of going into black space. 

Here’s where I puffed up with pride. I wanted to raise my hand, even though I was listening in my car. Me, call on me! I live in one of those so-called "bad" neighborhoods, a black neighborhood! When we moved here, people stared at us when we walked the dogs. They still do. I can count on two hands the times I’ve seen other white people walking in my neighborhood in the past nine years. 

That means I understood it more. By dint of where I live, I was—automatically—more sympathetic to the plight of black America because I saw more, witnessed more. 

But I was shaken to my core when Bell pointed out the obvious fact that I can leave whenever I want. 

I have a white passport. 

I had never thought this clearly about it. 

I live in a black neighborhood in Oakland, sure. This means precisely nothing. The fact remains that I can dive headfirst into white space (the grocery store, the sushi restaurant, the library) AT ANY MOMENT without anything to prove. I can go just about anywhere I want. Without being stopped, without being harassed, without being in danger. I belong. 

WHITE LIVES ALREADY MATTER. 

In our country, black people have to prove they deserve to exist in white space (and a hell of a lot of people don’t think they do).

If you’ve ever given a black man on the sidewalk an extra once-over just to make sure he’s not doing anything hinky, you’re guilty of this. I’m guilty of this. We’re guilty of this because, as Americans, racism is our legacy. 

I used to think I was better than most at understanding racism, at being sensitive to it, at not letting it anywhere near me. Let’s face it, we all tend to think we’re better than others—it’s a human failing, and maybe it’s what keeps us reaching to do better. But the real, painful truth is that I’m just accidentally privileged, by virtue of my skin color. 

Kadijah Means, an 18-year-old Oakland social activist said at Bell's community meeting: "Focus less on color blindness, because honestly, you're not going to get a gold star for that. Be more color competent."

That was my sin--thinking I could somehow become color blind if I just tried hard enough. Turns out I need more competence in the subject. So, as the same kind of anti-racist you are, I implore you: Please think before you try to erase the word Black from this conversation. It NEEDS to be said.

My mother was so proud she'd been witness to and a part of the Civil Rights movement. "We Shall Overcome" was, literally, one of the very first songs I ever learned from her. She would hate that I had to write this today, more than fifty years later. 

Black people are dying because of racism. Today. 

PS - Comments welcome. Disagreements welcome. Rude language or a fists-flying attitude will get your comment/tweet/FB response whomp-blocked, so don't bother. 

(A good Why All Lives Matter is Inappropriate storify here.)