Justice has been something that people of color, women, and the LGBTQ+ community have been fighting for and desiring for decades. Throughout the various peaceful protests, acts of injustice, equality speeches, and unnecessary killings I can only imagine how many individuals have been affected mentally. I can’t prove that one group has been affected more than another but I can guarantee that mothers have worried that their sons won’t make it past a certain age, women go over and over their “opinions” before presenting them in the workplace to make sure they are not sounding aggressive or have room to be misunderstood, and persons in the LGBTQ+ community think about their safety due to others judgement more than they should have to.
With these thoughts in mind, I decided to write a creative piece to attempt to display the thoughts of a mother with a black son, the affect of injustice and how it can start out mentally affecting a mother and the act of injustice trickles down to her son. Some of this piece comes from my personal thoughts/experience and I call it “Justice for my Black Son”.
In the beginning God created this little human from the most perfect place of LOVE in his heart and positioned you in my arms.
In that moment I felt a sense of joy because my prayer was finally answered.
But in the same space I experienced sadness to know that once you entered the world the stamp of judgement would be placed upon you.
Not because you did anything spectacular to receive this distinction but because you were BORN BLACK!
At first, I thought that the joy of your arrival would slow down the words of shrewdness from others but instead it increased the ignorant comments from OUR people.
The words spoken questioned how you could possibly be a “lemon drop” when I was a noticeable “chocolate drizzle”.
I must admit initially my words matched the statements given by the people I felt would love you unconditionally.
Our intent was not to harm you with our words, but we fell into how society shaped us to look at our outside.
I had to take a step back to create a JUDGEMENT FREE ZONE for my BLACK SON, because whether I agreed with it or not that place, I created may be his only “safe place” for years to come.
As the days, the months, the years rolled by I witnessed you grow into an intelligent, authentic, highly educated, and well-mannered young gentleman.
But your character would not stop the injustice that you would face but in turn compel you to ask the question, In a perfect world what does justice?
I would gather the answer to your question in my thoughts with the hope that you would listen carefully and be one of the ones that demands justice for you and others based on the words my lips would speak.
Justice looks like you not being accused of thinking you are better than your brother because of the tone of your skin.
Justice looks like you receiving TOP quality education at an HBCU which helps you to become the CEO of a Fortune 500 company.
Justice looks like you being able to have on an urban outfit and enter an elevator without a woman clutching her purse.
Justice looks like you wearing a Brooks Brothers suit in a room full of other businessmen that look like you.
Justice looks like you being able to walk down the street and enjoy a bag of skittles, run/exercise in any neighborhood, play any music of your choice, drive an expensive car, and not having your last words be “I can’t breathe”.
That is what justice would look like for you my BLACK SON.
by: Tiffany Mills-Howell LPC,MSc, LPC, MSc
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