To say I was nervous would be an understatement. I've been participating in a zoom bible study on Sunday nights with @kaleophx and the pastor asked me to share something. If you know me, I don't normally get emotional when I talk in front of people...but this time...I did. #AhmaudArbery

A SPEECH ON RACISM

In this moment I invite you to put yourself in the shoes of someone who is black in America...

The following examples are based on my personal experience.

If I walk into a store that's too nice, it's assumed I don't have any money because my people are poor.

If the way I talk is too ghetto, it's "too much" for you, unacceptable, and causes me to overlooked for different opportunities.

If I walk into a conference with a selfie device, I'm asked to put it away because surely it is really a gun and if anyone would shoot up the place it would be me, right?

If I walk outside with a red bandanna over my mouth to protect myself from COVID-19 (because it just so happens to be all that I have), people look twice, three, four times to double-check if I am a man and if they should call the police.

I'm invited into circles because of my talent, yes, but often times because I make you feel better about your whiteness...because if I'm your friend, then you can't possibly be racist. But when I am your friend, I must assimilate quickly into your culture and fit in with you in your environment...and it is hard to do. I have to constantly think like you, talk like you, walk like you to be accepted by you...just so I'm not put into to harm’s way.

But no one tries to understand me and the perspective I have every day as much as I am REQUIRED to do that in order to survive in white America.

These are just a few of my experiences as a female, but If I am a black man...what hope do I have?

I am forever at the mercy of how I am perceived in culture...forever having to prove my innocence so I am no longer guilty in your eyes.

If I'm not shooting baskets for you, scoring touchdowns for you, putting on concerts for you, or entertaining you in some way -- that is the only expression of blackness you will accept.

Please don't look away.

Please don't ignore it.

Please sit in the pain of the perspective I am sharing for I feel that is the only way you might change.

This "poem" is nearly over and you can take off the proverbial shoes of what it's like to be a black person in America.

But I cannot. This is life every single day. A good friend of mine who is a white male recently asked me: Erin, what do I do, what do I say, how can I help? I don't know where to start.

I told him in addition to taking the action steps in my most recent Instagram post, to speak up and not tolerate racism in his circles, conversations or in himself. I told him that the reason why these two white men felt it was the right thing to murder this black man is that they grew up in an environment where their subtle acts of racism were never confronted, were never corrected.

It is important that when we see racism, we say something and we correct it. When we do it ourselves, we say something to ourselves and we correct it in ourselves. We teach our children to say something and to correct it....otherwise, there will be yet another person wrongfully murdered...and the cycle will repeat once again.

We stop that cycle by inserting and acting on the rhythms and ways of Jesus.

Thank you.