Dispatches From A Failing State

Issue #2

Hi Members,

I just wanted to share a few thoughts that have been on my mind this week. I've been dipping into and out of the Derek Chauvin Murder Trail this past week and it's been really draining. All the emotional testimony has been overwhelming. If you've haven't seen anyone die unexpectedly because of their inability to breathe, seizure, etc., it's quite traumatic.

I have. A few times. Each time was different, but each experience was unforgettable. The first time I watched someone die I'd say was my most memorable of my death witnessing experiences. The memory of the face of the person in transition has been etched into my memory forever.

I was pretty young the first time I witnessed death. It was long ago back in the 90s. The name of the young lady's death I witnessed was Ananda. I never forget how Ananda, a young 17 year old cousin of my ex-husband, died. She had walked over to her sister's home from her own her after school, and never walked out. She had some pre-existing health issues that I was unaware of but she was a sweet girl. I'd known her for years. She literally had just walked up a flight of stairs, took a seat, and just died, slowly. I didn't realize at the time I was watching someone die, which in itself after some reflection is traumatic.

Not realizing death is upon you is haunting. You think about the things that could've been said or done. Life is short. Time is short.

After Ananda came into the house and sat down, said announced she didn't feel well, and was going to take a nap. I was sitting watching televisions. I watched her go over to the sofa to take her final seat. She laidback on the sofa with her legs up where her feet wouldn't be on the cushions, put her arm across her head and face, and closed her eyes. It was just the three of us in the siting in the room. My son was there as well. He was about 2-years-old at the time.

I continued watching television, not knowing Ananda was dying.

After about 25 minutes or so, I could see something shiny, glistening in the sunlight from the corner of my eye. It was a white bubbly, foam creepy from between Ananda's lips. It's the same type of foam witnesses of George Floyd's murder said they saw as he laid being murdered in the street. I hopped up to take a closer look. Ananda's eyes were partially opened, on the whites were visible. I ran over to the phone and called 911. I was traumatized. The 911 dispatcher kept asking me questions about her appearance and what she was doing before I discovered her unresponsive. It's was an out of body experience.

I screamed at Ananda, trying to keep her here with us, among the living dead. I knew she had a pulse, but barely. I listened to her chest, her heart was barely beating. I didn't know what to do. I was only 22. I didn't know CPR. I'd not been prepared to save anyone's life. Most people aren't.

I called her oldest sister, who was a Nurse Aide at a local nursing home and in school for nursing at the time. She rushed home. She and paramedics arrived at the same time.

They all worked on Ananda for about 35-40 minutes to no avail. They kept losing her. Paramedic just couldn't get her back. They tried longer than usual because Ananda was so young. Paramedics eventually got a pulse and got her to the hospital, but they kept losing her on the way. Ananda was just 17.

I was the last person to see her alive.

Ananda's mother didn't get to witness her death or her last moments alive. Neither did her big sister. I had unexpectedly spent the final moments with someone taking their final breaths and I have never forgotten that day. I've never forgotten how I felt. I've never forgotten the casualness of death. It just trapeses in quietly sometimes, catching victims and innocent bystanders by surprise. No one knows when their number will be called.

None of know if we're ever have the blessing, and sometimes the curse, of watching someone die. I know what those witnesses are experiencing reliving the moment.

As I've watched the testimony at the Derek Chauvin murder trial, I'm reminded of the randomness and sometimes the intrusiveness of someone's unexpected death. No one woke up on the day George Floyd died knowing they would be witnessing a death. No one knew they would be witnessing White Supremacy, in it's purest and most evil form, in action on the day of George Floyd's murder.

Death called on that day. Derek Chauvin helped death out, and it was unforgettable. The sadistic way Chauvin killed George Floyd and the smirk he had while doing deaths bidding reminds me a lot of how White Supremacy has always treated Black people in America. It's disturbing.

I have thoughts.

The World Is Watching White America

If you're not paying attention to the importance of this trial, you're missing out on an important moment in American history. I've been paying attention to the international media attention this trial has been receiving. Media outlets all over the world are watching to see if America is the free and just place it professes to be, or is it the racist shithole African-Americans have always known it to be. The world is watching trying to determine if we are the failed state they've been witness over the past 6-8 years in rapid decline to the brink of a coup, or if we just have a few bad apples.

America is rotten to it's core. It's not possible to rehab such a broken house in my opinion. This trial will be the catalyst for change or for civil unrest. Derek Chauvin isn't the only one on trial. America is on trial too.

The world, especially Black and Brown nations across the globe, are watching the Derek Chauvin Murder Trial to see just how racist America really is. No one wants to send their loved ones to a place where they could randomly have contact with White racist police who kill them while other non-White racists standby and watch. Prospective immigrants are watching. Leaders of foreign nations are watching. The international media is watching.

If America gets this trial wrong, it will no longer have any standing in the world when it comes to being a poster child for a democracy. You can't tell people what to do about their nations if you can't control your own. In one short year, America will have shown the world, not only that it's it not a democracy, but it's a liar. The truth of America shall be revealed.

Here are just a few of the reasons why America is in deep trouble:

• We had an attempted coup, and despite what the media and naïve White folks say, it was indeed successful. When groups attempt to over throw their nations, often the first attempt is a dry run for the real deal coming later. Rarely are coups successful the first go round. If the Hillbilly Insurrection happens again, it will be successful. The foundation has been laid, the tolerance for violence is apparent, and the need apathy is all White men need to keep going. White people know White people. America has always allowed it's White men to be angry and be violent and the government still hasn't done anything radical to stop them. Nothing has changed. The slow arrests and lack of action by Congress and state legislatures means we will absolutely have another or three. Why wouldn't they try again? Democracy has one foot in the grave.
• The police and the justice system are both rotten to their cores. African-Americans have had so much injustice and seen so little reform, it's hard to see anything changing no matter the outcome of this trial. Even if Chauvin is convicted, White people aren't really working hard enough on purging racists from our systems, therefore, nothing changes. And the casually nice Racist-In-Chief, President Jim Crow Joe Biden, is not addressing the problem specifically, directly, head on. In fact, he said he wasn't going to do much of anything that would significantly purge systems of authority of racists. If police can use lethal force to kill people they come in contact with even though we have an entire justice system set up to address innocence or guilt, we have no protections for some of the nation's citizens. We no longer have a civilized society. Our police are no different from police in Myanmar, Russia, Syria, Ethiopia, or Somalia. We have an autocratic kleptocracy. We're a lawless state.
• Black and Brown people have no faith in America's systems. America doesn't change. The only thing America does is turns its dirty underwear inside out so you can't see the dirty other side has been worn. She's too lazy to clean, to lazy to change, too busy to take care of her hygiene. America's underwear are still dirty and stinky no matter how many times you flip them over. Nothing changes here. When we don't/can't make progress, we're agreeing to remain in a failed state. The powers that be ensure they remain in power, ensuring there are no changes and when there are changes, they roll them back. That's not democracy.
• Voting rights are being steamrolled. The theft of Black folks' voting rights is happening as we speak nationally. Racist state legislatures are busy making our nation's racist kleptocracies work the way they always have. No need to rely on the nation's highest courts for a solution, they've allowed the Voting Rights Act to lapse and made Citizens United a thing. We're doomed. If all people can't vote or we all don't have the same opportunities and privileges.

The world is watching America, acutely aware they are witnessing the fall of another once great White empire. Some of the world is watching in horror. Others are watching our downfall with glee. Black folks are stuck in the middle with no place to go and no friends to turn to. I must say it's painful to watch such a slow demise of America. I'm also tired of living the trauma of it like we're tired of watching Black pain being used for profit.

All this Biden-Harris talk about New Deals and Infrastructure Plans will never work if the original sins of the nations aren't addressed. Every New Deal or plan to help the working-class (better known as White people) only makes the wealth gap worse between Whites and Blacks as well as between the rich and the poor. All of this talk is an effort to make White voters feel good about just how shitty a state they've gotten the country into collectively.

I don't care what White people do, they'll never be able to escape their roles in the demise of America. We can't possibly have a democracy when so many people are distracted, painfully unaware of how important this moment in time is.

We're either witnessing a new dawn (which I seriously doubt), or another phase of putting the final few nails in the coffin of a failing state on life support. If you haven't been watching international news outlets, please casually browse their coverage of shitty affairs. The world is intently tuned into the trial of Derek Chauvin, having the nuanced conversations about race we here in America are not able to have because White people control what we. People around the globe are finally seeing Whites in America the same way we Black folks see them.

Listen to their commentary of Black and Brown journalists at those international media organizations and compare it to the callous hot White journalist garbage takes we get here in the states. Every time I see a White journalist express outrage at the horrific details flowing from the trial, I just roll my eyes.

Like really White journalists, where in the fuck have you been your entire lives?

This violence and injustice isn't new to America, and not even the most graphic of murders committed by White men. Spare me your stupidity, please. At least they could keep their ignorance to themselves. But nope, they gotta share that ignorance with the world.

White people are shamefully clueless at every turn about America's demise, a demise they all  played a direct role in causing.

From being racist, living racistly, and creating racist sons and daughters who grow up to become racist people working in our society to being apathetic in their politics which directly (and negatively) impact Black and Brown people, White people have allowed America do go do the toilet. Sadly, a lot of us Black and Brown folks have helped America become a failed state because we've allowed Whiteness to convince us to vote against our own interests. We all vote the interests of White people, and we're not clear on how to stop doing this.

White countries all over the place are choosing to go down the toilet than to share with otherness. Finally the world has had enough of it. It's allowing those countries to eat themselves.

America is one of those White nations going down the toilet. The entire country, its systems and its people are on trial. If we get this wrong, we can't come back from it. If we get it right, we still have a lot of work to do. We all need to be decolonizing our minds, focusing on the real problems at hand. Capitalism, our economies, and our race and class systems. But that won't happen because America is distracted about Spring coming, the economy opening back up, and Covid shots.

We've already forgotten about racism. It's a familiar pattern Black folks are accustomed to. This time though, the world is watching America. This trial is a huge deal because America's standing in the world and reputation are at stake. White people's reputation and standing globally are at stake as well. Most are too oblivious and self-absorbed to understand this trial is about White Supremacy, not just Derek Chauvin.

White people not understanding the significance of this moment is why America will fail.

America and all of her White people cannot seem to bring herself to wash out her filthy nasty underwear. They've been turned inside out more times than anyone can count. They stink too. But imperialistic America just sashays around with her dirty underwear on like no one can smell her stink, no matter how pretty she looks on the outside or how proudly she speaks about herself.

America's underwear are dirty. She needs to change them, or at least wash them. But she won't. She's a proud, dumb girl, and pride always comes before the great fall. Stay ready.

Marley K 2021