Am I Next?: How many more will go through what Uyinene went through?

TRIGGER WARNING:

I’ve been logged out of social media for a little bit so I was a little out of the loop on some things that have happened recently. Going through the normal bar bathroom selfies, inspirational quotes, and random rants, one story made me furious. It made me grow angry with each word that I read. I’m tired. I’m tired of seeing stories like this. I’m tired of slowly being desensitized by these stories because they happen so often. I’m tired of being fearful for the people that I know. I’m tired of begging my friends to put their locations on so I can check and make sure they’re where they are supposed to be going. I’m tired of carrying around mace because I don’t know if some lunatic is going to randomly feel enticed to tackle me to the ground and assault me. I had thought of carrying around a taser, but they aren’t legal in Illinois. I do plan to carry a pocket knife with me at some point. I shouldn’t have to do that! No one should have to do that! I should be able to get to my destination safely with no interference. Anyways, I could get stuck on this topic for days, but I’m going to get on to the point of this article.

Uyinene Mrwetyana. Uyinene; a South African name meaning gift of God. Reading about her I got a chance to get a glimpse of her personality. She seemed intelligent, warm, and widely loved. Her skin was so radiant and that smile…her smile was captivating. She was just nineteen years old, making strides and efforts towards living her dream. She attended the University of Cape Town. She was a film student. Who knows, we could’ve seen one of her films on the big screen one day. Well, that won’t happen. We may never get to see her creativity in motion. We may never get to see her artistry. Uyinene Mrwetyana was raped and killed by being hit in the head with a scale by 42 year old Luyanda Botha (allegedly) inside a post office. She went there to get a package, and the man told her to come back later. She was said to be missing August 30th. That’s when he brutally attacked her. I was scrolling through her Instagram and nearly cried. She was beautiful…my God she was so beautiful. The man’s trial is set for November 5th according to The South African. He seemed to have no remorse in regards to what he did. I really hope he rots in prison.

The hashtag #AmINextProtest has been trending. People carry signs through the streets of South Africa pleading with people to stop killing their peers and loved ones. South Africa’s president, Cyril Ramaphosa, addressed the nation Thursday, admitting that there is an uproar of sexual violence against women. He proposed numerous ideas to try and combat this issue. Will these proposals be enough though? Words are just words…they are nothing without action.

Women in South Africa are at risk for being attacked. According to Al Jazeera, a woman is murdered every three hours. Rape is just as rampant. In a 1994 journal by S. Armstrong, it goes into how rape is the assertion of male power. Under apartheid, rape of white women was the only rape that mattered; they found black women rape to just be apart of the struggle. In the journal, it also states that one out of four women have been sexually assaulted before the age of fourteen. These numbers are on the rise…more and more women are going through this treachery.

Will it be me? Will I be the next one to die? Will a situation like this be my fateful demise? Will it be my best friend’s? My Mother’s? My aunt’s? My future daughter’s? I couldn’t fathom sitting at home waiting for my baby girl to come home…only to have the police approach me, telling me that she’s been bludgeoned and raped to death. So many people are apart of the “sexual assault club” and frankly, I don’t want any new members. I think back to my experience, and I thank the Lord that I am still alive, because I didn’t have to be. I’m starting to lose faith in humanity. I’m thinking that there will never be change. And if there is, things will get a lot worse before it gets better.

Uyinene could’ve been me. It could’ve been anyone. So…who’s next?

Self Care Isn’t Just Pedicures and Bath Bombs

Disclaimer: these are my opinions, as well as my own personal experiences

Self care is an art form. Being able to find something that can make you forget about the worries that you were stressing about can be a major release and relief on someone’s mental, spiritual, and even physical self. Everyone goes through something, no matter how trivial and no matter how ridiculous.

Life interrupts people in many different ways, and most times we don’t have the time to prepare for them. During this week, almost all of my homework assignments deleted itself due to a malfunction that occurred on my computer. I had three projects due at 11:59 that night. As I searched through the countless files on my Dell, I began to cry. Actually no, it didn’t start off as crying. It began as laughter. I was laughing at the fact this would have to happen the day everything had to be due. Then, the laughter turned hysterical, as if someone had told me one of the funniest jokes that I had ever heard. Tears began to stream down my face as they rolled in between my computer keys. The laughs became muffled, and then they turned into sobs. All of my hard work was lost. It’s okay to cry; crying is self care by itself. But, at some point, you’re gonna have to wipe away your tears and move forward.

I ended up missing my classes, sitting down on my couch, and redoing all my homework to the best of my ability. For hours I typed. My fingers ached and my eyes began to fall, but eventually…I got my work done. On top of that, I had work to go to, and then a meeting right after that. I was a mess dragging myself back into my apartment. I threw my bags down and nearly sunk to the floor from the exhaustion that I felt. I needed to recharge. I needed to refuel. I ran a shower at around 8:30 pm, sat my phone down on the bathroom sink as it played Mama’s Gun, and sang to my hearts content. The walls were thin, so I’m pretty sure the people next to me could hear me tell the bag lady to pack lightly. After that, I read a chapter from a book I had bought the semester prior at a book store in town. I meditated, and then pulled out my notebook to manifest how I wanted the rest of the week to go. I needed that time to wind down and gather myself together. That helped me, but for that time being.

Various ways on how to indulge in self care:

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.goodtherapy.org/blog/134-activities-to-add-to-your-self-care-plan/amp/

Meditation, yoga, cooking…all those things can be essential to your self care routine, but that’s not all self care is. Self care can be bubble baths with rose petals in the water or getting your nails painted or even just taking a nap, but this will only get you so far. Not to go into great detail, but my second semester my freshman year was probably one of the hardest times of my life. I’m not talking about slight fatigue or exhaustion…I didn’t know if I wanted to live anymore. It’s still touchy to talk about, so I’ll leave it at that, but just know that during that time, how I was coping was not the way I should have. Watching Netflix wasn’t going to save me from wanting to take my life (no matter how good the first season of Stranger Things was). I understand missing a day of class to calm yourself, but I would miss weeks! When the pain gets to be too much, buying yourself some Chick-fil-A isn’t going to just make all the trauma and suffering magically disappear. If it did, I’d be wolfing down waffle fries as we speak. You need to differentiate when self care is appropriate, and when self help needs to take the reigns.

Healing comes in many professional forms if you can afford them (a topic that I will discuss at a later date). There are mental health counselors, psychologists, social workers and so on and so forth. If need be, psychiatrists; they’re equipped to prescribe medication for more serious cases. If I had pinpointed my change in behavior and had actually gotten some help earlier on, I might have been able to avoid the turmoil that came afterwards, or at least deal with it better. There are things that I will never be able to forget, but there will always be a way to heal somehow.

I ended up going to therapy over the summer. I am not going to lie, I did not want to do it…at all! Thinking about it, it’s somewhat hypocritical. I want others to get the help they need and deserve, but I didn’t want it for myself. I was scared. I was scared of being told that there might actually be something wrong with me. It’s intimidating at first. It took me some getting used to. The counselors even told me that I engaged in a lot of self care, but that my actual healing process seemed to be lackluster. I didn’t put in any importance or effort on the progress I wanted to make in the long run, I kept relying on temporary fixes to numb me.

Every day, I would sit down and listen to people share their stories. I’d sit back and think about why I’m here and would ask myself if this was necessary. I would go through the CBT and DBT exercises and worksheets while reciting positive affirmation mantras. I would engage in conversation when the physicians wanted to go into one on one sessions. It seemed extraneous, but as each morning came, I grew to realize what the purpose of this was and why I needed to be here.

Am I fully healed? No. Will I ever stop partaking in the act of self care? Absolutely not. It’s become a vital part of me not dropping out of college. With what I have learned, I know that it’s okay to take some time and do something special for yourself, but you’re doing a real disservice if you ignore what’s really bothering you. Everyone deserves to heal.

Stay Woke? Feels Like Summer and the Black Woman Savior Trope

Childish Gambino is a star within his own right. I mean, it seems like there is nothing Donald Glover (that’s his real name….yes, they are the same person) can’t do. Starting off as a writer for the popular television sitcom 30 Rock, Glover has proven his capability as a writer time and time again. Search Glover on YouTube, and I’m sure that you’ll find a couple stand up specials of his. His comedic chops were a dominant reason as to why Glover rose to stardom. Even with his most recent project, the award winning FX show Atlanta, he is no amateur in front of the screen, nor behind it.

Another hat we can give Glover is musical artist. Childish Gambino is his alter ego, coming out when he is ready to indulge in his craft. The first song I heard from him was Heartbeat. I remember bobbing my head to the song in the car as my mom dropped me off at hell…I meant high school. I also remember being shocked at finding out that the guy who created the song was previously playing a former jock turned nerd on the NBC show Community. I was impressed at his versatility, and don’t get me wrong, I still am. Awaken, My Love! was the album that made everyone realize that Gambino was a force to be reckoned with. They are still playing Stay Woke on radio stations. If you didn’t know who Childish Gambino was, I’m pretty sure you have some idea now. The psychedelic, funk, Bootsty Collins-esc vibe was a delight to my senses. When we were hit with This Is America, I was stunned at the amazing visuals that Gambino’s video left us with. It was one of those videos where you had to watch it a few times to make sure that you caught everything, and even then! You still would miss something. The white horse symbolizing the coming of death, the violence towards the black man in the beginning, but the careful handling of the gun representing how we care more about gun rights then the rights of other human beings…and so many more symbols for us to digest. People knew that he was talented, but now, it was no longer an opinion, it could be considered a fact.

Most recently, Gambino released the music video for his song “Feels Like Summer” off of his Summer Pack EP. The song was easy going. The song was mellow. It felt like a song that you would listen to during the summer time. I can easily envision myself on my back porch back at home in Chicago as the sunsets; my friends and I laughing and reminiscing about the past and how much we’ve grown as individuals sipping lemonade and not having a care in the world. I kind of zoned out a little there, but the song is just a chill song for lack of a better word. I notice that with Childish Gambino, his music is good, but the visuals make it that much better. I feel like This Is America would not have gotten the point across without the music video, and I can say the same with Feels Like Summer. Gambino gives us a dual sensation with the senses; auditory and visual. With the Feels Like Summer video, we see some of our favorite music artists and public figures interacting with each other. I didn’t notice what was going on until I saw Chance at Birdman’s cookout. I saw the Migos, Trippie Redd, Nicki Minaj, Travis Scott, but the moment I mostly want to talk about starts at the second minute and the sixth second. Kanye West is seen crying his eyes out as he’s donning the infamous MAGA hat. Soon after, we see Michelle Obama embracing him in a hug as his tears begin to cease. I’m sure it was only supposed to be seen as a sweet sentiment, but something with that visual did not sit right with me.

Michelle Obama is the epitome of an inspiration. When her husband Barack Obama was President, she did not just sit on the sidelines. She was vocal, she was active, and she was just a straight up badass. I know that it’s just a little music video, but the only animation that you could give her was her consoling a man who called slavery a choice? Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but hear me out. Why are black women always the ones who have to “save” black men? When Snoop Dogg said that Kanye West needed to be hugged by a black woman, I thought about it. Black women are the most ostracized demographic in America. Black women are at the bottom of the totem pole when it comes to desire and respect it seems like. Black women are constantly ridiculed for their hair, the way they look, and so on and so forth. I know I’m kind of going off on a tangent here, but I’m just trying to explain where I’m coming from.

Every race of man has degraded black women…including black men. I can count on my fingers and toes the times I’ve heard a black man ridicule black women  on something that they possess. However, if a woman of another race does the same thing that a black woman has done (long acrylics, braids, etc…), it is seen as innovative, cool, and them stepping out of their comfort zone. Kanye West…I have no idea what happened to him. He used to be a vigilante for the kids on the South Side of Chicago. He used to talk about the issues that plagued the streets that he used to live on, now he kind of mentions it when he is selling a brand new pair of shoes. Mr. West has shown some disrespect towards black women in the past. In 2016, he came under fire when he requested only multiracial models for his Yeezy Season Four fashion show. It’s all fun and games to drag black women, but when you’re getting dragged a black woman is supposed to come in and save the day? It’s a black woman’s job to set you straight? No no no, that is not our sole purpose in life.

Childish Gambino has been accused a few times of being “woke” when necessary. Now, when it was revealed that Glover was dating a white woman and had two kids with her, people flew off the handle and started labeling him a “traitor” and a “coon.” I wouldn’t go that far. Mr. Glover can date and marry whoever he wants, but as a black woman myself, I can definitely understand the disappointment that some black women felt. Chrissie, a YouTube commentator made a video about Childish Gambino in May, detailing some of the reasons as to why Gambino may not be as “woke” as people think. I’ll be honest, before this, I thought Childish Gambino was one of the most unproblematic people on the planet. That’s probably an exaggeration, but I didn’t question any of his intentions. In her video, she plays a clip of one of his stand up specials. To sum up everything, he has sex with an Armenian woman (not half Armenian, half black, not a black woman from Armenia….a full blooded Armenian woman) and got extremely aroused when she called him the n word during climax (er not a). Hmmm…maybe the joke was a little over my head, because I didn’t laugh; not even chuckle. I don’t know about you, but I personally believe that non black people should not ever use the n word, not even if their life depended on it. On an episode of Atlanta, he has a dark skinned black woman verbally going at it with a white woman on the fact that she’s with a black man. “We’re good enough to fight for black men, but we’re not good enough to marry or date….” she says later on in the video. That struck a chord in me. Black men will fight with black women, but not for.

Stephon Clark was gunned down by police March 18, 2018. Black women were the main people protesting for him and against what happened to him. His death was senseless and uncalled for, and there are no ifs ands or buts about it, but Stephon Clark…would he have done the same thing for a black woman. Tweets were released of him clowning black women, saying that dark skinned black women bring “dark days.” He had a seething hatred for black women. Even when these tweets surfaced, black women still were up to bat for this man. The women on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and other forms of social media that repealed their support, were lambasted and shamed by mostly none other than black men.

Coming back to Childish Gambino and his video, I wasn’t the only one who felt this way when that image was shown. A few women on my Twitter feed felt the same way I did, reiterating the fact that black women are more than just a black man’s superhero. I’m not saying that black women can’t be, but there should be more of an equal response when black women are being attacked. Under the bus is not a good place to be thrown, and black women have been there more times than they should have been. Like I said previously, I’m sure the intentions were innocent, but when we acknowledge how these once acceptable ideologies can be seen as toxic, we have a chance to change the narrative for the future. Black women have their own struggles to deal with. If you have whatever you’re dealing with, and on top of that having to be the “savior” of someone else, that can cause tremendous pressure. Again, black women are HUMAN, and as well as deserving respect, they deserve a break.