Midnight in Dallas: What’s going on?

Last updated on: July 8, 2016 at 5:36 pm by Maria Dixon Hall

Midnight in Dallas: What’s going on? 2016-07-08T17:36:12-06:00 Maria Dixon Hall

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Mother, mother

There’s too many of you crying
Brother, brother, brother
There’s far too many of you dying
You know we’ve got to find a way
To bring some lovin’ here today, eheh

What’s Going On-Marvin Gaye

I was a little girl when I first heard this song.
I was a 50-year-old woman when I first wept over this song late into the midnight hour.

My city is under siege. The police are hunting for two gun men who turned a peaceful protest into a killing field men and women who were doing their job.

Image Public Domain

My brothers are being shot in front of their children for getting their license out. My sisters are being pulled out of their cars for asking questions.

A former congressman just tweeted a threat against the life of the President of the United States on behalf of ‘Real America.’

A man running for President of the United States made himself famous by questioning the citizenship of the first black president. He has endeared himself to the white supremacists by spewing hateful speech against the brown, the disabled, and the foreign.

A woman running for President of the United States is being bogged down by a stupid mistake she made over an email server and the media is more interested in her three emails (out of 30,000) than the lives of two unarmed black men shot by those sworn to protect and serve.

The people calling for the protection of the unborn turn a cold shoulder to America’s cradle to prison pipeline that is snagging 1 in 3 black boys born after 2001. They don’t care about the children languishing in foster care. No one is regulating the adoption industry that puts a price on babies heads depending on their color.

I am watching my clergy colleagues fall over themselves to defend the rights of my brothers and sisters who are LGBT that benefits one of my sons but remains silent on the systematic racism that endangers my other son’s life every day. Curiously as their mother, both their lives and happiness are important to me.

A White rapist is known by his swimming times, not the heinous crime he committed and is given six months while a black football player at Vanderbilt is given 22 years for the same crime.

I am scared of progressives who don’t know my life or that of my people but want to speak on our behalf all the time. I am scared of conservatives who label my children animals without even knowing them.

I am living in a world where the disabled are called losers; where anti-Semitism is approved, and there is no shame in shirking your duty as a tax paying citizen.

I live in a country in which my son can never wear a hoodie; or drive a car with ‘black music’ on with his friends; where my daughters will have to tame their sassy tongues; and my husband will constantly be asked if they are ‘his’ children.

In 2016, I live in a world where up is down and down is up. When qualifications matter less than a willingness to demean, demand, and prop up a nostalgic era that never existed in American history. I live in a world where people can tell me they love me but actively do everything they can to destroy my people.

I am confused.

I am hurt.

I have no idea what’s going on.

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