Erica Jean
@HeyItsEricaĀ Ā·Ā 4:38
Can the HEALING of Race Wars Begin By Honestly Learning Our Stories?š¤
If we're singing these songs and we're doing blackity black things, that's good, that's fine. We're black. Some people will argue that we're brown and get into all the fisticuffs about that, but I'm not getting into that here. But when we learn each other's stories and when we get to learn about one another, it opens that door to something so beautiful, you can't even describe it
Michael Knight
@MK1981Ā Ā·Ā 3:05
And seriously, part of my language, but it's so visceral to me that this thing of we have to do things in order for people to see the beauty in us. I couldn't care less what people see in us, or don't see in us, or treat me as you would, or any other human being, or suffer the consequences of not doing that
Harvey Pullings II
@The79thstreetkdĀ Ā·Ā 4:58
And the book is very influential when you think about what can happen to a black boy. But on the other hand, women expect us to, which we should get behind narratives like the color purple, which highlight the wrongdoing of black women and the circumstances that they had to go through after slavery at the hands of black men. That's a very critical and important story
Angela Kaye
@AnngieKayeĀ Ā·Ā 2:44
It was like, oh, they let anybody play the Super bowl. All this, all that. And I'm like, yo, it is clear where we are today. And all of this, like you're talking why we've proven ourselves to show our beauty. I think that's part of the problem. Integration. The idea that we wanted our kids to go to school side by side with white kids
Harvey Pullings II
@The79thstreetkdĀ Ā·Ā 4:57
But the tonality of it, there's a certain charm it has that cannot be replicated today, especially now, with how sensitive we gotten. But the main reason I say we can't heal is because our environment has become too traumatized, where we can't think for ourselves. Everything is overwhelmingly bad and needs to be argued about and debated, and tea needs to be spilled and all that
Erica Jean
@HeyItsEricaĀ Ā·Ā 1:29
The problem is that many people are very stubborn, as I mentioned before, and it's typically not us, because we embrace everyone more than we embrace our own selves. You should hear some of the conversations I have at home off of swell, because not with my own family members, but with outsiders. I tell them that I would love for there to be a world where black people love themselves more and just worry on our own upliftment than the upliftment of others
Angela Kaye
@AnngieKayeĀ Ā·Ā 5:00
Go over to Africa, and if you don't like this country, go back there. I mean, that's the same thing that my parents were hearing in the. We are in 2024, and we're still being told that. But our stories are out there. And I think if that man and men like him really knew our stories, okay, because we didn't grow up in a tent, and that's not even how people in Africa grow up. But that's just the thing
Swell Team
@SwellĀ Ā·Ā 0:15
Michael Knight
@MK1981Ā Ā·Ā 4:09
I'm definitely with you on that. We need to love each, like, love ourselves more. And again, it's not to say that, like, I even believe in us segregating from the greater american community because we are Americans, essentially, but it's like every other group is allowed to have a culture onto themselves that no one fucks with. Again, if you were a jewish person, you have a culture onto yourself that no one tries to infiltrate and dictate how you do things
Michael Knight
@MK1981Ā Ā·Ā 4:01
And there's a lot of indian refugees or indian people that went there and settled years ago that made her want to go. And it's funny that it took her to convince me, because I'm thinking all the things, the negative things I've been told about Africa growing up. You don't want to go there. It's war torn. It's horrible. The people are starving. It's bad. And don't get me wrong, there's poverty there
Angela Kaye
@AnngieKayeĀ Ā·Ā 3:39
And much like your wife, I think a lot of people don't realize, first of all, how huge the continent Africa is. But how huge, how diverse and how beautiful it mean. That's why I personally don't call myself an African American. It's where the continent is so diverse and choose. I can guess that we might be from the west, but that's a huge guess considering that there are many people my skin tone who were here before the first slave ships even landed
Erica Jean
@HeyItsEricaĀ Ā·Ā 4:00
You. Hey, Anne and 79th street, thank you so much for your contributions. I decided to reply to the both of you because I heard both of your responses, and it is very burdensome and sad to keep flaying open our skins and revealing these stories just to prove to people that we are human. I think when you look at it like that, it is a sob story, because I think, in answer to my own question, no, I don't think there will be healing
Erica Jean
@HeyItsEricaĀ Ā·Ā 2:51
I've always been vocal about that because, yes, we can appreciate each other's culture and styles. I don't have ownership to any of that. But let's give credit where credit is due. If I am wearing chopsticks in my head and I am wearing a kimono with a certain design on it, you best believe I'm going to give credit where credit is due if I were to do that, because that's not a part of my culture, but I can show appreciation
Erica Jean
@HeyItsEricaĀ Ā·Ā 2:36
But we definitely have to be careful who's sharing their thoughts about Africa and their motivation and intention may not be pure. So I'm happy that those of us who can are going. And also, the thing about the celebrities, as I mentioned before on here, unfortunately, when it comes to entertainment, that's what we're mostly known for
Tanya Coles
@MsColes77Ā Ā·Ā 3:23
How about understanding your own history and understanding how you got to where you are and why you are where you are? Why not do that? I think a lot of black people don't really know their own history because we've become a lazy generation of people who don't like to do good research. We want to go by what we see on social media. We just take it and run with it. Memes, we take it and run with it
Erica Jean
@HeyItsEricaĀ Ā·Ā 2:45
Deleting and taking away people of the history, that doesn't just do us a disservice, it does every culture a disservice, a great disservice. Because now they're learning about us through social media and television and music. But we are so much more than that. We're so much more than that. I don't believe in being in a separatist society. At the same time, I do recognize and understand that many people do not want us near them and tend to be very vocal about it