TW: mentions of murder, white supremacy, violence.

This week's opening thought, for people of pallor: With everything that has transpired in Minneapolis, Minnesota, it is clear to me that people of pallor are so deeply entrenched in systems of white supremacy and the privilege they receive from them that even their "activism" is swaddled in blankets of white supremacy.

Over the past few days, I've seen y'all saying things like, "This isn't what America stands for", and what's happening is "unprecedented" and that nothing like this has ever happened before. Some of y'all are out here saying wild things like you miss "regular" police brutality. Throngs of people of pallor are calling for Kristi Noem's impeachment and quoting and resharing things from every Black activist and scholar they can find to frame their "this is our moment" narrative and it's equal parts hilarious, infuriating, and banal because it's so obvious that y'all have no clue how to react when the systems that were built to elevate, protect, coddle, and gas you up are being utilized to oppress and kill you if you don't "comply" and get back to being docile.

Y'all are lost right now. Y'all don't know what to do with yourselves because you've grown accustomed to those you've oppressed saving and guiding you to a place where you can continue to feel safe in the cocoon of white supremacy while engaging in, at best, beginner-level activism against the system that has protected you most of your life. Y'all fully expected Black and Brown folx, Black women, Indigenous folx to save y'all and continue getting beaten and killed for your comfort and safety. But we're not stepping in to "lead" you right now because we're taking care of our own. And now y'all are left to figuring out how to mobilize and create plans of action on your own because y'all obviously have learned nothing from us over hundreds of years of us fighting for basic rights and survival and us writing books and teaching y'all how to fight. So now y'all are barely weeks and months into fighting the oppressors and I can see that most of y'all are already lost, already exhausted, and growing increasingly angry at us for leaving you to see how "fun" it is to dismantle YOUR systems of oppression with no collective assistance.

Here's some facts for you:

This is EXACTLY what (the United States of) America stands for.

This moment is only "unprecedented" for people of pallor. There's a few newer twists at play, but versions of this have been happening to Black, Brown, and Indigenous folx, and most communities of color, for centuries on this stolen land. The murder, the oppression, the gaslighting? It's been happening. It just wasn't happening to YOU.

And you only want to go back to "regular" police brutality because it allows you not to feel the inhumanity of the systems that support you when you "behave."

You want us to be fully in this moment with y'all and not focused on just protecting our own and working toward our own liberation and safety?

Then keep your "hot takes" to yourselves.

Save and channel your anger toward upending our mutual oppressors.

Get yourselves prepared for what melanated folx have been trying to get y'all to prepare for and get on board with for hundreds of years.

Show us something that compels us to believe that we should stand by your side against our common oppressors for the long and exhausting battles ahead.

Or put some seasoning on your face for the leopards and wait for them to come to a neighborhood near you.

The choice is yours.

Sad thing is, most of y'all have already made your choice.

[Image description: a screenshot of a person of pallor saying, "Can we just go back to regular police brutality, please?" followed by a Black woman responding with "Ahh yes the kind only Black and Brown folx wsere subjected to, right? Girl, delete this."]