Clarity (New Year 2021)

Artwork by Jesus Barraza & Melanie Cervantes

In 2021 and beyond we can only hope the picture gets clearer.

We haven’t had a New Year quite as potent as this one in recent memory. A moment of reflection usually reserved for the end of December was the mood for many of us almost all of 2020. A global pandemic, economic collapse, massive unemployment, an oncoming housing crisis, and racial reckoning manifesting into months-long global protests were largely and most notably consumed in isolation. As a result, this was a year marked by reflection. What exactly are we looking at? 

First and foremost, make no mistake, this is a piece about Oscar Grant.

The flip phone footage taken in Fruitvale Station on January 1st 2009 was in 240p. The Bay Area once again weaved itself into the ongoing national and international conversation regarding the Black experience as it exists in a world coded by white supremacy. The imagery in that statement is intentional, as it is an imperative we recognize the ways our individual lives in the present day are bound to history, whether we choose to perceive it that way or not. Second and foremost, make no mistake, this is also a piece about COVID. How do we perceive a life as it lives among us? How do we view that life’s worth while it’s still here? How do we process a life taken? How do we interpret the consumption of that life after it’s lost? Oscar was one of the first, if not the first, lives taken on cell phone footage, in clear view, and whose worthiness of life was then debated on the national stage. Approaching the New Year and the anniversary of his murder, it weaves into the present day in ways we should recognize and reflect on.

iPhone footage taken in Minneapolis on May 25th of this year was in 1080p. Protests that bubbled in every section of the United States then spread across all seven continents. George Floyd’s murder instigated a type of solidarity built on the back of a short but now established history of a murder gone viral and national debate over whether that life mattered. This event, too, is inextricably bound to the debate of who is and isn’t worthy to survive this virus as we lead the world in both COVID cases and COVID deaths. Before COVID we still lead the world in categories having to do with cruelty and murder. When it comes to the value of life, America has always had a very recognizable problem.

We can only hope the entire picture gets clearer.

Oscar Grant was average. Maybe it’s important to point that out. His life, in death, became consumable on multiple levels and his face turned into an icon. He became directed by Ryan Coogler, starring Michael B. Jordan. He became murals physically larger than any of us, and an idea that will live longer than any of us. But he was average, like any of us. Oscar was a son, a brother, a father, and a boyfriend. He was a butcher. As a child he grew up in the church, liked fishing, and playing ball. He was an Oakland kid. He was an 80’s baby. He wasn’t a debate about how much he measured up, what he wore, a dissection of what kind of trouble he got into, no. He was average. Does a Black person need to be a larger than life superhero to meet the standard? 

In 2021 can we see the ways our lives, our everyday average lives, weave together? In the name of what and in favor of who do we have these national debates over which stolen lives mattered? How and why has it extrapolated from one life to thousands a day? What can each of us individuals do to remedy this?

Our New Year’s resolution is more clarity.

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Written by Temba Kamara, RYSE's new Communications Manager. He has a deep passion for storytelling, particularly stories that illuminate the most vulnerable. He was born in early 90's War On Drugs era Washington D.C. to Ugandan & Mozambican parents, lived in mid-90's post-apartheid South Africa & was raised in late 90's Dot Com Boom San Francisco in its early stages of gentrification. He believes language, the command over our narrative, is where liberation starts. Stay tuned on our blog & social media channels for more of his contributions in 2021.

As we approach November 26th and prepare to engage with a version of history rooted in disinformation, it is worth our time to explore what disinformation does. RYSE member, Stephanie, recently put together a presentation highlighting Indigenous people, Indigenous Peoples’ Day, and the facts of their story that combat an age-old disinformation campaign perpetuating various forms of violence against them to this day.

November 26th in the time of COVID hits a little different. Sure, there’s got to be something to say about a virus killing our most vulnerable and willfully spread by those marked with greed, white supremacy, and a colonizer mentality. But disinformation weaponized as a play for power seems like a serendipitous topic to engage with as we approach this day. It is the ultimate weapon, which causes ultimate harm. This is a time when our country is reckoning with its own mis-told history and this mis-telling inspires violent action out of those adamant on maintaining the myth. The United States’ experience with COVID is significantly more painful due to a disinformation campaign that inspired people not to engage with reality.

So on this day it is important for us to think about this country’s history of warping reality, the ways in which we, the vulnerable, have always combatted this, and the ways we can continue to do so. Something as simple as changing a Thanks-Giving to a Thanks-Taking asserts reality and our first line of defense as the vulnerable is to make sure we get the story straight.

But Stephanie can explain the rest. Click on the image below to view her presentation.