9:00AM
It is a time of tremendous fear. Many of us around the world are afraid to leave our homes, afraid we’ll contract the virus, afraid we’ll lose our jobs, afraid we’ll give the virus to someone else, afraid we’ll lose our homes, afraid we won’t have enough to eat, afraid we’ll be stuck in the same house with the people that assault us, physically and emotionally, afraid that we won’t get out of this alive or if we do, we’ll be so badly hurt that we won’t recognize ourselves.
Now take this and add it to all the fears that we had before. The fear of not being enough, the fear of losing our loved ones, the fear of not trusting that other people care about us.
I spoke with a friend yesterday about the murder of that jogging human and she seemed to get really afraid. She told me that two white police officers waved at her the other day and she didn’t wave back, afraid that any sudden movement from a black woman could trigger some adverse response. She talked about how if she were pulled over in the car and had a bee on her nose, she would let the bee sting her rather than make some sudden movement and trigger the cop into a deadly response. She talked about the pain. She talked about the fear.
Many people already feared the police, already feared the government, already feared the authorities. Imagine having that fear and then a pandemic strikes. That fear doesn’t go away, it just adds to the heightened fear of the pandemic. Now, these people are supposed to trust the people telling them to stay in their houses? They don’t believe the police or government care about them. Why would they believe what they’re saying?
I believe, for many of us, our relationship with the public institutions that are supposed to protect has broken. We feel so distant, so disconnected from the people who are supposed to have our backs. We don’t trust the people, we don’t trust the rules, we don’t trust the future.
I believe this needs to change. I believe that we need to repair this relationship, that we need to rebuild the trust and rebuild the love between the civil servants and the civilians. For the public officers and the public to come closer together.
Each side will probably say it begins with the other. “They need to apologize to me!” I don’t know where it begins. I just believe that it must begin. We must begin to rebuild our trust in each other, our belief that the other person cares about us. Our belief that we care about them.
I believe we need this now more than ever.
9:10AM
