This afternoon in Aurora, CO, the amended autopsy report on the death of Elijah McClain was released. The 23-year old Black man was injected with ketamine by paramedics following his restraint by police. McClain was stopped after purchasing a bottle of iced tea at a corner store.
Someone had called the authorities, reporting a Black man wearing a ski mask and waving his arms. According to his family, McClain wore a ski mask due to a blood condition that often left him feeling cold. Police put him in chokehold, applying pressure to his carotid artery and injected with the powerful drug against his will.
Seven minutes later, he went into cardiac arrest. Less than a week later, he was taken off life support and declared dead.
I ask forgiveness in advance of my Black friends and readers, and indeed any African American person reading this, who may experience pain at reading yet another example of this ghastly assault on the humanity of POC, particularly the young men.
This is not intended for you. It's intended for people like me, people who might otherwise have sighed and said, "What a tragedy!" then move on to the next news item.
Every time I leave the house, particularly at night, I'm aware of the privilege of my invisibility—in spite of my queerness, my age, or anything other component part of my most visible identity. I can buy iced tea, or Skittles, anytime I want, at any hour.
I could wear a ski mask if I want to, and if I was stopped by the police, I could clarify my position, perhaps even take the upper hand with a slight change of tone, or a different voice, or a veiled comment about lawyers, or that I have connections in the media. Truth be told, I might not even have to. All I'd have to do is take my ski mask off and let the police see my skin colour.
For now, I'm haunted by this transcript of Mr. McClain's final words, the vulnerability of him in face of the all-powerful authority figures who ultimately doomed him.
His words break my heart, and, ironically, even the fact that I have the luxury of having my heart broken by the terrible humanity and fragility of those words is, itself, a form of privilege. I can afford to be horrified and appalled instead of feeling what can only be a ghastly, 400-year old unhealed wound, barely bandaged by an awful sort of familiarity—a familiarity I can only imagine, but never claim to truly know.
No community should have to absorb tragedy after tragedy in the hopes that it effects change. And the job of the change shouldn't be on them— it should be on us.
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