Grieving for an Illusion
By Tara Ebrahimi, Director of Communications, Women Unite!
“It is not a dream of motor cars and high wages merely, but a dream of social order in which each man and each woman shall be able to attain to the fullest stature of which they are innately capable, and be recognized by others for what they are, regardless of the fortuitous circumstances of birth or position.”
-James Truslow Adams, 1931
As children, we are told that if we work hard enough, we can be whatever we want to be. That if we put our mind to it, we can reach our goals and alter the outcomes of our lives. It is only now, after living 35 years--my whole life--in this country, that I see this ethos for what it truly is: the ultimate gaslighting of the American people.
Many people point to the COVID-19 pandemic as the great ravager of our social, political, and economic systems, but this is a naive and privileged perspective. Others believe the crisis has simply highlighted just how broken our systems have always been. This, too, is incorrect. The systems in place in the United States function exactly as they were intended to function: to ensure that the concentration of wealth remains in the hands of a few, to keep people of color impoverished and marginalized, and to indoctrinate us all that our individual fortunes rise and fall in direct correlation to hard work, integrity, and perseverance.
But there is no amount of hard work, integrity, and perseverance that will level out the inequities faced by people of color. They permeate every aspect of life--from employment to health to housing to the justice system.
As the unemployment rate skyrockets, it is Black Americans who will bear the brunt of the economic fallout. Before the pandemic hit, the median net worth of Black families was $17,600, compared with $171,000 for white families (The Guardian April 2020). Meanwhile, we continue to hear stories about multi-billion dollar companies receiving federal assistance through the COVID-19 stimulus packages, while small businesses owned by people of color are systematically being excluded from the Paycheck Protection Program. The Center for Responsible Lending reports that there is a 95% likelihood for Black business owners to be denied by a mainstream bank for assistance. Lost wages from coronavirus closures are felt far more acutely in Black and Latinx neighborhoods due to the high percentages of these populations living paycheck to paycheck, working jobs that don’t even cover basic needs (New America 2020).
Employment and income are of course tied to health outcomes. In April 2020, 70% of the deaths in Chicago from COVID-19 were Black residents, even though Blacks make up only 29% of Chicago’s population (WBEZ 2020). According to the Chicago Tribune, there are more than 370 confirmed cases of coronavirus in the primarily Black neighborhood of Englewood in Chicago; in comparison, the mostly White River North neighborhood has fewer than 100 confirmed cases.
I could go on and on. I could discuss incarceration rates and the ways in which Black people are imprisoned at higher rates than Whites for the exact same crimes. I could cover the disparities in health insurance coverage. I could talk about the education gap, housing instability, police brutality, and every other component of life under the sun. Because there is not one area of our modern life where an enormous--and growing--chasm does not exist between people of color and White people.
But to me, what is so insidious, so utterly despicable, is not just these systems and structures that are in place to feed this divide, it is the ridiculous assertion that climbing out of poverty and overcoming injustice is in the hands of the individual. That this country provides opportunities equally, and it is a failing on the part of each person who can’t pull themselves up through the rungs of society. One group has a ladder, the other is climbing a sheer surface covered in grease.
I keep hearing, over and over, the phrase “when things get back to normal.” We are longing for something that only existed for a percentage of the population. If “normal” means that the color of your skin determines your education, employment, the number of years you live, then we need to reexamine everything we’ve told ourselves about who we are as a nation, speak truth into the myth and lies woven through the very fabric of this promised land, and completely break normal and reimagine it anew.
Illustration by Laura Callaghan.
