Eracism Minute 7/15/18 (Pride)

7/15/18 Eracism Minute

Good morning. I’m Lauralee Carbone, here to present a weekly eracism minute, a minute of consciousness-raising on behalf of the BUF Black Lives Matter Ministry Action Team. Eracism is defined as the removal from existence of the belief that one race is superior to another.

I’m going to present a poem by Audre Lorde: a black, feminist, lesbian, warrior, mother, author, poet. In her poem she speaks of intersectionality, the overlapping discrimination of racism, heteronormativism, sexism, ageism, ablism, and classism. See if you can pick all these “isms” out. For clarification, she refers to Nedicks, which is sort of like the Denny’s of the east coast.

Who Said It Was Simple

There are so many roots to the tree of anger

that sometimes the branches shatter

before they bear.

Sitting in Nedicks

the women rally before they march

discussing the problematic girls

they hire to make them free.

An almost white counterman passes

a waiting brother to serve them first

and the ladies neither notice nor reject

the slighter pleasures of their slavery.

But I who am bound by my mirror

as well as my bed

see causes in colour

as well as sex

and sit here wondering

which me will survive

all these liberations.