Fear, not
NEWARK, NJ—Fear not, White supremacy, your justice system was not broken. The verdict is not that Ahmaud Arbery's life mattered, for the pre-trial hearings and trial proceedings confirmed it mattered not. Rather, the verdict says that "Whiteness as power" matters. For only in instances, and I underscore instances, of egregious tortuous actions intersecting at a critical social moment for more than a majority of citizens and necessitating some measure of admission will the system give. Only in such rare moments will it be pushed to allow for an appearance of balance, of empathy, of regard, of humanity. The records by the same system tell us such.
White America. For all your trappings garnered through bloodletting, you rested easily on the night of the verdict, if, for nothing else, so you could cite the next day, the list of things that you're grateful for before the holiday turkey and champagne. The annals of the halls of justice will be thankful for yet another miss of a humanity revolution.
Justice for those without "Whiteness as power" can never be observed when brought before a racialized set of laws inculcated in the social norms and mores. For men like Ahmaud Arbery and the countless Black and Indigenous people slaughtered and characterized as "others" not to be "counted as full citizens," a legal system constructed on "Whiteness as power" cannot serve up equal justice. It is not designed to do so.
The Ahmaud Arbery verdict stands as another indictment of a legal and social system designed to hold power and sway over the very movement of Black bodies in spaces, public and private. A system of laws constructed over 500+ years of colonization, rape, ethnic cleansing, and enslavement of human beings as chattel. A legal and social construct that demands the rearing of White men [and women] to dominate the minds and bodies of non-White designated men, women, and children--those othered--to the point of hunting and slaughter to affirm the denial of their humanity.
White supremacy demands the condemnation of Blackness, and the judicial system so enshrined must act in accordance. For Kyle Rittenhouse to stand in the validation of his actions and to be found righteous is the very historical paradigm that allowed three White men to hunt and slaughter Ahmaud Arbery. These two cases are more alike than they could ever be different: they draw the parallels and truths of this forever fractured society. The justice system served up two verdicts that allow the reveries and dreams of White America to rest without discomfort or distraction. The "Other" America will still be in fear of being hunted and slaughtered because this dynamic hasn't changed.
