Mentee Spotlight: "When will our pain be heard?"

Mentee Spotlight: “When will our pain be heard?”

A young woman of color is wondering why so many things are going on in life right now with people of color like her: Why must we present ourselves a certain way to not be stopped by the police? Why do we get judged for how we dress, and look suspicious because of our clothing gear? Why do we make some people feel threatened and their fear makes them want to harm us? How could you base a person off their skin color? Us Black people fought all our lives and are still fighting because of a skin color we never chose to be born with. We bleed the same just as everyone else. I believe Black people are still in slavery. It never ended. The system just changed the ways of slavery exists. It’s sad that “ traditional slavery” ended and yet we’re still fighting for our rights. We’re still being killed or treated poorly. When will it all stop ? When will our pain be heard? Women of color are dying in hospital beds after giving birth because doctors were not listening to them. We need more Black people in the system, in the hospitals. Not just any Black person though. We need the Black people who want to help people like them, treat everyone equally and make a change, we should move in silence to make this change. Black people need to come together also and not be against each other and help each other. Unfortunately we’re always going to have to fight. We are in a country who doesn’t even acknowledge us but make it seem like they do, or sometimes they make it clear that they don’t. I’m hurting from the pain I see in families’ eyes from the news of their relatives, innocent Black people, getting murdered by police. It scares me honestly. There clearly needs to be a complete change. Humans should not treat each other differently because we come from different backgrounds. We can all go through the same situations, no one is better than anyone just because we’re in higher places or even doing better than others. We shouldn’t look down upon each other. We must use different ways to be heard through our problems and not use any type of violence.