A call for a serious discussion to answer an age-old question. Black people are beyond tired to the bone. Our fatigue of playing the citizenship game goes all the way to the marrow.
A View From the Battlefield by Jamala Rogers —
2025 was a challenging year for people of African descent under the MAGA regime. Our immediate future also looks pretty bleak. We are coming to grips with a sobering reality: our history of being kidnapped and enslaved, along with the tenuous experiment called democracy, has us cornered. The two warring identities of being Black and American have taken an immeasurable toll on us. It’s time to assess the challenging crossroads that Black folks currently face and engage in a thoughtful discussion about our options. And we do have options.
Black people have remained loyal and patriotic to America for centuries, enduring extreme brutality, an unpredictable existence, and uncertain futures. No matter what we have accomplished, what we have sacrificed, and what we have endured, it has never been enough. Although there have been celebratory moments in our history regarding the enjoyment of American rights and privileges, these instances have been fleeting and are becoming increasingly infrequent.
For too long, we have played a losing game to achieve full citizenship and have our human rights respected. The goal posts keep moving. The bar keeps rising. The rules keep changing or are thrown out altogether. The double standards for whites and non-whites – written and unwritten – have been disappointing reminders of our elusive status. Black people are beyond tired to the bone. Our fatigue of playing the citizenship game goes all the way to the marrow.
Black people have worked hard to dispel the racist myths of being lazy, cowardly, and intellectually inferior. Debunking the lazy label is a no-brainer. Under chattel slavery, we worked from sunup to sundown with no pay for some three hundred years. The rise of the U.S. as a global superpower would not have been possible without the free and damn-near free labor of Black people. The wealth of former slaves has continued to be stolen, not just through labor, but also through land, homeownership, and intellectual theft.
Black people have demonstrated our bravery with every act of U.S. military service. Crispus Attucks, a runaway enslaved man, was the first casualty of the American Revolution, taking two musket balls to the chest. We have been taking bullets ever since, from the Buffalo Soldiers to the 365th Infantry Harlem Hellfighters to the Tuskegee Airmen to the 761st Tank “Black Panthers” Battalion to the 555th Parachute Infantry “Triple Nickels.” The Double Victory campaign was launched in 1942 to expose the fight against fascism abroad and the racism at home. The long and courageous military service has never guaranteed our citizenship.
White segregationists denied us access to public and private businesses and spaces, insisting that we create our own. In response, industrious and determined Black communities built thriving, self-sufficient neighborhoods, only to become targets of envious racial violence that devastated our generational wealth and perpetuated racial inequities for the future. Notable examples include the Black Wall Street in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and Rosewood, Florida, both of which were burned to the ground. Additionally, established Black neighborhoods, such as Seneca Village, were seized to make way for Central Park in New York City. Successful areas like Mill Creek Valley in St. Louis were destroyed in the name of urban renewal. Interstate highways were deliberately constructed through neighborhoods such as the Hayti District in Durham, North Carolina, and Jackson Ward in Richmond, Virginia. We must never forget prosperous Black towns like Oscarville, Georgia, which was intentionally submerged under Lake Lanier.
Black people are profiled in countless ways as they strive to achieve the American dream. Whether it’s driving, shopping, jogging, banking, breathing, gardening, laughing, worshipping, or more, you can fill in the blank with various verbs: _______ while Black. These perceived encroachments on white privilege and sense of security have unleashed attacks on Black bodies by white citizens and white extrajudicial groups. We have witnessed the break from male exclusivity with the social phenomenon of “Karen,” the self-appointed white woman who challenges the movements of Black people.
The ideology of white supremacy has effectively allowed white individuals to commit acts of violence against Black people with little fear of consequences. We have endured violence from the military, the police, the Ku Klux Klan, security guards, vigilante groups, and other self-proclaimed defenders of white supremacy. The maiming and murdering of Black men, women, and children are often deemed justifiable, resulting in little to no punishment or accountability for those responsible.
Blaxit is real. Sources have estimated tens of thousands of Black folks have left the U.S. and aren’t looking back. When beloved recording artist Stevie Wonder received his Ghanaian citizenship, many of us shared his joy vicariously. Some of us may have secretly wished we were in his shoes, longing for a country that received us with open arms. Some of us are leaving the U.S. for safety, others for genuine opportunities. Most are leaving because they are simply tired of justifying and defending their existence daily.
The 1619 Project laid out our case in vivid and uncomfortable ways. The well-documented project fell short of addressing whether full and unconditional citizenship for Black people will ever be achievable in America. We have the receipts. Now it’s time to determine our own future and residency based upon our reality, rather than on the litany of empty promises and temporary rights enshrined in laws with expiration dates.
Source: BlackCommentator.com
