I ran, officer, because I look exactly like the faces of dead teenagers and adults I’ve seen on the news, on posters at protests, and on little alters to the dead in my neighborhood. I ran on the outside chance that I was faster than you and that my speed could help me avoid this: an arrest I did nothing to earn and a public humiliation in front of my friends, rubber-necking strangers, and the millions of people I’ve never met who will watch this video online.
I ran because I do not trust you, sir. I do not trust that you will look at me, recognize me for a 15-year-old child, and talk to me as adults ought to talk to children, with reserve and understanding. I do not trust that when you came here today your goal was to uncover the truth and let me go home to my family. I ran because when you came here today it was relatively clear that your intention was to round up the disturbing elements in this neighborhood, namely me.
You see, officer, I ran because I am a target in this country. I am, as Langston Hughes said, the darker brother. I ran because no matter how many centuries people like me have lived in this country, I am still a threat just because my skin is brown. It does not matter to you or your partners that there are millions of people who look just like me in this country who are not threats. I ran because even the historical and popular presences of Langston Hughes, Nikki Giovanni, Neil DeGrasse Tyson, Will Smith, Steph Curry, and Lebron James don’t mean shit to you. I ran because even if I had been walking around in this neighborhood in a three-piece suit with a Harvard degree taped to my back you would have still wrestled me to the ground. Running was the only alternative because at the age of 15 I knew it wouldn’t even cross your mind to approach me calmly and with the assumption that I may, in fact, have a side of this story to tell.
That’s why I ran. Because even in my most vulnerable state, as clearly a child as I’ll ever be, barefoot and in a bathing suit, frolicking at a pool, you cannot see me. You see someone I am not. You see not just an adult, but a superhuman threat here to disturb the peace and somehow taint the innocence of these other children, these REAL children with their white skin and their right to innocence and fun.
N. Young is currently living in New Orleans. When she’s not working hard on education policy, she can be found cooking, laughing, rooting for the Gamecocks, brunching, reading, eating red gummi bears, or jamming out to Stevie Wonder (in no particular order).
N. Young – who has written 14 posts on Collected Young Minds.