Guess Who's Bizzack!

So, I'm back. I need to get back on the mic, but in the meantime, I thought I would write a blog post.  I have made some significant changes in my life.  I've done some inventory on the people in my life and quite honestly, some have done inventory on me. I've met some new friends that truly have my back and recommitted to some old ones.  Today, i was texting back and forth with an old friend.  Our relationship has changed, and i take a large portion of the responsibility for that. For quite sometime I have said one thing and done another, and she has neglected and ignore my feelings so we both bare some culpability (95% mine).  However, she had a 'life-changing experience' (notice the product placement. still available on itunes!) in a recent trip to Europe.  She was there for a noble reason, which is totally in-line with the amazing character she has.  In our text conversation (if you can call it that, it was pretty one way)  she described how she was lusted after by the men in this particular nation because she looked like a native, and these people view themselves as the most beautiful people on earth.  At that moment i got angry. I was not angry with her, or even jealous.  She is beautiful and deserves that attention.  However, it brought me back to my childhood.  I was brought back to watching my sister struggle with her identity and self-esteem, because she could not fit into the popular standard of beauty.  I watched as she would put t-shirts over her head and swing it around as if she had long hair when we played make believe.  I sat with her as she cried because kids at school called her names based on her skin color. I also saw her put chemical perms in her young daughter's hair that burned it out and permanently altered it.  I began to think about the fact that there is not a nation of brown or Black people on earth that thinks "we are the most beautiful people on earth".  That privilege has been robbed from Black and brown people.  I am certain some of you (yeah right, like anyone is reading this lol) are thinking that I shouldn't be angry, or that anger does no good.  You may be correct, but tell me the last time you and you community have been robbed and you didn't get angry?  Also, being robbed for material things is difficult, but imagine being robbed for you self-worth.  Imagine seeing your loved ones struggle and cry about the robbery.  Now, I ask you, as Tupac once eloquently stated "what would you do, if you were me?"  Marcus Garvey asked "where is the Black man's government"?  i would continue that line of questioning and ask, "where can Black folks, male and female, look at themselves in the mirror and around at other Black people and say "we are the most beautiful people on earth"?  I know some people say Black is beautiful.  This statement is often one of political defiance, which is important, but not actual belief.  If you disagree, you are denying the hold colonialism has on our collective psyche. Based on the fact that in this particular European country they throw bananas at Black soccer players and my cousin was approach several times as if she were a prostitute, I told this friend that I thought this nation was racist.  After several moments she responded "Everywhere is racist".