JEWsey City Shooting 2019
Yesterday after work, when the sluggish city of new york returns home to their families & comforts of their bed, as we wish our kids sweet dreams to alleviate their fear of the monsters under their bed or the dark spirits in their minds that keeps them up at night, we assure them tomorrow is a new day, while we are plagued by the imminent threat that leaks out our doors.
Our neighbors in Jersey City are grieving, 6 innocent lives are wounded, 3 of them jews, like me, murdered by 2 black Hebrew Israelites who believe our lives are worthless according to their own g-d. The politicians come first, with their fake sentiments of loving one another, while they hide in the comforts of their gated co-ops. With no effort 4 action 2 dismantle hate crimes. Second, comes the tweeters, who point fingers at different living struggles without any empathy for those dead. After the social media frenzy, thirdly comes the neighbors, who feel the actions were well needed to have revenge for their unrecognized wounds, the blood shed never ends.
Month by month, we hear of a new mass shooting, a new targeted population, America continues to run after their pockets than hold each other's hearts. I was working in Fall 2019, at the time of the shooting in a library in Staten Island, with its borough being in such close proximity to Jersey, as if the danger is around the corner. I vented to my supervisor, about the panic I have as a trauma survivor evading violence, and enlightening him about historical antisemitism, although the victims were Hasidic Jews, antisemitism never cares what type of Jew you are in or out of practice, its propaganda machine shanks its teeth into anyone its hunting. My black “liberal” male manager, with all of his bullshit semantics around Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, cut me off, when I was pouring out to him, my imminent fear of sobbing about being targeted next, especially in a republican borough, that is very pro-guns, that I should “man up, have a thick spine, and stop whining” in public for all my other colleagues, and patrons to hear, and as the employee with subordinate power, I am expected to take the verbal bullets, and be motionless of the wide spread violence around me, to shift into being a robot, masking my ancestors pain, and pretend to smile and service all who expects me to be readily available to care for them, and the needs of mine are never considered. We truly die as a people, when we are complacent to all the societal abuse around us, expected to keep our heads down, be silent to comfort whiteness and polite society. Being fed lies by even our faith ministers to just pray, and hope for change to provide an answer for resolutions that need collective input. As an agnostic, prayers and tears never wash away the endless scars, and as a humanitarian, I can’t negate the social justice warrior in me, to stand up and do something, even if everyone around me are politically sleeping, and just allowing the tragic news to wash over us, and flipping the daily reality we absorb in the media around us, and allowing it to slowly kill us all, until heaven forbid we are shot down ourselves spiritually or physically. May we see a day, where our people put our weapons down, and arming our hearts with empathy, where I don’t have to find bullets freely in my local public garden, and republicans defending with twisted reasoning, as to why safeguarding the outpour of assault weapons on our streets, allowing for the present to being another bloody end.