By Sikivu Hutchinson
They came to the Tops grocery store in Buffalo to do the
everyday ordinary rituals that are the unseen backbone of Black families and
communities everywhere; Sunday food shopping across generations. Quick trips
for a certain dinner or dessert item. Showing care in an environment that is
often the preserve of women entrusted with cooking day in and day out. Giving shout
outs to familiar faces in an establishment that was hard
fought and hard won due to racial segregation and legacies of
anti-blackness. Moments later, this normalcy was shattered, their lives snuffed
out by a white predator terrorist who had methodically plotted to massacre
Black folks on social media for months.
These beloved family and community members are
being grieved and celebrated by African
American communities across the nation, reeling from the unspeakable pain and trauma
of unrelenting anti-blackness. As Jillian
Hanesworth, Buffalo’s poet laureate, said
recently, “So many people hate us just because we exist, and we experience
that at different levels on a daily basis. We can't let society gaslight us
into thinking that there's no racism.”
The terrorist pulled the trigger, but the ten
Black massacre victims are also victims of the white supremacist nationalist
hate propaganda and NRA regime relentlessly promoted by the GOP. Their blood is
on its hands.
Pearl Young was a substitute teacher and ran a food
pantry. Celestine Chaney was a grandmother and a breast cancer survivor. Aaron
Salter was a security guard, a former Buffalo police officer and a hero who tried
to stop the murderer. Robert Drury was a caregiver to a brother who had
leukemia. Deacon Heyward Patterson provided transportation to folks who needed
to get to the store. Margus Morrison was a bus aid. Geraldine Talley was an
avid baker and mom. Andre Mackniel was a dad, brother, and uncle who was simply
there that afternoon to buy his three year-old son a birthday cake. Katherine “Kat”
Massey was a longtime activist-journalist
and member of the Black women’s
group, “We Are Women Warriors”. She was also a former block club president and
prolific letter writer. Massey worked tirelessly to improve her Cherry
Street neighborhood. As a result, the
community has a mural and tree plantings in its front yards. Last year, she
wrote
a letter calling for more gun control in her community. She highlighted the
deadly role that ghost guns and illegally trafficked firearms played in the
uptick of neighborhood shootings. In the same letter, she ironically decried
the overemphasis on universal background checks and assault weapons bans, which
she viewed as a less effective remedy for urban gun violence. She also alluded
to the fact that fear and anxiety over the imminent threat of gun violence in Black
neighborhoods is a form of normalized trauma.
In this social media
warped culture of instant gratification, letter writing has become a lost art. Massey’s
letter writing ranged from spotlighting social justice issues to her favorite
television shows. Her friend and fellow
community activist Betty Jean Grant noted that, “She was in love with the community and she loved Black
people. She would fight for anybody, without a doubt.” Massey was part
of a long tradition of Black women activist-journalists who built on Ida B.
Wells’ legacy of leadership and service. These elders from the “race women” generation
are more invested in giving back by mentoring younger writers than in seeing
their latest piece go viral on social media. Indeed, as more local print papers die on the
vine, writing for regional publications like Massey did is also a figment of
the past.
Since the massacre, there
have been renewed calls for tougher gun legislation, as well as crackdowns on and
surveillance of white supremacist groups. The terrorist murderer spewed his
racist “replacement theory” shit manifesto and shared his horrific plans with
others on Twitch, Discord, and 4chan. He is part of a long line of white supremacist
terrorists who have effectively been given carte blanche due to the passivity
of the federal government, the stranglehold the NRA has on gun control, the influence
of de facto terrorist cells like Fox and Newsmax, and the complicity of social
media corporations who aid and abet terrorist hate by looking the other way. Gun
legislation and penalties for terrorist hate groups are critical to redressing
this nightmare, but there must also be continued pushback
against right wing efforts to dismantle anti-racist education. These racist,
sexist, homophobic and transphobic views on the Internet are emblematic of the
erasure of BIPOC, queer and women’s history that K-12 youth encounter every day.
Citizen journalist Katherine
Massey and all of the other Black women and men who were ripped from us at Tops
last week were the oft unheralded movers and shakers who power our communities
through their kindness, compassion, empathy, and sense of “ubuntu” or shared
humanity and collectivity. A sick white terrorist lyncher will never be able to
negate that.
Verified
donor contributions to the families of the victims can be made here.
Donations to the family of Andre Mackniel, who leaves behind a three year-old
son, can be made here.
