I remember, really recently, a quote from Ta-Nehisi Coates (and don’t worry; I see the immense irony in my quoting a Marvel misleader like him) that even for all of my contempt for the Black Misleadership Complex in liberal politics, has still been sitting with me, chewing at me for a long minute; and it’s not for a lack of framework.
I know there are Black outfits out here actually trying to get on one accord and properly form up for us; but I was looking for a decade; only spending up more and more time and patience tryna organize with “lemme-talk-over-you”-assed crackers. And we’re only like ten percent of the population at best. So when I think about how long it took me to find folks I could unabashedly align myself with, then I look at the shit Coates was saying, my marrow runs cold.
“I have a deep-seated fear that the Black struggle will ultimately, at its root, really just be about narrow Black interest."
That’s where my mind goes, every time I see a Black face trying to harangue a vote for Harris anymore. Whenever I see a Black body, shrieking that ‘voot bloo no mater whoo’ slogan like a true believer, that’s the record spooling up in the mind palace. That we’ll never see liberation as long as a fraction of us continue to aspire to the capitalist’s brass ring. As long as they’re trying to edge each other for the White man’s chair; and trying to browbeat us back under the Big Tent™, I don’t think we’ll ever get around this bend in the river.