I created this blog to further the discussion and collective wisdom on a variety of non profit management issues, but today I want to do something a bit different. Because while it’s true that I am a non profit management consultant, I am that because at my core, I am an advocate for the downtrodden, the underdog, the ignored, and the underserved. I have spent my career trying to make the world a better place for victims, for the homeless, for underserved children, for minority communities and for the larger community.
The Trayvon Martin murder feels very personal to me. He could have been one of my Club kids; he
could have been one of my friend’s kids, under a different type of discrimination,
he could have been one of my kids.
My heart is breaking over Trayvon Martin’s death; over the seemingly dozens or hundreds or thousands of
other cases like it; over the parents who have to teach their children how to
move through the world as African Americans and over the children that have to
learn that lesson. It is breaking for
the African American men across the county who think it’s their job to make
other people feel safe, and for the people who feel afraid simply because of
someone’s skin color (or faith, or ethnicity or whatever makes us “other”). It is even breaking for the people who are
ignoring this case because they think it doesn’t apply to them, because we all
know that tomorrow it may.
Mostly, my heart is breaking because we can’t protect our
children.
When I worked in the Boys & Girls Clubs movement, I talked
about changing the way our children perceive their place in the world and how the
world perceives our children; I am still talking about that today.
Since Trayvon’s infuriating, tragic, senseless death, I have found
myself continuing to search for a way forward for our country. For a way to let this loss be our line in the
sand and the place we say no more.
We are not moving forward fast enough when it comes to addressing
the issues of race in this country. We cannot
stand by while more people cower and more sales clerks leer and one more child
bears the burden of racial injustice.
We cannot bury any more children.
