I don’t want to be divisive but I just need to say it: if you’re not black, I don’t think you can truly understand what this feels like.
You can empathize, and god I thank all of you for doing so, but you don’t feel it.
Not in the way every little black kid’s eyes lit up when they realized people who looked like them had a story to show about bordeline ethereal lands that showed them they came from somewhere beautiful, not just from a fucking boat.
Not in the way so many boys and even grown men felt pride swell in their chest at seeing themselves on screen as a powerful king, as a superhero.
Not in the way black girls and women everywhere felt encouraged to wear their hair out the way it grows from their scalp or shaved or threaded or any way they want to— and boys too!
Not in the way every single product of the diaspora, not just in the United States, saw themselves as something better, bigger, than what we’ve been reduced to over the course of history.
Black Panther came when we needed it the most, and Chadwick Boseman did so fucking much in the times before, during, and after the movie came out. He didn’t get dismiss it as “another superhero movie”. He didn’t “put up” with kids wanting to meet their hero, or older people wanting to express their gratitude because “when I was younger, I never thought I’d see someone that looks like me doing that”. He was key in us being able to feel good about ourselves across the board.
Chadick Boseman isn’t a character, and it would be horrendous to reduce him to such, but we can’t ignore the impact of his presence.
I’ve been crying since I woke up at 3AM to 24 texts telling me about the news in some way or another. I went to bed at 9PM last night, an hour before the news broke. I haven’t slept since then, and I don’t think I’ll be able to at any point today, because, y’all. I just can’t stop feeling.
