As a white person raised in a white supremacist society, you’re gonna fuck up sometimes. That’s just a fact. But racialized people often aren’t able/comfortable speaking up when y’all do some shit because of the power imbalance/not feeling up to educating when you may be resistant/don’t think the “fight” will be Worth It.

Show initiative without making it A Struggle or playing the white guilt card. Show you actually care about them, their struggles, and the way you interact with them BEFORE they have to have a bigger Conversation with you, beyond when they need to yell about someone else being racist.

#Repost @gogreensavegreen

You might be more than one. You might be different ones at different times. 🫶🏽🫶🏽 you might not be one of these. There are more roles 💪🏽 but this is an amazing intro.

You can’t just like the idea and envision yourself in one of these roles you have to figure out how to be about it ♥️🫶🏽

Black trans women aren’t monolithic; there are black trans women who are super badass and high femme but there are also black trans women who are butch, who are punk, who are a nerdy girl who hasn’t gone outside in weeks just like how white trans women are.

Ever wonder why trans memes only ever feature white girls? And rarely feature black girls? I certainly know a few black trans women who would love memes for them. It doesn’t need to be about the black experience to be for black trans women. You can have your little puppygirl memes with a black girl, they don’t need to be consigned to memes about natural hair or locs or racism or rap music.

Black people exist beyond the confines of anti-racist talking points. Black trans women exist beyond the confines of transfeminist talking points. If you don’t personally know any black trans women, analyze why that might be; are you making your presence a safe and comfortable place to rest for black trans women that you KNOW face tons of hardship? Or do you not care about actually giving them a safe harbor in your company and instead only care to use them as a cudgel in arguments.

in response, however, is a similar tokenization of queer and black palestinians in passing mentions of centuries old afro-palestinian communities, screenshots from queeringthemap, or reposts of cishet gazans being nice to western queer activists. it's as if there mere image of these communities and moments of solidarity is supposed to erase the real ways black and queer gazans are marginalized, or worse, "prove" that palestinians deserve to live because they aren't bigoted.

lost in the discussion of hypothetical genocide victims' personal bigotry are the lives of the real victims themselves. we have to realize that we've been centering cishet and nonblack gazans in our discourse and this has bled into our solidarity efforts.

in the pity economy (coined by yazan mohammed), black people are not worthy of compassion, so people scroll by when black gazans ask for donations. i swear i have never seen a single black gazan gofundme account without at least one post talking about how nobody wants to donate to them because of their race.

this is not a new thing either. we just passed the 20th anniversary of hurricane katrina where displaced black people were demonized and prevented from receiving aid, and even now black fundraisers on tumblr frequently go months without a donation even as white people (and ao3) double and triple their donation goals.

in the pity economy, queer people in the global south cannot even participate. there is a certain mold of a pitiable queer person on the internet, and it's usually a white trans midwesterner. it's not a queer palestinian of any kind.

westerners don't even know how to conceptualize a queer person of color outside of hypotheticals. queerness itself is still seen as a western concept, so the existence of queer gazans frustrates the pitiable image of themselves gazans otherwise have to advertise online in order to survive.

people shouldn't have to deal with this shit online just to avoid death.

don't just talk about black and queer palestinians - donate to them!

bridge of solidarity, a project started by an 18 year old poet that has gained popularity for its anti-capitalist refusal to participate in the pity economy, sees through the bullshit. it recently started a dedicated fund for black and queer gazans to receive a monthly stipend. this is going to be huge for queer people who cannot out themselves on the internet and for black families who are being systemically ignored, even by the broader palestine solidarity movement.

if you want to contribute to this fund, DM @bridge.of.solidarity on instagram and tell them you specifically want to support queer and black community members. as of right now, they are 10% of the way to their $22,000 goal for this project.