I love the idea of knowing who are the good people and who are the bad people.

But here’s the thing. The safety pins don’t really do the trick. Because a wolf can also wear sheep’s clothing.

When I’m distressed, I want to know that ANYONE is available to help me, not just the people who are wearing an actually dangerous accessory. To think that I as a woman of color need to “seek” the few safe people in this world is sad to me.

I won’t seek anyone out. I would hope that people have the decency to be good neighbors.

The pins do nothing for me personally.

These pins are like the cops who play with black children in the inner cities. They give this false sense of reality that #notall but truth is, in life we will encounter more bad than good because it is the bad that grows us.

Why was the pull to eat the forbidden fruit so strong? Because humans are week and we are drawn to things that make us “know more”.

The pins are like white feminists who have actually done a great deal of bad for their black feminists. Because even though you are a woman, and you are a feminist, you still carry a certain amount of privilege black feminists don’t get to be a part of. Feminism for black and whites does not mean equality.

Like…you still think it is “ok” to reach over and touch our hair without permission.

“My body my choice” is what I heard at the rally I went to last Friday. What does that phrase even mean? Yes, in this context it means I can choose to do with my body what I want if I were to get pregnant. But as a black woman, it also means that I have to tell white people who think I’m somehow “exotic” to not reach over and touch my child’s fro.

Because it is my body and my choice of whether I want a man or a woman to give me a hug.

It is my body and my choice of whether I want to wear a skirt out at night or wear a bra during the day. Neither of these decisions equals the right to be raped or assaulted.

I love me some feminists but they can be loaded with their own self in so many ways.

The pin is like saying “because I adopted a child of color, I am not racist“. Haha. In fact, oftentimes the truth is, you adopted a child of color to prove to the world that you were NOT racist when in reality, on the inside you needed proof so you separated a child from their family. So the child was your tool to prove to the world that you are one of the “good” ones.

Wearing the pin is like saying to a person of color  “I’m lgbtqiAA and therefore, I know what it means to suffer.” If you are white, one can’t be dubbed lgbtqiaa unless you dawn a certain apparel. One chooses a specific form of suffering.

No…..be who you are! I am all about that. But don’t use your white queer self’s suffering to minimize the suffering of a person of color-someone who suffers just because they have a different skin color.

Wearing the pin is like saying to a group of inner city kids that they can be as successful as children who go to a 30,000 dollar a year private school. You build up a certain hope in them that is just not real. You teach them to believe that people are out there to help them, when in reality, people are in the race to get ahead, not to be equal.

I was offered a pin when I went to the rally. I was not sure if it was because they didn’t want to exclude me or if they didn’t realize that I am my own ally. Two white people offered me the pin. I took it because hey, I sew, so I love the idea of having an extra safety pin.

Having a pin for safety also means “don’t hurt me, i’m the good guy“. The safety pin seems to be used more for white protection, and fragility than anything else.

They want to stand out, they want to be different they want to show that they are “solid” with the oppressed and yet, like in white liberal feminism, THEY are the problem.

How do we ever become equal if we need things like safety pins? How do we ever become equal if we need proof we are not racist? How do we ever become equal if a wolf can wear the same clothing as a sheep and fool so many?

The Pins. Another way to set yourself apart. Kinda like Supremacy.