It’s not exactly a secret that I opine on holidays and other observances that occur on my regular posting schedule (as well as the occasional event that takes place off of it). So it shouldn’t be a surprise that I’d comment on Juneteenth this year, since the federal holiday takes place on one of the days I would normally post; as such an observance, and one apt to have me close my day-job for the day (I did), it’s the kind of thing that invites remarks from me. But I’m…somewhat hesitant to say much about it (though not completely so, clearly, as the very existence of this post denotes). Not that that should be a surprise, either, given what the holiday represents and who and what I am.
(Please note that I am not in any way saying the observance should not happen or does not deserve to happen. It should, and it does.)
As is fairly common knowledge, or as damned well should be, Juneteenth commemorates the Emancipation Proclamation reaching Texas in force, the perceived end of institutionalized chattel slavery in the United States. On paper, it denotes the formal end of a long section of the history of the country, the formal end of a great wrong that had been perpetrated on generations of people. In truth, slavery continues, as the prison-labor complex shows, and the legacies of slavery continue even aside from the overt reality of it, as far too many things show to recount here and to recount in any place without being subsumed by tears long before the tale is told. So there’s some fraughtness to the observance right there.
More personally, I have to question the extent to which I have any right to mark the day. I close my day-job because the federal government is closed, and many or most banks follow suit; since I work in tax preparation and bookkeeping, both of which rely in large part on both of those, there’s not a lot of point in my spending the money involved in having the office open. That’s a piss-poor reason to do more to mark the day than that, though, even if it deserves a lot more marking that I can offer it.
No, my unease is a result, at least in part, of my recognition that I benefit from the legacies of the systems that were supposedly unmade on the first Juneteenth. I doubt that my family enslaved others (but I am not entirely certain), and I am pretty sure that at least one of my forebears fought for the Union (there’s some physical evidence suggesting such), but that does not mean I don’t enjoy benefits of a system that was built and predicated upon the treatment of people as livestock. What opportunities have not been foreclosed to me because I have the familial heritage I have and not those I don’t, I cannot really say, although I do know there are dangers I do not face because I look the way I do and live where I do. What experiences I have been able to have because others have reacted to the injustices perpetrated upon them, I have a few vague ideas, but I have not had to consider them more closely than I have because I occupy the positions I do.
I have benefited, but I have not had to pay. And there’s not really a way for me to give back those benefits; I cannot undo what has been done, whether for good or for ill (and it has too often and for too many people been ill). Too, there are limits to what I can do to improve matters, moving forward, which I recognize, even as I recognize that my pointing them out and not doing much of anything to address them makes me complicit in some ills, in many ills–but not even pointing them out makes me complicit in yet others.
I’m not trying to excuse myself, to exempt myself from discomfort. I should be uncomfortable, about this and about a lot of other things. I should also let that discomfort spur me to make things better than they are, and not just in the small ways I already do. Whether I am not so much of a coward that I will actually do something, though…
On this day, as on most every other, I’m happy to write on your behalf; fill out the form below to hire my pen!
Elliott RWI 