People along with New York City Council members attend a press conference to call for justice in the February 26 killing of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin in Sanford, Florida, on the steps of City Hall March 28, 2012 in New York City. Martin was killed by George Michael Zimmerman while on neighborhood watch patrol in the gated community of The Retreat at Twin Lakes.
Unfortunately, it's not a secret that racial insensitivity in the guise of a joke, whether the person knows it's insensitive or not, is quite common.
According to Pew Research Center, roughly 31 per cent of Asian adults say they have experienced racial slurs or jokes because of their race or ethnicity since the pandemic. 21 per cent of Black adults experienced the same thing, which is wrong in so many ways.
Last week, I came across a post from a Twitter user who made claims about a professor who expressed racial insensitivity. The post read as the following: "My professor just said, take your hoodie off… you're not going for skittles and sweet tea...I'm speechless."
My professor just said “Take your hoodie off... you’re not going for skittles and sweet tea”..... I’m speechless.— 3/23 👱🏽♀️ (@3/23 👱🏽♀️) 1613430045.0
Just reading this alone was very disheartening and angering because not only is it Black History Month, it poked fun at the unfortunate and unprovoked 2012 death of Trayvon Martin at the hands of George Zimmerman. Martin was wearing a hoodie and only had iced tea and skittles on him when he was killed by Zimmerman.
READ: How can we solve America's education problem?
Being a Black woman, I cannot help but be hyper-aware of how this education system has failed me, in more ways than one.
Trayvon Martin was 17-years-old, going about his day when the neighborhood watch volunteer, George Zimmerman, decided to call the cops on a 'suspicious person'.
Instead of ceasing the racial profiling and listening to the police orders to stop following Martin around, he shot him to death. He was ultimately acquitted for doing this heinous crime under Florida's "stand your ground" law.
Unfortunately, this isn't the first time Trayvon Martin has been at the end of a joke.
A security guard asked a Black bartender for a "Trayvon Martini" cocktail or people selling gun range targets in his likeness, and the list goes on. The way some people have portrayed this young man, downplaying the atrocity that occurred to him, continues to be unnerving.
To make light of a situation that someone endured, especially during a month that is supposed to honor the trials and tribulations of Black people, seems out of touch from the emotions felt in cases of the women and men who have lost their lives at the hands of injustice.
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