I remember sitting in the school cafeteria during my last year at the University of Western Ontario in 2014. As usual, the space was noisy and full. My friends and I stood near the exit so that we could hear each other speak and, like many of our peers, we were talking and laughing — loudly. But unlike them, who were mostly white, we were being watched.

It was as if time slowed down; the people in line for food all turned to stare at us with looks of concern and annoyance. On the other side of the room, several students looked up from their phones and conversations, gazing blankly. “I think people are watching us,” I said to my friends. But we already knew. As black women, being stared at in public for expressing a form of joy — whether in conversation with friends or alone — is so common that, well, it’s surprising when it doesn’t happen. But there was something different about it that time. It was that our presence, a large group of black women, was made to feel unwelcome. I didn’t just feel judged; I sensed fear.

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Five months later, in Florida, Michael Dunn was sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole for shooting and killing Jordan Davis, a 17-year-old high schooler, who wouldn’t turn down the Lil’ Reese song playing in his friend’s SUV. In August 2015, a book club of 10 black women (including an 83-year-old grandmother) was kicked off a Napa Valley Train tour after they were deemed to be laughing too loud.

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Around the same time, Peter Toh of Toronto’s AfroFest, an annual celebration of Afro-diasporic arts and culture, received an email from the City notifying him that its usual two-day permit would be canceled. The free outdoor festival, which has been running for 27 years and attracts over 100,000 visitors, would be forced to downsize to a single day for reasons involving time limits. But there was also another message buried in the City’s response: AfroFest was too loud.

Over the past two years, I’ve watched as black people have been silenced, arrested, and even killed for the noise they make. Black people aren’t more or less loud than anyone else, and yet the noise we make is feared, scrutinized, and made public. Understanding why there’s such a sensitivity — and fear — of black noise is a complex and intricate question that doesn’t supply a simple answer.

Source: https://t-tees.com
Category: WHY