Safe House

I’m sharing this again with a special dedication to those of us who are strangely fixated on “The Africa They Don’t Show You.” Even without going full pretentious writer with the “let me deconstruct real quick,” I’m really just curious…what exactly is it that we’re trying to prove? That brunch cocktails taste the same in Osu as they do in DuPont Circle? (It’s also possible that in addition to my writerly concern, I’m a little salty because my bank account says I can’t afford brunch in either of those places.)

But again, I ask, what are you trying to prove? To who? And why do you think they care? That our swimming pools gleam with the same kind of blue as that one delightful boutique hotel in Portugal? That we too know how to do social inequality with the best of the other “global citizens,” with the right amount of class and an extra healthy offering on Sunday to thank God for all the blessings our parents “worked so hard for?” (I too, used to be one of those people…)

At the same time I know it’s difficult for you to look down at those new suede boots and see that you are using them to stand on someone’s back, or that your penthouse apartments and island getaways are paid for money that a rundown clinic somewhere will never see. We’re all held up by the collar, yes, you too in the Prada, some far more tightly than others, so what can you/are you going to do?

I’m not interested in any kind of “global citizenship” that doesn’t acknowledge how much further a blue passport will carry you than a green one, and why that is (or carrying both, as I do), nor do I want to become numb to the sound of European cars rolling over the hands of “those people would make it too if they studied and worked hard like we did.” Aren’t you horrified? Do you not think you lose little slices of your humanity when you see and treat others as less human too?

I also do not mean to suggest that you deny yourself enjoyment for the good of those whose suffering props up your comfort. After all, one missed club night will not magically redistribute resources and recognize the humanity of every single person across our country. But be responsible. Or rather, be honest with yourself, no matter how much it stings to look at yourself without the veneer of wealth as virtue, virtuous wealth, that you have been wearing all your life.

I want to add that with the following piece, “Safe House,” I imagined the persona I was addressing as a cishet man for various reasons. It’s true that may women who have access to education, healthcare, social status among other resources are able to wield their power in terrible ways. Most of the time though, at least from what I have seen in my short life, this power isn’t enough to remove these women from the reach of what Flora Nwapa’s Efuru recognizes as a “conspiracy,” the patriarchy, quite simply, where men can harm and destroy and somehow evade accountability altogether.

What I’ve been reading;
The Desperate Journey of a Trafficked Girl, The New Yorker
Slavery’s Last Stronghold, CNN
Italy Holds Funeral for 26 Nigerian Women Drowned in the Mediterranean, Reuters