Good Black News is grateful to brilliant young woman Zyda Culpepper Mellon for taking the time to put her thoughts and feelings on current events sparked by the brutal killings of Ahmaud Arbery and George Floyd into words and sharing her spot-on, heartfelt and timely message.
Mellon’s video appeared first on Facebook three days ago and has started going viral. Now, with her permission, Good Black News is sharing it directly on our site.
Mellon’s labor not only educates and challenges those who need it, it offers a tool to those who are struggling to find the words to say to white colleagues, friends and family while dealing with so much anger and trauma:
Three people we have recently witnessed dying violently, people who died solely because as African Americans, their lives are not valued in this country.
Tragically, this horror is not new. Arbery, Taylor and Floyd are now part of a sickeningly long chain of Black people in the United States to lose their lives to systemic racism, brutality and hate.
“African Americans face harmful mental health effects every time high-profile incidents of racism and police brutality go viral,especially when little changes in the aftermath.”
Combined with a global pandemic, healthcare disparities and a financial crisis, African Americans are currently coping with exponential levels of trauma that will likely not dissipate any time soon.
So what can we do to protect ourselves as we bear these trying times, especially when community and family gatherings are so severely limited?
Today, Dena offers a six-minute “Power Shot” with guiding words and an exercise to help release and transform trauma into energy to fuel us forward. Watch:
