Violence

By Heather Marie Scholl

1a: the use of physical force so as to injure, abuse, damage, or destroy 

Violence is a slippery term, sliding between definitions with the turn of a phrase. Is it the violence in the imagination of white people, or the violence forced upon the bodies of Black people? Can violence be the assault of an object? Or does violence require mourning, trauma? If we label destruction of property as violence does it imbue it with personhood? As if it might bleed when broken, a family of shutters and doors mourning the loss of a window. As objects are given life, does it drain humans of theirs? The lens of humanity focused on these broken shards, shrinking the grief of 400, 600 years - of names, lives, hopes, families, turning into soil. To objects.

And what of the violence in our, white, imagination? An assault; the film playing out in our minds, as we walk past a Black man talking to his neighbor. Certain that violence is around every corner, lurking behind each set of soft brown eyes. The story of our innocence and your violence humming in our ears. 

Stepping across the curb, a plumage of signs, we enter the streets, proud. Exceptional. Not one of them. A violence of denial. We claim our NON-violence. What does it mean to define our lives, our movements, our beliefs in opposition? As NON-violent. How does negation play out? The absence of, like the absence of color is whiteness, the absence of culture is whiteness. A violent negation. The separation of, I am not like you. You are wrong. 

The violence of control emerging under the distancing of peace. Knuckles turning white as we clutch onto beliefs — if we SAID things the right way, DID things the right way then finally we will be heard. Finally, justice will prevail. The arrogance of manipulation.

A movement born of rage. Breaking the control of objects over personhood. Yet how quickly we race to PEACE. Dipping our rags into bleach wiping away the origins. A clean slate, corroding the agony of birth. I hear you beg, plead, demand gentleness from the uniformed officers who moments ago broke a Black child’s ribs. Do these pleads define non-violence? Does the sweetness of white sugar in your voice provide the key to unlocking a soul? Or is it the medicine blinding you. So that even in our pursuit of justice we don’t have to see: everything we know, everything that brought us safety is rooted in violence.

How easily we are able to stand in the innocence of NON-violence, the cruelty of whiteness washed away with righteousness. Rejecting the expressions of anger that make our stomachs turn.

I hear “PEACEFUL PROTEST” shouted drenched with good intentions. My blood turning cold, freezing with the violence of NON-violence. A descendant of pacifists, their legends surrounded me. Those hero’s above expressions of anger. As if cutting off a limb meant moral evolution. Spreading silent judgement, keeping the pedestal firmly planted beneath our feet. A non-violence of missionaries, saving those wretched souls as their homes burned. 

The dance of Martin Luther King JR and Malcolm X illuminates a path. A guide to complexity. How as the battle for Black liberation clicked by, the expansiveness of resistance emerged. Of the symbol of guns and self-autonomy and the power of silence and love. That both could serve a dream of unity. A utopian vision of possibility.

We cannot break these chains with love and tenderness. And we cannot build the lush communities we all deserve without it. The ashes from the fires dance in my eyes, falling to the ground mixing with blood and bone and soil teeming with generations of life. From it; a burned building a headquarters for aid, an abandoned hotel, homes for those left behind. Songs of hope carried in the wind.

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Heather Marie Scholl is a mixed media artist addressing issues of race, gender and trauma. Scholl was a fellow at the Leslie-Lohamn Museum (2019-20) a resident at the James Washington House (2019) and a recipient of a Brooklyn Arts Council Grant (2014). Scholl has explored white women’s roles in white supremacy through her series, Whitework and with Confront White Womanhood, anti-racism education for white women. She held workshops for Women’s March, Columbia University and others. Her work has been written about in i-D magazine, Cosmopolitan, and Slate. (http://www.heathermariescholl.com/)