Dominant Narratives Seek to Silence
While we spend the bulk of our thinking and academic research on the way discourse names and shapes, one of the more terrifying aspects of it is that it seeks to silence dissenters.
When we go to the Merriam Webster’s dictionary and define the word, “discourse,” the word’s definition is broken into two parts: the noun and the verb form. To sum it up, according to M-W.com, discourse is simply a systemic act of communication and it is the act of communication. That sounds simple enough. However, this is not the definition that I am going to write about today.
Discourse, according to late philosopher Foucault, is “Systems of thoughts composed of ideas, attitudes, and courses of action, beliefs and practices that systematically construct the subjects and the worlds of which they speak.” Discourse names, defines, shapes, constructs, and imposes. Discourse takes a Black male body, and labels it “criminal.” The black male body is then displayed throughout all of media as “criminal.” The black man with the soul that is attached to such a body is stereotyped daily, treated as a thief when he walks into stores, is run from by white women if they are walking on the same side of the street, and is characterized as a “monster” in waiting rooms by anxious white mothers who do not want their children to sit too close. Discourse marks its victims as “always-already.” The Black man is always-already a criminal. Black women are always-already loud, manly and unfeminine, and generally nasty-acting (how different that definition is from the asexual Mammies of yesteryear).
But discourse does something even more heinous than define, construct, and delineate: it silences.
The controversy surrounding Kaepernick’s kneel is the perfect, unfortunate example of how dominant discourse silences. Kaepernick originally kneeled in order to protest the killing of innocent Black men by the police in various states across the United States. He acted within the limits of the First Amendment and with the approval of members of the United States military. Yet, those who are dominant in America, white men, were outraged. For centuries now, the message to minorities, especially Black people, is that rights are etched in stone for white men and privileges for everyone else. Can you imagine what would have happened if the 2014 standoff at the Bundy Ranch were conducted by Native Americans armed with automatic rifles? Check the history of Wounded Knee.
What if women were to raise their voices in protest of a defining discourse? Often times, they are called “liars,” and told that they are too “loud.” Sexists often silence women by destroying their credibility and trying to control the tone and pitch of the argument. What do tone and pitch have to do with sexism? Women, according to the dominant discourse, are not allowed access to their anger publicly. Anger and wrath are for me: jealousy, outbursts of uncontrollable crying, and catfights are for women. When Black women speak out, we are labeled as the “angry Black woman” in the room. And look at all of the emotional contortions Barack Obama performed right before our very eyes so as not to appear as “angry.” The last time I checked, anger was a human emotion and we all experience it from time-to-time, but since discourse has labeled many minorities as less than human, we are not entitled to it? In the case of Wounded Knee, this silencing and reinforcing of who is/who is not allowed to speak within our dominant discourse (the ongoing racism crafted by and for white men to enjoy American privilege — to be absolutely clear), was absolutely barbaric in its violence. In the case of the American Holocaust, the silencing of Black political challenges and economic competition was absolutely barbaric in its violence.
Do you see a pattern emerging here? A peaceful or violent protest by those who are tired of being victimized by a dominant discourse, then a hyperviolent response by those who crafted and perpetuated the discourse, then. That’s not a typo. That’s the eerie silence that follows the violent put-down of protest…any kind of protest of those who are tired of having their rights restricted.
Just as Kaepernick did not have “right” to peacefully protest grotesque violence against people who look like him, his male relatives, and the son he may have one day. The NFL owners colluded to silence this man, who said not one word and committed not one act of violence on the sidelines of a football field. Though white men traditionally enjoy obsequious, juvenile behavior from Black men who they employ one way or another, kneeling in order to take a stand was simply unacceptable! The rhetoric became about disrespect rather than police brutality as was originally intended. Some scenarios were: Kaepernick disrespected the flag; Kaepernick disrespected the service members; Kaepernick does not love our country.
When I hear the rhetoric of the discourse performing this linguistic magical tricks and taking our minds off of the injustice at hand, I hear the words unspoken. The words unspoken were: “How dare this Black man, who is not an American because he is Black, disrespect the white men who allow him and his people the privilege of building this country with their chattel slavery and then benefiting from it economically! It is his privilege and his people’s privilege just to be hear, where they have more material comfort and better opportunities than other Black populations in other ‘sh*thole countries.’”
Is that what the outrage was around Kaepernick all about? Is that why George Floyd, Eric Garner, Ahmaud Aubery, Trayvon Martin, Jordan Davis, Mike Brown, and many, many other Black men were murdered at the hands of the law (either directly as with the recent shootings or indirectly as in the second American Holocaust)? Is that why African Americans are expected to remain silent about continued systemic racism and daily microaggressions that go unrecorded?
