Even White Privilege Didn't Save Gabbie Petito

I have been thinking about the Gabbie Petito case for a long time, following the news stories, the blog posts, the social media, the viral publicity her tragic case garnered. While I acknowledge that Gabbie, being an attractive, young, blonde, white woman helped her case gain national attention, I do not resent the publicity her case, and every bit of minutiae about it has received. Being white did not save her from the violence of a white man, even after the police were called. I am thinking in particular of the body cam video of the police stop of Brian Laundrie that played over and over again in the evening news, and how different it was from the body cam video of Philando Castile, Sandra Bland, Daunte Wright, and a mind numblingly long list of Black people in videos in police stops getting shot in a continual sickening loop. Seeing the movie portrayal of a Black police officer in the Gabbie Petito case when the officers were actually white seemed to me a grossly misguided case of color blind casting. Casting a Black man in the role of Officer Daniel Robbins served as a kind of erasure of the racial bonding at play between him and Brian Laundrie. How has it completely escaped the public's notice that Brian Laundrie's white privilege is what allowed him to convince the police that he, not Gabbie Petito, was the victim, and ultimately led to both of their deaths?

The police were very casual and polite to Brian Laundrie after seeing him drive erratically on the road following up on two calls reporting a man hitting a woman. Some quotes from the police transcript of Brian Laundrie's stop:

Officer Robbins: Driver is showing some obscure driving, possibly intoxicated. Currently doing 45 miles an hour, zone through here is twenty-five. Oh, subject just hit the curb...

When they finally stop him:

Officer Robbins: You want to place your vehicle into park and go ahead and turn it off for me...Do you mind if I take your keys and just put them on your hood?...Do you want to tell me about hitting the curb..Yeah, it took quite a bit to catch up to you...You don't have anything in your pocket, or anything like that do you?

Compare that to the police stop for Sandra Bland:

State Trooper Brian Encinia: "Hello Ma'am. We're the Texas Highway Patrol and the reason for your stop is because you failed to signal the lane change."

Moments later she was ordered out of her car and arrested because the officer did not like her attitude. Shortly after that she died in custody, by presumed suicide. Philando Castile was pulled over for a busted tail light, and ended up fatally shot by the police in front of his girlfriend and her child less than a minute later because he disclosed that he had a license to carry a fire arm as he was complying with the order to show his license and registration. In those cases it took far less than speeding, and driving erratically to enrage the police.

I can't help but think of how differently things might have turned out if Brian Laundrie was treated like a Black man. They would have presumed he was a dangerous criminal, cautiously approaching the vehicle with weapons drawn, barking at him in a commanding tone to put his hands where they could see them. He would be made to show his license and registration, disclose if he had weapons, ordered out of the car, patted down, cited for speeding, driving erratically and failing to stop, given a ticket, arrested, possibly even shot. Because Brian was white, they treated him like a man having a bad day with a difficult emotional woman, something they could bond over as men. They disregarded Gabbie's terrified, shrinking body language and her eagerness to accept blame that gave no indication of of aggressiveness. They decided he was the victim, though he laughed when they told him this, and gave him a hotel room for the night. They gave Gabbie a pass for her "abuse" of him, rather than arresting her. If Brian was Black, the police would not have dismissed the witness accounts of him hitting her so easily. He would have been made to face the consequences of his actions, one way or another, and Gabbie might still be alive. Brian might even still be alive. If it is so difficult for a clearly distressed white woman to get protection and justice from the police, how much more difficult it must be for Black women and women of color.

Travels in California

We spent our first two days in California in Oakland with my brother, Zeke. My husband, Dan, and I had arrived on Friday evening, checked into the Best Western Bayside, then had a quick dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant with Zeke. Our hotel had a beautiful view of the water from the room window, but the front side faced a highway and a blighted area with the word "Decolonize" spray painted in large letters on the wall. We were a short Uber ride from Zeke who lives near Lake Merritt. Saturday we met Zeke for a walk around the lake and a visit to the Farmer's Market, where in addition to a variety of vegetables and mushrooms we saw many vendors of afro-centric arts and crafts. Sunday we met my friend Laura and her husband, Sander at Fenton's icecream shop for lunch, then spent the afternoon walking down Piedmont Ave., visiting a mausoleum, shopping, and stopping at a Mexican restaurant for lunch. We had dinner one evening at a scenic restaurant in Alameda called Pasta Pelican that served "Chilean Sea Bass" that closely resembled talapia.The service was great, and the vegetables were delicious, however. We took the ferry to San Francisco on the third day.

We discovered that our Clipper Cards for the Bart system could be used to ride the ferry, and it became our favorite way to go to San Francisco from Oakland. Monday we walked to the Hotel Pickwick, the long way, through Chinatown, where my family stayed in the 70s. I can't believe that old hotel is still there. It seemed so much bigger when I was a kid. We had a delicious lunch of ceviche at La Mar Cebicheria. Later we took the ferry to Alcatraz. Alcatraz was very grim and forbidding, but also had beautiful gardens in unexpected places. After coming back from Oakland on the ferry, Zeke made us chicken piccata, and we saw Blood, Sweat, and Tears at Yoshi's in Oakland. That had been one of my Dad's favorite bands.

Tuesday we took the ferry to San Francisco again from Oakland's Jack London Square. We had a fancy seafood lunch at Scott's Seafood Grill & Bar- Oakland before embarking. In San Francisco we walked down Fisherman's Wharf before going to Haight Ashbury, which was far more Yuppie than hippie. We only went into a few shops and decided to leave. I was really annoyed when a woman in one shop tailed me so closely that I was reminded that though I'm a tourist spending valuable dollars, I was still shopping while Black. I put back the $60 in gifts I was about to buy and left. That neighborhood had more homeless people camping on the sidewalk than I saw in any other neighborhood. In its heyday Haight-Ashbury was 40% Black, but it is now only 3% Black. We walked to Golden Gate park, through the AIDS Memorial, rode a ferris wheel, and walked through the Botanical Garden before heading back to the ferry. That night we ate dinner at a very fancy Thai restaurant called Farmhouse Kitchen Thai Cuisine . The meal was delicious, but I lost my temporary crown, and from then on had to avoid crunchy food.

Wednesday we spent the entire day in Oakland and visited the Oakland Museum of California. We saw the spectacular Afro Futurism exhibit, and I also posted some pictures from the Black Panther and Gay Liberation exhibits. The Black Panthers were based in Oakland. I highly recommend the cafeteria here. The food is delicious, and I had a kumquat daiquiri slushy. This museum is a short walk from Lake Merritt scene of the famous Barbecue Becky video. Our visit was cut short by my futile attempt to visit a local dentist. I was told my tooth could not be touched because the crown was made specifically for it as it is now. That night Zeke made another delicious dinner for us accommodating my missing tooth.

Thursday and Friday we visited wineries. Thursday we took a half day to Napa Valley tour from Tower Tours, where we visited Madonna Estate, and Kieu Hoang Wineries. Friday we got a more personal tour from the lovely and vivacious, Laura Ackley, who I befriended at the GSD, and whose wedding I attended almost 20 years ago. She is the author of San Francisco's Jewel City: The Panama-Pacific International Exhibit of 1915, and a local history expert. She drove us around Sonoma Valley in her antique convertible car, and we visited Benziger and the Muscardini Winery Afterwards we had yet another spectacular meal at Vintners Resort and John Ash & Co. with her husband, Sander. We were later joined by the lovely, talented, scary smart, and outrageously funny, Lissette Chao. She kept everyone on their toes, and collapsing with helpless laughter simultaneously. I really am fortunate to have such amazing women friends.

Saturday was our last day in Oakland. After checking out we spent the day with my brother Zeke and Kyle. We walked the three miles around Lake Merritt, went to the vendors at the Farmer's Market. It was a scorching hot day. We did at least 10,000 steps every day we were there. We took the red eye back and got barely any sleep. We enjoyed our vacation thoroughly, but are happy to be home with our kitties again.

Is Slashing the incomes of contracted labor at the richest university a demonstration of Inclusive Excellence? An Open Letter to President Bacow

Inclusion and belonging, in my mind, is partly about building community. It’s about helping people to see themselves as part of Harvard when they look at Harvard. Great institutions find ways of capitalizing on the full range of ideas, experiences, backgrounds, and personalities to create a great community. Ultimately, diversity not only makes Harvard a more interesting place, it enhances the learning environment for everyone.

Lawrence S. Bacow, President of Harvard University

Dear President Bacow,

My question is, what actions do you take that demonstrate that you support inclusive excellence? The dining hall workers, security guards, custodial workers, and contracted labor have the highest concentration of BIPOC people at Harvard University, and they are the most essential and least valued in our community. Slashing their incomes demonstrates elitism, a lack of respect for their lives, and a lack of respect for the surrounding community, as this will add to the burden of an already inadequate social safety net. Do Black and Brown lives matter, only when they have overcome the persistent obstacles placed in front of them denying them the most basic of human needs? When individual effort and luck has allowed them to achieve academic excellence, or when they are the subject of a viral news story? That is an inhumane and barbaric idea, yet facts seem to bear this idea out.

People without income are more vulnerable to coronavirus, and have less access to good healthcare. These are the same people we depend upon most to do the most necessary, but least academically lauded of jobs. There is no learning without life. I'm sure your ability to pay contracted labor through the pandemic has no bearing on your ability to provide financial aid to students, and that it is a disingenuous opposition, to pit disadvantaged students against disadvantaged workers, so that the corporation can maximize its already humungous endowment.

The Federal government is stalling on a coronavirus relief bill, and only one stimulus check was released since the pandemic started in March. Harvard should not turn its back on people who provide essential services and want and need to work to sustain their lives, families, and communities. This subversion of the values you claim to uphold directly contributes to perpetuating systemic racism and inequality.

In Memoriam

Philando Castile, Cafeteria Worker, July 6, 2016

Breonna Taylor, EMT, March 13, 2020

Alvin Simmons, Custodian, March 17, 2020

George Floyd, Security Guard, May 25, 2020

Deirdre Edwards, Custodian, April 7, 2020

Andres Guardardo, Security Guard, June 10, 2020

Believe Black Women

Believe Black Women

We are in the midst of a pandemic, and a cultural reckoning with rampant police brutality, racism, and sex abuse of all genders. Our cultural, religious and governmental institutions are under intense scrutiny, but the people we have upheld as idols for their authority, status, and high achievements have enormous power to remain immune from the consequences of their actions. I'm talking about Jeffrey Epstein, Harvey Weinstein, the police, and yes, Bill Cosby, R. Kelly, and Russell Simmons.

A recurrent theme in the documentaries Surviving R. Kelly, and On the Record was that Black women fear that telling their stories about sexual abuse at the hands of a powerful Black man, would be viewed as a betrayal to the race, that they would not be believed, they would be forever defined by being a victim, and their careers would be ruined. That if Black women tell their stories, the Black people they love will be randomly subjected to more injustice, like George Floyd, Philando Castile, and Jacob Blake. These Black women's tears and vulnerability were a revelation to me as a Black woman. I had only seen Black women's anger, rage, humor, toughness, and resilience portrayed in the media. This is an unfair burden for Black women. Black women should not be the vessels to hold the pain of the violence, and humiliation inflicted on all Black people. #BlackLivesMatter, with the focus on Brionna Taylor, has recently expanded to include women murdered by the police, and has yet to highlight transwomen. A Black woman's voice, right to safety, security, autonomy and sovereignty over her body and Black people's right to freedom from being hunted by the police should not be mutually exclusive.

It can be true that Bill Cosby, R. Kelly, and Russell Simmons made great contributions to creative culture, and also used their celebrity status to abuse and rape women. Their transgressions should not justify the oppression of all Black people. They are not the only Black men we have to admire who have not raped women. We still have James Baldwin, MalcolmX, and Barack Obama, and many unknown Black men quietly living their lives, out of the the spotlight, loving and supporting their families and communities. White people do not have to worry that the entire White race will be represented by the Jeffrey Dahmers and Ted Bundies of the world. Jeffrey Epstein's White female victims risked humiliation and slut shaming from telling their stories, but could rest easy that they did not make White men more vulnerable to being stereotyped as rapists. We will be free from racial oppression as Black people when we are not defined by the worst among us, and do not have to be seen as paragons of virtue, an impossible standard for anyone, in order to enjoy the advantages of full citizenship in the United States.

I believe Anita Hill. I believe Azriel Clary. I believe Drew Dixon. I Believe Black Women and #BlackLivesMatter.

Travels in Spain

Some pictures from our first day in Spain. We arrived in Madrid 5 hours before our hotel was ready, and spent four hours waiting in the hotel lobby. Serious jet lag. We later took a walking tour of old Madrid with our tour group. It was hard to get pictures because our group was very large and the guide really rushed us.

Our second day in Spain we took a bus trip from Madrid to the town of Segovia, and visited the ancient aquaducts and the palace where the marriage of Isabella and Ferdinand united two kingdoms. The castle was the inspiration for Walt Disney's logo. We ate lunch there. Our tour guides urged us to try the suckling pig, which I did, and regretted. The restaurant was a tourist trap. It was like greasy fried piglet chunks. I took two bites and left it on my plate. The tour was beautiful, however. Later and I went to Madrid on our own and and a good dinner with grilled octopus and paella.

Today, our third day in Spain, Dan and I left our hotel in Madrid, and took a long bus ride, stopping in Toledo, considered the religious capital of Spain. This is where the saying "Holy Toledo!" comes from. We took a walking tour through hilly and narrow streets and saw what was once the Jewish Quarter before the Spanish Inquisition drove the Jews, and most of the arts and culture out of the city. There were many beautiful shop windows, though we couldn't shop, we had a very tight schedule, and it is too easy to get lost in Toledo. We continued on our bus ride stopping in La Mancha, home of Cervantes and Don Quixote for lunch, which was simple and pretty good, but we had to keep swatting away the flies. I saw a cute black stray cat at one rest stop. We rode a total of 200 miles, arriving at our new hotel in Seville. I'm adding pictures Dan took of us on his phone yesterday in Segovia and Toledo.

Seville is the most beautiful city in Spain I've seen so far. There were so many stunning views, of architecture from all different eras. I finally had to put away my camera and just take it all in. Between cities our tour director, Lydia, gives us a lecture about the region we are about to visit on the bus. She is like a motherly drill sergeant professor. We have travelling companions from Australia, the United States, and some Asian countries, and we have become very friendly with some of them. Our first tour of the day was a visit to the buildings of the Seville Expo of 1929, and Parque Maria Luisa, named after a princess who donated her gardens as a park. We ate a very good lunch of ceviche, oxtails, jamon iberica, and Octopus after a tour of the Alcazar de Seville, built by Arab artisans for a Christian king. I was exhausted most of the day. I didn't sleep well the night before. I rested a little before we went out to see a local flamenco show, and a view of the futuristic buildings of Seville Expo '92 on the way.

We are up at dawn every day. Today we are leaving Granada and are on the road to Valencia. Granada was the seat of the Moslem empire in Spain before the sultan surrendered peacefully to Isabella and Ferdinand in their campaign to unify Spain under Catholicism. In Granada is where the Arabic influence is most prominent. Granada means pomegranate and was the symbol of the Moslem empire. We took a walking tour of the neighborhood of Albaicín, which has houses that were typical of the moslems or gypsies with floral gardens with Jasmine and beautiful flowering vines overflowing the courtyard walls. From the lookout point we could see the Alhambra palaces and fortress from which the sultan was exiled moslems were forced to leave Spain or convert to Catholicism, much like the Jews in Segovia and Toledo. The streets of the Albaicín are very narrow and hilly, but the pavement, 500 years old, is an artistic and intricate design to allow for traction, and the retention of water. We later toured the cathedral that houses the tombs of Isabella and Ferdinand. We were very hungry after the walking tour and found a small restaurant nearby and had a delicious meal of oxtails and a large platter of typical Spanish food. After resting a little at our hotel we enjoyed some free time to explore the city, and got churros and chocolate, and delicious gelado. I had the pomegranate flavor which was tart and sweet with pomegranate seeds. Dan bought Polverones cookies, which are considered a specialty here for holidays. They fall apart like dust. "Polvo" means dust in Spanish. We left them in our hotel room.

Every city we have visited so far has something unique and special about it. In Valencia it is the blend of baroque and futuristic architecture. Valencia was built on a river instead by the nearby Mediterranean sea to protect the inhabitants from invasion by sea. Valencia means "valliance," in honor of the warriors who retired there. After the flood of 1957 where 81 people died, the river was routed out of the city. Valencia is famous for its oranges. Two popular beverages there are "Agua de Valencia", which is like a screwdriver with orange juice, vodka, and prosecco. I tried one and I really wasn't impressed. In our walking tour in the old city we tried horchata, which is a vegan blend of tiger nut milk, water and sugar. It is supposed to be very healthy. It is different from the Mexican kind made with rice water. I really liked this horchata and would drink it again. Our tour in Valencia began in an architectural complex called the City of Arts and Science designed by the architect Santiago Calatrava. The seagulls in the water are bright white, and the turquoise water reflected off of their white bellies as they flitted around, giving them a surreal quality. You can see one of the turquoise birds in the corner of one of my photos. After stopping here we took a tour of the old city. In one of the photos Dan took you can see a statue of a wanton woman grasping her breasts projecting from the side of the cathedral. This statue was to warn visitors not to tread into the red light district that existed on that side of the town in medieval times. Valencia was once a walled city. Two of the gates are still standing, but the walls were torn down in the 19th century to allow the city to expand. Over a thousand buildings were destroyed in World War II, but the buildings that still exist are extraordinary. After a dinner of paella at the hotel, we walked back to the City of Arts and Sciences to see it lit up at night.

Our last two days we ate lunch at the beach town of Peniscola. Dan had a hotdog, and I ate some questionable octopus. Then we continued on to Barcelona where we had a city tour and viewed Gaudi's famous church, the Sagrada Familia. That night the group went out to a fabulous dinner on the water front, where we had garlic shrimp fried calamari, salad, and a choice of paella, fish, or beef for the main course. I chose fish, and Dan chose beef. A man went around playing the accordion and urged us to dance. I did the macarena with Willie, who was always entertaining us with his commentaries. After dinner we took a drive to see the lighted fountains. The day next was a drive to the cathedral of Monserrat to view the Black Madonna and a mountain view, which remained almost completely enshrouded in mist. After a brief rest we were driven downtown to the center of Barcelona to a marketplace called Las Ramblas, which reminded me of Quincy Market, except much longer and much more crowded. There were street performers dressed as statues, little places to eat, and off to one side a gigantic indoor market with stalls for ham, smoothies, fruit, fresh fish, almost anything you could imagine.
Our last dinner at the hotel, covered by the tour was a bit of a disappointment for everyone It started with a bowl of flavorless lukewarm pumpkin soup. The meat was like fried reconstituted shoe leather, with a side of lukewarm greasy potatoes, and a ball of tough looking stringy spinach. People were saying they would have gone out to buy their own dinner. It seemed more like a "don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out", than a "farewell dinner." Gordon Ramsay would have made their ears burn if he reviewed this meal. Dan said no wonder our tour director was in such hurry to get those evaluations back before dinner.
All good things must come to an end, and this week had me clicking my heels three times and saying "There's no place like home, there's no place like home!". The past 3 nights we were arriving at a new hotel at 6, and then getting up at six to start an optional activity. My body really started to rebel. I felt like sleeping all the time in the day time, then our last night there I got really sick to my stomach. I was so sick at the airport, when I saw how long the line was to the women's room, I busted into the men's room in the Barcelona airport, and said, "I'm sick, I'm sick!" But I was able to push through and now we are home, where I was able to get American medical care today.
Lessons learned, don't overschedule, get enough rest, and drink bottled water. Still, our trip to Spain was a beautiful life experience.