I will give a small warning here before I go any further. The rest of this post will be a full-on Brandy rant with little to no fucks given about being politically correct and or proper. This is the internet if you don’t want to read cuss words or other people’s opinions you should head out now.
Saturday, May 14th, 2022, 18-year-old Payton S. Gendron drove to Tops Market in the Kingsley neighborhood on the east side of Buffalo, New York, and shot 13 people killing 10 of them. 11 of his victims were black.
This young man drove three and a half hours from his home in Conklin, NY ( 200 MILES) to a grocery store with the sole purpose of killing black people. He wore body armor with a military-grade helmet and a modified Bushmaster XM-15 rifle. He also wore a head-mounted camera that he used to live-stream his attack on twitch.
At 2:31 pm the Buffalo police received the first call reporting shots fired. This man shot 4 people while walking through the parking lot into the store. 3 of those people died. Once inside he opened fire while screaming racial slurs.
At one point during this situation, an armed security guard (A former Buffalo police officer) shot at him but due to the body armor, the shots did not stop him. He returned fire striking and killing the security guard.
By 2:36 pm the shooter made his way to the front of the building where police officers talked him down. He eventually dropped the weapon and was arrested.
This whole thing lasted 5 minutes. 5 long and terrifying minutes. 13 people, 4 of whom were just trying to get through their workday, and the rest just trying to get groceries were violently attacked. 10 of them lost their lives. This doesn’t even begin to touch the others who are forever changed by this experience.
He started planning the attack in January 2022 and targeted Buffalo because it was the city with the most black residents that was closest to his home.
The fact that there are parents/grandparents and even aunts and uncles that are out here teaching these kids to hate each other blows my mind. It is 2022 for fucks sake. I understand that this country was basically established on slavery and racism but we should not still be dealing with this kind of shit.
I am not black so I will never understand what it is my black friends and family have to go through daily but I do stand with them in saying enough is enough. If you claim to be with those of color and not against them it is time to stand up and make that clear.
This can not be the way of life anymore. No one should ever have to wonder if this trip to the grocery store is going to be their last. NO ONE should FEAR for their life simply because they are not white.
Hate is NOT something we are born within our hearts it is something that we are taught as we grow.
Then I think about my mother and the woman that she is. How she didn’t let the racism of others mold her mind.
My mother is 62 years old woman. She was raised by two very racist people. She attended a white catholic school because blacks could not afford the tuition to attend the catholic schools. When she was about 7 years old she walked home from her catholic school at the same time the public school kids got out so she often ended up walking the same streets at the same time as the black kids.
As this 7 year old girl walked home she noticed that a child beside her used the same math book as her and this caused her to start up a conversation with this child. She knew this was something she could never let her parents see her doing.
My mother told me about how she became friends with some of these kids because she very quickly learned that the only difference between them was their skin tone.
“We were just kids, kids dealing with the same crap. Parents that we complained about school subjects we loved and hated, siblings that drove us nuts. The only difference was the color of our skin“.
My mother walked through a mostly all black neighborhood where the older black kids targeted the white kids with violence. One of the kids that my mother befriended went to their older siblings asking them to help her learn to defend herself so she could make it home safely. So these boys would sneek out and meet up with her and teach her how to fight.
Those kids my mother was told were no good and all that nonsense, not only befriended her but helped not only to protect her but helped her protect herself. As a child I was raised that we are the same and just because you don’t look like me doesn’t mean you don’t deserve love and respect.
All of these people out here claiming that people of color and immigrants are taking over our country seem to forget that the people that origanated in this land are NOT white people.
This is NOT white land. They are NOT part of a superior race
They are some of the lowest beings in the human race and are the ones that need to be stopped.
Below are the people whom lost their lives on May 14th 2022 for no other reason than they are black.
Roberta A. Drury of Buffalo, N.Y. – age 32
Margus D. Morrison of Buffalo, N.Y. – age 52
Andre Mackneil of Auburn, N.Y. – age 53
Aaron Salter of Lockport, N.Y. – age 55
Geraldine Talley of Buffalo, N.Y. – age 62
Celestine Chaney of Buffalo, N.Y. – age 65
Heyward Patterson of Buffalo, N.Y. – age 67
Katherine Massey of Buffalo, N.Y. – age 72
Pearl Young of Buffalo, N.Y. – age 77
Ruth Whitfield of Buffalo, N.Y. – age 86
My deepest condolences go to everyone who has been effected by this terrible tragedy. If you are local to the Buffalo area please consider helping out with food donations to the pantrys in the area of this tragedy as so many are without what the need to get by due to this.
Prejudice is a burden that confuses the past, threatens the future, and renders the present inaccessible.
Maya Angelou
