The Fallen Veil

When white denial slips, the truth burns through. This essay is a reflection on racism, silence, and the cost of looking away.

The veil has fallen. What once softened the truth now lies in the dirt.

When I became an educator, I caught my first glimpses behind the veil that white America has long employed to pretend we were living in a post-racist world. Until then, I could, if I chose, dismiss echoes of hate as jokes, misunderstandings, or euphemisms. Racial violence didn’t happen anymore; or it didn’t happen in my community; or it wasn’t perpetrated by people I knew.

With that sinister veil intact, white people could brush off racism like a faded memory recounted by a doddering elder. But now the veil has dropped, leaving little to mistranslation.

This past weekend at a local high-school party, teenagers from my community committed a hate act against another teen from my community. The slurs, the fists, the threat of a noose — all real. The locality and familiarity of these events disgust and horrify me to the marrow.

My discomfort is necessary, but it’s not the story. I know damn well that this event isn’t about me. I also know it reflects only a sliver of what our friends and fellow citizens of color endure every day. Every day. Right here. People we know harming people we know.

For our neighbors of color, the veil never really existed. It’s only ever been something white people used, perhaps subconsciously, to soften the glare of truth. As a result, many white people think racism doesn’t touch us personally — but it does. It seeps into the water and the schools. It shapes what our children learn about power and belonging. It corrodes our souls.

Now it’s playing out openly and in our faces. The choices are simple: face it or look away, because there is no more pretending.

The beautiful idea of America is decomposing under the rot of racism. There’s hate in our national DNA, and those traits are showing strong in the current political light. To be clear, we know MAGA didn’t invent racism; it just made public expression of it acceptable again.

I personally cannot unsee what’s glaring before me, so I have to face it. I’m writing today because I want people who look like me to feel the disgust, horror, and discomfort I feel over that ill-fated high-school party.

Fellow white people — are we uncomfortable yet? I hope so, and I don’t want us to feel this briefly. We’ve allowed this evil. You know it to be true. We’ve allowed it, and now it’s in our faces. We are out of excuses. It’s past time to muster a permanent intolerance for what we’ve allowed to pass as normal.

Racism — hidden or casual — isn’t okay. None of this is okay.

What are you going to do about it?