“The Truth is at the Door…”
Written by Ari Christine
For the sake of my heart, I had to take a couple of days away from the sad demise of Brother Botham Shem Jean. I felt myself growing angrier and angrier by the minute. Each time I would see that mug shot of Amber Guyger, I would stare into her devious eyes and see a saturated tone of confidence and privilege. I could just feel her thinking “I’m going to get through this.” At this point, after so many untruths and so many self-serving narratives – she probably truly believes that she is the victim.
This case is hardening my heart.
You can be a bible-toting Christian. You can give to the homeless and donate to friends who are struggling. You can have a perfectly clean record. You can sing hymnals that inspire and encourage the masses. You can be in your own home, where you pay all of the bills without the assistance of anyone. You can sit on the couch that you bought, work on the iMac computer that you financed with your perfect credit and paid off before the interest kicked in. You can walk around your home in your most intimate intimates. You can read a book, with your feet kicked up on the ottoman.
Your door can be “mistaken” and you can be killed. But your murder better not inconvenience the privilege of a white police officer.
Whether Amber made a mistake or planned out the execution of Botham, the fact that he is dead is a roadblock in what should be a paved path of freedom and unlimited gain for her. So, Amber must be saved.
She killed him, but according to her many narratives "she didn't mean to do it."
She should be forgiven. She should be allowed to move away for her safety. She should have a team of cops and various legal representatives work around the clock to create narratives that get her the absolute minimal punishment possible, if any at all. She should be allowed to continue working her job. She should be allowed to carry out all of her life’s missions and reach her goals.
After all, she just made a mistake.
She should be able to cry and to apologize. She should have her stories believed - all of them or whichever one works for whichever day of the week it's told.
We should forgive what she did to us. We should accept that maybe Botham played his music too loudly. We should accept that maybe Botham smoked weed, while he read Gucci Mane's autobiography.
We should just believe that this very meticulous man left piles of laundry on his couch and a pizza box resting next to it on the floor. We should believe that the same Amber whose Pinterest account proves she hates Obama and Kaepernick and wouldn’t mind shooting a mofo who gets in her way, had a real hard time killing the black neighbor who maybe walked too hard above her. We should believe that this was God's will and wait for the next innocent black person to be killed by an angry, unstable, racist white cop who's having a bad day. We should let our rage subside and accept that elected officials only fight for "some" of the people.
It doesn't matter what history tells us should happen.
We need to imagine ourselves as Botham; our children as Botham; our parents as Botham, our church members as Botham. We need to be angry. We need to rally. We need to protest. We need to vote. We need to not let Botham's murder be in vain. We don’t know every intricate detail, but we do know that what happened to Botham was not right.
The truth is at the door.
