Week Four: Rest in Peace, Philando Castile and Nabra Hassenen – Detroit Community-Engaged Research Program

Week Four: Rest in Peace, Philando Castile and Nabra Hassenen

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/killed-castile-pot-smell-made-fear-life-article-1.3265188?utm_content=bufferfa05d&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=NYDailyNewsTw

Today, while browsing a website for inspiration about a project I’m working on, I stumbled upon this article. I read it, and felt such disgust, such pain.

This week’s theme is culture, and having just read Dominique’s article, I’m thinking about culture outside of the confines of race, gender, nationality, religion, ethnicity. All of those components factor into what we define as “culture,” but for once, I wish people would look to the universal human culture, before they looked into things that they think they cannot identify with.

Philando Castile was a human being. Human beings think, feel, love, cry, experience unimaginable joy, and unimaginable sorrow. Philando probably had nicknames. Probably made jokes that made his fiancé roll her eyes, but smile with her heart in her throat when he wasn’t watching her. He had a mother who loved him, a mother who watched chubby legs turn into gangly limbs, turn into thirty-two years of man. He had a daughter. A daughter who he’ll never get to watch become a rebel, a fighter, a woman.

Earlier this week, Alyson took me to a vigil for Nabra Hassenen. Nabra was a 17 year old girl. She wore a bright smile, and glasses, and a nose ring, and a killer sense of style, and…a hijab.

Now, Nabra wears the white cloth that Muslims are buried in.

Nabra probably had a list of books she wanted to read, and artists that she wanted to see in concert, and things she wanted to do this summer. Nabra had all of these things. Nabra fought for immigrants affected by the immigration ban, and probably went home later that night to do her homework.

I can’t stop thinking about the fact that her parents are going to spend this Eid, and every Eid after it crying for their daughter. I can’t stop thinking about her mother, who is going to spend the rest of her life seeing the ghost of her daughter everywhere she goes. Of her father, who had the joy of a fearless older daughter ripped away from him. Of her siblings, who might have bickered with her earlier that day, and are now regretting that. Of her siblings, who needed her help, or her advice, or who just needed a smile, or an inside joke.

Philando and Nabra were human beings from completely different walks of life. They had nothing and everything in common. They had friendships, and communities, and people who loved them, people who will never get to love them.

They were two human beings whose deaths have become politics. They were people who wanted to be alive more than they wanted to be movements.

2 thoughts on “Week Four: Rest in Peace, Philando Castile and Nabra Hassenen”

  1. Elsa Mae Borrello

    Incredible. I, too, have been glued to all the news of new video and information coming out of the Philando Castile, and have been in shock. My dad, a judge, has always told me that there’s always things I don’t know whenever I would get mad about the outcome of a police brutality case against a minority. He reminded me that unless you’re in the courtroom, you don’t know everything you need to know to understand the verdict, but all I could think about were the lives that were lost that should not have been. But especially in the case of Philando Castile, there is enough video evidence and testimony that makes it clear to me how unjustified his death was and that it really was about race. I had not heard of the case of Nabra Hassenen, but I am going to do some research on it. I appreciate your connection between the two incidences, it just goes to show that all minority groups and allies need to fight for justice together.

  2. Calahna Camille Butler

    Wow this was so amazing, so well put. I find it very depressing every time to hear stories like these in the news. These incidents are happening so often that when these stories come on the news, all we can do is say another one, post about these incidents, spread awareness, and try to stop these incidents. On one hand I want to be informed but on the other hand do I really want to hear another sad story of someone getting shot, of someone losing their dad to a preventable situation, something that only happen because of the fear of someone’s color? It leaves me thinking about how crazy the world will be when I am ready to have children. Both of these stories was sad and I pray that this ends.

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