What do we think about leaving the country? Not for a vacation, but for good. These conversations can se seen in various places online and in living rooms. With so much that has happened and continues to happen to us in America, would we be better off somewhere else? If so, where?
A quick scroll of Twitter, Facebook or any news channel will tell you that life for Black people in this country is less than ideal. It’s not all struggle and hard times, for sure. Still, we all live in two worlds because at any minute we know someone we love could lose all humanity and merely become a hashtag. As Black mothers, it seems like that realization is at the forefront – especially, if you have boys.
Leaving the U.S.
This whole conversation of leaving the U.S. of A starting really coming up again with the “Year of Return” in 2019. That year marked 400 years since our African ancestors we brought to this country. Ghana marked the year by inviting all of us living here to “come home”. There were huge, celebrity filled celebrations. So many of your favorites made the trip back “home”. During the same year of return campaign, there was even talk from officials in Ghana about welcoming us there on a permanent basis. That talk got even stronger the following year when George Floyd was murdered by police. If memory serves, Nigeria also joined in the “come home” refrain.
More recently, Stevie Wonder has been in the news after announcing that he, in fact, would be moving to Ghana. While talking to Oprah on her “Conversations with Oprah” show he mentioned the move and clearly caught her off guard. She’d asked him what he thought about the time we are living in since he’d been so heavily involved in civil rights back in the day. He said that he still had hope for this country and he hoped America would get it together before he moved to Ghana. She asked for clarification and he repeated the news. He said that we didn’t want his kids and grandkids to constantly feel the need to prove themselves to this country.
The Conversation About Leaving
That got the conversation started all over again online. Can’t you relate though? The older kids get the more you have to worry about what this country is doing to them or will do to them. When you listen to expats who live in various parts of the world, like London, they acknowledge that the racism still exists but they don’t worry about being killed by police. There are more and more stories popping up about Black women, in particular who have made the move elsewhere.
A book we mentioned recently also talks heavily about the decision to move and raise kids abroad and not regretting it. You have to wonder, even with the issues with race and government that you’d face in other places, is it worse than what we face here? Or is it better to deal with the devil you know?
After writing this post , one of our favorite podcasts “The Stoop” did a whole episode on this topic. They talked to people who moved to various countries and shared their experience, good and bad, of living Black outside of America. We’d love to hear your thoughts.