A Brief Response to Christopher Keelty @ChristopherKeelty on the Matter of Safety Pins 

Um, Mr. Keelty?  Regarding your ’embarrassing safety pin’ position?  You got a few things very wrong.

First, no white person I know is wearing a safety pin to ‘make themselves feel better.’  We won’t feel better.  Ever.  And we didn’t feel so good to begin with.  (Can’t imagine where you’re getting the “make yourself feel better” stuff.)  Second, don’t worry.  We already ‘feel like crap.’  We’re already ‘sitting in our guilt’ and have been our whole lives. We already see that we benefit and that we were fortuitously born into a certain privilege.  We’re not total idiots.

So we try to act to set things right, in small and big ways, even if right– in the largest sense – has never been and can never be restored.  A show of solidarity via safety pin is simply one more small thing.  Maybe it’s meaningless to you.  Maybe it’s meaningless in general.  But it’s something rather than nothing.  And yes, of course, we know to do other bigger stuff.  Again, we’re not total idiots.

What is more (and worse) is that you miss a very important point about the safety pins when dismissing them as an “embarrassing” symbol of solidarity.  The pin-wearing had an original purpose:  to give a small sign to another human being – being bullied or chased or worse – that they have somewhere to turn.  To mock and discourage such a safe-haven sign is not just pointless.  It’s also potentially dangerous.

[And yes, I realize here that this safe-haven meaning may be ultimately be rendered obsolete if white terrorists and hate groups fully co-opt it and twist its meaning.  In the meantime, why not use it for good if it helps someone?]

Finally, please keep in mind that in many communities your preferred ‘black lives matter’ attire and symbolism is NOT effective at all.   In fact, it is often the exact OPPOSITE of effective.  Many people are beyond ignorant about this movement’s meaning and willfully relentlessly so. Therefore, depending on where you live, such attire may only work to give platform to hate-spewers, a symbol wearers’ message becoming twisted to serve and perpetuate racist thinking.

The safety pin’s message, by contrast, may in these communities be more difficult to twist and misshape.  Those who mock its wearers directly mock safe haven and compassion and thereby reveal their own ugliness in no uncertain terms to otherwise willfully ignorant observers.  So, for simple practical purposes, please refrain from discouraging anyone’s ‘small action.’  Even a small act can help someone and have a big impact.

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