Kathryn Neale14:16, May 28 2021
Jeremy Moeller/Getty Images
They say that we wear our hearts on our sleeves. But, increasingly, we like to wear our feelings and show our love on our T-shirts and tote bags.
Last summer, every T-shirt in New York had a political message of some sort.
Movements, anti-movements, blatant provocations, or more subtle slogans. This summer, I’ve noticed a different type of identity politics playing out on the cobblestone streets of Brooklyn. It’s the tote bag wars.
I carry a tote bag from Bitter Sweet, the black-owned coffee shop closest to me. It always has a 12-minute wait for coffee, but Bitter Sweet provided free coffee to Black Lives Matters protesters all summer.