New York, New York, Age 28
There is something black children, especially black girls, are told from a very young age. You know what it is. It has made its way into the political discourse and into television sitcoms. Statisticians have worked to prove and disprove it. Young black people talk about it at happy hours and black student association meetings. We say it silently with nods to one another when we meet in places we are not expected to be: as we take our seats on a panel of experts, for example. Or when we check in with the receptionist at a job interview for a VP position at a big corporation. Our eyes say it when they meet the eyes of other black people at glitzy charity balls. We say it to ourselves as we get dressed and step out into a world that was designed to fail us, to see us fail.