News and Commentary

New From Teen Vogue: Sleep Is Systemically Racist

" ... to navigate as an activist or organizer ... creates a lot of burnout."
Empty Bed At Home
Photo by Siraphol Siricharattakul/EyeEm/Getty Images

Teen Vogue, in its imperishable desire to act as the spearhead for political correctness, published an article titled “Black Power Naps Is Addressing Systemic Racism in Sleep,” in which they plugged an artistic initiative entitled “Black Power Naps,” which argues that blacks have had shorter lives than whites because blacks were not permitted to sleep, and thus reparations must be given in the form of time off from work.

Teen Vogue writes of Fannie Sosa and Navild Acosta, who created Black Power Naps, that they “were tired, but it wasn’t just any old fatigue. Yes, they experienced a lack of sleep, but they were specifically experiencing a generational fatigue familiar to Black people and people of color.”

Teen Vogue says Black Power Naps is “also a recognition of the hundreds of years of sleep deprivation that Black people and people of color have experienced as a result of systemic racism, a way to pushback against the false stereotype that Black people are lazy, and an investigation of the inequitable distribution of rest.”

Acosta posited, “We’re dealing with an inheritance of sleep deprivation. Sleep deprivation was a … deliberate tactic of slave owners to basically make the mind feeble. That same tactic has only evolved.”

Sosa added, “Slavery is a regime of stealing and extraction: Stolen wages, stolen life, stolen land, but stolen time was one of the main things. We need time. We need time off; we need time out. Our ancestors never got to take a month off for holidays; they never got to take a sabbatical; they never got to take a nap. When you pile all of those together, you see the reparations that need to happen are monetary, but they’re also time and space.”

Teen Vogue writes, “Acosta and Sosa are calling for rest as reparations. Yes, they’re looking for an ease to the many burdens that might prevent Black people and people of color from sleeping like systemic racism, socioeconomic struggle, and more.” Teen Vogue adds, “This conversation about rest is particularly pertinent now, as people take to the streets to say Black Lives Matter. If Black people keep having to fight for their humanity, how can they ever rest knowing they could be in danger?”

Sosa said, “We are having to go out in the streets during a pandemic, expending our energy in really huge amounts in order to ask for reparations and rest and energy. It is a … double edged sword to navigate as an activist or organizer. You are putting your body on the line to reclaim it. That creates a lot of burnout. We have people who are 20, 21, they are burnt out. They need time off. They need not only to sleep, but to know their people are going to be ok, to know they’re going to be ok, to know they can take a break.”
