When W. E. B. Du Bois wrote his essay Strivings of the Negro People in 1897, I imagine he firmly understood that a thing like the double consciousness of a Black body in America would reverberate across time and space to reach Black bodies in the future. A sociologist, author, integral part of the creation of the NAACP, and one of the preeminent intellectuals of the 20th century, he once wrote that his earliest memory was of tongs and the fireplace. His essay poetically, and painfully, addressed the unasked question he put forward: “Why did God make me an outcast and a stranger in mine own house?”
Born with a veil, Du Bois said, “the Negro … is gifted with second-sight in this American world.” His examination is filled with the eloquence and finesse that could only come from having witnessed some of the gravest atrocities wrought upon Black bodies in this country’s history. This “double-consciousness,” he explains, is an unshakeable sense of “always looking at one’s self through the lens of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity.”
As the world still looks on with all manner of spectacle curiosity and frequent indifference, it is easy to forget the “two-ness” that still follows Black people in spaces where the measuring hasn’t stopped. From hostile conversations on critical race theory to the assault of unarmed people at the hands of law enforcement, the past several years have provided more than enough examples of this “two-ness.”
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Sign up for our Games newsletter and never miss our latest gaming tips, reviews, and features.The summer George Floyd was murdered, Black communities came out in droves—as we did for Michael Brown and Philando Castile and Trayvon Martin and Breonna Taylor and Eric Garner and Tamir Rice and Alton Sterling. Corporations took to social media to highlight their disdain for the grievous acts of violence committed against communities of color. Video game companies were for the first time tweeting and posting the phrase “Black Lives Matter” across their channels, to the dismay of a subset of disgruntled players.
Despite the public show of support, it was abundantly clear that even in the digital space I too was a stranger in my own home. Having “BLM” in your Xbox gamertag or PlayStation profile name, or even as part of your clan tag, made you an immediate target for internet trolls riding the wave of dissent-fueled posts piling on in message boards. Gamers still spewed racial slurs in online lobbies when voice chat was active, and players frequently and disingenuously used the names of victims of police violence as their own gamertags.
Last year during a World First race, one of Bungie’s premier events for Destiny 2 raids, a user who made the top spot of the leaderboard was banned for having the name “#BlackLivesDontMatter.” The response from Bungie’s community manager at the time was swift and appropriate, but the occurrence was a reminder that many of these ills remain endemic to video game culture. Fringe groups on streaming platforms and social media continue to serve as hotbeds for racism, which percolates and subsequently manifests into hostility at a Black character in a video game or a Black person on Twitch, if not escalating to outright violence.
Navigating the gaming space as a Black person comes with a balancing act that forces you to question whether you ever really belonged. This double consciousness extends to the creators of our favorite games and adds considerable weight to the creative process when you think about the spectrum of our lived experiences.
