Therapy for victims of racism should be tax deductible
Therapy for victims of racism should be tax deductible
What if the IRS treated therapy for black people the way it does for “emotional distress” lawsuits?
I deactivated my Twitter account — for about 3.5 hours. After Elon Musk’s Twitter purchase (and sink photo) were final, I worried about the nonsensical MAGA users who would go back to treating Twitter like they now do with Truth Social. Then it hit me. Leaving Twitter meant I lost a place for writing inspiration, a place that has become lucrative for Medium membership invites and pay-per-read posts, and my biggest priority — losing out on #BlackTwitter.
The latter is both a guilty pleasure and a digital hug for black folks. I can read offensive comments and heartwarming ones in this crew, sometimes within the same 60 seconds. It’s like going to a family reunion with my favorite cousin and my least favorite relative at the same time.
I reactivated my account and blocked Elon Musk. It didn’t make any sense to let one guy and his flock of followers control my day-to-day. Why would I leave a social media platform to avoid a boost in racist tweets (like someone comparing black women to gorillas) when I wasn’t anywhere near Twitter within the past week and ended up in a phone battle with a process server flippantly talking about “hanging black people”?
Recommended Read: “The darkest subject change I’ve ever heard: From summons delivery to hanging black people ~ Disturbing things I wish I wasn’t learning about hiring a special prosecutor”
Twitter didn’t invent racism anymore than Donald Trump did. It just gave a large group of people a place to create anonymous accounts and share their cowardly, dark views with a larger public. Fuck that. I’m staying.
However, a recent freelancing assignment caught my attention and gave me an idea. The article I was assigned to edit discussed how the Internal Revenue Service handles “emotional distress” and anxiety when it comes to personal injury cases. A thought kept coming into my mind: If black people could go to therapy for free and have an outlet to openly discuss the harm that racism does to us, is that tax deduction a reasonable way to get reparations?
Recommended Read: “First 16 black Evanston residents chosen for housing reparations ~ Illinois is first to offer reparations to African-American families”