Elijah McClain was lynched.

Dear America:

I know we’re all distracted right now with new (but predictable) COVID spikes across the country, with stormtroopers rampaging in Portland, with the return of baseball finally in sight, and that our collective attention span right now is roughly equivalent to that of a rabid gnat, but I just wanted to stop by to remind you of something. I know it’s been a while, but it’s worth recalling.

Elijah McClain was lynched.

I do hope you remember that name, that story.

In the time since I first heard about his murder, I’ve learned everything I could about Elijah McClain, everything I could read and listen to until I actually wept and couldn’t read or listen anymore. I am not embarrassed or ashamed to say that his story makes me weep. I made myself watch that video more than once so that I could try to understand, that maybe there was something I was missing, something that might become clear to me, something that might help me comprehend how what happened to Elijah McClain could happen.

That Elijah McClain was lynched.

There’s nothing else there, of course. Only one thing explains it. The usual story. Someone saw a young Black man and decided he didn’t belong where he was, that someone made a call, and some other people decided be should die for that.

Elijah McClain was lynched.

That’s the only word for it. The dictionary definition of lynching is “to kill someone for an alleged offense without a legal trial.” That killing, in the context of American history, is primarily motivated by hate. Lynching is a hate crime.

And Elijah McClain was lynched.

Of course Elijah’s murder was a hate crime. Fear drives hate. Hate can’t exist without it. It’s the same tired old chestnut. Someone feared a young Black man because Americans are taught — have always been taught — to fear young Black men. And Elijah paid for that history with his short, loving life. And I cannot fathom that. But then again, I can.

Like so many others, Elijah McClain was lynched.

Here’s one thing I do understand: I think I knew him. No, not like I actually ever met him. But I knew kids like him. Every year for twenty years in my middle school classes, I had an Elijah. The quirky gentle soul, probably if not definitely on the autism spectrum, sometimes quiet and sometimes gregarious, usually frail in some way, smart, interested in things other kids weren’t, compassionate, empathetic, artistic. The “odd duck” with the “old soul.” The kid you worried about and the kid who you knew the world was going to hurt because he was just too damn good for this world. The kid who you just knew could maybe… if the world would just let. him. be.

The world never lets the Elijahs be. Especially in America. Most especially if they’re Black or brown.

Elijah McClain was lynched.

No one’s child deserves what happened to Elijah McClain. But he apparently actually was one of those “better angels” we keep hearing about. And how many of them are being taken from us every day that we don’t hear about, where there’s no cell phone video or bodycam footage documenting how they died? From police violence, gun violence, domestic violence, abuse, neglect, suicide, poverty, inadequate healthcare… the whole rotten system which sees an Elijah and judges him and sentences him. And frequently executes him.

Elijah McClain was lynched.

A young man who played his violin for shelter cats was lynched.

A young man who simply wanted to take a walk to buy some soda was lynched.

We — America — watched Elijah McClain be lynched. We know who did it. And we see how that part of the story goes. As it almost always does.

When good people die, folks frequently fall back on the old chestnut that “he was too good for this world.” So what does that say about us? If he was “too good” for this world, whose fault is that? Not his. Our better angels don’t deserve to be made into angels at twenty-two.

We need to figure out how to make this sick, sad excuse for a country into a place that’s worthy of all the Elijahs out there whose stories we will never hear. Maybe all the struggles we’re going through will make that happen.

Elijah McClain was lynched.

Say his name. Remember his name.

Then honor his name and do something. And please take the time to look out for the Elijahs you know.