Thank you so much for reading and responding, Lakitha. You are definitely right. While movies like Harriet are important from a historical perspective, it’s so important for Black trauma and pain not to be equated to entertainment. I think you’re on to something there considering the ways police brutality videos are shared and passed through social media and the entertainment some people get from it — without considering how triggering that is for some Black people watching.

While I have no problem with Harriet being made or being successful, I do have a problem with people shaming others for not consuming Harriet or even When They See Us — the Netflix series about the Central Park 5. I knew so many Black people who were afraid to see that because they knew the brutal injustice the boys faced would cause too much mental distress.

To know that these movies distress Black people and to them shame us for not watching them is cruel. I agree with you in that producers need to be more creative in envisioning our futures in film. We can create all-Black works — like Black Panther — without the constant reminder of slavery and oppression.