Montgomery dock brawl memes were an internal conversation

When you’ve built a career around explaining race and racism to people, what happens when you find a moment you just don’t want to explain?

That time came for me this week, as memes were rocketing around social media connected to the brawl in Montgomery, Ala., where a crowd of mostly-Black bystanders ran to help a Black riverboat co-captain who was being assaulted by a group of white people. He had been attempting to move their pontoon boat, since it was blocking the ferry from docking in its regular space.

Video from various bystanders around the dock captured it all: The co-captain throwing his hat in the air, once a white man pushed him harshly; a different Black man whaling on people with a folding chair, including a white woman who was just sitting on the ground by then; a young Black man on a boat close by who jumped into the water and swam with amazing speed to the scene, jumping up to throw hands.

And, in moments, Black Twitter jumped to life (I know the social media platform is renamed X, but — for the purposes of this piece — I’m using the term to describe people being Black across lots of social media platforms. Harrumph).

There were images of people carrying folding chairs like holstered weapons. There was the graphic pointing out that an early design of the folding chair was patented by a Black man (seems to be true). The photoshopped picture showing glowing rings around Black folks rushing into the fight, mimicking the climax of Avengers: Endgame, where superheroes rushed in to save the day. A spirited re-enactment of the fight around someone’s backyard pool which amped up the absurd humor of it all. Images dubbing the young…