I’ve been sitting with the Macklemore situation for a while because I don’t think we should be impulsive with our analysis. After letting it sit, here’s where I land: What Macklemore did, and what followed, was good. But we need to hold two truths at the same time. First: Macklemore, by his own admission, isn’t sacrificing much. And we need to remember that. Because while we celebrate a celebrity speaking up, there are people who paid a far greater price for Palestine: people who lost their livelihoods. People who were imprisoned. People who resisted. People who put their bodies on the line to stop weapons from reaching Israel. They didn’t have a platform to fall back on. They didn’t have millions of followers. They didn’t have a career waiting for them. They sacrificed. And I think, myself included, we have an impulse to immediately praise and comment on every celebrity action. In doing so, we risk losing sight of the people who have actually borne the weight of this struggle. Second: somehow, in all this noise, we keep forgetting Gaza. Gazans have repeatedly told us what they need. They need our donations. Why is it that we can run to donate to nonprofits miles away from Gaza, but ignore their pleads for help? We need to start prioritizing orgs who are immediately sending funds to Gaza imo. And if we don’t do that, yes, we’re ignoring Gaza.

I’m sure this will stir up controversy, but it needs to be said: no influencer, celebrity or social media page should be absolved for their silence on Palestine and/or its resistance. Some are speaking up now because they waited until supporting Palestine became comfortable, until the personal and professional risk was low enough. Meanwhile, people like me were hunted down by the government for doing the movement work when speaking up actually came with consequences. You don’t get credit for finding your courage only after others paid the price for having it first.