Who Keeps The Only Black Friend Safe?

A photo can look like friendship and still hide risk. Today we’re asking a question that cuts through the nice memories, the group chats, and the holiday pictures: who keeps the only Black friend safe? I’m careful with facts and I refuse to fill gaps with speculation, but I’m also honest about why so many Black people feel fear before reassurance when we see certain stories unfold.

We talk about what is currently known about Nolan Xavier Wells, an 18-year-old who travelled by boat to Horn Island with friends and did not make it home, as well as why Tamla Horsford’s name still sits in our collective memory. The common thread is not gossip, it’s the lived reality of being the only one in a space, where racism can show up quietly and belonging can disappear fast. That’s where tokenism in friendship lives: being included, even loved, but not protected when friendship requires courage.

I also bring this into parenting, safeguarding, and the adultification of Black children. When institutions and other adults can perceive Black girls as older, less vulnerable, or “difficult” for simply being confident, proximity and vigilance stop being personality traits and become protection. The takeaway is practical and challenging for anyone who cares about real allyship and interracial friendships: don’t ask whether you have Black friends, ask whether you are safe for them.

If this lands with you, subscribe, share it with a friend who needs to hear it, and leave a review with your answer: when race enters the room, who do you become?

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Transcript

Heat, Politics, And Daily Strain

SPEAKER_01 0:29

Hey everyone, I hope you're doing well. Um, we're fighting fighting through this heat, this heat waves. Um, and I don't do very well in the heat. Um, and also I think that the UK is it's a difficult place to live in right now, to be honest with you. I don't know whether we start with the politics of it all. Kia Starmer will be stepping down as the leader of the Labour Party in September. Um, I think it's Andrew Burnham that has been tipped to take over, and of course, by virtue of leading the Labour Party, then comes the de facto Prime Minister of the UK, the cost of living, just the rising tensions here here in the UK when it comes to reform UK and just things in general that you know it's not an easy place to live right now. People will turn and say, Well, you've got running water, you've got, you know, you can go to the shop safely and and and buy stuff, and okay, fine, but we are still able to say that what we find difficult about the UK as we live it. A lot of us, our parents came here under the guise of a you know, like of greatness that they thought that they would be able to obtain here, and you know, that dream is a nightmare, actually, if you think about it. You've got people who are limiting their ambition because anything over 100k will be penalized. You've got people who want to emigrate from the country in the full thought and knowledge that if they return, they will be financially penalized. HMRC is moving like a debt collector, the supreme debt collector of the UK is HMRC. And it makes for an uncomfortable feeling when you walk into a shop and buy less than five items and they're telling you about 60 pounds, and you wonder how somebody on minimum wage, or even just somebody who is just scraping by, like, how how are they actually surviving? Um, yeah, it's difficult in the UK, can't lie. But I know in other parts of the world people are finding it difficult too. I know a few people in the states, and they confess the same, you know. So, yeah, it's it's a it's a difficult place to be and in the world right now, and we're just striving and surviving.

Masterclasses Pause And Deadline

SPEAKER_01 2:58

I do want to um also announce that I will be on www.toytalks.com. I have masterclasses and they've been on there for a couple of years now, and the view is always that I was gonna update them. I thought the law has changed, um, the job market has changed, the labour market's changed, and I just felt like it deserves a complete revamp, and I haven't had the opportunity or the time to do it. So, what is going to happen is by the end of July, so I'm talking July 2026, you will be unable to purchase any more masterclasses. And if you have purchased, I would say that you refresh your mind on some of those masterclasses, bearing in mind I own the IP, they the masterclasses do belong to me. Um, and as as long as you've been able to view them on numerous occasions, the view is that I will um remove the masterclasses from my site, and that's because I never want to put something out that I can't um continue to update, and life has just been life in, and I just haven't gotten around to doing it. So I think the fairest thing to do is whilst I feel like the messaging is still very relevant, but I think something like the redundancy mastercast, things like that, they need an upgrade, and it needs me to take the time to do the work and then record the videos, even if it's in addition to the videos that already exist, which I think that that would always be the plan. So 2027, um, working towards launching new videos, masterclasses to support the existing ones, but also to bring more up-to-date the existing um masterclasses. So that's the the announcement I want to make there, and I think it's the fairest way to do it, to be honest with you.

Trigger Warning And The Core Question

SPEAKER_01 4:49

So, yeah, okay, so this podcast is coming with a trigger warning because it's really heavy, and I think I can't not discuss some of the topics on here that's pertinent to us. So, whilst the Toy Talks podcast um advises, shares, and supports as we navigate the world of work and highlight the path of our success, I always say life and politics underpin the world of work because when we talk about the world of work, we're not talking about it in isolation of other things. You know, for example, if something happens in politics, it impacts the way we work because it impacts our lives, and the same can be said about certain things that happen in our society. And I always say whatever happens in the States is a backdrop to what happens here, and true to form, it's usually the case. So, this episode comes with a trigger warning. Who keeps the only black friend safe? I've done a lot of research, I've done a lot of reading, I've done a lot of soul searching myself, and a lot of us can relate to being the only black friend. Yeah, it's nothing particularly wrong with that, but it's very loaded. I don't know what happened to Nolan Xavier Wells, and I want to start there because this episode is not an accusation, it's not an attempt to solve an active investigation sitting behind a microphone, and it's not me deciding who's guilty, who's innocent, or what happened in the final hours of a young man's life. I do not know what happened to Nolan Xavier Wells, but I know why so many of us black people looked at the circumstances surrounding his death and felt this fear before we felt reassurance. And that is what I want to talk about on this episode because the question sitting with me is not only what happened to Nolan, the question sitting with me is who keeps the only black friend safe? So, what does friendship actually mean when the people around you enjoy your presence but have never considered themselves responsible for your safety in a racialized world? A white person may genuinely consider themselves your friend. They may invite you on holiday, uh, may have you in their home, you may be in a group chat at the birthday parties, on the boat, in the photographs. You may have years of memories together, but will they notice when something isn't right? Will they challenge another white person on your behalf? Will they recognize racism when it isn't announced as racism? Will they believe your discomfort before they understand it? And that is so important. That belief before understanding is the acknowledgement that you will never truly understand, but you would still recognize that your friend has been racially discriminated against. Will they believe your discomfort before they understand it? I f I I I this doesn't feel right. I don't I don't understand what you mean. You don't need to. You just need to know and believe me when I say it doesn't feel right. Will they inconvenience themselves to protect you? Will they make sure you get home? Will they speak when everybody else is silent? And perhaps the hardest question of all, have they ever considered that friendship with a black person carries responsibilities they have never had to think about before? Because being friends with a black person in a racialized world means that one day race may enter the room. And when it does, who will you become? That's the actual question at hand here. Not when the music is playing, not when everybody is laughing, not when the friendship is convenient. Who are you when your black friend needs you to see exactly what you have never personally experienced? Do you have the capacity to understand the weight of that? Who are you when defending them might make the room uncomfortable? Who are you when another white person is the problem? Who are you when believing your black friend requires you to question somebody who looks like you? Who are you when friendship requires courage? Because I've learned something in my own life. You were my friend when friendship was social, but when friendship required courage, I was on my own, and that is a very particular kind of loneliness.

What We Know About Nolan Wells

SPEAKER_01 10:04

So I'm sure that you've seen in the media, social media, specifically social media to be fair, because I haven't seen any UK news outlets carry the story. Nolan Xavier Wells was 18 years old, and on the 4th of July, which is um US independence, he travelled by boat to Horn Island off the Mississippi Gulf Coast with friends. He did not return home. His mother reported him missing, and that's really poignant. His mother reported him missing when he went to Mississippi Gulf Um coast. He went with friends. Um, and all his friends were white males. I believe there was four of them. So when his mum reported him missing, a search began, and two days later, his body was found in the water near the northwestern shoreline of the island. At the time I'm recording this episode, the investigation remains ongoing with no official cause or manner of death which has been released. Authorities have said that the friends who were with Nolan are cooperating with investigators. I also need to add that the friends have removed their social media and have lawyered up. Reports have also said investigators were told Nolan may have chosen to remain on the island because he expected to return to the mainland with another group. Nolan's family have retained civil rights attorney Ben Crump and is asking for answers, transparency, and a full understanding of what's happened. Those are the facts. Those are what we know at this time that I'm recording, the time that I've researched, I've checked again before recording, and this is the facts as we know it so far. So I'm going to be really careful here because I'm not going to accuse people of something that hasn't been established, and I'm not going to fill in factual gaps with speculation. But I am also not going to pretend that the public's reaction to this story appeared from nowhere.

Why The Image Sparks Fear

SPEAKER_01 12:09

Because when photographs and details of the trip began circulating, many black people saw something that activated a very particular fear. A young black person, the only black person in a white friendship group, away from home and then dead. And almost immediately a question emerged. Who was looking out for him? Who was looking out for Nolan? Now, asking that question does not mean we know what happened. We don't know what happened. It's still an active investigation. But I think black people are allowed to examine why that image, that the picture image that has been circulating unsettles us. So why does the image of the only black person in a white friendship group, dead in an unexplained or uh contested circumstances, immediately touch us? And it's something that's so deep within us as black people. Why do so many of us recognize the vulnerability of being the only one? Because many of us have been the only one. The only one at work, the only one at school, the only one on the girls' trip, the only one at the sleepover, the only one at a wedding, the only one in the friendship group. And many of us know exactly how quickly belonging can disappear when something goes wrong. So I want to slightly move the conversation slightly.

Tamla Horsford And Collective Memory

SPEAKER_01 13:36

Tamala Horsford. And this is why so many people have also remembered Tamala Horsford. Tamala Horsford was a 40-year-old black woman, mother of five, and in November 2018, she attended an adult birthday sleepover at a home in Force County, Georgia. She was the only black woman at the gathering. The following morning, she was found dead in the backyard, bruising on her body. The original investigation concluded that her death was accidental and consistent with a fall from a second-story balcony. Her family and supporters continued to raise questions about the circumstances of her death and the investigation. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation later reopened and reviewed the case, and it ultimately concluded that the evidence did not support the criminal charges. Hear me, the evidence did not support the criminal charges. An independent autopsy commissioned by Tamala's family later contributed to continuing questions and disagreement about the circumstances surrounding her death. I need to be precise here too. The official conclusion was accidental death. No one was actually criminally charged. I'm not going to tell you that I know something that has not been established, but what I am interested in is why Tamala's name has remained in the collective memory of so many black people. Why does her story still disturb people? Why does it still disturb us? Why, when another black person is the only black person in a white social group and dies in circumstances that are not immediately understood, do people remember Tamala? Tamla, sorry, I'm calling her Tamala, it's Tamla, sorry. I think it's because the fear is bigger than one case. The fear is I am the only one who is watching out for me. If something happens to me, who will notice? Who will know me well enough to know that something is wrong? Who will speak for me if I cannot speak for myself? Who will insist on answers? Who will understand why my family does not simply accept the first explanation? And who will believe that my life deserves the inconvenience of further questions? That is the fear here in the UK.

UK Parallels And Unequal Attention

SPEAKER_01 16:09

Um I don't I love Kalechi Okafour. I I love her, I think she's amazing, fellow Libra's sister, and she's openly spoke about or spoken about um the rate of the deaths of black women, and I know in that there are also um been some very highly suspicious deaths of black men, but more number of women who have been dead, found unalived, found dead next to bodies of water. And I have touched on this topic before, and I have said that I believe that there is a serial killer who is targeting black women, unaliving them and placing them their bodies of water. And I think part of it is because we understand how institutionalized racism works internationally, specifically here in the UK, and we know the lack of media retention, follow-up, and follow-through means that, in my opinion, as a community, we don't get the visibility and the level of seriousness that other races in our in society get. That's the truth. So it could take 10 to 15 years for someone to come to the same conclusion that black women being unalive and found next to bodies of water now become suspicious. I guess the other point to make is I've always said what happens in the in the US usually manifests itself in the UK. That is our equivalent to what is also happening in the UK, or be it that a lot of these women who have been found dead under suspicious circumstances, it hasn't been about them being the only black friend. I guess that's the nuance here. But I think it's important to draw parallels whereby, as black people, as a community, I don't think we get the same treatment, coverage, investigation, and questioning that leads to further investigation. We don't get that spotlighting in the same way that non-black people, specifically the white community, would get if that was the circumstances that arose within that community. And I think it's a fair comment to make.

Tokenism And Silence In Friendship

SPEAKER_01 18:58

Nobody has to announce it, and nobody has to say you are here because you are black. Tokenism can exist, it can exist in intimacy, you can be loved and still tokenized, and you can be invited and still isolated, you can be included and still not be protected. And this is where I've had to really think about what tokenism means in friendship. For me, tokenism begins when people want access to your blackness but have no relationship with the reality of keeping a black friend safe. They love the humor, the culture, the music, the food, the perspective, the stories, the proximity. They love being able to say, My black friend, they may genuinely actually love you and adore you as a friend, but have they developed any understanding? Has that has your non-black friend developed an understanding of what it means to love a black person in a world or adore a black person in a world where the black person is not always treated the way they are? Do they know what to do when a black woman says something about this doesn't feel right? Do you believe her? Or does she become difficult, dramatic, aggressive, paranoid, sensitive? Are you my friend when I'm entertaining, or are you my friend when my reality becomes inconvenient? Because those are not the same thing. I have been in spaces, in a situation where my friendship required courage. I know this personally, and I've been racially discriminated against in front of a white friend, and she did nothing. Nothing. She did not defend me, she did not intervene, she did not challenge what was happening, she did not even ask me afterwards whether I was okay. And I think that made that experience so significant to me. Um, because it wasn't just about racism in itself, it was it was the silence of somebody I considered a friend. Because there is something about experiencing racism in front of a white friend that creates a test you did not know you were administering. You are watching what is happening to you, and then you are also watching them watching what is happening to you. You are experiencing harm, and you are also registering their silence, and the silence becomes information. I learned something that day. You were my friend when friendship was social, but when friendship required courage, I was on my own, and that changes the friendship. It definitely changed mine. It has to because how can I feel safe when somebody who has shown me that when something happens to me, their first instinct is to protect their own comfort? This is what I mean when I Talk about safety. I'm not saying that every white friend is dangerous. I'm not sitting here saying that. Like, really deep what I'm saying here. I'm not saying that black people should only have black friends. Absolutely not. I grew up in Tottenham. I grew up in and amongst diversity, different races, ethnicities, cultures. What a time to be alive. For me, I think diversity is very, very important. The argument is that friendship cannot simply be measured by how much fun we have together. For me, safety is part of intimacy. And I need to know: will you advocate for me when I'm not in the room? Will you recognize when I'm being treated differently? Will you challenge racism even if I'm not there to witness it? Will you believe me when I tell you something has happened? Will you stand beside me when standing beside me has a social cost? Because if the answer is no, then I need to understand the limits of our friendship. Maybe you're a social friend, maybe you're somebody I have dinner with, maybe you're somebody I can laugh with. But are you a safe friend? And this is a different category. And I think too many black people have mistaken inclusion for safety. And I definitely know I have. There was a nail tech that I would go to get my nails done in her house. And I'd introduced my friend to her. I actually paid for my friend to get her nails done on her birthday. So during COVID now, I had an appointment at Same Nail Tech Lady. But I'd COVID, so I couldn't go. So I told her. Couldn't go. And I said, listen, if you want me to come with this COVID, cool, I'm gonna come, but I don't think that's the right thing, and I'd already paid my deposit. So she said that she can't give me my deposit back. I said, So do you want me to come with the COVID? Because I could do that, but I'm not gonna lose my deposit because I've got COVID. This is we're it we're in a pandemic. She got very aggressive, very abusive very quickly. And there's certain things that she said, and I thought, okay, I know that you you're trying trying a thing, and I know where this is. It's I'm a black woman, you're giving me microaggression of superiority here. And I had told my white white friend, I had told other women that I had recommended to the Neltech, and as soon as I told the other women that I'd recommended to the Neltech, they were like, Absolutely not, they're not going there. That was loyalty. Now, the ladies that I'd told happened two of them were black and one was a mixed race woman, and I didn't even know them very well to be honest. I wouldn't even call them friends, they're just people that I'd recommended to the Neltec. They were like, when I told them exactly what happened, they were like, No, no, no, no, we don't do that. They didn't owe me that loyalty, but my white friend who I told continued going there. She would go there and tell me and then moan about her, but she still went. There's so there's a I'm no longer friends with this person. There's a list of reasons why I'm not a list of them, and it's interesting because I allowed these things to culminate. That's typically a Libran, by the way. We study we we pattern recognition, and it's not that we're stupid, we're gathering intelligence as to the person's character. So she continued to go. And in that moment, I knew that the friendship was dead or dying. I've told you about someone's super micro-aggressive superiority complex. I've told you about the exchange, I've offered to show you the exchange, and you are not protecting me from a loyalty perspective, and just as a friend, because I am your token black friend, and I've told you about this pervasive racism that I've experienced. That's not the first time. I've been on holiday with this person and received racial discrimination while she has stood there, not done anything, not advocated for me, not asked me for my K, done nothing, just stood there as a bystander. You're not a bystander to my friendship, you're just a bystander. When a situation becomes too uncomfortable, you'll pretend like you can't see it. That to me is complicit complicity. It is. You have an opportunity to use your privilege when you're choosing not to. You can't be friends with someone like that. It becomes dangerous because what that is is a backdrop to a situation that could be far, far worse. And said person would literally leave you to the walls. Remember, I said there's a long list of reasons why I'm not no longer that person's friend anymore. Justifiable reasons. I've said them to said person, but the example I've given you lends itself to this conversation when we talk about being the token black friend, being the only one. There's particular there's a particular vulnerability in being the only one. Because when you are the only black person in a space, everybody else has the comfort of being reflected back at themselves. You do not have that. If something becomes racially uncomfortable, and something racially uncomfortable happens, you may be the only person who recognizes it. You may be the only person affected by it. You may be the only person expected to explain it, and you may also be the person who is punished for naming it. That is a lot of work to place on one person, and I think this is why I have become increasingly uncomfortable with the idea that diversity simply means access. Diversity does not simply mean access. You can have access in a room and still be unsafe in it. You can be invited on a trip and still be isolated. You can be included in the group and still have nobody who understands what happens when race enters the room. Being included is not the same as being safe. Being invited is not the same as being protected, and being somebody's only black friend does not mean that they understand what friendship requires when race enters the room.

Motherhood, Proximity, And Safeguarding

SPEAKER_01 29:08

We live in a diverse area, if you like, but depending on the time of day you go out and where you go, we are as black people a minority. But motherhood has made this like this question um even more urgent to me about tokenism being the only black friend because I'm not only making decisions about my own safety anymore, I'm raising a black girl. And I'm very intentional about the environments I place her in. I want her friendship group to be diverse. I want her school, her nursery, kindergarten diverse. I want the activities she participates in to be diverse. And I do not want my daughter growing up believing that diversity means she is always the diversity. I do not want her entire childhood to be an exercise in being the only one, the only black girl, the only black child, the only child with her with to have textured hair, the only child whose mother has to explain why something that everyone else thinks is harmless does not feel harmless to us. And does not mean, and it doesn't mean I want her to fear white people, because I really don't. It means I do not want her to be structurally isolated, and there is a very clear difference. I want her to have a diverse portfolio of friendships because I want her to understand different cultures, different people, and different experts have different experiences. But I also want her to have people around her who instinctively understand parts of her life that she should not always have to explain. I want her to know what it feels like to be reflected, and I want her to know what it feels like not to be the exception. I want her to know that being chosen by a group is not the highest form of belonging. Safety really, really matters. I really want to be clear that proximity is part of my safeguarding when it comes to my daughter. So my daughter does performing arts, and it is predominantly a white, white, a performing arts um class. Um, and she does have a performance coming up, and I've been told that parents are expected to drop their children off, and there will be chaperones there, okay. Um, and I also want to be very, very, very clear. Like the owner of the performing arts school is lovely, she's a lovely woman. Um, but we as black parents understand when we're especially when you're outside London, we understand those subtle nuances, okay? Because I've had conversations with other mothers and I have concluded there are certain cultural understandings that you could just can't expect people to know who are not part of your culture. In a way, saying no is teaching them if they are willing to learn. And if they're not willing to learn, learn, that's on them. But you for me, I am not the type of parent, whether my daughter is three, 10, or 13, drop off my child somewhere and walk away outside of school. Like that, that is that is, I don't know. I I don't think I could do that. Not in the society we live in today, absolutely not. So she has a performance coming up, and and like I said, you know, we're expected to drop our children off, they'll be chaperones. And my answer is no. If I can't be there with my daughter backstage, she will not be there, and that's my position. And and it was met with a little bit of resistance, subtle resistance. I would, it was, it was more covert rather than overt. Um, because I think when parents hear there will be a chaperone, they feel reassured. But for me, I hear when they say, Oh, there'll be a chaperone, what I'm hearing is my young black daughter will be somewhere, I cannot see her, surrounded by adults I do not know, in an environment where she is one of a few children who look like her. Those are not the same safeguarding, those are not the safe same safeguarding calculations that I'm making in my mind. And I need people to understand that. I'm not saying the chaperones are bad people, I'm not accusing anybody of wanting to harm my child. I'm saying I do not outsource my judgment simply because somebody else has been given a title. Chaperone does not automatically mean I know you. It does not mean you understand my child, and it does not mean you understand how black children can be perceived differently. It does not mean you understand adultification, it does not mean I'm required to surrender my instincts because other parents are comfortable. I'm not all parents and I'm not other parents. My child is not moving through the same world as all the other children, especially as a black child. We know our black children are moving differently in the world. That is my parenting position. And proximity is part of my safeguarding. And I want to say that clearly proximity is part of how I safeguard my child. Sometimes my presence is the protection, sometimes my ability to observe is the protection. Sometimes my daughter knowing that mommy is nearby is the protection. Sometimes other adults knowing that I'm her mother and her mother is nearby is the protection. And I refuse to be shamed out of this because people may consider it as a helicopter mom or maybe in excessive. I'm safeguarding my child, I'm safeguarding her life, and I'm also ensuring that she's protected and seen when she is around me and I'm parenting her.

Adultification And Institutional Risk

SPEAKER_01 34:41

I also want to talk about adultification because we need it, it's a topic we need to talk about, and it's something that we talk about as and when situations arise, but I do think it's a topic of conversation. It's a shame it's not part of the curriculum, the school curriculum, actually. Black children are not always afforded the same presumption of innocence, vulnerability, or the need for protection as white children. Black girls in particular can be perceived as older, more mature, less innocent, and less in need of comfort or protection than their white peers. So when I think about safeguarding my daughter, I'm not only thinking about the obvious dangers, I'm thinking about whether she will be believed, whether she will be comforted, whether her distress will be taken seriously, whether somebody will interpret her confidence as attitude. Because I've shared with you before in her nursery where her confidence has been uh seen as a negative, and I had to tell them, why would you say that a two-year-old acts like a teenager, the adultification of children? Can you see how confidence is interpreted as attitude as something negative because it's because a black child possesses confidence? That's mad. I guess another question that plays on my mind is whether somebody will interpret like fear, a black child who has fear as defiance, because this is what we when we talk about adult adultification, these are the things we're considering as black parents. Whether somebody will expect more maturity from my child than they would from another child of the same age, simply because my child is black. Whether she will be treated as a little girl. That's that's what matters to me. And this is why I think there can sometimes be a disconnect between black parents and institutions. Some parents experience institutions as inherently protective. Black parents often know that institutions can be the very places where our children are misunderstood, adulterified, or insufficiently protected. So, no, I do not simply hear everybody else leaves their children. I, as a black mother, what I hear is everybody else's child is not my child. Everybody else's history is not my history, and everybody else's risk calculation is not mine. And I will not ignore what I know in order to make other people feel comfortable. So I volunteered to be a chaperone, and the resistance it has been met with is more about it's almost like it's been it was ignored. And to be fair to the owner, I did pull her up and I said, Listen, you're asking DBS check. I told you I have all these things. And I think what I was offended about is when she said, Do I not want to see my daughter perform on stage? Then that's when I knew that this is not landing for her. It's not landing, it's not the penny's not dropping. Um, so there's a rehearsal on Friday, and I'm gonna see where the penny drops. And if it doesn't drop on the table, my daughter will not be performing on Saturday because I'm not going to explain how I'm protecting my child in what should be clear. I don't expect you to fully understand my reasoning, but you're not gonna question my ability as her mother to protect her. That's not what's gonna happen here. So when I'm having this conversation with you and we're talking about Nolan Xavier Wells, and we're talking about Temla Horsford, there are it's the way we need to explore this topic. You know, we've spoken about tokenism, we've spoken about parenting, the adultification of children, it's so important because it all intersects, it all overlaps, and I think it's really important, especially as a black parent, how we're educating our children. Because for me personally, how I'm educating my child, she's never gonna be the only black friend in a group, it's not happening, that's not a friendship group. My daughter needs diversity in her friendship groups, because now we have cautionary tales, unfortunate examples of where mothers have lost their children, where their children have been the only black person in and amongst white friends, so-called friends, because when they've had an opportunity to display that friendship, it's been walls of silence under suspicious circumstances of a black person losing their life. That's the reality, those are the facts. I know some people will listen to this podcast and say you can't live your life assuming something bad is gonna happen. And I totally agree. I'm not trying to say that. This is not about teaching my daughter to fear white people, this is not about teaching black people that interracial friendships is impossible. This is not about me saying every unexplained death involving a black person and white friends is evidence of racism or foul play. It is about refusing to confuse access with safety. It is about asking better questions of friendships. It is about understanding that love without awareness can still leave somebody vulnerable. And it is about recognizing that for black people, vigilance did not emerge from nowhere. We have inherited stories, we have cautionary tales, and we have lived experiences where we've watched institutions fail people who look like us. Institutions who have failed black people, and we've experienced racism in rooms where people who called themselves our friends remain silent. So when we ask questions, the questions have history. There is a backdrop, there is a reason, there is context.

What A Safe Friend Does

SPEAKER_01 41:04

So, what does safe friendships look like? I think a safe friend is somebody who does not need to experience what I experience in order to believe me. A safe friend notices, a safe friend asks questions, and a safe friend does not disappear when race makes the conversation uncomfortable. A safe friend does not need me to perform my pain perfectly before they take it seriously. A safe friend does not make me prove that something was racist to a criminal standard before they offer me care. A safe friend understands that sometimes I will see something before they do. And instead of immediately defending the world as they know it, they become curious about the world as I experience it. A safe friend knows where I am, a safe friend makes sure I get home, and a safe friend speaks. Silence also makes you complicit, and I think that that's what I'm asking people to consider. I'm not asking you to consider do you have black friends? No, I don't care how diverse your group photographs are. I want you to know are you safe for your black friends? That's the question you need to be asking yourself. Yeah? So if you're listening as a non-black person, that is the message I'm trying to get. If your black friend was in danger, social danger, racial danger, physical danger, would they know you were a safe place before they had to find out? Because the worst time to discover the limits of a friendship is when you need that friendship to protect you. So I returned to the the question and the title of this podcast. Who keeps the only black friend safe? Maybe the answer cannot simply be their friends. Maybe the answer is that safety has to be intentional. Maybe it is the friend who notices, the friend who asks, the friend who refuses to leave without you, the friend who does not dismiss your instincts, the friend who challenges the room, the friend who understands that friendship is not only about enjoying somebody's presence, it is also about caring about what happens to them. I do not know what happened to Nolan Xavier Wells. As far as I also don't know what happened to Temla Horsford. But as we're confronted with this ongoing investigation of Nolan Wells, his family deserves. They deserve a thorough investigation. They deserve transparency. They deserve to understand the circumstances in which their 18-year-old son did not come home. And as that investigation continues, I will not use his death to make claims that have not been established. That's not what I'm meant to do. But I will allow his story to make me ask questions that has existed long before this case. Keeps the only black friend safe. Many of us have been the only one, the only black friend, and many of us have learned sometimes painfully that being welcomed is not the same as being protected, that being loved socially is not the same as being defended. Proximity to whiteness is not the same as safety. And that sometimes the people who say they love us have never asked themselves whether they would protect us. So if you are listening to this, listening to this podcast episode, and you have a black friend, I don't want you to ask yourself whether you love them. I want you to ask yourself something harder, something deeper. When race enters the room, who do you become? Your black friend says something is wrong. Do you believe them? When another white person is the problem, speak when friendship requires courage. Still your friend? And if they were ever in danger, social danger, racial danger, physical danger, would they know you were a safe person before they had to find out? Because friendship should not only be somewhere we belong, friendship should also be somewhere we are safe, and no black person should ever have to discover in the moment they need protection the most that they were the only one in the room.

Dedication And Closing Reflections

SPEAKER_01 46:10

And they were always on their own. This has been like a deep episode. Researching, reading. It felt heavy. And to do this episode justice would just be to leave it here. I can't talk about any other topics. I don't want to convolute other subjects. I just want you to listen and receive. This is my perspective as a black woman. 42 in October. I've lived a little, okay? I've been the only black friend. I've been the only black woman in the room. There are so many micro and macro aggressions that we experience in the world of work, but we already know the world of work isn't safe. We're working, gotta pay the bills, friendships, those are your choices, this encourages conversation. Friendship groups, your diverse friendship groups, where you are the are the only black woman in your friendship group. I hope this is a conversation to them. Tell them listen to the end. Because sometimes maybe it's easier for them to hear it from another black woman than it is to hear it from you. Maybe this provides the black backdrop to an uncomfortable conversation. But why should the conversation even be considered uncomfortable? Right? Shouldn't it be an uncomfortable topic for those people who are open to learning, listening, and being educated? Be uncomfortable to people who don't want to confront their own prejudice, as far as I'm concerned. In saying this, I'm dedicating this episode to Nolan Xavier Wells and Temla Horsford. May they rest in peace always. May the truth be told. And as in the case of Nolan Wells in the developing investigation, I pray for the covering over his family and friends, and may they access the truth. And may his soul rest in peace. My name is Toy Washington, and you have been listening to the Toy Talks Podcast.