December 11, 2025

In 2015, I photographed a series of individuals—Black and white—each wearing a simple surgical mask. On the front of each mask, each individual wrote a single word representing the personal struggle with racism that each person wanted to contain: Words like Fear, Shame, Silence, Arrogance, Color, Hopelessness, Willful Ignorance.

The masks were straightforward. There was no poetry or dramatization. They were shields, a physical barrier between the wearer and the world. They separated what we carried inside from what we sought to block, a simple boundary between self and a world that only saw racism as a "Black problem."

These masks captured an essential truth: racism is like a virus. It mutates. It spreads in ways both obvious and subtle, and it affects everyone differently. Each word on each mask was a recognition of that virus in its current form—a virus that existed in our lives and demanded acknowledgment.

Ten years later, the viruses have evolved. Fear, once a hesitation or simple worry, now appears as hypervigilance, chronic anxiety, or self-doubt when our worth is questioned. Shame, which once silenced us privately, can show up as internalized inferiority or the compulsion to perform for validation. Arrogance may have shifted from blatant entitlement to subtle superiority or dismissiveness. Silence, once the absence of voice, can now appear as complicity or the pressure to “stay safe” at the expense of truth.

These mutations exist for many reasons: societal pressures, new cultural narratives, systemic inequities, and the accumulated weight of microaggressions over time. Just as a virus adapts to survive, these forces evolve to fit the environments we live in.

The antidote is within reach. Awareness is the first step—naming the virus allows us to recognize it in ourselves and others. Boundaries provide protection, defining what we allow in and what we do not. Community strengthens us, offering support and accountability. Empathy, self-compassion, and honest reflection counter internalized fear, shame, and suspicion, reinforcing the shields we first wore so plainly on our masks.

The lesson remains clear: the viruses may mutate, but the principles of protection and self-preservation are timeless. By recognizing their new forms and deploying these antidotes, we continue the work begun a decade ago—shielding ourselves, preserving our dignity, and deciding consciously what we allow into our lives.