Social media has a way of creating an allure, a certain aesthetic and with the right soundtrack it can make anyone feel as if they, too, can live their best lives. People are hungry for curating a life they no longer need a vacation from. To that end, many are voluntarily leaving the United States for life abroad. There’s a growing number of Black American women who are opting to leave the country — permanently. This is not a new trend; activists, musicians, socialites, and writers like James Baldwin, Richard Wright, Nina Simone and Josephine Baker all famously took the leap and left America behind for life in Europe. According to the State Department, about 9 million Americans reside abroad. I am one of those people and there are a myriad of reasons why I, and so many others, chose to leave the U.S..
