For Martin Luther King Junior Day 2016

Screen Shot of the Online Version of This Article

So already, I hadn't planned to blog on the occasion of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday. But three articles I read recently are compelling me to write. After I posted two of them on my Facebook page, I realized merely posting them wasn't enough.

For a while, I've realized how difficult it is to get White people of my own age group--fifties and older--to talk about racism and white privilege. Silence quickly followed by a change in subject to something either tangential or not at all related is the general strategy. It's made me wonder what kinds of conversations do and don't happen at family dinner tables and among small gatherings of White people who consider themselves to be close friends.

But my assumption as a longtime teacher has been that if those conversations weren't happening among people of my age in homes or other places, they were happening among young people in schools. Maybe not as often, as lengthily, as deeply, and as satisfyingly as teachers and students both hoped, but at least with sincerity and a strong possibility of further discussion. In classes where relationships had been built, such difficult conversations had a chance of being genuine; in classes where there was a presumption of intended respect, difficult moments had a chance of being explored so that all felt more if not fully understood. The group was involved in a process, not a one-time activity that would be a panacea.

But The Boston Globe article about tomorrow night's Boston Children's Chorus "Raw Truth" concert disproved my assumption. Talking about the group of more than 500 young people--the article explains its members represent more than 120 zip codes and are as young as 7 and as old as 18--Anthony Trecek-King, its conductor, explained,

“When Trayvon Martin happened, when Ferguson erupted, Tamir Rice, Kalief Browder, we bring them up and we have discussions. And what I’m finding out — and it’s not surprising — is that not only are they not talking about this in their schools and communities . . . but they’re being discouraged from talking about it. . . . . 
"The exact opposite is true here at the Boston Children’s Chorus. If I don’t talk about these things, if I’m not bringing them up, having the discussion, then I’m not doing my job.”* 

Who was discouraging the kids from talking about racial justice and the deaths of other young people, I wondered--teachers? some kids? most kids? administrators? Was the conversation being officially, overtly, and/or subtly discouraged? Were those who were discouraging the conversation aware of all their reasons for discouraging it?

The second article was a column by a teacher** from extremely White New Trier High School who was responding to an article criticizing New Trier's MLK Day plans to replace a day of regular classes with a "variety of seminars on racial justice." Buckman was writing in response to the objections of some anonymous parents that were published in an article in The Breitbart News.*** 

Two of the objections were especially subtle:

“This is supposed to be a day to honor Dr. Martin Luther King. Yet of the 59 classes, over half seem to focus on the color of skin and not the content of character. Why not spend the day to study, reflect and write about Dr. King’s actual words,**** the advancements made and the dreams yet to be realized?… 

“In order to be post-racial you have to live it."

Wow, I thought as I realized I was reading my second article in as many days that was about the active discouragement of talking about racism and race-related history and current events in school. As the first statement suggests, of course there's value in studying MLK's speeches and writings, his legacy, and his character. But "dreams yet to be realized" seems to require an assessment of the present and the past. The second statement takes almost a cognitive therapy approach. After asserting "post-racial" as a societal ideal--lots to unpack there, since in my experience, this word is understood very differently by different people--the person offering that comment argues that if race shouldn't matter and won't matter in post-racial America, our best course is simply to embody the belief that "racism no longer exists and no longer matters." No need to worry about the enduring inequalities that are the legacy of "racial America"--it's all about attitudes, what really should be, not institutions past and present.

Responding to the Breitbart article, Buckman passionately justifies New Trier's plans for having its predominantly White student body engage with one another around issues of racial inequality: "It's necessary," "It's not guilt--it's history," and "If we feel guilt, so be it." She explains her third point as follows:  

"That temporary feeling is nothing compared to the histories of inequality and current discrimination faced by many racial minorities--and avoiding these exchanges because of 'guilt' only breeds ignorance that recreates oppression. Guilt will fade. Understanding social location and different perspectives on complex issues is lasting."

Buckman says an awful lot in that short paragraph. And before talking about my own feelings as a sixty-year-old, it seems worth mentioning three kinds of guilt that people of any age might experience: guilt by association, guilt through action, and guilt through inaction. While many sixteen-year-olds--people who've never cast a vote, never participated in a town meeting, never accepted or rejected a candidate for a job, a loan, or a place in a freshman class--may feel some guilt by association, chances are great that they haven't acted in ways that perpetuated systematic oppression on the basis of skin color. So school programs like the one New Trier is planning actually create the opportunity for future enlightened action and less guilt through action and inaction.

Speaking for myself, I don't feel guilty when I learn about institutions and policies that were put into place before my lifetime--I don't take responsibility for their creation. But I do feel guilty about having been the beneficiary of them without having understood that I was benefiting and for having unwittingly helped to perpetuate them. But isn't that privilege--white privilege or any other kind of privilege--in a nutshell--that breezy unconsciousness of the way the deck is stacked in one's favor? And isn't the big problem with that priviliege the way in which it allows one unconsciously to keep restacking that deck? Buckman's right, though: that guilt--really a combination of guilt and feeling pretty stupid for not having understood this sooner as a result of entitled inattention--fades pretty easily once one owns up to it and resolves to act according to one's new consciousness.

It's guilt related to present and future action or inaction that most haunts me: the guilt I do feel and will feel when I don't speak up and when I fail again at getting White people to talk about white privilege and race-related injustice. Most of the White people I know get it that the expression "Black Lives Matter," in asserting the value of Black lives, does not mean that non-Black lives don't matter. They recognize and talk about systemic oppression.

But systemic benefit is not discussed, unless the beneficiaries are CEOs and billionaires. Because many of them don't talk about white privilege with me, I don't know if they don't accept the idea of it or just don't want to talk about it (or talk about it with me in particular). My unsubstantiated theory is that for some--and maybe many--high-achievers, acknowledging white privilege means letting go of cherished notions of being completely "self-made" and admitting to any kind of preferential treatment as a result of "connections" and race-related assumptions. Especially among those of them who've worked very hard in competitive fields--and that's a lot of them--acknowledging their privilege may feel analogous to saying that they didn't need to work hard, didn't work hard, and deserve less credit for their achievements. In my opinion, white privilege generally says nothing about who has and hasn't worked hard. But since we don't talk about it, we don't get to talk about what it does and doesn't mean.

In responding to the Breitbart News article, New Trier School Superintendent Linda Yonke said, “"Current events show us that there is still much work to be done toward creating a world in which people are judged by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin . . .We are proud to spend a day exploring these important topics.” Yonke's right: there is still much work to be done. Let's hope schools are one of the places our youngest citizens can become part of that work and, in so doing, help to reduce the overall need for that work over time. Meanwhile, I'll keep trying to start the conversation, looking for new angles. And if it's one thing this blog has taught me, it's that many people are in ongoing conversation with themselves if not with others around topics like these and others. Maybe this blog will galvanize what I hope it will galvanize. Or maybe it will galvanize something else different altogether, but just as important or more.

* Weininger, David. "Boston Children’s Chorus Pursues ‘raw Truth’ in MLK Concert - The Boston Globe." BostonGlobe.com. Boston Globe Media Partners Inc., LLP, 14 Jan. 2016. Web. 17 Jan. 2016. <http://www.bostonglobe.com/arts/music/2016/01/13/boston-children-chorus-pursues-raw-truth-mlk-concert/Dn2S0g3YKgxZ86Eej1VGPJ/story.html?event=event25>.   
** Buckman, Celia. "Sorry Breitbart--White People Should Talk About Race." The Huffington Post. TheHuffingtonPost.com, 15 Jan. 2016. Web. 17 Jan. 2016. <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/celia-buckman/white-people-should-talk-about-race_b_8982056.html>.  
*** Pollak, Joel B. "High School Forces Kids to Attend 'Racial Identity' Classes." Breitbart News. Breitbart, 12 Jan. 2016. Web. 17 Jan. 2016. <http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/01/12/racial-identity-mlk-new-trier/>. 
**** Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial- Alabama Quote. 2011. Wakeuplife.org Website, Washington D.C. Wakeup.org. Web. 17 Jan. 2016. <http://wakeuplife.org/4505/img_20111008_123033/>.