I have done things I am ashamed of.
I have a lot to learn, process, and remedy. I reflect on my own biases and experiences on this Juneteenth. I’m embarrassed that I only learned of Juneteenth in adulthood. Most of the history I learned was whitewashed and inaccurate, or just plain wrong and deceitful.
I am thinking back to my high school years more and more as my oldest is about to begin his senior year. Bird is a far more confident kid who is more focused on justice than I was. He studies his facts and history and has a keen sense of injustice and a fierce will to fight. He’s 16 so it’s not always from a rational position, but I admire his fierceness nonetheless. He is independent, strong-willed, and ornery. It’s a mighty combination and just the constitution he needs to be in this space for the long haul.
When I was his age, I hid in my own shadow, hoping to be seen as something I wasn’t. I wanted to be white. I was ashamed to be different, in part driven by the lack of representation in my world. I never saw anyone who looked like me in the halls of my school, in the grocery store aisles, behind TV news desks, on the big screen. When you don’t see yourself represented, you learn that the world doesn’t value people who look like you. This holds true today in every meeting I walk into where there are no other people of color. This alone tells me that the group I am entering does not value me. If they did, there wouldn’t be only white faces staring back at me. It’s these experiences that shaped me and these experiences I draw on as I try to be a better friend, ally, champion, and student.
Surely you remember Virginia Governor Northam’s racist photo dated 1984.
Just two years later, also in the state of Virginia, my high school class participated in a school tradition, “Senior Slave Day.”
We stood up on a chair in front of the class in the cafeteria and bid on each other. It was positioned as a joke, a big laugh at the end of senior year. We made each other dress up in silly outfits and do menial tasks for each other.
I was one of a few people of color in my school, and I am ashamed to say I did participate in this. I was neither coerced nor cajoled to do so. I joined in wholeheartedly. I was 17-years old, and as is often the case when you are the only “other” in a group and desperately want to belong, you do what it takes to fit in, despite your discomfort and internal rage. It is something that leaves you brimming with shame, and self loathing consumes you.
My school has since stopped this appalling “tradition,” though I don’t know exactly when it died. The curriculum has evolved, a necessity after what my hometown of Charlottesville experienced. It would be an egregious omission to not talk about race and social justice now. The current reading lists are diverse and challenging and impressive. It’s a small step. I’m not sure about the diversity of the school – students, teachers, board members. I imagine there is still work to do.
I’m telling you this to show you what that time was like in Virginia (I suspect it was the same in many places) and how people and institutions alike learn by listening and giving voice to the unheard (please stop saying people are voiceless). We still have an awful lot ahead of us. More listening. More healing. More remembering. More honoring. More repairing.
Our country needs an etch-a-sketch shake. We must dismantle the systems intentionally built to elevate white supremacy and the patriarchy. There is no fixing what was broken to begin with. Let’s begin with law enforcement. That vernacular alone is menacing and not trauma informed. We must also dismantle racist systems in healthcare, housing, education, banking, the list goes on… We are long overdue for this reckoning, America. The time is now. There are no options to be less than a vocal, anti-racist. There are not good people on both sides. You cannot stand silently in solidarity.
I’ve changed and grown since 1986 and I’ve found a platform for my voice. I have spent all of my subsequent years fighting for justice and equality, even before the days of social media, if you can believe it. Part of that drive stems from that very heinous joke I participated in when I was 17.
It fills me with shame still.