I’ve been enjoying the conversations and dialogues we’ve been having on TikTok recently. Some are funny and some are deep. The ones about race are not easy conversations to have. They often dredge up painful and hurtful thoughts and memories of our troubled past and current state of troubled affairs in this country. Nonetheless, I often find myself engaging in conversations in the spirit of finding ways to help us collectively heal and learn together.
What is not being taught in the schools
Critical Race Theory is a current hot topic being discussed. To some degree, it’s nothing new. White people have been whitewashing history for as long as the world has existed. The problem with that is, often Black and Brown people know the real history but White people often only learn what has been taught in schools. For obvious reasons, the brutality and violence is often glazed over for softer, more acceptable language to the same people who inflicted the brutality.
So, when a person stated how racist he felt Hawaiians are against White Americans, I could only figure he had no idea of the brutality behind Hawaii becoming a State. I wanted to make sure he understood the history so he could perhaps understand their feelings.
My video on how Hawaii became a State
In case you don’t know the history either, here’s the video.
For whatever reason, perhaps the length, I can only provide you the link to the video.
So far, the video has been viewed over 8,000 times and shared over 100 times. This and many of the comments let me know there’s a lot of information many White People have not had access to. I realize this is on purpose. However, I am encouraged by the level of understanding and acknowledgment by people learning the information for the first time.
Have we made progress?
In response to a question in the comment section from that video, someone asked if I felt we, African Americans, were better now than 100 years ago as it relates to systemic racism. This topic is pretty extensive so for this video, I focused on income and wealth.
The full video
The snippet from the video is from this organization, Race Forward. They work to bring tools, information and resources to help people understand complex race issues and help take effective action toward racial equity.
Here the full video my excerpt was taken from for my TikTok video.
Charts 1
Chart 2
Chart 3
What do you think?
What do you think about the progress we’ve made? Drop me a comment here or join the dialogue on TikTok.
