“No person has the right to rain on your dreams.”
—Martin Luther King Jr. (1929–1968)
My morning began with Black Patriots: Buffalo Soldiers and continues with Tuskegee Airmen: Legacy of Courage.
When I watch these amazing stories I think about the determination, will, and desire just to be on an equal basis. I’m struck by the heroism to protect their white comrades while being shunned by those same individuals.
I truly wish that whoever came up with the phrase “Critical Race Theory” had just used the phrase “U.S. History, the Facts” because those three words of CRT immediately make certain people defensive and they reject even considering it, much less become aware of their history, or allow it to be taught.
The word “critical” immediately makes anyone defensive.
Unfortunately, the word “race” will shut people down.
The word “theory” implies that it’s not necessarily factual.
Both sides of my family benefited from being slave owners. Their offsprings became doctors, lawyers, stockbrokers, and politicians of and were afforded the luxury of the best schools and the best jobs due to the benefits of slavery. That’s a pure and simple fact.
The interesting thing is the children of those same slave owners fought for the rights of Native Americans, equal justice for American citizens, and voting rights for women.
I was raised by a woman born in Georgia and who grew up in Alabama, who hated racism and allowed me to have any friend I wanted no matter what race, culture, or color.
We lived just outside of Detroit when the riots happened in 1967.
The news portrayed the riots in a horrifying way, I was terrified that I was going to be killed by “angry rioting Negroes.” I remember my mother, who was dying of cancer at the time, trying to explain to me what they were angry about and to calm my fears.
While watching a program about racial inequality years ago I was struck by a young black man talking about walking down a sidewalk and seeing three white young men his age walking towards him and having a sense of fear of them.
I was shocked because it never occurred to me that a black man my age might fear me. My perspective changed after that.
On this rainy Martin Luther King Jr. Day, may we all pass each other with an awareness that that individual might fear us, and give them a smile, a nod, and truly ask how they are and mean it.
—Louis Warfield
Flommist Louis Warfield is a fabrication specialist who runs the award-winning Rhino Design Studio, “You dream it, we’ll build it.” Copyright © 2023 Louis Warfield. Sacramento photo by mehallo.
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