An important piece. I, too, share your pessimism about long-term lasting change. I live in Spain, now, and went to a English barber last week. He is in his mid-40´s, not much older than me. First question he asked was, what I thought of the protests back in England. I could tell he was mildly disappointed with my answer. He brought up the `vandalism´ of the statues, namely the slave-trader in Bristol. "But he did a lot of good for the city," was his response. I said the Nazi´s did a lot of good for Volkswagen, but you don´t see busts of Himmler outside their factories. He gave me that one. He also seemed genuinely surprised when I quoted him figures about the amount of incarcerated African-Americans. He didn´t know, or didn´t want to know. My point is, he(and I) is from a generation where you couldn´t say `shit´on prime-time TV, but you could toss about racial slurs with abandon. His attitude has been ingrained in him, and I doubt anything will change this. However, the one hope I have is the amount of young people from all backgrounds marching for change. They are the future, and while it is impossible to alter the past, the future is yet to be written. Perhaps, with our upcoming generation we may see a sea change in attitude, which may result in positive progression. I hope...
I agree with you 100%, David! The young people are our brightest hope, and thank goodness, our future. I'm continually impressed with their intolerance for injustice and their courage to speak up.
But you, as well, help to make that bright light shine brighter by being willing to enter into difficult conversations. I think part of why racism and injustice continued to flourish was because of our reluctance to be made to feel uncomfortable or to make others feel uncomfortable as well, no matter how egregious their attitudes or comments.
To think that we would tolerate hate and injustice, simply because we don't want to seem impolite.
An important piece. I, too, share your pessimism about long-term lasting change. I live in Spain, now, and went to a English barber last week. He is in his mid-40´s, not much older than me. First question he asked was, what I thought of the protests back in England. I could tell he was mildly disappointed with my answer. He brought up the `vandalism´ of the statues, namely the slave-trader in Bristol. "But he did a lot of good for the city," was his response. I said the Nazi´s did a lot of good for Volkswagen, but you don´t see busts of Himmler outside their factories. He gave me that one. He also seemed genuinely surprised when I quoted him figures about the amount of incarcerated African-Americans. He didn´t know, or didn´t want to know. My point is, he(and I) is from a generation where you couldn´t say `shit´on prime-time TV, but you could toss about racial slurs with abandon. His attitude has been ingrained in him, and I doubt anything will change this. However, the one hope I have is the amount of young people from all backgrounds marching for change. They are the future, and while it is impossible to alter the past, the future is yet to be written. Perhaps, with our upcoming generation we may see a sea change in attitude, which may result in positive progression. I hope...
I agree with you 100%, David! The young people are our brightest hope, and thank goodness, our future. I'm continually impressed with their intolerance for injustice and their courage to speak up.
But you, as well, help to make that bright light shine brighter by being willing to enter into difficult conversations. I think part of why racism and injustice continued to flourish was because of our reluctance to be made to feel uncomfortable or to make others feel uncomfortable as well, no matter how egregious their attitudes or comments.
To think that we would tolerate hate and injustice, simply because we don't want to seem impolite.
Well, that's gonna change... ;-)