The Future of Black History Lives on Donald Trump’s Front Lawn
Further Thoughts On A Recommended Read by John McWhorter on the National Museum of African American History and Culture
John McWhorter’s NYT Piece Here
A pair of men’s slippers attributed to Elizabeth Keckly, who was Mary Todd Lincoln’s seamstress as well as an activist and memoirist.Credit...Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture.
I’d love to hear any reader’s thoughts on or surrounding this piece—below are mine.
There are so many stated and intimated points of elucidation and reckoning here —they’ve my head spinning a bit.
I prevail upon a "catch-all" phrase in most heated political/societal conversations, especially those engaged with individuals that display, but won't own, numerous blind-spots in their familiarity with the sub-dermal layers of historical eras past.
It is: "All the answers live in history".
I firmly believe that the eschewed or ignored inspiration dynamically manifest within the triumphant spiritual fortitude of the American Black “diaspora” is the most pathetic aspect of our nation's failure to achieve what should be our most viable and identifiable strength.
The Black American experiential legacy in this country is as unique as its origin. Our failure to grapple with these documented realities meaningfully and with insight is profoundly regrettable. We'll face a steeper hill to climb with a racist-adherent AI algorithmically winnowing down whatever archives whose availability we've heretofore taken for granted.
Grievance is too often conveniently misplaced in order to accommodate--and subsequently mollify-- the shame of generational culpability.
Delusional "non-racists" may not be actively participating in a witting way, but our unwillingness to proactively pursue the often inspirational knowledge within history is itself a willful form of negligent racism.
A non-interest in historical (past and present) human events under any rubric is bigotry.
The truth is a light.