So you’re tired of hearing about slavery…
Recent (negative) commentary has arisen regarding First Lady Michelle Obama’s speech at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia this week. The First Lady stated she “wakes up every morning in a house built by slaves”. Both Bill O’Reilly and Rush Limbaugh found her statement to be problematic, which can almost be expected from those two. On another note, it’s also expected for society to critique the First Lady regularly- she could have made mention of a pet lizard in the White House and people would be appalled.
Having attended White schools my entire life, I can assure you my classmates and I received extremely minimal history lessons on the horrors of slavery in the United States. For this reason, I believe I can partially empathize with the White perspective why the repetitive referencing of our nation’s history can be occasionally overwhelming. It is not something that White America has truly ever been comfortable speaking on, digesting, or accepting as a significant piece of this country’s success, thus the outpour of Whites reposting and supporting O’Reilly and Limbaugh’s statements. However, since I am, in fact, a Black female, raised in a Black household, in a largely Black city, within a predominantly Black neighborhood, I completely and thoroughly understand why re-emphasizing our nation’s history is more important than ever before. And, as a citizen of this nation, I also believe the lack of understanding of Black history is inexcusable for those outside of the Black community.
Let me first say that Michelle was not trying to play the sympathy card, as some have suggested. Michelle is a highly educated Black woman who understands how difficult upward mobility is to attain. She is an outlier and a success story, but she has seen poverty, she has seen oppression, and she has surely experienced discrimination. Being Black in America does not mean we can turn our identities on and off. It means we carry the weight of a country within our veins. Many of our daily experiences remind us that our melanin continues to be a crime. Tracing our ancestry yields delving into the some of our darkest moments as people in a nation that was built on slavery and the genocide of Natives. It means understanding that at one point, we were only considered fractions of human beings. Our mothers were raped, and our fathers and brothers were sold to the highest bidders. Our families were torn apart. And, as a result of those horrific events, our underserved communities have been suffering the consequences of slavery for generations.
Simply put, slavery has contributed to a large majority of the societal and systemic problems the Black community faces. They range from structural racism to residential segregation to mass incarceration (click those links, I promise they’re helpful).
The Black community was/has been stolen, enslaved, whipped, beaten, raped, lynched, extinguished, handcuffed, incarcerated, and continues to be isolated from many opportunities to fulfill the American dream in this country.
My community has held a narrative that not only bears painful scars, but also upholds stories of survival and resilience. So, while First Lady Michelle Obama’s words only appear to be repetitive to the privileged eye, they are well within relevance as we work to uplift our communities, educate the ignorant on our history, and work to eradicate many of the increasingly sophisticated racist practices our society perpetuates. And, if anything, Bill O’Reilly and Rush Limbaugh’s complaints are evidence of those needs.
If you are interested in exploring this topic more in depth, I have provided a list of books that will aid in your understanding. Although, not comprehensive, they are a good start:
Aimé Césaire, Discourse on Colonialism
Michelle Alexander, The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness
Ta-Nehisi Coates, Between the World and Me
W.E.B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk
St. Clair Drake & Horace Cayton, Black Metropolis
bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism
