brushfire"This, yes, this, it was always like this." -Stanley Koehler
REFLECTIONS OF AN EMPTY NESTER
|
First Lady Michelle Obama, in her speech opening night at the Democratic National Convention, said she “wakes up every morning in a house built by slaves.” According to an article in the New York Times, her “assertion was met with derision and disbelief by some, who questioned whether it was true and said her choice to mention it amounted to an attempt to divide the country on racial lines.”
Had I looked, I'm sure I would have found a ton of responses to the First Lady's comment on Twitter. I didn't look. I did wonder, however, why stating both a fact — it was verified by historians — and a personal truth would be challenged. Anyone who watched her speech would know she went on to say she watched her daughters — “two beautiful, intelligent, black young women, playing with their dogs on the White House lawn.” The underlying message is: Look how far we've come. This is a statement of unity, not division. No doubt the imagery evoked by her reference to “generations of people who felt the lash of bondage” made some people uncomfortable. And well it should. But this is part of our country's history we white Americans can't deny. We criticize college students for needing trigger warnings and safe zones to protect them from things that may make them uncomfortable and yet when our own past is raised, we put our hands over our ears and drown out the noise. We close our eyes. We say: But slavery ended more than 150 years ago. Why do we have to talk about it now? Whether I myself have ancestors who were slave owners or whether ancestors of my black fellow Americans were, in the First Lady's words, victims of “the shame of servitude, the sting of segregation” is irrelevant. Oppression isn't something I need to inflict or experience personally to have it impact my life or sense of what is right or just or fair. It is part of the fabric of our shared past. When I was 15, I spent my sophomore year at a German high school. In history class, we covered World War II. My classmates and I studied the role of their country in the war. We learned about the Holocaust. My German peers were uncharacteristically quiet during this unit. The discussion among the teacher and students was uncomfortable. When I mentioned this to one of my classmates, she called it “ein schwarzer Punkt” — a black point — in their history. It made an impression on me. I returned to my American high school my junior year and studied U.S. history. This was a long time ago and I may have forgotten, but I have no memory of a similar sense of respect and air of solemnity among students when we learned about some of our own shameful chapters in history. We have a lot to be proud of in this country. But we also need to learn from our past and become better as a result of it. My limited experience as a 15-year-old in Germany, including a visit to the memorial site of a concentration camp, revealed people who acknowledged their ancestral role in history, made no excuses and expressed shame and remorse. My experience as an adult in this country is a tendency at times for people to defend rather than acknowledge and cast blame rather than show compassion. Defensiveness and blame are divisive. Acknowledgement and compassion are unifying. As Americans, black or white, our discomfort with our shared past is something that should unify, not divide us. It is only in accepting it, owning it and seeking a better future for everyone that we can move forward. A version of this appeared in the Grosse Pointe News Aug. 4, 2016.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Mary Anne BrushJournalist, fiction writer, wife and mother |