My White, Rural Town

 Hello everyone, and welcome back. I've yet again read another installment of Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow, and it's been educational to say the least. Today, I'd like to talk about some of the concepts discussed in her book, and relate them to my own life. 

In the interest of transparency, I'll admit that this morning, I didn't intend for this blog post to be based on my own "narrative." However, I ended up having a very insightful AP Language class midway through the morning, and found that it fit well with many of the themes of my book. We read a letter written by one of my school's alumni- it was about how he comes from a "small, white, rural town," but that just because of this, he shouldn't be exempt from basic human decency. One's background does not justify racism; this is a realization I've increasingly come to. 

Although my school is small and has little diversity, I've always considered it to be relatively "forward" in its thinking. I've always looked at examples of prejudice and bigotry within school systems and thought, "this does not apply to me." However, after reading the previously referenced letter, I've rethought this evaluation. The author brought up various examples of racism (and/or simple ignorance) throughout his education, and I found myself relating to many of them. For example, I myself remember having a 9th-grade debate about whether slavery was "good" or "bad," during which the entire class would regularly burst into giggles. The class clown would play devil's advocate, and in a low and humorous voice announce that the practice was "good for the economy." I felt extremely uncomfortable, but wondered if I was being too "sensitive," as no one else seemed to mind. Thinking back, that entire discussion was wildly inappropriate. 

My school is extremely tailored to the white experience. All of the topics we discuss are told from the white perspective, and because of this, social and historical issues often have an "us versus them" feel. There are no black students in my grade, but there are black students in my school. I often wonder how they felt during the "slavery talks," or during the race units. Because honestly, how arrogant is it for a room of white individuals to have a genuine discussion about whether or not it's ok to say the n-word, or to refer to enslaved peoples as a simple by-product of white history? This isn't entirely the fault of my school alone- my school didn't write the curriculum, or design the AP college board prompts. As Alexander discusses, nearly everything in society is constructed for the white audience, from movies and books to clothing and makeup; education is not the exception (172).

As a society, it is so incredibly important that we work towards unity, and move away from racism and prejudice. In class today, we also read about a bill that was proposed in the state of New Hampshire about a month ago. It would ban the classroom discussion of "divisive topics," which include race and sex. The fact that this bill might possibly pass (and within my high-school experience) is incredibly alarming. 

I have learned so, so much during my current unit on race, a unit that would be banned should this bill pass. As a society, we are still very racist. As I've learned from Alexander's book, we are using mass incarceration as a way to control the black population. As I've learned from the media, our law enforcement officers are shooting innocent black citizens on sight because of how they look. There is so much work that needs to be done, and so much action that needs to be taken. But none of that work or action is possible without education.