To hear right-wingers tell it, schools are making white people feel guilt and shame over the history of racism in America — a situation which they insist must stop.
No, not because those schools are misrepresenting the history, but because that history of enslavement, segregation, lynching, and genocide is too painful to recount.
No, not for the people who experienced them, but for Chip and Jenny in their exurban bubble, raised to think their country is the finest place ever struck off from the forehead of white baby Jesus in the manger.
For them to learn the truth might prompt them to wonder what grandma was doing during the March on Washington, and that never ends well.
Because let’s face it, she was probably at home screaming at the nightly news about the ungrateful n-words. Or at least doing what my mom’s mom was — just wondering what all the fuss was about.
Because that’s what most of our people did. They hit the snooze button and went back to sleep whenever the racial justice alarm clock went off. They didn’t see American apartheid as a problem. Just like earlier generations hadn’t thought slavery was a big deal either.
