Tim Wise: To understand white denial about American history, consider two photos. [View all]

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Tim Wise
@timjacobwise
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To understand white denial about American history, consider two photos. First, this pic of Hazel Bryan screaming at Elizabeth Eckford during the integration of Little Rock Central High. The date: September 4, 1957. As for the second photo, follow along...(1)
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To understand white denial about American history, consider two photos. First, this pic of Hazel Bryan screaming at Elizabeth Eckford during the integration of Little Rock Central High. The date: September 4, 1957. As for the second photo, follow along...(1)


This is a promo pic for the TV show Leave it to Beaver: a much-beloved program, especially for white conservatives, who view it as a nostalgic representation of family life and the ultimate example of a more "innocent time..." But here's the thing...(2)


Leave it to Beaver premiered on October 4, 1957: one month to the day after that photo from Little Rock was taken. America was not innocent, and the evil wasn't only in the heart of Hazel Bryan or other Little Rock whites. It was a national sickness. One most whites ignored...(3)

...or simply couldn't allow themselves to see. Any nation that produces hagiographic representations of itself, at a time when others are being assailed and destroyed, deserves to be exposed as the fraud it is...(4)

And those who bought the lie -- whose childhoods were dependent upon it -- deserve to have their memories assaulted with truth, to be confronted with reality no matter how difficult. It's called growing up. It's called not being able to wallow in infantile naivete anymore...(5)

White Americans have an understanding of this country which is, by and large, infantile. And we are held hostage by our own ignorance. James Baldwin said it best...(6)

'These innocent people are trapped in a history they do not understand, and until they understand it, they cannot be released from it.' We want release without recognition, pardon without pain, forgiveness without facing the truth of what this nation has done in OUR name...(7)

And to our relative benefit for centuries. We want the America of the Cleaver family, because we fail to realize it NEVER EXISTED. It was a myth. A lie. Always. Reality was represented by that other picture from Little Rock...(8)

And it wasn't just the overt haters like Hazel Bryan and her fellow racist students. It was the millions of whites who maybe wouldn't have screamed hate like that, but did NOTHING to bring down segregation. That was the vast majority of our parents/grandparents...(9)

And that silence, that acquiescence, was more evil than Hazel Bryan. At least Hazel had the courage of her awful convictions. Far worse to be the white person who accepted segregation quietly and compromised their humanity without even having the guts to own their sickness...(10)

At some point, we will have to grow up, like it or not. This country cannot much longer abide white denial and the perpetuation of the mythology that passes for American history. That mythology tethers us to systems of injustice and prevents us from becoming what we could...(11)

And it guarantees conflict and violence in years to come. We must kill the mythology and bury the lies deep in the soil. Only this will save the country from utter ruin (END)
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