Hello and welcome to the ninth post of Talking Points! President Trump has been taking steps to limit the discussion of history and culture by the American government, in his second term. Specifically, he has become Chairman of the Kennedy Center over complaints of the Center’s content, limited how museums that form the Smithsonian Institute can discuss racism, and has limited the way that government websites can discuss racism. This is arguably the culmination on the American right-wing of their criticism of various topics known as wokeness, critical race theory, and DEI. Such topics are typically used as pejoratives by the right-wing, to claim that the left-wing, through academia and the media, to actively divide the American people. In this essay, we will examine wokeness, critical race theory, and DEI. Furthermore, we will view a brief history of racism in America. In addition, we will examine how history and national myth can be at odds with each other. Beyond this, we will discuss the importance of being aware of dark history, in order to ensure past atrocities are not repeated. Finally, I will argue that racism should be taught in the United States, both to ensure that people are aware of it, and can take pride in the ways that America has overcome it.

According to Ryan Newman, the General Counsel for Ron Desantis, Governor of Florida, “Wokeness is the belief there are systemic injustices in American society and the need to address them”. Beyond wokeness, other terms have been used by the right-wing to criticize scholarship and the left-wing actions related to it. For example, critical race theory, an academic framework which examines racism through a more systemic lens, rather than an individual one, has been derided by the right-wing, claiming that it says everyone is racist. In addition to this, DEI, referring to diversity, equity, and inclusion, which refers to policies that organizations employ to have a more diverse workforce, has been claimed to discriminate against straight, white, and cisgender men. I would say that each of these criticisms obscure vital American history, by claiming discussion of it is divisive.

For example, with regards to the status of Black people, prior to the country’s founding, slavery was widespread. During its founding, slavery remained a core issue, with the 3/5 compromise, which counted each enslaved person as 3/5 of one person, when calculating the representation for a state in the House of Representatives. After its founding and during its expansion, a balance between free and slave states was established. Maine was separated from Massachusetts as a free state, in order to admit Missouri as a slave state and maintain the balance. The question of whether Kansas would be admitted as a free state or a slave state caused an internal conflict lasting years, called Bleeding Kansas. Even the Civil War, which led to the abolition of slavery nationwide, did not end racism.

Although black men did gain political power during Reconstruction, when former Confederate states were militarily occupied, such power was lost with the Jim Crow laws of segregation that were in response to such gains. These laws persisted until the 1960s, when the Civil Rights Movement successfully saw to the passage of federal laws which led to their elimination. However, the movement faced considerable opposition, including from government agencies like the FBI, whose secret COINTELPRO program targeted the movement. Keep in mind that this is only explicit racism through the law, excluding racism which has persisted to this day. Although such racism is less objective, it is still visible, especially with regards to the American prison population, where 32% of prisoners are Black, despite only constituting 14% of the American population.

I can understand why there is reticence in teaching such history. Stories of discrimination, racial violence, and racism, conflict with the narrative that America is a bastion of freedom, democracy, and liberty, a central component of the American story. Nevertheless, such stories are a part of American history. For example, many of the Founding Fathers were slave owners, including George Washington, the first President, Thomas Jefferson, the third President, and James Madison, the fourth President. The narrative that is told about these men, is that they were great, intelligent, and brave men, who risked everything to form a country based on freedom, democracy, and liberty. If this is true, how could such men also be the sort of men that would own people, viewing them as machines, property? I do not have the answer to this question, but I can say it is extremely important to ask the question, to ensure no one is ever treated as property again in American history.

Denial of atrocity because it conflicts with national mythology is not unusual. As one example, we can look to the genocide of the Armenian people by the Ottoman Empire during World War One, which laid the foundation for the establishment of the Republic of Turkey. The Armenian People, primarily Christian, were a minority in the Turkish and Islamic dominated Ottoman Empire, traditionally occupying a subordinate but protected position in Ottoman society. When the empire was declining in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, there were concerns that the Armenian people would seek independence. These concerns came to a head during World War One, when Ottoman leadership, claiming the existence of a widespread rebellion, conducted a genocide against the Armenian people. This genocide also helped establish the Republic of Turkey, which succeeded much of the Ottoman Empire, as a country for the Turkish people. It is largely for these reasons that the Turkish government continues to deny the genocide, going so far as to build the Iğdır Genocide Memorial and Museum in 1997, which claims that it was Armenians who massacred Turks.

We can contrast this denial with the treatment of the Holocaust by the German people, a genocide which occurred more than twenty years after the Armenian Genocide. The Holocaust, which was the systematic murder of Jews, LGBT people, labor union members, and disabled people, among others, is actively responded to in Germany. It maintains extensive museums and memorials of the Holocaust, actively compensates survivors and their families for their pain and suffering, makes education about it mandatory in school, and holds a Day of National Mourning, annually, among other activities. Such actions are no doubt difficult, exhausting, and expensive for Germany. Indeed, I do not imagine it is easy for German schoolchildren to learn what their great-grandparents and grandparents were either involved or complicit in. However, I think that such teaching is also critical, not only to honor those whose lives were lost, but also to ensure that the Holocaust is never forgotten, and that nothing like it may ever happen again.

Racism through law in the United States was eliminated in the 1960s, about 60 years ago. While this may seem to be a long time, I think it seems shorter if we consider that people born in 1960 are only turning 65 this year, just old enough to retire and collect social security. That is to say I do not think we are as far removed from segregation and Jim Crow as we would care to imagine. Without a core understanding of how legal systems perpetrated the disenfranchisement of Black people from political systems, denying them access to voting, adequate education, quality public services, and economic advancement, I do not think we can successfully ensure such racism is never perpetrated again. Of course, scholars, historians, and researchers are going to ask these questions. However, if the public is denied access to such work on the basis that the work is divisive, I do not see a way for the public to become aware of how legal systems perpetrated and continue to perpetrate racism, and through that, be able to understand how to counter and prevent racism.

Indeed, it might be a screening of The Hate U Give at the Kennedy Center, an art gallery at the National Museum of African-American History and Culture (a Smithsonian museum), or a textbook discussing the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921, that the general public might learn about the prevalence of racism in American society. If access to such works are ended on the basis of divisiveness, not only may Americans lose an understanding of this part of their society, but they may also not be able to admire how far America has come. Of course, racism remains of a problem, and is terrible in every regard. However, the story of American racism is not just the story of racism, but how far America has come in overcoming it. The story of George Washington owning slaves, is not just the story of him owning slaves, it is the story of him freeing them, albeit after both his and his wife’s death. The story of black people being denied the right to vote is also the story of Barack Obama, the first and as of yet only, black President. Ultimately, I think that without the general public having an understanding of racism in American society, American society is vulnerable to racism, and the public would be unable to appreciate how America has been working to overcome racism.