
Hey everyone, thanks to all who sent me heartfelt get better wishes, including any of you who sent them telepathically only. I have received your messages, and they are bolstering me through this difficult time of concussion setback recovery. It’s unfortunately going to be a two-week process of getting back to where I was before the setback. But the good news is, the first week of it is almost over, and that’s the hard week. The second week will be easier: I’ll be able to do much more and function much better!
Today I’d like to share with you the most profoundly important sentence in the book How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi. People, this is huge. Huge, huge, huge . . . yuge? No, def just HUGE.
Kendi explains that, as a scholar of racism, he had to, every day for years and years and years, read about some of the most horrific moments in American and world history. He read everything he could find about race and racism. He read about slavery and its origins and how and why it persisted, and he read about what happened after it was abolished. He explains that this was emotionally difficult for him. He writes about the anguish of visiting and revisiting this history on a daily basis.
And then he explains that, throughout much this time, he believed that ignorance was the source of racism. And he believed that education was the solution to eradicating racism.
But his research, he was finally forced to admit, pointed toward a different source of racism. Here’s the bombshell sentence of the book:
Self-interest. Pure and simple. Wow.
So here’s the conclusion Kendi draws, as a result of this bombshell:
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“I had to forsake . . . researching and educating for the sake of changing minds. I had to start researching and educating to change policy.”
Want to be an antiracist?
Vote.
On that note, happy Friday, all! How’s your health? Do you know when your state is holding its next election? Click on your state in the map here to find out!
Self interest!?! I would have never guessed. I have to read this book.
Hope you are feeling better and quick recovery!
Thanks, Zeev! Yes, it’s a great book. Enjoy!
healing vibes for your head!!!
Hey Rob! Thanks so much!!
Take it easy. I hope this is the last of the setbacks. But I’m sure you learn from this how easy to take it.
Me, too! I’m tired of taking it easy, lol…. Thanks, Jack!
What Jack said, that goes DOUBLE for me. Anyway, I find this topic important, of course, in part from a less than objective perspective; however, the author you’re referring to puts me very much in the mind of another: Ta-Nehisi Coates. Have you read Between the World and Me? It’s tackles the same subject matter in the form of a letter to his son.
I haven’t read that one…. Thanks for the recommendation!