nobis

We've now had a week of February to enjoy, and if you haven't already heard a few times, it's "Black History Month".

I hope I don't offend anybody by addressing this.  As many of you may know, I myself am not black.  So my perspective may be different because of that.  Even so, I offer my views with all due respect.

To start off, though, I'd like to share God's opinion on it.

Actually it's Morgan Freeman, but if you've seen Evan Almighty, you'll understand.

Here's a portion of an interview a couple years back:

I must say that I agree with Mr. Freeman completely.  Black History is American History, as is Native American History, Asian American History, Third-child-of-a-second-generation-Italian-immigrant-and-a-Malaysian-refugee History...
If American History was limited to the puritans and their descendants, it would be boring indeed.

I also agree that issues like racism are aggravated by people making them issues.  We have more commonalities than differences with most people, but we judge so quickly on what we can see most immediately: skin, tattoos, clothing, sex, kemptness of hair...  It all results in this view of "us" and "them"--people we think are like us, and people we think have nothing to do with us. Eventually, you begin to think that one group of your over-generalized dichotomy is better than the other for one reason, and even if it's something small like "Oh, I just don't think they really understand how to act in this part of town", it's not right.

We all do it, really.  And it doesn't even have to follow racial lines.  For example, I'm a bit discriminatory against people that go to a particular rival university.  It doesn't make that much sense.  But for some reason, I automatically make judgments against people I've never before met solely based on where they go to school.
I guess the first step, though, is admittance.

So how do you celebrate Black History Month (which some would prefer to call American History Month)? Take some time to learn some history, make an effort to be less discriminatory and more accepting, and look for the things you share with other people, whether they're someone you meet now, or someone who is part of the great American history.  See more "us" and less "them".  It's something we all need to work on, and we have a month to make that particular effort.