To My Fellow White Teachers,
If we, say we are color blind,
If we, claim we are not racist,
Because we don't see color.
We, lack the courage to fight White Supremacy,
We, can't see 500 years of oppression,
Can't see Jim Crow,
Can't see the School to Prison Pipeline,
Can't see gender,
Can't see ourselves,
Can't see others,
Then we, are part of the problem, not the solution.
Then we, have not studied the seal of approval that White Supremacy played and still plays within the law of the land for 500 years of our history:
The first 20 Slaves at Jamestown 1619,
3/5's of a human being 1776,
Indian Removal Act of 1830,
Dred Scott decision, 1857,
Native American boarding schools,
How our silence on Confederate Statues lessens the blood sacrifice of Civil War Union soldiers 1890 to 2018,
Chinese Exclusion Act 1882,
Prison Wardens force feeding the Great Suffragist leader Alice Paul while on prison hunger strike, 1917,
The Civil Rights Movement of the past, presence, and future,
The ship Saint Louis turned away from our shores 1939,
Mendez v. Westminster 1947,
Brown v. Board of Education 1954,
Delano Grape Pickers Strike Of 1965-1970,
Stonewall uprising,
The illusions of school choice,
Muslim exclusion ban,
The call for a Wall,
Our DECCA Dreamers,
Voter suppression laws of today.
Let's this revolution for change begin with I,
My teaching fight for racial justice begins with I.
It begins seeing Black, Red, Brown, Yellow, White, and everything in between.
I see, inequity,
I see, injustice,
I see, denial,
I see, the man I am in the mirror,
I cannot undo White Supremacy without studying the silence and apathy of my own role in the grand scheme of racism. I cannot teach in the silence of racism,
I cannot teach enclosed in apathy of racism,
I can teach facing my history with courage,
It's not enough, but this is my start.
My eyes are wide open, as is my heart,
Jesse The Walking Man Turner
We, lack the courage to fight White Supremacy,
We, can't see 500 years of oppression,
Can't see Jim Crow,
Can't see the School to Prison Pipeline,
Can't see gender,
Can't see ourselves,
Can't see others,
Then we, are part of the problem, not the solution.
Then we, have not studied the seal of approval that White Supremacy played and still plays within the law of the land for 500 years of our history:
The first 20 Slaves at Jamestown 1619,
3/5's of a human being 1776,
Indian Removal Act of 1830,
Dred Scott decision, 1857,
Native American boarding schools,
How our silence on Confederate Statues lessens the blood sacrifice of Civil War Union soldiers 1890 to 2018,
Chinese Exclusion Act 1882,
Prison Wardens force feeding the Great Suffragist leader Alice Paul while on prison hunger strike, 1917,
The Civil Rights Movement of the past, presence, and future,
The ship Saint Louis turned away from our shores 1939,
Mendez v. Westminster 1947,
Brown v. Board of Education 1954,
Delano Grape Pickers Strike Of 1965-1970,
Stonewall uprising,
The illusions of school choice,
Muslim exclusion ban,
The call for a Wall,
Our DECCA Dreamers,
Voter suppression laws of today.
Let's this revolution for change begin with I,
My teaching fight for racial justice begins with I.
It begins seeing Black, Red, Brown, Yellow, White, and everything in between.
I see, inequity,
I see, injustice,
I see, denial,
I see, the man I am in the mirror,
I cannot undo White Supremacy without studying the silence and apathy of my own role in the grand scheme of racism. I cannot teach in the silence of racism,
I cannot teach enclosed in apathy of racism,
I can teach facing my history with courage,
It's not enough, but this is my start.
My eyes are wide open, as is my heart,
Jesse The Walking Man Turner
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