cross-posted from: https://exploding-heads.com/post/158955

“I’ve heard people say to me, well, you’re exceptional or you’re just carrying the America, you can pull yourself up by your bootstraps.

Slavery was a stain on America, of course, it was 1964 before my parents and I could go to a movie theater in my hometown of Birmingham.

But never did my parents say to me, you can’t achieve even if the society is against you.

As a matter of fact, Dana, they used to say, you have to be twice as good. Just go out there and work hard and you will get ahead.

And if you start taking away agency from African Americans by saying, oh, the system is so stacked against you that you can’t possibly succeed, what am I supposed to say to the eight-year-old? Well, don’t study until structural racism is over?

That is taking away agency from that child.

That’s taking away agency from the parent that wants to put that kid in a good school.

And I really resent it. I resent the idea that African Americans can’t succeed despite the challenges of being black in America.”