Ep 230: Breaking Down Systemic Racism

David Mura, author of The Stories Whiteness Tells Itself,
illuminates the realities of modern-day racism. We talk about the
danger of avoiding race discussion, changing school curriculums
to accurately address racism, and talking to our teens about
race.


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Full show notes


Racism is one of the world’s oldest and most complicated topics.
With centuries of genocides, segregation, and colonization
leading up to the systemic inequalities of the modern day,
there’s no easy way to sit kids down and teach them about it all.
The intensity and intricacy of the topic means that parents just
don’t talk about racism at all–which only leads to more injustice
and ignorance in the next generation.





Education is key, but where do we even start? What’s important to
cover, and how can we explain the nuances of race relations with
kids who are still shaping their ideas about the world?





To help us educate kids, we’re sitting down with David Mura,
author of The Stories Whiteness Tells Itself: Racial Myths and
Our American Narratives. David is a memoirist, essayist,
novelist, poet, critic, playwright and performance artist. As a
third generation Japanese American, he’s often written about his
own relationship with race, along with American society’s
complicated relationship with systemic racial injustice.





In our interview, Daivid is explaining how we can adjust our
definition of racism to be more accurate, and why we shouldn’t
avoid talking about race. We also discuss how schools can adopt
better methods for teaching kids about race, and how we can have
conversations about race at home.





Why We Need to Talk About Race


When we talk about racism, we often describe explicitly racist
concepts or behavior–like actively segregating environments or
using slurs. In reality, racism can be a lot more nuanced and
implicit, especially in today’s world, says David. Someone who
doesn’t identify as racist can still exhibit racial
preferences–and in fact most of us do, he explains. If we want to
teach kids about racism, we’ll have to adjust our definition to
include a more complicated range of behaviors.





Even worse than oversimplifying racism is not even talking about
it at all, sayd David. Refusing to discuss race is pretty common
in our society, especially among white people, he explains. In
our interview, David and I talk about how we often don’t talk to
kids about race because we’re scared it will overwhelm them or
make them feel bad. This is typically true for white families,
David says, who don’t want kids to feel shame about the
historical actions of white people. But by not teaching kids
about racism, we’re allowing them to live in ignorance–and
denying them the truth.





Plus, the shame or guilt white folks often feel about racism in
the past or present isn’t productive, says David. Instead, he
believes it should be replaced by knowledge and responsibility.
By learning about what’s happened in the past and what’s still
going on today, parents and kids can be better advocates for
equality. Responsibility means choosing to actively work against
racism in any way we can, he says. In the episode, David and I
talk about all the psychological steps white individuals often go
through as they learn to process the ways racism shapes
modern-day society.





Talking about race is important–and we should be doing it in
schools, David says. In the episode, we’re also talking about the
role school can play in helping kids understand racial
discrepancies.



Racial Education in Schools





You may have heard the term “critical race theory” thrown around,
but David explains that most schools aren’t really having kids
contemplate race in a layered sense. Instead, many schools are
simply teaching kids about the history of racism and breaking
down the ways our society maintains racial biases in everyday
life.





This definitely seems like something kids should know, right?
David says that it’s unfortunately not that simple. Many people
still feel uncomfortable having white children learn about the
nuances of racism in American society, and want this curriculum
banned from schools. In the episode, David and I talk about how
certain politicians have made a very concentrated effort to stop
kids from learning about race in school, even when it provides
necessary context for how the Civil War started or why kids have
Martin Luther King Jr. Day off.





In our interview, David and I talk about how we need to adjust
the curriculum for students of color as well. Many times, these
students take cues about their race from the world around them,
and aren’t taught to think about how and why these stereotypes
might be wrong. For example, David explains that many black
students internalize ideas about black men being involved in
crime or violent activity, and start to think they’re destined to
fulfill the stereotype. If we want kids to grow up happy and
healthy, we’ve got to set the record straight and remind them
that stereotypes like these don’t define them.





If we really want kids to learn about racism in a meaningful way,
however, we’ve got to talk to them at home. David and I are
diving deeper into how we can address racism with our kids.



Discussing Race at Home





Kids typically know about racism in the past tense–events like
March on Washington or people like Rosa Parks–but unless they
experience it firsthand, some kids might not understand the
presence of systemic racism in the modern day. To help them
understand, David recommends bridging the past and the present.
In the episode, he talks about how people like Thomas Jefferson
spread certain rhetoric about race which continues to make its
way into modern day thinking, and how we can illuminate this for
kids.





To help kids see the truth about racism in society, it can also
be useful to present them with the facts and statistics. David
offers plenty in the episodes. For starters, black individuals
are four times more likely to be arrested for marijuana-based
offenses than white individuals–even though white and black folks
have been shown to consume marijuana at the same rate. Black
people are more likely to go to trial for these offenses, more
likely to be convicted, and typically serve longer sentences.
Black patients in hospitals are less likely to receive pain
medication for the same conditions, and wait longer for
medication when they do get it. The unemployment rate among black
folks is twice that of white people, and so on and so
forth. 





Helping kids see these discrepancies can be an important step
towards helping them understand the ways racism continues to
prosper in the United States. In the episode, David and I provide
more examples and tips for talking to teens about race.



In the Episode….





David and I examine the many dimensions of race relations in the
U.S in our interview. On top of the topics discussed above, we’re
also talking about:


Why black folks are unfairly pinned as criminals 

How medical racism affects people of color

Why authors make their characters white as a default

How white America mimics the psychology of an abuser



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