A prejudice-free society is not enough. Healing requires reconciliation – one that we must lean into every day, not just on the National Day of Racial Healing. Reconciliation pre-supposes humble, thoughtful restitution. Restitution will lead to equity. And equity is not the same as equality. Equity, simply, means equal opportunity – authentic equal opportunity.
Because people of color, in particular, people of African descent in America, have been crushed under foot for so many decades, equity will not emerge easily.
Slavery started here in 1619 – one year before the Mayflower landed. From 1865 to 1965, domestic terrorism against Black people reigned – Jim Crow, lynching, and visceral racism in many other forms followed the wrath of slavery.
From 1981 to present we’ve been incarcerating African Americans for nonviolent crimes at an alarming rate. Many refer to it as mass incarceration. In reality, it’s been a racialized mass incarceration. Others refer to it as a modern day slavery as the inmates often work for the profit of others at low pay. Yet study after study shows that our incarnation rates do not translate into a safer society.
