Lets quit winking.

Ok, here is the subject-Racism. I am sick of how we wink at racism in out country. We get all up in arms because Harry Reid says "Negro" and "light skinned". I think the whole African American History month is a farce. Yes I said it. Keep reading.

Maybe it is because I grew up in Virginia and we Virginians know all American History starts there and we are taught it very well. As a little skinny white kid growing up the Old Dominion I learned about Booker T. Washington, I knew all about Lincoln because we went on field trips to Appomatax, I wrote reports about the civil war as far back as third grade. I already knew about most of the sanitized stuff that goes for African American History. Now that we have that official month how is it wasted? By talking about who invented Peanut Butter, the first traffic light, and windshield wiper motor.

While I can not live my life with out Peanut Butter, why aren't we using this month to talk about the travesty of slavery which is the genesis of the attitudes that still haunt our society today.

My kids are grown (they are also white) so maybe I don't know what goes on in school today, but let me ask this. How many kids (or adults for that matter) have read Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave? This book should be passed out on the first of February every year. One can not begin to talk about African American History with out reading this.

At the end of the day, no government appointed month or program will do anything to end racism. The only thing that will end racism is changing the heart of man. I read somewhere that that heart is desperately wicked. The above book is probably the second best book to help change the state of that heart.