In J.S. Waters, a 65% white K-8 school in Chatham County, with only a 14% Black population, students held a mock slave auction last month. Insider quotes Ashley Palmer, the mother of a Black student who partook in the “auction,” who expressed her concerns over the event on Facebook. The post said, “His friend ‘went for $350’ and another student was the Slavemaster because he ‘knew how to handle them.’ We even have a video of students harmonizing the N-word.” While no adults participated or witnessed the event, which happened after school on a baseball field, it provides evidence for the need to have conversations about racism and its history.
The probability of having a mock slave auction would most likely have lessened if race has not become such a sensitive and forbidden topic in society. Of course, the concept of race should be treated carefully and those discussing it should be aware of their words and actions, but ignoring the issue does not make it go away. Talking about racism has been avoided because of all of the pain and suffering it causes, but sidestepping the topic has given it more power. If students had been slowly introduced to America’s history regarding race to normalize the conversation about race, maybe an event this extreme wouldn’t have happened.
To prevent something like this from happening again, the topics of slavery, racism, and discrimination need to be discussed. Taking a few minutes out of the day can make such a difference, and helps prevent unethical behavior. As Jane Bolgatz, the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at Fordham University, once said, "If we aren't talking about race, we aren't noticing the ways in which society pushes white people forward. And so then we're not noticing the fact that these winds are not only pushing them forward but pushing people of color backward."
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