I don’t want to rain on your parade, but my guess is that if you’re a member of my audience, you’re not into ignorance. While many Americans, especially white Americans, think of the 4th as a happy holiday meant for barbecues and beer, for other Americans, this holiday is a painful reminder of exclusion.
America at its founding was unique. Previously, the world was led by kings, and in a few instances, queens. Royalty was Divinely appointed, and through that appointment, the aristocracy provided wealth and the ability to create wealth, to a few. The new United States were the first to turn that idea on its head, stating that all men were equal, and the opportunities for wealth and wealth creation were open to all. At the time, this was a radical notion. But it wasn’t inclusive of Black Americans, still enslaved in the Colonial South, or of women, who were also viewed as property of their husbands.
Historians argue that it’s unfair to judge history through the lens of what we know now, but at the same time, how can we not? Our founding fathers had an opportunity to start a new nation in which all citizens were truly created equal. Instead, slavery became a part of our Constitution, and created a system of oppression and imprisonment that has not truly ended, but rather changed forms.
Fredrick Douglas captured the thoughts of those enslaved in 1852:
What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer; a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sound of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciation of tyrants brass fronted impudence; your shout of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanks-givings, with all your religious parade and solemnity, are to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy – a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages.
Due to redlining, a lack of reparations, Jim Crow laws, the pipeline-to-prison system, and bias both conscious and unconscious, Black Americans have not been provided a place in society that allows them to show up as their most authentic selves. Many in white America feel guilty, uncomfortable, or are ignorant about systemic racism in this nation. With the rise of cell phone cameras, we have been able to glimpse the unequal treatment that Black men endure at the hands of the police. Yet, despite witness the injustice, not much has changed.
This is heavy. And it’s your day off. I get it.
But change won’t happen without our awareness.
If we as women are asking for equity, to be seen, valued, and accounted for, it stands to reason that the demand does not end there. Justice for some is not justice for all. Knowing what it means to be undervalued, stereotyped, and victimized means that once we open our eyes, we cannot close them again.
How does this impact your 4th of July? I don’t know. The first year I paid attention to the fact that our nation had been build on the backs of slaves, I elected to stay home. I’m not suggesting the same for you. What I am suggesting is that you consider this other point of view. Take it in. Exercise empathy. And extend the empathy farther than you may have in the past.
