Happy Thursday!
It’s been quite a minute since our last edition — I hope life has been treating you well. June was an astonishingly busy time, so I apologize for the absence.
A lot has happened in the world since the last edition. A 25-year-old Black man named Jayland Walker was killed in Akron, Ohio, the former Prime Minister of Japan, Shinzo Abe, was assassinated, and perhaps, most crucial of all, the Supreme Court ruled in Dobbs v Jackson that a person had no constitutional right to an abortion putting an end to Roe v Wade.
Researchers think we are the nearest to a civil war since 1865, and it feels tough to hold onto hope that this country will finally reckon with its past and repair the harms and vestiges of slavery. So, in today’s Opinion section, I offer some thoughts on why it’s so hard for some people to have hope and how we might redistribute it.
Some reparations-related news that I recommend checking out:
Detroit has started to make decisions on how the city’s reparations task force should be structured.
A Texas school board proposed that teachers should relabel chattel slavery as “involuntary relocation.” This piece in the Atlantic offers a good rebuttal.
According to the Washington Post, the National Statuary Hall collection will feature the first Black person. Mary McLeod Bethune, a civil rights activist and founder of the Daytona Literary and Industrial Training School for Negro Girls, will get a statue that will replace a Confederate leader.
With radical love,
Trevor
National News
The Atlantic: Just Say ‘Slavery’
Vox: Could California become the first state to provide reparations?
Washington Post: Capitol statue collection gets first Black American, replacing Confederate
NPR: Jan. 6 panel shows evidence of coordination between far-right groups and Trump allies
Washington Post: Jayland Walker’s killing didn’t spur expected protests. Here’s why.
The Conversation: Former Oath Keeper reveals racist, antisemitic beliefs of white nationalist group – and their plans to start a civil war
WBUR: White supremacy poses increasing threats in the U.S.: ‘We are dealing with a massive movement.’
Voice of America: How Slavery Figures in US Abortion Battle
Christian Today: Reparations, like the real Jubilee, are radical
Axios: States eye "baby bonds" to address wealth gaps
The Hill: America will never achieve racial justice without reforming our broken tax code
Business Insider: Gov. Glenn Youngkin opposes teaching Critical Race Theory because 'we shouldn't play privilege bingo with children'
CNN: W. Kamau Bell tackles critical race theory on 'United Shades'
The Nation: Republicans Are Attacking Wisconsin’s Lieutenant Governor for Saying Slavery Was Terrible
Salon: Was this finally enough? Trump and his terrorist confederates must be prosecuted
Regional News
Michigan Advance: Detroit City Council sets up reparations task force
Tulsa World: Race Massacre researchers seek DNA, family histories
Evanston Roundtable: Reparations grants to be released in increments
MPR: Lee Hawkins on the history of Georgetown University's involvement in slavery
Virginia Mercury: No more Confederate flags at Hollywood Cemetery
The Post and Courier: Why Confederate flags are flying in the middle of Charleston Harbor
PBS: New Orleans was once the center of U.S. slave trade. This artist wants to make sure we don’t forget
LA Times: Texas keeps trying to make slavery sound less slrevery-ish
LAist: LA County-USC Medical Center Unveils Artwork Apologizing To Women Forcibly Sterilized There
Philadelphia Tribune: Families sue Ohio school board over critical race theory ban
Toward Freedom: The Story of the Little-Known 1917 East Saint Louis Massacre—Can Reparations Restore Justice?
Providence Journal: Housing, health care, Black media: Providence reparations panel unveils massive list
The Alestle: Local activists call for reparations for 1917 massacre in East St. Louis
Evanston Roundtable: Spend July running for reparations
Next City: Evanston’s First “Reparations” Payments Have Gone Out. Here’s How It Was Spent.
The Observer: The Wealth Gap Isn’t a Game for Black America
International News
CBC: Some hope for reparations beyond upcoming federal apology to No. 2 Construction Battalion
CBC: Manitoba premier says new reconciliation holiday could happen this fall
The Conversation: Pope’s visit to Canada: Indigenous communities await a new apology — and a commitment to justice
Opinion
A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to go to the Aspen IDEAS Festival, where I was surrounded by both brilliant people and ideas. A few folks who stuck out:
Eric Liu: As the CEO of Citizen University, Eric dedicates his time working to building a culture of effective and responsible citizenship in the United States. One of his talks featured a question he’s been asking folks across the country since 2014; ‘what are ten things that every American should know?’ The things that people came up with at my table were fascinating, and there was at least one thing on another person’s list that someone else didn’t know. You can view the list of thinkers like Henry Louis Gates Jr. here. My list included:
The story behind ‘40 acres and a Mule.’
The Homestead Act
Trail of Tears
The true meaning behind Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness
Hiroshima
Dred Scott
Cointelpro
9/11
Frederick Douglass
Japanese internment
Jane Coaston: Host of one of my favorite podcasts, ‘The Argument,’ Coaston’s thoughts on a panel about the culture war we’re seeing play out in schools were especially intriguing.
Eileen Gu: The youngest Olympic Freeski gold medalist in history was one of the youngest people at the event, but no doubt, one of the brightest. Her insights on Title IX and its impact on girls and women in sports spurred me to dive into the topic further.
Baratunde Thurston: It’s always amazing to meet one of your favorite writers and particularly exciting to hear about their new project firsthand. Baratunde was there to discuss his new PBS show ‘America Outdoors,’ where he explores the history of American land and its connection to healing this country.
Rodney Foxworth: I’ve been a big fan of Rodney and the Common Future team from afar for the last few years. He had a great conversation with other philanthropy leaders about the role foundations must play in systems change.
A common theme throughout these talks, and the entire festival, was the concept of power. Almost every conversation suggested shifting power structures to create a more inclusive society.
A few questions that I kept coming back to throughout the festival were:
What equation spurs someone to desire social power (expertise, wealth, fame, political power, etc.)?
Is there a ‘hope-gap?’ Does it correlate with income and/or racial wealth gaps? What role does race play in the amount of hope someone contains?
Does hope inspire action, or does action inspire hope? How can we inspire hope that reparations for Black Americans are both possible and necessary?
These are questions that I will not be able to answer alone or in this one newsletter.
According to Hirokazu Miyazaki and Richard Swedberg, sociologists have paid little attention to the concept of hope — which is a shame because it is arguably one of the most positive emotions one can feel. It is an optimistic mindset rooted in the belief that future outcomes will happen the way one wishes. The philosopher Victoria McGreer argued that hope is “a unifying and grounding force of human agency” and that we “cannot live a human life without hope.”
Social psychologists have broken down hope into three components:
Goals: The desired outcome
Pathway thinking: Possible ways to achieve our goals.
Agency: The motivation that moves people toward their goals. It is “made up of thoughts that relate to individual beliefs that they can start working on a goal and continue progressing until that goal is reached.”
It feels that most, if not all, of the reasons someone might seek social power are extrinsic (external) since the goal of having social power is to have an influence on others within society. So perhaps, Hope + Potential for Reward = Desire for Social Power. Or in other words, a combination of hope and the potential for a reward drives individuals to seek social power.
But, if wealth, power, and agency are disproportionately distributed throughout society, then it’s reasonable to believe that hope is also disproportionately distributed.
Emilie Durkheim wrote in The Division of Labor in Society that “hope has not miraculously fallen from heaven into our hearts, but must-have, like all the sentiments, been formed under the influence of facts.”
A fundamental fact of American society is that it is incredibly inequitable. So, does a person born into a wealthy family hold the same amount of hope throughout their lifetime as someone born to a family who will never get out of debt — particularly in such as capitalistic system as the United States?
“When one has hope, one does not wish for something abstract,” according to Miyazaki and Swedberg. The “American Dream” story suggests that anyone, no matter their race, gender, sexual orientation, or religion, can come to the United States and achieve economic success. Capitalism, and the problems it breeds, create significant roadblocks to increasing hope throughout a society. According to Dr. Annelise Rules, a professor at Northwestern Law, “human agency is rendered, within the capitalism system, as a mere instrument.”
After his 2008 victory in the Iowa Caucus, former President Barack Obama noted that “hope is that thing inside us that insists, despite all evidence to the contrary, that something better awaits us if we have the courage to reach for it and to work for it and to fight for it.”
This quote, particularly the last three words, remind me of the opening lines of the 1619 Project — “our democracy’s founding ideals were false when they were written. Black Americans have fought to make them true.”
Perhaps, it is not Black and other people of color that require the inspiration to hope, but white people who require the inspiration to hope for something different.