We Shall Overcome

This evening, I attended a Martin Luther King tribute dinner. There was a young man who gave a passionate rendition of Dr. King's "I Have a Dream" speech that had me reaching for something with which to wipe my eyes. The keynote speaker was Tim Wise. Amazing. He seemed small and unassuming, sitting quietly at the head table, but when he stood up to speak, he was probably the most dynamic speaker that I've ever seen. It was an eye-opening speech, to say the least. I've always known that, as a white person, I've been priveledged. I can never know the experience of a person with brown skin, though I may try and conceptualize it. I know that I'm not a bad person, but I've been ignorant. I felt tonight the same way I felt after reading The Thinking Woman's Guide to a Better Birth. There are facts all around that prove an institutionalized racism (or an institutionalized treatment of women and their bodies), yet so many blindly accept The Way Things Are. Not out of malice or even out of racism, but out of a huge blind spot. What we don't know that we don't know. The speech wasn't a listing of facts, however, but a call to action. We can't move ahead until we acknowledge where we are. Where we truly are.