In the beginning the three colors Reds, Yellows and Blues lived in Harmony. That is, until one day a Red says, “Reds are better!” Of course, Blues and Yellows will not stand for that and the three colors each make their own section of the city. That is until the day that two of the colors find themselves feeling good when they are with the other one. Of course, many did not like the colors mixing, but soon Yellow and Blue make a new color […]
The end of the Joe Dillard series
So this is the last book of the Joe Dillard series. I’m torn about it, because it covers two very important topics. It tackles race in the South, including false accusations against black men, the Klan, and racism by police. I feel like this topic is covered well, but I’m white, live in the North, and have never had to deal with racism directed at myself (due to being white). The other topic is sexual assault. Here’s where things get sticky. I know that every […]
A Short History of White Women’s Complicity
In Mothers of Massive Resistance: White Women and the Politics of White Supremacy, historian Elizabeth Gillespie McRae makes a strong argument for white women’s vital role in protecting and perpetuating white supremacy and thwarting integration in the US. One hundred years ago, woman began to organize in ways that we would recognize from today’s resistance movements. They developed grassroots campaigns reaching out to other women and encouraging them to organize, to write letters, to publish, to speak up and to vote. They did this, however, […]
“These are the frail, imperfect ways of ordinary human beings in the teeth of a great epidemic”
I finished reading this book a week ago today, and I’m still not sure how to write about it. I found it deeply moving, but it may still be too soon to put my thoughts and feelings into words, and anything I write here can only scratch the surface. Jonny Steinberg has packed so much into the 326 pages of Three-Letter Plague (published in the U.S. under the title Sizwe’s Test). He writes about his own literal and figurative journey to try to learn how […]