Ok, so today is the 20th of June and I realize I messed up big time. Yesterday was June 19th which may not mean much to everyone, unfortunately, but it is of great importance to millions of American citizens. Over 200 years ago, on June 19th, 1865 African Americans in Galveston Texas were told that they were at that point free citizens and no longer slaves The reason? Slavery had ended due to the north winning the civil war and Texas finally catching up to the rest of the nation.
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You may be wondering how this has anything to do with someone like me, and what possible mistake I could have made. Well, here it is. The mistake is, I did not fully understand how important the day is, nor did I understand how I could possibly celebrate the day being that I am white. I don’t know how many people really consider this to be a sin, but I absolutely do, at least for me. While Juneteenth just this year became a federally recognized holiday thanks to President Joe Biden, It has been celebrated by the African American community for years, probably since it first happened. It is another one of those things we were not taught about in schools, and in fact, I just learned that even though it is now a national holiday It is illegal to teach about in schools in 15 different states, and is not recognized as a holiday in many of the different states. I do blame my lack of knowledge of the subject in part on this sad fact, as most of the country still wants to pretend slavery never happened in the first place.
I am ashamed of myself for multiple reasons, but mostly because I like to think of myself as an open-minded caring loving person, and Instead of learning more about it last year when I first learned about the holiday, I did not look into it, because I was under the understanding that if I celebrated it at all it would be considered cultural appropriation, which is still an issue I’m learning more about. I am also upset because I have many members of my family including cousins, my youngest brother, and my first niece/nephew who was just brought into the world, plus her daddy and his side of the family. I have so much love for all of these people and pretty much anyone I meet, but I didn’t even take a moment to learn about this important event and other issues that will end up affecting my loved ones for their whole lives.
This brings me to how I am going to fix the situation so It can’t happen again.
I am going to learn everything I possibly can about the day in history and more issues that affect African Americans every day of their lives, then I am going to make sure I find a way to be a productive voter and American Citizen by voting on legislation that elevates black lives and contacting lawmakers who are trying to hinder progress for all. I am also going to invest more in black businesses and less in large corporations like Amazon. I don’t exactly know if this is going to be enough to make a difference, but at least it’s a better start than the ignorance I was exhibiting before today.
I would encourage you to do all you can to support people of all races and cultures even if you are not right here in America, but somewhere where the civil war never happened. It is vital that during this human experience we all share, that we all take steps to improve the world so It is better than we left it. We can’t properly do that if we try to pretend historic events never even happened. Maybe you are like me and never learned much about cultures outside of your own, maybe you never learned about these historic events and these little victories that lead to big change, but just because you never had the chance to learn and change before, doesn’t mean you can’t choose to do so starting now.
If you are one of the many African American citizens who call this rock formation home, I want you to know there are people who do care about your victories and causes, your trials, and your losses. There are people out there who want to stand with you against all the hate and injustice, It might just take some of us a bit of time to get there and fix all of the mind fuckery and brainwashing (and whitewashing) that has been done for centuries.
Mental Health Blog | Fight4mylife | United States 