Tulsa Massacre Doesn’t See Color - podcast episode cover

Tulsa Massacre Doesn’t See Color

Jul 24, 202319 minSeason 22Ep. 29
--:--
--:--
Download Metacast podcast app
Listen to this episode in Metacast mobile app
Don't just listen to podcasts. Learn from them with transcripts, summaries, and chapters for every episode. Skim, search, and bookmark insights. Learn more

Episode description

The Non-Prophets, Episode 22.29.1 featuring Cynthia McDonald, Aaron Jensen and Teo el Ateo


Let's not tie it to skin color': Oklahoma superintendent says racism not to blame for infamous Tulsa massacre Raw Story, By Matthew Chapman, July 7, 2023, https://www.rawstory.com/oklahoma-superintendent/



State Supt. Ryan Walters defends comments on Tulsa Race Massacre, claims words taken out of contextFox 25 News, by David Chasanov, July 7, 2023 https://okcfox.com/news/local/state-superintendent-ryan-walters-oklahoma-department-of-education-tulsa-race-massacre-critical-theory-crt-classroom-class-hannibal-johnson-raymond-doswell-greenwood-rising-black-wall-street-history-center-racist-evil-terrible-color-skin-controversy


"Let’s not tie it to the skin color and say that the skin color determined that," - Oklahoma State Superintendent Ryan Walters.
For those not aware, far-right Oklahoma State Superintendent Walters was talking about the Tulsa race massacre in an area called Black Wall Street. This was a self-sustaining community filled with banks, schools, doctors offices, dentists, and shops. Everything that a township could use in order to be sustainable was there.But, in 1921, Dick Roland shared an elevator with a white woman named Sarah Page. While they were in the elevator Sarah screamed and then went to the authorities. She falsely accused Dick Roland of trying to assault her.The Tulsa Police put him in in jail, then a white mob went to the jail and demanded Dick to be handed over to them, the police refused. They released Dick to WWI black soldiers on the scene who had showed up to defend him against the mob.White rioters then deliberately destroyed an estimated 1,200 homes, along with churches, schools, businesses, even a hospital and library. The police force in that area even deputized citizens to become law enforcement so they could take up arms against the black township.Now moving forward to 2023, well in some places that may be more of a lateral move, Oklahoma State Superintendent Ryan Walters seems to think that a white mob attacking and destroying a black township can be taught without discussing race. The next day Walters claimed that he always said that the race riot was evil. But he still is firmly in the camp of not wanting to bring up skin color when talking about it.Critical race theory is the the study of how laws, social, and political movements are impacted by race and ethnic concepts in our society. It also delves into ways it is baked into our our systems, like our Justice systems, employment and many others.But it has become a buzzword in the right’s rhetoric because they want something that gets people up in arms. So they say that critical race theory is teaching white people to be ashamed of being white and that black people are better.
The attack on anything race-related has brought the troll known as Marjorie Taylor Green from under her bridge. She defines critical race theory as something that teaches white children to hate themselves and to feel guilty while lifting black children up.A lot of people hold the view they just don't want to see things that make them uncomfortable, they rail against CRT without even understanding what it is. They want to change the history of the USA, to hide the truth, to instead say things that really happened didn't happen.How exactly are we to teach about one group killing others over race without discussing race Superintendent Ryan Walters?


Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-non-prophets--3254964/support.

Transcript

All those Hello everyone, today we have this interesting topic which is which starts us Tulsa massacree doesn't see color? Apparently, Oklahoma sperintendence says, let's know, TIChE to skin color. He says that racism is not to blame for the infamous Tulsa massacree. And this story you can find it on the description of this It was written by Matthew Chapman in rosstory dot com Oklahommada Superintendent.

Still, according to this guy, yes, let's let's be clear. According to this human to call it one way, the Tulsa massacree, also known as the Tulsa race massacree, was not about race. Cynthia, have you heard about this topic and what do you think about those words? I want to know your your point of view. Yes, well, I think that one of the good things that we should do before we really get into the discussion is kind of give people a background on the Tulsa masked her if they

are not aware. So back in nineteen twenty one and Tulsa, there was a all black district named Greenwood District that was actually inhabited with mostly black people. It was called black Wall Street because these was a self sustaining community filled with banks, schools, doctor's offices, dentists, shops, you name it. Everything that a township could use in order to be sustainable was there,

and also did business with other organizations overseas. Now, one day, back in the day, there was a shoeshine person named Dick Roland who happened to share an elevator with a white woman named Sarah Pate. While they were in the elevator, Sarah screamed and then went to the authorities and told them that Dick Roland tried to assaulter. Now, this was not true, and the

Tulsa police actually went and put him in jail. And then there were white towners in Tulsa that went to the jailhouse and demanded Dick to be handed over to him. They the actual police in Tulsa, refused, and there were other people, specifically black serviceman X servicemen from World War One that came to the police station to actually defend they released Dick. The police released Dick to the black soldiers, but brought him back to Greenwood District where the township around

them in Tulsa, specifically the white township, was extremely angry. They went into Greenwood District and burned it down and murdered over three hundred people in that particular place. People would think that in nine to eleven that was the first time that moms what planes were like flown into buildings. That's not true. Planes were actually flown into houses, schools, churches, and other businesses during

the Tulsa master And this was done a hundred because of race. So with that being said, I would love to get you guys as thoughts on Superintendent to Walters trying to introduce revisionist history, Aaron, please share this guy. This guy really confuses me, and a lot of people that share his views really confused me. I'm not sure what they're doing or what they're gaining by trying to omit race from the discussion, especially from an event that is so

obviously racially motivated and racially charged. The day after he made his original comments, he was interviewed by a new station there in Oklahoma, and he kind of walked back what he said and claimed that he always said that the race riot was even that it was a horrn thing that we should and that it should be definitely be taught. And then but then he still is firmly in the camp of not wanting to bring up skin color when talking about it.

Um, Yeah, I have a hard time talking about because what are they What are these people trying to avoid? Do they feel guilty and they just don't want they just can't manage their guilt when when when they think about it, do they feel like it's their fault and they just they just want to avoid any bad feelings. Do they not want their kids to feel responsible?

I mean, obviously you're not responsible for something that happened one hundred years ago, but as something that we can learn from, Yeah, I'm just confused by him and a lot of other people that hold the same view. But they just don't want to see things from the way if you want. But I'm sure this is closely tied to this idea of the seven mountains that specific

Christian groups want to achieve in the USA. Among those, you can find politics, you can find education, And this is going to directly with education. They want to change the history of the USA. They want to hide facts that happened. They want to say that things that really happened didn't happen. And this is directly related to them. How it's called they changes in education that they're making now. They are stopping anything that could be called quotation

mark progressive, such as, um oh, what is the name? Critical race theory? They want to avoid that because how do they they're teaching people what happened in the past, Everything related to sexual education because how do they they're want to protect their children from abusive pastors, everything related to you know, trans rights, because how do they there to admit that people are people. But this happened only because somebody asked him, because this guy what is

the name of the guy? They thank you, Cynthia. This guy was talking against, you know, against critical race theory, and somebody asked if the if if talking about I mean, if removing everything related to skin color would mean that they wouldn't have to talk about the racism that was that happened in the Black Wall Street massacrey of Tulsa. And that's where he said, no, no, no, no, no, no, let's let's tie let's not tie to a skin color. And this has nothing to do with

that. And I think that this guy lies lies to the face of people because they are so sure that they will be able to change the understanding of people from history because we have checked in previous episodes, if you're a teacher and you dare to talk about racism and talk against racism, you're going to get fired immediately right away. And this guy, he's living the future already,

he's living. He's living his life as if he was a student from nowadays education in the USA, which is cribbing because he knows that teachers will not be able to tell the truth to the students because they are going to get fired. Luckily, we are not teachers, and we can actually tell people what happens. We can talk about the many ways. How we know that all the old happened in Tulsa was based on racism. Uh, there is there is a page called tools a history dot org. You can go

there and you can check a lot of information about what happened there. And this was made by the Tulsa Historical Society Museum. But you can go to History dot com, ABC News dot go, Oh, I have se The Garden dot com has several several articles about what happened over there. The Smithsonian smith it's hard for me to pronounce it. Yes, yes, yes, Smithsonian magazine. Yeah, Smithsonian dot com. You can go there and you

can check the history and study on your own. People check it. Maybe this guy should go, should follow my advice and should study uh and stop lying to people on their faces and learn how racial segregation happened back there. How all this was motivated by a lie, a Cynthia sa and the lie the only thing that did was to spark you know, they already usn hatred towards the black people. That's that's why we have so many things that happened

over there. You know, their violence was one sided, a wide mouth, a William power and attacking a vulnerable African American community that had no way of defending themselves. And after I have to I'm sorry, I do have to chime in because in actual the um there was, that particular township was full of ex soldiers that were in World War One. Yes, yes, well, yes it was full of ex soldiers and they did defend themselves,

they did. But the difference was that the um and this is the reason why we talk about racism being systemic, because the the actual police force in that area at that time actually deputized citizen to actually become law enforcement, so they could actually take up arms against that township as well, so that's the reason why I know that some people would say that they didn't defend themselves.

No, that's not true. They did. They were just overwhelmed because the police, if it was just the police force that tried to quell that particular township, only they were lost. So that's the reason why they deputize other angry white people in that area, specifically around Greenwood District, in order for them to go ahead and just burn it down. But I wanted to bring up a point, and then Aaron, I wanted you to um time in a bit that. Um. I don't know if any of you, because

like Tail, you brought up critical race theory. I don't know if any of you ever heard Marjorie Taylor Green describe or define critical race theory while she when she used to be part of the Freedom Caucus on the Hill. Has anybody heard her say what it was? Oh, I'm sure, I'm sure it was something terrible. Well, Aaron correct, Please correct me. I

don't know about correction, but I will tell what she said. And I do believe that this is a sentiment that is shared by most of the people that think like her, is that critical race theory actually teaches white children to hate themselves and to feel guilty and to lift black children up. Don't believe me, people, look it up yourself. C Span has all the archives of Congress people when they are in committee and they're doing here, and this

is exactly what she said. I may be paraphrasing a bit, but this is how she defines critical race theory. But that is not critical race theory now, is it, Aaron. No. Critical race theory is a graduate level area of study that means you have to go through four years in college to get a bachelor's degree, and then go through for three more years to get a master's degree. And then if people like you and he have good things to say, then you can start talking to people about critical race theory.

And the reason why it's become such a buzzword in in people's rhetoric nowadays is because that's what that's what the right, that's what people in the right wanta. They want it to be something that gets people up in arms, that critical race theory. It's teaching white people to be ashamed of being white

and that black people are better. No is a study of how race affects our society and how it's built into our systems of our justice systems, employment, and other things like that, because there's no way it doesn't have an impact one hundred years ago, when you have three hundred black people die in the Tulsa race massacre, riot massacre, there's no there's no way that doesn't affect your society, that doesn't affect the people your society and your criminal justiceystem

and all those kinds of things. So, no, CRT is not teaching white people to be ashamed of themselves. It's helping us understand our society, why it is the way it is, and what we can do to make it better and more equal for all people. You know, I do want to point out something because, like Teo, you did allude to this specifically about the superintendent walking back his comment consigning what he said that the Tulsa massacre

was not about skin color. One of the things that he said is that when he was asked about on Fox twenty five specifically what he said at the previous thing, when he was asked specifically, can something like this be taught or do you denounce that a CRT, he said, I would never tell a kid that because of your race, color or your skin, gender, or anything like that you are less of a person or inherently racist. That doesn't mean you don't judge the actions of individuals. Oh you can. Absolutely,

Historically you should. That was right, This was wrong. They did this for a reason. But to say it was inherent because of their skin is where I say that is critical race theory. You saying that a race defines a person. I reject that, Tao. When you hear that, what is mulling around in your cartoon brain? Yeah, I mean, Jude, that is what we've got race serious about. What it's not saying that because of your color you're different on all of that. It's just explaining what

happened in the past and how people were discriminated in past. So this guy is a work in contradiction. Now it's not a working contradiction. He just lies to the face of people and then tries to excuse himself. Or maybe or maybe, okay, let's let's be fair. Maybe he's just extremely ignorant and has no idea what critical race theory is all about. Just maybe.

So this is the reason why we need to teach history in schools, because obviously we have a whole Superintendent of education in Oklahoma, that don't know what the hell he's talking about. What you're talking about, Walter's what you're talking

about. And the thing about it is that if I had a chance to sit down with Walt and said, you know what, race and skin color are not completely the economists of one another when race was invented, because this is completely a made up social construct and has nothing to do with science, biology or the like. It is completely made up. One of the characteristics was the hue of your skin, and we even have reference to that.

I don't know, if you all ever heard of the paperback test, has an I don't know, I tail if you've heard of the paperback test, have you hearing describe it? Well? The paperback test was what the paperback test was that if you were at or darker than the um than the color of a paperbag, that you were not allowed entry in to an establish That's the that's the paperback test. So you know, and and this is and this happens to be a an outlier. Were not necessarily an outlier, but

it is a product of racism. So to completely divorce yourself from skin color to uh to race, where we even get raced from the first place. I is completely disingenuous. And I have to say to this particular person that when you if you are trying to water down or even try to you know,

move the goalposts, which is a fallacy concerning this particular topic. When we're talking about a massacre, and like I said, it was not the only one, America had over almost two hundred of them, then you cannot completely you can't just say that we're just going to divorce skin color or what have your or even race from this when in every instance of a massacre that had to do with the Black Township, the foundational reason why it happened was

because a race and that sensibility is now baked into our institutions, into our systems. And we know that not by because one group feels victimized, or if they feel debased or they feel like they want to play victim. It's because we have data in history to back that up. And it is unfortunate that we are here now and that we have to continuously debunk these insidious and silly talking points that we have coming from people who have been elected into their

position elected. I do believe that the superintendent was elected to uh into his particular position. I don't necessarily think. Yeah, so Oklahoma patterns, let me highlight you. You have some explaining to do, and you have some thinking to do about who you choose to represent yourself. And I want to know anything else that you want to add aaron to that whole. Yeah, I um, it doesn't. It doesn't have to be overt overt, you

know, violent racism to be a problem. There are really subtle ways that it affects us, you know, Yeah, how could it not affect us? This our country was found on the fact that black people count as three quarters of a person. Yeah, that was okay to enslave people. How could it not affect you? Even though it's almost two hundred years ago, it's going to affect you. And and it's not, like I said,

it's not always overtly. Like when Kodak, the maker of film for photography, that you might have noticed if if you were black and taking pictures with film, black people didn't look very good in in pictures because all the reference people they used in developing their film were white, and the white people look good, but the black people. Did you know? It wasn't nobody set out you know, to make it that way. It just kind of happened

that way. And it's those kind of subtle things and that are also that are also part of the of the problem. But of course race is an issue in the United States. Yeah and yeah, yeah, but people are trying to erase their own history like this, and that ends up with people saying such such ignoral lice and you know, lyne to everybody else out there listening to them. And these are people who are supposed to know what they're

talking about, and they don't. It's extremely sad. The US say, I keep saying it, The U say scares me more and more every single day, and even more now that they are making sure that all children have the same amount of knowledge that this guy had when he made that comment. That is zero, no education at all, and that is the scariest hill. Yeah, and and I just wanted to just add to the conversation, just to kind of just tie this all up in a bow, that there's

still three survivors of the Tulsa massacre that are still alive today. They are in their one hundreds, and they recently tried to bring up a lawsuit in order for them to seek repair and reparations for what has happened to them because they were displaced as children, and the judge over that was presented with that particular case dismissed it. Why they're gonna appeal and I hope the appellate process

will work. And if you guys want to work on listening to a little bit more of our content, coolick here

Transcript source: Provided by creator in RSS feed: download file
For the best experience, listen in Metacast app for iOS or Android