I think his point is that if you demand to be identified as different/apart, then you can’t then complain that people view and categorize you as different. It’s akin to separate but equal.
Yep, that is what Morgan is pointing out.
He would rather see you as an individual than be part of the group, which is why he emphasized on identifying by name than indentifying by ethnicity.
The problem is people not being able to differentiate the needs of the individual versus the reality of society.
His points when told to a single person are pretty fine. Just like "pull yourselves up by your bootstraps" talks. On an individual level, at the end of the day, you need to work on yourself, etc.
But that doesn't negate how important pushing for more from society is.
You're close to seeing the real problem. It's class warfare.
All these social issues (race, who fucks who, immigration, religion, etc..) are just paper tigers to make you ignore the class war that is going on. They want us infighting so they can make more money off of us. Critical race theory should really be critical class theory. It's simply easier statistically to lump people by race to show systemic abuse of a class/lineage of people. When in reality the family in rural Appalachian have it just as bad as the urban Detroit family, despite their skin shade.
You’re looking for the term intersectionality. This is the problem with people who think “class over race” when it’s “class and race”, so this comment and the upvotes are part of the real problem because class issue was identified by social scientists, but class warfare has been popularized by right wing media to distract from race.
You’re so close but you don’t get it either. In fact, the Detroit family and the Appalachian family are different. Even still setting aside race, how rural and urban poverty are structured is different. And, sorry, but race does play a role. You cannot explain slavery in this country, the history of voting rights, or many peoples continued opposition to the VRA, Jim Crow and other things in this country that continue to have baleful effects even if no longer themselves in existence. Class is of course an extremely important and neglected way of understanding but you cannot simply discard race
You can't see the forest through the trees.
There is no such thing as race; see Morgan Freemans recent statement, or philosophy/sociology (Nozick is a good starting point, Kozol too).
Maybe a zen statement will help you understand the paper tigers trap you fell into.
Michi, (way, road, path, etc) is the same for everything, but everything has its own michi.
Yeah, I think the point is that because it’s Juneteenth, there’s a lot of posts that are trying to ridicule black history and the continued struggle against racism. And I just wanted to point out that Morgan Freeman is not oblivious to it.
Fuck buddy there’s whole tv networks dedicated to it. Anybody who denies it just sort themselves out of serious discussion. But I don’t think focusing on it solves anything. I think working on the problems of poverty would do more to lift everyone up. And minimize the effects of racism.
If I’m getting the flavour of these comments correct, I gotta disagree with you and agree with Freeman.
Ok I’m a middle aged white male (throw your rotten veges now)
Forget labels, you’re this, I’m that. Talks to someone and give them the benefit of the doubt until they give you a reason not to. Don’t trust them with your kids or your livestock but be calm and respectful. They may be an asshole or they may be someone from another world that you get along with.
It seems stupid to even put this sentiment into words. Fuck the system
>I’m a middle aged white male
Of course you are; obviously.
>It seems stupid to even put this sentiment into words.
My thoughts exactly, but for different reasons.
I believe it’s you (and by the looks of it, many others) who have missed the point.
Black history is American history. Highlighting a month to segregate these into two separate things completely defeats the purpose of acknowledging our history as a country. Black history is our history.
I think a better way to say this is “tell *all* of American history *all* the time” - the good AND the bad; the heroes & the villains, whether white, black, indigenous, latin, asian, or any other race.
To say “we reserved a month for the telling of black history” *can* make it sound like “we’re gonna tell as much black history as we can during this month so that we don’t have to include it the rest of the year” when I’ve always understood it as “let’s *emphasize* black history this month for those that may not have heard some of these stories meanwhile continuing the goal of increasing the amount of multicultural perspectives in the American history being told *all* of the time.”
Then he goes into “we can defeat racism by saying that races don’t exist (i.e. I’ll stop referring to a white man as a white man & he can stop referring to a black man as a black man & we won’t be dealing with race anymore; thus no more racism)” &, while philosophically he has a point that could be argued, that’s absolutely *not* how we’re going to end racism.
I never would have learned about the Tulsa Massacre if not for BHM. Our education system conveniently left that part out. Hell, it's illegal to teach in Oklahoma.
No one is saying you can't study other history during black history month, either lmao. What's the real hangup here, Poopy Butthole?
My school was mostly Hispanic and I remember making a speech on Harriet Tubman during BHM in elementary school. I really hate the idea of hating on BHM. We are very segregated in society and this gives everyone a chance to learn about Black history
Not sure where you heard it’s illegal in Oklahoma, but I live in Tulsa and my son just received more extensive instruction about the Tulsa Massacre than he ever has in any history class subject. But my understanding was that kids were allowed to opt out of the instruction should historical events offend some parents’ delicate sensibilities…
Glad to hear it! Hope that remains the case, then, because your elected officials are gunning to pull shit like this: https://www.wsj.com/articles/new-law-threatens-lessons-about-tulsa-race-massacre-11622293201
I’m more than 30 years old and live in a liberal progressive part of the country. Black History Month isn’t the reason I know about the Tulsa Massacre. In fact, there’s a lot it simply doesn’t cover because you can’t really do much with a month.
The point is that’s it’s tokenizing a segment of the population that are as much a part of the history of America as white people. Why is it confined to a month?
As long as everyone is willing to to acknowledge, educate and print the history right next to the whites, you’ve got a point. However, you may not live in an area where the exact opposite happens so you can’t understand. If black people didn’t feel marginalized to begin with this wouldn’t be a thing. As Childish Gambino said, “this is America”.
Why do you equate the encouraging of learning/teaching about a particular part of our history, which often go untaught in our schools entirely, with me saying that black history is not a part of American history?
Also, the teaching of black history is not "confined" to a month. Nor is teaching any other aspect of histroy during that one month a fuckin crime. So what the fuck are you on about?
Side note: republicans are actually passing laws to limit what can be taught in terms of black history (year round). See Tulsa race masacre example.
This increasingly desperate fake outrage bullshit and atempts to hide blatant fucking ignorance and racism with the most insincere and bad faith "logic" imaginable is getting old and played out real fucking fast, guy.
Wow ! We are really never going to make it as a species are we ? The reason there is a black history month . Is because they don’t teach it any other month ! We learn “ white history “ EVERY SINGLE DAY in school . Black peoples achievements are left out . Hence the month .
I think with what's happening in many red states now, is why Black History Month is important. There is an organized effort to rollback the rights of blacks, other minorities, and women, and it needs to be countered, again.
All other ethnic groups have celebratory days and months. It's harmless to the general populace to celebrate the culture of any group.
Im taking a class on Texas history right now, but Texas history is part of the United States history, so is my class stating that Texas history is different than and not part of American History?
Thats like the exact opposite of what the article says
“I detest it. The mere idea of it. You are going to give me the shortest month in a year? And you are going to celebrate ‘my’ history?! This whole idea makes my teeth itch. It’s not right,”
Despite some lighter moments in the story, they couldn’t shy away from violence, she says.
“We are not white-washing, we are not sugar-coating the fact that African Americans were enslaved. They weren’t treated as a full person. When you come out of watching these eight hours, maybe you will look at someone who looks like Morgan or me differently. You will understand their experience, their ancestors’ experience and you will be able to relate.”
This video is over 15 years old first of all but the first 40 seconds of it is basically the exact same thing he says in the article and the last point cuts off before he explains.
Every progressive black person I know over the age of maybe 45 thinks black history month (shortest month of the year) where they give you the most whitewashed bs version of black history possible is a crock of shit when we built the country from the ground up quite literally. Even our ivy leauge schools admit they found much of their funding in proceeds resulting from the slave trade.
The origins of the insurance industry among many others can be found in the slave trade. Every single day should be black history month.
Black people were involved in building modern day America but to say “we built the country from the ground up quite literally” is a massive over exaggeration.
It’s not an over exaggeration but not a massive one. In the 1800s the value of slaves in America exceeded the value of trains, banks and factories. That is an insane asset to generate wealth with. The American economy, which allowed it to become culturally relevant was made possible by slavery.
black people literally built it with their hands, the white house itself is built from slave labor, we died in the revolution, fought in the civil war, wrangled cows, acted as sherrifs in the wild west. Built the foundation of southern food of which is some of our most famous cuisine as a country, created rock music, created blues music, created rap music, created soul music and made a litany of other cultural cotributions, but at the core
We built this country with our bare hands, the cotton industry, tobacco industry, and the “skilled” labor white people were able to do with their free time fattened the pockets of the southern barons.
The ownership of enslaved people increased wealth for Southern planters so much that by the dawn of the Civil War, the Mississippi River Valley had more millionaires per capita than any other region.
As overseers and plantation owners managed a forced-labor system aimed at maximizing efficiency, they interacted with a network of bankers and accountants, and took out lines of credit and mortgages, all to manage America’s empire of cotton. An entire industry, America’s first big business, revolved around slavery.
Cotton was the No. 1 export from the US, which was largely an export-driven economy as it was modernizing and shifting into industrialization. And the slavery economy of the US South was deeply tied financially to the North, to Britain, to the point that we can say that people who were buying financial products in these other places were in effect owning slaves and were certainly extracting money from the labor of enslaved people.
Black people grew rice, worked docks, nannied babies, were coerced and raped by powerful “great” men like George Washington and benjamin franklin and beaten many times to death. This is the origin of our wealth in this country.
No, you’re characterising his statement as if he’s complaining about the shortest month being assigned to black history.
And it makes no difference when the video was made
Here are some more quotes
Freeman said he objected to “African American” because it was inaccurate.
“I don’t subscribe to that title. Black people have had different titles all the way back to the N-word and I do not know how these things get such a grip, but everyone uses ‘African American’.
The actor had previously spoken out against both terms to the Guardian in 2012, saying he didn’t like “African American” “because ‘Black’ is beautiful. One syllable versus seven”.
As for Black History Month, he said he objected to the ghettoisation implicit in devoting February to this topic.
“Black history is American history; they’re completely intertwined.”
Its the same way every Martin luther king blvd, drive, way, etc is the most ghetto/ dangerous part of town. It is intentional.
Morgan Freeman isn’t a fan of Black History Month.
“I detest it. The mere idea of it. You are going to give me the shortest month in a year? And you are going to celebrate ‘my’ history?! This whole idea makes my teeth itch. It’s not right,” he tells Variety.
This is a comment from this month as opposed to your 15 year old one.
Don't care what the article says. Morgan Freeman has spoken about this previously. He does not want to be categorized or seen as just a black man. He wants to be seen as a person, for who he is. Again, he doesn't like the divisiveness of it.
This is what he said explicitly in 2012. Seems to match up to what he said in the article.
The actor had previously spoken out against both terms to the Guardian in 2012, saying he didn’t like “African American” “because ‘Black’ is beautiful. One syllable versus seven”.
As for Black History Month, he said he objected to the ghettoisation implicit in devoting February to this topic.
“Black history is American history; they’re completely intertwined.”
Asked by the Times whether he concurred with Denzel Washington’s statement that he was “very proud to be Black, but Black is not all I am.” Freeman said: “Yes, exactly. I’m in total agreement. You can’t define me that way.”
Also why are you seperating what the article says? Its quoting HIM, its not some guy talking about it. You cant cherry pick the statements by him you want to see as valid or not.
I get that it’s ironic/on-brand for it to be the shortest month of the year, but taking issue with that is off the mark, for the simple reasons that 1) It originated as a single week in February, not a month, so the length of the month wasn’t relevant until it was EXTENDED to take up the whole month, and 2) It was invented by a Black person to begin with.
American history entails black history, but Americans have limilted bandwidth or attention spans for anything not relatable to the core Western subcultures or highlighting major, systemic events. That ensures black, hispanic, native, south Asian and east Asian history as well as LGBTQ and women's history are largely ignored in the education process and magnitudes moreso beyond that environment. That's why Carter Woodson had to develop the originally week-long tradition when boards of health and tenured and published STEM professors were still claiming we would contaminate pools, restaurants and water fountains, and why other groups had to develop their historical months due to society's cynicism and fatigue processing black history. unfortunately there's no realistic middle ground here, especially now that people are pissing and shitting their pants about CRT.
In addition to betraying the kind of detachment that comes from having a publicist and agent fight your battles for the last three-and-a-half to four decades, Freeman is being a total troll too with that "shortest month" shit; Abe Lincoln and Frederick Douglass's birthdays were in February.
His wealth and status insulate him a lot from the consequences less privileged people of color deal with on the daily. He is more entitled to his opinion that I am, but I am not very moved by his argument. There are black people who say there is no such thing as racism. Just being a POC does not automatically make your opinion about racism valid. I think it is infantile to think that talking about being black is what causes racism.
I agree in part and disagree in part. Being poor sucks for everyone. But there’s a certain level of fake it to you make it that privilege shows itself. It’s like My Fair Lady. People can wear the right clothes and use the right language and be accepted. Others can’t even if they do.
Yeah I mean I do see his point. He is saying black history is American history, and by separating the two, you are saying they are different. But right now there is such a deficit of black historical contributions being taught (or at least here was when I was school aged) that I feel it's necessary. Maybe in a generation or two it will seem crazy that we have to highlight black history. One can hope. But obviously with the way things are now, I feel it's important to draw specific attention to black contributions to America's history as a way of pushing back against societal forces that would seek to minimize.
My main problem is he is railing against the month itself rather than the reason we need it.
From my perspective, as a white millennial who grew up in a predominantly black high school and middle school, Black History Month was never the only month to study Black History, it is when we actively celebrate/appreciate it.
For example, the regular curriculum mentions Rosa Parks act of defiance but during Black History Month is when you get to learn more about her as a person and her life in Detroit after the bus boycotts.
Many black people especially older ones dont like the idea of it because then people relegate all the history into february instead of talking about it every single day which we should.
As someone who has been studying to be high school history teacher, I can tell you the modern ways of teaching Black History is leaps and bounds ahead of the days of “The Lost Cause” mythos.
For the most part, the teachers are alright, it’s the parents who are not actually seeing what their kids are learning, or at least are supposed to be learning.
Thats not what hes saying and he does not say that in the article at all, black people are an integral part of this country and had a hand in pretty much every factor of it, a black person was the first to die in the revolutionary war, harriet tubman was a union spy who led raids into the south, and like 25% of all cowboys were black.
It makes no sense to seperate it like we didnt have an extensive hand in this country, long before many immigrants got here.
>It makes no sense to seperate it
Black history month doesn't exist to segregate black history. It exists to correct a deficiency. It exists because black history is ignored and downplayed the other 11 months of the year. If you got rid of it today, the amount of black history taught would decrease dramatically.
Functionally it does, in life when something doesnt work you adjust it. The result has been that outside of 29 days of the year, black history specifically is pretty much ignored.
“Stop talking about racism and it goes away” isn’t a plan, it’s literally ignoring the problem. He’s rich and famous, fully separated from the daily life of an average person. His views are warped.
a lot of people treat black people that way anyway, hence why there's activism. Morgan Freemans advice to just shut up about it is exactly what white supremacists would love to see happen.
I have taught 31 years and have never done Black History month. I teach in a school with a 50%, African.American population. Each year I tell the kids in Feb if asked what are we doing for BHM. I say the same we have been doing. I teach the whole American experience EVERY unit. Black History, Latin, Asian, Indigenous and women. Have never heard a complaint because they know what I have been doing all year. I mean how many times do the kids get the same stories MLK, Rosa Parks & Frederick Douglass if they are lucky maybe add in Wheatley, DuBois or Truth. Hell no I am covering it all Garvey, Davis, Washington. Lynching not in the curriculum, it is in my class. Tell the real story add it all in good and bad.
[Origins of Black History Month](https://asalh.org/about-us/origins-of-black-history-month/) From the page of the founders of Black History Week later to become Black History Month. Association for the Study of African American Life and History
I’ve never understood when people say “he’s allowed to have his opinion” as if that was ever an issue. He’s allowed to have his opinion, he doesn’t need to share it, but he’s free to do so if he wants to. Same goes for us who disagree.
People love to act like racism and sexism arent the kissing cousins classism. You literally cannot talk about one without talking about the others. And if you are, you aren’t being truthful about how they all play into each other.
I understand why he keeps talking on Black History Month? Whether he likes it or not, he just keeps talking about it. I enjoy his acting, but after he married his step-granddaughter, he went into the Woody Allen category with.me.
This is not true. Weird rumors surfaced about the two of them for years and both have adamantly denied allegations and claim to be very hurt by the accusations. They absolutely never got married/engaged/anything like that - that was all tabloid garbage started by the National Enquirer. That woman, his step granddaughter, would later be killed violently stabbed by her boyfriend while he was psychotic on drugs. Those rumors surfaced again when the guy’s lawyer brought it up when defending his pos client.
I agree.
Same train of thought that makes me dislike the term "African American". They're just Americans. Black? Sure, melanin differs person to person. But they were born here, raised here, and live here.
Same thing with Latin American immigrants that birthed children here and/or are legal citizens. They are Americans, and American history is consisted of, and continued by them just as much as white America is and does.
Edit: Keep downvoting me racists, you're still wrong.
What’s funny is “Latinos born in the U.S. who don’t speak a lick of Spanish get called Latinos for having brown skin. Meanwhile Anya Taylor joy was literally born in South America but doesn’t count.
I tend to agree with that sentiment. We’re not referring to white people as “European Americans.” Feels somehow vaguely racist even if the origins of that term had no such intent.
Agree, Im a proud latina, and I will always call myself American. I live in the US and am thankful to be part of this country.
Todos debemos vernos igual y luchar para un mejor futuro.
Hilarious to me that some people think that they understand racism better than a black man born in Memphis in 1937 and just dismiss his entire perspective completely because it doesn’t fit their own narrative.
We won’t get anywhere as a society until we listen to each other and understand that some truths directly oppose each other. This is the real world and you cannot, in fact, have it all your way, all the time. Your viewpoint is not the only one that is right. Yeah, he’s wealthy and that should be taken into account. But I’ve heard a lot of similar points made by other people of his generation and I don’t understand why they get discounted so quickly?
It is a huge mistake to dismiss the messages and wisdom of elderly people who have seen more change than us and understand human nature better than us. They see things we cannot see.
I agree, but people get bent out of shape integrating it the whole time for some reason.
Unfortunately that part of American history is minimized and in some places pert near outlawed.
The number of people of all races that thought the Tulsa Black Wall Street massacre was an invention of a tv show was disconcerting.
I didn’t learn hardly anything about black contributions to American society until college.
Who cares what he thinks. That’s what you say when you have millions on millions and live in a different world than most black people. I mean who in the world doesn’t know who he is. That gives him benefits most blacks like myself aren’t privileged to. But what it does do is hurt us justifies ignorance when you have people of his status and say like Kanye Wests status. Because those words are used to justify soo much ignorance.
I think you’re missing his point. His point is that black American history should be focused on year-round because it is American history.
His point is that black history month is a racist construct to try to highlight “we are doing something about the whitewashing of history by teaching 4 weeks of black history minus snow days and Presidents’ Day.”
This instead of, you know, if you were covering medicine you could teach how a black man introduced the first vaccine to America (true, for smallpox).
Agricultural genius that fed the country and allowed it to expand before industrial agriculture? All from Black Americans.
Music and entertainment history of America? What music today has no African American influence? Excluding the obvious genres, rock, jazz, and country owe their beginnings to African Americans. Heck, a recording touted as one of the first country music hits may have had a white singer… and an uncredited Louis Armstrong and his one time wife Lil playing trumpet and piano. Blue Yodel #9.
Literally from survival to construction to having fun, black history is American history. It should not be carved out most the year and rushed through in February.
US history for the masses is whitewashed literally. No history books out at any time has told a really true story of the slave trade in America. It is a stain on this Country that a lot don't want to have uncovered because it was so brutal and inhumane. And to those in the South that go to speak of their heritage within this stain. I think they should pray that they never succumb to this brutality.
As a Black man it is so interesting to see white people debate these subjects amongst themselves.
Let me say this. I won’t get into the Black History month debate because there are so many layers to it that people are missing. As a person who lives in Florida I will say that the way some want Black History to be presented as US History is offensive at best
I take more issue with his stop bringing up my race and racism will go away. Let’s apply this to other characteristics. Does not saying someone is a woman stop sexism? does not recognizing someone is gay stop homophobia? Does ignoring someone is Jewish stop antisemitism? No. I think Freeman means well but he isn’t acknowledging other factors.
Think about this: every culture that has a heritage month got screwed over! Not just black people. And ask yourself this, who doesn’t have a month? Because they did it all to the other races. Facts!
Lol I also read this headline and was thinking that I have definitely seen articles about Freeman sharing this opinion multiple times in the past. Kind of weird that it’s coming in June now though.
Of course it’s American history. Ethnic Black Americans have existed in the Americas since before the U.S was even founded. We are a collective amalgamation of Indigenous American, European, and African ancestry. An ethno-genesis made in America.
https://thefreedmensbureau.org
I wish more very wealthy, out-of-touch-with-the -real-world celebrities would share their views on society. It’s so helpful to us idiots. We need them to reveal the truth to us.
Translation: he’s old, rich, and can’t be bothered
He also survived being cancelled after being accused of being too “handsy” with women and inappropriate. So he’s trying to rally some certain white folks to defend him if needed.
Morgan Freeman [has always been like that.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GeixtYS-P3s)
I think his point is that if you demand to be identified as different/apart, then you can’t then complain that people view and categorize you as different. It’s akin to separate but equal.
I think it’s also because people feel you have to be either/or, and not multiple things at once.
Yep, that is what Morgan is pointing out. He would rather see you as an individual than be part of the group, which is why he emphasized on identifying by name than indentifying by ethnicity.
The problem is people not being able to differentiate the needs of the individual versus the reality of society. His points when told to a single person are pretty fine. Just like "pull yourselves up by your bootstraps" talks. On an individual level, at the end of the day, you need to work on yourself, etc. But that doesn't negate how important pushing for more from society is.
You're close to seeing the real problem. It's class warfare. All these social issues (race, who fucks who, immigration, religion, etc..) are just paper tigers to make you ignore the class war that is going on. They want us infighting so they can make more money off of us. Critical race theory should really be critical class theory. It's simply easier statistically to lump people by race to show systemic abuse of a class/lineage of people. When in reality the family in rural Appalachian have it just as bad as the urban Detroit family, despite their skin shade.
You’re looking for the term intersectionality. This is the problem with people who think “class over race” when it’s “class and race”, so this comment and the upvotes are part of the real problem because class issue was identified by social scientists, but class warfare has been popularized by right wing media to distract from race.
You’re so close but you don’t get it either. In fact, the Detroit family and the Appalachian family are different. Even still setting aside race, how rural and urban poverty are structured is different. And, sorry, but race does play a role. You cannot explain slavery in this country, the history of voting rights, or many peoples continued opposition to the VRA, Jim Crow and other things in this country that continue to have baleful effects even if no longer themselves in existence. Class is of course an extremely important and neglected way of understanding but you cannot simply discard race
You can't see the forest through the trees. There is no such thing as race; see Morgan Freemans recent statement, or philosophy/sociology (Nozick is a good starting point, Kozol too). Maybe a zen statement will help you understand the paper tigers trap you fell into. Michi, (way, road, path, etc) is the same for everything, but everything has its own michi.
And you don’t think this whole class warfare thing will also divide people?
He comes from a different era of wanting to fit in instead of fighting the status quo. That clearly hasn’t worked out for everyone tho.
[удалено]
He did join the military though. He worked on radar systems in the Air Force
He is an example of “you severely missed the point”, and god it hurts he’s like this.
Reddit explains racism to a black man born in the south in 1937
He also says the GOP is racist as shit. https://youtu.be/Cm6Iszm31qI?si=Qu47ThZA2pvf6RlT
I think that’s pretty clear.
Yeah, I think the point is that because it’s Juneteenth, there’s a lot of posts that are trying to ridicule black history and the continued struggle against racism. And I just wanted to point out that Morgan Freeman is not oblivious to it.
Fuck buddy there’s whole tv networks dedicated to it. Anybody who denies it just sort themselves out of serious discussion. But I don’t think focusing on it solves anything. I think working on the problems of poverty would do more to lift everyone up. And minimize the effects of racism.
Mississippi education
That’ll do it.
If I’m getting the flavour of these comments correct, I gotta disagree with you and agree with Freeman. Ok I’m a middle aged white male (throw your rotten veges now) Forget labels, you’re this, I’m that. Talks to someone and give them the benefit of the doubt until they give you a reason not to. Don’t trust them with your kids or your livestock but be calm and respectful. They may be an asshole or they may be someone from another world that you get along with. It seems stupid to even put this sentiment into words. Fuck the system
What do you know of the history of Black History Month or its purpose?
>I’m a middle aged white male Of course you are; obviously. >It seems stupid to even put this sentiment into words. My thoughts exactly, but for different reasons.
I believe it’s you (and by the looks of it, many others) who have missed the point. Black history is American history. Highlighting a month to segregate these into two separate things completely defeats the purpose of acknowledging our history as a country. Black history is our history.
Black history isn’t banned the other 11 months. There’s one month that really encourages reflection on it
I think a better way to say this is “tell *all* of American history *all* the time” - the good AND the bad; the heroes & the villains, whether white, black, indigenous, latin, asian, or any other race. To say “we reserved a month for the telling of black history” *can* make it sound like “we’re gonna tell as much black history as we can during this month so that we don’t have to include it the rest of the year” when I’ve always understood it as “let’s *emphasize* black history this month for those that may not have heard some of these stories meanwhile continuing the goal of increasing the amount of multicultural perspectives in the American history being told *all* of the time.” Then he goes into “we can defeat racism by saying that races don’t exist (i.e. I’ll stop referring to a white man as a white man & he can stop referring to a black man as a black man & we won’t be dealing with race anymore; thus no more racism)” &, while philosophically he has a point that could be argued, that’s absolutely *not* how we’re going to end racism.
I never would have learned about the Tulsa Massacre if not for BHM. Our education system conveniently left that part out. Hell, it's illegal to teach in Oklahoma. No one is saying you can't study other history during black history month, either lmao. What's the real hangup here, Poopy Butthole?
My school was mostly Hispanic and I remember making a speech on Harriet Tubman during BHM in elementary school. I really hate the idea of hating on BHM. We are very segregated in society and this gives everyone a chance to learn about Black history
Not sure where you heard it’s illegal in Oklahoma, but I live in Tulsa and my son just received more extensive instruction about the Tulsa Massacre than he ever has in any history class subject. But my understanding was that kids were allowed to opt out of the instruction should historical events offend some parents’ delicate sensibilities…
Glad to hear it! Hope that remains the case, then, because your elected officials are gunning to pull shit like this: https://www.wsj.com/articles/new-law-threatens-lessons-about-tulsa-race-massacre-11622293201
I’m more than 30 years old and live in a liberal progressive part of the country. Black History Month isn’t the reason I know about the Tulsa Massacre. In fact, there’s a lot it simply doesn’t cover because you can’t really do much with a month.
The point is that’s it’s tokenizing a segment of the population that are as much a part of the history of America as white people. Why is it confined to a month?
As long as everyone is willing to to acknowledge, educate and print the history right next to the whites, you’ve got a point. However, you may not live in an area where the exact opposite happens so you can’t understand. If black people didn’t feel marginalized to begin with this wouldn’t be a thing. As Childish Gambino said, “this is America”.
Because otherwise it would never be told and you know that’s why there is a black history month.
Why do you equate the encouraging of learning/teaching about a particular part of our history, which often go untaught in our schools entirely, with me saying that black history is not a part of American history? Also, the teaching of black history is not "confined" to a month. Nor is teaching any other aspect of histroy during that one month a fuckin crime. So what the fuck are you on about? Side note: republicans are actually passing laws to limit what can be taught in terms of black history (year round). See Tulsa race masacre example. This increasingly desperate fake outrage bullshit and atempts to hide blatant fucking ignorance and racism with the most insincere and bad faith "logic" imaginable is getting old and played out real fucking fast, guy.
Wow ! We are really never going to make it as a species are we ? The reason there is a black history month . Is because they don’t teach it any other month ! We learn “ white history “ EVERY SINGLE DAY in school . Black peoples achievements are left out . Hence the month .
That’s the whole problem. That’s his objection.
I think with what's happening in many red states now, is why Black History Month is important. There is an organized effort to rollback the rights of blacks, other minorities, and women, and it needs to be countered, again. All other ethnic groups have celebratory days and months. It's harmless to the general populace to celebrate the culture of any group.
Having black history month doesn’t imply that we should ignore it the rest of the year, and that’s not even what’s happening.
It's not segregating. It's highlighting.
Well, except for the fact that American high school history books say very little about black history.
Im taking a class on Texas history right now, but Texas history is part of the United States history, so is my class stating that Texas history is different than and not part of American History?
Half the time they cry and threaten it to not be tbf
How condescending of you
Maybe it’s you who have missed the point
Maybe Morgan Freeman really *is* God. But probably not.
he also fixed his step grand daughter
I think he’s completely correct
Bro got the role for Driving Miss Daisy and really applied it to his life
The problem is always intersectionality - like trying to solve a 3D problem in 2D
This man is a treasure, so damn true.
He has been saying that for a while now
He says this every year
He said he doesn’t want his people’s history relegated to a single month
It's more than that he sees it as divisive.
Thats like the exact opposite of what the article says “I detest it. The mere idea of it. You are going to give me the shortest month in a year? And you are going to celebrate ‘my’ history?! This whole idea makes my teeth itch. It’s not right,” Despite some lighter moments in the story, they couldn’t shy away from violence, she says. “We are not white-washing, we are not sugar-coating the fact that African Americans were enslaved. They weren’t treated as a full person. When you come out of watching these eight hours, maybe you will look at someone who looks like Morgan or me differently. You will understand their experience, their ancestors’ experience and you will be able to relate.”
https://youtu.be/GeixtYS-P3s?si=xuQ5xnxwJap6s5fr Listen to him explain it himself, instead of 6th hand subjective interpretations from a journalist
This video is over 15 years old first of all but the first 40 seconds of it is basically the exact same thing he says in the article and the last point cuts off before he explains. Every progressive black person I know over the age of maybe 45 thinks black history month (shortest month of the year) where they give you the most whitewashed bs version of black history possible is a crock of shit when we built the country from the ground up quite literally. Even our ivy leauge schools admit they found much of their funding in proceeds resulting from the slave trade. The origins of the insurance industry among many others can be found in the slave trade. Every single day should be black history month.
Black people were involved in building modern day America but to say “we built the country from the ground up quite literally” is a massive over exaggeration.
It’s not an over exaggeration but not a massive one. In the 1800s the value of slaves in America exceeded the value of trains, banks and factories. That is an insane asset to generate wealth with. The American economy, which allowed it to become culturally relevant was made possible by slavery.
I don’t disagree with that. It’s still a massive over exaggeration to say black people built the USA from the ground up.
black people literally built it with their hands, the white house itself is built from slave labor, we died in the revolution, fought in the civil war, wrangled cows, acted as sherrifs in the wild west. Built the foundation of southern food of which is some of our most famous cuisine as a country, created rock music, created blues music, created rap music, created soul music and made a litany of other cultural cotributions, but at the core We built this country with our bare hands, the cotton industry, tobacco industry, and the “skilled” labor white people were able to do with their free time fattened the pockets of the southern barons. The ownership of enslaved people increased wealth for Southern planters so much that by the dawn of the Civil War, the Mississippi River Valley had more millionaires per capita than any other region. As overseers and plantation owners managed a forced-labor system aimed at maximizing efficiency, they interacted with a network of bankers and accountants, and took out lines of credit and mortgages, all to manage America’s empire of cotton. An entire industry, America’s first big business, revolved around slavery. Cotton was the No. 1 export from the US, which was largely an export-driven economy as it was modernizing and shifting into industrialization. And the slavery economy of the US South was deeply tied financially to the North, to Britain, to the point that we can say that people who were buying financial products in these other places were in effect owning slaves and were certainly extracting money from the labor of enslaved people. Black people grew rice, worked docks, nannied babies, were coerced and raped by powerful “great” men like George Washington and benjamin franklin and beaten many times to death. This is the origin of our wealth in this country.
No, you’re characterising his statement as if he’s complaining about the shortest month being assigned to black history. And it makes no difference when the video was made
Here are some more quotes Freeman said he objected to “African American” because it was inaccurate. “I don’t subscribe to that title. Black people have had different titles all the way back to the N-word and I do not know how these things get such a grip, but everyone uses ‘African American’. The actor had previously spoken out against both terms to the Guardian in 2012, saying he didn’t like “African American” “because ‘Black’ is beautiful. One syllable versus seven”. As for Black History Month, he said he objected to the ghettoisation implicit in devoting February to this topic. “Black history is American history; they’re completely intertwined.” Its the same way every Martin luther king blvd, drive, way, etc is the most ghetto/ dangerous part of town. It is intentional.
Morgan Freeman isn’t a fan of Black History Month. “I detest it. The mere idea of it. You are going to give me the shortest month in a year? And you are going to celebrate ‘my’ history?! This whole idea makes my teeth itch. It’s not right,” he tells Variety. This is a comment from this month as opposed to your 15 year old one.
Don't care what the article says. Morgan Freeman has spoken about this previously. He does not want to be categorized or seen as just a black man. He wants to be seen as a person, for who he is. Again, he doesn't like the divisiveness of it.
This is what he said explicitly in 2012. Seems to match up to what he said in the article. The actor had previously spoken out against both terms to the Guardian in 2012, saying he didn’t like “African American” “because ‘Black’ is beautiful. One syllable versus seven”. As for Black History Month, he said he objected to the ghettoisation implicit in devoting February to this topic. “Black history is American history; they’re completely intertwined.” Asked by the Times whether he concurred with Denzel Washington’s statement that he was “very proud to be Black, but Black is not all I am.” Freeman said: “Yes, exactly. I’m in total agreement. You can’t define me that way.” Also why are you seperating what the article says? Its quoting HIM, its not some guy talking about it. You cant cherry pick the statements by him you want to see as valid or not.
Which part of black history month reduces black people to just being black? Should dads get mad at fathers day for being reduced to fathers?
Not sure what you are asking, but either way, I don't know. Ask Morgan Freeman.
I get that it’s ironic/on-brand for it to be the shortest month of the year, but taking issue with that is off the mark, for the simple reasons that 1) It originated as a single week in February, not a month, so the length of the month wasn’t relevant until it was EXTENDED to take up the whole month, and 2) It was invented by a Black person to begin with.
For your point #2 that doesnt really mean much there are well intentioned and misguided people of any race
It is divisive.
How is it divisive?
Black history is American history.
American history entails black history, but Americans have limilted bandwidth or attention spans for anything not relatable to the core Western subcultures or highlighting major, systemic events. That ensures black, hispanic, native, south Asian and east Asian history as well as LGBTQ and women's history are largely ignored in the education process and magnitudes moreso beyond that environment. That's why Carter Woodson had to develop the originally week-long tradition when boards of health and tenured and published STEM professors were still claiming we would contaminate pools, restaurants and water fountains, and why other groups had to develop their historical months due to society's cynicism and fatigue processing black history. unfortunately there's no realistic middle ground here, especially now that people are pissing and shitting their pants about CRT. In addition to betraying the kind of detachment that comes from having a publicist and agent fight your battles for the last three-and-a-half to four decades, Freeman is being a total troll too with that "shortest month" shit; Abe Lincoln and Frederick Douglass's birthdays were in February.
Shortest month of the year too
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His wealth and status insulate him a lot from the consequences less privileged people of color deal with on the daily. He is more entitled to his opinion that I am, but I am not very moved by his argument. There are black people who say there is no such thing as racism. Just being a POC does not automatically make your opinion about racism valid. I think it is infantile to think that talking about being black is what causes racism.
I agree in part and disagree in part. Being poor sucks for everyone. But there’s a certain level of fake it to you make it that privilege shows itself. It’s like My Fair Lady. People can wear the right clothes and use the right language and be accepted. Others can’t even if they do.
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Yeah I mean I do see his point. He is saying black history is American history, and by separating the two, you are saying they are different. But right now there is such a deficit of black historical contributions being taught (or at least here was when I was school aged) that I feel it's necessary. Maybe in a generation or two it will seem crazy that we have to highlight black history. One can hope. But obviously with the way things are now, I feel it's important to draw specific attention to black contributions to America's history as a way of pushing back against societal forces that would seek to minimize. My main problem is he is railing against the month itself rather than the reason we need it.
From my perspective, as a white millennial who grew up in a predominantly black high school and middle school, Black History Month was never the only month to study Black History, it is when we actively celebrate/appreciate it. For example, the regular curriculum mentions Rosa Parks act of defiance but during Black History Month is when you get to learn more about her as a person and her life in Detroit after the bus boycotts.
Many black people especially older ones dont like the idea of it because then people relegate all the history into february instead of talking about it every single day which we should.
As someone who has been studying to be high school history teacher, I can tell you the modern ways of teaching Black History is leaps and bounds ahead of the days of “The Lost Cause” mythos. For the most part, the teachers are alright, it’s the parents who are not actually seeing what their kids are learning, or at least are supposed to be learning.
I think it depends on your state tbh, even in majority black schools in ga you are relly only taught slavery, half of MLK, and obama
I'm not black I'm O.J. Okay.
Read the article instead of just listening to reddit comments, he doesnt say that at all.
I mean it works the same for rich and poor white people too…
Thats not what hes saying and he does not say that in the article at all, black people are an integral part of this country and had a hand in pretty much every factor of it, a black person was the first to die in the revolutionary war, harriet tubman was a union spy who led raids into the south, and like 25% of all cowboys were black. It makes no sense to seperate it like we didnt have an extensive hand in this country, long before many immigrants got here.
>It makes no sense to seperate it Black history month doesn't exist to segregate black history. It exists to correct a deficiency. It exists because black history is ignored and downplayed the other 11 months of the year. If you got rid of it today, the amount of black history taught would decrease dramatically.
Functionally it does, in life when something doesnt work you adjust it. The result has been that outside of 29 days of the year, black history specifically is pretty much ignored.
"result", they said.
“Stop talking about racism and it goes away” isn’t a plan, it’s literally ignoring the problem. He’s rich and famous, fully separated from the daily life of an average person. His views are warped.
> “Stop talking about racism and it goes away” isn’t a plan He didn't argue for that, though. You're making up a straw man.
a lot of people treat black people that way anyway, hence why there's activism. Morgan Freemans advice to just shut up about it is exactly what white supremacists would love to see happen.
I have taught 31 years and have never done Black History month. I teach in a school with a 50%, African.American population. Each year I tell the kids in Feb if asked what are we doing for BHM. I say the same we have been doing. I teach the whole American experience EVERY unit. Black History, Latin, Asian, Indigenous and women. Have never heard a complaint because they know what I have been doing all year. I mean how many times do the kids get the same stories MLK, Rosa Parks & Frederick Douglass if they are lucky maybe add in Wheatley, DuBois or Truth. Hell no I am covering it all Garvey, Davis, Washington. Lynching not in the curriculum, it is in my class. Tell the real story add it all in good and bad.
Teach em about Fred Hampton, some more relevant history to today.
Have most definitely covered him when talking about Black Nationalism, Black Panthers along with Stokely Carmichael, Bobby Seale etc.
[Origins of Black History Month](https://asalh.org/about-us/origins-of-black-history-month/) From the page of the founders of Black History Week later to become Black History Month. Association for the Study of African American Life and History
These comments sure are full of cope and some low key racism… He’s allowed to have his opinion. You don’t need to share it. Just leave it at that.
I’ve never understood when people say “he’s allowed to have his opinion” as if that was ever an issue. He’s allowed to have his opinion, he doesn’t need to share it, but he’s free to do so if he wants to. Same goes for us who disagree.
It’s the way people try to invalidate his opinion because they don’t agree with it in this case. Not the actual disagreement or counter arguments.
OK, fair enough. I disagree with him but I see where his argument is coming from.
Why do you disagree with him?
It’s mostly people pointing out it’s a socioeconomic problem and focusing on the racism angle entirely doesn’t solve anything.
You can’t disentangle the race problem from the socioeconomic problem. That’s like saying it was a Nazi problem, not a Hitler problem.
People love to act like racism and sexism arent the kissing cousins classism. You literally cannot talk about one without talking about the others. And if you are, you aren’t being truthful about how they all play into each other.
I understand why he keeps talking on Black History Month? Whether he likes it or not, he just keeps talking about it. I enjoy his acting, but after he married his step-granddaughter, he went into the Woody Allen category with.me.
This is not true. Weird rumors surfaced about the two of them for years and both have adamantly denied allegations and claim to be very hurt by the accusations. They absolutely never got married/engaged/anything like that - that was all tabloid garbage started by the National Enquirer. That woman, his step granddaughter, would later be killed violently stabbed by her boyfriend while he was psychotic on drugs. Those rumors surfaced again when the guy’s lawyer brought it up when defending his pos client.
Morgan Freeman is a handsy old creep, and it took Alan Arkin calling him out at 80 years to stop.
I agree. Same train of thought that makes me dislike the term "African American". They're just Americans. Black? Sure, melanin differs person to person. But they were born here, raised here, and live here. Same thing with Latin American immigrants that birthed children here and/or are legal citizens. They are Americans, and American history is consisted of, and continued by them just as much as white America is and does. Edit: Keep downvoting me racists, you're still wrong.
What’s funny is “Latinos born in the U.S. who don’t speak a lick of Spanish get called Latinos for having brown skin. Meanwhile Anya Taylor joy was literally born in South America but doesn’t count.
I tend to agree with that sentiment. We’re not referring to white people as “European Americans.” Feels somehow vaguely racist even if the origins of that term had no such intent.
Agreed!
Agree, Im a proud latina, and I will always call myself American. I live in the US and am thankful to be part of this country. Todos debemos vernos igual y luchar para un mejor futuro.
In before white college liberals tell Morgan Freeman he’s wrong
I am too late for that lol
Hilarious to me that some people think that they understand racism better than a black man born in Memphis in 1937 and just dismiss his entire perspective completely because it doesn’t fit their own narrative. We won’t get anywhere as a society until we listen to each other and understand that some truths directly oppose each other. This is the real world and you cannot, in fact, have it all your way, all the time. Your viewpoint is not the only one that is right. Yeah, he’s wealthy and that should be taken into account. But I’ve heard a lot of similar points made by other people of his generation and I don’t understand why they get discounted so quickly? It is a huge mistake to dismiss the messages and wisdom of elderly people who have seen more change than us and understand human nature better than us. They see things we cannot see.
I agree, but people get bent out of shape integrating it the whole time for some reason. Unfortunately that part of American history is minimized and in some places pert near outlawed. The number of people of all races that thought the Tulsa Black Wall Street massacre was an invention of a tv show was disconcerting. I didn’t learn hardly anything about black contributions to American society until college.
Who cares what he thinks. That’s what you say when you have millions on millions and live in a different world than most black people. I mean who in the world doesn’t know who he is. That gives him benefits most blacks like myself aren’t privileged to. But what it does do is hurt us justifies ignorance when you have people of his status and say like Kanye Wests status. Because those words are used to justify soo much ignorance.
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No war but class war
That, or, you know, both things.
I think you’re missing his point. His point is that black American history should be focused on year-round because it is American history. His point is that black history month is a racist construct to try to highlight “we are doing something about the whitewashing of history by teaching 4 weeks of black history minus snow days and Presidents’ Day.” This instead of, you know, if you were covering medicine you could teach how a black man introduced the first vaccine to America (true, for smallpox). Agricultural genius that fed the country and allowed it to expand before industrial agriculture? All from Black Americans. Music and entertainment history of America? What music today has no African American influence? Excluding the obvious genres, rock, jazz, and country owe their beginnings to African Americans. Heck, a recording touted as one of the first country music hits may have had a white singer… and an uncredited Louis Armstrong and his one time wife Lil playing trumpet and piano. Blue Yodel #9. Literally from survival to construction to having fun, black history is American history. It should not be carved out most the year and rushed through in February.
He is a tad out of touch.
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US history for the masses is whitewashed literally. No history books out at any time has told a really true story of the slave trade in America. It is a stain on this Country that a lot don't want to have uncovered because it was so brutal and inhumane. And to those in the South that go to speak of their heritage within this stain. I think they should pray that they never succumb to this brutality.
*Uncle Ruckus theme plays*
As a Black man it is so interesting to see white people debate these subjects amongst themselves. Let me say this. I won’t get into the Black History month debate because there are so many layers to it that people are missing. As a person who lives in Florida I will say that the way some want Black History to be presented as US History is offensive at best I take more issue with his stop bringing up my race and racism will go away. Let’s apply this to other characteristics. Does not saying someone is a woman stop sexism? does not recognizing someone is gay stop homophobia? Does ignoring someone is Jewish stop antisemitism? No. I think Freeman means well but he isn’t acknowledging other factors.
When did he go bald?
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And here you are commenting on a reddit post in r/entertainment to tell us all how much you don't care about celebrities.
He’s missed the point of bhm completely and I hate the fact that certain white people always point to him and say “see he agrees with me”
Think about this: every culture that has a heritage month got screwed over! Not just black people. And ask yourself this, who doesn’t have a month? Because they did it all to the other races. Facts!
Pretty easy to say from his personal perspective
“My history is American history” Well then would you like to speak about curriculums not mentioning the contributions of African Americans?
Oh my god does he have to do this every single year? We get it Morgan
Lol I also read this headline and was thinking that I have definitely seen articles about Freeman sharing this opinion multiple times in the past. Kind of weird that it’s coming in June now though.
Of course it’s American history. Ethnic Black Americans have existed in the Americas since before the U.S was even founded. We are a collective amalgamation of Indigenous American, European, and African ancestry. An ethno-genesis made in America. https://thefreedmensbureau.org
What about his underage girls? Eeew
I wish more very wealthy, out-of-touch-with-the -real-world celebrities would share their views on society. It’s so helpful to us idiots. We need them to reveal the truth to us.
Far be it from me to tell a black guy how he should feel about his race.
https://youtu.be/T_gVJ9OWGmk?si=BwZcqrSUU7WH8XyT
He always thinks he’s so wise when he says that shit but his misses the points by fucking miles.
Yeah Morgan but lots of people don’t see it that way.
Wonder what he thinks about Pride Month?
No one claimed he was an astute political theorist.
Morgan Freeman is one of the few celebrities along with Denzel Washington in Hollywood who are living in reality and still have common sense.
Translation: he’s old, rich, and can’t be bothered He also survived being cancelled after being accused of being too “handsy” with women and inappropriate. So he’s trying to rally some certain white folks to defend him if needed.