Sixty years ago, Lerone Bennett, Jr., wrote: “There is no Negro problem in America; there has never been a Negro problem in America – the problem of race in America is a white problem.” I’m white, having grown up in the South along the Mississippi River Delta. Mr. Bennett was absolutely right in the mid-1960s, and his judgment is absolutely correct today.
A major improvement to the ingrained, national, Black-white race problem, exemplified by the historical, white subjugation of Black Americans, has to rely on an alternative, powerful approach for more individual, personal responsibility being taken for racial healing by American whites. This view replaces the previous emphasis of engagement generally assumed by public and private institutions, but based on the thick catalogue of individual stories involving both Black and white persons who serve as an inspiration to us all, it is not an exaggeration to accept that individuals, away from the ambit of institutions, can be more effective change-agents for racial healing.
In fact, we probably always realized that ultimately resolution to Black-white racial healing should fall heavily on whites individually – a one-to-one promise that we whites were better than the racial history in America had shown us to be. The correction begins with individual responsibilities for a one-to-one dialogue and relationship, grounded in Black-white potential and realization. A detailed blueprint for the implementation of a major improvement, if not solution, in white behavior for Black-white relations will be set forth in my future distributions and blogs.
For many generations now, we’ve known that if there were a real solution to the Black-white racial problem in this country, it should come, at least in large part, from white folks for no other reason than it had been whites who created the problem in the first place by embracing slavery and Black subjugation and who benefitted from the evil construct. However, it is reasonable to assume that the absence of strong, generalized initiatives from whites for racial healing derives from whites being subject to an axis of filiopietism (excessive veneration of the past, traditions, and ancestors) and damaged heritage that stifled who those whites could be and that kept them locked into a system propelling them to reflect, through themselves, racial ideas, temperament, and treatment that evolved from several lifetimes before them.
While there should be a prima facie recognition of filiopietism’s reality in this context, damaged heritage requires a little more examination. In this respect, damaged heritage is an essential part of American white racism against Blacks and consists of evidence, passed on from generation to generation, of established, prejudicial traditions and customs, sometimes codified into law, and historically combined with not infrequent and gratuitous violence and repression perpetrated by American whites against Black Americans.
In contravention to the axis of filiopietism and damaged heritage, whites have a significant purpose to demonstrate authentic passion for Black personhood, persona, history, and culture. A more detailed description of the authentic passion will be the subject covered in the next distribution and blog of “For Racial Healing”, though it doesn’t depart in a substantial way from what Martin Luther King, Jr., had in mind for his concept of “the weapon of love”. The adoption of authentic passion, as it works and wills the connection between Blacks and whites, can be made much deeper, more fundamental, and instinctual than the axis of filiopietism and damaged heritage.
In turn, authentic passion endows us with the capacity to understand, empathize, heal, love, and co-inhere. Relationships that are founded on authentic passion can rise above principal shortcomings that limit human engagement. Through authentic passion, Black-white relationships can be created and can and will blossom, as Sheila Lorraine Walker and I were able to experience, express, and foster. In this respect, much more about Sheila Walker and me will appear throughout the distributions and blogs to come. In particular, the racial healing created between the two of us – Black and white – will be described in a distribution to come, entitled, “Sheila Lorraine Walker: Lesson in Authentic Passion”.
Being white, I believe it to be presumptuous of me to offer strict and strong advice on actions that victims of racism – Black Americans – should take toward racial healing, except insofar as those steps may impact meaningfully the effectiveness of adherence to the protocol to be prescribed in these distributions and blogs. Nevertheless, I do hope that Black Americans will note in future writings in this space the remarkably generous and constructive efforts that Sheila Walker took to support the seven-year, racially healing relationship that existed between Sheila, a Black woman, and me, which ended upon her death in March, 2021. In response to a request from Sheila’s family, I gave the eulogy at Sheila Walker’s memorial service. I remain close to her family, especially her husband, Ivor Walker.
When so much more has been written and examined about the causes and results of American white racism, especially about white subjugation of Blacks, than on the subject of possible major improvements or solutions to the problem, there has been therefore a formidable inference that little exists to suggest or promise that such an improvement or solution can be applied to the problem. Actually, the inference intimates that there is likely no major improvement or solution at all. I stand in direct opposition to this conclusion. For one thing, Sheila Walker and I experienced meaningful and consequential racial healing, and that success can be duplicated. As one who has read much of my work on this subject asked the question: “How do we translate morality to action? How do we help to create millions of Johnson/Walker friendships?” Further, the acclaimed Black poet and author, Cornelius Eady, responding to my writing on Black-white racial healing, has commented: “(Johnson) has laid the healing tools in our hands, and left instructions. This is how it starts.” The intention of the distributions and blogs is to bring a meaningful improvement or solution proposal and protocol for Black-white racial healing clearly into focus.
It is indeed regrettable that sharp pessimism has prevailed about a major improvement or solution in Black-white relations. A couple of years ago, I participated as the only white person on a panel discussing Black-white status when a fellow panelist, a Black professor, in reaction to my remarks, pulled out a book by a well-known Black writer to define the dangers of so-called positive prospects for resolving racial dissonance in Black-white relations. Judged from the Black perspective, I might also arrive at the same cynicism, for white responses to the situation have been muted in comparison to the problem. While such cynicism may be a logical view for Blacks to take, it is not where the story must end.
As I have searched for fundamental truths and viewpoints on which to lay claim for greater racial healing, I was again struck by the messages of Martin Luther King, Jr., and I wish to underscore the proposition by him that the basis for his proclamations on “the weapon of love” lies in an appreciation that what connects us individually is deeper and more fundamental than what can divide us, a concept consistent with the protocol to be promoted by my distributions and blogs. For example, King felt love to be a dominant force since love can drive out hate. Moreover, hate can also turn to love quickly, driving out residual hate.
The past cannot be prologue. We whites especially can and should do much better; this distribution and blog and the ones to come rely on elements of an approach to be adopted and implemented for the attainment of that goal.