America’s first feature-length motion picture premiered on this day, February 8, 1915. The film premiered at Clune’s auditorium in Los Angeles, California and was a box office smash. During its unprecedented three hours, it popularized countless filmmaking techniques that remain central to the art today. The film, Birth of a Nation, was produced by DW Griffith, based on Thomas Dixon’s novel, The Clansman. It tells the turbulent story of American history in the 1860s, as it followed the fictional lives of two families from the North and the South. In the film’s climax, the Ku Klux Klan rises up to save the South from the Reconstruction-Era prominence of African-Americans in Southern public life.
Birth of a Nation was one of the most offensive films ever made, because of its explicit racism. The film provides a highly subjective history of the Civil War, Reconstruction and the rise of the Ku Klux Klan. African-Americans are portrayed as brutish, lazy, morally degenerate and dangerous, and played by white actors with blackface. Riots and protests broke out in several Northern cities and the NAACP engaged in a campaign to have the film banned. The film was eventually censored in several cities, but was still seen by millions of people. Although the KKK was suppressed by the government in the 1870s, it was re-founded in December 1915 and spread throughout the North and the South. By 1924, Klan membership was estimated to be as high as three million.₁ Birth of a Nation consequently gave ‘birth to a nation.’
“Don’t forget what I am.
Don’t forget who I am.
I am Black dude.
And don’t forget how I got here.
My ancestors were kidnapped, I don’t even know where the fuck I’m from.
They were put on the bottom of boats.
They sailed across the Atlantic.
Many of them died.
Only the strongest survived.
And once they got here, they beat the humanity out of my people.
They turned us into beasts of burdens.
They made us do their work, and the irony is hundreds of years later, they’re calling us lazy.
We fought in the civil war, we damn near freed ourselves.
Now we are all here.
Four hundred year nightmare.
Took us four hundred years to figure out as a people.
The white people’s weakness the whole time.
Was kneeling during the national anthem.”
-Dave Chappelle
It was 2016, just over 100 hundred years later, Colin Kaepernick was seen on the sideline kneeling while the National Anthem was being performed before an NFL game. Before this time, Kaepernick was labeled as a star quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers. He holds the NFL records for the most rushing yards by a QB in a single game and season. He led his team to the Super Bowl in 2013 where they lost to the Baltimore Ravens by just three points. With his success, Kaepernick used his rising NFL star platform to bring awareness to police brutality and racism against African-Americans. Many fans of the game did not like his form of protest and the act brought so much controversy, it brought not only the attention of Commissioner Roger Goodell, but also President Donald Trump. After that season, Kaepernick’s contract wasn’t renewed and hasn’t taken a NFL snap since. The President took an extreme dislike to the extent of calling Kaepernick and the other athletes who kneeled names, saying they should be fired and shouldn’t even be living in this country if they are to ‘disrespect this country.’
But it wasn’t just Kaepernick and other NFL players who took a knee, other professional athletes in soccer, basketball and others took a knee as well. After the murder of George Floyd in 2020, more protests and riots broke out around the country. More athletes and other entertainers began to speak out on police brutality and the injustices against African-Americans. For us, this isn’t anything new. While the world was shut down from COVID watching George Floyd being murdered by a police officer, it brought unprecedented visibility to the injustices African-Americans have been rioting, protesting and advocating against since having a voice. We can say it began with Negro spirituals such as “Nobody Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen” to Billie Holliday’s “Strange Fruit” in the 1930s. Gospel music artist of the 60s, Mahalia Jackson, used her gospel music heiress throne throughout the civil rights movement, performing alongside Martin Luther King, Jr. and for American presidents. Even though hip hop has been marked as music produced by ‘thugs and criminals,’ it constantly talks about racism and the systemic barriers, from Public Enemy’s “Fight the Power” in the late 80s to Donald Glover’s song, “This is America.” Today, it’s not just hip hop that is trying to ‘fight the power,’ you can now hear it in pop, R&B and even country music. Let’s not also forget all the countless films that share examples of racism in our country, from the movies sharing the lives of Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, to ‘Do the Right Thing’ by Spike Lee, “The Hate You Give” and “If Beale Street Could Talk” just to list a few, in addition to the countless documentaries. Since 2020, streaming platforms such as Netflix and Prime Video created special categories featuring films and documentaries to help bring awareness of not only Black History, but Black Excellence in our community. We’ve seen the power of how entertainment can drive influence and change. But is it enough?
While we, as African-Americans, our influencers, entertainers and allies strive to bring awareness of what needs to change, the government is now trying to censor what can be taught in schools. They fear ‘critical race theory’ (CRT) admonishes all white people for being oppressors while classifying all Black people as hopelessly oppressed victims. These fears have spurred school boards and state legislators all around the country to ban teachings about racism in classrooms. Some parents also worry about their kids learning things in school they do not have the capacity to address.₂ Similar to how I struggle helping my kid with math. I was so good at math in school, but now I can’t remember anything my daughter brings to me for help. Our future, not just the future of our Black youth, but all youth, are at risk of being prevented from understanding what makes this country who we are today. Even more seriously, I am a Black man who is a step-father to three non-Black children. Conversations about what happened to George Floyd, the protests and the things being heard at school over the last two years have been not only uncomfortable, but enlightening. I’m amazed how much my children don’t know what I feel they should know to navigate this world and how unprepared I am in sharing with them about Black History other than my own experiences. I can share with them how I feel, but am I doing more harm than good sharing my feelings, which could possibly not always be positive nor accurate? On the Daily Show, comedian DL Hughely said while interviewing guests, “Slaves weren’t allowed to read and now it’s becoming illegal for our youth to read about enslaved people.” CRT is being grossly misrepresented in the public eye, which is probably one of the main reasons why it was only being taught and mainly purposed for college graduate courses and law school. CRT is the study of the racism that is embedded in our US social institutions such as the criminal justice system, the housing and labor markets and healthcare and not white people as individuals or even entire groups of people. However, many Americans are not able to separate their individual identity from institutions that govern us. What that says to me is that they perceive themselves as the system and are unwilling to remove the blind spot obscuring the fact that America is still not great for everyone. Birth of a Nation was seen by millions of people around the country and the harm it has inflicted on African-Americans, particularly African-American men, has yet to be lifted 108 years later. This advocacy for ‘censorship’ of our past is attempting to forget the transgressions and move on believing either the systemic barriers can be resolved without looking at our past or believing that these barriers don’t exist. We live in a land that ‘celebrates’ Martin Luther King, Jr. and ‘acknowledges’ February as Black History Month, so I struggle to understand this hypocrisy of celebration and recognition while attempting to censor the purpose behind it all.
So, while our life experiences in this country are trying to be silenced and we are being continually oppressed in the systems, the media is trying to advocate the injustices louder. We have seen how entertainment can bring influence to society. Following the predecessors of past entertainment, including Birth of a Nation, music, film, athletes and influencers of today have brought awareness to racial injustices in our country, and even more significantly in the last two years. Entertainment award shows, such as the Grammys and Oscars have allowed celebrities to use their platform to advocate for change, while seeing the entertainment industry grow more and more diverse, particularly the LGTBQ+ community. Film and music are a stark contrast from the 1915 film, trying to change the narrative and pushing to make significant strides for change.
The main question we should be asking ourselves is who do we want to best educate our youth, our future, on not only how this country truly came to be, but how to communicate and connect with others that don’t look like them? How would you tell your white child why their classmate was treated differently than they were, ask questions about offensive language or references, or worse, your child comes home using racist and offensive language? How would you respond? Whether you’d believe it or not, your children are not much different from when you were their age and are still hearing similar offensive language that you heard, or possibly even used. If you’re not prepared to address it, who is? Who would you like them to address it with? Wouldn’t it make sense to prepare our teachers properly to have these conversations? The teachers who are paid to prepare our students for the future? We are in a very interesting time where I am seeing our country more divided than I have ever witnessed and banning CRT, or any type of ethnic studies from our schools, only pulls us further apart. Later in the segment of the Daily Show with DL Hughley, he goes on to say that while white people disagree with the actions of the KKK and white supremacy, they are not opposed to the outcome. If we are not willing to teach our full past so students have an understanding of the community growing around them, we could potentially experience a new birth of a nation; a nation that reverses the progress we have made causing greater pain and prove that America wants a superior race. To avoid this ‘rebirth,’ I ask, who do we want educating our students about our growing multicultural nation? Someone like me, concerned, frustrated and motivated to bring change, our entertainers, whose influence is stronger than our own government at times, you, who often has no idea how, or our school system, supposedly purposed to build our future? By eliminating the latter, we should be very concerned who will organically move to that position.
₁“The Birth of A Nation” opens, glorifying the KKK. History.com editors. Link. A&E Television Networks. Published 2/9/2010
₂ “Why are States Banning Critical Race Theory?” Rashawn Ray and Alexander Gibbons. Link. November 2021