Jack, sign the petition: We must destroy state-led efforts to ban Black history.

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I was an adult before I learned of the Black history of Memorial Day, the enslaved people who didn't know they were rightfully free until Juneteenth, or even Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Rosa Parks' radical leanings.

The whitewashing of history, presenting only white people as heroes and Black dissenters as meek and lacking agency, is every bit as intentional as forbidding enslaved people to read. An informed and maligned people will rise up, demand more, and buck against the institutions that oppress them.

Luckily, I had educators inside and outside the classroom who gave me supplemental materials to shape my identity as a Black child in America. Now, just after a Black president, increased pressure on the police state from Black people, and the mainstreaming of white supremacy, these materials are being outlawed in schools and libraries. The motive to quell Black dissent and criminalize Black dissenters and their allies could not be clearer, and our call to action could not be more urgent.

Sign the petition: Black history is American history and must not be erased.

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Keep fighting,
Irna Landrum, Daily Kos

P.S. You can find an earlier email about attacks on Black history and proposed legislation to address them below:

Jack, sign the petition to Congress: Push back against state attempts to ban Black history.

SIGN THE PETITION
While the news of Tyre Nichols' senseless murder is spurring new demands for reform and police accountability, racist GOP Governor Ron DeSantis has blocked the College Board from testing a pilot of the Advanced Placement African American Studies curriculum in the state. DeSantis claims that the program’s intent to raise issues like police brutality would merely cast aspersions on police, rather than highlight an historical pattern of abuse that needs to be addressed.

In the coming days, communities in Memphis and more will continue to push to change the violently racist nature of policing institutions across America. There is an established history of this violence and its disparate impact that builds the case for a systemic overhaul. Yet GOP-controlled states will continue to advance discriminatory legislation to erase this country’s biased treatment of Black communities and defend racist institutions that continue to deny that history.

This is a key reason why we must urgently fight to protect Black history.

Sign the petition to Congress: Push back against state attempts to ban Black history.

SIGN THE PETITION
Ben Crump, the attorney for Tyre Nichols' family, has warned DeSantis he may sue the governor for blocking the Black studies AP course, stating, “...our children have to understand, from the beginning, that Black history is American history." Quoting the great Negro educator Carter G. Woodson, known as the father of Black history, he said, that "if a race has no history, if a race has no traditions that are respected and taught to the youth, then that race becomes a negligible thought in the world that can be eliminated from the world.…”

In 2021, Rep. Jamaal Bowman introduced the African American History Act. The bill would invest $10 million over 5 years in African American history education programs that are voluntarily available for students, parents, and educators. Renewed attempts to block Black history education means that Congress must renew efforts to pass legislation that gives parents, teachers, and students the resources they need to continue to promote African American history. It is a small but important step in the right direction.

Sign the petition to Congress: Push back against state attempts to ban Black history.

SIGN THE PETITION
Keep fighting,
Jayleen Alvarado, Daily Kos