When I began researching my family tree, there was so much of the past, many unanswered questions that I am not sure I will ever uncover the answers to them. While I achieved a lot regarding education and my exposure to things my ancestors never experienced, I realize they were exposed to horrifying treatment and made sacrifices I could never fathom. I do not take my gratitude for granted. Looking back, I realize that my freedom is not free because a huge price was paid by those who came before me, whether they were family or not.
It’s rather sad to witness some who have expressed eliminating the discussion of pivotal historical events that may not have occurred in the most positive light. They believe that people need to get over it and stop discussing it by rewriting more sanitized versions or completely eliminating certain parts of history from history books in school. I have to ask how these individuals who express such self-sensitivity do not think about how much the atrocities that happened to so many oppressed people, whose descendants cannot erase nor forget about their history, must feel. Do these individuals ever embody a sense of compassion to understand the scars people from many oppressed cultures suffered for the sake of the exaltation of a self-chosen few? I liken these discussions to the scene in Poltergeist where the bodies buried underground begin to surface and haunt more people, all because someone decided that what folks don’t know won’t hurt them. But people don’t forget, including the stories about their unsavory historical moments. We must vow to do better and be better.
Juneteenth, short for “June Nineteenth” marks the day when federal troops arrived in Galveston, Texas, in 1865. The troops came to take control of the state and ensure that all enslaved people were set free. The arrival of the federal troops came two and a half years after the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation. Many ask if the physical freedom of those enslaved individuals included emotional and spiritual emancipation too.
Let’s face it, you cannot erase history no matter how much you may try to sanitize it. Even if you choose to ignore it or avoid having a conversation about it, you still can never erase it. No, in our current social climate, we won’t suddenly have a kumbaya moment. If we don’t, however, shed light on healing from the atrocities that occurred in the past, those atrocities may only repeat history in a new and unsanitized way, sooner or later, and probably be far worse than it was in the past. For now, we celebrate with unshakeable resolve.
From Behind the Pen 