Opinion: Be better, Idaho. Show you value creating a fair and equitable society for all

For those of us who are Black citizens of the United States, George Floyd’s murder was yet another reminder that Black lives don’t really matter to some Americans. For those of us who are white, it was a moment of reckoning — would we finally acknowledge that race problems in America are more severe than many of us have been willing to admit, or would we double down on our support for systems that privilege and protect whiteness? Where does Idaho stand on this question?

Two of us are writing this guest opinion. One of us is a Black man who grew up in Ohio and has experienced firsthand the ugliness of discrimination and prejudice. One of us is a white man who grew up in Idaho — who once thought the same way many of you do about race, that white dominance of every aspect of society isn’t ever questioned, who never considered the advantages in life that accrue from simply being born white. We are colleagues at a community college in Ohio that is currently having transformative conversations about diversity, equity and inclusion. Together, we would like to share our deep concerns about some things we are seeing right now across America, especially in Idaho.

Many in this country, and particularly this state, expressed unqualified support for a president who avidly started the birther movement, pushed to prosecute the Central Park Five even after they were proven innocent, mistreated Black and other minority tenants of his apartments and properties many years ago, and told congresswomen of color to go back to their own countries. These are just a few of his racist dog whistles that magnified racial divides in our country.

One of his chief advisers was an avowed white nationalist. While continually maintaining that he was not a racist, he supported keeping Confederate monuments and opposed renaming bases named after Confederate generals — people who committed treason and fought to keep the ancestors of your Black friends and neighbors slaves. It is worth noting that many of these monuments were erected in the 20th century to intimidate Black citizens and to let them know their place.

When racist groups such as the KKK, the Boogaloo Boys, Three Percenters, Oath Keepers and Proud Boys considered that president racist, that should have been enough for all of us.

He also signed an executive order banning diversity training at government offices. To quote author Dr. Ibram Kendi, “To say that anti-racist training is un-American is to say that racism is American.” In doing so, he launched a war on any conversation in education that doesn’t acknowledge the primacy of white viewpoints and avoid making whites uncomfortable about historic — and current — inequities and discrimination.

We now watch many Idaho legislators — one of the most vociferous a professor at a church-owned university — continue that war against social justice and diversity education, attempting to pass legislation imposing their white-centric view of society on Idaho’s educational system, even holding educators’ paychecks hostage in their misguided crusade against ideas on race they don’t agree with. And we are deeply troubled that in all the conversations about race being had in the Idaho Legislature there is a complete lack of input or perspective from anyone who isn’t white. White people unilaterally setting the terms for what can and can’t be taught about race is white supremacy at its most blatant.

Be better, Idaho. Choose to be on the right side of history, so that your children and grandchildren can look back with pride that Idaho stood firmly against white supremacy, that Idaho demonstrated that non-white perspectives are important, and that Idaho proclaimed that non-white citizens are included and valued. Show the world that creating a fair and equitable society for all is an ideal you value, that we can acknowledge the wrongs of racism and work together to end them, that the thoughts and feelings — and ultimately lives — of those who are not white matter as much as anyone else in Idaho.