Learning to Listen #11 - Separate is Never Equal

 This week I read another picture book, called "Separate is Never Equal" by Duncan Tonatiuh. It tells the story of the Mendez family's fight for equal education in America. Their fight in the justice system happened seven years before the Brown v. Board of Education ruling (that ended segregation in schools in America).

A beautiful untold history is unfolding before me. I am ashamed at how racist our surface retelling of the past is - how we tell one story (Brown) to wrap up decades of pain, trying to point to a single moment in time when we can pat ourselves on our backs for the enlightened decisions we make in shaping society.

The truth is so much worse. Before that singular event, we ignore the real life pain and injustices inflicted on real people and cemented in our systems. After that singular event, we ignore the lasting legacies of racist policies and prejudices. More than that, we ignore the complex and long list of experiences and struggles courageous Black, Indigenous, and people of colour endured that paved the way to that singular event.

The Mendez parents had a passion for education and learning. This resonates with me as it was a familiar message I heard from my own parents. And when I think with compassion about the many parents in the past with sharp minds, yearning to gather knowledge and be mentored by passionate educators, desperately hoping their children could be gifted the same thing, I ache. I ache because their faces become real and I despise the hate that unfairly kept this gift from their grasp.

The lines from this book that stood out for me are the ones about the system - the ways of thinking that were so deeply entrenched in White people's minds that they couldn't see the souls behind the eyes of the BIPOC people around them. These lines will stay with me because I am under no illusion Brown v. Board of Education solved the inequities in education...not by a long shot. There is much work still to be done.

"Your children have to go to the Mexican school, " said Mr. Harris. "But why?" asked Mr. Mendez. He was not given an answer other than, "That is how it is done."

"It's not only the building that's a problem - the teachers at the school don't care about our children's education."

"Every time he asked someone to sign the petition, he would get the same answer. "No queremos problemas." "We don't want any problems."

Finally - the text in the storybook from the courthouse scene comes directly from court transcripts, and it's heartbreaking. This is the testimony of the superintendent of schools:

"For what other reasons do you send children to the Mexican school?"

"For their social behavior. They need to learn cleanliness of mind, manner, and dress. They are not learning that at home. They have problems with lice, impetigo, and tuberculosis. They have generally dirty hands, face, neck, and ears."

"How many of the two hundred ninety-two children at the Mexican school are inferior to whites in personal hygiene?"

"At least seventy-five percent."

"In what other respects are they inferior?"

"In their economic outlook, in their clothing, and in their ability to take part in the activities of the school."

"Do you believe that white students are superior to Mexicans in the respects that you have mentioned?"

"Yes."