This excruciating state of affairs, in which one after another a young black male is killed, has to stop. I can think of no better peaceful protest than this: a national moratorium on a white culture trying to remain dominant instead of accepting diversity.
The idea springs from last week’s New Yorker magazine cover: a beautiful black family on “a day at the beach.” The magazine arrived in my home after two black men were shot by police, one in Louisiana, one in Minnesota.
A moratorium is the temporary prohibition of an activity. We need a moratorium on the old, entrenched white culture. For a period of at least a week, ideally a month, all magazine covers, all print advertising would feature only non-white people: blacks, Native Americans, Hispanics, Asians, Arabs and mixed races.
The same would go for TV ads for health, fashion, food and entertainment and all children’s cartoons. Meanwhile, TV news reporters would report only on stories that are of grave concern to people of color.
There is a worldwide precedent for this national form of cleansing and atonement. The Christian religion has its period of Lent, 40 days of trying to grow closer to God through fasting and prayer. Jews observe 10 Days of Awe, a time of intense introspection and repentance before Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. Ramadan is a month in the Muslim calendar devoted to prayers and removing oneself from worldly pleasures.
With a national moratorium on the no-longer-dominant white culture, we can similarly focus on aligning ourselves with American principles of equality and justice. We can mourn our collective failure to educate each generation in those principles.
And maybe we will come out of it steeped enough in our diversity to move forward.
Susan D. Anderson
South Deerfield