have you ever been on one of those
moving walkways that have airports so
like you know you’re you’re at the
airport so you’re trying to catch your
flight so you’re probably walking pretty
fast you’ve got your suitcase with the
handle pulled up in your book at it and
then you come to this moving walkway
it’s like a conveyor belt for humans
sometime to call them people movers and
now if you step onto that moving walkway
you have the speed of your fast walking
plus the speed of the moving walkway so
it’s more like you’re running with no
additional effort or you could decide
just to stand still and you’d be moving
forward all the same well culture is
like a moving walkway the great conveyor
belt of human history has brought us to
this particular time and place and now
whether we like it or not every one of
our actions our forward motion on that
walkway there’s no such thing as being
unaffected or uninvolved with the moving
walkway of human history everything we
do somehow either embodies or iterates
up from all of the inherited history of
where we live so where do we live
in the 1920s Kansas City was a true
cattle town most of the city’s activity
was centered around the cattle yards
what’s now West Bottoms and downtown but
one man had a dream that would change
all that so JC Nichols bought a pig farm
out in the boonies and built the
country’s first shopping mall intended
for transport by automobile the Country
Club Plaza and once he successfully
lured people to his then quite suburban
shopping district he set about creating
the surrounding residential areas the
Country Club district an area that he
envisioned should be full of mansions
and golf courses and oak trees that
should look like they’ve been there for
hundreds of years
but of course JC Nichols was moving on
this great conveyor belt of human
history just the same so the way he
would go about populating and creating
his idyllic suburbia would be very much
circumscribed by that moving walkway in
the 1920s the idea of the fabled
dangerous black man was fairly new
previously during slavery black folks
had been considered inferior human
beings objects of pity in need of
religion and white folks to uplift them
but if the turn of the century one false
destructive narrative would be exchanged
for another why to disrupt the
organization of white and black labor in
the south especially and to suit the
needs of political parties so at the
turn of the century propaganda flew off
the presses depicting black bodies as
sexually rabid and incredibly violent
this false destructive narrative is the
same narrative that we live with today
and that also impacted JC Nichols it’s
the reason JC Nichols created his
idyllic suburbia as a white haven apart
by way of JC Nichols Kansas City set the
gold standard for racial discrimination
and housing he created these racially
restrictive housing covenants that said
that only white people could buy or sell
in his neighborhoods and language in
these covenants was so tight was so
strong that they became practically
impossible to remove and they became
nationally renowned real estate
developers from all over came to JC
Nichols to ask for template so they
could duplicate his efforts in their
cities so that means if you’re not from
Kansas City this goes for you too and
what was the purpose of all
that it was her that white people could
live in white neighborhoods and I’m
quoting here from an ad could live in
white neighborhoods full of quote
desirable associations and free from
less desirable less white associations
the real estate product made available
to black folks in Kansas City was
extremely different due to legal
discrimination and lending practices
called redlining black folks were forced
to work with illegitimate mortgage
lender or to work with under-the-table
deals to purchase property in the very
few neighborhoods where they were
allowed to do so oftentimes these deals
came with astronomical interest rates
which then led to foreclosure on the
properties they bought after foreclosure
properties would be then returned to
their illegitimate mortgage lenders then
turned over the prices inflated or they
would be turned into rental properties
what then became the black side of town
fell into decay for a variety of reasons
that I want you to pay attention to the
black side of town turned fell into
decay because of a proliferation of
absentee landlords a proliferation of
rental properties because of a system of
property appraisal that explicitly
favors white folks to this day and
because of lack of available jobs and
opportunities for advancement for black
folks in Kansas City because black folks
didn’t have access to the wonderful
vehicle for wealth accumulation by
growing equity in your house in a
property that is growing in property
value whereas white folks and JC Nichols
idyllic suburbia had this great sublime
vehicle many folks living in what is now
Prairie Village in Kansas City the
suburban area had benefited from
subsidized mortgages fees via the GI
Bill and dirt-cheap mortgage
and then benefited from steadily rising
property values they were able to
accumulate all this great wealth and
black folks living in the black side of
town in Kansas City did not have access
to that vehicle for wealth accumulation
and this is the moving walkway on which
we now move forward it was intentionally
put on this trajectory and only with
commensurate intentionality can we
change the trajectory of the human
historical walkway I remember the first
time I started to understand this
history about where I live and where I
grew up it was in an anthropology class
at college and at that moment when I
started to see this moving walkway
started to see this trajectory I decided
I wanted to do something to change it so
I decided I would link up with a local
cinematographer and start to create
videos and podcasts for the purpose of
busting stereotypes of humanizing
difference of contextualizing the
present in this past and I learned a few
lessons along the way that I want to
share with you first I learned that it’s
very hard to make a living doing
documentary and podcast production who
knew
second I learned that Kansas City is way
more racist than I ever could have
imagined I grew up here and I had this
this sort of mythos that oh well we’re
out the south so we can’t be racist or
at least not as racist as them I can’t
tell you how many conversations I’ve had
with black people who said they would
prefer the outright racism of the south
to the veiled Midwest nice racism of
Kansas City what one friend put it to me
this way and he’s from Alabama he said
that there if he as a black man walked
up to a white guy he would know pretty
quickly whether that person was racist
or not but here in Kansas City he said
it was like he meets white people like
myself and he’s like okay this person
racist no no I don’t know this person’s
racist or not and thirdly most
importantly from my work and anti racism
I’ve learned that it will take me the
rest of my life to undo the built-in
bias and inherited racism of history
that lives inside of me and like I said
I’ve been doing this this anti racism
documentary in podcast production for
four or five years now
so there’s many occasions where I’ve
thought man I am just one woke white guy
but without fail something will happen
to remind me that I have so far to go
maybe I’ll be in a room of friends and
I’ll say something egregiously biased
and they will be good enough friends
strong enough friends to call me on my
words or maybe I’ll catch myself maybe
I’ll be walking down the street as a
black man in front of me and I’ll think
man that guy is up to no good when in
reality I have zero indication of what
that person is up to it all it’s crucial
for me to remain humble and teachable
and honest about the fact that I will
never be an expert when it comes to race
and really I think the greatest work
that I will ever achieve is unraveling
my own racism and bias there’s a couple
ways that I try to do that on a regular
basis one I try to get out of my white
bubble I try to make sure that I am
exposed to a variety of types of people
of opinions and perspectives I love
going to spaces where I’m the minority
and to with folks permission in my
auntie’s anti-racism work I hold myself
accountable to people of color in my
life like this talk yesterday I was
meeting with a friend
running through portion of this talk
with him to see like hey does this sound
good to you am i am i off-base here is
it’s wrong what are your thoughts and
then three I listen to people I don’t
doubt the validity of their experience
with oppression and racism and the
fourth thing that I do I want to tell a
little story to illustrate its story
from the very first documentary series
that I ever worked on it was in
partnership with kCPT well so pick the
local PBS station
it’s called your fellow Americans you
can look it up on YouTube everyone
should look it up on YouTube I was
interviewing this the 7 year old black
lady really amazing woman who had
marched in the civil rights movement she
had been jailed when she was pregnant
with her first daughter and then after
integration she had taught white people
how to be a racially
at a local college where she lived in
Nebraska so of course when I interviewed
her I asked her about all those things
and I asked her but had things had
changed over time but the very last
question I asked her was for me as a
white person who wants to be about
creating a more equitable future who
wants to go about the business of
changing the trajectory of this walkway
of history that were on I asked her what
should I do
I knew she was the expert she had done
all this anti-racism work and I’ll never
forget her answer she looked at me and
said I know how to survive racism I’ve
done in my whole life take a look at
what racism is costing you think about
how racism affecting you and your life
experience then you’ll get pissed off
and then you’ll go fix it there’s one
crucial difference between the moving
walkway and an airport and a great
moving walkway of human history the
moving walkway at an airport is powered
by motors machines our moving walkway is
powered by us we have power and agency
to change the trajectory of human
history if we will but take racism
personally thank you
[Applause]
you
moving walkways that have airports so
like you know you’re you’re at the
airport so you’re trying to catch your
flight so you’re probably walking pretty
fast you’ve got your suitcase with the
handle pulled up in your book at it and
then you come to this moving walkway
it’s like a conveyor belt for humans
sometime to call them people movers and
now if you step onto that moving walkway
you have the speed of your fast walking
plus the speed of the moving walkway so
it’s more like you’re running with no
additional effort or you could decide
just to stand still and you’d be moving
forward all the same well culture is
like a moving walkway the great conveyor
belt of human history has brought us to
this particular time and place and now
whether we like it or not every one of
our actions our forward motion on that
walkway there’s no such thing as being
unaffected or uninvolved with the moving
walkway of human history everything we
do somehow either embodies or iterates
up from all of the inherited history of
where we live so where do we live
in the 1920s Kansas City was a true
cattle town most of the city’s activity
was centered around the cattle yards
what’s now West Bottoms and downtown but
one man had a dream that would change
all that so JC Nichols bought a pig farm
out in the boonies and built the
country’s first shopping mall intended
for transport by automobile the Country
Club Plaza and once he successfully
lured people to his then quite suburban
shopping district he set about creating
the surrounding residential areas the
Country Club district an area that he
envisioned should be full of mansions
and golf courses and oak trees that
should look like they’ve been there for
hundreds of years
but of course JC Nichols was moving on
this great conveyor belt of human
history just the same so the way he
would go about populating and creating
his idyllic suburbia would be very much
circumscribed by that moving walkway in
the 1920s the idea of the fabled
dangerous black man was fairly new
previously during slavery black folks
had been considered inferior human
beings objects of pity in need of
religion and white folks to uplift them
but if the turn of the century one false
destructive narrative would be exchanged
for another why to disrupt the
organization of white and black labor in
the south especially and to suit the
needs of political parties so at the
turn of the century propaganda flew off
the presses depicting black bodies as
sexually rabid and incredibly violent
this false destructive narrative is the
same narrative that we live with today
and that also impacted JC Nichols it’s
the reason JC Nichols created his
idyllic suburbia as a white haven apart
by way of JC Nichols Kansas City set the
gold standard for racial discrimination
and housing he created these racially
restrictive housing covenants that said
that only white people could buy or sell
in his neighborhoods and language in
these covenants was so tight was so
strong that they became practically
impossible to remove and they became
nationally renowned real estate
developers from all over came to JC
Nichols to ask for template so they
could duplicate his efforts in their
cities so that means if you’re not from
Kansas City this goes for you too and
what was the purpose of all
that it was her that white people could
live in white neighborhoods and I’m
quoting here from an ad could live in
white neighborhoods full of quote
desirable associations and free from
less desirable less white associations
the real estate product made available
to black folks in Kansas City was
extremely different due to legal
discrimination and lending practices
called redlining black folks were forced
to work with illegitimate mortgage
lender or to work with under-the-table
deals to purchase property in the very
few neighborhoods where they were
allowed to do so oftentimes these deals
came with astronomical interest rates
which then led to foreclosure on the
properties they bought after foreclosure
properties would be then returned to
their illegitimate mortgage lenders then
turned over the prices inflated or they
would be turned into rental properties
what then became the black side of town
fell into decay for a variety of reasons
that I want you to pay attention to the
black side of town turned fell into
decay because of a proliferation of
absentee landlords a proliferation of
rental properties because of a system of
property appraisal that explicitly
favors white folks to this day and
because of lack of available jobs and
opportunities for advancement for black
folks in Kansas City because black folks
didn’t have access to the wonderful
vehicle for wealth accumulation by
growing equity in your house in a
property that is growing in property
value whereas white folks and JC Nichols
idyllic suburbia had this great sublime
vehicle many folks living in what is now
Prairie Village in Kansas City the
suburban area had benefited from
subsidized mortgages fees via the GI
Bill and dirt-cheap mortgage
and then benefited from steadily rising
property values they were able to
accumulate all this great wealth and
black folks living in the black side of
town in Kansas City did not have access
to that vehicle for wealth accumulation
and this is the moving walkway on which
we now move forward it was intentionally
put on this trajectory and only with
commensurate intentionality can we
change the trajectory of the human
historical walkway I remember the first
time I started to understand this
history about where I live and where I
grew up it was in an anthropology class
at college and at that moment when I
started to see this moving walkway
started to see this trajectory I decided
I wanted to do something to change it so
I decided I would link up with a local
cinematographer and start to create
videos and podcasts for the purpose of
busting stereotypes of humanizing
difference of contextualizing the
present in this past and I learned a few
lessons along the way that I want to
share with you first I learned that it’s
very hard to make a living doing
documentary and podcast production who
knew
second I learned that Kansas City is way
more racist than I ever could have
imagined I grew up here and I had this
this sort of mythos that oh well we’re
out the south so we can’t be racist or
at least not as racist as them I can’t
tell you how many conversations I’ve had
with black people who said they would
prefer the outright racism of the south
to the veiled Midwest nice racism of
Kansas City what one friend put it to me
this way and he’s from Alabama he said
that there if he as a black man walked
up to a white guy he would know pretty
quickly whether that person was racist
or not but here in Kansas City he said
it was like he meets white people like
myself and he’s like okay this person
racist no no I don’t know this person’s
racist or not and thirdly most
importantly from my work and anti racism
I’ve learned that it will take me the
rest of my life to undo the built-in
bias and inherited racism of history
that lives inside of me and like I said
I’ve been doing this this anti racism
documentary in podcast production for
four or five years now
so there’s many occasions where I’ve
thought man I am just one woke white guy
but without fail something will happen
to remind me that I have so far to go
maybe I’ll be in a room of friends and
I’ll say something egregiously biased
and they will be good enough friends
strong enough friends to call me on my
words or maybe I’ll catch myself maybe
I’ll be walking down the street as a
black man in front of me and I’ll think
man that guy is up to no good when in
reality I have zero indication of what
that person is up to it all it’s crucial
for me to remain humble and teachable
and honest about the fact that I will
never be an expert when it comes to race
and really I think the greatest work
that I will ever achieve is unraveling
my own racism and bias there’s a couple
ways that I try to do that on a regular
basis one I try to get out of my white
bubble I try to make sure that I am
exposed to a variety of types of people
of opinions and perspectives I love
going to spaces where I’m the minority
and to with folks permission in my
auntie’s anti-racism work I hold myself
accountable to people of color in my
life like this talk yesterday I was
meeting with a friend
running through portion of this talk
with him to see like hey does this sound
good to you am i am i off-base here is
it’s wrong what are your thoughts and
then three I listen to people I don’t
doubt the validity of their experience
with oppression and racism and the
fourth thing that I do I want to tell a
little story to illustrate its story
from the very first documentary series
that I ever worked on it was in
partnership with kCPT well so pick the
local PBS station
it’s called your fellow Americans you
can look it up on YouTube everyone
should look it up on YouTube I was
interviewing this the 7 year old black
lady really amazing woman who had
marched in the civil rights movement she
had been jailed when she was pregnant
with her first daughter and then after
integration she had taught white people
how to be a racially
at a local college where she lived in
Nebraska so of course when I interviewed
her I asked her about all those things
and I asked her but had things had
changed over time but the very last
question I asked her was for me as a
white person who wants to be about
creating a more equitable future who
wants to go about the business of
changing the trajectory of this walkway
of history that were on I asked her what
should I do
I knew she was the expert she had done
all this anti-racism work and I’ll never
forget her answer she looked at me and
said I know how to survive racism I’ve
done in my whole life take a look at
what racism is costing you think about
how racism affecting you and your life
experience then you’ll get pissed off
and then you’ll go fix it there’s one
crucial difference between the moving
walkway and an airport and a great
moving walkway of human history the
moving walkway at an airport is powered
by motors machines our moving walkway is
powered by us we have power and agency
to change the trajectory of human
history if we will but take racism
personally thank you
[Applause]
you
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