Emmanuel Acho's series: Uncomfortable conversations with a black man

[TestyTestospherson]

Emmanuel Acho, former NFL linebacker, and current analyst on FOX Sports, has started a series on YouTube called Unconfortable Conversations with a Black Man. I think it would be good to watch and share here. His first video and the second video with actor Matthew McConaughey talk about lots of the things I've seen come up in other threads. A good perspective to hear!

Episode 1:

Episode 2:

 

[TestyTestospherson]

Episode 3:

 

[Ellener]

I'm getting older so I've been through many of the same 'social conversations', usually the first thing which happens when a group in society says 'look at what I'm going through' is a mass denial, I remember all the kids who grew up in Catholic 'care' coming out and if they weren't alleging sexual abuse they were saying the nuns physically beat or intimidated them, and no one wanted to hear that, least of all the Catholic Church. It took 30 years for them to get recognition. When women en masse were saying 'me too' about sexual harrassment ( or worse ) same there, first of all there's denial and all kinds of gung-ho joking and ripping apart their testimony, then when it becomes apparent it's too many to ignore there's 'soft acceptance' and 'I am not an abuser...'. It is progress of sorts, but unless it leads to change and safety it's just another layer of frustration for someone trying to get equality and justice.

'White fragility' or "The simplistic idea that racism is limited to individual intentional acts committed by unkind people is at the root of virtually all white defensiveness on this topic," is what writer Robun DiAngelo says.

DiAngelo recommends reading Layla Saad's book Me and White Supremacy and taking the 21-Day Racial Equity Habit Building Challenge by Eddie Moore. These resources will help start you on what must be an ongoing process of both recognizing how you are complicit within a racist society and interrupting that complicity, says DiAngelo. A momentary interest is not enough.

[alphamale]

african-american's need to stop thinking that sports/athletics are a panacea to all their problems. Go to college, get a degree in accounting, medicine, legal studies, nursing,  or any other STEM field.  chances are they will do much better in life over the long-term vs some washed up college football player who has a incredibly small chance of making the NFL

[Ellener]

3 hours ago, alphamale said:

african-american's need to stop thinking that sports/athletics are a panacea to all their problems. Go to college, get a degree in accounting, medicine, legal studies, nursing,  or any other STEM field.  chances are they will do much better in life over the long-term vs some washed up college football player who has a incredibly small chance of making the NFL

I think you'll find most of the successful sports players do have a good education, whatever their ethnicity. It's one way that Americans pay for college, on a sports scholarship.

[Ruby Slippers]

It looks interesting. I'm always heartened to see any oppressed group rising up and expressing themselves. Interesting times we're living in.

[alphamale]

32 minutes ago, Ellener said:

I think you'll find most of the successful sports players do have a good education, whatever their ethnicity. It's one way that Americans pay for college, on a sports scholarship.

i don't agree with that at all, there is not much you can do with a Basket weaving degree from Texas Tech

[Haydn]

I checked a few sites and they seem pretty qualified to me. No basket weaving in sight. Unless it`s the ancient art of Japanese weaving, that seems highly specialised. 

[TestyTestospherson]

47 minutes ago, alphamale said:

i don't agree with that at all, there is not much you can do with a Basket weaving degree from Texas Tech

If you're referring to Emmanuel Acho, he graduated in 2011 with a bachelors degree in sports management, and a masters degree in sports psychology in 2017, both conferred at the University of Texas at Austin.

He seems to be doing quite a bit with both. I wish I could make beautiful weaved artwork. Kudos to him if on top of succeeding at a career in football, and two higher level education degrees, he also had the time to do with the basket looking thing two of the kids are sitting on in the third video.

[TestyTestospherson]

Shoot, I just realized there's two cool looking basket beanbag things. Where does he find the time?!

[alphamale]

1 minute ago, TestyTestospherson said:

Shoot, I just realized there's two cool looking basket beanbag things. Where does he find the time?!

i don't know

[Ellener]

1 hour ago, alphamale said:

i don't agree with that at all, there is not much you can do with a Basket weaving degree from Texas Tech

that's a stereotype!

But I did look up Texas Tech undergraduate major subjects and as expected they are almost all to do with the main industries here in Texas. 

There's a bachelor of science in wind energy, Lubbock had some of the first experimental wind farms.

[Gaeta]

I have uncomfortable conversations with a black man every day, my boyfriend.

I love him, I embrace his culture, I want to understand him and support him, and even with all my love and my openess I still don't catch it all, and probably will never, fully understand what it is to be black in a Western world. 

There are so many things he has to deal with that have never crossed my mind, like how he had to teach his children if a policeman comes by to not move, not reach for their pocket, not argue, not resist as they could die from it. As a white woman I have never had to worry about that for myself or my children. 

So, if I, with all my love it's not always easy to understand my black man, how is it possible to reconsile hundreds of years of racism between strangers. 

 

[TheStickisback]

16 hours ago, alphamale said:

african-american's need to stop thinking that sports/athletics are a panacea to all their problems. Go to college, get a degree in accounting, medicine, legal studies, nursing,  or any other STEM field.  chances are they will do much better in life over the long-term vs some washed up college football player who has a incredibly small chance of making the NFL

Not all of us think that. 

[alphamale]

4 hours ago, TheStickisback said:

Not all of us think that. 

of course

[TestyTestospherson]

Episode 4: Acho returns to give a response to questions surrounding the themes of the broken black family and lack of black fathers as a contributing factor to success for black people, cultural appropriation, and "reverse racism." 

He speaks to power, privilege, and prejudice and of engendering understanding and empathy in those who do find themselves in the same position as others. He shares an e-mail he receives from the mother of a black son who expresses something beautiful: "strength is not in anger; it's in action."

 

[FMW]

I've watched the entire series so far.  At times it brought me to tears.  The problem is that for others, the emotional reaction is defensiveness and anger.  My own parents and my extended family are those people. It's frustrating and disheartening, I don't have a lot of hope that they and those like them will ever "hear" the message.  But I was inspired to start speaking out again when the family conversations took a turn I couldn't stomach, instead of just getting up and walking away.  It's the least I can do, although honestly experience has taught me it has little effect on particular people.  But that's no excuse to stay silent.   

I agree strongly with the idea of the third show where they talked about the conversations needed to start with children.