“Dad, what is the Clue Clux Clan,” asked my 10-year-old son Bakary as we sat under a shade tree on Saturday in Montgomery, Ala. We were waiting to register for the Southern Poverty Law Center’s 40th anniversary celebration.
“Well, it’s the Ku Klux Klan,” I told him. “Do you remember the old song that goes, “Red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in his sight?" Well, the KKK thinks only white people are precious and they try to hurt people who think differently.”
“Oh, I’m glad it’s not the ‘Clue Clux Clan’ because they don’t have a clue,” he said.
Then he asked a question I wasn’t quite prepared for. “Is it okay if we hate them?”
In different sessions through the day, we heard stories about the KKK and other hate groups.
“I think it’s better to find a way to change them,” I answered.
Isn’t that what Teaching Tolerance is all about? Finding ways to educate and change them.
In an interview during the festivities, a newspaper reporter from the Montgomery Advertiser asked Morris Dees, co-founder of the SPLC, how the Teaching Tolerance program came to be.
“As we kept track of the hate groups and crimes, it became obvious that some of the people committing these crimes were young people who had been drawn into these types of groups,” Dees answered. “The two people who lynched Michael Donald were young people; one was 17. That made me realize that it was certainly helpful to fight hate in court, but that what we really needed to do was teach tolerance and acceptance in the classroom.”
Yes, it’s about finding ways to change hate and hurt into respect, acceptance and appreciation of every human being. That’s why I love being a part of the Teaching Tolerance community. I can read the stories of others and share my own stories about how I, as a teacher, help children become more respectful, accepting, and appreciative as they become readers, writers, mathematicians, scientists, and artists.
During the Teaching Tolerance presentation at the Martin Luther King Legacy Center, TT’s director Maureen Costello talked about the documentary Bullied: A Student, a School and a Case That Made History. The film tells the story of one student’s struggle to stand up against anti-gay bullies at his school. It offers hope to students fighting against that kind of harassment today.
Bakary leaned over to me and whispered, “I’m glad someone is doing this. Lots of kids at my school say, ‘That’s so gay,’ and ‘You’re so gay.’ It gets on my nerves.”
On Sunday morning, before we journeyed back to South Carolina, we went to Sunday school at Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church, the only church at which Martin Luther King Jr. served as a pastor. I wanted to know what Bakary had learned over the weekend.
“I didn’t know there were so many haters,” he said. “But now I know there’s a group of people trying to change hate. And I think I can change it, too. And that’s good.”
Yes, there are. And yes, thankfully, there is. And yes, you can. Thanks Southern Poverty Law Center and Teaching Tolerance.
Barton is an elementary school teacher in South Carolina
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