Meeting David Wilson

On Friday night I watched a show on MSNBC about the documentary "Meeting David Wilson", where a Black man traced his ancestors to a plantation in South Carolina (I think), and he went and met the descendant of the family who owned them. His name was also David Wilson. It was a great show about Dave's journey, both physical, mental and emotional. Then they followed the documentary with a Town Hall meeting at Howard University in DC, where they claimed they were going to have an open, honest discussion about race in America. They said that it would be groundbreaking and will start a conversation across the nation.

The first problem I had with it was that one of the first things one of the panelists said was that these discussions were going on every day on Black radio and television, but that was preaching to the choir. He was glad that it was happening in the "mainstream" that night. Except I couldn't watch this show on TV. I was staying on campus at WIU, and they don't get MSNBC. I had to watch it online. Doesn't seem very mainstream. Also, It was on beginning at 8:30 PM Central time. The actual discussion started at 9:30. I had to force myself to stay up for it. Also not very mainstream. Seems to me the only folks that are going to take the effort to watch are folks like me, who are aware of racial issues already.

And then the panel was hand picked, and they all pretty much said the same things we've heard all over. It was safe. Until a Howard Professor in the audience got up and started talking. He spoke the truth, but he didn't get to talk. No one from Howard was asked to be on the panel. He was cut off during his comments. That was unfortunate.

So I was left disappointed. I would like to see the entire documentary (they showed an edited version of it). That was very worthwhile. But let's not have staged "discussions" where nothing uncomfortable is said. It's time we get truly honest and dirty about racial relations in the United States. Until we do, tension will continue to rise, and we're going to have an explosion.