Text Submission

1. How is my story a part of American history?
This country was built for white people. Specifically land owning white men. If you didn’t fit that description, you were and still are pushed down. As a white person, it is my job to acknowledge what my ancestors did to the black and indigenous people in this country, be aware of the present white supremacy in this country, and, most importantly, be anti-racist.

2. In creating the Declaration of Independence, what mattered?
What mattered to the white land owning men who wrote our constitution was making sure that white land owning men were on top. They were the only ones allowed to vote, and white people were the only ones who could really walk free in this country. To paraphrase George Orwell, they essentially wrote that all men were equal, but some men were more equal than others.

3. How can we hold this history as a predicament versus an affirming myth?
An affirming myth ignores the plight of people of color in this country. It ignores their history in order to make white people feel more comfortable with the past. But ignoring the past doesn’t make it go away, and it doesn’t change what happened.

4. How does an honest reckoning with our past help us move forward together?
If we seriously acknowledge our past, we can see how that past still affects us to the present. We can prevent similar events from happening in the future, and we can properly compensate the descendants of the people whom we have harmed, naming the indigenous population of this country, black people, and other people of color.

Thank you for letting us see this play, I really enjoyed it!