Ep 230: Breaking Down Systemic Racism

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Racism is one of the world’s oldest and most complicated topics. With centuries of genocides, segregation, and colonization leading up to the systemic inequalities of the modern day, there’s no easy way to sit kids down and teach them about it all. The intensity and intricacy of the topic means that parents just don’t talk about racism at all–which only leads to more injustice and ignorance in the next generation.

Education is key, but where do we even start? What’s important to cover, and how can we explain the nuances of race relations with kids who are still shaping their ideas about the world?

To help us educate kids, we’re sitting down with David Mura, author of The Stories Whiteness Tells Itself: Racial Myths and Our American Narratives. David is a memoirist, essayist, novelist, poet, critic, playwright and performance artist. As a third generation Japanese American, he’s often written about his own relationship with race, along with American society’s complicated relationship with systemic racial injustice.

In our interview, Daivid is explaining how we can adjust our definition of racism to be more accurate, and why we shouldn’t avoid talking about race. We also discuss how schools can adopt better methods for teaching kids about race, and how we can have conversations about race at home.