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I was on a long road trip this summer,
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and I was having a wonderful time listening
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to the amazing Isabel Wilkerson's "The Warmth of Other Suns."
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It documents six million black folks fleeing the South from 1915 to 1970
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looking for a respite from all the brutality
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and trying to get to a better opportunity up North,
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and it was filled with stories of the resilience and the brilliance
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of African-Americans,
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and it was also really hard to hear all the stories of the horrors
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and the humility, and all the humiliations.
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It was especially hard to hear about the beatings and the burnings
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and the lynchings of black men.
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And I said, "You know, this is a little deep.
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I need a break. I'm going to turn on the radio."
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I turned it on, and there it was:
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Ferguson, Missouri,
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Michael Brown,
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18-year-old black man,
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unarmed, shot by a white police officer, laid on the ground dead,
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blood running for four hours
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while his grandmother and little children and his neighbors watched in horror,
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and I thought,
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here it is again.
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This violence, this brutality against black men
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has been going on for centuries.
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I mean, it's the same story. It's just different names.
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It could have been Amadou Diallo.
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It could have been Sean Bell.
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It could have been Oscar Grant.
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It could have been Trayvon Martin.
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This violence, this brutality,
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is really something that's part of our national psyche.
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It's part of our collective history.
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What are we going to do about it?
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You know that part of us that still crosses the street,
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locks the doors,
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clutches the purses,
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when we see young black men?
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That part.
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I mean, I know we're not shooting people down in the street,
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but I'm saying that the same stereotypes and prejudices
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that fuel those kinds of tragic incidents
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are in us.
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We've been schooled in them as well.
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I believe that we can stop these types of incidents,
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these Fergusons from happening,
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by looking within and being willing to change ourselves.
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So I have a call to action for you.
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There are three things that I want to offer us today to think about
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as ways to stop Ferguson from happening again;
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three things that I think will help us
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reform our images of young black men;
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three things that I'm hoping will not only protect them
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but will open the world so that they can thrive.
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Can you imagine that?
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Can you imagine our country embracing young black men,
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seeing them as part of our future, giving them that kind of openness,
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that kind of grace we give to people we love?
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How much better would our lives be? How much better would our country be?
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Let me just start with number one.
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We gotta get out of denial.
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Stop trying to be good people.
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We need real people.
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You know, I do a lot of diversity work,
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and people will come up to me at the beginning of the workshop.
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They're like, "Oh, Ms. Diversity Lady, we're so glad you're here" --
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(Laughter) --
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"but we don't have a biased bone in our body."
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And I'm like, "Really?
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Because I do this work every day, and I see all my biases."
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I mean, not too long ago, I was on a plane
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and I heard the voice of a woman pilot coming over the P.A. system,
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and I was just so excited, so thrilled.
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I was like, "Yes, women, we are rocking it.
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We are now in the stratosphere."
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It was all good, and then it started getting turbulent and bumpy,
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and I was like,
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"I hope she can drive."
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(Laughter)
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I know. Right.
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But it's not even like I knew that was a bias
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until I was coming back on the other leg and there's always a guy driving
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and it's often turbulent and bumpy,
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and I've never questioned the confidence of the male driver.
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The pilot is good.
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Now, here's the problem.
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If you ask me explicitly, I would say, "Female pilot: awesome."
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But it appears that when things get funky and a little troublesome, a little risky,
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I lean on a bias that I didn't even know that I had.
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You know, fast-moving planes in the sky,
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I want a guy.
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That's my default.
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Men are my default.
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Who is your default?
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Who do you trust?
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Who are you afraid of?
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Who do you implicitly feel connected to?
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Who do you run away from?
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I'm going to tell you what we have learned.
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The implicit association test, which measures unconscious bias,
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you can go online and take it.
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Five million people have taken it.
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Turns out, our default is white. We like white people.
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We prefer white. What do I mean by that?
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When people are shown images of black men and white men,
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we are more quickly able to associate
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that picture with a positive word, that white person with a positive word,
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than we are when we are trying to associate
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positive with a black face, and vice versa.
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When we see a black face,
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it is easier for us to connect black with negative
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than it is white with negative.
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Seventy percent of white people taking that test prefer white.
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Fifty percent of black people taking that test prefer white.
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You see, we were all outside when the contamination came down.
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What do we do about the fact that our brain automatically associates?
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You know, one of the things that you probably are thinking about,
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and you're probably like, you know what,
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I'm just going to double down on my color blindness.
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Yes, I'm going to recommit to that.
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I'm going to suggest to you, no.
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We've gone about as far as we can go trying to make a difference
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trying to not see color.
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The problem was never that we saw color. It was what we did when we saw the color.
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It's a false ideal.
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And while we're busy pretending not to see,
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we are not being aware of the ways in which racial difference
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is changing people's possibilities, that's keeping them from thriving,
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and sometimes it's causing them an early death.
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So in fact, what the scientists are telling us is, no way.
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Don't even think about color blindness.
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In fact, what they're suggesting is,
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stare at awesome black people.
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(Laughter)
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Look at them directly in their faces and memorize them,
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because when we look at awesome folks who are black,
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it helps to dissociate
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the association that happens automatically in our brain.
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Why do you think I'm showing you these beautiful black men behind me?
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There were so many, I had to cut them.
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Okay, so here's the thing:
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I'm trying to reset your automatic associations about who black men are.
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I'm trying to remind you
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that young black men grow up to be amazing human beings
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who have changed our lives and made them better.
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So here's the thing.
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The other possibility in science,
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and it's only temporarily changing our automatic assumptions,
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but one thing we know
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is that if you take a white person who is odious that you know,
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and stick it up next to a person of color,
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a black person, who is fabulous,
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then that sometimes actually causes us to disassociate too.
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So think Jeffrey Dahmer and Colin Powell.
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Just stare at them, right? (Laughter)
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But these are the things. So go looking for your bias.
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Please, please, just get out of denial and go looking for disconfirming data
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that will prove that in fact your old stereotypes are wrong.
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Okay, so that's number one: number two,
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what I'm going to say is move toward young black men instead of away from them.
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It's not the hardest thing to do,
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but it's also one of these things
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where you have to be conscious and intentional about it.
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You know, I was in a Wall Street area one time several years ago
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when I was with a colleague of mine, and she's really wonderful
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and she does diversity work with me and she's a woman of color, she's Korean.
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And we were outside, it was late at night,
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and we were sort of wondering where we were going, we were lost.
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And I saw this person across the street, and I was thinking, "Oh great, black guy."
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I was going toward him without even thinking about it.
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And she was like, "Oh, that's interesting."
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The guy across the street, he was a black guy.
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I think black guys generally know where they're going.
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I don't know why exactly I think that, but that's what I think.
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So she was saying, "Oh, you were going, 'Yay, a black guy'?"
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She said, "I was going, 'Ooh, a black guy.'"
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Other direction. Same need, same guy, same clothes,
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same time, same street, different reaction.
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And she said, "I feel so bad. I'm a diversity consultant.
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I did the black guy thing. I'm a woman of color. Oh my God!"
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And I said, "You know what? Please. We really need to relax about this."
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I mean, you've got to realize I go way back with black guys.
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(Laughter)
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My dad is a black guy. You see what I'm saying?
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I've got a 6'5" black guy son. I was married to a black guy.
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My black guy thing is so wide and so deep
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that I can pretty much sort and figure out who that black guy is,
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and he was my black guy.
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He said, "Yes, ladies, I know where you're going. I'll take you there."
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You know, biases are the stories we make up about people
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before we know who they actually are.
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But how are we going to know who they are
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when we've been told to avoid and be afraid of them?
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So I'm going to tell you to walk toward your discomfort.
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And I'm not asking you to take any crazy risks.
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I'm saying, just do an inventory,
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expand your social and professional circles.
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Who's in your circle?
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Who's missing?
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How many authentic relationships
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do you have with young black people, folks, men, women?
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Or any other major difference from who you are
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and how you roll, so to speak?
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Because, you know what? Just look around your periphery.
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There may be somebody at work, in your classroom,
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in your house of worship, somewhere, there's some black young guy there.
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And you're nice. You say hi.
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I'm saying go deeper, closer, further, and build the kinds of relationships,
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the kinds of friendships that actually cause you to see the holistic person
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and to really go against the stereotypes.
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I know some of you are out there,
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I know because I have some white friends in particular that will say,
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"You have no idea how awkward I am.
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Like, I don't think this is going to work for me.
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I'm sure I'm going to blow this."
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Okay, maybe, but this thing is not about perfection. It's about connection.
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And you're not going to get comfortable before you get uncomfortable.
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I mean, you just have to do it.
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And young black men, what I'm saying is
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if someone comes your way, genuinely and authentically, take the invitation.
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Not everyone is out to get you.
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Go looking for those people who can see your humanity.
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You know, it's the empathy and the compassion
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that comes out of having relationships with people who are different from you.
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Something really powerful and beautiful happens:
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you start to realize that they are you,
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that they are part of you, that they are you in your family,
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and then we cease to be bystanders
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and we become actors, we become advocates,
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and we become allies.
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So go away from your comfort into a bigger, brighter thing,
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because that is how we will stop another Ferguson from happening.
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That's how we create a community
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where everybody, especially young black men, can thrive.
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So this last thing is going to be harder,
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and I know it, but I'm just going to put it out there anyway.
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When we see something, we have to have the courage to say something,
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even to the people we love.
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You know, it's holidays and it's going to be a time
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when we're sitting around the table and having a good time.
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Many of us, anyways, will be in holidays,
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and you've got to listen to the conversations around the table.
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You start to say things like, "Grandma's a bigot."