Optimistic colorblindness

I’ve always been flabbergasted by how black history in the eyes of mainstream media outlets and advertising ends at Malcolm X.

Initially I was willing to give the benefit of the doubt to writers of history books; after all, if it were easy to update textbooks with information as recent as two decades ago, production costs would surely be cheaper, and as we college students are well aware, this isn’t the case.

I’ve heard the argument that teaching black history during Black History Month is now irrelevant; that the first black president marks the complete and irreparable demise of American racism and inequality forever and ever. So why bother to differentiate black people from everyone else for an entire month? “Don’t we all bleed red?”

This is indeed an optimistic perspective, but if colorblindness is the new American way, why do white people operate an overwhelming majority of media outlets, often projecting such singular, homogenized views of our society?

The media have a hand in shaping us as a people. A nation that’s dared to boast of itself as a Land of Opportunity, there’s something to be said about our inequity of media representation for every culture.