Why the Tulsa Massacre Anniversary Matters for Canadians

I'm thinking that the readers of this blog are not generally part of the demographic which enthuses over superhero movies and television series, but I could be wrong. If I am you know all about the Watchmen series which has a Black, female lead played by Regina King, who won an Emmy for her role. 

 The series focuses on events surrounding racist violence in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 2019. A white supremacist group called the Seventh Kavalry has taken up arms against the Tulsa Police Department because of perceived racial injustices, causing the police to conceal their identities with masks to prevent the Seventh Kavalry from targeting them in their homes. It is "Sister Night" (King) who responds in a superhero-y, crime-fighting manner.

The first episode takes viewers back to the historical massacre in a prosperous Black district in Tulsa in 1921. On May 31st and June 1st, a White mob, sanctioned by officials, invaded the streets of what was called Black Wall Street, burning businesses and homes, killing anywhere from 75 to 300 people, injuring hundreds of others. It was one of the worst incidents of racist violence in American history, yet little was known about it until recent years. 

Yesterday President Joe Biden Biden proclaimed a "Day of Remembrance: 100 Years After The 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre" and called on Americans to "reflect on the deep roots of racial terror in our Nation and recommit to the work of rooting out systemic racism across our country."

Biden is traveling to Tulsa today to tour a cultural centre and meet with surviving members of the community. He will deliver remarks to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the massacre. Today also begins the exhumation of bodies of those hastily buried after their murders. 

Why would we note this event in Canada? Sadly, we have our own history of racism, including violence, directed against Black people which the Black Lives Matter movement has brought to the fore. And in recent days we've had our grim reminder of the racist, genocidal deaths of Indigenous children who were part of the Residential School system in this country, a system largely run by Christian denominations. And there are regular incidents of marginalization and violence directed toward Indigenous people, Black people, and People of Colour, in 2021. 

For so many of us who are White, including Christians, there is the temptation to say "but I didn't know" or "but that happened a long time ago."  Can we really claim ignorance as an excuse, knowing that the subjugation of other people allowed for the prosperity and societal dominance we still have today?  To minimize or deny this is a sin. 

Proclamations, apologies, and flags at half mast can be meaningful gestures, but only if there are corresponding shifts in attitudes and actions. Racism and injustice still exist and White Supremacy does as well.

Christians are called to repent and to turn in a new direction, in our personal lives and in our institutional commitment to justice.