race relations

Chris Knight's avatar

 

Jesse Jackson passed away today at the age of 84.

I’m not the kind of person who speaks ill of the recently deceased.  That’s something that I learned during my upbringing in rural North Carolina.

But in the case of Jesse Jackson, I am going to make an exception.  Because I believe that there is much to be learned from his life and the choices he made.

Jesse Jackson had been a very good man.  A great man even.  He preached a terrific message to young black people, encouraging them to rise above their circumstances and make something better for themselves.  Jackson was also – I was shocked to discover – VERY vehemently pro-life and spoke often about the evil of abortion.

The original brand Jesse Jackson was a real leader.  Someone who had earned respect from many, many people.

But then Jackson ran for President in the ...

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Chris Knight's avatar

Twice in the past week, during the course of conversation with other individuals the situation with Black Lives Matter came up.  There was a lot that I tried – and failed – to convey, for various reasons.

But as it turns out, I really didn’t have to try, because a mind far better than my own accomplished it with more weight and consideration than I could muster.

I have long been an admirer of Dr. Thomas Sowell.  His is an enormous intellect and our culture is more the better because he has chosen to share it with us for quite awhile now.  And it is this time which, I believe, his words are worth considering more than ever before.  A few days ago on his YouTube channel there was a video posted consisting of various clips of Dr. Sowell discussing the Black Lives Matter movement, along with its intellectual ...

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Chris Knight's avatar

Just one of the reasons why I have not and can not jump on the big bandwagon issue these past several months. There were a LOT of organizations of various sorts that came out with broad statements of support. I knew all along that it was foolish to make a statement about ANY political issue. Due legal process has not run its full course. Many have yielded to the moral outrage of the moment, without weighing whether it was wise.

 

And now this has happened and there is growing backlash against the movement, its leaders, and its “protestors”. From the very beginning it has been borne of anger and that has given way to outright hatred and now the very many incidents of violence, and as we see here attempted murder of two innocent Los Angeles County Sheriff’s deputies. Not just the attempt itself: “activists” and some leaders

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Chris Knight's avatar

The United States Supreme Court is hearing the case today brought before it by Abigail Fisher, who is asserting that because of race-preferential policies at the University of Texas at Austin, she was denied enrollment at because she is white.

I want to put a question out there, because I think it’s more than valid:

If a member of a racial minority can easily become the President of the United States, then what use is there for academic admission or job-hiring practices that are based on racial preference?

Come to think of it, what use is there for the NAACP? I mean, seems like it’s pretty hard to advance much further than the White House. For anybody regardless of ethnicity, for that matter…...

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Chris Knight's avatar

Today I was accused of being a racist.

You need to know that, because that’s been on my mind all evening and that’s what I went in with when I watched Meeting David Wilson, which just premiered on MSNBC. And it would be doing a disservice toward my opinion about this film without disclosing what’s going on in my gray matter this evening, especially in light of the fact that much of Meeting David Wilson takes place here in Reidsville, North Carolina and the surrounding area.

The circumstance in which it happened, it doesn’t matter. Nor does it particularly bother me that I was accused of being a racist. I know better of myself than to let something like that bring me down. When I meet a person for the first time, the color of their skin or their creed or where they’re coming from… that doesn’t matter to ...

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Chris Knight's avatar

Tomorrow night at 9 p.m. EST, MSNBC will broadcast the documentary Meeting David Wilson. It’s a film by David Wilson, a journalist of African descent from New Jersey who spent some time researching his family’s history. In the course of his investigation he traced his lineage to a tobacco plantation in Caswell County, North Carolina. And that led him to an encounter with another David Wilson – this one a white man from Reidsville (where I live) – whose great-great grandfather had owned the great-great grandfather of New Jersey’s David Wilson in the years before the Civil War.

Since posting about it a few days ago I have heard nothing but astounding things about Meeting David Wilson. One person who has seen the film has told me that it is “INCREDIBLY powerful!” Having known Reidsville, North Carolina’s David Wilson for many years, I am certainly looking forward to ...

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Chris Knight's avatar

This coming Friday night, on April 11th, MSNBC will be premiering the new documentary Meeting David Wilson. It was written and directed by David A. Wilson, a black journalist from New Jersey who took time off from his career to research his family’s history. His quest eventually led him to the plantation in Caswell County, North Carolina where his great-great grandfather was once a slave before the Civil War.

And then David A. Wilson of Newark, New Jersey wound up meeting David B. Wilson of nearby Reidsville, whose great-great grandfather had owned David A. Wilson’s ancestor.

The film is already getting rave reviews. I’ll certainly be tuning in because I’ve known Reidsville’s David Wilson for a long time. He owns Short Sugars Drive-In in Reidsville, a place famous across the country for its barbecue (and where we shot the final scene of Forcery a few years ago).

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