Bakersfield College held a webinar on Sept. 22 about a recent article wrote by Justin Worland, a writer of the Time Magazine, about the systematic racism. He was interviewed by Dr. Oliver Rosales. They were introduced by BC’s president Sonya Christian.
“Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced,” Christian said.
President Christian assured that through Worland’s writing, we could better acknowledge the inequality that Black people face. For example, some federal mortgage programs that prohibited African American residents from borrowing money to buy homes, as well as many more examples of systematic racism.
According to Worland, systematic racism is when Black people are excluded systematically. No matter how the exclusion was; any kind of systematic exclusion towards Black people is systematic racism.
Worland said that some examples of systematic racism today could be found in Social Security. Although it is not illegal for Black people to buy or sell homes, some Federal Administrations are more likely to force a Black person to put a lower price in their homes because of their race.
Black Americans are most likely to be unemployed. He said that for several decades, there have been several conversations about the topic and that it is important to keep those conversations to have a better comprehension of the situations they face.
The massive unemployment that has been experienced for the last years has been affecting the Black community for the same reason. Worland showed discontent with the United States President, Donald Trump, for not trying to eradicate racism.
Worland said that the people who are extremists want to divide instead of unifying for the same fight, which is against systematic racism.
“If we come together, we are stronger together,” said Justin Worland.
The case of George Floyd was mentioned. Floyd was a Black man who was killed by a police officer on May 25. According to Worland and Rosales, the video that showed George Floyd’s death was horrible, and to tell the story is always hard to do.
“Defund the police means to transfer the funds to other causes,” Worland said.
According to Worland, white people can help the fight against racism by identifying the problem, discussing it, and introducing the topic to schools and debates so people would be more aware of what systematic racism is and how harmful is.
The webinar ended with Worland talking about his new article. The article is going to be about the funds that California is using to control the pollution. His article will be mostly reflected in Fresno.