At one point during my childhood, I was 1 of 5 Black students in an entire school. I was also regularly 1 of a few on a school bus.
I lived in a considerably urban area and rode the bus every morning. It made a couple pit stops for transfers before arriving at my school. It seemed like lots of Black students got on and off along the way.
One or 2 of them sat in random spots near the front. All the rest sat in the back. I was among them only because I was back there trying to hide. I hadn’t yet learned about Rosa Parks. Once I had, it changed how I felt about their preferred seating arrangement.
These students weren’t forced to sit back there. They had full reign of the bus. And here was this tale of an older Black lady who was willing to be arrested because she was too tired and weary to care about the law. A foolish law at that.
Because of her skin color, Parks had to sit in the rear until one day…she just didn’t.
Black people actually died fighting for equal rights, one of those was being able to pick and choose where to fold your body on a bus ride.
It made me wonder if these students were unaware, didn’t care, or just conditioned to fall back. |THIS.
[By Mr. Joe Walker]
BLACK is a 9-chapter series that deals with race, social perspective, and inclusion. Each entry is based on real life events.
