We are deeply upset about the human rights issue of police brutality and racism in the United States. As a family, we wanted to attend local demonstrations and protests in support of Black Lives Matter, but are unable to do so because several members of our family are immunocompromised. Instead, we decided to hold a family demonstration/conversation at home and gathered as a family for several hours to discuss race, racial justice, police violence, and white privilege.
Before we gathered on a Sunday afternoon, we created an outline with topics to discuss, resources to learn from, questions we wanted to ask. We also created a yard sign that says \\\"Black Lives Matter.\\\" When we met together, we followed the outline that was created ahead of time so that we could stay on-topic and learn from the various resources together. This initial conversation was constructive and informative. Three generations of family members were present, each person comes form a different academic/career path, and each person has different life experiences. Because of this, everyone contributed a unique perspective to the conversation that we could all learn from. This is not a one-time project; we plan to continue having planned conversations and taking action together on a regular basis. Our hope for this ongoing family project is that it will create a healthy dialogue, help us learn together, and helps us to create commitments to antiracism together so that we can hold each other accountable.
