Submitted by League of Women Voters of Tacoma-Pierce County.
Many of the equity issues organizations and policymakers face today have their roots in intentional laws, policies, and practices that were created decades ago, but continue to impact every sector of our society today.
Knowing our history provides insight and a better understanding of why the inequities we see in our organizations, neighborhoods, and communities exist. This knowledge then equips us to address these inequities through our advocacy efforts, decision-making, and resource allocation choices to eliminate structural barriers which continue to negatively impact historically-marginalized people and communities today.
The League of Women Voters, NAACP and Vibrant Schools are offering a public forum on February 17, 7:00 pm, in which facts about Washington State’s history that most of us were never taught, and how these events, laws, policies and practices are connected to disparities across sectors today, will be described.
Presenter Mary Fertakis has studied state histories in six other states as well as Washington and has extensive knowledge on this topic.
Register for the forum at bit.ly/2M0WCqv.
John Arbeeny says
Please define terms “equity” and “inequity” and give examples from history and today. The term “equity” is not the same as “equality” or “opportunity” and has been thrown about by many as a trendy woke term that doesn’t get defined much like “social justice”, “inclusion” and “diversity”. When did The League of Women Voters, NAACP and Vibrant Schools “awake” to this as a issue? When you state “……….disparities across sectors……” please define “disparities” and “sectors”. Clear speaking results in clear understanding. You only use “code words” when you have something to hide.
Scooter says
Sounds interesting..
I am aware of the racist history of the settlers, state residents towards Native American tribes, Chinese, Japanese, Mexican, Blacks, etc.
Tacoma running the Chinese out of town was ghastly. Puyallup’s Ezra Meeker at least stated he agreed that those there illegally should be deported.
I am interested in hearing about the round up of Germans in 1917-18 ( my Grandfather was housed where Seattle’s Jefferson Golf Club is situated today, not far from where I attended school.
I want to hear how the Italians in the state had all their boats confiscated before the Japanese were interred in 1942.
The Italian descendants were not removed from their homes but the Italian fishing fleet was decimated and allowed Scandinavians to gain majority of fishing in the NW..
Many of the males could not find well paying jobs, they depended on their children to help support them.
Now I am wondering if there is going to be discussion of how the different tribes were prejudice/racist towards other tribes, even to the point some tribes refused to acknowledgement of the key tribe in Seattle and of their tribal land boundaries!
If the Racism is viewed as White Privilege issue/problem, please no!
Racism in my life lessons comes from all races as a white male growing up in predominantly black/asian region in Seattle taught me this first hand!
John Arbeeny says
The entire concept of racially based “allocation of assets” is itself a horrible racist policy that goes against everything this country stands for. It is the systemic institutionalization of tribalism based on race, ethnicity, social strata, etc. where any one group is nothing more than a monolith of faceless individuals, stereotyped by the color of their skin or other group characteristic, as accessed by self appointed “community leaders”.
They claim to have been downtrodden in the past but inexplicably remain that way to the present and are apparently INCAPABLE OF RAISING THEMSELVES WITHOUT THE HELP OF WOKE WHITE PEOPLE! I can’t think of anything more degrading, paternalistic and racist, yet those self appointed “leaders” of that particular tribe (pick a minority) embrace it because it gives them the power to extract their own power from the majority to control the minority while doing nothing to actually redress any real issues. Yet despite all their posturing, things don’t get better; they get worse. Perpetuating race based policies in the 21st Century does nothing to solve the race based policies of the 19th or 20th Centuries.
As a practical matter just how “black” or “Hispanic” or “Native American” or “insert your favorite minority” does one have to be to enjoy the unearned fruits of “equity”? 50%? 25%? 12.5%? Or perhaps like Senator Warren .01%? She took advantage of it! Are you really willing to bring back the racist “qualifications” of the old South of “one drop rule”, “quadroon”, “octoroon” etc.. What makes these any less racist today? Indeed race only matters to racists.