I Am Not Your Negro: A Current Day Call To Action

The Oscar-Nominated autobiography, “I Am Not Your Negro” opened this past weekend; the critically acclaimed work honor’s James Baldwin, one of the greatest writers in American history and an outspoken pillar of the civil rights movement.

Director Raoul Peck had this to say about the film:
“I had no choice but to make the movie, an autobiographical sketch of literary icon James Baldwin. It’s not a game, this is the future of the country. The film is a sort of last call, or we’re going down the drain like everybody else – including everyone in power.”

The irony of listening to Baldwin as we go back in time in this film, or while viewing online footage, often feels as if he’s speaking to us today! All that Baldwin has given the world can be applied to what’s going on right now in our country.

In the first 60 seconds of the clip below Baldwin proclaims:

“If any white man in the world says give me liberty or give me death, the entire white world applauds. When a black man says exactly the same thing, he is judged a criminal and treated like one, and everything possible is done to make an example of this bad nigger so there won’t be anymore like him.”

This statement rings true of how many white Americans have labeled the Black Lives Matter movement as a racists and terrorist organization, comparing it to the KKK – although BLM has never had a violent history of murdering, hanging or harming anyone.

Peck believes this movie is for people of all color and says he wants people to understand the “country’s racial backstory” in order for everyone to have an honest conversation. Peck says, “You can’t be innocent anymore, nobody can go out this movie and say they didn’t understand this world. I didn’t understand what America was. I didn’t understand that the American Dream was a myth.”