What February Means to Me
“Seize the opportunity to honor the too-often neglected accomplishments of Black Americans in every area of endeavor throughout our history.” With that quote, President Gerald Ford officially recognized Black History Month in 1976. While African Americans across the country had been celebrating February as Black History Month for years, this was an amazing step forward. Over time, Black History Month has become a time for everyone to reflect on what Black people and Black culture have done for America and the World.
As a child, Black History Month was always a special time. While I learned about Black history year-round from my parents, they always took special care to make Black History Month an educational and enlightening time for my siblings and me. We would watch movies and read books about famous and sometimes obscure Black figures in history. They would enlighten us on ways that Black culture changed our country. This helped create a base for me to gain a unique understanding of Black influence and significance, and by virtue of that, it helped me understand my own significance and importance. It assisted in building my own identity as a young Black boy and aided in making me a proud Black man.
Now, Black History Month feels a bit different. As I’ve gotten older, I view it more as a time of reflection. I am able to appreciate this time in a different light now because of some of the things I've seen and experienced firsthand.
The summer of 2020 was a look into the daily reality of Black Americans across the country. And, hopefully, America has seen that while we as a country have progressed from the times of the Civil Rights Movement, much change is still needed.
Bias and prejudice come in many forms and affect Black people in many different ways. During my life, I have experienced many of them, from constantly being followed in a store by security on baseless suspicions of stealing to being stopped by the police in broad daylight as I jogged around Union’s campus and made to produce identification, simply because I “look like I don’t belong here.”
That’s why I take this time to reflect, but not just on the past. I view this as a time to reflect and examine what I am doing to be the change. I’m not willing to continue to live in fear about dying in an act of police brutality or being assaulted by open White supremacists who fear no retaliation. I’m willing to stand up and fight now because we can’t wait for tomorrow; change starts today. But this change extends past me – we as a generation must fight against hate, bias and prejudice and come together as one, to stand against what is wrong. As former President Barack Obama once said, “Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.”
Andrew Allen, Student Diversity Council President