-
...ahead of you. You're developing a new consciousness.
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You're just starting to see how we as people of colour feel,
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getting to find out a little bit of our reality.
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It's gonna be a long process to really really fully understand it.
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[Roberto] Stretch out your arms
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and take hold of the cloth that covers you
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with both hands
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the cure for the pain
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is in the pain
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good and bad are mixed
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if you do not have both
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you don't belong with us
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I really worked to keep my expectations out comin' up here.
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And one I couldn't keep out was, um, fear.
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Because I represent, uh, the oppressor.
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I am the oppressor.
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But I really see my responsibility
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and the Euro-American responsibility
-
to get together with our brothers, and talk.
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Come clean on what we've done, and what we've participated in,
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and what our ancestors have participated in.
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Put a stop to it.
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And one of the things that I really appreciate from all of you is tolerance
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[voice cracking]
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because we haven't given you much.
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And it really felt good that uh I wasn't treated by you the way we have treated you.
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And I thank you.
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As I look around the room, I have a lot of beautiful memories of each one of you.
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Particularly what sticks out at this moment for me
-
is Yutaka and I being belly to belly last night,
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and talking, we sort of had a little world just within the two of us.
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[Yutaka] I saw the genetic link that we had between each other that was just so amazing.
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And as I was looking into him, you were talking about seeing me, but I was seeing you,
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I was seeing a version of myself.
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[Roberto] And I could see myself inside him.
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That was a younger me standing in front of me.
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[Loren] I know when I got here Friday,
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I found myself, would people would arrive, I was sizing them up,
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y'know, I was already trying to decide who was my friend, who was my enemy.
-
I found out that you can really express your opinions with people who are different than you,
-
without it leading to any kind of violence.
-
Over this weekend, it was really important for me to see people express their anger against racism,
-
because it's something that is very hard for me to do.
-
I was raised, acculturated, to not express that kind of anger when I'm mistreated,
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and to take it silently.
-
And I have always wanted to express it because when I keep it inside, I feel that it's killing me,
-
as it has, I believe, killed my father.
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Hearing something, and being the nice Japanese man, and just sort of bowing my head,
-
and not wanting to create any waves or not wanting to uh, disturb people,
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or not wanting to offend people,
-
and, as I get older I'm not longer willing to do that anymore,
-
it's just not acceptable.
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Y'know, a lot of these guys I may never see again,
-
but um, they got a good, they got a special place inside here, everybody.
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And if they ever need an ally, they got one.
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If somebody makes a remark about a Latino,
-
Roberto's face will be there.
-
Hughs face will be there.
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And I won't be able to put up with it.
-
If I were facing a white audience, and they were asking me what I wanted from them,
-
I would say justice.
-
Because I cannot love you until you give me justice.
-
First.
-
I think I will see change in individuals,
-
I saw that here with the white men, that there was change for them.
-
I don't think I'm gonna see much change on a societal level or institutional level in my lifetime.
-
And that makes me very sad to think that.
-
What I can hold onto are the individuals that I know are changing.
-
And I know David will go away and he will educate his daughters.
-
I know he'll do that, and the people around him.
-
And that's what I have to hold onto.
-
I really am appreciative that I was here [voice cracking] um...
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You will have an impact on me
-
throughout the remainder of my life.
-
And I will be your ally
-
and do all I can
-
to stop racism wherever I encounter it.
-
He'll fight, and he'll struggle, and he'll intervene on my behalf, um,
-
and I think that it'll wear off.
-
That his ability to struggle against racism will wear off
-
unless he has other white men with him.
-
Unless he has other white people with him
-
sayin' "keep going".
-
If David or people like David are going to depend on people of colour
-
to keep him goin' against racism, it won't change.
-
Racism won't change.
-
I think we have a beautiful world that is in great danger,
-
I know we have a beautiful world,
-
and I know that it's in great danger.
-
And I can't think of aything I'd rather do with my life
-
than to see this great, um, project of human life and of life in general on this planet,
-
persist and go on and I'd like to leave a healthy and beautiful world for my son and any generations that come after him.
-
Well, if I could talk to my father,
-
I'd say, "be brave, be proud, and do what you believe is right, and study,
-
always study, never stop studying."
-
I think what one of the first thoughts for me
-
was that I think I really wanted something for my father to see,
-
because he thought that white people wouldn't listen,
-
or come to see or get really angry if they saw a film on racism.
-
Besides that, I think he also
-
has indoctrinated me for years that people of colour and whites can't get along,
-
there's no way that's going to happen on this earth,
-
it's gonna keep going on and on and on.
-
David, I liked it perfectly when you said, you know, about you like the anger,
-
I mean, it was needed, and it was honest, and it was appropriate, the word you used,
-
but that we do need to get that anger out,
-
because underneath all that anger is all that hurt
-
that has never been allowed to come out for us,
-
and then on the other end
-
is I think what we all saw with David and Gordon also saw was the end of it, was the possibility
-
to get along,
-
if we could just be heard and acknowledged.
-
I remember on Saturday evening I just broke down and I cried on Hughs shoulder,
-
because I told him that I think that I could rest now after this film.
-
That I could say that I left something for my son.
-
And I know that he's gonna go out into the world,
-
to see what I had to see,
-
I wanted to know, to let him know that I, that I was with him in some way,
-
but I wanted the world to be different for him.
-
I wanted him to know that he wasn't crazy.
-
And then I shared with you, David,
-
that I wanted my child to meet your children someday,
-
on an equal basis.
-
And I want that.
-
I will remember every one of you for the rest of my life.
-
I mean, I, some of you I've known,
-
but never quite in this way,
-
and for the rest of your lives, you too have this film
-
for your children and your partners.
-
And Victor, you did your people proud.
-
Each of you did that.
-
Your fathers, your grandfathers, grandmothers.
-
You did it for them,
-
and for that, from the deepest part of my heart, I want to thank each of you.
-
[all singing] may the work that I done speak for me
-
may the work that I done speak for me
-
and if I fall short of my goal
-
someone else come take a hold
-
may the work that I done speak for me.
-
may the truth that I told speak for me
-
may the work that I done speak for me
-
and if I fall short of my goal,
-
someone else come take a hold
-
may the work that I done speak for me.
-
may the truth that I told speak for me
-
may the truth that I told speak for me
-
and if I fall short of my goal,
-
someone else come take a hold
-
may the truth that I told speak for me
-
may the love that I shared speak for me...