In this day and age when many in the media and entertainment industry are quick to call out any alleged incidents of racism by white people, they seem to be more than willing to turn a blind eye to reverse discrimination.
Even worse, they like to encourage it.
The Daily Mail reported the Noël Coward theatre in London’s West End host two nights of the play “Slave Play” exclusively for an all-Black audience.
Playwright Jeremy O Harris told the BBC he was “so excited” for the two nights, July 17 and September 17.
“One of the things we have to remember is that people have to be radically invited into a space to know that they belong there and in most places in the west, poor people and black people have been told that they do not belong inside the theatre,” he said.
O Harris added, “For me, as someone who wants and yearns for black and brown people to be in the theatre, who comes from a working class environment, who wants people who do not make six figures to feel like theatre is a place for them, it is a necessity to radically invite them in with initiatives that say ‘you’re invited’. Specifically you.’
Asked about the idea it was telling white people they were not invited, he countered, “There are a litany of places in our country that are generally only inhabited by white people, and nobody is questioning that, and nobody is saying that by inviting black audiences here you are uninvited.”
“The idea of a Black Out night is to say this is a night that we are specifically inviting black people to fill up the space, to feel safe with a lot of other black people in a place where they often do not feel safe,” he insisted.
Except, if you are only inviting Black people for an “all-Black identifying” audience, you kind of actually are telling white people they are not invited. And there is a difference between a place simply being “inhabited” by a group of people, and saying, “You’re not invited or allowed to be here.”
A website dedicated to the idea of a Black Out night explained, “A BLACK OUT is the purposeful creation of an environment in which an all-Black-identifying audience can experience and discuss an event in the performing arts, film, athletic, and cultural spaces – free from the white gaze.”
Now, private institutions can do what they want. And if they want to have play showings for only Black audiences, fine.
But just imagine if there was a theater in 2024 that said, “We’re only going to invite a white audience.”
The progressive mob would be melting down on social media screaming out racism. And it’s not even just hypothetical. About a year ago, the creator of the “Dilbert” comic strip argued white people should “get the hell away from Black people,” and all hell broke loose — as it should have.
How it helps racial tensions to say it is so threatening or experience-altering just to hypothetically sit next to a white person in a theater is unclear. It only promotes the idea that white people — by their very existence — are scary or threatening. O Harris even promulgated that by suggesting that Black people “often do not feel safe” in theaters because of the presence of white attendees.
You’re not going to solve racial tensions in this country by simultaneously saying it is OK and good for people of color to create their own safe spaces to get away from white people and their “gaze,” while saying it is racist and horrible for white people to do the same. That is only going to fuel the resentment and skepticism towards people of color, and vice versa.
These ideas will only serve to further divide society by encouraging people of different races not to interact because “they” hate you or are a threat to you. And they should be called out in whatever form they appear.