Emmanuel Acho.Photo: Emmanuel Acho/ Instagram
“Was I Black enough?“Emmanuel Acho— a former Philadelphia Eagles linebacker and Fox Sports analyst, who attended a predominantly white prep school in Texas — remembers asking himself as a kid.
Now, the analyst turned activist is reaching out to kids with his young readers' adaptation,Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Boy, which published on Tuesday.
In an interview with PEOPLE, Acho explains how such a book could have saved him from “emotional damage” as a child.
He continues: “They told me that I’m too smart to be Black, so maybe I should act dumber, because I guess to be smart is to make my Blackness void. That’s what I was led to believe.”
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Now a successful author, Acho says thatUncomfortable Conversations with a Black Boyis the next step in his “mission” to help dismantle racism through candid and nonjudgmental dialogue. He explains that it’s imperative to connect with and educate children and their parents in order to prevent racial injustice from continuing.
“I want to send a message to the kids, but also the parents,” Acho explains. “I would say that if you want to change a tree, you would cut down the branches, you may collect the leaves, but if you want to do it best, it’s best you address the root.”
InUncomfortable Conversations with a Black Boy, Acho addresses questions that white friends have been asking him for a long time. Chapters range from “Roll Call: Black or African American?” and “NOOOOOPE!: The N-Word” to “Good Trouble: Fighting for Change”. He also weaves in history and stories from his own life.
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Acho explains that every topic he addresses is “difficult to broach” because it may be a sensitive topic depending on the reader.
“For one [person], interracial relationships is a super heavy, sensitive subject,” he says. “For another reader, systemic racism may be an important thing. It really all depends on the topic. Everything is difficult.”
For Acho, writing about cultural appropriation was the hardest issue to break down for young readers.
“I titled that chapter ‘Cite Your Sources or Drop the Class’ because we all understand that you can borrow someone’s work on a paper in class, but if you don’t cite your sources you’ll get suspended,” he says. “The difficult part isn’t the concept. The difficult part is making the concept digestible.”
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“No one wants to come out if they’re going to get hurt, right? You don’t want to walk outside if there’s a torrential downpour. And so, if it’s a nice, sunny day out you’ll walk outside,” he explains. “I think if you can make these kinds of topics and conversations seem more approachable, then I think people are willing to have them.”
The importance of Acho’s mission became even more heightened during the trial of Derek Chauvin, who wasfound guilty of all charges in the murder of George Floyd, a Black man, on April 20. Watching the trial and hearing the verdict was an emotional experience for Acho — and for many Americans who have been marching and protesting for justice for the police killing of Floyd and other unarmed Black Americans since this summer.
“In all honesty, I was nervous because I was nervous for this country,” Acho says. “If Derek Chauvin would have gotten acquitted we were going to go into a mess — just turmoil and chaos all over again. And then imagine what that would have meant for society.”
“Then, finally I felt relief,” after the verdict, says Acho. “But then I felt guilt for my relief, because I was like, ‘If I am relieved that a man I saw murder someone got charged with murder, what does that mean for this country?’ We were all collectively relieved that Derek Chauvin, who we all saw murder George Floyd, [got charged] with murder.”
“I’m hopeful because I’m choosing to be hopeful,” he says. “I think that this country at least is now aware that we have historically had some major problems that we all need to fix. And now we’re now cognizant of how we’re going to go about fixing them.”
Acho adds: “We have to realize that our children are the ones who are going to be the fixers of these problems. Our youth are the ones who are going to change the future, literally.”
Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Boyis on sale now.
source: people.com
