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Speaker says history rips off young people
By Denise Dick
Youngstown
Jeff Steinberg believes young people are getting ripped off because many of those who were instrumental in the development of the United States aren’t mentioned in history books.
“You know who’s being ripped off the most?” Steinberg, founder of Sojourn to the Past, asked East High School students Monday morning. “Black students, Latino students, Asian students, Indian students ... and women.”
He mentioned Minnijean Brown-Trickey, one of the Little Rock Nine; the Rev. Jimmy Webb, who led a group of protesters in Selma, Ala.; and Denise McNair, 11; and Addie Mae Collins, Carole Robertson and Cynthia Wesley, 14, who were killed in the 1963 bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Ala.
Steinberg’s presentation was part of Nonviolence Week, which started Sunday and continues through Friday.
Events are planned by Mahoning Valley Sojourn to the Past, the Youngstown Area Jewish Federation, city of Youngstown, Youngstown City Schools, Youngstown State University Office of Student Diversity Activities, the Martin Luther King Jr. Planning Committee, the YWCA and Youngstown’s Community Initiative to Reduce Violence.
Sojourn students participate in a seven-day journey to the civil-rights sites in the South where they meet leaders of the civil-rights movement.
Sojourn students initiated the weeklong observation in 2010, prompting city, city schools, Mahoning County and, ultimately, state officials to make the designation.
Steinberg talked about the killings of Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, Tamir Rice and Eric Garner as examples of how racism persists in the U.S.
“No one is born a racist,” he said. “Racism is taught. It can be untaught.”
The speaker also told the students – who were ordered to leave the presentation if they weren’t listening or misbehaved – they are the ones to unteach it.
Steinberg also cautioned about using the “N-word” and calling women and girls “b------ and h---.”
That’s the same hateful language used by those who bombed the church where the four girls died and the people who shot and killed civil-rights workers, he said.
“If you walk out of this room using that language, you’re saying those four little girls didn’t matter,” Steinberg said.
David Jacobson of San Francisco attended Steinberg’s talk. Jacobson’s wife is a childhood friend of Steinberg, and that’s how he got involved. He traveled with Sojourn to the Past last March and met students from Youngstown.
“I was so moved by the experience of meetings the kids from Youngstown,” Jacobson said.
Many of those he met come from poor homes and fractured families, he said. His home is in a relatively affluent area, he said.
As a child, Jacobson moved from a predominantly Jewish neighborhood to one that was primarily black.
“I’ve always thought there was a tremendous amount of potential in especially African-American youth,” he said. “It’s to our advantage that potential be tapped into.”