On April 23, 1951, in Farmville, Va., 16-year-old Barbara Rose Johns
took a courageous stand against segregation. In doing so, she helped change
a nation and define a family.
Sydney Trent, whose article "Stand and Deliver" appeared in
yesterday's Washington Post Magazine, is Barbara Johns's goddaughter. She
will be online Monday, April 5 at 1 p.m. ET to field questions and comments about the article and the 50th anniversary of the Supreme Court's ruling in Brown v. Board of Education.
Trent is deputy editor of the Magazine.
The transcript follows.
Editor's Note: Washingtonpost.com moderators retain editorial control over Live Online discussions and choose the most relevant questions for guests and hosts; guests and hosts can decline to answer questions.
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Sydney Trent: Hello and thanks for joining me today. Let's get started.
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Washington, D.C.:
I think segregation is unhealthy because it prevents people from getting to know each other as individuals. However, it seems that today we are more than ever segregated, not by law, but by our own devices: Blacks have their neighborhoods; whites theirs; and Hispanics, theirs. So while your godmother, created a positive change in the law, we still have a long way to go integrating as individuals. And it doesn't help when certain blacks and Hispanics want to maintain a separate culture, such as their own language or speech pattern. I am a granddaughter of Italian immigrants, who left their culture behind and adopted the proper English speaking American culture. And I'm sure glad they did, because it gave me opportunities to advance myself and not have a fear of integrating with others. My first playmate as a child was an African-American little girl. Had I stayed in an Italian-American neighborhood, I wouldn't have had the chance to get to know her and her family and see that they were quite like my own, and that skin color was insignificant. So let's intergrate and adopt a common culture.
Sydney Trent: I applaud you for going outside your comfort zone and reaching out to people who aren't like you. It sounds like we have much the same philosophy. I've had the choice of associating only with people like myself, but I don't want to either. I enjoy getting to know people who aren't like me. But I also realize there are not enough people who agree with me on that. How can we learn to empathize with one other if we don't get to know each other?
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Falls Church, Va.:
Mrs. Trent, in your position as Deputy Editor at the post magazine do you ever in counter issues of race. Do you think there are enough educated blacks that have attained your level of success and can be called your peers career wise?
Sydney Trent: There are many very talented black journalists, including here at the Post. We still have some distance to go in diversifying this industry, however.
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Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada:
I grew up in Louisiana and Alabama during the 1950s before moving to Massachusetts during the 1960s. I attended both black segregated schools, public and Roman Catholic, in the South and integrated schools in the North. Conservatives like Thomas Sowell tell us that some all black schools, such as an elite one in Washington, D.C., had superior academic achievement to many white schools before the Brown decision. Do you think that had the Supreme Court, in 1954, ruled that "Separate but Equal," was constitutional so long as black communities had political autonomy over their communities and a fair share of taxes, that the country would have been spared the ordeal of forced racial integration and its consequent disintegration of black controlled institutions such as the elite black schools pre-1954 that Sowell cites? In short, could we have avoided racial confrontations over integration if whites had treated the black community fairer, not interfering with the development of a separate black culture and politics apart from the white community?
Sydney Trent:
Perhaps -- who knows? But then we'd be even more in our separate orbits than we are today. That lack of meaningful contact just helps to perpetuate sterotypes. Is that what we would want.
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Cleveland, Oh.:
With the poor conditions of inner city school around the country would you look favorably on a student who organized a walk out due to the little amounts of money in the schools as apposed to what the nation spends in defence?
Sydney Trent: I would! And when thinking about the lessons Barbara Rose Johns has left us, this immediately came to mine. There are still many schools in this country that are separate and unequal. A passionate response on the part of the students oculd possibly help change that.
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Washington, D.C.:
I grew up in the D.C. public schools. Their was one white girl in my class and the other students made her regret she was there. What can we do to bring more whites into the struggling school districts I grew up in. Why would they when their parents can afford to send them to private schools.
Sydney Trent:
I think magnet schools are one way in which school districts have tried to do that, with mixed success. Not being an education expert, I admit to being somewhat stumped at what would work better. I just wish everyone thought more about the common good.
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Baltimore, Md.:
Looking at a lot of our public schools in large cities, I can't help but notice that there remains an imbalance of resources. Since there is a large concentration of African Americans and other minorities in these disadvantaged schools, this can be viewed as a setback. What are you thoughts on this geographical and economic educational imbalance between urban and suburban schools?
Sydney Trent:
Every child deserves an equal education, and in my mind there's really no way to rationalize providing otherwise. I'm not sure what the solution would be but looking hard at funding formulas to redistribute wealth based on need -- both financial and academic -- might be one way of approaching it.
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Detroit, Mich.:
The argument has been emerging lately that black deserve reparations, not just for slavery but for the inequalities after. What do you think about this and what do you think those reparations should be?
Sydney Trent:
I think affirmative action is a reparation of sorts, and that's why I'm pro affirmative action. Personally I think we should focus on how we can better equalize the playing field now, and spend and rethink toward that goal.
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New Jersey:
It seems that in the civil rights movement, particularly in the school desegregation fight, women and children led the way (Autherine Lucy, Daisy Bates and the Little Rock Nine, the Brown sisters themselves). However, women are rarely remembered as the heroes of the civil rights movement, instead we remember men like Martin Luther King, Thurgood Marshall, Malcolm X. Any insights as to why, if women were so at the forefront of this movement, that the legacy is a male one?
Sydney Trent:
This is an interesting question. My educated guess is that we don't see more women revered in civil rights for the same reasons women don't get the recognition they deserve in many arenas. That reason would be sexism.
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Washington, D.C.:
How can blacks get their kids in college, then keep them there? A lot of the numbers you see when you look at college minority rates are in their freshmen and sophomore years, and never graduate.
Sydney Trent:
We can't do enough to support our children and help them develop a positive sense of their own ability and competence. Much like my cousin Barbara, they need to be able to define themselves and believe in themselves, so they're not as vulnerable to some of society's negative messages.
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Fairfax, Va.:
My daughter has just read Warriors Don't Cry by Melba Beals for 8th grade English. Did your Godmother ever meet with other participants in the desegregation struggle like Melba Beals?
Sydney Trent:
I don't know if she did. In adulthood, she focused on raising her children well, being a public school librarian and helping other blacks move ahead in their lives -- a quiet life but the kind we all should emulate.
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Chantilly, Va.:
Thanks for a great story. Same goes for the story on McKinley High too.
It's a shame in a way that the cases were not consolidated under the Johns name instead of the Brown name. I'm guessing that was the first of the five in alphabetical order. I'm sure things were bad in Topeka, but to take a stand in rural Virginia was exponentially more courageous.
Sydney Trent:
Well, thanks for saying that but the important thing is that the cases made it to the U.S. Supreme Court and that the Court ruled the right way!
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Washington, D.C.:
I just wanted to thank you and the rest of the staff for a great magazine this week. I rarely read the entire thing, but this week was an exception.
Sydney Trent:
Thanks so much for saying that. We would appreciate any feedback you have about the Magazine at any time, not just now -- including criticism!
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Arlington, Va.:
"left their culture behind and adopted the proper English speaking American culture"...an interesting comment. I am speechless as to how to respond, but am offended. Every immigrant does not have to leave their culture behind and language behind to integrate into U.S. society. I can offer myself as an example, I am a (Black) Haitian-American, I speak French, Haitian Kreyol and the "proper English." My first playmates were Irish Americans. Ms. Trent,given the content of your article, I'm disappointed you didn't take Washington, D.C. to task for his/her exclusionary views.
Sydney Trent:
I must have missed something in that question because I agree with you.
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Clinton, Md.:
Do you really buy into the Johns' temper in reference to Barbara as well as Vernon Johns, Sr.? How about your uncle Increase, did you know him well? Your article is
dynamite! JAYNE HOWELL JOHNS
Sydney Trent:
Thanks! And oh yes, I do buy into it, having experienced it myself more than once. They may not want me to write this but all of my grandfather's children have his passion and temper.
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Anonynous:
Women in Civil Rights?: Um, I think more people have heard of Rosa Parks than any man in the civil rights movement other than MLK.
Sydney Trent:
True, but count 'em up. I think there's merit in that reader's question.
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Bethesda, Md.:
Much has been written about the "elite" black schools prior to desegregation. However, those people are, at best, looking at the situation through rose-colored glasses. Back then, most blacks didn't even go to high school, much less to elite schools. The extent to which these schools were "elite" is also arguable. While today's black high school graduation rates could be greatly improved, they're still an enormous improvement over pre-integration days. And while the quality of the education could also be improved, vastly more black kids are at least getting an education than in pre-integration days.
Sydney Trent:
Good point. I certainly agree.
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Washington, D.C.:
I would like to know what your honest opinion is to something that bothered me which was reported several weeks ago in another POST Magazine cover story: a young white "Teach for America" teacher who is openly disrespected by both his pupils and their parents because of his race. This also happens to one of the subjects in the current book "The Working Poor." An experienced teacher works at a D.C. inner-city school and is called a "white bitch" by parents who I feel are just as racist as the good-old-boys of the 1960s. Are these exceptions, or are race relations getting worse?
Sydney Trent:
Well, I think it's clear that race relations are much better than they were in the 1960s but they also have a long ways to go. Some blacks are understandably suspicious of whites based on the way they were treated and the way their relatives were treated -- but it's always racist in my mind to slander an entire group, no less so when blacks are doing it.
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Capital Hights, Md.:
With the exception of maybe Al Sharpton. Who do you consider the black leaders of today, who are willing to make sacrifices for the greater good of the black community?
Sydney Trent:
I really don't have an opinion on that, but consider this: every black parent is a black leader.
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Sydney Trent: I'm sorry I'm out of time here. Thanks so much for joining me today.
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