LeRon Barton is a widely published author on race, mass incarceration and dating. He is 40 years old and African-American.
Key topics on the show are:
- The importance of white people having conversations on race with each other.
- What white people and other people can do to be allies
- When people not in the target group need to speak out against racist or inappropriate comments and when they need to not speak for people of color or members of a group being targeted
- Why too many white people are afraid to have a conversation about race with people different than them
- Times when Black people don’t speak up because they don’t want to be seen as the angry Black person , so they water their comments down
- How Obama had to walk a fine line when showing emotions
- Simma and LeRon disagree about Obama as a president
- Why we need more cross-race conversations about race that discuss solutions and not just talk
- LeRon and Simma disagree about South Carolina. LeRon thinks there is nothing good about South Carolina and Simma says that she spoke at a diversity conference in South Carolina and met great people. Also, South Carolina has had a lot of civil rights activism and you can’t put down everyone in a whole state. Can a whole state be racist? Simma says no.
- Solutions to racist monuments- should they be taken down, put in a museum or destroyed?
- How to handle the dangers of being Black in America today, and in particular being a Black man. LeRon wrote an article- on “Staying Alive While Black.”
- Is stand your ground and open carry only for white people?
