Denzel Washington has had an extraordinarily successful career in the entertainment industry, and unlike some others (*cough* Colin Kaepernick *cough*), it’s shifted his views on race away from the narrative the Left promotes, which is that America is filled with oppressors.
I never understood failed NFL quarterback Kaepernick when he said that he was protesting the National Anthem because he didn’t want to “honor a nation that oppresses black people.” It’s awfully nice for an institution of that “oppressive” nation to pay Kaepernick an annual salary equal to greater than what the average U.S. household earns in a lifetime. Of course, he may eventually have to get off his knees to pick up a welfare check given that no team is willing to sign him anymore.
Denzel, meanwhile, is making it clear that when it comes to success and failure, there’s no “system” to blame. After all, what’s more dangerous to the long-term success of your average black American: getting harassed by a racist cop or growing up without a father? While obviously I don’t mean to demean the seriousness of the first, the most pivotal “structural” problems facing blacks in America have nothing to do with racism.
According to Breitbart, “Veteran actor Denzel Washington says his latest role as a dogged defense attorney in Roman J. Israel, Esq. reinforced his belief that black men ‘can’t blame the system’ because we make it ‘easy work’ when it comes to filling America’s prisons.”
Here’s what Washington said: “It starts at the home. It starts at home. It starts with how you raise your children. If a young man doesn’t have a father figure, he’ll go find a father figure. So you know I can’t blame the system. It’s unfortunate that we make such easy work for them.”
Washington even went on to describe his personal history: “I grew up with guys who did decades (in prison), and it had as much to do with their fathers not being in their lives as it did to do with any system Now I was doing just as much as they were, but they went further I just didn’t get caught, but they kept going down that road and then they were in the hands of the system. But it’s about the formative years. You’re not born a criminal.”
This is such great advice, and everyone needs to hear it more often.
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