This Is the Fire: What I Say to My Friends About Racism

“Do what you are told to do in each statement, nothing more, nothing less. Be careful as one wrong answer denotes failure of the test. You have 10 minutes to complete the test. [...] Draw a line around the number or letter of this sentence. In the first circle below, write the last letter of the first word that starts with L. In the space below, draw three circles, one engulfed by another.”

To explain the importance of activism, Lemon shows his nephew the literacy tests that Louisiana used to prevent African Americans from voting in Lemon’s grandmother’s time. The tests circumvented the 15th Amendment by requiring those who could not prove they had a fifth-grade education to answer convoluted questions at a time when literacy rates among people of color were low. The inability to make mistakes and short time limit show how White politicians designed the test to be impossible to pass. While Trushaad now attends an innovative school, the ability for people of color to enjoy any education or political power is only a recent phenomenon. In addition, the discussion on voting rights is on Lemon’s mind because of the contentious 2020 election cycle.

“You’re old enough to know what’s going on, approaching the precipice where you’ll begin to understand. Soon you’ll see the difference between those who preach, those who march, and those who maintain a deferential silence while the bullhorn of racism blares the same foul tropes it’s been sounding for four hundred years. I promise you, Tru, because I love you: I will not stand among the silent. Silence is no longer an option.”

While Lemon can be sarcastic and cynical at times in This Is the Fire, he is sincere throughout his letter to Trushaad, noting their similarities and the importance of family in their lives. As the death of Floyd and others exposes the US to the threat of police brutality that Black people face, Lemon notes, the moment will force Americans to respond, whether through advocacy, activism, or a complicit silence. Lemon recognizes the importance of his own voice as a journalist and tells his nephew that he will fight for change.

“In July 1619, legislative representatives from eleven large New World settlements met in Jamestown, Virginia, to establish the standards and practices that would lay a foundation for the democracy they aspired to build. One month later, at nearby Point Comfort, about two dozen Angolan men and women were offloaded and sold by Portuguese slave traders. Thus the dream of democracy and the nightmare of slavery were born in the same urgent breath, and there was never a time when White people, as a monolith, were comfortable with it. There were always agitators and conscientious objectors; they just couldn’t summon the traction needed to overcome the landed gentry and wealthy industrialists who depended on free labor for their beefy bottom line.”

Lemon juxtaposes the convening of the first Virginia General Assembly with the arrival of enslaved Africans to demonstrate how the egalitarian ideals of American government have always been at odds with its practices. White people were not ignorant of this reality; indeed, abolition movements were always present, and Thomas Jefferson, himself a slaveowner, called slavery a “cruel war against human nature itself” in an early draft of the Declaration of Independence (11). However, business interests depended on free labor and wielded their political power to stifle change. This struggle continues into the present day as activists rally against a system that, while not explicit slavery, works against people of color.

“White brothers and sisters: Pocket that But I’m Not Racist! card. I don’t want to hear about your Black girlfriend in college, or your Black postman to whom you give fruitcake every Christmas, or that Black comp and lit teacher who totally, like, rocked your world. It doesn’t matter if you are racist or not racist or anti-racist; our society is racist. You’re just letting me know how okay you are with that. If you’re still in denial about it, then clearly you’re comfortable with the way things are, and when you tell me you’re not a racist, you’re really telling me, ‘Please, stop talking about racism. Your oppression is harshing my mellow.’”

Lemon occasionally addresses portions of his readership base, such as after discussing the story of Amy Cooper, a White woman who faked distress to the police when a Black birdwatcher told her to leash her dog. When White people receive accusations of racism, they often claim innocence, like Cooper does, and point out positive relationships with Black people. However, this situation is less about whether a White person is a bigot or an anti-racist ally; it’s more about whether they will exploit systemic racism when it’s convenient. Lemon likens this situation to Republicans who thought they could control Donald Trump, chastised critics of his behavior, and “defaulted to racism” when he led America to crisis (27).

“‘If the word integration means anything,’ Baldwin wrote to his nephew, ‘this is what it means: that we, with love, shall force our brothers to see themselves as they are, to cease fleeing from reality and begin to change it. For this is your home, my friend, do not be driven from it… You come from a long line of great poets, some of the greatest poets since Homer. One of them said, ‘The very time I thought I was lost, My dungeon shook and my chains fell off.’’’

Lemon keeps his first, heavily annotated copy of James Baldwin’s The Fire Next Time in his home, and he sees this book as present-day observations of these themes. While Baldwin encourages his nephew to see the greatness in his own lineage—that a Negro spiritual is as worthy of acclaim as the Ancient Greek poet Homer—he also sees the importance of integration exposing White people to their past failings. To Lemon, this requires reconciliation as Black people put aside their “righteous wrath” and Whites learn to understand it without needing direct instruction (31). The hard part is getting people to the table for meaningful conversation. If love cannot bring people of all races together, Lemon notes, then even greater conflict will ensue.

“White supremacists—active and passive, present and past—would like to pretend their credo is ‘Give me liberty or give me death,’ when in fact their abiding doctrine is ‘Give me what I want or I’ll kill you.’ The specificity of their intention could not be more apparent. On the surface, their pragmatic goal was to use Black bodies as machinery for the economy. But there was something deeper, something diabolical, that’s more difficult to explain. What sort of orgy mentality leads ‘normal’ men to engage in a group effort as deranged as the ritualistic torture and murder of Charles Deslondes and the casual acceptance of bloody, rotting heads being displayed on a public throughfare? I ask over and over, Who the hell does that? And who the hell ignores that?”

The Lost Cause narrative and happy-slave stereotypes like Uncle Remus in Song of the South obscure the bloody methods of maintaining order. Southern militias brutally crushed the Gold Coast Uprising of 1811, tortured Black rebels for information on leader Charles Deslondes, butchered and burned him alive, and placed the heads of rebels on pikes as if it were a barbaric fantasy story. Few covered the event besides local historian Charles Gayarré, who mocked the rebels’ limited killings and damage even though their goal of liberation did not require that, and assured readers that Black people will never have a place in southern society. Trump and other conservatives call attempts to educate others of these events unpatriotic, but Lemon feels that ignoring these tragedies makes building a healthy society impossible.

“Whether we admit it or not, the subtle presence of racism and White supremacy plays like that innocuous little ditty on endless repeat up and down every street in every town in the United States of America. Preconceptions and prejudices are so deeply ingrained, they don’t even register, but we feel it. We respond exactly as we’ve been programmed to respond. [...] Watching the children scuffle and romp in the waves on the coast of Africa, I wondered aloud, ‘What would it be like to grow up without that undermining soundtrack in your head?’

‘What would it be like to grow up without air conditioning?’ Mom countered.”

As a child, Lemon endured sexual abuse as well as a “Black box” in which teachers and other adults discredited his academic success. He also notes how the iconic ice cream truck jingle comes from the minstrel song “N***** Love a Watermelon Ha! Ha! Ha!” Such microaggressions can be as traumatizing as overt displays of racism, and while traveling with his mother in Ghana, he pondered whether growing up in a poor but majority-Black country would be healthier. His mother responded sarcastically at first, but after visiting Gold Coast Castle she confided that relating the horrors their family endured in the past to their current privileges is difficult.

“Truth is, there’s darkness beneath the floorboards of Louisiana. Between the layers of lush vegetation, beyond the beautiful idiosyncrasy, there lurks a shadow of shame and regret. I’d always sensed that and assumed it was about me; now I was beginning to see the big picture. As a Black man with White heritage, I embody both the struggle for survival and the hope of reconciliation. This makes me what we all are, each in our own way, each of us the immutable consequence of our own unique journey: American.”

Throughout Chapter 2, Lemon discusses how the state of Louisiana “sticks to you” with not only its sweltering heat but also its carefully crafted machine of systemic racism (33). As he concluded a CNN special about his family’s origins, Lemon learned of his great-grandfather Harry Rivault, a White overseer who appeared to genuinely care for his great-grandmother Catherine Jackson, tried to care for their daughter after she died, and committed suicide out of guilt. Learning this left Lemon with many questions, and he feels that undoing White supremacy will require an opposing reaction of generosity: “Where they were relentlessly cruel, we must be relentlessly kind” (50).

“My journalist brain needled me at night. How? Why? Why? How? In the absence of answers, my mother blamed herself. People who didn’t know Leisa fell into a natural tendency to fill the answer vacuum with cautionary tales (‘You should never go out on the water alone’) or bias-based assumptions (‘Oh, she must have been drinking’). People naturally go there, because the only alternative is the potentially paralyzing realization that we live in a chaotic universe where terrible things sometimes happen to wonderful people for no damn reason. If we’re capable of love, we’re vulnerable to loss, and it’s painful to be reminded of that.”

The death of Lemon’s sister Leisa in an accidental drowning shook the family. His mother blamed herself for suggesting in her last conversation with Leisa that she go fishing, while he wondered if some medical event kept his seemingly invincible sister from swimming away. Later, during a contentious interview, he unconsciously told Stevante Clark about Leisa’s passing, violating the standard that journalists should avoid discussing their personal lives. In addition, as a prominent news anchor, Lemon received condolences from hosts to his political right and mockery from those pundits’ followers. While Leisa was not a victim of police violence or lack of access to medical care, she is a reminder of the connection between death and people of color as well as the ways that strangers twist their lives to suit their narratives.

“‘We love Stephon—I am,’ he snarled at whoever was talking to him offstage, and then he struck a pose for the camera, teeth clenched, lip curled. ‘Don Lemon, say his name, Don Lemon. Say. His. Name.’

The whole thing felt very theatrical and disconcerting. My goal was to end it gracefully before he made himself any more vulnerable.

‘Stevante, listen. You’re in grief…’

He threw his arms wide. ‘He’s not going to say his name!’

‘You’re in grief. I’m sorry for that.’”

Lemon’s interview with Stevante Clark, the brother of a 22-year-old Black man who died because police thought his cell phone looked like a gun, fell apart as Clark expressed “a darker, angrier version” of the grief Lemon was enduring (66). While sympathizing with Stevante’s struggle, Lemon’s response reflected his media training. He remained calm and professional as Stevante fought with an off-screen supporter and bounced between sincere and performative. When Stevante accused CNN and the media of poor treatment, Lemon reminds him that this is his opportunity to speak to an audience. He allows Stevante to vent but not control the interview. Rather than accuse Stevante of something that would exacerbate tensions, Lemon expresses sympathy and ends the interview when it is clearly not working. (Halbrooks, Glenn. “News Interview Tips for Handling a Combative Situation.” The Balance Careers, Updated 23 June 2019, https://www.thebalancecareers.com/news-interview-tips-for-handling-a-combative-situation-2315415. Accessed 23 July 2021).

“Moreover, I question the true purpose and effect of people watching those videos over and over and over again. At what point does desensitization kick in? At what point are we feeding the malevolent proclivities of those who consume with mouth-watering gratification what is, in essence, a snuff film? At what point do we stop staring at these grotesque, dehumanizing images and start taking a hard look at the society that sowed this bitter harvest?”

Footage of Black people enduring police brutality, whether during Bloody Sunday in the 1960s or the George Floyd protests of today, played a key role in convincing citizens—particularly White people—of the need for reform. However, Lemon questions the limits of sharing these violent and disturbing images. White people shouldn’t need this imagery to galvanize into action, and people of color should be able to celebrate a person’s often complicated life, the way Stephon Clark’s sister tries to, rather than make that person a martyr. In addition, a contingent of White supremacists revel in this footage.

“‘When I speak on it, I’m considered an angry Black woman,’ she said. ‘But know this: I am angry.’ [...] ‘I hope you never know the pain of knowing your child is in need of help, and you’re not able to get help,’ said Tamika. ‘I hope you never know the pain of your child being murdered 191 days in a row.’”

Breonna Taylor’s aunt, Tamika Palmer, expressed her frustration with a grand jury’s decision not to prosecute the Louisville, Kentucky police officers responsible for Taylor’s death beyond a property-damage charge. The questionable no-knock warrant, turned-off body cameras, and lack of medical care after the shooting led to 75 days of nonstop demonstrations and the arrest of—and filing of charges against—more than 500 protestors between Taylor’s death on March 13, 2020 and the decision in September 23. Palmer’s statement reflects the perspective of the families of Eric Garner and Jacob Black, who are not surprised at the lack of justice for their loved ones and are numb at the prospects for change. In addition, the Breonna Taylor decision coincided with the 45th anniversary of the Emmett Till decision, in which an all-White jury acquitted the lynch mob responsible for his death.

“‘You have the piss-poor three Ps in this situation,’ said Ben. ‘You have the policy, you have the policing, and you have the prosecution.’”

Speaking about the Breonna Taylor decision, attorney Ben Crump summed up the difficulty of holding the police accountable for how they treat people of color. Most protestors and media focus on the middle P because images of aggressive policing are shocking and attention-grabbing. However, the first P, policy, enables shoddy policing both with overt legislation, like pandering gun-rights laws that put more weapons on the streets, and covert action, like a 1980s CIA program to introduce cheap cocaine into Los Angeles. Policy and policing conspire to make prosecution impossible: Policies like qualified immunity give police vast protections on the job, and an insular police culture protects bad officers.

“Calls for ‘law and order,’ along with the mobilization of troops into cities to quell demonstrations, failed to recognize the difference between ‘order’ and ‘subjugation.’

What does ‘law and order’ look like? People cowering from iron-fisted abuse and a dysfunctional system? No. Law happens when duly elected officials create civil and penal codes that apply to all people equally. Order happens when we all abide by a social contract that respects all people equally.”

Donald Trump saw himself as a champion of law and order, but that phrase has a different meaning for many people of color. Police departments have their roots in slave patrols of the South and prejudiced organizations in the North. Despite efforts to bring military discipline and science to the profession, enduring biases and demanding expectations usually mean that these precincts simply enforce an unjust status quo. Although police officers resist reform, the use of body cameras and community review boards have led to a reduction in crime rates and punitive damage lawsuits in Newark, New Jersey and other cities, and the use of specialized officers can lead to better outcomes than sending someone who may escalate tensions. However, defunding the police will not solve such issues, especially in neighborhoods that face a lot of crime. Only incremental change will bring about a reimagined vision of justice.

“I’m willing to own that. If your heroes are murderers and armed insurrectionists who sought to overthrow the United States government by force and violence, I hereby volunteer for a merciless campaign to defame them. If your values are grounded in White supremacy, yes, let’s erase that. If your children never heard about the German Coast Uprising or Sojourner Truth, if they were taught in school that this country was torn in two—and is now being torn in two again—over some nebulous tenet of ‘states’ rights’ and that neo-Nazis from Michigan display Confederate flags for the sake of ‘Southern Pride,’ then I pray for their indoctrination.” 

The George Floyd protests renewed the debate about monuments to Confederate officers as either municipalities agreed to take them down or protesters did so by force. Standing in front of Mount Rushmore—itself a moment with problematic origins—on the Fourth of July, Trump claimed that activists want to replace American values. Lemon has no problem in accepting this charge. All nations build a mythology to create shared values amongst its citizens. The US has always had a diverse population, but its mythology condones violence against Indigenous and enslaved peoples while minimizing the role of abolition in the Civil War. This selective history gives cover for discriminating policies and keeps the country divided. In addition, both Lemon’s and Trump’s statements touch on critical race theory, a historical perspective that teaches students about the injustices of slavery and how systemic racism can influence public policy.

“As much as she disliked the Mammy stereotype, my mom still loved Gone with the Wind and bristled when it was temporarily removed from HBO Max in June 2020. She felt it was unfair to the Black actors, Hattie McDaniel, the first Black person to win an Oscar, and Butterfly (‘I don’t know nothin’ ’bout birthin’ no babies’) McQueen, who, in Mom’s estimation, stole the whole show. My take on McQueen’s performance is closer to that of Malcolm X, who said, ‘When Butterfly McQueen went into her act, I felt like crawling under the rug.’” 

The Lemons’s love of classic films is at odds with the reality that Black performers often ended up as gross caricatures, like the enslaved housemaid or caregiver who unconditionally supports the White protagonists. Examples include McDaniel’s Mammy, the origin of the stereotype’s name, and food mascot Aunt Jemima, whose fictional role in creating the pancake product line is the same as the homeless woman in Imitation of Life. These stereotypes reflect the prejudices of their White creators rather than the neighbors of Lemon’s youth and deprive Black actors of meaningful opportunities. However, Lemon doesn’t support the removal of these works from the historical canon as they provide a lens into how filmmakers romanticize the South and mistreat Black creatives (Eplett, Layla. “Not Gone with the Wind—The Perpetuation of the Mammy Stereotype.” Scientific American, 30 November 2015, https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/food-matters/not-gone-with-the-wind-the-perpetuation-of-the-mammy-stereotype/. Accessed 23 July 2021) 

“I come from a poor family. I love my family dearly. I’ve seen them become more and more radicalized over the past couple of years. It breaks my heart. I’m seeing people that I grew up with and people that I care for sharing not only White supremacist misinformation, but I’m seeing them become more and more radicalized against African Americans, people of color, and LGBTQ Americans. They’re starting to talk about straight fascist ideals.” 

Jared Yates Sexton, author of American Rule: How a Nation Conquered the World but Failed its People, is a White historian whose studies into Confederate mythology force him to confront his own upbringing in the South and the radicalization of his family members through social media. Throughout the 2016 election and during most of Trump’s presidency, the social media websites Facebook and Twitter rarely moderated Trump’s posts, regardless of truthfulness or potential harm, under the belief that that it was not their role to regulate political content. Their algorithms send similar, eye-catching content to viewers, which meant that Trump supporters received far-right news stories that drew them away from more objective outlets. Facebook and Twitter began banning some Trump’s posts in 2020, as he propagated misinformation about COVID-19 and mail-in voting, and they finally banned him from their platforms after the January 6, 2021, insurrection. Trump launched his own blog afterwards, but its closure within a month demonstrated just how important these networks were to his political career (Dans, Enrique. “What the Failure of Trump’s Blog Tells Us About the Power of Social Networks.” Forbes, 10 June 2021, https://www.forbes.com/sites/enriquedans/2021/06/10/what-the-failure-of-trumps-blog-tells-us-about-the-power-of-socialnetworks/. Accessed 23 July 2021).

“The remainder of my fresh morning energy was consumed with back-and-forth—with Tim, with friends, and inside my own head—over motives, optics, gaslighting, hypersensitivity, and all the possible ways you could deconstruct this incident from various points of view. Because this is what happens when you’re shopping while Black, driving while Black, crossing the street while Black, breathing while Black: A White person reacts in a certain way—or did they? No, no, they rush to assure you, you misunderstood. If you express skepticism—like maybe it isn’t really store policy to follow customers up and down the aisles—you’re chided for being oversensitive.

‘Don’t make it about race,’ we’re told. Because racism is so twentieth century.”

Lemon’s experience at a kitchenware store, where an employee followed and chided him—but not a White woman—for ignoring COVID-19 protocols, reflects how any uncomfortable interaction could carry racist undertones. However, White people, even allies, reflexively bring up other explanations, which can become a kind of gaslighting—a form of manipulation that makes people doubt their own experiences. Lemon compares this relatively minor example to situations in which White people defend police brutality by citing prior records, claiming a potential unrecorded incident, or dodging the question altogether. He likens his mental state to a sprinter who is perpetually on the starting line and must be ready to perform on a moment’s notice. The anxiety almost leaves him wishing for the more overtly racist days of segregation.

“When the principal of the school introduced Dr. King to students as ‘an American Untouchable,’ King was taken aback, stung by the appellation. It felt like an insult in the context of a state visit that included public speaking events and dinner with the prime minister.

But as King reflected on the fire hoses turned on peaceful Black protesters, the water fountains and doorways marked ‘White’ and ‘Colored,’ the struggle involved in exercising fundamental rights to vote, to drive unmolested, to enter a store without suspicion, or to walk down the street without fear, King was forced to conclude, sadly, ‘I am an Untouchable.’”

Isabel Wilkerson’s Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents examines social hierarchies in India, Nazi Germany, and the US. While many Americans would resent the comparison, the anecdote about Dr. Martin Luther King’s journey to India demonstrates how race was as much a deterrent in the land of opportunity as religion and birth in India or Adolf Hitler’s obsession with racial purity. The Third Reich’s Nuremburg Laws also take inspiration from the Jim Crow South and America eugenicists, which is why modern Neo-Nazis readily adopt the Confederate Lost Cause symbology. Ultimately, segregation is a synonym for caste, allowing a society to separate the privileged, the oppressed, and a few classes in between. Wilkerson notes that discussing inequality in terms of caste instead of race is “liberating” because it removes loaded concepts and allows people to examine America’s structural problems (137).

“We’ve all heard the Monopoly analogy circulating since the 1990s: For the first four hundred rounds, while Player A rolls the dice, acquires property, buys railroads, and collects $200 every time they pass GO, Player B does not get a turn. In fact, Player B must provide snacks for Player A, manage the properties, and build the railroads. For the next fifty rounds, while Player A plays on, Player B will theoretically get a turn, but any money they take in will be promptly set on fire. For all subsequent rounds, Player A will play golf while accruing additional wealth through a passive income stream generated by the work done by Player B, who will be instructed to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. [...] Now, smile. No, smile bigger.”

Lemon is disappointed with the lack of serious proposals for reparations, which partly results from how complaints about redistributing wealth and bad work ethic jam up the debate. The Monopoly analogy exposes the flaws of these complaints. Redistribution suggests a fair distribution to begin with, especially given that much of America’s early wealth came from slave labor. After emancipation, Blacks’ efforts to build their own wealth and political power were in constant danger from not only Jim Crow laws but also mobs that massacred Blacks in cultural centers like Tulsa, Oklahoma and Rosewood, Florida. These laws and incidents left few Black people with the inherited wealth and resources that White families take for granted, making their advice to “pull yourself by your bootstraps” feel hollow. Only recently are people of color building enough wealth that marketers have begun to promote inclusive advertising; however, ongoing gaps in the system lead some to still justify theft and looting.

“Don, let’s remember, this guy is—in large part—responsible for the deaths of nearly 210,000 of our fellow Americans, nearly 16,000 of my fellow Texans, almost 600 of my fellow El Pasoans. We are 4 percent of the globe’s population. We are 22 percent of the globe’s active cases, almost a quarter of the deaths, and that’s not by force of God or Mother Nature, but the miserable leadership of one man—Donald Trump—and every Republican senator who enables him, every Republican governor like Greg Abbott who follows in his footsteps.” 

Beto O’Rourke, a former Democrat Congressman who gained national attention after a nearly successful Senate campaign in the conservative stronghold of Texas, blamed Trump for the US failure to contain the COVID-19 pandemic. As a politician, he tied the national statistics to those of his state and former district—and depicted other Republicans as complicit. Trump admitted to journalist Bob Woodward that he downplayed the virus’s threat for economic reasons, and at times he appeared flippant about the death rate. Additionally, Trump turned COVID-19 into a political matter by feuding with Democrat governors and hosting large rallies with no mask guidelines. Trump did authorize Operation Warp Speed to accelerate vaccine development, and it approved at least two vaccines while avoiding the political turmoil of other COVID-19 initiatives. However, the first FDA-approved vaccine from Pfizer–BioNTech wasn’t part of the program, and the program’s distribution phase struggled. (Diamond, Dan. “The Crash Landing of ‘Operation Warp Speed’” Politico, 17 January 2021, https://www.politico.com/news/2021/01/17/crash-landing-of-operation-warp-speed-459892. Accessed 23 July 2021). Lemon tempered O’Rourke’s accusations but was simultaneously tracking news that Trump was in quarantine and potentially had the virus. While conducting the interview with O’Rourke, he stalled, awaiting Trump’s announcement of his positive test.

“We started telling stories, recalling all the good reasons we had for coming and going back and forth, waxing philosophical about the role this bridge had played in our lives. It connected our family to my father and, later, to my stepfather. It connected each of us—Mame, Mom, Leisa, Yma, and me—to our larger purpose in a bigger world. [...] The old bridge was a symbol of the way things changed as the story of our lives unfolded within the greater story of Louisiana. Down below us, all along the riverbank, were the last vestiges of the plantation culture that had sprung up and thrived along this great waterway.” 

Stuck in traffic on the way to Leisa’s funeral, Lemon’s family members reminisced about their trips on the old O.K. Allen Bridge, now secondary to the Horace Wilkinson Bridge. Lemon notes that his father traveled the bridge as an attorney fighting to desegregate the South, and the family used this less-convenient bridge to reminisce about their loved one before saying goodbye. However, Lemon has conflicting feelings about the bridge. He ties the Wilkinson Bridge to his college days and the career that allowed him to leave Baton Rouge. He is even fine with gentrification, a term that usually refers to modernization that prices Black residents out of their former neighborhoods, should they remove the reminders of a destructive culture and replace it with “a better way” (169). Nevertheless, a joke about Lemon’s childhood reminds him that sometimes delays happen for a reason.

“My grand-nephew Cairo, who is the same age as Henry, refers to Tim as ‘Uncle Don’s husband.’ Henry refers to me as ‘Uncle Tim’s friend.’ It occurs to me that the two of them will, from their earliest memories, be part of a family in which not everyone has the same color skin, and in which the very definition of family is fluid. I wonder about the difference that will make in the way they think about people.” 

Lemon places his faith in progress—not in any election or political party but in America’s increasingly diverse future. In 2015, 17% of US couples are interracial, and multiracial children are the largest demographic under age 18. In addition, acceptance of LGBTQ relationships is more prevalent now than in Lemon’s childhood. Both as a Black man and as a gay man, Lemon can impart positive experiences and life lessons to his family’s children. Change isn’t automatic, though: Children as young as two can form opinions about skin color, and conversations about race require more sophistication as they age. While Lemon sees White supremacy as fading, Trump will inspire a new generation of bullies and bigots to disrupt this change.