A poem by an Atlanta student that was part of a school contest has gone viral. He bravely accepted that there is a ladder of privilege built in America, and that he – along with other white people – sit at the very top while most others start out on the bottom rung. The 8th grader eloquently described why white men and boys should acknowledge how they benefit from this privilege.
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Dear everyone who isn’t a middle or upper class white boy, I’m sorry.
As the video and the poem spread across the net, trolls have attacked him, his parents, Black people and others. After Minnesota, Baton Rouge and Dallas, Mann’s poem struck a nerve on line. “We have a class called Race, Class and Gender that everyone has to take, and I got really passionate about how unfair it is”.
Before you rush to judgment, you must watch the entire video to see why he loves the situation he is in. “I’m just saying, I fucking love being privileged and I’m not ready to give that away”.
It’s time to let go of that fear.
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His incredible poem pointing out the racial – and in many cases lethal – double standards in the United States garnered him the first-place prize in the spring slam poetry competition.
