Intersections with Phil Allen, Jr.        

Episode: 012 “Love Is Not THE Answer to Racism”

Airdate: December 20, 2020

Length: 27:34

Guests: Phil Allen Jr.

This year, 2020, has shown us much about who we are as a nation. We have been suffering through a pandemic like we haven't experienced in the last 100 years. We’ve seen this virus tragically impact the poor, African Americans, LatinX, and Native Communities at alarming rates. We have witnessed together the murders of two men, Ahmaud Arbery and George Floyd, caught on video and we’ve heard the audio and the details of the murder of Breonna Taylor. Phil Allen Jr. closes out 2020 with a challenge for the listener to frame 2021. We cannot get around the issue of race as it touches every aspect of society. However, the solution to racism is not love. He cautions us to not fall into the trap of oversimplifying what needs to be done to address racism.

The challenge is education. Not just education in the classroom—although that is one area of need—but education through relationships, hearing the stories of communities impacted, and by taking an honest look at one’s own ignorance in regards to one’s own biases and ideologies that contribute to the status quo of a racist society. If we do not address individual and collective ignorance, 2021 will look much like 2020. A sobering, but necessary episode to close out the year and prepare ourselves for the work next year.

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Phil Allen, Jr. is a Los Angeles-based pastor, social justice activist, filmmaker and author. Allen’s book Open Wounds explores the murder of Nate Allen—Phil Allen’s grandfather—in the Jim Crow era of South Carolina and how that traumatic event resonated through generations of his family. Open Wounds – which is based on the Allen-produced documentary of the same name – will be published February 9, 2021. Allen is a Ph.D. student studying Christian ethics at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, CA.