When seeing the news in the past few years, depressingly enough, a song from Les Miserables comes to mind. The song “Turning” is performed in the second act, as women in the street mourn the deaths of the revolutionaries, speaking of how much hope in a new world they had as they were killed in the street. The bridge of this song includes a haunting melody with the words “Nothing changes” in a round, as we continue “turning through the years.”
It’s pretty easy to feel like one of those women right now, singing “nothing changes” round and round. Six days into this new year we witnessed white supremacists attempt a coup on the Capitol with little holdback from police. For those who had hope for a better 2021, this was a pretty devastating blow.
The cry of “nothing changes” is an important one. It comes from a people battered and oppressed. White supremacy wants us to ignore and deny the cry. Those who say “this isn’t who we are” ignore the chorus of people saying “nothing changes,” and thus refuse to see the extremely recent history of public white anger and backlash. Nothing about what happened that Wednesday is new but has happened over and over again. And more abhorrent things will continue to happen even with a new President because white supremacy is as common as the air we breathe in the U.S.
When most people think of the musical Les Mis, “Turning” doesn’t come to mind. It isn’t easy to listen to a song that points out the world’s bleakness. Yet it is such a powerful message and one we shouldn’t shy away from. I think we all deserve the time to mourn what our country has is and always has been. The U.S.’s white supremacist history has whitewashed and sanitized our history so much so that white people have been taught a certain image of the U.S. as a “post-racial” society. It can be hard to face facts when the curtain is pulled away. There is a power in mourning a system in which white supremacy wants us to blindly abide.
An even more depressing part of the song “Turning” is they say “nothing ever can” change. But, despite this, Les Mis ends with “Do You Hear the People Sing?”, a song of hope for a better tomorrow. “Somewhere beyond the barricade is there a world you long to see?” sings the ensemble cast, including the same chorus of women who sang “Turning.” It brings about a hope that that cycle of mourning can come to an end. The musical asks if we will join in the crusade to end it.
I am a white person and I have a responsibility to help end the cycle of mourning, the round of “nothing changes.” I have a responsibility to hear and fight alongside my Black and brown siblings in the fight for justice, to follow their lead on the movement already in motion. I have a responsibility to bring my fellow white people along with me on the journey of antiracism. I have a responsibility to unlearn white supremacist ways of thinking, and to take responsibility for when I uphold systems of oppression. I have hope of a revolution, of a possible U.S. where wealth is distributed evenly and everyone has what they need. I believe it’s in reach, and that we have the power to claim that future for the next generation. But it takes all of us, and it takes especially white people like myself to frankly get past only listening and to commit to antiracism. I hope you will join in our crusade.
Freddie Swindal (they/them) is an Emmaus fellow working at Massachusetts Voter Table as a community organizer. They love listening to Queen music, eating good food and annoying their housemates.