What Happened to Nuance
It is easier to read the headline than read the story.
It is easier to listen to the clip than watch the whole video.
It is easier to be upset than to learn.
People I genuinely like say very stupid stuff at times. In this world where we often battle over ideas, ones that are different from your own are often met with rejection. I’m not asking you to give people the benefit of the doubt. I’m asking you to pause before immediately responding to your first emotions.
Take time to read the headline, the story, background information, and the follow up to the story.
If it’s not worth your time to do all of that then it isn’t worth your energy, period.
That’s the only way to understand all of the small details that make up a headline.
Take the recent Lecrae controversy. A White pastor called slavery a”blessing” and attempted to reframed white privilege as a “white blessing” in front of him while Lecrae nodded along. That’s the headline.
Diving deeper into the story, the pastor was noting that if you were to reframe the term “white privilege” to another phrase that was easier for White people to accept, then it may be easier for some White people to understand it and take action using their privilege for reconciliation with the Black community. He suggests the term “white blessing.” During the talk, Lecrae doesn’t necessarily address the term “white blessing” or saying slavery was a “blessing” directly but he does speak to his experience as a Black man afterward in response to the comment. He also talked at length during the whole talk about his experience with systematic racism and the police from a young age (e.g. he was put on a gang list just for skipping school). He also mentions how White people have to do the work to learn from their Black brothers and sisters about what is really happening.
For some background, Lecrae is a rapper whose music is a direct reflection of his Christain faith. In other words, he can actually rap but his subject is faith-based. His whole movement is about uplifting the Black community through Christan teachings in a genre that is always not aligned to that imagery. He stands out because he has taken a stand.
The follow-up story is Lecrae was processing when he first heard the term and had that conversation with the pastor immediately afterward about his stance. He doesn’t stand by the rephrasing of the term and how it was presented during the talk.
Looking at it holistically, there’s so much more nuance to this story than the headline when it comes to viewing Lecrae’s role in it.
Note that I’m only speaking to Lecrae’s role in this and not the pastor because I relate to him as a Black man and understand his path. I think the comments the pastor said and Lecrae’s lack of response to them are two separate topics. I also wholeheartedly disagree with the notion of linking slavery with a blessing for anyone and that is a topic for another post. I hope that if I’m ever in this situation, I can respond much more directly than Lecrae did in the moment.
My main point is that we shouldn’t write off all of the work Lecrae has been doing both before and after this talk nor should he only be remembered for the headline. The nuance is very important here along with the context.