Pushing boundaries and margins with Baratunde Thurston

Baratunde Thurston, a bestselling author, comedian, and activist, attended this year’s humanities event as the keynote speaker, providing Colby attendees with valuable insights related to participating in conversations about the nation’s current social, economic, and political state.

During the live-streamed discussion held on April 8, Thurston discussed the importance of pushing “Boundaries and Margins,” which he explained as limits in understanding, especially as the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic pushes several national issues to the forefront. 

Thurston recalled the early stages of the pandemic and all the lies and misinformation propagated by the government and media.

“They said that it [unity] would be a feature, not a bug of a global pandemic, that it would bring us all together and treat us all the same ... that we would ride in the same boat or sink in the same boat, as the phrase might suit itself to that particular circumstance ... that [COVID-19] was some kind of great uniter, that it doesn’t pick winners and losers, that it doesn’t discriminate,” Thurston said. “‘We’re all in it together.’ That’s what they said. You go back and check the tapes, and that did not happen.” 

Thurston explained that the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on minorities has emerged from the systemic issues within the country. 

“The systems that we have designed to protect us from such threats do [discriminate]. They choose who wins and loses, and the results of that decision skew towards people with a bit more melanin and certainly a lot less money. We built [these systems], a long time ago, and have failed often to reconstruct something better. So instead, we fell deeper into a truth that we denied,” Thurston shared.

Over the course of the night, Thurston argued that to break through socially constructed boundaries and margins requires embracing the discomfort each sensitive discussion brings. 

“We need to face the truth through our history and move through it. And I know it’s scary. There is always some embarrassment, some shame, some fear,” Thurston said. “But when we face it and deal with it, there is always relief on the other side. There is freedom on the other side.” 

“With boundaries and margins, I want us to push them,” Thurston added. “I want us to push them and get uncomfortable because discomfort is growth. That’s how you know something is happening.”

Historical events detail the pain and suffering people haveendured, which are elements of the past too many would prefer not to face. However, according to Thurston, confronting the past is essential for moving forward because history has shaped the present. 

“History is present,” Thurston said. “I am here because someone else was before I ever arrived. [History] affects the now, and we have an addiction to amnesia, seeing it only as an upside in this country when it serves the few to forget certain things.”

Although American history is tainted by discrimination, war, and inequality (to name a few), Thurston discussed how every person can implement their knowledge of the past to reimagine a better tomorrow. 

“The story, even of how we talk about justice, is out of balance because it maintains a story that is built on imbalance and giving power to the powerless. We all have power, and it’s up to us to tap into it, to activate it, to use it for all of our benefits,” Thurston explained.

“Everything that we know is just a story. Mostly, we don’t tangibly interact with the world. I don’t know what’s real and what’s not except for what somebody told me. So, if that’s the case, that most of our experience of reality is something somebody told us, and something we chose to believe, then let’s choose to tell a different story and believe something else.”  

Thurston urged the audience to “choose to tell a bigger story and believe in a bigger us that is not predicated on winners and losers.” According to Thurston, pushing that boundary can help the nation reorient its relationship with the past in order to achieve true equality in the future. 

~ Jenna Boling `24