 Welcome, everyone, think Tech Hawaii time for responsible change, and we're here to celebrate Juneteenth just signed into law by President Biden, with also proclamations from Governor EG, and from city and county of Honolulu, and Mayor Blanjari, and we have with us today. Just a wonderful diverse group of people. We have retired judge Sandra Sims from Hawaii, who survived a number of years of law practice and state court. And we can see how incredibly intact and lovely she has emerged from all of that. That makes one of us. We have Louisiana one of our leading women's rights lawyers and civil litigators a partner at Dentons. We have David Larson from the Mitchell Hamlin School of Law in St. Paul, David is among many other things, as well as a law professor did the incoming chair of the American Bar Association section of dispute resolution. And brings to it, a wonderful expertise in both conflict resolution and technology and having engineered New York's online court dispute resolution system for a number of years and Tina Patterson mediator arbitrator. So, folks, Juneteenth cause for celebration. Now that it's nationally recognized. Where did it come from? You know, Oh Chuck, I'm going to be your outlier so the history of Juneteenth goes back to Lincoln signing the Emancipation Proclamation and soldiers entering Texas there were a number of states that post Emancipation Proclamation that were unwilling to give up their enslaved people and Texas was one of the last. So Juneteenth is a celebration regarding those individuals being informed that they had been emancipated by the president of the United States. Having said that. Juneteenth is not my thing. And I'm glad to see that the president has made it a national holiday. But I'll be transparent. I've been saying this since I was 13 years old I wrote an essay about this. The day that I look toward is June, July 2, the signing of the Civil Rights Act. To me, that is my true emancipation day. No tolls, no polls, no test at the voting. We are talking about Juneteenth and I think it's wonderful, but we have, we have a struggle on our hands right now we've got educational institutions, saying that they can't be being told they can't talk about critical race theory. There are people who literally are fighting for their voting rights. I can appreciate the holiday and for those who want to celebrate. I'm all for it. I think there's another element that I think will need to be explored more, which is, will it be much like Dr. King's holiday. It's a federal holiday, but private sector can make an optional holiday. Are we going to see the same thing with Juneteenth. So, I probably not the best person to start off discussing because I think others will be much more excited but for me. I've struggled with this Juneteenth and I, you know, for those who celebrate, I encourage them to do so. For me, it brings up the discussion of what happened after Juneteenth and the reconstruction period in the United States. So, you know, I hate to sound like negative Nancy, and for anybody named Nancy, no disrespect. But it just brings up. I'd rather see the focus on July 2nd personally, but it, you know, what's done is done and we move forward a friend text me this afternoon and said, I've got Friday off now. This was a complete surprise. It will be interesting to see what the United States does in terms of an actual celebration and talking about the truth of what happened. This is a fantastic place to start. Yes, it is. If anyone thought for a second that we are any place in terms of racial disparities and treatment that is caused for celebration. They must be in some other country, not this one. Yes. In night in 2020. There were 40 bills introduced in right wing legislatures to restrict voting act in less than half of 2021. There are 389 in 48 different states. Thankfully Hawaii is not one of them. This is not a time for celebration of racial equity. Or equity in any of the other categories. Yeah, the Supreme Court just today issued a decision 90. They tried to narrow it but basically they said to Catholic social services. It's okay for you to refuse. We are a long way from where we need to be. Your point team is absolutely well taken. I saw it more about an opportunity for educating people as to why we are in the situation that we are in. The notion of Juneteenth is if you look at what really happened. We are talking about Texas again, Texas, simply refusing to allow the 250,000 enslaved people to be informed of their freedom and kept them enslaved years after the emancipation proclamation had been signed. And kept them enslaved continue to build their wealth based on the backs of these folks of our basically my ancestors and so what I see it as in I'm glad you brought that perspective up Tina because I've always wrestled with the notion of celebrating not even celebrating July 4 and I have a whole story about celebrating July 4. But is an option to really now look at this juxtaposition of racial equity and looking at these laws against what actually happened with Juneteenth. It was just a blatant exercise of racism, pure and simple to simply tell these to not tell folks and they toy old and toy old and continue to toil. Now I never heard I didn't know about Juneteenth, Juneteenth until actually I moved here to Hawaii and was like in the 80s late 80s. When there was one. I don't know if you remember her Mary Wagner she was real active with the Democratic Party at that time she moved to Maui and she since moves to the mainland but she brought the notion of Juneteenth I she had this picnic to explain to people. What this is all about I I was embarrassed at how little I knew about it I grew up in in Chicago in the north and that's just not something that what our education system is is its own issue. But when I learned of it. Yeah, we shared it with my kids with the family so we've always known about it. But the the the thing that was shocking was that here was these people were just simply not told they were free and they toiled as slaves for an additional two and a half years. Hey, and we have a question from a viewer, which is, can children who haven't been educated about critical critical race theory, still appreciate these values and these disparities. What needs to happen in education. Critical race theory, are we teaching kids critical to race theory or we just don't be teaching a mystery. And if we just simply teach some history we don't have to get into the notion of critical race theory you recognize Juneteenth standing on his own is like, hey, we didn't tell the people, what does that mean, what will be trying to do. I mean critical race theory I don't know is that something you take an elementary school that's a, you know that's a, that's a. That's a subject for, I don't even, I don't even want to get into a debate about critical race theory because that's, let's just teach the history let's just tell the truth. Okay, and the truth that you just said, is that even two and a half years after the emancipation population. It took military intervention. Yes, to theoretically liberate 250,000 enslaved black people, and who knows how long it really took after that. Exactly. For any of those people to obtain anything approaching freedom. I'm just, I just wanted to answer the viewers question since I'm the one that brought up critical race theory, their critical race theory debate is actually taking place in higher education institutions it's happening in colleges and universities it's not happening in elementary schools, junior high schools, and high schools. At that level, as the viewer asked children need to know what actually happened we have school systems that don't want to talk about slavery, and it's removed from the books or talked There were people and I used to live in Texas so I remember this debate regarding, should we talk about enslaved persons and at one point the conversation was, no, let the, let the history books show in the schools that these were people who enjoyed working hard and and and earning a living well fact the matter was they weren't working and earning a living, it was they were enslaved they were chattel. The same we've had conversations about talking about the internment of people in the United States. Yeah, and talking about the trail of tears and always, you know, First Nation people gladly moved to the West know that's not actually what happened so we have to really talk about what happened even going as far back as when the first individuals came to Jamestown, when they showed up at Plymouth Rock, and what happened to the people who were there. And after the first year. No, it's not pretty but I think it's it's a reality of what what we see later with Andrew Jackson and manifest destiny that this has been a thought process that goes back to 1619. I'll be quiet I know that Louise and David had had an opportunity to speak but I hope I answered the viewers question, because I brought up critical race theory. No but that's important too because, as someone said about the subject of taking children away from their families dividing families at the southern border. Don't be surprised. This is not new. This is part of our history. We've done it to blacks we have done it to indigenous people for hundreds of years. So the question is, where do we go from here what what do we need to understand and what do we need to do about it. I was just thinking that I mean it's great that Hawaii and the US have recognized this as an official holiday. Our firm had already done that, but I see this really as an opportunity. It's not really just a holiday. I would be an opportunity to learn and educate and to connect all those dots that you've been talking about. And just I wanted to let people speak but then of course, your it is get articulated cycle. Well, they'll call it later on. But I think there's some value making a national holiday because now people can ask about it and she'll they're going to ask about it. It's like, what is this thing. And I was talking with a black friend of mine in New York today, who emigrated. Didn't come from after her family. But, you know, she's saying I didn't get any of this stuff in school. And it's all, you know, it was all new to me. And the idea that the fact that it's now a national holidays, there will be questions asked about it. And the hope is that more information will be learned. Now, I'm thinking about this year I'm thinking about, you know, the information I'm reporting about the Tulsa NASA here which was never talked about in school. And finally it's getting talked about this year. And I feel that that there is at least a kind of a recognition that we need to look back and think a little harder about where we came from and what happened previously. I was thinking, for example, I've been thinking today a lot about the idea of white privilege. And I don't love that term, because I think that term anger some people they resent it they don't respond to it. I don't even think it's accurate I mean I think there is white privilege. But really I think a better term is is is white indebtedness. I mean there's really, there's really a debt. When we talk about slavery and the history of slavery and the fact that wealth was built upon a population that didn't participate in that wealth building. And there's a, you know, so it's privilege I don't think is the right word I think indebtedness is a better word. And, and I don't know if I'm right or wrong. I just thought about this today. But, you know, but the fact that it's, we've got this holiday has me thinking about it it's got to have other people thinking about it. And I think that's positive. Yeah. Yeah, I think today but I think it is raised a really important point which is children may come young people may come to see things without some of the lenses without some of the biases. If the learning is opened up. And if it's okay to talk about it it's okay. What Sandra mentioned before what Tina mentioned before, there is a concerted effort to prevent that kind of learning from opening. Hey, and all of you folks are or have been involved in education personally for your children through your families. What needs to happen in our learning system, different from what has been happening. I think we need to simply tell the truth. Tell the truth. You know, slavery wasn't in order to perpetuate slavery, we had to tell, we had to diminish the humanity of, of Blacks were born from Africa we had to decide, and in turn, and document that they were not people so we could justify it. I think also. Oh, sorry Sandra. No go ahead. Oh, my thinking on how do we teach history differently is I would just remember the way I was taught it, which was really from the dominant colonizing populations perspective. And so I identify to with our founding fathers of that history but I think what's important is that even more and more we need to learn it from the perspective of all the different groups that have enriched our history and our culture. That's starting I think that in some many ways this you know we haven't everybody calls it an inflection point we have a point, maybe because of the pandemic, where people are much more aware of these issues. This is a point at which we can hopefully treat ethnic studies is just not ethnic studies but really it's part of the fabric of our history. I agree with that that's absolutely it it shouldn't just be marginalized as to some, you know, ancillary of the history, it's a part of how we became, we look at when you look at things like the arts, and, and the creativity of people who came out of those systems and what they had to do to spiritually strengthen themselves to endure it's not just, you know, an Africa for African Americans for Native Hawaiians I mean you took the whole, you had to build that whole thing of your sense of who you are, based on your language culture that you struggled to preserve in some place the instance struggle to define and find it, and then be able to build that to build that up and that's, and we made that part of American culture but we got to understand the pain that that culture came out of to be as important as it is. I think you need to be, you know, as an educator I think we need to be proactive. So at my law school, Mitchell Hamlin School of Law, we are, we've changed our mission statement and we're going to identify ourselves as an unbiased anti racist school. So, so, but what does that mean? It's got to mean something it's got to, it's got to, it's got to result in some kind of action. And we're spending a lot of time talking about okay, what does that mean and what does it mean to be anti racist. Does it mean just not to be overtly racist that can't be it. It's got to be something more active than that. So then the question becomes okay, what kinds of actions, should we be engaging and what kinds of actions are necessary. I think that's, that's really productive and that's part of my responsibility as an educator to think about where are we today and what can I do as an educator to make things better and that may require some, some action, some act, some activist. And all of you have touched deeply upon a critical convergence of what Sandra, David, the two of you put so well. It's a cultural indebtedness. There is a cultural debt that is owed to people who have been undervalued, dishonored, disserved. There are cultural reparations as well as others that need to be sincerely understood and undertaken. And that's kind of why I was thinking about that term indebtedness today. So when people talk about privilege. It just doesn't connect with reparations it's just like, I don't see the connection that is connected to reparations. That's a better term. And if you understand how the founding fathers became so wealthy at relatively young ages of life, it's because they had slaves. So wealth was built upon people's shoulders who didn't participate in the accumulation of that wealth. And I think that if we frame it that way, I think it's much more understandable. We see that in Hawaii, in native Hawaiian history is the whole concept of overthrowing the kingdom had to be crushed and made to look like something else that was necessary. And in the course of doing that you really you've crushed the people you've crushed up, you've crushed the society or they certainly attempted and for those that have, you know, fought to, to bring it back and I think Ray Dean's been on a few times to talk about, you know, some of the instances that that, you know, we're a part of her study. And then you look at like now, I think you're, you're absolutely right. You know, Davis, we've got to, you know, look internally and see what it is that we need to look at and decide what needs to be told and how it needs to be shared and that story needs to be told. I mean, when I teach my classes in criminal justice about the master case here in Hawaii, students who are young, they're 1819 20 year old students, they are simply appalled they had no they have no that's not taught to them. The notion that you know someone who's native Hawaiian would just be hauled away and and killed and there be no consequence. And it's, you know, those kinds of things have shaped how is as Louise has pointed out how we have that colonial perspective even here. They're still lingers it's why you have so many more native native native Hawaiians and and people of color incarcerated in our the incarceration rates are so high for those groups. Um, that's, that's a piece of it. I was talking about thing, you know, that's one thing to say your any racist and what are you going to do about it. One thing our school is doing about it, we have a truth and action project. And, you know, the premises that you can't really have any reform without understanding the truth can have any reconciliation reform unless you understand the truth first. So the first phase of the project is to go out in the community and basically collect stories of people who believe they've in particular focusing on the criminal justice system, who have victims of systemic bias and criminal justice system and begin to collect those stories. And there's a large advisory group that's very cross occupational prosecutors defenders, judges, you know, trying to get as wide of breadth as possible people participate in this project. But the goal is to try and accumulate these stories and identify common themes and begin to quantify things in terms of is a particular kind of thing happening in a particular step in the process and be bargaining. I mean, you know, it, you know, parole here is at different points. Can we actually identify problem points in this process, empirically, so it's not just anecdotal, and then maybe we can begin to begin to create some reform. David, is that having other law schools to I know that various professors have looked at aspects of truth and reconciliation and reparations but you know how widespread is it. Yeah, I think, I think we're at a, you know, at the emerging stage where people are beginning to do that kind of thing. Yeah, I think there's probably been isolated cases where people have actually tried to do that. But I think it's been pretty isolated in terms of a particular study in a particular jurisdiction wrote an article about it and maybe that's where it ended. And the hope is that, you know, hope with our project is that, okay, we'll start in kind of the same Paul Minneapolis. Let's build it out then the surrounding metro area, then let's take it out to the whole entire state and keep expand keep just keep expanding it. I was just curious, I mean it kind of ties in with something I think it was Tina who forwarded about some well Providence Rhode Island maybe there's other cities to are starting their own truth and reconciliation, reparation. You know, is that a one offer are you seeing that in other municipalities to I am seeing it in other municipalities, a friend of mine, a childhood friend actually her mother is a descendant of a First Nation community in Rhode Island and a tooth and reconciliation. I don't know what I call it it's beyond a committee but they formed so that they could talk about the truth of, of what it was like for in this case we're we're talking about the first settlers English settlers white settlers coming to Rhode Island and what the, what the interface was with the peoples on those lands that initially there's been a lot of misinformation, a lot of things that have been left out, and we're starting to see this elsewhere. You know, I'm in the Washington DC, Maryland, Virginia area there's more conversation, whose land are you on. I'm participating in a project where about facilitating racially just spaces, and each session we have to start by talking about whose land are we on, and I know I'm on the land of the Piscataway and a Manahoa. Okay, but it's enlightening because you can literally see, as you mentioned before, Louise, this mosaic. I think about the area Louisiana where I was born, and I always knew that my great grandmother was one of her descendants is First Nation, but I never knew and when I typed in the area where I was born. It suddenly popped up and I thought, well, that makes sense. It's chalk top. I never knew it, but it makes when I go back and look at the records and I see the naming conventions and see some of the pictures. It definitely ties in so yes, I think we're starting to see more of this where where it's the opportunity to talk about where is like you said, where is that inflection point, but you know, you have parallel activity happening so it also makes me think about the stories that we hear in the south where you have outlier communities of Chinese in the south and people ask, well, how did that happen I thought the Chinese were only on the West Coast. No man. And again, it's that parallel that mosaic the same thing in Minnesota when we talk about First Nation people, the people who came from Scandinavia nations but also those who were traveling from the east, heading west and that influx in terms of ideology, culture, food, way of life, you know it's a mosaic. And while we're out of time for today. Maybe that's a good place for us to stop with that thought that maybe clearly with Juneteenth, we've moved toward some concept of restorative truth that is part of a cultural debt to those who have been deprived of it. And a cultural obligation of those who have misused it or abused it for advantage. Maybe truth that seeks balance is where we might need to go. Thank you all. Come back and join us in two weeks. Thanks for coming to think tech Hawaii and thanks David Sandra Dana Louise. Who's land are you on I like that. It's a good place to start a discussion who's land and I think that applies to all of us. In all of the places that we are certainly Hawaii and Minnesota and the East Coast and everywhere. Yeah. I like it. Thank you.