sousa.26 | CS 1100 Intro to Humanities

Black-ish is a television series about an upper middle class black family living in an all white neighborhood while trying to keep their black culture alive. The show follows Dre Johnson, father of four and husband, who has a high paying job as an advertising executive in a predominantly white workplace. However the show examines how Dre’s successes cause him to wonder if he and his family have adjusted to be less proud about their black culture in order to have the same opportunities as the white community.

In an episode from the series titled “Sink or Swim” Dre notices that his neighbor across the street has been hosting pool parties every weekend for the neighborhood but, the Johnson are never invited. Being the only black family in the neighborhood, Dre believes that his family is not invited because their neighbor thinks they cannot swim, following the stereotype that black people cannot swim. The neighbor shares that the real reason was that she thought Dre hated her. During their conversation, she seemed hesitant and uncomfortable to talk with him, asking who he was and telling her husband to “stand down” with his gun after Dre reminds her they are neighbors. After this conversation she then calls Dre her “homie” and begins to change her tone toward Dre and begins changing her personality to be like a “typical” black person’s.

All the while Dre’s two twin children, Jack and Diane are signed up to join Boy Scout and Girl Scouts by Dre’s mother, their grandmother. She believes that the children must learn their place and gain necessary life skills as a young woman and man. In both programs Jack is taught survival skills while Diane learns how to cook. As their grandmother is enforcing such stereotypes onto the children, Jack discovers his passion for cooking and Diane quickly understands how to tie different types of knots. This portion of the episode shows the main ideas de Beauvoir critiques in her “The Second Sex” as she defines men as the One and women as the Other. Their grandmother represents the stereotypes the audience can assume she was taught when growing up.

This episode of Black-ish displays two different forms of injustice in a modern day setting. Though, the Johnsons were not excluded because of the stereotype that they cannot swim, the neighbor still held some form of a stereotype by changing her attitude to align with how she imagined a black person’s personality would be when speaking with a friend. Also, the grandmother attempts to enforce gender stereotypes on her grandchildren because she believes this will better prepare them for life’s expectations. Though, Jack and Diane separate themselves from the One and Other as they each enjoy activities that gender traditions would not allow them to do. Such relevant situations such as these truly demonstrate that racial and gender inequality still occur in today’s setting.

The Johnson Kids Are Surprised That Dre Doesn't Swim on Tonight's 'black-ish': Photo 926664 | Marcus Scribner, Marsai Martin, Miles Brown, Television, Yara Shahidi Pictures | Just Jared Jr.

Group Members: Morgan Sousa and Maddie (Sarah) Massie

Morgan: Hi, my name is Morgan Sousa. I’m Sousa.26.

Maddie: And hi my name’s Maddie Massie, but my real name is Sarah and my number is 131.

Morgan: And the title of the podcast is “Yo, is this equal healthcare?”

Maddie: So when going through our DSI’s and our systemic injustices diaries we picked one that just, we both felt really passionate about and we felt like it really needed to be talked about more. So actually this instance is pretty relevant and has to do with COVID-19 and the pandemic that we’re experiencing right now. When it first started, I just remember being scared and terrified and like just fearing the unknown because we had never experienced something like this before. We all just sat in our houses all day and really just watched the news, like it was kind of our only people interactions outside our family ,which is just crazy to think about. And so I remember hearing this article that talked about how COVID-19 deaths were actually more like elevated for minority groups, which is just a really unfortunate truth that we’re facing right now. This news article talked about how minorities were more likely to die from this virus than white people and non people of color in the United States. This media outlet really explained that the reason for this is because we need reforms in the health care system in the United States, and how just overall minorities, unfortunately have less access to affordable health care than other groups do, and how expensive insurance really is.

Morgan: Yeah, definitely. I mean like, as a white person, I’d never thought of this as an issue. I never thought of it being an issue because I didn’t grow up worrying about it. Even in the pandemic my family didn’t stress that much. And just hearing about the story made me realize so much more. It was very interesting to learn about and at the same time not at all surprising to know that they were having difficulty with getting affordable health care, or just finding resources for them.

Maddie: Yeah, like when thinking back, it was just really shocking when I first heard it because we’ve just never really had that think of something like this before, like this global pandemic is once in a lifetime thing and we’re just not expecting it. It really shocked me when I saw this but then again, it’s really unfortunate that it’s not super surprising. Just because like when you really think about it, minorities don’t always have the access to the health care that they need, obviously, to maybe even live from COVID-19, so that’s a big reason about why their deaths were more elevated. Then just like reflecting on this in my own life like I had braces when I was younger, like a lot of people did. And I specifically remember my parents talking about how they were both taking out dental insurance plans for me through both of their jobs to pay for it. Which is crazy to think about, I mean it’s smart on their end because they covered the cost of it, but it’s crazy to think about how my family and my parents were able to do this when other people can’t even afford to get the health care that they need in order to live.

Morgan: Exactly. And I had braces as well. And my parents, they wouldn’t talk to me about taking out health insurance or any of that. So it really just showed that it wasn’t a worry for my family, and they saw it as, “Oh she needs them like we’re going to do this”, we have to. We had the opportunity to, and unless like minorities, where it’s a struggle and it’s a bigger part of their money being taken out.

Maddie: Yeah. And that leads us into like talking about the impact of this, and it really just shows how, like, that this is just another burden, that’s set on the minority groups in the United States that just furthers how they feel more unequal to other people in the United States, which I mean, nobody should ever feel like that and it’s really sad that they have to.

Morgan: Exactly and this kind of represents the theory we discussed in class One versus Other from de Beauvoir, and when she talked about how, well I actually have a quote, “it is not the Other who, in defining [them]self as the Other, establishes the One. The Other is posed as such by the One in defining himself as the One”. So it just shows upper middle class, white Americans and the government, separates minorities from them, and sets up restrictions, I guess, and takes away access and defines them as the Other. While making healthcare so expensive, they just cannot be a part of the One.

Maddie: Yeah, it’s just a really unfortunate group that minorities get placed in along with them, a plethora of other groups that they should not belong in but they do. So when looking at some of the statistics that we found from this new story. We found some on the CDC website that actually highlighted the cases, hospitalizations, and deaths comparison from different minority groups in the United States, compared to white, non Hispanic persons. So, like Native Americans were 1.4 times more higher to die from COVID, and then Black or African American non Hispanic persons are 2.1 times higher to die from COVID-19 and then finally Hispanic or Latino persons are 1.1 times higher to die. So those numbers are just super shocking. And I’m like, genuinely really sad that we even have the statistics and we have to look at how it affects the different groups.

Morgan: Definitely and it quite literally shows the gap between minorities and white people. The lack of affordability of health care just goes back to minorities and their pay from jobs. I mean they’re more likely to have lower paying jobs than white people and minimum wage jobs, and with minimum wage jobs, it’s almost impossible to pay the health insurance at the end of each month. We did find the average cost of health insurance and for an individual in 2018, it was about $574 per month, and about $1,634 per family per month. And if you do the calculations of minimum wage made in a month, assuming you’re working 40 hours, to take out that much money would leave you with almost nothing, to worry about other bills or food or expenses that are essential.

Maddie: Yeah, it really just shows how some people have to put literally having food on the table and a house over their head above their own health. And it’s just really sad that we have to even think about that, because it really just shouldn’t even be a problem. It really just shows how big of a systemic injustice this is and how it really hits home and comes right down to like, for me like the government. I think they can do more to help like set in assistance programs to help them get the help that they need. Or just maybe setting boundaries with health insurance companies because we did find a study from 2016, that shows there has been a steady incline in health care costs for the past 10 years, and that in 2016 it showed people were expected to spend $25,000 a year on health care for a family. So that’s really just crazy to me spending that much money, and how really people can’t afford to spend that much money. So it really just hits home about why this is a systemic injustice, and how it hits home to the government.

Morgan: Exactly and we’re talking about affordable solutions, or just possible changes in general. And obviously affordable health care, universal health care, as well. Just, I mean taxes would increase, but at the same time everybody would have an equal opportunity and equal access to medicine and resources.

Maddie: It’s not even like we’re asking to raise taxes. We want a more equal distribution of taxes, so maybe we can look at programs that maybe we shouldn’t be spending so much money on and maybe put it towards programs that offer more affordable health care to people who really need it, and to inevitably just save their lives from COVID if they do get it and have to go see the doctor.

Morgan: Exactly and by reevaluating where we spend our money and putting more toward health care would just improve so much more. There would be a lower death rate within the country within minorities, and the economy would improve as more people are able to go to work, and can afford it. I mean sales like, everything would just improve.

Maddie: Yeah, so in the end we just really want to work towards, like eliminating these awful categories that are given to these minority groups because they can’t afford health care. So some people might think of them as poor or poverty stricken, which just have really negative connotations that nobody should really be called. And it really just gives them the identity of being not equal, which we both think that everyone should have equal opportunities in this country. Unfortunately, it’s not always like that, but we can make steps every day towards fixing this.

Morgan: And by doing this, it would kind of close the socioeconomic gap that is widening today and continues to grow larger. So my closing thought, we again, have more equal opportunities like you said.

Maddie: So in the end, after we talked about all the bad, one big change and solution that we both have discussed and we love to talk more about, and just see some more statistics about, is universal health care and looking at that aspect of maybe redistribution in our tax dollars this way. Looking to our neighbors in the north, Canada and the UK, they both have universal health care. And I would just be really interested in seeing the statistics that come out after the pandemic about how they handled COVID-19 when they had universal health care and maybe their death rates, their infection rates, all of that.

Morgan: And, I mean, they’ve done well before the pandemic I’m not too sure about now. By looking at how successful they’ve been, maybe it’d be a good idea for the United States to start looking at how successful we could be.

Maddie: Yeah, I think there’s just a lot of room for growth, and I don’t want to downplay the government in any way because they have done a lot of good for the American people when people lost their jobs during the pandemic. But one thing that is definitely lacked, is the equal distribution of healthcare and just making sure that everyone’s taken care of so they can get the care that they need if they do come down with the virus. And so in the end like this pandemic is far from over. And we don’t know when it’ll end, if it’ll end, it’s just the unknown. And so we really just want to focus on trying to fix this now, saving literally millions of lives. If something could be implemented to help minority groups.

Morgan: Exactly. And, again, this is kind of an opportune moment with the pandemic to start looking at new ways to improve the health system within our country.

Maddie: Yes.

Morgan: That is all.

Maddie: I think that’s it.

Morgan: Thank you.

Maddie: Thanks everyone for watching.

Morgan: Bye.

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