This is an opinion column.

There’s a reason they didn’t want us to read.

Sidebar: When anyone around me wants to blame anything on “they” (or “them”) – as in, They don’t want us to (fill in the blank) – I always ask, “They who?”

So, I’ll turn my mirror on me: Who’s they?

Oh, I’m sure you know: The folks who enslaved Black people. Who tortured and dehumanized Black people. Who ripped Black people from their families without a shred of shame or regret.

They.

They didn’t want us to read because they knew. They knew reading led to learning and learning led to thinking and thinking led to believing and believing led to thoughts of freedom.

There’s a reason, now, they don’t want us to read. Don’t even want their own children to read.

Who are they?

Oh, their numbers are copious, so I’ll pluck one from the pile: Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt. Last week, Stitt stunted my home state by signing an executive order seeking to eliminate offices of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion from state agencies and institutions — from colleges and universities.

Signing it with a smug expression that didn’t even try to belie his ignorance about DEI. His fear of it.

“We are going to stop using state officers for DEI officers,” he blared at the signing, before wielding that oh-so-opaque move of conflating the matter with something totally irrelevant.

“[Let’s] use those monies to educate kids…”

Man, please. Last May, the state legislature in Oklahoma approved a $12.8 billion state budget that included $1 billion for state colleges and universities, a $130 million increase from the previous year, a 14.9% increase that was the largest in years.

That’s plenty to educate kids.

Then Stitt deployed that lame, tired weaponized word they wield to stoke fear among the easily misled: Preferences. Or some misused version of it.

“… instead of trying to preferential treat people based on their race.”

Maybe some of the state’s funds should be spent on teaching its governor adverbs.

On obliterating ignorance — his and that of those who stood behind him grinning during the signing. And the so many others seeking to eliminate DEI.

Stitt was obtuseness on DEI was trumped by State Superintendant Ryan Walters, another racial Troglodyte.

“DEI rightfully should be known as discrimination, exclusion, and indoctrination,” Walters told the Tulsa World. “It does not represent American values. Gov. Stitt is right for taking a strong step to protect Oklahomans from these discriminatory programs.”

Let me make this as plain as possible. There is nothing about diversity (recognizing that America is a mosaic of dynamic cultures that continuously shape us and the world), equity (ensuring all cultures have a fair and balanced opportunity to avail themselves of the best this nation offers, to sit at the table) or inclusion (see: all cultures, even those who may hyperventilate when most in the room do not look like them) — that is preferential.

Nothing that is discriminatory. Nothing.

This is why they don’t want us to read. Don’t want you to read. Because they know. Check that — because they fear.

They fear reading leads to learning and learning leads to thinking and thinking leads to believing and believing leads to the truth.

The truth about us. About our nation, about its florescent journey through darkness and light, through moments of great pride and instances of ignominy.

Truth about them. That they didn’t build this nation by themselves, that they weren’t the only game-changing, history-making scientists, artists, entrepreneurs, writers, physicians, inventors, architects, conquerors, filmmakers, thinkers, leaders. Weren’t the only heroes.

That today, this nation ain’t just white. Never was, in truth, and won’t ever be. Not even majority white.

That scares they. Scares they so much they go to absurd stretches to deter us — us all — from reading, from learning, from thinking, from believing, from the truth.

They attack libraries — libraries for goodness’ sake.

They attack curriculums, distorting them with their virus of ignorance, from which they refuse to become vaccinated.

They attack women. (See Texas. See Alabama.)

They attack anything or anyone who lives in a way they don’t understand. (See: above)

Next month, Alabama lawmakers will begin preparing to convene for their annual legislative session. Their annual opportunity to make lives better for Alabamians. Better after the session than they were prior.

To improve education, healthcare, access to capital for entrepreneurs, childcare, infant mortality, economic opportunity.

To address poverty.

To expand Medicaid.

To give a damn. Instead of wielding fear.

Oh, there will be knucklehead bills introduced — bills created to feed fear not people.

Don’t even think about it, Alabama. Don’t comfort the library predators, history wimps, the DEI ignorant.

Don’t become Oklahoma.

Instead, empower Alabamians to read, to learn, to think, to believe, and to embrace the truth about us all.

Which makes us better. Despite what they think.

I’m a Pulitzer Prize finalist for commentary and a member of the National Association of Black Journalists Hall of Fame. My column appears on AL.com, as well as the Lede. Check out my podcast series “Panther: Blueprint for Black Power,” which I co-host with Eunice Elliott. Subscribe to my free weekly newsletter, The Barbershop, here. Reach me at [email protected], follow me at twitter.com/roysj, or on Instagram @roysj