for some understanding of Baltimore

Watch 'The Wire'. I think it's on Netflix.  "The Wire" is probably the best television writing in the history of television. And it tells a very important story white Americans need to know. Step out of your white bubble and binge watch "The Wire".

It tells true stories rooted in how poverty, crime, racism and corrupt governance institutions.

I have urged many friends to watch this show and most watch a couple episodes and grow bored. I think white people get bored and will not invest easily in stories about nonwhites. Let's get over ourselves.

Another good example from the arts is Spike Lee's brilliant film "Do the Right Thing".

Once, while living on Whidbey Island in a friend's converted garage home (it was a great place to live -- I could see ferries on the Sound as I lay in bed and there was a deck outside that bedroom from which I could see the Sound and the Cascade mountains. Or I could walk a short distance to the water's edge and behold the Sound, beachcomb. . . but I digress. . .

My landlady and friend presented herself as extremely liberal. She had hired me to work for her at the Whidbey Institute. The Whidbey Institute is, more or less, a liberal institution.

I took advantage of the fantastic library system on the island. I had quickly learned I could request virtually any movie ever put on DVD or, maybe back in 2002, on VHS tape. Whatev.  The branch on the south end of the island was tiny but I could get any book, movie or music in the whole library system with just a couple days' wait.

When I learned that Sophie had never seen "Do the Right Thing", I suggested we watch it together, fix a nice shared dinner, then popcorn. Movie night!  I also suggested Sophie and I watch some of The Wire and she also refused to watch that.  I have had other white friends show little interest in 'The Wire" and some of these people really surprise me. Like I know a guy from a conference who presents himself these days as powerfully interested in Africa, African Americans. He works part time for a foundation that funds programs in Africa. He posts poems by African Americans on FB.  He writes somewhat incoherent essays about love from his idea of what constitutes the perspective of Mother Africa. Yet when I urged him to watch The Wire to gain some valuable insights into some black reality, he said the show was boring.

Just a few minutes into the movie, Sophie said "This is boring, I don't want to watch more."  I explained to her again,for I had already,  that it was a very importanat film, that it is very important for whites to have a better understand of African American reality. I told her Spike Lee is a genius. He certainly is.  So is David Simon, who wrote "The Wire" and also the also-awesome HBO series "Treme".  It was hard for me to politely accept Sophie's refusal to watch it.  In hindsight, I wish I had called her out on what I believe was racist disinterest.

So. Whoever you are, if you want to have a better visceral undertanding of AFrican American reality, begin with Spike Lee's masterpiece, David Simon's two master works, The Wire and Treme.