It's About More Than Monkey Sounds. It's About the Humanity They Tried to Deny.

Some people just don't get it.

They see the video of white students making monkey sounds and gestures outside the apartment of Black students at the University of Mississippi and wonder why Black America is so upset.

They ask, "What's the big deal?" "They were just being stupid." "They're young." "Why does everything have to be about race?" And, of course, there are those who believe a simple apology should be enough for everyone to move on.

But here's what they don't understand. It's not just about monkey sounds. It's about 400 years of being told we are less than human. It's about a history that some people would rather forget, others would prefer not to teach, and far too many still refuse to acknowledge.

For centuries, Black people were compared to monkeys, apes and other animals as a way of justifying our enslavement, segregation, mistreatment and exclusion from American society. Those comparisons were never innocent. They were calculated efforts to convince society that Black people were intellectually inferior, morally deficient and somehow less deserving of the rights afforded to white Americans.

Think about that for a moment. Before our ancestors could be bought and sold on auction blocks, somebody had to convince themselves that those human beings were not quite human. Before Black men could be lynched and their bodies left hanging from trees, somebody had to convince themselves that Black lives were somehow worth less. Before Black children could be denied an education, somebody had to believe they were incapable of learning alongside white children.

And before Black families could be forced to drink from separate water fountains, sit in the back of buses and enter businesses through back doors, somebody had to accept the lie that one race was superior to another. That's why those monkey sounds are not funny. That's why they are not harmless. And that's why they cannot simply be dismissed as a youthful prank.

What makes this incident even more disturbing is where it happened. The University of Mississippi. Ole Miss. The same university where, in 1962, James Meredith had to be protected by federal authorities simply to exercise his right to attend college.

Let that sink in. A Black man wanted an education, and the very thought of him sitting in a classroom alongside white students sparked violence that left two people dead. Sixty-four years later, Black students attending that same institution are being subjected to racist gestures that echo the attitudes Meredith confronted.

The message may no longer be delivered by angry mobs standing in front of university buildings, but the underlying sentiment is painfully familiar. You don't belong here. You are not one of us. You are less than we are.

And here's what should concern all of us: This is not the first time Ole Miss has faced such an incident. In 2024, a white student was recorded making monkey gestures toward a Black woman during a campus demonstration.

At what point do we stop calling these isolated incidents and begin asking why the same attitudes continue to surface?

Racism Doesn't Begin With a Monkey Sound. I have always believed that children are not born hating other people because of their skin color. Somewhere along the way, that hatred is learned. It may be learned around a dinner table, through conversations among friends, from social media or simply through the silence of adults who refuse to correct offensive behavior.

Now, I don't know the families of the young women involved in this incident. I don't know what they were taught growing up. But I do know this: You don't have to personally experience slavery or segregation to understand that comparing Black people to animals is racist. And in 2026, ignorance is becoming an increasingly difficult excuse to accept.

We live in an age when information is available at our fingertips. We have museums, books, documentaries, historical archives and firsthand accounts documenting the devastating consequences of racial hatred. Yet we continue to encounter individuals who behave as though they have no understanding of that history. Perhaps the greater problem is not that they don't know. Perhaps it's that they don't care enough to learn.

Let me be clear about something. I believe in forgiveness. I believe in second chances. And I believe young people can make terrible decisions, learn from them and become better human beings.

But I also believe in accountability. An apology does not automatically erase the pain of humiliation. It does not remove the fear a Black student may experience after discovering that people living nearby view them through the lens of racial stereotypes. And it does not erase the historical meaning behind the behavior.

We should not be so quick to focus on protecting the futures of those who engaged in racist conduct that we forget about the students who were targeted. What about their futures? What about their emotional well-being? What about their right to attend college, pursue an education and live in peace without being subjected to racial intimidation? Those questions deserve just as much attention as whether the offending students should be allowed to continue their education. Accountability is not revenge. Accountability is the recognition that our actions have consequences and that the dignity of others matters.

It would be easy to point our fingers at Mississippi and pretend this kind of behavior exists only in the Deep South. But racism does not recognize state lines. And racial ignorance is not confined to one university, one community or one generation. The uncomfortable truth is that America has made tremendous progress in race relations while still struggling with the attitudes that made the civil rights movement necessary.

We celebrate Black History Month, recognize the achievements of Black Americans and applaud the election of Black leaders. We have watched Black Americans become presidents, governors, judges, university presidents, corporate executives and leaders in virtually every profession. Yet somehow, we still find ourselves explaining why comparing Black people to monkeys is offensive.

How many more generations must pass before our humanity is no longer up for discussion? How many more Black students must endure humiliation before institutions recognize that racial harassment is more than a public relations problem? And how many more apologies must we hear before we begin addressing the beliefs that produce this behavior?

There is something particularly exhausting about being Black in America and constantly being expected to explain why racism hurts. We are told to move on. We are told not to be so sensitive. We are told that slavery happened a long time ago. We are told that segregation is over. And we are told that because opportunities exist today that were denied to our ancestors, we should somehow stop being offended by the very attitudes that once justified those injustices.

But here's the problem with that argument. You cannot tell people to forget the past while continuing to remind them of it through your actions. You cannot celebrate James Meredith for integrating Ole Miss while dismissing the humiliation of Black students attending that same university today. You cannot claim to believe in equality while finding humor in imagery historically used to deny equality. And you cannot demand that Black Americans stop talking about racism while refusing to confront it when it appears. Our ancestors fought too hard, sacrificed too much and endured too many indignities for us to remain silent when their humanity — and ours — is mocked.

When those young women made monkey sounds, some people heard a few seconds of foolish behavior. But many Black Americans heard something entirely different. We heard the echoes of slaveholders who viewed our ancestors as property. We heard the voices of segregationists who insisted we were inferior. We remembered the photographs of Black men hanging from trees while crowds gathered as though attending a community celebration.

We remembered the Little Rock Nine walking through angry crowds simply to attend school. We remembered the courage of James Meredith. We remembered our grandparents, who were forced to enter through back doors, surrender their seats and lower their eyes in the presence of people who believed themselves superior. And we remembered that the struggle for dignity did not end simply because the laws changed. That is what some people fail to understand.

Racism is not measured only by the action itself. It must also be understood through the history, meaning and message behind that action. And the message behind comparing Black people to monkeys has always been unmistakable. It is an attempt to diminish our humanity.

I hope the young women involved in this incident learn from their actions. I hope they take the time to understand why their behavior caused such outrage. And I hope the University of Mississippi uses this moment to do more than issue statements and impose discipline. I hope it becomes an opportunity for honest conversations about race, history, respect and the responsibility we have to one another.

But I also hope America learns something. We cannot keep pretending that racial progress means racial prejudice has disappeared. We cannot keep dismissing racism as harmless simply because the person engaging in it claims to have been joking. And we cannot keep expecting Black Americans to quietly accept insults that carry the weight of centuries of oppression.

I am proud to be Black. Proud of our history. Proud of our resilience. Proud of our accomplishments. And especially proud of the generations who refused to allow this country to define their worth.

Our ancestors survived slavery, segregation, lynching, discrimination and countless attempts to strip them of their dignity. They built families, churches, schools, businesses and communities despite a society that often refused to recognize their humanity. And they passed down something that no racist gesture, insult or sound could ever take away. A sense of pride in who we are.

So, to those who still don't understand why this incident matters, let me make it plain. It's not about a few young women making monkey sounds. It's about the generations of Black people who were treated like animals. It's about the ancestors who were denied their humanity. It's about the children who should never have to experience the indignities their grandparents endured. And it's about our refusal to allow anyone to turn centuries of racial degradation into a joke.

Because after everything Black Americans have endured, we should not still have to explain why we deserve to be treated as human beings. The real tragedy is not that someone made monkey sounds in 2026. The real tragedy is that, in 2026, we still have people who don't understand why those sounds are racist.

And that, my friends, is why it's about so much more than monkey sounds.