Ruby Bridges was just 6 years old with a white ribbon in her hair when deputy U.S. Marshals escorted her into a New Orleans classroom. She was there in 1960 to integrate an all-white school. Outside, protesters hurled racism and rancor. Ruby wanted to be brave. She didn’t cry. Parents of many of the other students refused to let their kids attend first grade with a Black girl, so Ruby spent the year in a classroom alone with her teacher. One woman greeted Ruby with a Black doll lying in a black coffin. Despite it all, Ruby endured.
It’s the type of heroism that movies are made of, and Disney did just that, producing “Ruby Bridges” in 1998. Now, Pinellas school officials have banned students from watching the film at a St. Petersburg school after a parent complained that the story might teach kids that white people hate Black people. It’s embarrassing that anyone would be so threatened by the story of a young girl who helped integrate a school. When did we become so fragile?
For years, the school district has shown “Ruby Bridges” in classrooms, often during Black History Month in February. The story is relatable to so many elementary students. Ruby is young like them. Ruby has doubts like them. Ruby just wants to be a little kid like them. She shows children — all children — the power of perseverance, how at times life is hard, really hard, but that they can get through it. And her story is real. Her part in integrating schools is a key part of this nation’s civil rights struggle. It is history worth teaching, examining and absorbing. The feelings it conjures should be addressed, not suppressed. Have we not learned that yet?
