Give me three minutes of your time to talk about something that has nothing to do with the environment, but has everything to do with who we are as people and I think is particularly relevant at Christmas. 

Just a few moments ago I posted a blurb about Kwanzaa and the Kwanzaa tradition of exchanging handmade gifts.  I know next to nothing about this holiday celebrating African heritage and family, so I thought I'd do a little research and see what I could dig up to share here on Ecollo.  So, like any normal person I went to Google, typed in "Kwanzaa" and looked at the first page of results.  What did I get?  Two or three legitimate Kwanzaa resources and a whole ton of web sites and discussion forums full of hate.

I thought "no way" and checked a few more search engines and got the same thing.  I did a little clicking around and was blown away by all of the hateful racist stuff I came across.  This is something that makes me... angry... too angry to put into words.

Let's change the scenario for a moment and let's pretend that it wasn't me Googling "Kwanzaa", let's pretend it was a 10-year-old African-American girl looking for more information on the holiday her family celebrates.  That little girl is going to be confronted with a wall of hate and racism because she dared to look for information on a holiday that celebrates her African heritage.  It's just wrong.

To be fair, I have content filters turned off by default on most of my bookmarked search engines.  Turning on those filters makes a big difference.  What's scary is how much of this stuff is out there.  It's dark stuff, full of violence and ignorance and hatred.  Don't search for it, it's not worth your time.  I'm not going to name any names, include any quotes or link to any of the offending sites.  Even scumbags have the right to publish their opinions on the Internet, but I don't have to publish them here. 

Kwanzaa is a celebration, one of many great family traditions enjoyed the world over at this time of year.  You don't have to be African-American to learn about Kwanzaa and the joy it brings to the millions who celebrate it each year.  I wanted to share my little search engine experience with you because I think it illustrates the importance of educating our children and teaching them how to understand, accept, and tolerate others.  This is a time of year for family, for celebration.  You can't celebrate hate.

If you want to learn about Kwanzaa's history and traditions, hit the jump for the Wikipedia article that sums it up nicely.  Merry Christmas and Happy Kwanzaa.

» Wikipedia