A white journalist is being justly dragged on social media for an investigative report gone seriously wrong. Canadian writer Sam Forster wanted to see what it was like to walk a mile in a Black man’s shoes –literally – and the internet is not having it.
In “Seven Shoulders,” Canadian Sam Forster writes about disguising himself as a Black man and traveling around the United States to “document how racism persists in American society.” The Amazon description of the book called it “a vigorous attempt to make sense of American race relations in the modern era.”
Say what now? Couldn’t he have just lined up a few Black folks to interview?
Forster announced the release of his book in a May 28 post on X, calling it “one of the hardest things” he’s ever done as a journalist. But the negative reactions came in hot, with most commenters telling him he should have saved himself the trouble.
“If you knew any black people, they would have saved you from getting torched on the internet because they’d have told you this was a bad idea,” wrote one user on X.
“It’s hard to simultaneously draw the ire of black people, white people, conservatives, AND liberals... But I think you’ve just done it. I want to see the photos,” wrote another.
Others are saying he’s not doing anything new, comparing “Seven Shoulders” to John Howard Griffin’s 1961 book “Black Like Me,” in which he writes about his experience darkening his skin and went from living as a white man to an unemployed Black man in the Deep South. And while that might have been considered a good idea in the 1960s, anyone with an ounce of good sense should know better than to try something like that today.
There are others who are hilariously comparing Forster’s book to the 1986 film flop “Soul Man” in which an affluent white teen pretends to be Black on an application for a college scholarship.
“Wasn’t this the plot of the movie “Soul Man?” wrote someone on X.
Hopefully Forster learned a very important lesson here: just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should.