Getting to the roots of racism: ‘Afterschool’ special looks inward

“Black people are not black and white people are not white. We’re all really different shades of a single protein called melanin,” Oprah Winfrey says in the ABC Afterschool Special Shades of a Single Protein. The special focuses on what teen-agers think and feel about race relations.

The ABC crew travels across the country to talk to teens. Among them: a young black on a New York subway platform; a Korean girl wandering in the burned-out rubble of her family’s South Central business; rage-filled white supremacists in Portland, Ore.; newly arrived Asian and Central American immigrants, and Native American youths.

One of the most poignant insights comes from a tattooed New York teen with a bright orange Mohawk who says, “America was a country created for everybody. It’s filled with every single race and culture in the world. I don’t understand how anybody can come to this country and be a racist!”

“ABC Afterschool Special: Shades of a Single Protein” airs 3-4 p.m. ABC. For ages 7 and up.

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