Racism we can’t speak easily about

FOR MANY white people, the Roaring Twenties evoke fond historic memories of economic prosperity and the freewheeling frivolity that encouraged men and women to let the good times roll. But for black people, that decade is different. That time is marked by the spread of Jim Crow laws enforced by racial terrorism forever seared in our memory with images of black men — and women — hanging from tall trees. That was important to remember Monday when we opened the Daily News and saw that a parent-teacher association in Brooklyn had used pictures of performers in blackface to promote a school fund-raiser. Somehow, these mothers and fathers in charge of tomorrow’s future thought this was the best way to get the word out about a speakeasythemed party that paid tribute to an era glorified by “The Great Gatsby.” But the idea was about as popular as Prohibition, and the PTA of Public School 118, the Maurice Sendak Community School, quickly ended up with egg on their blackfaces. “There are no acceptable excuses for how this happened,” the PTA co-president, Nadine Baldasare, 45, wrote in a lengthy apology. “My privilege as a white person requires that I be conscientious, engaged and informed when representing our community and promoting events. “I failed to be fully engaged here, and as a result, I added to a hostile media landscape that continues to deepen wounds carved by persistent racism in our society. I am deeply sorry.” But what Baldasare, in her enlightened white liberal moment of guilt, failed to apologize for is a crime far more egregious than a racist, 90-year-old, black-and-white picture posted on Facebook. The real offense is the all-white PTA. Is it really a surprise that one of the most enduring insults to black people could fall through the cracks of a committee that is even less diverse than President Trump’s cabinet? Baldasare should resign in a hurry or be removed from the PTA along with anyone else who saw or signed off on the picture. Then, immediate steps should be taken to make the panel look like something other than a snapshot of House Speaker Paul Ryan with congressional interns. We have enough whites-only rulership in our world. We don’t need it in our schools.