Former Sri Lanka captain Kumar Sangakkara on Thursday delivered a powerful message against racism, saying education without values will not stop discrimination.
Sangakkara said a change can be brought only by teaching real history instead of a sanitised version of it.
Offering his views on the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement that has gathered momentum following the death of African-American George Floyd, Sangakkara said, “It doesn’t matter if you are educated or not. I have seen some of the worse acts committed by people with best education.”
“If your education is not based on values and not rooted in that in-built moral campus then you will be in trouble. Education is not going to take away any of your prejudices, it will only help you argue them away better,” he told Cricbuzz.
Sangakkara said there are various versions of racism and “skin colour is not the only basis for discrimination.”
“If you take Black Lives Matter, if you take racism and discrimination in the world, I think one of the most important things is to teach our children history as it should be, and not the sanitised version of it. We need to shine the spotlight on the whole character — the good, the bad and the ugly,” he said.
“Once one understands what real history is, we will find changes in attitude. If you wake people up to that reality instead of believing we are the be all and end all of civilisation, I think that will be a powerful lesson to everyone.
“Change won’t happen overnight, it’s not the flavour of the month where you protest about it and forget it. It’s a slow and tedious process involving everyone in the world.”
