THE COST OF DARKNESS DOCUMENTARY
The Culture C.O.-O.P.—an organization that focuses on diversity/equity, cultural competency, literacy, and a quality education for all—and collaborating partners are in the process of producing a documentary entitled The Cost of Darkness. This hour-long documentary will identify racial disparities in the United States, focusing on the major institutions and their compounded institutional impact on communities and individual people of color. The seven institutions the film will focus on are economics, education, health care, the criminal-justice system, politics, and the media. In each of these institutions, it is a challenge to have darker skin. Those challenges culminate into a compounded institutional impact on individuals and communities of color. The documentary will identify structural or institutional reasons for racial oppression in the United States that date back to the colonial period, explore some real life experiences with this oppression, and offer potential solutions, structural and otherwise, for combating this oppression. The arguments presented in this documentary will be supported by extensive research and expert interviews. The goal for The Cost of Darkness is to illuminate to audiences how extensive the racial disparities in America are, while offering ideas and inspiration for how to approach changing this oppressive situation.