Hey, listeners, it's Elise Hu with TED Talks daily today, diversity advocate Verna Myers, she's so awesome, so energetic and is talking on a topic we all need to confront more directly our own biases and how they move from generation to generation. In her 2014 archive talk from Ted Beacon Street. She calls on us to get out of denial and go looking for our biases.

It will likely prove your old stereotypes are wrong and how to change them so we can stop racial injustice in our society.

I was on a long road trip this summer and I was having a wonderful time listening to the amazing Isabel Wilkerson's warmth of other suns, it documents six million black folks fleeing the south from 1915 to 1970 looking for a respite from all the brutality and trying to get to a better opportunity up north.

And it was filled with stories of the resilience and the brilliance of African-Americans. And it was also really hard to hear all the stories of the horrors and the humility and all of the humiliations.

It was especially hard to hear about the beatings and the burnings and the lynchings of black men. And I said, you know, this is a little deep. I need a break. I'm going to turn on the radio.

I turned it on and there it was, Ferguson, Missouri, Michael Brown.

Eighteen year old black man, unarmed, shot by a white police officer, lay on the ground dead blood running for four hours while his grandmother and little children and his neighbors watched in horror.

And I thought. Here it is again. This violence, this brutality against black men has been going on for centuries. I mean, it's the same story.

It's just different, different names. I mean, it could have been Amadou Diallo.

It could have been Sean Bell. It could have been Oscar Grant.

It could have been Trayvon Martin. This violence, this brutality is really something that's part of our national psyche, it's part of our collective history. What are we going to do about it?

You know, that part of us that still crosses the street. Locks the doors, clutches the purses when we see young black men, that part.

I mean, I know we're not shooting people down on the street, but I'm saying that the same stereotypes and prejudices that fuel those kinds of tragic incidents are in us.

We've been schooled in them as well.

I believe that we can stop these types of incidents, these Fergusons, from happening by looking within and being willing to change ourselves.

So I have a call to action for you.

There are three things that I want to offer us today to think about as ways to stop Ferguson from happening again. Three things that I think will help us reform our images of young black men.

Three things that I'm hoping will not only protect them, but will open the world so that they can thrive.

Can you imagine that? Can you imagine our country embracing young black men, seeing them as part of our future, giving them that kind of openness, that kind of grace we give to people we love, how much better would our laws be?

How much better would our country be? Let me just start with number one. We got to get out of denial. We don't need stop trying to be good people.

We need real people, you know, I do a lot of diversity work and people will come up to me at the beginning of a workshop. They're like, oh, Mr. Versity lady, we're so glad you're here. But we don't have a biased bone in our body.

And I'm like, really, cause I do this work every day and I see all my biases.

I mean, not too long ago I was on a plane and I heard the voice of a woman's woman pilot coming over the P.A. system.

And I was just like, so excited. I was so thrilled. I was like, yes, women, we are rocking it. We are now in the stratosphere. You know, it was all good. And then it started getting turbulent and bumpy.

And I was like, I hope she can drive. I know, right, but it is not even like I knew that was a bias, it's always coming back on the other leg. It is always a guy driving and it's often turbulent and bumpy. And I've never questioned the competence of the male driver. The pilot is good. Now, here's the here's the problem.

It's like if you ask me explicitly, I would say female pilot. Awesome.

But it appears that when things get funky and a little troublesome, a little risky, I lean on a bias that I didn't even know that I had, you know, fast moving planes in the sky.

I want a guy that's my default.

Men are my default. Who is your default? Who do you trust? Who are you afraid of? Who do you implicitly feel connected to? Who do you run away from?

I'm going to tell you what we have learned.

The implicit association test, which measures unconscious bias. You can go online and take it. Five million people have taken it. Turns out our default is white.

We like white people. We prefer white.

What do I mean by that?

When people are shown images of black men and white men, we are more quickly able to associate that picture with a positive word.

That white person with the positive word than we are when we are trying to associate positive with a black face and vice versa. When we see a black face, it is more easily it's easier for us to connect black with negative than it is white with negative 70 percent of white people taking that test prefer white.

Fifty percent of black people taking that test prefer white. You see, we were all outside when the contamination came down.

What do we do about the fact that our brain automatically associates, you know, one of the things that you probably are thinking about, you're probably like, you know what, I'm just going to double down on my colorblindness.

Yes, I'm going to recommit to that.

I'm going to suggest to you know, we've gone about as far as we can go trying to make a difference, trying to not see color. The problem was never that we saw color. It was what we did when we saw the color. It's a false ideal.

And while we're busy pretending not to see we are not being aware of the ways in which racial difference is changing people's possibilities, that's keeping them from thriving and sometimes it's causing them an early death.

So, in fact, what the scientists are telling us is it's a no way, don't don't even think about colorblindness.

In fact, what they're suggesting is stare at all black people, look at them directly in their faces and memorize them, because when we look at awesome folks who are black, it helps to disassociate the association that happens automatically in our brain.

Reset your automatic associations about who black men are.

I'm trying to remind you that young black men grow up to be amazing human beings who have changed our lives and made them better.

So here's the thing.

The other possibility, and and it's only temporarily changing our automatic assumptions, but one thing we know is that if you take a white person who is, like, odious, you know, and take it up next to a person of color, a black person who's fabulous, then that sometimes actually causes us to disassociate to.

So, you know, think like Jeffrey Dahmer and Colin Powell, like just stare at them.

Right. But these are the things.

So go looking for your bias. Please, please, just get out of denial and go looking for disconfirming data that will prove that, in fact, your old stereotypes are wrong.

OK, so that's number one. Number two, what I'm going to say is move toward young black men instead of away from them.

And, you know, it's not the hardest thing to do, but it's also it's it's one of these things where you have to be conscious and intentional about it. You know, I was on a Wall Street area one time, like maybe several years ago when I was with a colleague of mine.

And she's really wonderful. And she does diversity work with me. And she's a woman of color. She's Korean. And we were outside. It was late at night and we were sort of wondering where we're going. We were lost.

And I saw this person across the street and I was thinking, oh, great black guy.

You know, I was going toward him without even thinking about it. And she was like, oh, that's interesting. The guy across the street, you know, he was a black guy.

I think, you know, black guys generally know where they're going. Like, I don't I don't know why exactly. I think that. But that is what I think.

OK, so she was saying, oh, you were going, yay, black guy. She said I was going to a black guy.

Other direction, same need, same guy, same clothes, same time, same street, different reaction. And she said, I feel so bad.

I'm a diversity consultant. I did the black guy thing. I'm a woman of color. Oh my God.

I said, you know what, please, we really need to relax about this. I mean, you got to realize I go way back with black guys.

My dad is a black guy. You see what I'm saying? I got a six foot five black guy son. I was married to a black guy. My black guy thing is so wide and so deep that I can pretty much soar and figure out who that black guy is.

And he was my black guy. He said, yes, ladies, I know where you're going. I'll take you there. You know, biases are the stories we make up about people before we know who they actually are, but how are we going to know who they are when we've been told to avoid and be afraid of them?

So I'm going to tell you to walk toward your discomfort. And I'm not asked you take any crazy risks. I'm saying just do an inventory, expand your social and professional circles, just like who's in your circle. Who's missing? How many authentic relationships do you have with young black people, folks, men, women?

Or any other major difference from who you are and how you roll, so to speak, because you know what you know, then maybe just look around your periphery that maybe somebody at work in your classroom, from your house of worship somewhere, there's some black young guy there and you're nice. You say hi.

I'm saying go deeper, closer, further and build the kinds of relationships, the kinds of friendships that actually cause you to see the holistic person and to really go against the stereotypes.

I know some of you out there know because I have some white friends in particular.

They would say you have no idea how awkward I am.

Like, I don't think this is going to work for me.

I'm sure I'm going to blow this. OK, maybe. But this thing is not about perfection.

It's about connection. And you're not going to get comfortable before you get uncomfortable. I mean, you just have to do it. And young black men. What I'm saying is if someone comes your way genuine and authentically take the invitation, not everyone is out to get you.

Go looking for those people who can see your humanity. You know, it's the empathy and the compassion that comes out of having relationships with people who are different from you. Something really powerful and beautiful happens.

You start to realize that they are you, that they are part of you, that they are in your family.

And then we cease to be bystanders and we become actors, we become advocates and we become allies.

So go away from your comfort into a bigger, brighter thing, because that is how we will stop another Ferguson from happening. That's how we create a community where everybody, especially young black men, can thrive. So just this last thing is going to be harder.

And I know it, but I'm just going to put it out there anyway. When we see something, we have to have the courage to say something, even to the people we love. You know, it's holidays and it's going to be a time when we're both sitting around the table and having a good time with many of us anyway will be in holidays. And, you know, you got to listen to the conversations around the table.

You start to say things like. Grandma are big, it Uncle Joe is racist and, you know, we love grandma and we love Uncle Joe, we do.

We know they're good people.

But what the saying is wrong. And we need to be able to say something, because, you know, who else is at the table? The children are at the table and we wonder why these biases don't die and move from generation to generation because we're not saying anything.

We got to be willing to say, Grandma, we don't call people that anymore, Uncle Joe, it isn't true that he deserved that.

No one deserves that. And we've got to be willing.

To not shelter our children from the ugliness of racism when black parents don't have the luxury to do so, especially those who have young black sons.

We got to take our lovely darling to our future and we ought to tell them we have an amazing country with incredible ideals.

We have worked incredibly hard and we have made some progress, but we are not done.

We still have in us this old stuff about superiority, and it is causing us to embed those further into our institutions and our society and generations.

And it is making for despair and disparities and a devastating devaluing of young black men.

We still struggle.

You have to tell them we're seeing both the color and the character of young black men, but that you and you expect them to be part of the forces of change in this society that will stand against injustice and is willing to, above all other things, to make a society where young black men can be seen for all of who they are.

So many amazing black men, those who are the most amazing statesmen that have ever lived, brave soldiers.

Some hard working laborers, these are people who are powerful preachers. They are incredible scientists and artists and writers.

They are dynamic comedians, they are doting grandpas.

Caring sons. They are strong fathers. And they are young men with dreams of their own. Thank you. Parsecs.