Tom Hanks expressed guilt over his role in an industry that "helps shape what is history and what is forgotten" in a powerful op-ed for The New York Times about the strikingly overlooked 1921 Tulsa race massacre. In the essay, published Friday, Hanks described himself as "a lay historian," but confessed to knowing nothing about the murder of as many as 300 Black residents at the hands of a white supremacist mob until last year.
"History was mostly written by white people about white people like me, while the history of Black people — including the horrors of Tulsa — was too often left out," he writes. "Until relatively recently, the entertainment industry, which helps shape what is history and what is forgotten, did the same. That includes projects of mine."
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