DeVon Franklin and Ryan Seacrest connected on-air on Friday, June 5, and had a powerful and encouraging discussion on the importance of using your voice in the wake of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, George Floyd, and countless othersโ deaths whose names weโll never forget.
DeVon shared with Seacrest that a โfull understandingโ of his experience as a Black man โis not required to be a part of the solution,โ but that using your voice is.
โIf weโre being honest, white people, white men in particular, are the group thatโs in power that continue to allow racism to persist so where we meet, my white brothers and sisters, are to partner up and to be vocal now,โ DeVon stressed, encouraging Seacrest to further use his voice and platforms. โYouโre my brother, Ryan, so weโre having an honest conversation: I love how you have used On Air With Ryan Seacrest, that page, your Twitter, to be vocal about these issues, but Ryan Seacrest the individual, on your social media pages, has been silent around this and that silence is the silence that we need to break,โ DeVon added. โBecause when white men, especially in power, are silent when they have influence, it by definition allows these issues to persist. I canโt tell you what to post, I would just encourage you about saying something from your personal page because you do have a voice and you are influential.โ
Seacrest shared on social media that, like many others looking to fix racial injustice and support change, we โdonโt always know all the right questions to ask," but that having conversations such as today is "a step in the right direction.โ
โIโm thankful to be able to use my television and radio platforms to discuss the issues happening in our country today and I recognize the need to use ALL of my platforms to bring attention to these issues,โ Seacrest added. โWe need to have more of these conversations, both publicly and privately.โ
Read Seacrestโs full statement in the post above and join the conversation with us by sharing what other questions we can ask via social @OnAirWithRyan
To learn more ways you can get involved and use your voice, click here, and for resources we've previously shared on-air, click here and here.ย