Frienily, we have some healing to do, some deep deprogramming – if not reformatting altogether – and some relearning. And it is not going to be easy, or pretty.
The dominant culture on this entire planet is designed to exclude non-white and non-male people from power. Occasionally somebody sneaks through, and thank goodness they do. But at least for the United States, the backlash of our most recent non-white person in a leadership position has been, honestly, shameful and horrific. People of color are fighting for their lives, fighting for the right to even exist, and far too many white people are, if not actively fighting back, then not getting out of the way and making room for those lives. And it’s time, so far past time, that we embrace our wonderful human rainbow and let everybody be who they are. Period.
This post isn’t really about that, though. What I want to talk about is a tendency for humans to see that they have been doing something wrong and take a hard 180 while beating the shit out of themselves in the process. Please don’t let’s do that. We can’t do that. Sustainable change happens rationally, intentionally, and carefully.
Let’s say Margaret wants to lose fifty pounds, because one day she looked at herself in the mirror and the light hit in a way it hadn’t before, and she saw, in disturbing detail, every bulge and pooch and pocket of fat and flab, and had a serious freak out. So she goes on a rampage through the kitchen, throwing out all the food that she sees as part of the problem, and then makes a shopping list with carrots, celery, apples, every kind of lettuce, and entirely too much kale. She calls her local gym and sets up a membership, and an appointment with a trainer for tomorrow. And she messages all her girlfriends, saying, “Shit! I’m soooo fat! Who wants to be my diet buddy? I’m going ALL IN!!! The FAT MUST GO!!!”
The first thing she does after her session with the trainer is ignore everything she tells her about taking it slow and working up to it. And for three days she can barely walk, and she’s starving so she orders some take out, just this one time . . . And so on and so on.
Does this sound familiar? This is how most Americans treat any sudden crisis they happen to notice. Must! Fix! Now! But it’s never sustainable. I’m guilty as hell of this very crime. Less so as I get older, because these days this kind of behavior would quite literally land me in the emergency room. But I have done this, and regretted it.
What does this have to do with the crisis of conscience we’re facing as a nation? Everything.
Right now, we’re protesting, we’re out on the streets, we’re making a ruckus, and it’s making a difference, things are starting to change. But conversations are too often devolving into arguments, because White Fragility is starting to creep into the equation, like it always does. White women’s tears are washing away the stories of Black People’s Real Lives. And my greatest fear is that we’re about to do what we always do: say we have no idea how it happened, condemn our own actions, promise to do better, and . . . Like good abusers everywhere, behave just enough for just long enough for our victims to catch their breath and start to think, Maybe it really is different this time, and then WHAMMO back to the same old bullshit.
Now, the other thing you must understand is that White people cannot lead these efforts and these conversations about becoming a Culture of Equality. We are the ones who broke it, and keep breaking it, over and over. I know, you didn’t ask for the system to be created the way it was and for that system to be sustained for so many centuries. And sadly, there is a veil between the two worlds, Black and White, that prevents us from really seeing each other. Very seldom do we get to mix in the same neighborhoods and socialize easily together. Once in a great while. I lived for thirteen years in a neighborhood that seemed like a rainbow to me, after growing up and spending most of my life in little White towns. And I thrived on it. I got to know my neighbors, got to participate in celebrations of cultures that I had no idea about. It was magical. But it was also a big wake-up call, as I watched my neighbor next door get harassed by the police nearly every day, for sitting on his porch reading to his kids while Black, for going to work to support his family while Black, for taking his wife who suffered and eventually died from Marfan syndrome to the ER while both of them were being Black . . . And while watching them handle it so calmly and politely because their lives literally depended on their staying calm about it.
No White heroes allowed in this situation. You are here to work, and to serve, and to help, and to be in support of the movement. But in this instance White people need to step into secondary roles and allow the Black folks to shine, because we have been dimming their lights for so long. No more. It’s not about White people.
And so I worry that once again, we’re going to throw ourselves into this fight against injustice, and then get bored: “Well, it’s not really about me,” and suddenly Black Lives Matter just a little bit less than they did a month ago.
I know us. I know this is how we operate. You know us, too. It hurts to admit this, but we have to face it in order to change it.
We can’t let our brothers and sisters down again. We just can’t. Can you imagine, after 600 years of slavery, of being treated like animals, of oppression and abuse and systemic racism and racist policy that was specifically designed to oppress, can you even imagine the searingly excruciating disappointment of every Black mother, praying that her son isn’t the next casualty in this war against all people who look like him, if we back off on this? If we don’t hold our elected representatives accountable for changing once and for all the racist policies that keep people of color at such a disadvantage that they can’t . . . even . . . breathe?
But we can’t do it from a place of frenzy and panic and self-loathing. We have to get our heads on. We have a lot of healing to do around this issue, and many of us are, be honest, part of the problem. We have enormous privilege, and most of us have never done anything about any of this. We can’t be complacent anymore, but we can’t go in like a bull in a china shop, because that has the potential to make everything so much worse.
Job One is to educate yourself.
There are some wonderful books that I can highly recommend, and I recommend that you read them in this order:
- White Fragility, by Robin Diangelo, which brings great clarity to the issues of white privilege and fragility, and why we need to let that shit go;
- I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made For Whiteness, by Austin Channing Brown, which gives us a look at some of our unconscious behaviors in the way we treat people of color and our attitudes toward their reactions and expectations of being treated with the same respect as anyone else;
How to Be and Antiracist, by Ibrahm X. Kendi, which helps us understand that racist policies get created and become the status quo because White people allow them to, and how we can see it, call it out, and work to change it.
Job Two is to listen, without judgment or defensiveness, and keep your damn mouth shut unless you are saying, “Thank you, I understand now and I will do better.”
Do not expect your Black friends and acquaintances to drop whatever they are doing in order to educate you. There are resources widely available, including the three books mentioned above, that you can start with to get a better idea about what needs to stop and how you can support change. After you have listened, the next step is to believe what you are hearing, because if you take these stories with a grain of salt, you aren’t really listening.
Job Three is to call it out when you see it and let it be known that you will not tolerate racism, personal or policy, anymore.
None of us are perfect, and we’re not going to get it right every time, but the more we learn the better we can do, and the more we do, the easier it gets. But please, while you are learning, be gentle with yourself. Don’t beat yourself up about stuff you might have said or done in the past; you know better now, so do better now. You don’t have to dwell on what you didn’t know then. It wasn’t okay, but that part of your life is over and now that you have seen what is really going on, you can never un-see it. Learn from the past, but move toward something better.
And maybe the most important thing that White folks can do is get on the phone to our mostly White elected officials and insist that they listen, that they do better, that they vote to pass legislation that makes it harder to discriminate, that makes it illegal to profile, that makes police harassment of innocent people a crime, that makes killing Black men and women actually illegal and consequential. No more Black girls going to jail for life because they killed their White abuser after how many years of torture, rape and abuse. No more White men getting off with probation for killing unarmed Black people in the shopping mall parking lot for walking to their cars while Black. Write letters, send emails, call them, leave messages. White voices get heard, Black voices get tuned out. So raise a fuss. Don’t let them tune you out.
Don’t expect forgiveness, or any kind of reward for behavior that, honestly, should already be the norm for everybody. It’s like men of a certain age and upbringing wanting a reward for doing the dishes or folding their own damn laundry and putting it away. No, guys, you live here, these are yours, deal with ’em. You eat the food, you can help clean up the kitchen. So no, White folks, you don’t get a medal for doing what is humanly decent and correct, for doing what should have been expected of you all along. You do what is right because it is right, not because you get extra points for it.
We can create change swiftly and sustainably if we stay calm and open; listen and learn; don’t judge, get defensive, or make excuses; and let it be known that racism in all its forms is unacceptable and will not be allowed to flourish anymore.