Hey White people, Kos brought up racism and sexism among progressives. Now’s a good time to check our own responses for some common reaction patterns.
“You’re being racist” is apparently the last thing a White person wants to hear. Try it sometime; tell a White person of your acquaintance that they did something that was racist. Actually, there’s no need to even go that far. Hint that they might not have spoken up when someone else said something racist, describe a time when someone else acted in a racist way, talk about what it’s like to be a person of color. And watch the reaction begin.
Some people have a base level of responding badly to any criticism. - “You’re wrong,” “You insulted me,” “You broke my arm.” – with denial, defensiveness, lashing back, etc. But when the criticism involves racism somehow there’s an extra layer. Not only is it not true, but it could not be true. I am pure, innocent, untainted. Normally when we are criticized we have at least some capacity to try the criticism on for size before accepting it or politely disagreeing, but when it comes to racism things are different. Notice the lengths to which we White people will go to avoid engaging with the point of feedback about racism. If there is any imperfection, no matter how small, latch onto it for dear life and refuse to engage with any other aspect of the critique. Deny that there is a problem. Turn the conversation to be about my feelings or my pet issues. Refuse to learn from the criticism unless the other person can demonstrate that they have perfectly understood me first. Refuse to listen to what is said unless it is said in the “right” way (i.e. the way that causes me no discomfort). Does any of this feel familiar?
What it comes down to is this: we as White people have been taught that maintaining our own comfort is more important than the harm we do to our brothers and sisters of color.
I remember where I first learned this about myself. I have the great good fortune to work in a school where my colleagues push me to become a better White person. One of my colleagues pushed me fairly hard to listen to a Black student who had a problem with something I had done. I remember her softening me up before the conversation with the student and not letting me get away with trying to shift the conversation to be about me. As I processed this over the following weeks and months, I started to notice that my default is to prioritize my desire to avoid conflict with adults over the learning of our predominantly Black and Brown students.
I do not like this about myself, but it is strikingly empowering to know about it. Like anyone else, I have a list of traits I would like to change about myself, but succeeding at improving this one feels so much better than victories regarding on something like spending less time online. As a person in a dominant group, I have the power to make my little corner of the world a better place simply by working on my self-improvement to-do list. How cool is that! When someone points out something I could do differently to make the world a better place, normally it’s something like showing up at a representative’s town hall or something – it takes a ton of effort and a ton of people to nudge 1/438th of one house of one branch of one level of government to pass a policy that in a couple years may impact my students and colleagues. You’re telling me something I can do right now, by myself, to impact them tomorrow? WOOO HOOO!!! MORE PLEASE!!!
It is a mindset shift along two dimensions. The first is simply acknowledging that our brothers and sisters of color are being routinely hurt in large and small ways. This is the default. Accept the impossibility of having clean hands in a fallen world. You can’t avoid participating in doing harm to people of color. It is baked into laws, our hiring practices, our iPhones. It is baked into clutching purses as Black people go by, definitions of what it means to be professional, and acceptable ways to give feedback. Your hands are dirty. When someone points this out to you, they give you an opportunity to grow. If they don’t do so, you’re still doing whatever the problematic behavior is, you just don’t know about it. Shifting to a mindset of “ I know I need to do better, who can help me?” is a way to welcome feedback.
More generally, this is a shift to a growth mindset. I highly recommend Carol Dweck’s book Mindset for further discussion, but in short it is a shift from valuing pretending to be perfect (by avoiding anything we struggle with) to valuing growing and seeing mistakes as opportunities to grow.
The second dimension is our attitude toward what should happen if we have caused harm. In a punitive framework, if I have caused harm, I am a Bad Person who Deserves to be Punished. My only hope of not being a Bad Person is to gather enough evidence in my defense to fend off the accusation that I have done harm. This is especially true with racism. Because racism is Very Very Bad, if I have done something racially problematic, then I am A Racist which is even worse than just a normal Bad Person.
This approach is counterproductive. Taking on a scarlet R and covering oneself in sackcloth and ashes does no one any good. You don’t need to be punished; you need to fix the harm you did. In the example from my own life that I gave earlier, the student didn’t need or want me to angst over being a bad person. She wanted me to hear her and redo the problematic conversation right. Which we did. Harm fixed. This is the Restorative Justice approach that is becoming more popular in schools. I recommend restorativejustice.org for further study. Some harms are harder to fix, but listening and acknowledging rarely makes them worse. Surprisingly many day-to-day ones, such as “I overlooked you when I invited people to give input on this decision. Should we reopen this decision? How can we make sure this doesn’t happen again?” are actually quite fixable. Being unable to fix them all is no reason not to fix what I can. A good starting point is to start learning about past and common harms to become more able to spot them. Anti-racism in-person trainings are another avenue. I know of ones through Unitarian Universalist congregations. I’m sure there are others.
Finally, as White people we need to put the experiences of people of color at the center of policy creation. Even aside from the moral arguments, from a purely selfish perspective, people of color (esp. women of color) are the ultimate test case for any progressive agenda. If we start with them and expand out, racism and sexism basically guarantees that everybody else will have it even better off. If we don’t explicitly start with them, then we end up with “victories” that are just the latest in a long line of policies that help all people… as long as they’re white. Design economic justice programs for everybody by putting the experience of queer, Black, Muslim, immigrant women with disabilities at the center of policy analysis. Then listen to what they say we need to do in this country. I bet you that the results would lift all boats far better than economic justice programs that start with White men and forget to make it to everybody else… again.