cultural sensitivity 101
a perennial struggle of mine has made its way to the forefront. it was a non-issue at my previous job since there was no pretense of accommodating anything other than white, english-only privilege (and i survived that job the best i could by laying low and generating change in the places where possible--i.e i was, for the most part, a coward). i made my escape and the new job, thankfully, started with a retreat for folks in education. awesome to work with an administration that recognizes the need for an induction that touches on the history of education in this area (cultural genocide and institutionalized racism) and then sets it up so that those that direct the workshop are indigenous leaders. brilliant, right?
i loved the workshop. loved networking, loved learning more about this area, loved sharing my experience and loved getting on my soapbox about how important this is, how when i grew up in alaska we didn't learn any of this and we should have and how present racism is here and how much work there is to do.
but i suck at engaging with people who don't get it. the people who ask annoying, clueless questions or get stuck focusing on cultural differences (i tried to write some examples but i can't, not without mocking). i am a harsh judge of my peers who i perceive as slow to recognize the urgent need to engage with this, folks who still use phrases like "melting pot" in a positive way, folks blind to their own privilege. folks who, if i'm being fair, are for the most part genuinely interested in the kids they work with and who are good folk. i'm not talking about the out-and-out racists, or assholes, i'm just talking about people who are slow to get it.
and so i disengage from those people. but i realized this week that i leave the work for someone else. usually the same workshop leaders. like they don't have enough to do already. so i'm lazy. but there's more to it: i'm disgusted in some way by these people. i think, "why didn't they get this already?" "how come they don't know their privilege?" "how can they ask these clueless, insulting questions?"
i want to become better at this. their questions were my questions, their privilege a reflection of my own, their racism is mine. i feel bad that i had an opportunity this week and i missed it.
posted by andrea at 4:25 PM
1 Comments:
This is a very clear-eyed observation. What you've identified is, in my view, one of the major challenges for white anti-racist organizing and educational work - namely, engaging compassionately with other white people.
Some activist theorists actually talk about this as an early "stage" in white anti-racist development in which we try to distance ourselves from other white people and distinguish ourselves as "with it." I've never been completely convinced about this stage scheme, however. In my own life and work, I've experienced it more as an ongoing pull with which I have to constantly struggle. And I think you're right that this is partly about laziness - it's exhausting to engage with people who seem oblivious to the ways in which they participate in perpetuating white supremacy as a social system.
One of the ways I've tried to work with my own tendency toward distancing is to think and act like an organizer. For me, this means trying to see other white people (with some notable exceptions, including cops, fascists, and dedicated right-wing assholes) as potential allies - people who can be moved to critical consciousness and action for justice.
How to put this into practice is something I'm still working on. I think it really helps to identify shared values around justice and equality, to listen carefully to what people say, and to avoid being self-righteous and dismissive. At the same time, I think one of the most important things to do in engaging white people about racism is to orient discussions around power (which means talking about history, systemic violence, and inequality) rather than individual intentions (which is the frame that most white people use for thinking about racism).
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