A work in progress

We are all works in progress! It's uncomfortable! Most of the time we adults do a good job of putting on a competent front, and in many areas we are actually competent. The reality is, however, that nobody has everything figured out. We are all constantly changing, learning, and growing every day, and even though growth can be uncomfortable, our potential for growth is an encouraging fact. We can learn and change and make changes! One of the topics I have been working to learn more about is structural racism and how to pull it down to create equality for people of all colors.

"We have to learn and fight at the same time. Because people have been waiting far too long for their chance to live as equals in this society." --Ijeoma Oluo

I always hesitate to share my thoughts on tough topics in public places. For one thing, it doesn't seem like enough to change or help. I don't know enough to even know what to do or say. And I worry about "optical allyship," aka cultivating the appearance of support without doing the work to learn more and support causes I believe in. But, I have been reading and thinking a lot about structural racism over the past six months and the more I learn, the more I see that there will never be a point where I know enough not to feel uncertain, a point where I can do enough to effect massive change like Martin Luther King Jr. and so many others have done. What I can do is keep reading, keep working on my awareness, keep teaching my kids, and keep doing my part to dismantle racism, big and small, in myself and in my tiny corner of the country. I have to be brave enough to learn and fight at the same time.

The idea of learning and fighting at the same time resonates deep in me. It feels right, although my peaceful non-pugnacious personality prefers to replace "fight" with "act." It means we don't have to have a perfect knowledge to try. Even though simultaneous learning and fighting feels right, jumping into the fray and learning along the way is not my favorite method. I prefer to learn and digest everything I can on a tricky topic before saying anything about it at all. But I have been reading anti-racism books nonstop for the past six months and I still feel like too much of a beginner to actually say anything about it! That tells me I will likely never "know enough," so can't just passively read for the rest of my life. 

"We have to learn and fight at the same time. Because people have been waiting far too long for their chance to live as equals in this society."

These words from author and activist Ijeoma Oluo helped give me courage to start the conversation, to make it known where I stand. It's ok that I don't know or understand everything. I can start and I can try and I can learn along the way.

A few lessons I've learned so far:

• It is not a person of color's job to educate me or anyone about the burden caused by racism; it's on ME to learn about it. Related: it is not a person of color's job to congratulate me on my anti-racism efforts.   
• Racism is not about one isolated act, big or small. Each microaggression --each quickened step, each averted gaze, each "random search," each clumsy interaction--builds on a long history and adds to an exhausting burden for people of color.
• Intent does not cancel effect. If I bump into someone, I don't say "I didn't mean to" and expect them to be fine. I say "I'm sorry!" and try to make it right because I caused damage. It's the same with racial relations. 
• Even if I didn't specifically, personally cause damage to someone of a different race than me, the fact that I am white and benefitting from an unearned set of privileges by living in a white-controlled country means I can and should ACT to push against white supremacy in my way.
• Having black or brown friends/spouse/children does not automatically mean you are free of racism. Living in a white supremacist society means it takes constant vigilance to pull down racism because it pops up in so many unexpected ways.
• Whiteness is not the ideal. Saying things like "she's black, but she's super articulate and well-educated" implies that you think people who are black are not articulate or educated. That's one small way to change how to think and talk.
• Tone matters, but it is not acceptable to discount a person's pain just because they express it in a tone that I don't love. I did a lot of soul searching about tone policing, because tone affects my highly sensitive self deeply. I am learning to accept words and allow the tone in regards to a person's lived experience with racism. Expressions of pain should not be policed.
• If I don't teach my white kids to be anti-racist, they will absorb the idea of white superiority naturally because that's the foundation of our society. This fact was a jolt, and now I am trying to up my parenting game!

So far, my action looks like:

• Reading from anti-racism books every day.
• Voting for leaders who I think will serve all races most equally.
• Teaching my kids: about what racism looks like (both implicit and explicit), that it is not ok, and to be aware of how they treat others. 
• Trying to support black businesses whenever I can. (This is my newest effort, and also my weakest link because I'm ridiculously picky with my purchases and not a big spender in general. But I am trying to be more conscious about who I buy from, and I hope to grow that awareness.)

During dinnertime on Martin Luther King day, we had a family discussion about race and racism in our country. It was good until I asked the kids if they had ever noticed any racism at school. They shrugged and said no. At that point I remembered that our school district is 95% Latino and that creates a very different racial dynamic than what I have been reading about. Kids focus on their own personal daily lives, not the big national picture! I'm not saying our schools are free of problems; I just realized in that moment that I need to figure out how to teach my kids to be anti-racists in their actual life. Speaking of learning along the way... I guess it's back to the drawing board on the real-life personal application part of our family discussions! 

Our schools here may not be very diverse, but it is still important that I keep teaching my kids about the realities of racism in our country so they can be aware and not make superficial assumptions such as "I'm not racist because I have lots of brown friends" or "my life is good, so everyone else is probably fine too" or "we've had a Black president before and now we have a Black vice president, so clearly racism is a thing of the past." It is not. 

Back in college, I took a Therapeutic Recreation class, where I learned about "person first" language. Person first language means always placing the person before any other adjective. A man who is gay. A girl with a disability. This is easily one of the top ten most valuable lessons I learned in my entire college experience. Putting the person first emphasizes their humanity, the basic similarities that as humans we all possess. I LOVE that. 

Before my anti-racism study began, I cringed when I heard someone called a "black woman" or even "black lives matter" because my person-first foundation screamed "but they are people! Put their humanity first!" As I have studied racism, however, I have come to understand that you can't take the race out of the person. A black woman can't only be a woman. She can't even be a woman first, because in our society, her skin color affects her lived experiences so deeply, it cannot be separated from her womanhood. 

It was actually the question of person first language that got me started on studying racism in the first place. Amidst all of the racial unrest last summer, I naively kept thinking person first language would solve these problems. "They are people, not colors!" I thought. But that oversimplification didn't sit quite right with me, so I started reading. And the more I read and learned, the more I realized what a complex fraught pervasive problem racism really is. Respecting people is important, but there is a whole lot more to pulling down racism than mere respect because we can't just flip a switch and say "ok, I respect all people now." There are learned behaviors, assumptions, laws, injustices, etc. that need to be carefully examined and removed over time.

Person first language is still my main sensitivity guideline, and I still put the person first as often as possible, but I understand that it is not the Final Word No Matter What. Even the idea that calling someone a black man might be offensive is actually something to consider: it implies that black is less. Not so!

This post has been a work in progress for weeks. It is a vulnerable feeling to attempt to put these thoughts into words that are balanced and respectful to all. Even after reviewing and revising this post over and over, I'm scared I said something wrong or rude or insensitive. 

It's SO easy to get discouraged along this charged, confusing anti-racism journey. As a work in progress, I fumble and feel all kinds of overwhelmed discouragement frequently. My white privilege slyly tells me that I could quit this tough self-examining anti-racism journey with zero consequences. I could. But people of color can't quit living with the painful burden of racism, so I can't in good conscience quit doing my small part to dismantle it. So I pick myself up, reach for my courage, and remind myself that all I can do is my best within my tiny circle of influence, to learn and fight at the same time.

An introspective, serious selfie seems appropriate.

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Anti-racism books I have read so far:

• White Fragility by Robin Diangelo
• Me and White Supremacy by Layla F. Saad
• Why I'm No Longer Talking to White People About Race by Reni Eddo-Lodge
• A Promised Land by Barak Obama (not a specifically anti-racism book, but a memoir of the first black president still fits the category in my opinion)
• The Truths We Hold by Kamala Harris
• So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo
• I'm Still Here by Austin Channing Brown