Dealing with Everyday Racism
Originally Published in the Reclaiming Quarterly #79, Summer 2000
Starting in 1992, the year I joined the Sojourner Truth Congregation of Unitarian Universalists, till 1999 when it ceased to meet as a congregation, I gave a series of lectures and sermons on the topics of racism, sexism, homophobia, and diversity. This particular talk started as an hour long lecture as part of our 1994 seminar series on African Americans and race relations. It was later shortened to a sermon and delivered to a suburban congregation the following year.
Mine was the last lecture in the series and the topic was chosen as a provocative ending to a hugely succesful six month run. When I sat down to write this talk, I realized that there was nothing about racism that wasn't everyday and every waking moment from my perspective. And that realization poignantly set the tone and tenor of my talk.
Target Audience
What audience should I address with this talk? Well, there is not much I can tell other African Americans or Native Americans about racism or how to deal with it. And I cannot speak for the experience of Asian, Latino, and other oppressed groups. We all, in some sense, deal with oppression every day of our lives and all of us have developed complicated strategies just to live out our everyday life. Each and every one of us is an expert on our oppression. No there is not much I can tell victims of racism about how to deal with it. I can only share my personal strategies in dialogue.
So if I cannot target my talk at victims of racism, maybe I should target my talk at people who benefit from racism. The problem is that most who benefit from racism, are not aware of it. There are no announcements, such as "We do this because you are not black", or "not Latino."The "For Whites Only"signs are gone, and just about no one uses the n-word in polite conversation nowadays. It is all very hush hush, buried in coded words, and under wraps.
So much in fact that many well meaning white people in this country sincerely believe that (a) racism is an isolated phenomenon restricted to poor uneducated whites and the Nation of Islam; (b) Black people have just as much access to opportunities as whites, although they seem not to take as much advantage of it; or my personal favorite (c) Black people are prone to immoral behavior but it's not their fault really it is a pathology caused by the anti poverty programs of the 60s and 70s'. So targeting a talk on dealing with racism to a group that doesn't even acknowledge it existence is kind of difficult.
It was when I contemplated these dilemmas and others, that I decided to focus my talk on strategies for allies. What is an ally? An ally is someone who although not the target of an oppression, is outraged by its existence and is willing to act on that outrage. We are all potentially allies in the struggle against oppression. We may not always know what to do, and sometimes what we do is not helpful, but our actions are rooted in a sincere wish to stop oppression. And so I am directing my talk to anyone who is or can be an ally in the fight to end racism.
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Wish I could be there. Very well spoken.
Katrina,
I wish you all the blessings and power you need on your journey. Thank you for these words. It is good to remember that returning to work (and thus returning to grace) bring a chance for us all to rest and have joy.
Wishing you joy in the Work.
David
Dear Katrina- Thorn reposted your blog and happy am I. Your passion, always so immense, comes blowing out in these words. So akin to my own heart and soul that it makes me have a bittersweet smile.
The Storm is only now coming to the edges of our universe and yet it will sweep and consume all that is. In the end, our beautiful universe will be so much...more? Different? Complete? Who knows?
All I do know is my soul came here to witness and be part in this period. I cannot shrink from the work. I am here with you, fae sister!
Thought-provoking piece, Katrina. Thanks.
I don't know what to call myself either. In Pagandom, I've taken to referring to myself as a Witch at Large. In the interfaith world where I'm active, I call myself a Pagan. Sometimes I call myself an uppity woman or a Second Wave Feminist. I've never really thought to publicly identify myself by my sexuality, het woman, which is very "white bread" and old-fashioned. Not only het, but serially monogamous for the most part. It seems almost a liability these days to say you're het, but I am proudly and happily so. I tend towards intellectualism but only have a BA, which doesn't carry much weight, at least in public and professional worlds, no matter how much you've studied, trained, and can articulate, even teach.
My biological heritage is Irish, Dutch, French Huguenot, Euro-mongrel. My social heritage is Roman Catholic on one side and conservative Methodist, temperance-crusading, women's rights and education on the other, with distinct East Coast sensibilities, now mellowed by more than half a century living on the Left Coast. My maternal political heritage is conservative Republican (altho what my relatives might think of current trends in the GOP I cannot imagine, since they did have brains and they did think and they did have a social conscience), yet I am much farther left in my outlook than any elected official I know. My paternal political heritage is blue collar Democratic, except that my dad broke with his family on politics and allied with my mother's family's conservatism.
I'm a former hippie, a home-birth advocate, a home death and green burial advocate, an opponent of capital punishment and resorting to warfare to resolve humankind's differences. I support the right to conscious self-deliverance. I rejoice in any and all consensual expressions of love and eros. I'm a lover and a mom.
I have never missed voting in an election and I disrespect those who don't avail themselves of this hard-won right. (I have ancestors who fought the Brits in the American Revolution.) I support workers' rights. I recognize our interdependence on this planet, so could be called a greenie. I'm a committed environmentalist in my day-to-day life (in terms of eating locally grown food, expanding public transit, recycling, preserving open space and wildlife, opposing exploitation of natural resources [strip mining, oil-drilling, nuclear facilities, agribusiness, monocultures, clear-cutting timber, overuse of pesticides, genetic modification, etc.]) I want to make the city streets "safe for dancing," as my old friend Tony Serra said when he ran for mayor of SF on the Platypus Party ticket.
Well, you got me going there, my friend. Thought-provoking read, as I said. ;-)
xo,
Macha
Lovely azaleas!
[cough][gag][snort][sneeze]
Just lovely...
I know what you mean.
I feel you. There is too much bs- particularly when people decide that their temperament is tantamount to truthful and ignore everyone else.
I get irked by immature extroverts or closet introverts who ignore you REPEATEDLY and then pretend you're out of line for being upset by the time they can't pretend you didn't say anything anymore. I find that the same people will ignore you if you blow up right away, too, and that it's because they just don't think that honoring what you value is important to maintaining a relationship, or even worse: that you don't know what you value at all and that it's all a mind game for their pleasure or annoyance. Then they call you passive-aggressive, aggressive, moody, touchy and temperamental. I call them "not listening".