This week saw the finalizing of my ILC, Day of Absence/Day of Presence activities, and so much more. Though it turned out to be a busy week for non-program reasons, the many activities I’ve been working on took up quite a bit of time, too. On Wednesday, I attended Day of Absence, and on Friday I participated in Day of Presence.
To attend DoA as a first year student further cemented my appreciation for the work this school does to create safe environments for dialogue. Though much of the anti-racism training was introductory, I found it extremely helpful as much of my activism experience is in anti-war and pro-choice work, and clearly there are nuances to the work to combat systemic racism to which I had never been exposed. In the afternoon, I attended an engaging and entertaining seminar entitled “Can White People Be Woke?” The short answer seems to be “no,” for anyone curious.
Also, I experienced a rare moment of complete awareness and embodiment of my privilege and existence as a white person (haha, not quite, but maybe as close as I can get) at that workshop. Looking around the room at first, I didn’t think too critically. I just saw a sea of people. But upon a more careful second look, I chose to consciously examine the idea that all of the people in the room with me self-identified as white or were largely perceived as such. It made me briefly uncomfortable in the way that self-awareness often does, and then I was ashamed of how brief that discomfort was.
Sensationally, after my initial realization, it didn’t feel particularly strange to be in a room full of white people. A part of that is my education and life experience, having grown up in a predominantly white neighborhood and having attended predominantly white schools. But a much bigger part of that is the fact that I almost never think about my own race when entering a room.
Ostensibly, I am welcome everywhere. No one will bat an eye seeing me walk into a classroom, a courtroom, or a grocery store. I do not feel eyes follow me as I walk up and down the aisles of my favorite shops, and I have never felt unwelcome in a police station, home, convenience store, or educational institution. These places are so often built and operated with the consideration of white identities and white bodies, and usually little else. I suddenly wondered how many rooms I had walked in throughout my life populated entirely by white people that I had never stopped to notice. What a privilege to live that way, and what a narrow view of the world.
I was again made especially conscious of my race on Friday night when I listened to Baratunde Thurston‘s talk. Many if not most attendees of the talk were non-white, and though it was fantastic to create a space at Evergreen for a black man to speak and be heard, I was a little surprised at how few white people attended. Perhaps they feared potential moments of discomfort in which they would be made to feel aware of and responsible for their race.
It’s not a great feeling, huh? Try to imagine living it every moment of your life. Realistically, you probably can’t and never will, but allow the image to teach you some empathy.
Watching Thurston’s talk also made me wonder: why can’t white people take a joke? White attendees seemed scared to enjoy themselves and be entertained. I wonder if it was an attempt to be conscious not to laugh at something that may be offensive, or simply the rare experience for most white people of listening to a person of color speak without the opportunity to share their own opinion. I think we should maybe examine why that’s such a rarity and start to shut up more.
Still, the uncomfortable laughs from white folks as Thurston made comments about watching the film Get Out with his white girlfriend were so tentative (and maybe vaguely offended?). By the way, if you haven’t seen it, go see it. Take Thurston’s advice and listen closely to the jokes the white audience laughs at versus the jokes a black audience find funny.
And if you truly want to experience white discomfort, maybe listen instead of speaking once in a while. And maybe, if you listen enough, someday your silence will feel less like “reverse racism” (whatever the heck that is) and more like equity.
April 24, 2017 at 4:28 pm
I wish you could remember more about living in Japan when you were little…there were very few moments spent in public there when I was NOT deeply aware of our racial identities. You were so young – I don’t know exactly what you were perceiving – but I felt it for BOTH of us, especially because you attracted so much attention for simply being tiny, cute, and BLONDE. Those inescapable aspects of your identity in particular were pretty relentlessly noticed in a way that they weren’t in Seattle (strangers touching your head without permission, asking to take photos with you, etc). Some attention was kind and lovely and very special; some was invasive and objectifying; but always it was the result of being inescapably “other”.
Sometimes we just wanted to buy some freaking peanut butter and go home without being noticed…but in our neighborhood in Tokyo, that was never, ever going to happen. There was no anonymity – going outside our door meant being on display, always. The comfort of blending anonymously into a crowd was simply not available to us. Japan was awesome – don’t get me wrong – overall people were friendly and helpful and it was safe and child-friendly and clean, the food was amazing, the architecture was amazing, we loved it. It made me want to go live in other places even more. But still…there was always this THING of being “not-like-everyone-else”. It was different than being in England or Scotland or France. If we keep our mouths shut in those places, we’re anonymous. But not in Japan, because….”race”. Even though most Japanese people AREN’T racist. Doesn’t matter – we’re still “other”, just by looking at us.
And for me, as your “freakishly tall” Western mom, it was an interesting and often uncomfortable experience to be your parent and protector through all that, as well as having my own reactions, responses, and filtering to do. It was often illuminating, and also exhausting.
I can still vividly recall the relief I would feel when we walked into someplace – a coffee shop, a grocery store, a playground – and there was a white person there. It happened maybe two or three times a week, but definitely not every day. MAN, it made me squirm to feel that way. Still does. Why was it so significant?
As a “good, non-racist” white person, wasn’t I supposed to not care about race? As the weeks went on, it quickly became obvious in a really personal and profound way why
“I don’t see race, I see the *person*…”
is such a joke, and comes from such truly blind privilege, and why it’s so enraging to so many people. I don’t know how to get past that in our culture. If we hadn’t lived in Japan for that time, I’m not sure I would be able to hear it in the same way that I do now. Still an incomplete understanding, of course, but definitely different than before our trip. Before, I’d probably argue that people who say “I don’t see race” have their hearts in the right place, so why be mad? And maybe they do – maybe they’re trying…but now I see a little better why it’s enraging for people of color to hear. “Not seeing race” is something only people with generations of pretty much absolute power can afford to pretend to do.
I am not comparing our experience in Japan qualitatively to the experience of being African-American in this country – the misalignment of history, experience, perception, power, etc between those situations is obviously profound. We never felt unsafe, we were mostly treated with respect (if sometimes a distinct coldness), we didn’t have to find education or jobs or housing on our own, and we always knew we were going to go home and get to “disappear” again into the un-earned elite status we pretty mindlessly enjoy here. But I try to use it as a toe-hold to build my own visceral understanding when I listen to stories of “other-ness”.
It certainly made me aware of my own race – and of race in general – in a way that I’m not sure I would ever have to experience otherwise, in my comfy little North Seattle life. It really made me question a lot of stuff, and also to see race a lot MORE here at home. I hope it helped us as a family to become more ANTI-racist, not just NON-racist. It made me very aware of the absence of kids of color in your kindergarten classroom, and to seek out another school for you where that was NOT the case (at least as much). I don’t know if that was a correct decision, or a racist decision, or what, but you turned out pretty okay and made friends, so I’m gonna decide to be okay with it. Parenting and trying to raise an anti-racist white kid in America is a moving target, especially when my own understanding is always changing.
I’m glad Evergreen works hard to create and extend these opportunities, and that you encourage other students to take advantage of them.
Maybe we can’t be “woke”, but generation-on-generation, if we listen to others and ourselves, and be WILLING to put ourselves in uncomfortable situations through Days of Absence and Days of Presence, through travel, and film, and lectures, and books, and whatever we can come up with – perhaps we can try to get a bit closer. I’ve got to hope so. Discomfort is a small price to pay, and holy sh*t do we owe it to our fellow human beings to not just endure it, but steadily and consciously seek it out.