Mary Sisney's Blog - Posts Tagged "robin-diangelo"
Dear White People: How Not To Talk About Race And (To) Black People
On a Friday in late September, I had the kind of mind-blowing, rage-inducing day that most white folks can't even imagine. First, I learned that someone had changed the labels of the homes owned by people of color in my community from the appropriate designation--single family home--to condominium on the real estate web site Zillow. It says something about how many racist jerks there are in real estate (not to mention in the Claremont area) that I had three suspects. Then, as I was seeking comic relief from usually favorite white comedian Bill Maher (he's been off his game lately and is sinking on my entertainment poll almost as fast as 2020 presidential candidate Amy Klobuchar has sunk on my political poll), British bigot Andrew Sullivan stated angrily on Bill's show that black people often don't have fathers. The one black female on the panel that night was (as public black folks so often have to be) calm and cool. But her mouth dropped open momentarily. Obviously, all people have fathers. However, Sullivan, who was defending Joe Biden, whose gaffe (I thought he didn't hear the reparations question and was answering an earlier question aimed at Andrew Yang) during the third debate had caused some consternation among mostly younger black liberals, was doing what bigots do really well, pointing out what's wrong with black folks. Fortunately, I have Twitter and know how to use it. After comparing the fatherless Obama to GW Bush and Trump, I told Sullivan to fix his people before he tried to help mine. After all, my people aren't the ones killing 58 people in Las Vegas, 9 in Dayton, 9 in Charleston, and 22 in El Paso. I said in an earlier post (see 8/5/18 post) banned on Twitter that I insist on discussing race with white folks because silence on the topic has led to an insane white supremacist occupying the White House. However, I'm learning to be more careful about when and how I talk to white folks about race. Even my white friends can't handle my black rage and despair. To rewrite a very old Will Smith rap: "White people just don't understand." They need to talk about race among themselves before they join the conversation with blacks. The more woke white folks, like Chelsea Handler (who is moving up on my entertainment poll) and Robin DiAngelo, author of WHITE FRAGILITY, need to set their people straight so that they can stop adding to the oppression of my people. Because I'm an optimistic teacher (see Jill Biden's memoir) who believes even clueless white people can learn, I will help Chelsea and Robin by telling their people who want to communicate with blacks more effectively what not to do and say in conversations about race and/or black people.
1) Don't "talk black" to (or around) black people you don't know really well. Although I assume many white people use the so-called n-word when talking among themselves, even Trump knows better than to use that word in public or when he might be recorded. However, black people may frequently use the word among themselves and occasionally in front of their white friends. No matter how comfortable a white person feels in the company of black people, no matter how frequently the black people they know use that word, and no matter how often their black friends may complain about political correctness, whites should avoid the word to be safe. Also, don't use words like "brother" and "sister" to refer to blacks unless you're with your black friends of many years.
2) Don't use racism denial, fake colorblind statements like "I treat everyone the same" (a lie) and "I don't care if they're white, brown, or purple" (there are no purple people). Also, avoid claiming that there is not a racist bone in your body. First of all, the bones of racists are not the problem. What's in your brain, and what's coming out of your mouth? Second, if you protest too much, smarter black people will become suspicious.
3) Don't complain about being called racist, and don't try to tell black people who is or is not racist or what behavior is or is not racist. Being called racist is not as bad as being racist or being oppressed by racism. White people are not experts on racism because they have not been oppressed by it. They haven't worried about their unarmed family members being murdered by police. They haven't been followed in stores. And the older ones didn't have to ride in the back of the bus, use "colored" restrooms, and drink water out of "colored" water fountains.
4) Don't ask black people if they think you or a specific behavior by you or someone else is racist unless you want to know the truth. Expecting your black acquaintances, colleagues, or friends to reassure you that you're not racist is putting still another burden on people who are already carrying too many.
5) Don't tell black acquaintances, colleagues, neighbors, or friends about your racist family members, acquaintances, colleagues, friends, or neighbors. Black people know enough about racists and racism. Talk to your white friends about your favorite bigots.
6) Don't compare your experiences growing up as a poor and/or ugly white child to growing up black in a racist society. Cops don't usually kill unarmed poor and/or ugly people. I also don't remember poor and/or ugly white children in my old Kentucky hometown having to go through back doors, ride in the back of the bus, or drink out of the ugly/poor water fountain during the Jim Crow period.
7) Don't change the subject when black people talk about racism, even if their rage makes you uncomfortable. If you expect black people to listen to your complaints about your boss, your spouse, your children, or your health problems, you should be able to listen to them discuss a problem that makes those problems seem minor.
8) Don't tell black people that discussing racism creates division. If we can discuss sexism, income inequality, and homophobia without creating division, why can't we discuss racism? White people who can only accept black (and other people of color) people when they pretend that they're just white people with really good tans are bigots.
9) Don't tell black people what's wrong with their race. Whites need to fix their folks, who voted for an insane, incompetent, unpatriotic, corrupt white supremacist and who are killing other people and themselves, before they try to heal us. Black people voted for Al Gore, John Kerry, Barack Obama, and Hillary Clinton. Whites voted for George W. Bush twice, John McCain, Mitt Romney, and Donald Trump. Yet the white folks are trying to prevent black people from voting. John Lewis is black. Mitch McConnell is white. I rest my case.
10) White folks who voted for Trump and still support him shouldn't talk to (sane; Kanye is as crazy as Trump) black people.
Blacks and whites must talk about race, and yet too often when they do, things can go very wrong. We blacks need to talk about race with whites only when we know that we can remain as cool as Heather McGhee did on Bill Maher's show a few weeks ago, and white folks should talk to blacks about race only when they can avoid acting superior, needy, defensive, and/or racist. Whites who can't follow my rules should quietly listen while the black folks talk about race, nod sympathetically, and wait patiently for the race conversation to end.
1) Don't "talk black" to (or around) black people you don't know really well. Although I assume many white people use the so-called n-word when talking among themselves, even Trump knows better than to use that word in public or when he might be recorded. However, black people may frequently use the word among themselves and occasionally in front of their white friends. No matter how comfortable a white person feels in the company of black people, no matter how frequently the black people they know use that word, and no matter how often their black friends may complain about political correctness, whites should avoid the word to be safe. Also, don't use words like "brother" and "sister" to refer to blacks unless you're with your black friends of many years.
2) Don't use racism denial, fake colorblind statements like "I treat everyone the same" (a lie) and "I don't care if they're white, brown, or purple" (there are no purple people). Also, avoid claiming that there is not a racist bone in your body. First of all, the bones of racists are not the problem. What's in your brain, and what's coming out of your mouth? Second, if you protest too much, smarter black people will become suspicious.
3) Don't complain about being called racist, and don't try to tell black people who is or is not racist or what behavior is or is not racist. Being called racist is not as bad as being racist or being oppressed by racism. White people are not experts on racism because they have not been oppressed by it. They haven't worried about their unarmed family members being murdered by police. They haven't been followed in stores. And the older ones didn't have to ride in the back of the bus, use "colored" restrooms, and drink water out of "colored" water fountains.
4) Don't ask black people if they think you or a specific behavior by you or someone else is racist unless you want to know the truth. Expecting your black acquaintances, colleagues, or friends to reassure you that you're not racist is putting still another burden on people who are already carrying too many.
5) Don't tell black acquaintances, colleagues, neighbors, or friends about your racist family members, acquaintances, colleagues, friends, or neighbors. Black people know enough about racists and racism. Talk to your white friends about your favorite bigots.
6) Don't compare your experiences growing up as a poor and/or ugly white child to growing up black in a racist society. Cops don't usually kill unarmed poor and/or ugly people. I also don't remember poor and/or ugly white children in my old Kentucky hometown having to go through back doors, ride in the back of the bus, or drink out of the ugly/poor water fountain during the Jim Crow period.
7) Don't change the subject when black people talk about racism, even if their rage makes you uncomfortable. If you expect black people to listen to your complaints about your boss, your spouse, your children, or your health problems, you should be able to listen to them discuss a problem that makes those problems seem minor.
8) Don't tell black people that discussing racism creates division. If we can discuss sexism, income inequality, and homophobia without creating division, why can't we discuss racism? White people who can only accept black (and other people of color) people when they pretend that they're just white people with really good tans are bigots.
9) Don't tell black people what's wrong with their race. Whites need to fix their folks, who voted for an insane, incompetent, unpatriotic, corrupt white supremacist and who are killing other people and themselves, before they try to heal us. Black people voted for Al Gore, John Kerry, Barack Obama, and Hillary Clinton. Whites voted for George W. Bush twice, John McCain, Mitt Romney, and Donald Trump. Yet the white folks are trying to prevent black people from voting. John Lewis is black. Mitch McConnell is white. I rest my case.
10) White folks who voted for Trump and still support him shouldn't talk to (sane; Kanye is as crazy as Trump) black people.
Blacks and whites must talk about race, and yet too often when they do, things can go very wrong. We blacks need to talk about race with whites only when we know that we can remain as cool as Heather McGhee did on Bill Maher's show a few weeks ago, and white folks should talk to blacks about race only when they can avoid acting superior, needy, defensive, and/or racist. Whites who can't follow my rules should quietly listen while the black folks talk about race, nod sympathetically, and wait patiently for the race conversation to end.
THEY DON’T KNOW US: HOW MY FOLKS CAN WIN
In her new book NICE RACISM, which discusses how progressive whites cause racial harm, Robin DiAngelo argues that white folks see themselves as both individual and universal. It’s one of the best points made about race and racism. (Of course, white progressives have attacked the anti-racism white woman for taking money away from blacks who should be exploiting this anti-racism moment, proving her point that too many whites become very defensive when anyone suggests they might be racist). Because they see themselves as individuals, not representative of a race, whites don’t have to worry about what other whites do. White folks may have been ashamed that Donald Trump was President of their country (and most of them, even the less racist progressives, see the USA as their country), but they weren’t ashamed that he was white. Even the Scottish and German people show no signs of being embarrassed that he is from their ethnic tribes. They also don’t have to be ashamed of (or blamed for) what happened on 11/8/16, 11/3/20, or 1/6/21. All white folks have to say is, “I voted for Hillary and Joe,” or “I was appalled by what those MAGA people did at the Capitol,” and their consciences are clear. White women have been especially obnoxious during the last almost five years. The majority of them voted for Trump twice, and some of them were at the Capitol (two died there) on 1/6, yet they are still pretending that the real problem in America is toxic masculinity and sexual harassment from powerful men instead of white supremacist, possibly sexist white women destroying our country with their votes, their calls to the police, and their (figurative) rape screams. Although white women don’t speak for everyone as often as white men do, they too see themselves as universal. That’s why Cindy McCain could say in her recent book that Americans had not yet elected a woman President. As I pointed out in my review of that book, the majority of Americans elected a white woman as President in November, 2016, but because the majority of white folks, including women, voted for an insane, self-proclaimed sexual assaulter, a white supremacist, he won the rigged-against-urban-people-of-color-and-democracy electoral college and shamefully became our President. It must be nice being a white person. However, they have a major problem when dealing with black folks like me. They don’t know us the way we know them. The progressives can pretend that we’re all alike and so black folks will think and behave like them while the white supremacists can cling to their racist belief that all blacks are ignorant, lazy, and criminal, so they can “conquer” us by outthinking us or framing us for “crimes.”
When I encounter whites speaking for Americans or “all humans” on social media, I let them know that I won’t even try to speak for all black women born in Kentucky in 1949. In fact, if another black female was born in Henderson, Kentucky, on March 15, 1949, I won’t even speak for her. Because I know I’m not universal, I don’t assume that people think and behave like me. Therefore I’m less surprised and more prepared when other people, no matter their race, gender, generation, class, religion, or sexual orientation, behave differently from the way I would. When I was younger and closer to my Southern Baptist roots, I could frequently be surprised and tricked by dishonest people. But after decades of dealing with mostly white shameless liars and cheats, I’m less likely to be conned than I was in my twenties and thirties. Still, as a recent blog post (6/18/21) indicated, I can be ripped off by people in the business of taking other people’s money and especially by rotten real estate operatives whose shameless lying and corruption are still shocking (although sometimes amusing) to me after forty-eight years of studying and working in white institutions and an even longer period of dealing with dishonest business folks (a few of them black, like a Bible-quoting landscaper at the end of the 20th Century).
My best weapons against lying, cheating, bullying white folks are not my education, as I suggested in the 6/26/15 blog post, and my good citizenship, as I suggested in a 2018 e-mail to a backstabbing real estate lawyer and in a comment to the Claremont City Council this year, but my knowledge of white folks and their lack of knowledge of my people in general and a black woman like me in particular. How many black women born in the Jim Crow South, who skipped kindergarten because they were living with their illiterate grandmother and who went to an all-black elementary school, where they had only black female teachers until seventh grade, then had no women of color teachers from seventh grade through graduate school, and only three (a black man at Northwestern, a black man and an Asian man at USC) men of color teachers during that period, and who spent much of their academic and professional careers as the only black person, occasionally the only person of color, in departments and classrooms where they were students and then teachers do you know? How many black women do you know who were living with their illiterate grandmother at fifteen and had a PhD in English from USC (supposedly only the second black woman to earn that degree in that department) at thirty? If you know me, the answer is one. If you don’t, none. Even black people find me strange and often don’t know how to deal with me. White folks are clueless when they’re trying to manipulate and/or bully me.
I, on the other hand (like many black folks my age and younger), have plenty of experience dealing with white folks. Once I left the all-black elementary school at twelve, most of my classmates and all but two of my classroom teachers (I had a black male professor for an Independent Study at USC) were white. After high school, the majority of them were white men. When I became a teacher, most of my colleagues were also white men. During the one year I taught there, I was the only black person and person of color in the English Department at Evanston High School, which was so large it had been divided into four schools the year after I graduated. I was also only one of two black teachers in one of those four schools—Michael; the other one was a man. During most of the time I was in the graduate program at USC, I was the only black student in my classes. By the time fellow Kentuckian Gloria Watkins, aka bell hooks, arrived, I had finished my coursework. At Tufts University, I was the only person of color in the small English Department, and at Cal Poly Pomona, I was one of only two blacks, but the other slightly older black woman was on medical leave for many years. While the CPP student population changed from overwhelmingly white to more diverse during the many years that I taught there, the black student population actually shrank, so (except when I taught the undergraduate black literature course) I was more likely to be the only black person in the classrooms where I taught than to have even four black students in a class. In other words, the majority of my teachers, colleagues, and students were white. And once I entered graduate school, the majority of my friends were white. I even lived with white folks at thirteen when my mother was a live-in maid in Highland Park, Illinois, and I briefly stayed with her “on the place,” and when I was a mother’s helper, also in Highland Park, during my fourteenth and fifteenth summers, and every weekend during my sophomore year of high school. During the weekends of my junior and senior years, I babysat four white children who lived in Skokie. I KNOW WHITE PEOPLE!
But white people don’t know black people and especially a black woman like me. Corrupt, racist real estate white folks have the same problem with me that the white social media cyberbullies do. When they see that they can’t outwit me, they try to bully and intimidate me. English teachers are wimpy, right? A woman who writes in Standard English and likes to use alliteration and puns in her social media comments probably sits at home with her cat in her lap, drinking tea, reading and writing poetry (well, I did just buy a collection of Nikki Giovanni’s poetry), and watching the latest costume dramas on television. Uh, that’s not Mary F. Sisney, not even close. The cyberbullies think if they call me terrible names, I’ll block them or at least stop commenting. It never works. Most of them eventually block me. The real estate crooks think they can intimidate me by sending men of color to my door (one of my white friends would call the police if a man of color appeared at her door) with fake legal papers. They think that if they create a hostile enough environment for me I will sell my house like some of my white former allies have and leave. But I’m used to hostile environments. I’ve been in hostile environments since at least the age of twelve. They think that they can get under my very dark skin by sending separate papers in my mother’s name, but just as the name calling on Twitter and Facebook reveals how ill-mannered and crude the racist white cyberbullies are, sending fake papers to a 93-year-old black woman who has been in memory care for five years reveals how racist, corrupt, and cruel these white real estate jerks are.
While corrupt, cruel, racist whites might briefly enrage me, they can’t irritate me nearly as often and as well as I can them. I know exactly what upsets racist white folks. As DiAngelo’s book indicates, even the progressives not only hate to be called racist but don’t really want to discuss race and racism. And as I explained in my 8/4/19 blog post, the most racist white folks hate successful, well-educated black folks. I’m going to send some documents to racist, corrupt Bungalows Board Treasurer Tim Harrison and to racist, corrupt, incompetent head of CMS (Condominium Management Services) Jim McCarthy Junior that will give them nightmares. Because my mother was a hoarder, I even have the 1967 letter from Northwestern announcing my $600 scholarship (the tuition for a year was only a little over $3000 back then, and because my mother worked as a maid there, I paid only half of that; my Illinois State Scholarship covered the rest of the tuition, so I received a stipend each quarter during my freshman year). I, of course, will also include a copy of the document that shows I paid off my mortgage almost exactly four years ago (nearly twelve years early).
Whites have more advantages, more privileges, than blacks do, but one advantage we have is that we know them much better than they know us. We should use that advantage when battling corrupt, racist white folks like rotten real estate operatives. We can laugh at them while they’re trying to bully and intimidate us. And we can get under their beige (also called “nude” or “flesh-colored” because they’re so “universal”) skin by pointing out their racism and by flaunting our achievements. Black folks can win if they use their knowledge of “the ways of white folks” and their “shady” signifying skills to fight back against corrupt, cruel, clueless bigots.
When I encounter whites speaking for Americans or “all humans” on social media, I let them know that I won’t even try to speak for all black women born in Kentucky in 1949. In fact, if another black female was born in Henderson, Kentucky, on March 15, 1949, I won’t even speak for her. Because I know I’m not universal, I don’t assume that people think and behave like me. Therefore I’m less surprised and more prepared when other people, no matter their race, gender, generation, class, religion, or sexual orientation, behave differently from the way I would. When I was younger and closer to my Southern Baptist roots, I could frequently be surprised and tricked by dishonest people. But after decades of dealing with mostly white shameless liars and cheats, I’m less likely to be conned than I was in my twenties and thirties. Still, as a recent blog post (6/18/21) indicated, I can be ripped off by people in the business of taking other people’s money and especially by rotten real estate operatives whose shameless lying and corruption are still shocking (although sometimes amusing) to me after forty-eight years of studying and working in white institutions and an even longer period of dealing with dishonest business folks (a few of them black, like a Bible-quoting landscaper at the end of the 20th Century).
My best weapons against lying, cheating, bullying white folks are not my education, as I suggested in the 6/26/15 blog post, and my good citizenship, as I suggested in a 2018 e-mail to a backstabbing real estate lawyer and in a comment to the Claremont City Council this year, but my knowledge of white folks and their lack of knowledge of my people in general and a black woman like me in particular. How many black women born in the Jim Crow South, who skipped kindergarten because they were living with their illiterate grandmother and who went to an all-black elementary school, where they had only black female teachers until seventh grade, then had no women of color teachers from seventh grade through graduate school, and only three (a black man at Northwestern, a black man and an Asian man at USC) men of color teachers during that period, and who spent much of their academic and professional careers as the only black person, occasionally the only person of color, in departments and classrooms where they were students and then teachers do you know? How many black women do you know who were living with their illiterate grandmother at fifteen and had a PhD in English from USC (supposedly only the second black woman to earn that degree in that department) at thirty? If you know me, the answer is one. If you don’t, none. Even black people find me strange and often don’t know how to deal with me. White folks are clueless when they’re trying to manipulate and/or bully me.
I, on the other hand (like many black folks my age and younger), have plenty of experience dealing with white folks. Once I left the all-black elementary school at twelve, most of my classmates and all but two of my classroom teachers (I had a black male professor for an Independent Study at USC) were white. After high school, the majority of them were white men. When I became a teacher, most of my colleagues were also white men. During the one year I taught there, I was the only black person and person of color in the English Department at Evanston High School, which was so large it had been divided into four schools the year after I graduated. I was also only one of two black teachers in one of those four schools—Michael; the other one was a man. During most of the time I was in the graduate program at USC, I was the only black student in my classes. By the time fellow Kentuckian Gloria Watkins, aka bell hooks, arrived, I had finished my coursework. At Tufts University, I was the only person of color in the small English Department, and at Cal Poly Pomona, I was one of only two blacks, but the other slightly older black woman was on medical leave for many years. While the CPP student population changed from overwhelmingly white to more diverse during the many years that I taught there, the black student population actually shrank, so (except when I taught the undergraduate black literature course) I was more likely to be the only black person in the classrooms where I taught than to have even four black students in a class. In other words, the majority of my teachers, colleagues, and students were white. And once I entered graduate school, the majority of my friends were white. I even lived with white folks at thirteen when my mother was a live-in maid in Highland Park, Illinois, and I briefly stayed with her “on the place,” and when I was a mother’s helper, also in Highland Park, during my fourteenth and fifteenth summers, and every weekend during my sophomore year of high school. During the weekends of my junior and senior years, I babysat four white children who lived in Skokie. I KNOW WHITE PEOPLE!
But white people don’t know black people and especially a black woman like me. Corrupt, racist real estate white folks have the same problem with me that the white social media cyberbullies do. When they see that they can’t outwit me, they try to bully and intimidate me. English teachers are wimpy, right? A woman who writes in Standard English and likes to use alliteration and puns in her social media comments probably sits at home with her cat in her lap, drinking tea, reading and writing poetry (well, I did just buy a collection of Nikki Giovanni’s poetry), and watching the latest costume dramas on television. Uh, that’s not Mary F. Sisney, not even close. The cyberbullies think if they call me terrible names, I’ll block them or at least stop commenting. It never works. Most of them eventually block me. The real estate crooks think they can intimidate me by sending men of color to my door (one of my white friends would call the police if a man of color appeared at her door) with fake legal papers. They think that if they create a hostile enough environment for me I will sell my house like some of my white former allies have and leave. But I’m used to hostile environments. I’ve been in hostile environments since at least the age of twelve. They think that they can get under my very dark skin by sending separate papers in my mother’s name, but just as the name calling on Twitter and Facebook reveals how ill-mannered and crude the racist white cyberbullies are, sending fake papers to a 93-year-old black woman who has been in memory care for five years reveals how racist, corrupt, and cruel these white real estate jerks are.
While corrupt, cruel, racist whites might briefly enrage me, they can’t irritate me nearly as often and as well as I can them. I know exactly what upsets racist white folks. As DiAngelo’s book indicates, even the progressives not only hate to be called racist but don’t really want to discuss race and racism. And as I explained in my 8/4/19 blog post, the most racist white folks hate successful, well-educated black folks. I’m going to send some documents to racist, corrupt Bungalows Board Treasurer Tim Harrison and to racist, corrupt, incompetent head of CMS (Condominium Management Services) Jim McCarthy Junior that will give them nightmares. Because my mother was a hoarder, I even have the 1967 letter from Northwestern announcing my $600 scholarship (the tuition for a year was only a little over $3000 back then, and because my mother worked as a maid there, I paid only half of that; my Illinois State Scholarship covered the rest of the tuition, so I received a stipend each quarter during my freshman year). I, of course, will also include a copy of the document that shows I paid off my mortgage almost exactly four years ago (nearly twelve years early).
Whites have more advantages, more privileges, than blacks do, but one advantage we have is that we know them much better than they know us. We should use that advantage when battling corrupt, racist white folks like rotten real estate operatives. We can laugh at them while they’re trying to bully and intimidate us. And we can get under their beige (also called “nude” or “flesh-colored” because they’re so “universal”) skin by pointing out their racism and by flaunting our achievements. Black folks can win if they use their knowledge of “the ways of white folks” and their “shady” signifying skills to fight back against corrupt, cruel, clueless bigots.
