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Whiteness has always been predicated on blackness.
there was no concept of race or a white race before the need to justify the enslavement of Africans.
whites split off from themselves and project onto black people the aspects that we don’t want to own in ourselves.
depict blacks as dangerous, a portrayal that perverts the true direction of violence between whites and blacks since the founding of this country.
There is empirical evidence that people of color (especially black people) have been discriminated against in hiring since the ending of enslavement and into the present.
white women have been the greatest beneficiaries of affirmative action, although the program did not initially include them.
Corporations are more likely to favor white women and immigrants of color of elite backgrounds from outside the United States when choosing their executives.
affirmative action never applied to private companies—only to state and governmental agencies.
Such beliefs would be unimaginable if we had been shown images
anti-blackness in how much more harshly we criticize blacks, by every measure.
satisfied approval of white people observing mass incarceration and execution in the present.
white identity depends in particular on the projection of inferiority onto blacks and the oppression this inferior status justifies for the white collective.
white collective fundamentally hates blackness for what it reminds us of: that we are capable and guilty of perpetrating immeasurable harm and that our gains come through the subjugation of others.
benefit from, and are complicit in, a racist system:
reduced psychosocial stamina that racial insulation inculcates.
field, habitus, and capital.
Habitus includes a person’s internalized awareness of his or her status, as well as responses to the status of others.
separate intentions from impact.
White fragility may be conceptualized as a response or “condition” produced and reproduced by the continual social and material advantages of whiteness.
Remarkably, a sense of white superiority and knowledge of racial power codes appear to develop as early as preschool.
racially based advantages as fair and normal,
power to choose when, how, and to what extent racism is addressed or challenged.
maintains white power because the ability to determine which narratives are authorized and which are suppressed is the foundation of cultural domination. This
continual retreat from the discomfort of authentic racial engagement in a culture
privilege is defined as a legitimization of one’s entitlement to resources, it can also be defined as permission to escape or avoid any challenges to this entitlement.”
cocoon of racial comfort, centrality, superiority, entitlement, racial apathy, and obliviousness, all
form of bullying; I am going to make it so miserable for you to confront me—no matter how diplomatically you try to do so—that
“All white people are invested in and collude with racism”
the only way to give feedback without triggering white fragility is not to give it at all.
when I say “safe,” what I really mean is “comfortable.”
obscure racism, protect white dominance, and regain white equilibrium.
From my position of social, cultural, and institutional white power and privilege, I am perfectly safe and I can handle
messages circulate 24-7 and have little or nothing to do with intentions, awareness, or agreement.
forms of dominance and intimidation,
contrary to popular white mythology, white women—not people of color—have been the primary beneficiaries of affirmative action. When forced
Ameliorating a white woman’s distress as quickly as possible may be felt as a literal matter of survival.
We must continue to ask how our racism manifests, not if.
All of us are socialized into the system of racism.
Given my socialization, it is much more likely that I am the one who doesn’t understand the issue.
How have we managed not to know, when the information is all around us?
warned readers not to depend on people of color for our racial education and explained why this dependency is problematic.
these relationships always have a degree of distance and inauthenticity.
I have a better sense now. Can we return to our conversation?” I then
my actions are driven by my own need for integrity, not a need to correct or change someone else.
being seen as a threat and a troublemaker. These biased assessments often lead to job loss, stress-related illness, criminal charges, and institutionalization.
our institutions were designed to reproduce racial inequality and they do so with efficiency.
