So You Want to Talk About Race

by Ijeoma Oluo

didn’t give enough space to the importance of recognizing that Kimberlé Crenshaw had coined the term “intersectionality” to address the specific ways in which black and brown women were being harmed by what we now call “White Feminist” efforts to help women in social, political, and economic spaces.

I remember saying once that

if I stopped to feel, really feel, the pain of the racism I encountered, I would start screaming and I would never ever stop.

family. I had started to see myself, and once you start to see yourself, you cannot pretend anymore.

Racism in America exists to exclude people of color from opportunity and progress so that there is more profit for others deemed superior.

What keeps a poor child in Appalachia poor is not what keeps a poor child in Chicago poor—even if from a distance, the outcomes look the same. And what keeps an able-bodied black woman poor is not what keeps a disabled white man poor, even if the outcomes look the same.

It is about race if a person of color thinks it is about race. 2. It is about race if it disproportionately or differently affects people of color. 3. It is about race if it fits into a broader pattern of events that disproportionately or differently affect people of color.

We are, each and every one of us, a collection of our lived experiences. Our lived experiences shape us, how we

interact with the world, and how we live in the world. And our experiences are valid. Because we do not experience the world with only part of ourselves, we cannot leave our racial identity at the door. And so, if a person of color says that something is about race, it is—because regardless of the details, regardless of whether or not you can connect the dots from the outside, their racial identity is a part of them and it is interacting with the situation.

Disadvantaged white people are not erased by discussions of disadvantages facing people of color, just as brain cancer is not erased by talking about breast cancer. They are two different issues with two different treatments, and they require two different conversations.

Often, being a person of color in white-dominated society is like being in an abusive relationship with the world. Every day is a new little hurt, a new little dehumanization. We walk around flinching, still in pain from the last hurt and dreading the next. But when we

say “this is hurting us,” a spotlight is shown on the freshest hurt, the bruise just forming: “Look at how small it is, and I’m sure there is a good reason for it. Why are you making such a big deal about it? Everyone gets hurt from time to time”—while the world ignores that the rest of our bodies are covered in scars. But

While just about everything can be about race, almost nothing is completely about race.

Systemic racism is a machine that runs whether we pull the levers or not, and by just letting it be, we are responsible for what it produces. We have to actually dismantle the machine if we want to make change.

We can get every person in

America to feel nothing but love for people of color in their hearts, and if our systems aren’t acknowledged and changed, it will bring negligible benefit to the lives of people of color.

Tying racism to its systemic causes and effects will help others see the important difference between systemic racism, and anti-white bigotry.

I’m sorry, I wish I could say that reading this book would guarantee that you’d never

leave a conversation about race feeling like you’ve gotten it all wrong and made everything worse. But I can’t. It’s going to happen. It’s going to happen, and you should have these conversations anyway.

State your intentions. Do you know why you are having this particular conversation? Do you know why this matters to you? Is there something in particular you are trying to communicate or understand? Figure it out before moving forward and then state what your intentions are, so that the people you are talking with can determine whether this is a conversation they are willing to join. Very often, these attempts at conversation fail because two people are entering with two very incompatible agendas

and proceed to have two very different conversations, and that doesn’t become clear until it blows up in anger and frustration. 2) Remember what your top priority in the conversation is, and don’t let your emotions override that. If your top priority is understanding racism better, or addressing an incident involving race, or righting a wrong caused by racism, don’t let the top priority suddenly become avenging your wounded pride if the conversation has you feeling defensive. 3) Do your research. If you are going to be talking about an issue you are not familiar with, a quick Google search will save everyone involved a lot of time and frustration. If terms or subjects come up that you are not familiar with, you can ask for some clarification if you are in person, but know that if you are a white person talking to a person of color—it is never their job to become your personal Google. If you are online and these topics or terms come up, you can Google faster than it takes to hold up the entire conversation begging people to explain things to you. Even if you are a person of

color, making sure you understand more about the topic you are trying to address, beyond your immediate experience with it, will give you more confidence in your conversation and will help you get your point across. 4) Don’t make your anti-racism argument oppressive against other groups. When stressed, when angry, when tired, or when threatened, our worst selves can come out. It is fine to be angry, there is a lot about racism to be angry about. And it is fine to express that anger. But it is never okay to battle racism with sexism, transphobia, ableism, or other oppressive language and actions. Don’t stoop to that level, and don’t allow others to. We must be willing to fight oppression in all of its forms. 5) When you start to feel defensive, stop and ask yourself why. If you are talking about race and you suddenly feel the n...

too heated to ask yourself these questions, at least try to take a few minutes away to catch your breath and lower your heart rate so that you can. This is something that happens to people of all races, and not only can it stop us from hearing things that need to be said, it can stop us from saying what we really mean to say. 6) Do not tone police. Do not require that people make their discussions on the racial oppression they face comfortable for you. See chapter 15 for more details. 7) If you are white, watch how many times you say “I” and “me.” Remember, systemic racism is about more than individuals, and it is not about your personal feelings. If you find yourself frequently referring to your feelings and your viewpoint, chances are, you are making this all about you. 8) Ask yourself: Am I trying to be right, or am I trying to do better? Conversa...

victory will rarely look like your opponent conceding defeat and vowing to never argue with you again. Because your opponent isn’t a person, it’s the system of racism that often shows up in the words and actions of other people. 9) Do not force people of color into discussions of race. People of color live with racism each and every day with no say over when and how it impacts their lives. It is painful and exhausting. When people of color have the rare luxury to choose to not engage in additional dialogue about race, do not de...

It is important to learn how to fail, to learn how to be wrong in a way that minimizes pain to you and others and maximizes what you can learn from the experience.

6) Remember that it is worth the risk and commit to trying again. Okay, this conversation didn’t go well. In fact, it went horribly. And now you know that you have more to learn and more you have to do to get better at this. But you have to just keep trying, because the alternative is your complacency in the continued oppression of people of color.

And if you are white, and you don’t want to feel any of that pain by having these conversations, then you are asking people of color to continue to bear the entire burden of racism alone.

Privilege, in the social justice context, is an advantage or a set of advantages that you have that others do not.

When somebody asks you to “check your privilege” they are asking you to pause and consider how the advantages you’ve had in life

are contributing to your opinions and actions, and how the lack of disadvantages in certain areas is keeping you from fully understanding the struggles others are facing and may in fact be contributing to those struggles.

this, a privilege has to come with somebody else’s disadvantage—otherwise, it’s not a privilege.

When we identify where our privilege intersects with somebody else’s oppression, we’ll find our opportunities to make real change.

Everything we do publicly can be made more inclusive and uplifting with intersectionality, and everything we do can become exclusionary and oppressive without it.

Intersectionality, and the recognition and confrontation of our privilege, can make us better people with better lives.

And I’m not sure what’s worse, the fear and anxiety and fatigue brought on by yet another encounter with an officer that you are hoping and praying to make it out of intact, or the never-ending denial by the rest of society of the fear and anxiety and fatigue you experience as a valid response to the near-constant reminder that those assigned and empowered to protect you see your skin color as evidence of wrongdoing, and could take your freedom or even your life at any time, with no recourse.

This belief that black people and people of color are more dangerous, unpredictable, and violent is not something that I believe most police officers (and other Americans) even know they believe. But they do believe it deep down.

you also believe in justice and equality for people of color, you will not see the lack of trust on behalf of communities of color as simply a difference of opinion. You will instead expect your police force to earn the respect and trust of communities of color by providing them with the same level of service that you enjoy. People of color are not asking white people to believe their experiences so that they will fear the police as much as people of color do. They are asking because they want white people to join them in demanding their right to be able to trust the police like white people do.

Either you believe these disparities exist because you believe that people of color and women are less intelligent, less hard working, and less talented than white men, or you believe that there are systemic issues keeping women and people of color from being hired into jobs, promoted, paid a fair wage, and accepted into college.

We can broadly define the concept of cultural appropriation as the adoption or exploitation of another culture by a more dominant culture.

These microaggressions help hold the system of White Supremacy together, because if we didn’t have all these little ways to separate and dehumanize people, we’d empathize with them more fully, and then we’d have to really care about the system that is crushing them.

And this is important to remember, for all of us. No matter what our intentions, everything we say and do in the pursuit of justice will one day be outdated, ineffective, and yes, probably wrong. That is the way progress works.

It is my job as a parent to help give them the platform they need to build their way on, or to smash once they’ve decided it doesn’t work for them.

future. It is our job to be confused and dismayed by the future generation, and trust that if we would just stop trying to control them and instead support them, they will eventually find their way.

My goal as a writer and an activist is not to shape future generations. I hope to give a platform, a foundation for our young people to build upon and then smash to bits when it is no longer needed.

I’m a human being who was born deserving justice and equality, and that is all you should need to know in order to stand by my side.

uphold. Your efforts to dismantle White Supremacy are expected of decent people who believe in justice. You are not owed gratitude or friendship from people of color for your efforts. We are not thanked for cleaning our own houses.

Conversations about race and racial oppression can certainly be tough, but that’s nothing compared to how tough fighting against racial oppression can be. Our humanity is worth a little discomfort, it’s actually worth a lot of discomfort. But if you live in this system of White Supremacy you are either fighting the system, or you are complicit.

You are racist because you were born and bred in a racist, white supremacist society. White Supremacy is, as I’ve said earlier, insidious by design. The racism required to uphold White Supremacy is woven into every area of our lives. There is no way you can inherit white privilege from birth, learn racist white supremacist history in schools, consume racist and white supremacist movies and films, work in a racist and white supremacist workforce, and vote for racist and white supremacist governments and not be racist.

This does not mean that you have hate in your heart. You may intend to treat everyone equally. But it does mean that you have absorbed some fucked-up shit regarding race, and it will show itself in some fucked-up ways.

The question is: do you want to look like a better person, or do you want to be a better person? Because those who just want to look like a better person will have great difficulty with the introspection necessary to actually be a better person. In order to do better we must be willing to hold our darkness to the light, we must be willing to shatter our own veneer of “goodness”