LEAVE WHITE PEOPLE ALONE!

My last blog post 'WILLFULLY IGNORANT WHITE PEOPLE ARE TRASH' has been drawing both ire and praise from my readers. Most of the ire comes from my white readers misunderstanding the point of the article. When they realize I am not talking about all whites, which should not have to be specified (because it is in the title of the post), they tend to agree with me. White people that are willfully ignorant, and do not care about what is happening in this country because it does not affect them, are trash. Now, in my head, if you are not a white person that acts in this way, you should not be offended. In fact, none of the people who were angry about my post were angry at the subject matter once they understood it. Let me say, if anyone had been angry, I could not possibly care less. I could not care less because like I mentioned in my post, people of color have been socialized to suppress their anger. We have been socialized to believe that to be loud about our anger is to be 'going about it the wrong way'. We are supposed to take our oppression and shove it down our throats. We are expected to wait, sitting on our hands, while change happens. And let me tell you my friends, if that is what you expect from me, fuck you.

Now, I was not expecting to write this post, in fact, I had another Zodiac Couple Case study to publish, but something that happened over the weekend really affected me. My dear friend Rebecca invited me to go swimming. It was going along nicely until she went for a Starbucks run and I was left alone with her resident bae, Josh. We began talking about blogs and my last blog post came up. Josh, who is white, questioned why I had to write about willfully ignorant white people. Josh asked, "why not say willfully ignorant people are trash, why do they have to be white?". And you know, that was a great question. In fact that is the exact question that people of color have heard over and over again, in different forms. And I popped off (in my head). To me it was  the equivalent of asking, "Why are you saying some white people are racist? Can't you just say some people are racist?" or "Why does it have to be black lives matter? Can't all lives matter?". You know what, some people ARE racist, and all lives DO matter. But we are not talking about SOME people, we are not talking about ALL people, and I was not talking about ALL willfully ignorant people in my post. No, I was talking about willfully ignorant WHITE people- because that was the group I was focusing on.

Now, to my dismay Josh kept asking why I had to single out the whites in this group of willfully ignorant people (or he was pretending not  to understand because he thought it was funny to get me mad). There is one simple reason. Because,unfortunately,whites are the ones that matter in this country. Their opinions, actions, and lives are put above those of people of color. I singled them out because I had to. At the time it seemed that I had found another white person who did not fully comprehend that and this was no surprise to me. Now, Josh is not an idiot and if you were to spend five minutes with him you would be able to see that he is an intelligent person. So I was very frustrated that he could not see WHY. And even more so I was frustrated that he said my anger and frustration at the situation was humorous to him. This hurt me more than anything because as a person of color I have been laughed off so many times by whites. Not just me, but many people of color have experienced our concerns being laughed off or written off. This discussion might have been funny to Josh, but to me, my reality is no laughing matter. As people of color, this is our sad situation. I do not think it is funny in any way, and I do not think it is funny to use it as a means to toy with someone for your amusement. It was both disappointing, and disillusioning. I am not aligning him with willfully ignorant whites, in fact Josh is as far from ignorant as you can get, and I am not saying he is against the advancement of people of color. If my friend Rebecca loves him, let me tell you, he is a good person. I was just disappointed that he thought it was funny to rile me up about something so serious. It was hurtful. When questioned for comment Rebecca responded by pointing out a few things:

Getting this message from Rebecca made me feel a lot better. And it made me realize that just like I did not know Josh well enough to know that he sees these debates as sharpening skills, he did not know me well enough to know I would feel personally attacked. I now look at this exchange as a learning experience, and again- Josh is not a racist asshole. It made me realize that I was projecting my past experiences on to Josh, and that is why I perceived his actions as intrusive and combative when he was really being inquisitive. The anger and immediate defensiveness I exhibited towards Josh's questioning while deeply rooted in past pain and experiences, was wrong. These are the discussions we should be having with our white allies. Any discussion to be had is worth having, as it moves our progression along. The immediate anger I showed and the recklessness in which I let my past experience with whites cloud my view on the situation really failed me. And it presented me with a bigger pill I had to swallow: that no matter what change is made I (and anyone else who has a judge, jury, and executioner mentality) am a hindrance to the movement if I cannot listen to what others think. I thank Josh for unintentionally helping me realize that.

Although I got upset, I am glad Josh got me riled up because it made me think about why I did single out white people, and it got me to write this post. It also made me sit down and think about the anger I have about what has been happening in this country. Putting what happened with Josh aside, I want to unpack why I was so frustrated. It was suggested that I leave the 'white' distinction out of my post. He wanted to know why I could not have said all willfully ignorant 'people' are trash. If I have said it once, I have said it a thousand times, the sensitivity that white people have comes from their privilege. And I was so upset at Josh because I thought he was telling me to do the same thing many people of color have been told to do throughout history: to censor myself in favor of white fragility. For those of you who are new to this term I have provided you with the Oxford Dictionary's definition.

Now, if there is one thing that gets me really angry it is white fragility. Some white people hate being reminded that they are white and they hate being reminded of their privilege. What is ironic is what these whites feel about being unexpectedly reminded that they are white is what colored people feel about unexpectedly being reminded that they are colored. The main difference here is that people of color are more used to it and handle it better, and white people can avoid it more effectively. It is status lowering, and dehumanizing to be reminded of your skin color because in this society it reflects our place, and people of color have had to deal with this their whole lives. So excuse me (or don't) if I do not give one flying fuck about how upset white people get when you remind them of this.

Our black brothers and sisters blood flows in our streets because they are being shot for holding cell phones, our Latino brothers and sisters are having their children ripped from their arms and put in cages, seven years of fighting has cost hundreds of thousands of our Syrian brothers and sisters their  lives, driven 6.1 million of them from their homes inside Syria, and forced 5.6 million refugees to seek safety in neighboring countries only to be told they are unwanted and unimportant. And we, as people of color, are reminded of these things everyday. When we go into a store and are followed, when we read about another police shooting, when we mention the injustices and get eye rolls, or when we get asked "what are you?" (when referring to race or ethnicity). But we are used to this by now, we have been socialized that this is the norm. And we are supposed to suck it up. That is NOT okay. But remind one white person that they are white, and their whole world comes crashing down. And because of this, I have people telling me to censor myself. Telling me that I was wrong for singling out the willfully ignorant whites. No, fuck that. And fuck anyone who tip toes around white fragility and expects others to do the same. And whether Josh was joking or not, the issue is not a joke to me, and a real friend would understand that. Psychology Today suggests that  the solution, is not to make white people as cautious, tentative, and situation-conscious as people of color are in America. The solution, it is suggested, is to make people of color feel as privileged, as comfortable, and as free from being defined by their bodies as white people typically are. While that sounds all good, that solution is light years away. I am all for empowerment, but my point here is that the empowerment of colored people begins with us being vocal about our oppression. Stop expecting us to be quiet. Stop expecting us to be complacent. And most importantly, stop expecting us to tip toe around the issues in favor of white fragility. On another note, if you have a friend that takes these issues seriously do not joke about it. Do not belittle them with your humorous take on their frustrations. It is hurtful and it will not make you closer.