Today I facilitated a dialogue between a group of first-years regarding very basic race and ethnicity issues. We discussed diversity and inclusion, and overall it was a good talk. There were a lot of different identities and perspectives present. Yet, there was a single phenomenon I noticed during the entirety of the conversation- none of the white students there said a word the entire time.
The black and Asian students carried the conversation mostly, and one girl spoke up to share her experience as a Latina woman who passes as white. But the white students stayed absolutely silent. This is something that was interesting for me to consider, as our class is very vocal and engaged with these issues although we are all white. We have people of all ages and backgrounds in our class, much like the discussion today, but the only different factor was that there was racial diversity in the dialogue. For some reason, this made all of the white people in the room silent.
I think this is interesting to consider because it relates to a conversation that I was having with a friend the other day. She discussed how she really wanted to spend time in minority communities as a white ally but was scared to enter certain communities out of fear that she would say the wrong thing and be disregarded by everyone. She was scared to speak because she did not know enough, and did not want to upset anyone. This relates somewhat to the conversation we had in class the other day when someone brought up that their friend was afraid to speak in the African American and Diaspora studies class they were in for fear of backlash from the black students in the class.
The main argument here is that people do not always know to respond in these situations, so they remain quiet. That is very much how the white students in my session today responded. They could not identify with the systems of oppression, micro aggressions, and overt racism that the students of color in the room had seen so many times. Therefore, they just listened. As they left, they were talking amongst themselves about how they now understood many things that they did not know about before.
I think this brings up an important point. Sometimes, the best way to learn is to listen. You cannot ask a black student to tell you all about why black people act in certain ways and do certain things because they should not be asked to speak for their entire race. People do not always want to answer questions about their lives and experiences. Hence, sometimes sitting and listening when they openly choose to share their experiences is the best way to learn. Although it may have been an uncomfortable experience for the white students that took part in the discussion today, the intentions were good and it was great to see them take the initiative to come to the event. They learned the rhetoric and forms of micro aggressions that they should avoid for the next time they are in a situation along those lines so that they can actually speak their minds without the fear of offending someone that they very obviously had today.
Hi,
I think your point about interracial discussions is very important, and something that occurs frequently without ever being discussed.
The main reason I can think of for the hesitance is that people are nervous to accidently offend someone. We talk in class about how much white people fear being called racist. So, in dialogue with representatives of many races present, it can be nerve wracking to share a thought or idea, in case it is accidently construed as insensitive or hurtful. Like you brought up, people fear that, since they don’t have the same experiences as members of other races, they don’t want anyone to feel as though they are trying to speak for them or know what it’s like from their perspective.
In class, we watched a video in which Tomi Lahren criticizes Jesse Williams’s BET Award speech. One of the points that Lahren emphasizes in her short video is about how she isn’t afraid to speak up, and encourages viewers to not be afraid to voice their opinions; dancing around what you want to say rather than just sharing it only perpetuates miscommunications and does nothing to help. However, Lahren herself is too brash and approaches matters insensitively. It is an important skill to try to strike a balance when having an uncomfortable conversation, somewhere in between being afraid to speak up and talking in a way that offends people.
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I can recall situations that I have been in that mirror the one you have described in this blog post. I cannot say that I have ever experienced cases of discrimination because of my race and I am so grateful for that. I think that in diverse forums, my lack of experience does isolate me from commenting on race relations and cases of racism and micro-aggressions that others have faced. I completely agree with your point that it is important for white people like myself to listen, especially because I would have no similar anecdotes to share. However, I also think it is important that people of different races and of all races find common ground in these discussions so that we are more easily able to relate to and understand the people around us. I have absolutely come away from conversations in which I was only listening with more knowledge than I possessed before, but I think that because in situations like these, if listening instead of contributing comes from fear of being mocked or attacked, it is not nearly as valuable. I would like to clearly state that I am not victimizing myself or anyone of the white race because of discomfort we may feel in conversations about race relations. I agree that the discomfort is necessary and valuable.
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