There is a surface level belonging in whiteness. It provides place, group identity, and connection, it locates me in an exclusive community of similarly raced others within a larger racial structure. Whiteness gives guidance — it tells me how to navigate a racialized social context, furnishing tools and story to help illuminate the way. But, what is the cost of maintaining belonging to whiteness? For me, it’s overpriced.
One cost of my sticking with it, is denying the experience of people of color — some of the people who I most love. There’s this irrational practice within whiteness that I’ve found myself falling into. It’s where I learn about racist lived experiences from my loved ones, I take in this knowledge, and go on to seek out evidence that supports the opposite.
In these nonsensical moments, I look to strangers for the truth, or create alternative reasons for what happened. Maybe it wasn’t racism, it can’t be, it must’ve been… fill in the blank. I do this rather than seeing, hearing, and believing racist truths from people I know and trust.
Then there’s the rationalization that this way of being with racism, is founded in concern and love for others. It’s the idea that I can’t possibly accept an existence this harmful to other people and especially to those I care for. Surely this sort of world doesn’t exist.
But it does exist and I’m a part of it. Every time I try to find evidence to the contrary or explain it away, the racial reality, that I loathe to believe is true, continues, unresisted. Worst of all, I hurt people that I love, I bring myself distress, and I prolong large scale, raging racial harm. Instead of belonging to myself, to my values, and to those that I love, I end up belonging to whiteness.
Indeed it’s an illogical practice, to look for proof out there somewhere in order to deny what’s right in front of me. To hurt the ones that I love and to support a system that creates a world far removed from the one I wish for. And, it’s kind of a custom among white people that I know.
I see us do this often — we white people seem quick to let others know that we don’t hear their experience of racism as the most accurate explanation of what really, truly happened. I think we’re trying to make sense of it when we try to make racism about something else. It’s different from what we know in the belonging whiteness gives us. We struggle to consider that things are really this way — the way the truths of racism say that it is. The way that people of color have long told us that it is.
It’s uncomfortable and heartbreaking to be part of such a warped construct. But, part of it we are. What do we do with our participation? Where, what, and to whom do we belong?
And it’s not just individuals who give into it. The practice of rejecting truths about race in order to maintain whiteness happens all over America. An example is in the business sector. Organizations constantly overlook evidence, best practices, and their self interests in order to belong to and sustain whiteness. Evidence? White people make up much of top industry leadership and employment even though: diverse teams are smarter, diversity increases productivity, fosters innovation and creativity, and increases the likelihood of financial outperformance. Illogical indeed.
What is happening with us, my dear white people? Do we possess a deep, yet unacknowledged, awareness of the harm whiteness inflicts? Do we fear that the way we’ve dominated others could be turned on us? That we could become the ones that can’t measure up — that we’ll be the ones who don’t belong?
From what I can tell, this unsound practice is based in collective and learned racialized fear. I’ve felt this fear and known the practice of denial that comes with it. These things have been deeply planted within me. Whiteness is a very good teacher.
I am compelled to question, how do we give up connection and belonging to whiteness? The position I hold as a white woman is pretty comfortable. Ostensibly, this place where whiteness rules, seems to look after people like me. But, what is white connection and comfort in relation to justice, liberation, and wholeness for everyone? What are we saying no to when we say yes to whiteness? What is the cost?
I want meaningful change in myself and in our world. And, I know for certain that belonging to whiteness, gets in the way of the sort of transformation needed. This is a cost demanded of me if I am to belong to whiteness — that I stand with it even if it means I can’t be who and how I want to be. It means I give up on creating the world I dream of.
We can’t proclaim that racism is a thing of the past while clinging to whiteness. We can’t demand people get over it, when we can’t get over whiteness. We can’t focus on the outcome — or end of racial injustice — if we don’t remove the barriers that keep us from seeing and understanding racial inequity. And we can’t know freedom until we dig into the process of undoing practices based in fear and oppression.
What is whiteness costing you?
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