Racism 101

Can you tell I’ve been haunted today by how much we’re not doing at Luther to engage racism? Here’s another really useful blogpost, from the blog ResistRacism:

• White privilege exists.
  
• Sanctuary is not segregation.
  
• Flipping the actors does not lend clarity to an issue, nor does it mean that you have created equivalent analogies. See entry under Fallacious Flip.
  
• People must own their feelings and expressions. Ventriloquy is not helpful in discussions of racism.
  
• Seeking the empowerment of people of color is not the same as disenfranchising white people.
  
• Racism is more than individual acts of meanness.
  
• Hating white privilege is not the same as hating whitey.
  
• Defensive responses to issues voiced by people of color are invocations of privilege.
  
• A claim to anti-racism cannot be made based on any variation of the “black friend defense” (Mexican boyfriend, Asian wife, children of color, etc.).
  
• Apology means say you’re sorry and then shut up. No rationalization, no long explanation of your intention, no invocation of the black friend defense. And then ask what you can do to make change.
  
• The anti-racist focus should be on effect rather than intention.
  
• Celebrations of “multiculturalism” do not address racism.
  
• People of color are not responsible for the education of white people.
  
• It’s not all about you.
  
• An experience you have as a white person that you think is similar to an experience related by a person of color is not a valid proof that racism doesn’t exist.</blockquote>