Outrage. Shock. That’s what I’m willing to bet that tolerant white people are feeling at the news – and the sight – of the racist attack on Jay Phillips in Courtenay, BC on July 3rd. I doubt other people (not-tolerant or not-white) are so stunned at the newsflash that racism still exists in Canada.
I feel great tenderness for white people who are shocked by this attack. They’ve got good hearts. They truly, madly, deeply believe in equality – and the very fact of their whiteness insulates them from the everyday knowledge that racism exists. That’s why this assault is such a shock. When you’re white, you don’t notice racism, because you feel racially neutral and you think that this racially neutral experience is the norm. It is not.
Some dearly loved people in my life are uncomfortable with the fact that I identify my children as black. They’re biracial, after all. Calling them black erases their white mother, their white family members, and the acceptability and the privilege that comes from not being black. As one of my friends told me recently “It’s okay to be black as long as you don’t act black” (he’s black). That’s usually the case – except every once in a while, the very fact of your blackness, your otherness, your not-whiteness, will make you a target of physical violence. And nearly every single day, your blackness will be noted but it may be ignored so long as your behaviour and demeanour doesn’t coincide with stereotypes and assumptions about black people. In other words, in the words of my friend, so long as you act white.
This is why I identify my children as black. I’m choosing to identify with reality. I am preparing to be an ally for my black children as they make their way in this still very, very white world, our true north strong and free, our grand multicultural mosaic. I don’t want to be shocked when they come home from school, work, baseball, dancing, life and report the outrageous, covert or coded slings, arrows and slurs that have been hurled their way. I want to prepare them. I want to be prepared. I want to prepare the world. And yet I know that there is no way to truly prepare. I’m scared. The attack on Jay Phillips means that I am right to be scared. We all should be.
Still, I find hope in the shock and the outrage and the outcry. This is what I hope happens in the aftermath of this racist beating: I hope the community reaches out to Jay Phillips and offers him love and support and the space to speak and be heard. I hope that our communities rally and start dialogues and action about racism – and highlight the fact that racism isn’t always blatant and shocking; in fact, more often, it is coded in assumptions and preference for English-sounding names and all the miniscule snap judgments we make about strangers every few minutes of every day. I hope that the community reaches out to these three young men who acted out their ignorance and hatred and privilege in cowardice and violence and offers them ways to learn another mode of being. I hope that the parents, friends and families of these young men don’t minimize the attack and what it means. I hope for change. I hope for better.
And I hope that all the good-hearted, mosaic-referencing, tolerant Canadian white folk are willing to push beyond their own shock and outrage at this and examine the ways that racism is present in our daily lives – to acknowledge and challenge it.
Because when you’re blind to the small stuff it takes the big stuff to shock you. And in your well-meaning ignorance lies tacit assent to all the small stuff and thus your permission for the big stuff. These three young men did not just wake up racist one day: it took 19-25 years of their small acts of racism being tolerated by other oblivious white people for them to feel entitled to physically attack a black man.
Thank the gods and goddesses or the deity of your choice that Jay Phillips is big and strong and physically powerful and no stranger to the gym and could physically defend himself although he should not ever have had to. Imagine if he had been a frail, elderly man. Or a less physically-strong woman. Or my two beautiful little girls.
Imagine that. And now, white people, think back to every single time another white person said something ‘off’ that you didn’t challenge or educate with humour or love or just SOMETHING. Or a resume came across your desk with an ‘ethnic’ name and you didn’t call that person back. Or when you chose to rent your basement suite to a white family instead of a South Asian one because you thought the house would smell like curry. Or when you sigh over traffic in Richmond when you really mean Asian drivers. Start seeing those things; and see the connection, the continuum, the path from those things to three racist men in a McDonald’s parking lot threatening to lynch a black man. Start seeing that if being black, or Chinese, or South Asian can be a disadvantage, that by the same token, being white translates into advantage.
Someone I know once said to me that he didn’t want to live in X neighbourhood, because then his (white) daughter would go to X school; and the reason he worried about this was because he didn’t want her to be a minority.
There is truth in that unexaminedly racist statement. He didn’t want his daughter to be a minority, because to be an ethnic minority is to be disadvantaged. He didn’t want her to have to rescind her white privilege, her advantage.
Being privileged because you are white does not mean you are evil; it does not mean you are racist; it is just the fact of the matter and it means that you can choose whether or not you see racism. And if you choose to see it, and really, really want to confront and eradicate racism, start by examining – and acknowledging – the fact that there is an advantage to being white. Start seeing the privilege. Start articulating it. Stop being shocked. Continue being outraged.
It starts now. It starts with you. And me.
Kelly,
It’s great that you feel strongly against racism. There’s really no need to discriminate against other races. Race will be forever apart of us (race relations will never fade away), but the least we can do is work towards a better future.
Before I saw the video, I expected to see a poor man get beat up. What I saw instead was a man stand up for his right to exist.
Admirable post, Kelly.
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There’s really a lot to be said about racism in this country, even if people are blind to it. Unfortunately, as a white person, I find myself susceptible to falling into racist thoughts of “damn Asian drivers” or what have you. You’re right that’s time to challenge our thinking patterns and start to examine what we can to continue living in such an amazing multicultural mosaic (as you so eloquently put it).
Thanks for the post, Kelly. As this is the first post I read from your blog, I’m intrigued and will continue to follow it.
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