Being Colorblind

I used to say it. I used to think it. I never EVER ONCE, in all my growing-up years and even into adulthood, considered that I might be part of a mindset that unknowingly promotes racism. But I was. And I said it, and thought it.

What did I say? I said that I was colorblind. I said that I didn't see color.

But of course I did. I'd have to be blind not to see color. And what I thought and said about NOT seeing it only further alienated me from the very people I thought I was allying myself with. Because guess what... THEY see it. They see it when they get up in the morning and look at themselves in the mirror. They see it when they try to wait for a bus, reflected in the eyes of those who notice them standing there. They see it when they are outside taking a walk and decide to stand in a building's overhang and wait for a friend to come out.

And for me to say that I don't see color ... discounts and dismisses their experience of the world. It makes them invisible, and let's face it - everyone wants to be seen, to be acknowledged for their existence. The color of their skin is just as much a part of them as having fingers and toes. And their skin color dictates how the world treats them, what kinds of choices they make about everyday things, how they feel about their society, and how they interact with people who are outside of their circle. It is like an insult to them when I say I don't see color.

Photo courtesy of
Alec White at Pixabay

I have learned instead to say, "I see you." I have learned to say, "Teach me about your experience of your culture." I have learned to honestly ask people what it is like to BE them. I have learned to honor the existence and the history of those who are different from me, and to be curious about it, and to celebrate what is different and unique about each individual. I have learned not to assume that just because a person has a particular skin color, that all people who have that skin color feel this or that way, or think this or that way, or act this or that way. They don't. They don't in the same way that not all white people have similar beliefs or lifestyles or political leanings. It does a disservice to everyone to pigeon-hole people based on anything they might hold in common.

While it is true that we all bleed red, that we are all the same underneath, that every life matters, the reality of our society is that people of color are treated and viewed by so many in society as less-than. The reality is that racism is rampant and it runs amok in our world. The fact of the matter is that white people, like myself, have a societal privilege in our western culture that people of color do not. And it is for this reason that I join with thousands and millions of others in saying, "Black Lives Matter."  I don't say "All Lives Matter" because that silences those whose lives don't matter in today's society.

I saw an illustration of equality versus equity a few years ago that has stuck with me. It is a three-part cartoon depicting three people: a tall person, an average-sized person, and a little person, who are trying to watch a ball game from behind a five-foot wall. In the first illustration, the tall person can easily see over the wall. The average person can see but just barely. And the little person cannot see at all. Then there were two illustrations under that one. The one on the left put an equal-sized box under each person. In this illustration, the little person could just barely see over the fence, and the taller ones had an even better view from equally higher-up. This one was labelled "Equality." On the right, in the illustration labelled "Equity," the tall person who did not need a box, was not given one. The average-sized person was given a box tall enough so that he could reach the same height as the tall person, and the little person was also given an even taller box so he could enjoy the game from the same height of the tall person. In this way, each of them could enjoy the game to the same degree.

This is a wonderful illustration of why I believe that those in the dominant culture do not need to be stroked and given special consideration. They already have the privilege of seeing the world without assistance. Those who need help and recognition should get it to the degree that they have been disadvantaged. And the history of white culture has many, many examples of the oppression of other races, especially black people (and yes, this is documented!) throughout the history of our interactions with other people who don't look like us.

From the time I was a little girl of ten years old, when I met a black man for the first time, I have been intrigued by people of color. But what I didn't know then, and what I still didn't know even as recently as ten years ago, was how difficult it was (and is) for those who are not white. We don't even think about the same things as people of color when we think of everyday activities that most of us take for granted. Going for a walk in a quiet neighborhood after dark ... going into a store in broad daylight ... walking the dog ... driving a car with tinted windows ... paying for an item by check ... waiting in the park for a friend ... all of these things we take for granted and never once think that we might not make it home alive. But people of color, and especially black people, do. Every. Day.

If recent events have not highlighted these facts for you, then it might be time to honestly investigate how best to honor people who are targets of racism in your city, in your province or state, in your country. Look for stories told by the actual people themselves, and not by white people telling their story for them.

Listen. And say it with me. Black Lives Matter.

#BLM #ISeeYou

The right to take up space

Some time ago, I was watching a comedian on television do his routine.  Comedians are sometimes the only people who can get away with telling truth because they tell it in a funny way (they hope). This comedian's name was Greg Rogell, and the line I remember most is when he started talking about golf and golf caddies. "Golf is the only sport that comes with a slave." He then started to demonstrate. He held his microphone like it was a golf club, made the classic golf swing with it, and then dropped the mike on the floor and walked away.

While that was funny, Mr. Rogell was also highlighting an attitude that exists not only in golf, but in everyday life.  Some people, for reasons that still mystify me, have a really hard time with the simple concepts of saying Please and Thank you.  If someone puts themselves out to help them, especially if that putting out is physically or psychologically hard for them, you'd think that "thank you" might be on the list of things to say.  Treating people with courtesy, respecting their personhood, would seem to be a basic skill.

But no. Instead, such people are more likely to find fault with something else that same person is NOT doing, but which they never said they expected. Since different people have different priorities, it is impossible to read minds; expectations need to be stated at the outset, even if it might seem like a no-brainer.  For example, I'm more of a sit-and-visit kind of person; the housework can wait.  For others, housework is this huge thing and they can't sit and visit until it's out of the way. So my sitting and visiting is like laziness to them, perhaps even inconsideration. Yet their refusal to sit and visit until the housework is done tells me that things and appearances are more important to them than friendship and spending time with people. Dishes don't have feelings. People do.  

And yet, who is it that apologizes when the topic comes up? Typically it has been me - because no matter which way you slice it, for whatever reason, I usually end up looking like the one in the wrong... and I have been cow-towing to guilt trips my whole life.

All of my life, I have been fighting for the right - taken for granted by most - to take up space in the world, to be appreciated, and to own my own feelings and opinions without being told (verbally or non-verbally) that they are insignificant. Or wrong.  Or whatever other negative adjective you might want to use.  I'm uncomfortable with confrontation, and my natural response is to withdraw or feel bad for friction existing between people - even if I'm not one of those people. The fact that it exists makes me feel and act guilty.  I lose sleep. I get far more upset for far longer than I need to. Often, I feel like if I screamed at the top of my lungs to be heard, nobody would listen anyway; even if I have something important to say, a large part of me doesn't believe anyone will pay attention to it. 

Photo "Businesswoman Asking To Stop" by imagerymajestic at
www.freedigitalphotos.net

Maybe (and I know that this is a rather big logical jump for some) maybe a big part of it has to do with the fact that I'm under five feet tall. Not being taken seriously because of my height, not having my short legs taken into consideration when doing tasks that take an average-sized person about half the number of steps it takes me, and being twitted (or laughed at) for something over which I have no control, is one of those sore spots with me, because I've had to put up with it all of my life.  

People do it without thinking of the consequences, and they think that by doing so they are funny, or somehow superior.  As if it is by some accomplishment of theirs that things are easier for them (when it is simply a fluke of DNA), they criticize (or laugh) and tell me to keep up. (By the way, these are the people who treat me like a slave without saying thank you...)  Or they laugh and tell me to stand up (when I'm already standing.) Or they worry out loud (like someone did once), when I drop a few pounds, that I'll "disappear."  One person even looked past me and asked where I was ... pretended he couldn't see me.

Ouch!  That behavior and those kinds of statements convey dismissal of my existence and (knowingly or not) they are an attack on my worth.  They reduce all that I am down to what I look like on the outside, and they fail to acknowledge accomplishments that a regular-sized person would be proud of and never would expect to have called into question. Yet it happens to me all the time! Because of that patronizing "I'm better than you, and you don't even have the right to exist" mentality, this kind of belittlement (no pun intended) really hurts. 

In the past, I wouldn't say anything when people treated me this way (or worse yet, I would try to laugh it off), but all that succeeded in doing was (a) send the message that I was okay with it, and (b) make my resentment grow and grow so that finally, I would explode - and not in a nice way.  Someone would invariably get hurt.  And then I would end up looking like the bad guy.  After all, they were "only having fun." Or worse yet, they considered their fun-loving nature (read here: cruelty) to be part of their personality, and took my affront to their unthinking behavior as a personal attack against them.  Suddenly they were the injured party.

Wow. What is worse, I would beat myself up for weeks, months, sometimes even years, for something that at the source, had more to do with someone else's thoughtlessness and insecurity than it did about my reaction to it. It's what kept me in abusive relationships with some people for far too long.

So I'm looking at things a little differently now.  I am telling myself that I have a right to take up space, that my feelings and opinions matter and are valid, and that I have the right to tell someone who is behaving like a jerk toward me that they're behaving like a jerk.  I have the right to expect an apology from them, (not the other way around) and I have the right to require them to be accountable for their actions, to realize that they can't just say any old thing they want to and to blazes with the consequences.  I have the right to be angry when that happens, to work through that anger and to take the time that I need to do that fully before moving past it and on with my life, with - or without - them.  

Maybe someday soon, I might even act on those new ways of thinking. 

Stranger things have happened.

Acceptance - the royal road

I learned a new word this week: "microagressions." These are tiny, almost subconscious ways in which aggressors mistreat those they target, based on a belief that the other person is 'wrong', 'misguided', 'stupid', 'lazy', 'over-sensitive', or whatever. This is usually the case when aggressors have prejudged someone on the basis of his or her race, religious belief, lifestyle, appearance, gender identity, etc. These microaggressions can come out in the workplace as increased scrutiny (careful examination) of the quality of someone's work (over and above what would be done to another person in the same job), a dismissive attitude of what someone says or contributes, or even just a raised eyebrow (indicating the aggressor doesn't believe what the person is saying). 

Those who feel subjugated as a result of microaggressions lose motivation (they're going to find fault with what I do anyway, so why even try?) and may even succumb to physical illness more frequently as a result of significantly increased stress.

Microagressions are particularly problematic in the helping professions, where there is an inherent imbalance of power. Counsellors, pastors, doctors, and nurses (among others) are held to a higher ethical standard and yet ... abuses occur every day. Patients are not believed, their legitimate symptoms "gas-lighted". People in pain because of a specific problem are turned away (or worse yet, turned into a personal project to "convert") when they reveal a totally unrelated lifestyle not considered acceptable by the helper. It happens every day!

The more I study counselling, the more I realize that the key to becoming a good counsellor - indeed, the key to becoming a better person - is acceptance of other people, regardless of how different they are from me, my thoughts, and my beliefs.  This is much more than just "love the sinner, hate the sin." It goes WAY beyond that fallacy.  It involves a deep-seated belief that every single person has the right to be who they are and feel what they feel. That belief is HARD to cultivate... but it is crucial.  If it is not there, I could turn into (or perhaps continue to be) a microaggressor. 

People who habitually commit microaggressions rarely see their behaviour as aggressive or prejudicial.  They usually consider themselves to be wonderful, caring people ... and they may be in some contexts ... but there is this huge blind spot that obstructs their ability to accept that the other person has just as much right to be there as they do.

I have been the target of microaggressions.  The perpetrators were simply acting on their core beliefs, based on their own chosen lifestyles, that (for example) all short people never become adults and should not be taken seriously, that all fat people are lazy, ugly and stupid, that all Christians are crazy bigoted right-wingnuts, that all depressed people are suicidal, that all civilians (or non-professionals) are ignorant, and so forth. It's probably not obvious to anyone watching, and certainly not to those who have acted on those beliefs, because they cover it up with a veneer of civility and respectability.  Yet ... it exists.

Photo "Conflict In The Office" courtesy of
franky242 at  www.freedigitalphotos.net

I've also watched people commit microaggressions against others without them even realizing it, and I have seen the results in their victims ... who feel as though they have just been bullied, but can't quite put their finger on how.   All they know is that they feel belittled, condescended to / patronized, and made to feel powerless .... like the person who makes a mistake at work (due to a misunderstanding) and is not called into the supervisor's office to chat one-on-one, but is confronted about the mistake in front of his or her co-workers.  The co-workers (not being the ones under attack) can easily identify the conversation as one that should have been conducted in private. Why wasn't it?  The microaggressor (for whatever reason) believes that the person in question does not merit that kind of consideration ... whether that belief is on a conscious or subconscious level.  Often the victim's feelings don't happen during the encounter but afterward, after the shock of the (usually verbal) assault wears off.  This is how bullies get away with bullying.  Talk about feeling ambushed!  Not to mention vulnerable, helpless, trapped, and a whole host of other unpleasant things. 

Those feelings (though unpleasant) are VALUABLE because they are the brain's early warning system: danger, danger, danger!  They can lead you and me to recognize when such things are happening and to speak out against them, so as to do something to stop them from happening again.  Nobody has the right to be treated like a disposable person, a worthless piece of junk.  NOBODY. 

And truly, acceptance (valuing the other person as a person, with the same rights as anyone else) is the key.  It is the royal road to creating a safe place where non-judgmental, non-aggressive conversations can happen.  It is much easier to create that safe place when two people are on a par with each other, where one does not hold power over another, where one is not more qualified than another.  However, it becomes far more difficult (yet still equally as important, if not more so) when there is an imbalance of power. 

Raising awareness is only the first step in addressing this problem.  I've used the example here of a co-worker with a supervisor, but this could apply to pretty much every arena where there is a perceived difference in the level of power two people hold.  People in positions of power or influence MUST learn that the fact that they hold more power makes them more accountable for the way they treat those who have less ... or none.