Memo: Justice General Assembly 2012

Memorandum: Justice General Assembly 2012 (pdf)

This proposal for the structure of the UU Social Justice General Assembly in 2012 is a collaborative effort of Phoenix and Tucson Unitarian Universalist activists, Arizona-based community organizations and independent organizers working on immigration or human rights/social justice issues. Although we are aware that the decision to not uphold the boycott of Arizona was made at the request of two Phoenix-based community organizations, we also know not all Arizona organizations agree with this decision. Furthermore, we are concerned with the strategy of partnering with only the two or three largest Phoenix-based organizations to decide the direction of the GA. Many organizations make critical contributions to the struggle for justice in Arizona and some incredibly effective work is being done by smaller organizations. We have unique needs, unique perspectives, and unique skills. To truly create change, all of our contributions are needed.

We are asking for a decentralized GA structure, described below, that allows a multitude of community organizations to define their own goals based on current needs and to create service projects that enhance, rather than burden, their organizations and increase the likelihood that their efforts will proliferate across the U.S. A decentralized structure is being proposed for several reasons:

1. We believe that this structure is more likely to create mutually beneficial, reciprocal relationships between GA attendees and Arizona community organizations through shared expertise, resistance strategies relevant to attendees’ home congregations, and interpersonal relationship building.
2. People who are already involved in social justice organizing in Arizona will be able to determine their own goals and needs.
3. Smaller community organizations can be involved. With this structure, organizations who would like to draw on the resources and expertise of attendees do not need a “seat” at the planning table. All that is needed is the infrastructure described below in order to allow everyone to participate as they see fit.
4. Many community organizers and members are unable to travel to the Phoenix Convention Center (PCC). Checkpoints in the southern part of Arizona make it impossible for undocumented organizers to travel to Phoenix without serious risk to themselves. Even those in the Phoenix metro area face substantial risks when traveling outside their barrios. The risk of harassment or detention is escalated by the proximity of PCC to the MCSO offices and 4^th Ave Jail. We should also take into account Arpaio’s reputation for retaliation against social justice organizers and public officials. Aside from the likelihood that Arpaio remembers the Unitarian Universalists from the last time they came to Arizona in droves, PCC is located in District 4 under Maricopa County Supervisor Mary Rose Wilcox, with whom Arpaio has long had a deeply divisive political and legal rivalry.
5. The people who would most need services are also the most likely to rely on public transportation. The inadequacy of our public transit system limits the participation of families with minor children, elderly, differently-abled, and undocumented persons. The light rail doesn’t go to the hoods and barrios, many of which have limited bus service. It takes an hour by bus to travel to PCC from many of the barrios, and depending on the route, transfer wait times vary considerably, especially in summer months when public transportation typically has lighter demand. Even for those who are able to drive, free parking in the downtown area is limited and parking fees may be an expense families cannot afford.

For these reasons, we propose a General Assembly in the addendums that follow which will suit the needs of community members/organizers across the entire state of Arizona. For each point we are proposing below, we provide detailed ideas and concrete examples in the pages that follow. The following points are how we believe the GA may prove most useful to us:

1. We would like people to know what is going on regarding immigration issues and the rights of undocumented people within their own communities (see Addendum A: Needs and Assets Report (PDF))
2. We would like people to come prepared to share strategies being used in their own communities to stand with undocumented people and change the narrative regarding immigration (see Addendum B: Roundtable Structure (PDF))
3. We would like people to come prepared to participate in community service programs that have been requested from a wide variety of community organizations (see Addendum C: Service Programs(PDF) )

If the General Assembly is structured in a way that allows us to establish our own goals and needs, we are willing to commit to sharing our time and expertise in a meaningful and reciprocal way. We have many organizers and volunteers who are happy to commit time toward making the GA successful if we feel that the GA will provide us with tools and resources that will improve our ongoing work or further related work in other communities throughout the United States and beyond. In return, we would like the Planning Committee to commit to developing the infrastructure needed for us to build ongoing relationships with attendees, including the online infrastructure. Finally, we are asking the Planning Committee to support a “bring it home” atmosphere wherein attendees are encouraged to consider how immigration issues are being played out in their home communities. In this way, we hope that attendees will realize that we are all Arizona.

Being experienced organizers, we realize that not all of these ideas may be realistically and effectively implemented given the time constraints and somewhat dramatic shift from the traditional GA structure. We have hopes, however, that if the majority of these plans could be executed, it could result in a significant step toward doing more meaningful justice work in the future, both at upcoming GAs, as well as in our home communities.

Addendum A: Needs and Assets Report

We request that all delegates perform a needs and assets report of social justice and social services for their own communities and congregations. For our purposes, we need to strategize with people who are actively working on social justice issues within their own communities or who are committed to implementing the plans we develop together in Roundtable Discussions in their own communities. We do not need people to come and tour Arizona; this is a distraction from our work and does not benefit our communities and organizations. We need people who can work with us on an ongoing basis regarding problems we are facing. We believe that the best way to ensure this ongoing relationship is for attendees to involve themselves in Roundtable Discussions and Service Projects that are relevant and transferable to their home communities.

· Places to start with to compile a Needs and Assets Report

• Talk to leadership of churches that hold services that are not in English
• Talk to members of these churches who are involved in social justice organizations
• Talk to UUs who are involved in social justice organizations
• Talk to community members who are historically marginalized ·

Other places to start:

• Does your community have a prison or detention center nearby? What groups are working with prison populations?
• Does your community have free/reduced legal services? Are these services provided to undocumented people?
• Does your community have a workers’ rights group? A women’s rights group? An LGBT rights’ group? A domestic violence shelter? A health collective? Are these groups providing services to undocumented people as well?
• Does your community have a group dedicated to affecting legislation or public policy? Does this include immigration issues?
• Are there family support systems within your community (e.g., childcare collectives, mentoring programs, protection networks, sanctuary movements)? What are they doing? What do they need?
• Does your local police force have 287(g) status? What has been your community’s reaction to the Secure Communities mandate?·

 Four main things to think about regarding Needs and Assets:

• What resources are being provided?
• What is currently working?
• What obstacles do you face?
• What do you need? ·

Things to think about:

• Are current social justice organizations in your community aware of immigration issues? Could you expand them to work with undocumented people? What would this look like?
• Are members of your congregation involved with these organizations? If not, why not? What concrete steps are you willing to take to involve other congregational members in social justice organizing?

Best practice: Have organizations that provide services for undocumented people help with the drafting of the needs and assets report

With a detailed Needs and Assets report, attendees will be able to identify Roundtable Discussions and Service Projects that are most relevant. For example, people who volunteer at the local domestic violence shelter may be most interested in a roundtable dedicated to strategies for successful filings for U visas or VAWA petitions. (Both are ways to file for protections for undocumented victims of domestic violence.) If VAWA programs are not currently available, attendees could begin to implement them in their home communities; if they are currently available, attendees could discuss problems they have had and brainstorm solutions with other people who file VAWA cases. We hope this example demonstrates the potential for being able to implement current strategies across the U.S. and to provide for ongoing relationships between people engaged in similar work.

Addendum B: Roundtable Structure

We propose that Arizona community organizations be allowed to structure Roundtable Discussions. These discussions should be held in a collaborative way with attendees who are either familiar with similar programs within their own communities (and are prepared to discuss the strategies and obstacles relevant to these programs) or who are committed to implementing similar programs within their communities. In other words, all attendees should also be participants. These would not be lectures or presentations; they would be strategy sessions. We request this restriction out of respect for our time and energy and to maximize the productivity of these Roundtables.

During our brainstorms regarding GA, several suggestions came up repeatedly. First, Roundtable Discussions should run for at least two or three hours so that all attendees, including people from our organizations, can develop strategic plans regarding next steps. Although Roundtables could be repeated to allow more individuals to participate, each session should be small. Second, the deadline for Roundtable topics should be no more than three months before GA to ensure that they are current and relevant for our organizations. Third, we would like to explore possibilities for interactive, online participation so that people across the country who are working on these programs but cannot attend GA will be able to participate. Finally, we suggest that a wiki-style, self-generated posting system be developed for several reasons:

• To reduce bureaucratic obstacles, this can discourage participation from smaller organizations.
• To allow attendees to do their Roundtable homework (via the Needs and Assets reports) before coming to GA.
• To allow attendees and Arizona organizers to post resources, ideas, and obstacles on an on-going basis before and after GA. In other words, this would serve as an online resource and discussion board for congregations and organizations across the country who are working on similar topics. We could also post notes from the Roundtable for people who were not able to attend.
• To provide a ready-made space for continuing to build relationships and develop collective wisdom.

When we have considered how Roundtable Discussions would function, the following suggestions have been made. Discussions would start with a “crash course” on the topic for people who are interested in implementing similar programs but do not yet have them. This would be followed by brief presentations from all attendees on how the issue is related to their home community. Then there would be a group brainstorm regarding strategies that have worked, things needed to adapt program/service for their home community, and the possibility for resource exchanges and ongoing conversations. Finally, each attendee would create a plan for implementing the program in their home community including obstacles and adaptations they can anticipate.

We believe that Roundtable Discussions will be very useful in helping us be more strategic regarding our work. As an example, the Childcare Collective of Tucson and the Valley of the Sun Childcare Collective/Valle del Sol Guarderias Colectivas are small community organizations that provide childcare services for community meetings and events. Their goal is to enhance the ability of women with children (who are historically responsible for childcare) to participate in community organizing and critical resistance. They have identified two possible topics for Roundtable Discussions:

• They would like to hold conversations with people who are involved in Early Childhood Education and identify bilingual curricula that could be applied with children of varying ages (preferably with a social justice flavor, and even more preferably, with a “know your rights” component). If such curricula is not available, they would like to brainstorm about how such curricula could be developed so that it is both culturally and developmentally-appropriate.
• They would like to hold conversations with people involved in other childcare collectives (The Tucson Collective has had phone consultations with several collectives across the U.S. and have found them to be very valuable). Their main concerns are: helping other CDBs or social justice organizations increase accessibility for primary caregivers (i.e. going to scale), maintaining parent involvement, and enhancing community building through childcare (i.e., being a vehicle for change rather than a service provided).

We also propose that Immigration or Anti Racism 101 level lectures be kept to a minimum and that intensive trainings and workshops be offered on topics such as accountability in AR/AO/MC organizing for allies, intersecting oppressions, leadership training for young adults, crowd management strategies, organizing a health collective, establishing a rapid response teams, crisis hotlines, English/Spanish Language Exchanges, or Spanish for Social Justice courses.

Addendum C: Service Programs

In comparison to Roundtables, Service Programs would be less collaborative and focus on using attendees’ specific skills sets to help with a short-term project. We suggest that a wiki-style website, similar to that for Roundtable Discussions, be created wherein community organizations can post service opportunities up to one or two months before GA to ensure that projects are timely and relevant to the current needs of our organizations. We propose that this structure be adopted so that organizations are allowed to identify and determine for themselves how short-term volunteers can best be utilized. On the wiki-site, we would post information on the background of our organizations, an overview of the project, what skills would be needed, how many people were needed and for how long, and additional concerns about accessibility (including checkpoints, terrain problems that would restrict participation for those with mobility issues, etc.). This will also give local organizations that already have an established relationship in the community an opportunity to lend their expertise and experience, which will be critical to the success of any service project. Projects that were posted well ahead of time would also invite further collaboration (e.g., several CDBs (Comites de Defensa del Barrio or neighborhood defense committees) have discussed expanding their community gardens. They could use the expertise of attendees familiar with rainwater management to help plan their project before GA and then have attendees help dig the garden during GA).

As a more specific example, No More Deaths, an allied organization that provides humanitarian aid to migrants in the Sonoran Desert, does not allow volunteers to serve for less than two weeks at camp because orientation and logistics are a continual drain on infrastructure. Therefore, many attendees would not be able to provide this specific service. However, No More Deaths has a continual need for volunteers to help with strengthening and streamlining their infrastructure. Although they cannot anticipate now what their service project needs will be next year, recent projects could have benefited from short-term volunteers as long as they had the appropriate skill sets. For example, the volunteer donation system was recently transferred into an online format for merging with a general mailing list database. To automate this transfer, several macros needed to be written by volunteers who were only somewhat familiar with this. If a computer programmer were available, this would have taken much less time. Therefore, the time spent by volunteers to orient the programmer would have been recouped by the time saved by having a programmer. For this organization, this would have been a worthwhile investment.

Most importantly, we request that service programs and opportunities hosted at PCC also be offered at decentralized locations based on community needs and interests. We are concerned that service projects held at PCC will be neither relevant nor practical for our communities. For example, we have heard of several references to setting up health clinics, voter registration and/or citizenship fairs at PCC. We recognize that the UUA is accountable to delegates and attendees to provide an accessible General Assembly, but we must also hold ourselves accountable to and provide accessible services for the Arizona community. There is an inherently troubling dynamic in asking undocumented and otherwise disenfranchised communities to bear the risk and burden associated with travel to a centralized location when those of us who have the privilege of documentation and are physically able to do so could, with comparative ease, travel to satellite locations in the barrios. If CDBs feel that health clinics would be valuable for their specific barrios, they could request these clinics on the wiki site and identify a location that would be accessible to people in their barrios. Furthermore, we must keep in mind that the primary purpose of a community health fair is to get people without access to medical services into an ongoing relationship with a medical provider and the people most likely to attend such an event will be more likely to have conditions that require follow up care. There are concerns about how relationships will be established with medical providers from outside Arizona, how follow up care would be managed for those who require it, in addition to the reality that many undocumented people will not travel to PCC due to concerns previously cited. It will be critical to partner with the local medical community already providing services that can coordinate follow up care for those in the community who need it.

Finding Our Humanity: Calling on my fellow Euro-Americans

Last Sunday I was stopped by a member of my congregation… someone from what I call my church family. She mentioned THIS is why I cannot, will not, comply, written after I explained to my son that I would probably (or not) be arrested on the National Day of Non-Compliance. 

Arizona in Crayola: Multicultural, I guess. Non-Toxic, debatable.

 When I asked my son what might lead an officer to suspect someone was not in the country legally and he answered, with only a little doubt in his voice…

“Their race.”

To which I countered,

“What race are Americans?”

He responded, 

“White.”

With no hesitation. None whatsoever.

[snipped]

My son is only 14 years old, and already he’s picked up the subconscious message about who is American and who is not. My son is only 14 years old, it already it is imbedded somewhere in his subconscious that Americans are white.

 Read More

 
After confiding that she’d been thinking about that blog entry ever since, she started to talk about all the different classifications of Americans… Mexican, African, Native, Chinese etc.

I have to confess that I got a little nervous. Because the only thing harder than talking about race with people who are not white, in my experience, is talking about race with people who are. And I felt my shield go up, because I’ve heard one or two profoundly stupid things said in my church home, and I wasn’t sure what was coming. I was afraid it would be some argument about how all those prefixes should be dropped, and my mind was racing because I hadn’t been mentally prepared for a “that thing you said” conversation. But then she asked, “But what am I? Am I Caucasian or European American?” And I responded cautiously, still not sure where we were headed, “Well, there would be Italian, German, and Irish American…”

And then she asked the million dollar question. What can she do, in her day-to-day interactions, to challenge the assumption that Americans are of European descent by default, and everything else is “other.”

I wish I’d had a better answer. I’m a unusal case (in more ways than one, I know…) in that outside of work and church on Sunday, very few people who I see on a daily or weekly basis are white. I shared with her that I make it a point (with people who tend to use race or ethnicity to describe others when it is not relevant to the conversation), to mention EVERYONE’S race (aka, my “this white lady at walgreens” story), I don’t have those kinds of conversations often.

Tonight I was at a volunteer meeting for the Community Posada and someone (not white) mentioned Euro-Americans in a conversation, which was the motivation I needed to write this post and not table it until after I get all the other drafts in my head published. Most of the discussion on what I write happens in the link comments on my Facebook wall, but for the sake of centralizing feedback and hopefully providing some ideas and resources for others, I’d like to ask people to comment here and not on FB. You don’t need to sign up for an account to comment.

I want to hear from my Anglo/Euro/Caucasian American readers. Do you consciously use language to counteract the assumption that Americans are white by default? What does that sound like? How and when do you use it? What kind of reactions do you get? If you don’t, what kind of ideas do you have?

Thanks to all of you in advance, and a very special thanks to my sister. You renewed my faith last Sunday, as well as my commitment to continue witnessing, LOUDLY, about the costs of racism to white people. As proud as we may be to fight for justice, we need to acknowledge that we are also fighting for our own humanity.

A PS… This was written as a call for reflection & discussion to white/euro/anglo/gring@ people because I feel strongly we need to take more responsibility in creating equality and justice for all. People of privilege shouldn’t be looking to the people who are being oppressed to show us the light when we’re holding the matches and candles. That said, if you don’t fall into the targeted demographic and you have a suggestion about how we can do better or want to point out something we may do with the best of intentions that we really shouldn’t, jump right in.

Related Articles

• Own Your Beauty: On Being Multi-Racial in the Racist, Rural South (blogher.com)
• Why Racial Profiling Persists in Medical Research (time.com)
• All Are Alike Unto God: A Reaction to Margaret Blair Young and Darius Aidan Gray’s _Standing On the Promises_ Series (motleyvision.org)



Why You Should Be Talking About Race

There is an attitude among many parent-peers of mine in the DC metro area that frequently astounds me – parents I meet  feel that by being “color blind” themselves, that somehow (magically?) their children will be open-minded, accepting, and capable of navigating complicated racial situations.

FAIL!

There really is no other way to say it…it’s a huge parenting failure.  Maybe in an Utopian society we could all have the privilege of being “color blind,” but we live in the real world and only a fool thinks that color doesn’t matter on this planet.

A recent study by the Children’s Research Lab at the University of Texas backs up my POV on the subject.  Austin area families participated in a study in which the goal was to determine “if typical children’s videos with multicultural story lines have a beneficial effect on children’s racial attitudes” (Newsweek).

There were three groups of families involved in the study.  The first was group was sent home with just videos, the second group with videos and talking points, and the third group of families were given only the talking points.  The last two groups were told to have conversations about race with their children every night for five nights.

At this point, something interesting happened. Five families in the last group abruptly quit the study. Two directly told Vittrup, “We don’t want to have these conversations with our child. We don’t want to point out skin color.”

Vittrup was taken aback—these families volunteered knowing full well it was a study of children’s racial attitudes. Yet once they were aware that the study required talking openly about race, they started dropping out.

“We don’t want to point out skin color.”  Does that stop anyone from noticing skin color?  Does that stop children from forming opinions on their own?  In the absence of a guiding influence, children will substitute their own poor judgments, or worse, the hate-filled judgments of someone else.

The study went on to say:

It was no surprise that in a liberal city like Austin, every parent was a welcoming multiculturalist, embracing diversity. But according to Vittrup’s entry surveys, hardly any of these white parents had ever talked to their children directly about race. They might have asserted vague principles—like “Everybody’s equal” or “God made all of us” or “Under the skin, we’re all the same”—but they’d almost never called attention to racial differences.

They wanted their children to grow up colorblind. But Vittrup’s first test of the kids revealed they weren’t colorblind at all. Asked how many white people are mean, these children commonly answered, “Almost none.” Asked how many blacks are mean, many answered, “Some,” or “A lot.” Even kids who attended diverse schools answered the questions this way.

More disturbing, Vittrup also asked all the kids a very blunt question: “Do your parents like black people?” Fourteen percent said outright, “No, my parents don’t like black people”; 38 percent of the kids answered, “I don’t know.” In this supposed race-free vacuum being created by parents, kids were left to improvise their own conclusions—many of which would be abhorrent to their parents.

Are these parents really surprised?  If you have values to impart to your children about equality, it will take more than vague statements about everyone being “the same.”  Kids are smart.  They know very well that we are not all “the same.”  What they need to hear is that we are all uniquely different, and they need reasons to value that uniqueness. You, parents, need to find ways to value people of color.  Find ways to compliment and seek out positive statements to impart to your children.  Have frequent, open conversations about race.  Talk about slavery, talk about segregation, talk about miscegenation, talk about stereotypes and hurtful language…talk, talk, and then talk more!  Kids need to know what is acceptable and they need to see with eyes that are wide open, not color blind.

At first glance, the study appears to be a dismal failure.  Many of the families did not talk about race at all, or changed the talking points.  However, there was a ray of hope:

Of all those Vittrup told to talk openly about interracial friendship, only six families managed to actually do so. And, for all six, their children dramatically improved their racial attitudes in a single week. Talking about race was clearly key. Reflecting later about the study, Vittrup said, “A lot of parents came to me afterwards and admitted they just didn’t know what to say to their kids, and they didn’t want the wrong thing coming out of the mouth of their kids.”

In ONE short week, all six of those families improved the racial attitudes of their children.  By TALKING.  Imagine that.

I understand that parents are hesitant to talk about race for fear of saying the wrong thing.  I encourage you (beg, really) to try.  Seek out some material if you need it.  There are books, websites, and blogs with plenty of good advice.  The simplest (and most obvious) thing to do, is to seek out some interracial friendships of your own, and then talk to your friends about how to discuss race.  I guarantee they will be happy to help you have positive discussions about race with your children.  Also, it’s worth saying that if you espouse a desire to have children who embrace multiculturalism, and you have no friends of color, then you should practice being what you desire your children to be.  If your children never see you have a meaningful friendship with someone of another race, what does that really tell them?  Just food for thought.

What I do know, is that doing nothing is the wrong answer.  Clearly, not talking about race leaves children confused and unsure at best, and harboring racist thoughts at worst.  It’s up to parents to guide our children through complicated racial issues.  It’s time to embrace the task, rather than dread it.  What could be more affirming than to teach your children how to walk in this world, not colorblind, but with an appreciation for diversity and a sense of value for all people.

The full article with the study can be found here.  It’s also posted at the Anti-Racist Parent.

originally posted at Golden Acorn Homeschool » Blog Archive » Why You Should Be Talking About Race.

Related Articles

• Is It OK to Point Out the Differences Among Races? (race.change.org)
• Colorblind parents could handicap their biracial kids (thegrio.com)
• Getting to Post-Post-Racial (theroot.com)
• Starting the conversation (psychologytoday.com)
• Wray Herbert: Colorblind? Or Just Blind to Justice? (huffingtonpost.com)

Black Women Like Their Books Trashy

Sometimes people say some shit that’s so stupid, you actually catch a case of stupidity yourself. It’s like the stupidity flowing out of their mouth infects you. There you are, in a state of shock, trying to figure out what the FUCK you can say to cure them, except you’re mouth is hanging open and you can’t speak. It’s like you’ve been hit upside the head with a stupid stick.

So here I am, with a pen in my hand, dumbly signing my charge slip, thinking that I just spent an awful fucking lot of money but I don’t remember asking the proprietress if she had a racist stereotype that she wouldn’t mind bagging up with my books. I checked my receipt after I left, but it wasn’t listed so I guess it must have been a perk that comes free with my white privilege card.

What’s truly mind boggling about this is that I had actually been attempting to compliment the woman on the diversity of reading materials I’d found at the annual book fair was at. In addition to the standard book fair items you expect to see (cookbooks, you’re the best kid/parent/teacher ever, box sets of all occasion greeting cards) and the racy looking novels with black women I’d noticed the year before, there were several books for teens with African American protagonists; of the three I selected as potential gifts, two were teenage boys. I’d have to read all three first to screen for content that may be too mature or stereotypes I’d want to discuss, but considering how rarely I see books with diverse characters (protagonist or otherwise) for children over the age of eight and/or that aren’t a self esteem message on steroids, not to mention how hard it can be to find books that will interest a young man, I was thrilled to see these and three others for tween/teen readers.

So it was as I was trying to tell the woman how pleased I’d been to see books with diverse racial and religious characters, she interrupts me to warn me that some of “those” books can be a little risqué. I responded that I planned to pre-read them, and again tried to express that it’s not easy to find diverse literature for my kids so it was nice that they had a selection, limited as it was… but once again I was interrupted.

Black women like their books trashy,

she tells me, voice lowered. She doesn’t want to be overheard… but because I’m white, she assumes I’ll welcome being taken into her confidence.

I struggled for a minute. I wanted so badly to insult this woman the way she had just insulted and offended me. I wanted to scream at her,

WHO THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU’RE TALKING TO? I’m not in your fucking club. THOSE ARE MY DAUGHTERS you’re talking about. MY BEST FRIEND. MY OTHER BEST FRIEND. MY EX FUTURE MOTHER-IN-LAW (ok, so she’s Tyler’s grandmamma but I loved her first). My son’s second grade teacher, who was also my older daughter’s first Big. Her kindergarten teacher. My baby girl’s “Nani.” Three of my kids’ best friend’s mothers. Two moms I met thru volleyball that I consider good friends and among the few people of any color that I’d trust my children with.

But alienating her wasn’t going change her thinking. I didn’t know what, if anything, that I could say in that moment that would. I still don’t know the answer to that question, so all I could do was my best to tell the truth.

“I’d have to say that’s a pretty broad stereotype. I know that several of the black women I know wouldn’t consider reading those,” as I gestured to the handful of racy novels with Jezebels on the cover.

She started to backpedal with, “Well, ours beg us to get these books… they just love them.”

Ours? Really? OURS? They BEG you to sell them books they identify with, for whatever reason? ARE YOU SHITTING ME? I was about to lose my job for slugging a vendor in the cafeteria at work.

I took a big breath, and as I gathered my purchases, I said that I didn’t know if she’d noticed, but it isn’t always easy to find books with Black characters in stores, and that I know this because I am always on the lookout for books that will appeal to my own multiracial children who don’t always want to read about little white heroes & heroines, but most of the books that we have were bought online, thru Scholastic Book orders, or out of state. I pointed out that if her Black customers were excited to see the few books she carried on the bottom shelf, it might have more to do with the overall lack of availability than the taste of the individual reader.

And I walked away. I don’t know how well received my final comments were, but at least I knew that I’d made it crystal clear that she if she wanted someone to support the BS she was spewing, she was talking to the wrong one.

Hindsight is always 20/20… and looking back, I wish I had pointed out specifically how asinine it is to assume that ALL Black women like their books trashy based on the requests of a few… even if ALL the Black women in the Phoenix Metro area loved these books, simple demographics should tell you that number is not representative of ALL Black women. I also wish I had pointed out that just because SOME Black women enjoy racy novels or that particular line of books, that doesn’t mean that is the ONLY genre that they enjoy. I still wonder if I should have told her to reverse the charge and shove the books up her… never mind.

The only thing I know is that we are so not post racial. Not even close.

     

Fun Friday

If it was an option, I’d re-up every year!

From his stand-up “Chewed Up” – Louis CK tells people why it’s great being a white male. It’s advantages and it’s futuristic disadvantages.

More info about Louis CK here: http://www.louisck.net

 

Maybe you’re just hypersensitive about [fill in the blank]…

… race, religion, gender, sexual orientation…

There’s not a whole lot more I can say that hasn’t already been said by Macon, so I won’t recreate the wheel, except to say this: any time you are tempted to ask someone whether they’re being hypersensitive about race (which is code for accusing them of playing the race card), ask yourself FIRST whether you’re being INsensitive about race (and put away your white privilege card).

So far, I would say it’s something like this — white people don’t have to think much about race; however, given the ongoing reality of racism, most non-white people do have to think about it, and analyze it, and figure out how it works. As a result, most white people know less about racism than most non-white people do. Nevertheless, a great, sad, and even tragic irony is that when non-white people take the time and effort to explain examples of racism, white people often doubt what they’re hearing, they often think they know more about a phenomenon with which they’ve had less direct experience, and they often want to talk about something else instead. They also commonly fail to understand how dismissive they’re being when they do those things.

via stuff white people do: listen poorly during discussions of racism.

Related Articles

• Dr. Laura Reveals 15 Ways to Pretend You’re Not Racist (race.change.org)
• You won’t have Dr. Laura to kick around anymore (pinkbananaworld.com)
• Dr. Laura’s N-bomb meltdown (salon.com)
• Dr. Laura’s Rhetoric More Offensive than her Words (psychologytoday.com)
• Dr. Laura’s n-word rant the latest in string of slurs (thegrio.com)
• 5 Ways White People Should Continue to Seek Justice for Oscar Grant (race.change.org)

It’s official: white people done lost they minds

We don’t need no stinkin’ facts. Frankly, I’m more scared of white people than Al Qaeda sometimes. The Jihadists are crazy, but some of my people are giving them a run for their money.

Rep.Gohmert, with all due respect, YOU are a terrorist. YOU are terrorizing the American public with wild speculation about some theory that might potentially happen in some wild realm of your imagination. What you did on the house floor is no better than yelling “fire” in a crowded theater. There’s a difference between credible evidence and wild speculation, and you should be able to decipher where that line is.

I have pretty much gotten used to the average Joe on the street insulting another’s patriotism in a disagreement like this, but I really expect better from an elected official, and a former judge.

 

What’s wrong with the idea of mothers sneaking into the country, giving birth, and sneaking back elsewhere to lovingly rear their children into U.S.-hating mini-Osamas? Besides the fact that there’s no evidence of such a phenomenon?

via PostPartisan – Terror babies? Really?.

going to a party… a tea party, that is…

If you’re wondering if the title of this entry is a joke or a vie for your attention, it’s not. Well, definitely not the former, maybe a little bit the latter. This isn’t what I had planned for today, and even though this entry might make more sense if I publish the other one first, seeing as it is a detailed explanation of my personal views on SB1070, the article I have in draft will wait for another day, because right now I feel a need to “Witness.”

So, it happened like this… it was almost time to leave work, and I was well past done with stupid (I’ve been known to announce to the department, “Ok, that’s it… I’m done with stupid!”), and when I got up to put some docs I’d just reviewed in the next person’s inbox, and decided to visit a friend’s desk to insist that the happy hour we’ve been talking about for approximately two months needed to happen soon. He tortured me by listing all the weekends he’ll be out of town (damn single people), mentioned something about a rally he was planning on attending in DC, and then commented that he’d been planning on making me go to happy hour with him anyway.

Is it a tea party rally?

Well, no, but there’s nothing wrong with that. And a brief conversation about media coverage of tea party rally’s ensued… then,

How are you planning to “make” me go do something we’ve been talking about for two months?

Well, I know you and I agree on a LOT of stuff but we don’t believe the same things. And I know you’re not a wagon jumper… I know that you don’t just jump on the bandwagon, you have solid reasons behind it.

That boy couldn’t have melted my heart faster if it had been butter & he’d been holding a blowtorch. But I figured this had probably come up as a result of me wearing my Standing on the Side of Love shirt to work on July 30th, the day after the protests, which I realized in retrospect probably fueled a lot of speculation as to whether I’d spent the night in jail (alas, but no…).

So we got into a conversation about SB1070, and I explained my views on border security, the immigration system, and SB1070… what I think the problems are, what I think would fix them, etc. He listened, nodded frequently, and at the end of my monologue, said basically that my arguments are really solid, and when he’s tried to have conversations with people, all they can say is that it’s racist. To which I replied, “I agree that it’s racist, and this is why…” and as I spoke, he nodded, cracked a few grins cuz you all know I have no filters, and then said, “That totally makes sense, but nobody else that I have talked to has explained it that way.” And I talked a little bit about race relations, that in my experience, on one side you have a group of people who are very uncomfortable talking about race in mixed company because on the other hand, you have white people who are very uncomfortable hearing about race in mixed company. We as a whole are not very good at differentiating between personal racism and institutional racism, and white people are especially bad at it, and tend to assume that anytime someone says this law is racist, that they personally are being called racist and they immediately get defensive. The wall goes up and the communication goes down the toilet. More agreement from him, and he lamented that because he has favored the law, he’s been immediately being labeled a racist. I lamented that because I oppose it, because I actually believe in what we printed on the fucking Statue of Liberty, I get to be called anti American.

So as I’m preparing to go, he says, So do you want to go to a tea party rally with me? I thought about being in close quarters with that many white people (and yes, I have looked in a mirror lately)… “No, not really.” “C’mon, why? I’m serious, I’ve been to several and I’ve never seen anything like what hits the news. They’ve always been the nicest people, they just believe in small government like I do.”

And so I had to ask myself, OK Cyndi… WHY? You talked yourself hoarse two weeks ago about media bias and how deeply imbedded in our subconscious these racialized images are. Do you really believe that, and if you do, then you know that your reluctance to go anywhere with this friend who you admire and respect is based solely on a media stereotype. You’ve been all about the first principle… do you really affirm and promote the inherent dignity of all people? How many times have you commented wryly that you’re always preaching to the damn choir? You’re always talking about being the change you want to see in the world. Are you really open minded, or is that just CYNDI”S spin? Is this an opportunity for you to learn something and hopefully teach something?

So as I walked out I said over my shoulder, “I’ll go to a tea party rally with you if you go to an event with me.”

He said, Done deal.

I hope he likes yellow.

New ARWA 101 Resource: The Costs of Racism to White People

While I was talking with various people about SB1070 over the last week or two, I noticed looks of surprise and confusion from white and brown people alike when I talked about the cost of laws like this to Whites. I’ve added an additional link to my page of Anti Racist White Allies (no, that doesn’t HAVE to be an oxyoron) that speaks more directly to those costs.

I think it’s important not to set ourselves up on too high a pedestal or delude ourselves into thinking that we are in this fight for people of color. While the effects of SB1070 and other forms of institutional racism are clearly more devastating to minority groups, they hurt white people to, and we have a vested interest in this fight.

The Costs of Racism to White People

WE TEND TO THINK OF RACISM as a problem for people of color and something we should be concerned about for their sake. It is true that racism is devastating to them, and if we believe in justice, quality, and equal opportunity for all, then we should be trying to end it. As we saw in the last sections, racism does produce material benefits for white people. However, the costs of racism to white people are devastating, especially to those of us without the money and power to buffer their effects. They are not the same costs as the day-to-day violence, discrimination, and harassment that people of color have to deal with. Nevertheless, they are significant costs that we have been trained to ignore, deny, or rationalize away. They are costs that other white people, particularly those with wealth, make us pay in our daily lives. It is sobering for us as white people to talk together about what it really costs to maintain such a system of division and exploitation in our society. We may even find it difficult to recognize some of the core costs of being white in our society.

via Anti Racist White Allies 101 « curlykidz.

Ground Zero, Day One: National Day of Non Compliance

Just your average Thursday night...

The title is a little misleading; while this was day one for many who stood on the side of love that day, my community has been living under SB1070 for two years this coming February… under 287(g). Please note that when I say my community, I don’t mean my county or even my city. I mean, MY NEIGHBORHOOD. The student body at my son’s high school is 71% Hispanic, 22% Black. 4% White, 2% Native American, and .6% Asian. When Sheriff Joe “Bull” Arpaio does an immigration sweep, it’s not in Scottsdale or Paradise Valley, it’s in neighborhoods like mine that are going to give him the biggest bang for his buck… the highest numbers of “suspected” illegal immigrants for his media whoring. 

Unlike PurpleCrayon, friend and member of my church fam, I was neither shocked nor surprised by the show of force from the good Sheriff. It’s funny to me that the Sheriff’s Posse always seems to strike in the hours just before & after dawn or dusk, but there’s nary a Posse to be found in the wee hours of the morning as I lie in bed listing to what I hope is random, rather than intentional, gunfire. Don’t worry about those gangs of urban terrorists Joe… you go on and russle up some landscapers and day laborers instead, cowboy.  

I have been trying for a couple days now to sort through everything that happened during the National Day of Non-Compliance and throughout the weekend. How do I summarize all that I witnessed, everything I felt? There are so many different facets that I’m struggling to organize them, and I’m starting to think this might be a multi post series.

There’s ground deer in the fridge (& other things you don’t hear every day)

Wednesday, July 7

7:18pm~ Cyndi is taking a scenic tour of the US so as not to interfere with her parents being at the parade on time tomorrow… *smh*… ANYWAYS… she’s pretty sure she’ll be in PHL from 6-8AM if anybody wants to join her for breakfast at da airports 🙂 

10:27pm ~ Cyndi is on flight 258 to PHL. She hopes they will be kind to her luggage (SHOES) there since she took the AWA ID tag off of it before they took it…  

Thursday, July 8 

Christie drove 40 minutes to spend 10 minutes with the girls & I at the airport... she RAWKS!

2:39am ~ Cyndi watched the sunrise at 2AM… how obscene. Hello, humidity… err Philly…  

2:49am ~ Cyndi has a PSA for the flying public: your smart phone has an option to silence the keypad. please learn to use this function before you start rabidly texting everyone you know. this way, the other 166 people in coach won’t want to choke your ass out while we wait for a gate.  

4:44am ~ Cyndi is on the plane to MCI… halfway done!  

8:11am ~ Cyndi is wheels down & hoping for a nap in the car!  

11:30am ~ there’s ground deer in my parents’ fridge.  

“Nothing like ground venison to welcome home the crunchy urban mama,” observes MamaEi…   

My Daddy in the Color Guard

3:37pm ~ Cyndi is about to watch her daddy in the parade  

8:03pm ~ Cyndi is headed to The Office with Joni  

8:44pm ~ Cyndi just had Sweet Home Alabama moment…

There’s a baby… in the bar.

9:16pm ~ Cyndi is at some other bar… and remembering why she doesn’t usually come in town till Friday. ·  

9:21pm ~ Cyndi just heard someone drop the n word.

 OK, a side note for white folks: 

1. The n-word is ALWAYS offensive, not just when there are black people in hearing distance.
2. If you have balls enough to use a racial slur in public, be man enough to stand behind it. Don’t come with some weak ass apology like, “I didn’t mean that in a derogatory way.” Because then you don’t just look like a racist, you look like a dumbass too.
3. Picking up my tab was a nice gesture, but I’ll be headed back out of town before you recover from your hangover. I noticed there are a lot more brown children in town than there were back in my day… your community would benefit from you investing in a bottle of palmolive. Next time you feel that word about to come out your mouth… tilt your head back and gargle.

11:44pm ~ Cyndi doesn’t usually go for that tag teaming shit…  and bless your heart*, she’d really rather your hands stayed on the OUTSIDE of her clothing.

*Bless your heart is one of the most wonderful phrases of the English language. You can utter the most heinous insult, so long as you preface it with or tack this phrase to the end of it.

“She’s just young. And stupid, bless her heart.”

Friday, July 9

12:03am ~ Cyndi is a little bit chicken fried…  

 10:02am ~ Cyndi has misplaced her glasses somewhere…  

2:27pm ~ Cyndi wonders where her children are…  

2:57pm ~ Cyndi founded her glasses!   

Eileen: How bout the kids?   
Melanie: Were they in your head? That’s usually where I lose mine.
Cyndi Ugh they’d been to a church yard sale. We now have a number of Irish t shirts. And a couple wigs. One looks like the 4th of July threw up on it.    

3:54pm ~ Cyndi is waiting for her step mama to get back with the taco pizza  

4:57pm ~ Cyndi ‎ ~ “Well, you’re my mother, so I *should* do what you tell me to do…” reasons Daija, age 7 

How many almost 40 year old cheerleaders can you get in one picture?

9:32pm ~ Cyndi is at the pub. its karaoke night.    

9:36pm · Shawn: Tiny Dancer! It’s a must sing! LOL! Please report back on how it went! 😉
9:36pm · LaTonya: What’cha singin’?    
9:40pm · Cyndi: Uh, no.    
9:42pm · Shawn: No!?!?! C’mon, Cindy. And you have a Blackberry too! You could totally video tape that and share it! 🙂    How about … Welcome to the Jungle then? LOL! 🙂 have a great time regardless.    
9:44pm · Cyndi: Slightly more appropriate for the venue… Y’all just missed my version of Delta Dawn…    

I just love this guy…

11:58pm ~ Cyndi about to go drank like a muthafucka

Saturday July 10

9:28am ~ Cyndi had too much fun hanging out at 5th Street Pub & front porch pimpin’ at Brenda’s with Jami, Chip and Jen!    

2:14pm ~ Cyndi thinks it’s a good time for a nap.    

5:16pm ~ … the fair, episode three    

7:21pm ~ Cyndi thinks Halle looks like she about to toss her cookies…    

8:34pm ~ Cyndi just realized, & is pretty bummed, that she totally missed the demolition derby.    

Sunday, July 11

3:25am ~ Cyndi has insomnia, and while perusing her parents’ fridge, she noticed there are no longer several packages of ground deer. She should have just gone to the bar… either way she wouldn’t have gotten any sleep, but she wouldn’t be sitting here wondering when she ate Bambi.    

6:31am ~ Cyndi is sittin’ on her daddy’s porch listenin’ to wind chimes tinkling, birds singing, and… uh… a hella lot of bugs. This may be short lived… she forgot that the state bird is the mosquito, bless her heart.    

2:57pm ~ Cyndi is in Kansas City… seems like I just left here a minute ago…    

7:33pm ~ Cyndi wonders what possesses grown men to go out in public sporting a Mr. T look ·    

9:55pm~ Cyndi can’t narrow it down to one catch phrase to describe the annual pilgrimage. There’s usually something that someone says or does that really stands out, but this year the laughs just kept comin’…

a tale of two (or more) cities (updated)

So it’s probably not a surprise to any of my readers (if there are any left out there, that is) that I am not a fan of SB1070. I could go on about that, but right now I am going to attempt to focus my attention (this is a struggle for me) on a thought that occurred to me earlier, while I was reading Program gives Chicago Public Schools teachers a lesson in history, culture. It sounds like a pretty cool program, and I figure that the chances of our schools implementing a program like this are slim. If I sound cynical, well… between SB1070 and our more recent Ethnic Studies Law, well… nuff said.

So as it is prone to do, my mind started wandering & I started a comparison & contrast of Phoenix & Chicago, a city I recently visited & fell in love with. Now, it’s not easy to follow my train of thought on a lot of things… sometimes I can’t even do it. But humor me today… just sit down, shut up, and hang on.

all inner city kids need is a nice white lady

I know I said I wasn’t going to post anymore stand alone videos as a blog entry, but I just had to throw this one up last night when previews of The Blind Side were getting on my nerves. The Nice White Lady Movies are getting a little old for me. I knew better than to start an actual rant at 1AM, and I thought I’d saved this as a draft but I guess not!

H/T to {RAGE against the MINIVAN} for the video.. I remembered seeing it a few days ago and of course I think of it every time the preview comes on. So I went to hunt it down and saw Kristen had since written about the movie from a transracial adoption perspective in the feel-good adoption movie I don’t want to see

The first thing I noticed when I watched the preview was that, with the exception of the main character, every black person in the movie is bad, and every white person in the movie is good. We see a female black relative who appears to be an addict, several thugs who threaten the mom, and even a sassy black social worker who further plays into stereotypes. Then, on the Great White Hope side, we see sacrificial parents, concerned friends, loving coaches, and encouraging tutors. The subtle message: if we can just get some of these kids away from BLACK PEOPLE, then they might have a chance.

Walking the (color)Line

WARNING – Racial Smog Ahead

Proceed with caution. If you have a low tolerance for white guilt (stage whisper: that’s code for, if you are NOT white) or tend to have defensive reactions during conversations about white privilege (stage whisper: that’s code for, if you ARE white), I recommend some form of psychiatric medication or perhaps even the liberal use of recreational drugs before proceeding.

Know your limits. Step out of the sweat lodge as frequently as necessary.

Unitarian Universalist code word for racist: “Racially Challenged”

I know I am supposed to be blogging about my personal stuff that I’ve been avoiding. But last night I read Vessel: The Gordon Sisters did not have ‘a complicated past’. They were racist. I just can’t let it go. I think I could fill a Bingo Card from this article.

“I won’t say, ‘They were racists!’ ” said the Rev. Melanie Morel-Ensminger, waving her arms in mock alarm.

1. I’m pretty sure that waving your arms in mock alarm qualifies as using air quotes, which is generally offensive in any discussion about race.
2. Racism 101: The “I’m (or in this case, they’re) not racist… BUT” disclaimer is just code for “I’m about to say something racist.”