Week Seven: Chapter 12: Readings and Questions

 I cannot hide my anger to spare you guilt, nor hurt feelings, nor answering anger; for to do so insults and trivializes all our efforts. Guilt is not a response to anger; it is a response to one’s own actions or lack of action. If it leads to change then it can be useful, since it is then no longer guilt but the beginning of knowledge. Yet all too often, guilt is just another name for impotence, for defensiveness destructive of communication; it becomes a device to protect ignorance and the continuation of things the way they are, the ultimate protection for changelessness.

– Audre Lorde

When white people ask me what to do about racism and white fragility, the first thing I ask is, “What has enabled you to be a full, educated, professional adult and not know what to do about racism?” If we take the question seriously and map out all the ways we have come to not know what to do, we will have our guide before us.

– Robin DiAngelo

Reading Overview

This Week’s Reading

Chapter 12 (pages 139 – 154)

Reading Summary

Chapter 12

In conclusion, while the emotions, behaviors, claims, and underlying assumptions associated with white fragility are always in play, a transformed paradigm could develop different feelings and accelerate one’s lifelong journey of addressing unconscious racial bias. If feedback on racist patterns was met with gratitude, motivation, or humility, possible behaviors that would manifest could be reflection, engagement, and understanding. Going forward it is important to continue to seek out more information, demand that information on white fragility is taught in schools, and build authentic cross-racial relationships. Finally, interrupting racism takes courage and intentionality. We will never interrupt it if we remain comfortable.

Optional pre-reading question:

• Reflect on this quote from the book: “When white people ask me what to do about racism and white fragility, the first thing I ask is, ‘What has enabled you to be a full, educated, professional adult and not know what to do about racism?’” (p. 144)

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Discussion (~40 min)

• Robin DiAngelo writes that it isn't enough for white people to be nice and that, in fact, racism depends on white people simply being nice. How does niceness alone uphold the racial status quo?

• Very little if anything in society at large supports us to persist in the work of anti-racism. In fact, much pressures us not to continue the work. Because of this, we need to set up support for ourselves to continue. How will you set up support for yourself to stay on the journey? How will you resist complacency?

• Completion questions:

• What was life-affirming about being part of this group?

• What was challenging?

• What do you need to express to feel complete?

It is ok to spend time on one or two questions, don’t expect to make it through all of them, but please do spend 15 or 20 minutes on the completion questions so that everyone leaves feeling seen, heard, and with a sense of belonging.

Week Six: Chapters 10 & 11: Readings, Questions and Videos

 Stopping our racist patterns must be more important than working to convince others that we don’t have them.

– Robin DiAngelo

We need to reflect on when we cry and when we don’t, and why. In other words, what does it take to move us?

– Robin DiAngelo

This Week’s Reading

Chapter 10 (pages 123 – 129)

Chapter 11 (pages 131 – 138)

Reading Summary

Chapter 10

The author learned from decades of experience that there are unspoken rules for how to give white people feedback on racist assumptions and patterns. Most notably, the cardinal rule is to not give feedback at all. White fragility punishes the person giving feedback and demands silence. However, feedback is a key element in being able to address and dismantle racism. The guidelines that are typically acceptable insist on white people feeling comfortable and supporting the racial status quo. Focusing on the feedback, instead of the delivery or messenger, is key to building the stamina necessary for continued engagement.

Optional pre-reading question:

• Reflect on this quote from the book: “I repeat: stopping our racist patterns must be more important than working to convince others that we don’t have them. We do have them, and people of color already know we have them; our efforts to prove otherwise are not convincing.” (p. 129)

Chapter 11

In this chapter, the author reviews the historical impact of white women’s tears on black people and white men. Heartfelt emotions are important; however, when and why we cry is also political. Emotions are shaped by our biases, beliefs, and cultural frameworks, and our emotions drive behaviors that impact other people. When a white woman cries over racism, regardless of her intentions, most of the attention will immediately go to her. For people of color, white tears demonstrate a white person’s racial insulation and privilege.

Optional pre-reading question:

• Reflect on this quote from the book: “We need to reflect on when we cry and when we don’t, and why. In other words, what does it take to move us?” (p. 135)

Week Five: Chapters 7, 8 & 9: Readings, Questions and Videos

 Whiteness accrues privilege and status; gets itself surrounded by protective pillows of resources and/or benefits of the doubt.

– Michelle Fine

Within their insulated environment of racial privilege, whites both expect racial comfort and become less tolerant of stress.

– Robin DiAngelo

In this country, “American” means white. Everybody else has to hyphenate.

– Toni Morrison

Reading Overview

This Week’s Reading

Chapter 7 (pages 99 – 106)

Chapter 8 (pages 107 – 113)

Chapter 9 (pages 115 – 122)

Reading Summary

Chapter 7

Building upon earlier chapters, this chapter continues to explore what happens when white people are triggered in conversations about race and racism. Most white people can experience racial comfort because they live in insulated environments of racial privilege. Racial stress is triggered when foundational ideologies such as color-blindness, meritocracy, and individualism are challenged, and often white people are unable to respond constructively. Instead, common responses or emotions include anger, withdrawal, emotional incapacitation, guilt, argumentation, and cognitive dissonance.

Optional pre-reading question:

• How has the use of coded language, such as “urban,” “inner city,” and “disadvantaged,” kept you and your colleagues from having open and honest conversations about race and racism in education?

• How does using these terms shift the responsibility for racial inequality from white people to people of color? What is masked by these terms?

Chapter 8

Although research indicates that ideas about race are constructed as early as preschool, white adults often deny that racially based privileges exist. When challenged, white people resort to the discourse of self-defense. In conversations about race, and although no physical violence occurs, white people will characterize themselves as victimized or attacked. Claiming to be unfairly treated, they blame others for their discomfort. In that regard, white fragility is not fragile at all and can be a form of bullying that allows white people to regain control and protect their position.

Optional pre-reading question:

• Reflect on this quote from the book: “In my workshops, I often ask people of color, ‘How often have you given white people feedback on our unaware yet inevitable racism? How often has that gone well for you?’ Eye-rolling, head-shaking, and outright laughter follow, along with the consensus of rarely, if ever. I then ask, ‘What would it be like if you could simply give us feedback, have us graciously receive it, reflect, and work to change the behavior?’ Recently a man of color sighed and said, ‘It would be revolutionary.’” (p. 113)

Chapter 9

This chapter looks specifically at the common feelings and behaviors that occur when white fragility is in action. The author identifies common claims that are used to justify strong emotional reactions such as arguing, avoiding, denying, or crying. The claims are based on a series of assumptions that are common among the white collective when white fragility is in action. Each of these feelings, behaviors, claims, and assumptions is a function of white fragility. They block any entry point for reflection and engagement.

Optional pre-reading question:

• Reflect on this quote from the book: “White people are receptive to my presentation as long as it remains abstract. The moment I name some racially problematic dynamic or action happening in the room in the moment…white fragility erupts.” (p. 117)

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Group Discussion Questions: (~40 min)

• Start by reflecting together on the group (consider each question one by one)

• What’s going well?

• What could be better?

• What’s missing?

• What have we learned from that we can stop doing?

• Discuss how the “intention” someone holds when communicating can differ from the “impact” they have, in the context of race and racism.

• Where does white fragility show up in your own experience of the world?

• Why do you think many whites see that people of color get preferential treatment when studies show that people of color are discriminated against in education, employment, medicine, and criminal justice?

• How would you like to respond when confronted with white fragility? What would prepare you to respond that way?
  
  It is ok to spend time on one or two questions, don’t expect to make it through all of them.

Week Four: Chapters 5 & 6: Readings, Questions and Videos

 Racism is a systemic, societal, institutional, omnipresent, and epistemologically embedded phenomenon that pervades every vestige of our reality. For most whites, however, racism is like murder: the concept exists, but someone has to commit it in order for it to happen.

– Omowale Akintunde

The dominant paradigm of racism as discrete, individual, intentional, and malicious acts makes it unlikely that whites will acknowledge any of our actions as racism.

– Robin DiAngelo

In this country, “American” means white. Everybody else has to hyphenate.

– Toni Morrison

Reading Overview

This Week’s Reading

Chapter 5 (pages 71 – 87)

Chapter 6 (pages 89 – 98)

Reading Summary

Chapter 5

Following the civil rights movement era, many people believed that only intentionally malicious acts of extreme prejudice were classified as racist and that only bad people committed those acts. Thus, according to the author, the most effective adaptation of racism—the good/bad binary—became a cultural norm. The good/bad binary made it effectively impossible for the average white person to understand— much less interrupt—racism. The chapter ends by looking at some of the most popular claims within the good/bad binary and providing counter narratives to the claims.

Optional pre-reading question:

• Reflect on this quote from the book: “If, as a white person, I conceptualize racism as a binary and I place myself on the not racist side, what further action is required of me? No action is required, because I am not a racist. Therefore, racism is not my problem; it doesn’t concern me and there is nothing further I need to do.” (p. 73)

Chapter 6

White supremacy impacts all people of color, however, black people represent the ultimate racial “other,” leading to a uniquely anti-black sentiment integral to white identity. In this chapter, the author explains that anti-blackness is rooted in misinformation, fables, perversions, projections, and lies about African Americans. As a result, white racial socialization causes many conflicting feelings toward black people, including benevolence, resentment, superiority, hatred, and, most fundamentally, deep guilt about past and current systematic transgressions against black people.

Optional pre-reading question:

• Reflect on this quote from the book: “Creating a separate and inferior black race simultaneously created the ‘superior’ white race: one concept could not exist without the other. In this sense, whites need black people; blackness is essential to the creation of white identity.” (p. 91)

Supplemental Resources

Debunking The Most Common Myths White People Tell About Race

Implicit Association Test (Scroll to the bottom and click I wish to proceed, then click Race IAT on the following page. Feel free to Decline to Answer any of the survey questions before and after the test.)

Discussion Questions:

• How does the understanding of racism as "a structure, not an event” impact your perspective?

• Which of the color-blind or color-celebrate narratives connected to the good/bad binary have you used (p. 77), either in the past or in the present?
  For example:

• I was taught to treat everyone the same

• Focusing on race is what divides us

• I have friends or family members who are people of color

• We don’t like how white our neighborhood is, but we had to move here for the schools

• I marched in the sixties

• What is it like for you to hear someone acknowledge their own racism? What is it like for you to acknowledge it in yourself?

• Where do you see the influence of anti-black messages in your own thinking?

Week Three Readings, Questions and Videos

I don’t want you to understand me better, I want you to understand yourselves. Your survival has never depended on your knowledge of white culture. In fact, it’s required your ignorance.

– Ijeoma Oluo

I see a pattern running through the matrix of white privilege, a pattern of assumptions that were passed on to me as a white person. There was one main piece of cultural turf; it was my own turn, and I was among those who could control the turf. My skin color was an asset for any move I was educated to want to make. I could think of myself as belonging in major ways and of making social systems work for me. I could freely disparage, fear, neglect, or be oblivious to anything outside of the dominant cultural forms.

– Peggy McIntosh

My silence is not benign because it protects and maintains the racial hierarchy and my place within it.

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Reading Overview

This Week’s Reading

Chapter 3 (pages 39 – 50)

Chapter 4 (pages 51 – 69)

Reading Summary

Chapter 3

A simplistic understanding of racism leads people to believe that the civil rights movement and the desegregation of public facilities generally ended racist practices. However, racism is highly adaptable and modern norms, policies, and practices have resulted in racial outcomes similar to those in the past. Color-blind ideology, although initially well-intentioned, makes it difficult to address unconscious racist beliefs and has served to deny the reality of racism—thus holding it in place. Finally, cultural norms insist that white people hide racism from people of color and deny it around other white people, which also makes it impossible to confront and address racism.

Chapter 4

As a reminder, racial identity shapes a person’s perspectives, experiences, and responses. In this chapter, the author delves into eight foundational aspects of white fragility. The author explains that because of their racial identification, white people in the United States will generally feel a sense of belonging, be free from the burden of race, have freedom of movement, and will be considered just people. People of color typically do not have the same experience. In addition, white people are most likely to choose racial segregation and position themselves as racially innocent. Those two choices, along with an obliviousness to the country’s racial history, can lead white people to romanticize ideas about the good old days. Finally, white solidarity, which is an unspoken agreement among white people to protect white advantage and not cause another white person to feel racial discomfort, is key in maintaining white supremacy.

Optional pre-reading question:

Reflect on this quote from the book: “But my silence is not benign because it protects and maintains the racial hierarchy and my place within it.” (p. 58)

Supplemental Resources

Why Color Blindness Will NOT End Racism (beginning at 2:25)

White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack

Week Two Readings, Questions and Videos

This Week’s Readings

Chapter 1 (pages 7 – 14)

Chapter 2 (pages 15 – 38)

Reading Summary

Chapter 1

This chapter explains that two major challenges of talking to white people about racism are a limited understanding of socialization and a simplistic understanding of racism. White people have been socialized to see that race matters, but not their own race. Specifically, the Western ideologies of individualism and objectivity make it difficult for white people to explore the collective aspects of white experience. Thus, collectively white people do not see themselves in racial terms. Naming race, however, is a critical component of cross-racial skill building and is necessary in order to engage critically with the topic of race. Also, to increase the racial stamina that counters white fragility, white people must reflect on the whole of their identities and the impact of being members of their racial group.

Optional pre-reading question:

Reflect on this quote from the book: “Yet our simplistic definition of racism—as intentional acts of racial discrimination committed by immoral individuals—engenders a confidence that we are not part of the problem and that our learning is thus complete.” (p. 9)

Chapter 2

Chapter 2 outlines key information about racism and white supremacy in the United States. The author emphasizes that race is socially constructed; however, the belief that race and differences associated with it are biological is deep-seated. Race is an evolving social idea that was created to legitimize racial inequality and protect white advantage. Historically and contemporarily, being perceived as white carries legal, political, economic, and social rights and privileges that are denied to others. White supremacy is the overarching political, economic, and social system of domination that describes the culture we live in and that positions whiteness as ideal. Naming white supremacy makes the system visible and shifts the locus of change onto white people, where it belongs. Challenging complicity with and investment in racism is life-long work for white people.

Optional pre-reading question:

Reflect on this quote from the book: “Similarly, racism—like sexism and other forms of oppression—occurs when a racial group’s prejudice is backed by legal authority and institutional control. This authority and control transforms individual prejudices into a far-reaching system that no longer depends on the good intentions of individual actors; it becomes the default of the society and is reproduced automatically.” (p. 21)

Supplemental Resources (2 Videos)

What are some of the ways in which my race has shaped my life?

Racial socialization questions

Discussion Questions for Next Session: 

Did you discover anything about some of the ways in which your race has shaped your life?

For example:

How racially diverse was your neighborhood growing up?

How often have you had a teacher or professor of your own race(s)?

How often have you been to a wedding that was either all or virtually all white?

How often have you been to a funeral that was virtually all white?

What came up for you in reading Robin DiAngelo’s descriptions of race and racism?

What was your reaction to seeing the statistics, either in the reading (p. 31) or the supplemental video, about the extent to which white people control major institutions?

What does Robin DiAngelo’s reframing of Jackie Robinson as “the first black man whites allowed to play major-league baseball” (p. 26) bring up for you?

Week One Readings and Videos

Welcome to the West Hill summer book study on, "White Fragility; Why it's so Hard for White People to Talk about Racism." 

The program and questions we will be using were graciously given to us by The Pachamama Alliance organization, with whom Deb did this book study last winter.  They describe their purpose this way: 

Purpose

Pachamama Alliance, empowered by our partnership with indigenous people, is dedicated to bringing forth an environmentally sustainable, spiritually fulfilling, socially just human presence on this planet.

Our unique contribution is to generate and engage people everywhere in transformational conversations and experiences consistent with this purpose. We weave together indigenous and modern worldviews such that human beings are in touch with their dignity and are ennobled by the magnificence, mystery, and opportunity of what is possible for humanity at this time.

We are here to inspire and galvanize the human family to generate a critical mass of conscious commitment to a thriving, just and sustainable way of life on Earth. This is a commitment to transforming human systems and structures that separate us, and to transforming our relationships with ourselves, with one another, and with the natural world.

If you are interested in learning more about them, click here:

Pachamama Alliance: https://www.pachamama.org

After each session, the following week's readings, questions, and any supplemental resources (e.g., videos) will be posted here on the blog.   

Week One Readings and Videos

Author’s Note (pages xiii – xvii)

Introduction (pages 1 – 5)

Introduction

In the introduction, the author explains that North Americans live in a society that is deeply separate and unequal by race, that white people are socialized into a deeply internalized sense of racial superiority, and that conversations about race often challenge a white person’s sense of identity. The author, focusing on white progressives, explains that the book will define “white fragility,” discuss how it develops, how it protects racial inequality, and what can be done to overcome it.

Optional pre-reading questions:

• What is your previous experience discussing race and racism?
• Why have you decided to read and discuss this book?
• What questions do you have prior to reading?

Supplemental Resources: 2 short videos

White Fragility Welcome and Introduction


Stretch Zone and Compass of Reactions

First Online Session: Wednesday, July 29, 2020

In our efforts to continue our learning and growth, West Hill will be hosting another book study. Under the leadership of Scott Kearns and Deb Ellis we will be exploring

White Fragility: Why it's so Hard for White People to Talk about Racism, by Robin Diangelo

This 7-week West Hill zoom book study will be offered on Wednesdays from 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. starting July 29th, 2020.

Save this link to join us at our first gathering:

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85345181254

Meeting ID 853 4518 1254

If you have not yet purchased your copy, they are available at Chapters Indigo for under $14.

Links to Trans Videos

Here are the links to the videos Deb Ellis showed in full or in part: 

I'm Transgender & I Love My Trans Body

I'm Transgender & I Love My Trans Body #MyTransBody is a campaign that centres around celebrating trans bodies and we invite people to take part via so...

Surgery Has Given Me The Body I Always Wanted | MY TRANS LIFE

Surgery Has Given Me The Body I Always Wanted | MY TRANS LIFE SUBSCRIBE to Barcroft TV: http://bit.ly/Oc61Hj A YOUTUBER from Melbourne is celebrating her new body after under...

Born in the Wrong Body : My Transgender Kid VOSTFR

Born in the Wrong Body : My Transgender Kid VOSTFR Born in the Wrong Body : My Transgender Kid VOSTFR Fansub : http://mogeek.fr

Joshua M. Ferguson: Life Beyond Gender Roles

Joshua M. Ferguson: Life Beyond Gender Roles What would the world look like if society acknowledged and fully accepted more than two genders? Joshua M. Fergu...