A curious thing happens when people from dominant groups start trying to pursue justice. When they get out of their safe social bubbles, they start making matters worse.
Take racial injustice for example. Think of a White person you know who’s been learning about racism. They know they shouldn’t just think about racism, they should go do something. But in that doing something, they’ll probably be spending more time around people of color. And wouldn’t it be nice if they could do that without ever making mistakes? No such guarantee exists.
Even when we’re hyper-cautious, each of us carries deeply ingrained habits that can cause microaggressions.
Microaggressions are “brief and commonplace daily verbal, behavioral, and environmental indignities, whether intentional or unintentional, that communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative racial slights and insults to the target person or group.” - David Sue et al.
Here's some bad news. Good intentions will not protect you from committing microaggressions. To drive home this point, allow me to be honest about three microaggressions I was aware of committing in just a two month period.
First was the day I attended a gathering of women from many churches. The event was hosted at a predominantly Black church. As I placed a donut on my plate in the breakfast line, I chatted with a Black woman beside me. Assuming that members of this Black church had provided the breakfast, I asked her, “Did you help set up for this event?” She responded ever so politely, “Actually, I’m the speaker today.” I looked at her spike heels, her satin shirt, her perfect hair. Seated near the kitchen were the women in aprons who had set up the food. This woman was the keynote speaker, the guest of honor, here to receive an award. I had mistaken her Black body for “the help.”
A few weeks later, I attended a separate event in which I mistook one of the few Asian women in the room for another Asian woman, as if the only distinguishing characteristic between her and every other participant the room was the continent her ancestors came from.
And a few weeks after that, at a community event I mistook a Black woman who had come to volunteer for a recipient of aid.
Yes, this is a lousy track record for someone with a PhD and a job teaching about racism. I can still taste my foot in my mouth. Each time these things happen, I apologize. I name what happened. I try to say why it’s not okay and how I’m working on doing better. People respond with kind words like “it’s fine” because that’s often the easiest way to survive microaggressions. I try to say, “Thank you, but I still want to do better.” Often we make an awkward exit from the conversation. I want to crawl under a table. I wonder if it would be better if I had not showed up at all.
I offer these examples from my own life not to make myself look worse (or somehow more humble) than anyone else, but as evidence that intellectual learning does not make you immune from doing unjust things.
What to do then? One option is to hide. If a White person wants to feel innocent of racial injustice, they might think the best bet is to tuck away among a lot of other White people who care less about racism than they do. They learn to tiptoe around race. It’s a tricky topic that can get you in trouble. (Hint: It’s actually a skill you can learn with practice).
There are times to learn about injustice from a distance or among people with similar social experiences to your own. But hiding is not a sustainable solution.
Eventually learning about injustice is going to bring you to deep, scary encounters with inadequacy. You can not fix a whole society on your own. You can’t even fix yourself. You’re steeped in some discriminatory beliefs and some inequitable systems.
Maybe you think you’re different because you’ve got a plan and you’re not like those other people. Good luck with that. Even if you manage to get your whole life lined up right on a lonely road of self-perfection and self-flagellation, how are you going to fix all the past harm done? How are you going to put up with all the other imperfect people?
Here’s some good news. You don’t have to hide away in a basement trying to keep from ever hurting anybody. Every society across the history of the world has figured out ways to deal with mistakes. Sure, war is one of those ways. But we have better options to choose from, too. My favorites ways are these: we apologize, we extend forgiveness, and we take responsibility for making it better. We give each other the freedom to try again.
I suggest this. Give yourself a big hug, give somebody else a hug, remind yourself how grace works, and then go take a brave step toward justice today.