White Folks Workbook: Week 6
Aligning Values and Culture
When the Morning Light Finds You
When we begin taking ownership of our behavior, White Supremacy Culture rears its ugly head again. We must fight the culture ingrained in our minds that controls our self-talk. Sometimes, these voices can be hard to ignore and resist; they are loud with a lifetime of untempered sovereignty over our thoughts. Yet, they are the voices, the culture, that drive us to make decisions that make us feel shameful and guilty. They support us in acting in ways that do not make us proud.
In "The Question Your Soul Answers," Saeed Jones writes:
And so I pose the question to all White folks: Who do you want to be when the morning light finds you? Certainly, we want to be anti-racists, we want to co-conspirators and activists. However, I'm not talking about the nouns that describe us. As White folks unlearning White Supremacy Culture, we must identify the adjectives we want to embody, the values we want to describe the new culture to which we are self-indoctrinating.
The Fight between Our Values and White Supremacy Culture
Since childhood, we have ascribed to values that we think make a "good" human being. When asked to describe ourselves, we often use these values, we say we are generous or loyal or selfless. Yet, when faced with the task of dismantling White supremacy, we often fail to live up to these values. Values that, as children, seemed to simple. Little kids have a simplistic view of the world and the way people work. They have a limited vocabulary and tend to speak in broad strokes. They see values as straightforward: if you do this, you are caring; if you do that, you are mean. As we age, we realize it is not so simple to choose to embody our values all the time.
While we are acutely aware of how White Supremacy Culture is harmful to BIPOC folks, sometimes we forget that it takes away White humanity as well. Many will agree that White supremacy robs Black folks of their humanity in the eyes of White folks. But White supremacy also robs White folks of our humanity deep within, as it makes us blind to other humans.
The culture of White supremacy asks White folks to give up our humility, our responsibility to others, our morality, and our empathy. It asks us to give up these qualities that make us human and humane in the name of maintaining power structures.
Humanity is a two-way street: to recognize the humanity of others is to develop humanity within ourselves.
So how did White Supremacy Culture steal our humanity from our five-year-old selves?
Our five-year-old selves would have said, "I'm brave, I can face anything hard," but White Supremacy Culture taught us to avoid conflict, and so we do not bravely speak up in the face of racism. Our five-year-old selves would have said, "I'm loving because I care about others," but White Supremacy Culture taught us to focus on ourselves, and so we have failed to lovingly support those facing oppression that did not directly affect us.
We must hearken back to the values we want to embody, and reimagine them in the context of anti-racism. We must realign our culture to support these values.
Do the Work! Question Your Values
In a journal or in conversation with another White person doing this work, ask yourself:
At your best, who do you see yourself as? What words would you use to describe yourself?
What words would your five-year-old self use to describe themself?
Are you embodying either of those people as an anti-racist co-conspirator?
How has White Supremacy Culture deterred you from your values?
Toward a Culture of...
So if we realize the culture in which we have been raised, White Supremacy Culture, is not serving our work, we must reject it. We are doing the work to unlearn these characteristics and values, but once we unlearn this culture, where do we go? We move toward a culture of:
Let's break each of these down more carefully:
Collectivism is the answer to White Supremacy Culture's individualism. It is rooted in the belief that we are for each other. This includes:
Intersectionality: The overlap of oppression between multiple marginalized identities (race, gender, sexuality, ableism, class, etc.). As Kimberlé Crenshaw coined it, it is "a lens through which you can see where power comes and collides, where it locks and intersects. It is the acknowledgement that everyone has their own unique experiences of discrimination and privilege."
Centering Marginalized Groups: If the most marginalized groups are free, that means that everyone is free.
Power Sharing: Giving up privilege and authority in order to allow equity and justice in decision-making. This is an answer to White Supremacy Culture's power hoarding.
Black Villages: Derived from the 13 Guiding Principles of the Black Lives Matter Movement, the idea that our responsibility lies beyond the Western-defined nuclear family and includes our villages, or collective communities, and that we must function as a supportive village to dismantle racism.
Perspectivism is the answer to White Supremacy Culture's objectivity, paternalism, and worship of the written word. It is rooted in the belief that history and our world view were written by White supremacy, and therefore must be disrupted. This includes:
Spectrum Thinking: The belief that everything exists in more shades than a binary, straying from either/or thinking to consider more options.
Empathy: Derived from the 13 Guiding Principles of the Black Lives Matter Movement, engaging with all people “with the intent to learn about and connect with their contexts,” not from a place of othering or pity.
Relearning History: Acceptance that the history we were taught in school and that is perpetuated by White society does not reflect the lived history of marginalized people because it was written by the colonizers.
Listening and Believing: Allowing White stories, feelings, and experiences to take a back seat in order to hear those of Folks of the Global Majority, and believing what we hear to be true and valuable.
Sustainability is the answer to White Supremacy's sense of urgency and belief that progress is more, bigger. It is rooted in the belief that anti-racist work is focused on creating a just and equitable future. This includes:
Movement, Not a Moment: An understanding that dismantling White supremacy and racism are lifelong processes that do not end until everyone is free.
Quality over Quantity: Taking anti-racist actions that are thoughtful, impactful, well-planned, and lasting.
Building Stamina: Acknowledgment that, due to our privilege, we must learn to maintain energy in social justice work, and that we are in a marathon, not a sprint.
Seventh Generation Thinking: The Haudenosaunee Confederacy’s belief that “Nations are taught to respect the world in which they live as they are borrowing it from future generations,” and we must consider a world seven generations away.
Accountability is the answer to White Supremacy's fear of conflict, defensiveness, and perfectionism. It is rooted in the belief that we are responsible for our thoughts, action, learning, and growth. This includes:
Honesty: Even (especially) when it is uncomfortable, engaging in honest exchange and productive conflict with others.
Loving Engagement: Derived from the 13 Guiding Principles of the Black Lives Matter Movement, using principles of liberation and anti-racism to guide our interactions with others, and apologizing when we cause harm.
Restorative Justice: Focusing on creating, maintaining, and repairing communities and relationships when harm is done, through healing and learning to prevent future harm.
Benevolent Self-Criticism: Interrogating our own actions, behaviors, and thoughts for White supremacy, racism, and anti-Blackness, while seeing our mistakes as opportunities to grow.
Do the Work! Realign Your Culture
In a journal or in conversation with another White person doing this work, ask yourself:
What would collectivism look like in your life?
What would perspectivism look like?
What would sustainability look like?
What would accountability look like?
In what ways do I already embody these characteristics and how might I embody them more?
Returning to Values
One way to assess whether we are becoming the person we want to say we are is by considering Saeed Jones's call to be who we want to be when the morning light finds us. Another way to reflect on this is by considering if we're making our five-year-old selves proud. We must consider the values we claim and how they look in anti-racist work. We must imagine how a co-conspirator might embody those traits we strived for in kindergarten.
We must strive each day to embody the values we identify with. To do this, we must embrace a culture that allows us to embody our values. Relearning cultural values takes time, so we must make a practice of looking at ourselves each day to see who we are in the morning light.
Do the Work! Embody Your Values
In a journal or in conversation with another White person doing this work:
Reflect on how you are embodying your values as a co-conspirator every day.
Create a list of values (keep it short, no more than six) that you want to embody.
Choose a value to focus on each day and list actions that might embody that value.
At the end of the day, take stock of how you’ve embodied your values. If you haven't embodied those values, ask yourself what cultural characteristics have prevented your embodiment of your values?
Additional Resources for the Week
The following are good supplements to the work you did above, if you are looking to dig deeper into this topic.
The Urgency of Intersectionality, a TedTalk by Kimberlé Crenshaw
The Question Your Soul Answers by Saeed Jones
Is This the Beginning of the End of Racism? by Ibram X. Kendi
Interested in Doing More of This Work?
The activities and materials on this page were created for the Anti-Racism Every Day White Allyship Discussion Group and were completed together in a virtual discussion. All are welcome to join us to continue this work and benefit from the power of collective reflection and discussion.