Letters to My White Male Friends

The recent book, Letters to My White Male Friends, was written by Dax-Devlon Ross, a nonprofit executive focusing on designing disruptive strategies to generate equity in workplaces and education spaces. Ross is also a journalist and is currently a reporting fellow at Type Media Center. He attended Rutgers University and received his Juris Doctor from George Washington University.

The book has three sections and, as its title indicates, is structured as a series of letters to his white male friends. In the initial section, HARM, Ross "revisits his socialization inside white dominant institutions" including the elite Sidwell Friends School in Washington D.C. In the next, HEAL, he shares his racial healing journey and explores attributes of white culture that stand in the way of "white people finding true fellowship and common cause with Black people." His description and analysis of the Culture of Charity, the Culture of Expropriation, and the Culture of Disbelief are among the most perceptive, thoughtful, and informative parts of the book.

The final section is titled ACT. In it Ross offers "historical and contemporary perspective as well as practical guidance and tools for taking action at work, in your community, and within yourself." And although the entire brief but powerful book is a must read, we have selected excerpts from this final part as the most applicable to our conversation - What Can I Do?

Below are the scanned excerpts. Please note that there are three pages of material.

At the bottom right of each page is a link to the next one.