White Privilege and the Gift of Time
A friend of mine recently shared that his family was going to a local protest against police brutality. They were excited to stand with others and voice their anger for change. However, it didn’t go as planned. When they showed up, it was actually a vigil. Everyone in the vigil was asked to kneel in silence for 8 minutes and 46 seconds, the amount of time that the police officer had his knee on George Floyd’s neck. My friend shared that it was a sobering experience because kneeling for that long isn’t an honest mistake; it’s an intentional act. Since hearing this story, time has been on my mind.
The world continues to remind us that the disproportionate deaths of black people are not honest mistakes. They are intentional acts driven by bias and centuries of racism. We white people are being asked to “do the work” around racial justice so that we can do better. But what does “doing the work” actually mean? A big part of this work is increasing our awareness and knowledge about overt and covert ways of white supremacy. We have the gift of time to engage in this work when people of color have no choice for engagement. They live it every day for a lifetime.
An easy trap for us white people to fall into would be only building a head knowledge about racial justice. We could read all the books, listen to all the interviews, and write about all the learnings. Yet, head knowledge does not equate to heart connection. We need head knowledge and heart connection to racial justice for change to happen in our workplaces and relationships. Heart connection requires time for reflection, time for mistakes, and time for building new relationships that aren’t about us.
This work is also long-term, as in lifelong. We have grown up in an ocean of white supremacy, and it will take a lifelong journey to swim out of it. I encourage you to pace yourself in doing the work. You may be all about it now, and you may let your passion die down when the world isn’t talking about it as much. White people need to make long-term commitments to this work, even when it is not making news headlines. We need to set aside time to do this work every day for the rest of our lives.
In her book So You Want to Talk About Race, writer Ijeoma Oluo says, “Do you believe in justice and equality? Because if you believe in justice and equality you believe in it all of the time, for all people. You believe in it for newborn babies, you believe in it for single mothers, you believe in it for kids in the street, you believe in justice and equality for people you like and people you don’t. You believe in it for people who don’t say please.” Doing the work around racial justice means taking the time to think about all the people affected in all the situations in all of time.
Does that sound overwhelming to you? It’s okay to admit that it is. If you are new to this work, then it can be overwhelming. Change doesn’t happen overnight, but change does require intention and time. So, I have an exercise for you this week. Are you willing to make a commitment with me? Let’s dedicate 8 minutes and 46 minutes per day to build a heart connection with racial justice and honor people of color killed from police brutality. This might look like:
· Kneeling for 8 minutes and 46 seconds
· Meditating about the Black Lives Matter movement for 8 minutes and 46 seconds
· Saying the names of those killed by the police over and over for 8 minutes and 46 seconds
· Listening to an interview with a person of color talking about their experience with racism for 8 minutes and 46 seconds
· Watching a video about black history for 8 minutes and 46 seconds
· Writing about your experience with black people as a child for 8 minutes and 46 seconds
· Sharing your learnings and feelings about this work with another white person for 8 minutes and 46 seconds
I could make a list of videos, books, and podcasts for you, but part of our work is digging out this material ourselves. This daily practice requires a little over one hour of my time this week, which is so little. Yet, the impact of building a heart connection with my head knowledge about racial justice is where I am changed and one step toward doing better for our black community. This is just one week of work. Join me as we build a lifelong practice of excavating the white supremacy from our lives.
*Note: This article was originally published on LinkedIn on June 14, 2020.