The racial education of Arlette
The past few weeks have been complicated on a personal level, and the past days have been gut wrenching, to say the least.
I have struggled to put words on my feelings regarding everything that is going on in the US right now, and in other countries every day. A few conversations with friends have prompted me to write the next sentences (be ready, it’s long). For every person who is not part of a minority, for every person who has never been in the position of being THE OTHER, it could be hard to grasp.
What is racism exactly?
A few people have told me “I am to racist, I don’t see color.” “We are not racist in this country, look at your privileges.” And it hurts. It hurts because when I hear that, I feel that the person has not really seen ME.
Yes, violence is one manifestation of racism. Violence is the harshest manifestation of racism, but know that racism happens every day around you. There are other manifestations of racism, and no amount of education or money will shield you against racism when you are a person of color.
I cannot speak for everyone so to my friends here, I will just say what racism is to me:
My first encounter with racism was very early on in my life. When my parents started telling me at a young age, that because of the color of my skin, I would have to work twice, three times as hard as my white counterparts, for my efforts to be acknowledged. A lot of us were raised that way. I have long thought that my parents were teaching me the value of hard work but in fact, no. What they were telling me, is that the system is rigged against people like us from the very beginning, and that for every step my white peers would make, I would have to make ten to be considered equal. They were telling me to be smart, they were showing me how to play the system. How did I come to that conclusion? Well, I realized later on when I was older, that only parents from minorities background where saying that to their children. None of my white friends were ever told that they would have to work harder that everyone else to get somewhere.
So, from a young age, I started integrating survival strategies. How to survive as a black person, but also as a woman in a world where people are very likely to see you as less than. So, you work harder, you try not to make yourself be seen too much.
So, I did what my parents said, I studied as best as I could. I was on the path to become a model minority- God forbid I make a mistake that would reflect on the whole community-, the success story that is applauded in all white circles, the example they could use to tell other black people “see, the system works, you can do it too!”
Then I went to college in the US, where my experience as a minority started. A few days after I arrived, I went to the school orientation, a reception where new students are officially welcomed and given tips on how to live your best life on campus. Then a few days later, I got the informal and unofficial orientation from my fellow minorities’ peers. There were tips on how to live your best life on campus as a black student. The advices sounded like: “don’t walk with other black people in a large group, you are likely to be targeted by the police. Carry your ID at all time, you never know when you would have to show it to an authority figure, they are less forgiving to black students. If you are at a party and the police comes, get close to a white person, you will have less chance to be arrested.” Those and many other advices on how to stay safe as a black girl on campus. Those tips then added another layer of strategies to my survival kit. I had strategies to get that apartment I wanted, in case the landlord was biased: my friends again, filled my kit: Work with the landlord or lady over the phone at first. Send your paperwork through email so that when you get there, your good standing precedes you and they may ask less questions. If you can, go visit with a white friend, so they don’t think you are going to bring your 10 persons family into their house.
A few years later, I moved to Miami, with my then boyfriend. He too, had tips for me: « keep your loud mouth to the minimum here, people are prone to get their guns out at any provocation here. » Ok, noted. Shut up, but I kind of already knew that. But we also discussed what to do if I was arrested while driving: short answers, no backtalk, hands on the wheel at all time, keep your papers close so that you don’t have to make sudden movements. It was an easy conversation, but the three times I was stopped in my car by the police, all for minor things and nothing really happened, I started crying. Every time I was pulled over, I would put my hands on the wheel and would start crying. All those three times, I think the policemen just let me go with a verbal warning because the tears were a bit much. Even my boyfriend started making fun of my outbursts every time I was stopped. It may sound funny when I say it now, but in retrospect, is it normal? Are the police not supposed to be there for me too? Why should it be a traumatic experience?
Here in Tunisia or when I go to France, the color of my skin is also an issue. For every administrative transaction, I put my husband’s name forward. People tend to be more agreeable to me and things tend to move faster when I am called BOURREAU instead of NGO BADJECK. When we travel as a family, my husband is always the one carrying our paperwork, putting himself as a shield between me, my children and authorities. Not because I am dependent or from some sense of chivalry. No. It’s just that as a white male, people take him more seriously than they do me. When he says “she’s my wife and she is with me”, my experience in a country’s border is way more agreeable and faster. It’s sad, but it is true.
Often, my skin color has played for me, more than it has played against me. I got into a competitive college in the US. Yes, I had good grades, but I was also made aware of the fact that the school had a certain quota of people of color to reach, and I was the perfect « quota » candidate for their statistics.
When I got my first well paid job, the person who hired me told me that apart from my CV, it was because I was reminding him of his trip to Senegal years ago. Ok.
When I got the promotion I wanted, I was asked to cut my hair, because they did not want me to look too ethnic. They also asked me to shorten my last name “to make it easy for every one”, but I drew the line at that.
So, you see, dear white friends, the color of my skin does not give me the privilege of being “colorblind”. Racism is an integral part of my life, it has shaped the person I am today, and it’s the same for most people of color I know. A lot of my life milestones, decisions, happenings, have to do with the way I look. This is not me complaining, don’t get it twisted. I am just trying to explain to you what I think racism is, and how it benefits you more than me, whether we like it or not.
That is what systemic racism is, and I know you are not racist, but be aware, this is the world you, your children, me and my children live in.
People of color are raised not to make themselves too comfortable or not to feel too safe in spaces where they are the minority. They are raised to do more, to be more, if they want some type of recognition in spaces where white people are the majority. They are taught to toe the line, not to be too much, not to do too much so that their white counterparts do not feel threaten.
I have never been a subject of police violence. I have been at the receiving end of a few racist slurs, but they are not worth mentioning.
Like the majority of people of color, I have been subjected to racism more often than not, simply because we live in societies that were not built for us.
My sweet friends, my white friends, this is being what being privileged as a white person look like: You never have to have non-stop survival strategies, because the world we live in was built by you and for you.
For me, those ingrained strategies are facts of life and part of who I am. And like other minorities, you don’t think about it, you just move on and move forward, you don’t even question it.
It is all triggered and comes back when someone makes a careless remark and tells you for example that they don’t see color. You don’t see color, you don’t see me? Lucky you, to have the privilege to be colorblind. Because for me the color of my skin is everything. The color of my skin is a factor in what school I will get into, what job I am going to have, if I am going to get the house I want, if I am going to be able to travel where I want, heck, the color of my skin could also determine if I am going to get along with you! And I have strategies for all those parts of my life. And when you come to tell me that you are colorblind, then I start feeling the exhaustion of it all. It is exhausting, it’s tiring.
The protests you see around the world currently, are people being tired of fighting all days every day, for themselves, for their children, for their communities. It’s people being tired of devising strategies and being shown that those strategies don’t work anyway.
Racism is not only violence or slurs, racism is a system that was built for you my white friends, by your forefathers. It’s a system where me, as a black woman is not expected to thrive.
Some of you have asked me so what should I do ? Here are some ideas:
• Educate yourself and reflect on your biases. Know your history, your country history, the role race relations have played in your education. Most westernized school systems have erased black history, but the facts are there to see, if you really want to see. (To my Tunisian friends, a lot of the people working as help in your houses have university diplomas. Check. Help them, give them a chance. If you can, help them obtain residency. If you do that, other people would be empowered to do the same and that’s how we can start changing mentalities. If you don’t want to do that, ask yourself why.)
• Vote. Vote for you presidents, your ministers, your parliament, your mayors, your judges, vote for all those people who you think can change the racialized system we are all living in. My dear white friend, racism is not an opinion, it’s a system that you are still benefitting from. For me, for my brother, for my children with whom I still have not had the race discussion, please vote, so that the current system can be rebuilt to work for us all and not just for you. Please vote for someone who would change the police laws so that when I go to bed, I am not worried about my brother. Please vote for someone who will create school laws or working laws, that are going to allow my children not to have to work three times harder than their peers to make it.
• Speak up! Your white skin is a privilege. If you see an injustice, speak up, do something. When you go to a government building and see black students, other minorities waiting or being in distress, try to find out what’s going on, don’t turn a blind eye, you never know who you could help. More often than you realize, you skin could be a shield for people under racism violence. One of the worst things when you are a minority and you are in distress, is that you lose your voice. Sometimes you freeze, but most of the time, you are not listened to, you are not heard, your voice does not count. When you are in a regular setting, you think just let me shut up and move on. When you are in a confrontational setting, your voice is often not heard. So, my white friend, if you are there, be an advocate and speak up. Speak up when your boss makes a racially charged remark against your colleague, speak up when you are in a plane and someone is being manhandled.
Open your eyes and start seeing color, see my color, my humanity. Think about what all of it does to a person sense of self. Imagine being born knowing and learning that you are not enough and that you have to prove your humanity every day. For most black people, this is their reality. It does not matter where they live, it does not matter how much money they make, the number of their diploma does not matter. Racism permeates every sphere of our societies, and they are not immune to any of it. If you don’t believe me, ask them, really, what they had to go through to get where they are today. I ask yourself if it was you, if it was your child. If you don’t find it acceptable for you, why would it be for them?
Or maybe you don’t care, and it’s ok too.
Also, I have been asked to give examples of micro aggressions. FAQ that get on my nerves and since we are on the subject, let me lay it out here. Not to make anyone feel guilty, but to give examples of how unconscious bias sometime manifest itself and how it can be hurtful:
• Every time you get a CV in front of you and you think « hum…that’s a strange name ». Stop yourself and check your bias. Where is that thought coming from ? You might think you are just curious, and nothing may come out of it but if you say that thought out loud, think about how that would make the other person feel. Don’t you think your name may sound strange to someone else too? It’s their name, deal with it and get over it.
• Every time you think about asking a person of color where they are from, check yourself, check your bias. More often than not, the person comes from the same place as you and if you are not in a setting that is comfortable for them, you will only succeed it otherizing them and make them feel that they don’t belong. Would you ask the same question to a white person?
• Same for the language question. Try not to ask how they speak such or such language well. It’s insulting. They and their ancestors have learned your language by force more than 500 years ago.
• Try not to ask how come they are here, whether it be the country or the workspace or any other space. Like you, they went to school, they worked hard, they traveled, they are living their life experiences. That’s it. They have the same right as you to be in that space. Would you ask the same question to a white person?
• If they don’t volunteer the information, try not to ask the signification of their name. Not every culture has meaning for every name, let them volunteer the information, and ask yourself why you would ask such a question.
• If you have visited the same country as the person you are talking to, refrain from asking if they know this or that person from the same country. It’s dumb and makes you sound ignorant. Check your bias.
• In the workplace or among friends, when the person tells you where they are from, if they have not asked you to, don’t start immediately direct them to the next person that looks like them, come from the same country or the same continent. It’s like if I meet a person from Spain for the first time, and I tell them « oh you come from Spain, that’s nice, I know someone from Finland, I will introduce you! » Again, that sounds ignorant and thoughtless. What does that person being from Spain has anything to do with you knowing someone from Finland ? Don’t assume that because they have something in common, they should get along. Why ? Check your bias.
• Also, if you don’t know a person like that, don’t touch their hair, don’t ask them to sing a song from their country, don’t ask them to dance or to speak in their native language, if you are not asking other people to do it. It’s horrible. People of color bodies are not there for your entertainment. Check yourself. Check your biases.
Those are examples of micro aggressions that happen regularly to POC. They may sound like they are nothing, and taken apart they are really not that serious but over a lifetime, they shape people, they shape the way they apprehend their environment, the place they work at, the way they apprehend their relationship with you because based on your questions, they will have to steel themselves against what is going to come out of your mouth not to feel hurt and not to hurt your feelings. At the end of the day, after some time, they will feel the hurt of those micro aggressions and you never will.
« in a racist society, it is not enough to be non-racist. We must be anti-racist » Angela Davis.
Much love,
Arlette
