Here in America, we’ve had several opportunties to discuss race since the election of our nation’s first African American President:
- The New York Post cartoon depicting the author of the economic stimulus bill as a dead monkey
- Attorney General Eric Holder declaring that our country is “a nation of cowards” when it comes to race
- And all of this talk of a “post-racial” America. Whatever that is.
I don’t need to tell you how disappointed I’ve been after reading the commentary these events have prompted. Or maybe I do. For the most part, this nationwide conversation about race that we’ve been having very reluctantly has also been approached in some of the most demeaning ways, namely this editorial by one Heather Mac Donald. The idea that we are moving “past race” in any way because we have a Black President has only served to bring to light the reality of just how marginalized people of color are in this country, and even in our very own nonprofit sector. I’ll be interested to see how many nonprofit conferences this year take diversity off the agenda, now that California foundations have agreed to invest more in “minorities.”
I’m not saying we should drop everything and run around hooping & hollering about race and diversity. We all have competing priorities in the work we do on a daily basis. But as agents of change and the keepers of our nonprofit culture, we do need to make it a point to consider race & diversity in every decision we make, or don’t make, in our work. I know it is hard to talk about race. It will not get easier. It is hard and it will not get easier no matter how much we want to believe whomever is telling us that we are “post-race”. I’m under no illusion that when you see me walk into the room, you no doubt see my skin color. That inconvenient truth is what drives these statistics on leadership in the nonprofit sector: 82% of nonprofit CEOs are White, 94% of foundation presidents are White, and 86% of board members are White. In order to change that, we need to be able to talk about it. Without being dismissive or demeaning. This is our opportunity to show that we as a nonprofit sector can do better than mainstream America on this issue.
I’m always disappointed when discussions about diversity at nonprofit conferences are so sparsely attended. People don’t come for many different reasons, but mainly because they are afraid. So we need to do a better job of creating the kind of safe space to have conversations about race in a productive way.
If you attend a conference, meeting, training, or dialogue about race, diversity, or inclusion, please know that you are the right person in the room at the right time. It’s important to remember that talking about race is difficult, but that to learn anything, you must move past the discomfort to fully participate. I believe that deep down, what we all want is to find a place where we can engage together and make meaning out of this thing called history. We’re all searching for that sweet poetry that lies beneath the work that we are called to do. We want to overcome our own personal issues with race and be reminded of the common values that brought us to nonprofit work in the first place. We need to know that we are kept in a safe place where we’re free to put our hopes and dreams out on the table and co-create something new and real once it’s all said and done. Talking about race and how to increase the diversity of our sector is still an important conversation to have.
We also need to define in a real way what can and cannot come into the room when we talk about race. If the room were a poem, it might look like this:
Excuses cannot come into the room
Control cannot come into the room
Guilt cannot come into the room
Your facade cannot come into the room
Condescension cannot come into the room
Rolling eyes cannot come into the room
Actors cannot come into the room
Fear cannot come into the room
The status quo cannot come into the room
New ideas can enter the room
Open minds can enter the room
Curiosity can enter the room
Compassion can enter the room
Forgiveness can enter the room
Dreams can enter the room
Respect can enter the room
Trust can enter the room
What are your ideas for creating a safe place to talk about race in the nonprofit sector?
Wonderful post! I share your frustrations Rosetta, thank you for speaking to this so strongly and honestly. I will be linking to this post on my blog in the next day or two and have already plugged it on twitter and facebook. Thank you.
Maybe you got the wrong idea from my comic. I think you are looking at it in terms of saying the world has moved past racism. The idea behind the comic was to show that, in my opinion, efforts to promote racial tolerance are being misdirected and are coming across the wrong way. When you read the comic from the NY Post – do you honestly think the artist sat down and thought “Hmmm… I wonder which race I should slander today.” Hang on, I’ll answer that for you – nope. The preemptive attacks on “racially-charged images” have become comical (see the word play?). Most people do not see it as a racially-charged caricature. It’s only when these images are shown in front of a camera, pointed at, and demanded to be seen as a racist image do we take notice and say “Oh, I guess when you twist it that way… you may have a point.” So I believe you are way off-base in accusing people of thinking “racism is over” since Obama is in office. MY point is that if you want to build upon a foundation of racial tolerance, there are much better ways of going about it than picking out an image, going national with it, ruining someone’s life, and make the rest of the world fear the iron fist of racial “justice.”
My solution? Fund community programs, make sure employers are equal opportunity, hold public forums, and focus on the fact that we are all human… and thus, equal. To think that putting an image on the center stage will make people think “Maybe I have been wrong all along!” is absurd.
In the end, I was arguing method, nothing more.
Racism is such a complex, institutionalized topic to discuss as it is a GLOBAL issue, not just national. It’s so complex in that there is a legal and economic perspective on race, academic and scientific variants on race, evolutionary theories about the origins of racism, and inter-minority racism. I have to disagree with Jim in his quick fix method in funding community programs, EOE, public forums, and a focus on humanity. It is not realistic to oversimplify racism and provide a quick-fix solution. Racism is a complex global epidemic with a long history originating in the Middle Ages.
Race AND Class should go hand in hand because I believe that when a “minority” (Caucasians) have more economic power (money) and access to a means of production (health care, education, employment, housing, the tools to ‘getting ahead’), they have an advantage within the system to exploit the “majority” (non-whites) within society AND/OR cause some sort of market failure.
Let’s rally together and really examine race and class, how they impact the constituents that we serve in the charities we work for, and THEN develop strategies to discuss the race and class disparities while increasing diversity in the sector.
Jonathon
Jonathon, I don’t see Jim’s ideas as any kind of quick fix, nor are they new. And although they are a long way from perfect, they have contributed to the improvments seen over the last few decades. BTW, I’m white and have few of the advantages you so blythly assign to “us.”
I agree that the subject is complex, but racism isn’t limited to color. Jews have been subject to racism for thousands of years, although under a different name.
Sadly, I think that hate and bigotry in one form or another will be here as long as humans walk the planet.
Perhaps we should consider learning to manage it at the same time we work to eradicate it.
@Joe – Glad we’re connected! Your blog is one that helps me to think about this issues more deeply.
@Jim – Thanks for commenting here. I’m glad you clarified what your intent was behind your own cartoon. Though I’m not sure that racial tolerance is the outcome of community programs & equal opportunity employment – so far they seem to have done more to promote compliance rather than tolerance in my view – I do agree that we have to come up with less sensationalized ways of talking about race. The truth is, though, that the more these issues are made public, the most likely we are to talk about them. So think what you want about Al Sharpton, he does have his own way of keeping issues at the forefront.
What I meant by “demeaning and dismissive” in my post was just what you said here: “Most people do not see it as a racially-charged caricature.” Who are the “most people” you’re referring to and what makes you so sure that is how they viewed the cartoon? The language one chooses is important here, as one might conclude that you’re dismissing the feelings of many people of color (and whites) who did, in fact, believe the cartoon was racist and were very offended by it even before Al Sharpton said anything. So much so that Rupert Murdoch has issued another, more remorseful apology from the New York Post.
We might want to pause a moment to hear each other out first without being so dismissive. Everything is not so cut and dry when you’re dealing with real people who have real feelings.
@Jonathon – You said it better than I did “It is not realistic to oversimplify racism and provide a quick-fix solution.” I think that’s true, and also why it’s that much more important to have intentional conversations about race in the context of the work that we do. If we think the problems have been solved by equal opportunity programs, we have lost sight of our own individual responsibility to eradicate racial inequalities.
@Miki – Thank you for commenting here. I think that because the the subject of race is so complex, it often hinders us from discussing it. I’m not sure that I’ve ever heard anyone suggest that we “manage racism”, though I’d be glad to hear ideas for how we go about doing that. My sense is that overcoming our issues with race have to be addressed individually as well as structurally.
Hi Miki,
In my comment, I was referring to Caucasians who assert their power to exploit non-whites. I wasn’t generalizing all Caucasians as people who assert their power.
I am very interesting in hearing more about your opinion regarding the “managing of racism”.
When you refer to improvements, are you speaking about race relations or about solutions that are linked to the growth of the civil rights movement?
I think that there are two different perspectives going on here though. When you limit racism or racial discrimination to hatred and bigotry, it broadens the problem even more and paralyzes people into a state of confusion.
“If we tell ourselves that the only problem is hate, we avoid facing the reality that it is mostly nice, non-hating people who perpetuate racial inequality.”
-Ellis Close
Rosetta,
As usual, you are bringing up the big, truly important issues in our sector (not to mention our world) with clarity and insight.
While I don’t have anything particularly enlightening to add to the discussion in comments so far, I do want to thank you for taking some real time to discuss the idea of a ’safe space’ and welcoming all of us into it.
I often have trouble deconstructing my own privilege issues and that presents a barrier to talking about these issues. That is additionally complicated by my mixed-race background, lack of physical/emotional connection to the Latino side of my family and outward appearance as a white woman. Suffice it to say, almost every time I try to get into an important discussion on the topic of race, I get tongue-tied, embarassed and often confused – in short, scared! – so I just shut up.
Addressing these issues requires work from all of us. I think its incumbent on those of us who do get offended by these pop culture images to say something early and explain ourselves. It requires those who don’t ‘get it’ to listen and and try to understand. It also requires those who are in the public eye to possibly tone it down a bit and offer some of that space for an explanation (as the gentleman offered above).
Keep up the great work!
Elisa, what you said was actually very enlightening! You pointed out that one of the barriers to having productive conversations about race stem from our own issues in deconstructing privilege, etc. We all want to be “politically correct”, but are very afraid of being corrected when something we say offends or is found to be based on stereotypes or assumptions.
What if we were all brave enough to speak our truth, even through the fear?
Thank you, thank you, thank you! “Deconstructing privilege (power structures)” That is the very thing that encompasses the topic of racism. If we can start having those conversations, then we can come to more formidable solutions to this race issue..
Rosetta – really appreciated this post. Says what few of us are willing to say.
FYI, shared it on my blog, Nonprofit Execs on the Edge, in a post about cultural diversity in the boardroom. http://cortcom.blogspot.com/2009/11/racial-diversity-in-nonprofit-boardroom.html
Thanks very much. Enjoy reading your blog.