Thanks. It’s tough for us white folks to realize that racism is a pandemic in this society and we all got the virus. When we (white) folks become aware of this, survivor’s guilt / grief kicks in, and then we want assurance that we are good people nonetheless. This is a paradox and most people’s minds are not able to manage paradox. So too many of us default to denial.

News flash: we all have racist biases, even if they’re buried so deep in the back of our minds that we think they’re not there. These hidden biases allow systemic racism to go on. It doesn’t mean we’re bad people; it simply means we’re products of our society. We white people need to see these biases in ourselves, and help one another see them. Once we see these biases in ourselves, we can work to overcome them.

There are certain skills to this, otherwise we can make things worse. Spouting facts and figures and calling each other racist doesn’t help. We’ve been doing that for a while now, and it’s just gotten us so polarized that now we get to see our cousins LARPing insurrection in DC with live ammo. So what does help?

Honesty, compassion, and skilled dialogue. We can learn the methods of persuasion and put these to work in dismantling racism and establishing justice. Right now I’m taking a course with Dr David Campt, The Dialog Guy. His RACE method shows how we white folks can have these tough conversations in a good way. He writes here on Medium. If any white folks reading this want to know what we can do that will actually do some good, google Dr David Campt RACE method.

Thanks again for this article.