Dear White People

(The picture above is an illusion (a painting done by Rachel Carey-Harper). It is trompe l’oeil, (French: “deceive the eye”) in painting, the representation of something so as to deceive the viewer concerning the material reality of the object. There is no hallway beyond the 1st door on the left side.) Just so, our white centered systems fool us to see things in distorted ways.

White People: PAY ATTENTION

by Keisha Delva

  • Paying White people to teach you how to be anti-racist, is White supremacy itself in action:
  • A person who is racist (White people) can’t teach anti-racism as effectively as a Black educator.
  • Paying a White person over a Black person for something that only the Black person has actually lived and can speak to, is White supremacy.
  • White people making money off of Black people is White supremacy.
  • White people thinking they know more about racism than Black people do is White supremacy.
  • White people thinking they know more than Black people, in general, is White supremacy.
  • White people thinking they know anything about what it’s like to be Black is White supremacy.
  • White people thinking they are doing it out of the kindness of their hearts is White supremacy.
  • White people centering themselves is White supremacy.
  • White people not seeing anything wrong with their own behavior is White supremacy.
  • Even if White people gave all the money they earned from teaching [about racism] to Black people, it’s still White supremacy.
  • White people giving the money they earned off of Black people’s experience to Black people? White Saviorism.
  • White people paying other White people [to learn about racism] is White supremacy.
  • All-White accountability groups and book clubs on anti-racism is White supremacy. Black people should be paid to facilitate these groups.

_______
Posted with permission:
Keisha Delva is a Licensed Mental Health Therapist, Creative and Online Entrepreneur who has formed an entire business around helping other Creatives, Healers and Helpers build the life of their dreams. Visit her website

Dear White People, Cut It Out With The ‘Colorblindness.’

Dear White People, Cut It Out With The ‘Colorblindness.’

Colorblindness has become a frequently used lens to discuss racial difference by many white Americans, and despite the overwhelming research that suggests that colorblind ideology further perpetuates white supremacy, some are having a hard time letting it go.

Don’t question our experiences. You’ll never understand them because you don’t walk through the world with black or brown skin. Just sit there and listen.

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Dear Nice White People, What are you afraid of?

Dear Nice White People, What are you afraid of?

“The premise of the question[s] typically [asked]: I am scared to speak up, and I need to know how to overcome my fear… You are afraid that you will fall out of the good graces of those with power. You are afraid that you will be labeled “the problem,” the person who is “not a team player,” the one who is going to ruin a good time. You are afraid of not being invited, of not being favored, of not being liked, because [of the benefits you receive from being invited, favored, and liked]…”

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White people, stop asking us to educate you about racism

White people, stop asking us to educate you about racism

Let me get this out of the way first: People of color don’t owe you any type of conversation about race. But if you find someone actually willing to discuss race and white supremacy, make sure you’re entering that conversation with the real intention of being a less racist, better white person.

Don’t question our experiences. You’ll never understand them because you don’t walk through the world with black or brown skin. Just sit there and listen.

read more
Dear White Allies: Don’t Appropriate Our Anger

Dear White Allies: Don’t Appropriate Our Anger

Here’s what doesn’t help: taking on the mantle of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color’s rage and tearing down well-intentioned but ignorant white folks on our behalf. Our anger isn’t yours. It doesn’t belong to you.
Here’s what doesn’t help: taking on the mantle of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color’s rage and tearing down well-intentioned but ignorant white folks on our behalf. Our anger isn’t yours. It doesn’t belong to you.

read more
White People: I Don’t Want You To Understand Me Better, I Want You To Understand Yourselves

White People: I Don’t Want You To Understand Me Better, I Want You To Understand Yourselves

“Your survival has never depended on your knowledge of white culture. In fact, it’s required your ignorance… while I, and just about any person of color who has spent their lives in a white supremacist society, know enough about white culture to write a book or two on whiteness and option the bestseller movie rights, y’all know almost nothing about us and even less about yourselves…”

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Dear White People — Please Stop Pretending Reverse Racism Is Real

Dear White People — Please Stop Pretending Reverse Racism Is Real

0ne of my friends…, a white male journalist, told me that I was trying to “shut down white voices.” Towards the end of our exchange, … he admitted he was worried he was eventually going to lose his job to a person of colour… His views sound extreme, especially for someone who works for a mainstream media organization. But he’s not alone. It seems the more we talk about racism, the stronger another narrative becomes—one that paints white people as the ones who are truly oppressed.

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Dear White People — Before You Post Dr. King Quotes to Make Yourself Feel Good

Dear White People — Before You Post Dr. King Quotes to Make Yourself Feel Good

Do not merely quote words that make you feel good and do not challenge your thinking and actions. Do not tweet quotes that are nothing more than a Twitter performance when in actuality you have done nothing to support the causes that impact Black America. Do not use Dr. King’s quotes as a way to “check” Black America. Do not ask Black America, “What would Martin Luther King Jr. do?”… be reminded that Dr. King said: “We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.”… When you tell Black America, “Well, it’s the law,” be reminded that Dr. King said, “We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was legal.”

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Letter to My White New England Yearly Meeting Friends

Letter to My White New England Yearly Meeting Friends

My friends, what the Black Lives Matter movement is saying is that black lives are just as important as white lives, just as important — not more important, just as important. Why, why my white friends is it so very hard for so many of you to love us as humans with something of God in us? Why, why my white friends, is it so easy for so many of you to hate and want to do us harm because of the color of our skin? Why is it so hard for you, my white brothers and sisters, to get beyond just words and act in love for us blacks the same as each other? The Black Lives Matter movement is saying all human life should be treated with love and respect; after all, whether we like it or not, we are all God’s children and part of the human race.

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Dear White People: About Botham Jean, Forgiveness, Justice, and Cheap Grace

Dear White People: About Botham Jean, Forgiveness, Justice, and Cheap Grace

Forgiveness without repentance is what theologian Dietrich Bonhoefer, quoting Adam Clayton Powell, called cheap grace. It lets us believe we are off the hook for our evil without demanding any real change on our part. In the case of the murder of Botham Jean cheap grace lets us white people maintain our sense of innocence and goodness without first facing up to the role we all play, knowingly or not, in maintaining systemic racism.

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Introduction

Definitions

Facts rocks with sun

Facts

Maps

Assessment Tools

History

Appropriation / Aggression

White Privilege / Supremacy

Slave Owners Are in Your Pocket

Public Displays

Performance Art

Workshops

Freedom and Justice Crier

Activist Resources

Dear White People

Being Allies

James, Rachel, Dragon

Reparations

Three Candles

Spiritual Foundations

Dear White People

Being Allies

James, Rachel, Dragon

Reparations

Three Candles

Spiritual Foundations

Slave Owners Are in Your Pocket

Public Displays

Performance Art

Workshops

Freedom and Justice Crier

Activist Resources

Assessment Tools

History

Appropriation / Aggression

White Privilege / Supremacy

Introduction

Wood Stack Definitions Menu

Definitions

Facts

Maps

Dear White People

Being Allies

James, Rachel, Dragon

Reparations

Three Candles

Spiritual Foundations

Slave Owners Are in Your Pocket

Public Displays

Theater PTown

Performance Art

Maze

Workshops

Freedom and Justice Crier

Activist Resources

Assessment Tools

History

Appropriation / Aggression

White Privilege / Supremacy

Introduction

Wood Stack Definitions Menu

Definitions

Facts

Maps