I Took A Pledge to Help End Racism. Step One: I Am Asking You to Listen.

Most people who know me know, that in the past couple years, I've become kind of a church slut.  I've been attending a number of denominations, and I'm finding it difficult to commit.  Please don't judge!  (Maybe I have unreasonable expectations, but that may be another blog).  I love the social justice focus of the Unitarian Universalists and United Church of Christ, I love my personal history with United Methodists and much of the theology, I love the ritual and pomp of the Catholic church, and I read a number of Buddhist writers (not a church, I know).  I am inspired by Jewish stories and wisdom.  I wish I could combine them all into one thing and throw a little Hinduism too.  Yet, one thing I did commit to when sitting in the Unitarian Universalist pews the other week was signing a Pledge to Help End Racism. 

Here's some background:  My city has been in a process of transformation, protest, conversation, rage, avoidance, and effort since Michael Brown's death in 2014.  St. Louis is talking about race and racism in more honest and open ways than I can remember in my life.  It has been a particularly passionate topic in my small community within the city/county and permeates everything from the school board to friendships to facebook.  I've tended to be in a more personal than public role, because that's where I feel comfortable.  Going to coffee with people, talking in kitchens with friends, attending community events, putting a Black Lives Matter sign in my yard.   And in the UU church I attend, racial equity issues are addressed from the pulpit almost every week - hence, the action item - sign a "Pledge to Help End Racism."  Like you, I wonder, how can I do that?  I am a working single mom with many worries, hassles, concerns, interests, and passions.  Do I have the energy or courage for such a thing?  Who the hell am I to think anything I might say is helpful in this literal landmine of emotion?

But I am going to take the opportunity to try to say some things and I hope that people who read this will grace me with the generosity of knowing that I am taking a risk.  This is a topic that angers many people and causes people on all sides to shut down.  I know I am not going to talk about this in all the right ways from a political correctness point of view.  And I am going to take a stance that some people dear to me will want to argue with me about.  I am asking that you pause before you make assumptions or respond.  I am a strong person, but I am gentle.   And in talking about this, I am talking from my heart, which is certainly as tender as yours. 

I believe racism exists and is one of the great wounds that prevents every system in our lives from being all that it can be.  Racism  hurts people in every facet of life - our schools, our hospitals, our neighborhoods, our businesses, our friendships, our churches, our families, our prisons, the arts.  This wounding leads to more wounding.  It goes on and on until many people of good will feel hopeless and afraid - what can me done?  This is too big or I am too angry and I am not willing anymore.

I am here to ask you to be willing.  I am here to ask you to be willing to listen.  

I'll digress for a second and hopefully bring it back around.

When the night isn't too busy with driving kids around to various sports and practices, I like to cook dinner and listen to podcasts.  The podcast I am most intrigued by right now is the podcast from San Quentin prison in California, which is a look at life 'on the inside'.  Ear Hustle  The most recent episode provoked many thoughts in me for many reasons - it was called Dirty Water - a conversation between Sara, who had been a victim of sex trafficking and killed her trafficker and LA, who was a trafficker himself, serving time in San Quentin.  It was a conversation about the wounding of sex trafficking and a practice of restorative 
justice. In case you aren't familiar, restorative justice is defined this way in Wikipedia:


Restorative justice is an approach to justice that personalizes the crime by having the victims and the offenders mediate a restitution agreement to the satisfaction of each, as well as involving the community. This contrasts to other approaches such as retribution, deterrence, rehabilitation, or incapacitation.

Victims take an active role in the process. Meanwhile, offenders take meaningful responsibility for their actions, seizing the opportunity to right their wrongs and redeem themselves, in their own eyes and in the eyes of the community.

In addition, this theory looks at crime as something that happens against an individual or community rather than the state.  The dialogue between offender and victim is supposed to foster victim satisfaction and offender accountability.  

In this episode of Ear Hustle, I was intrigued by the act of both talking and listening as an act of justice-bringing.  Sara and LA listen to one another.  Toward the end, Sara asks LA a question and deeply listens to his answer.  She is not berating, but she is honest - she does not hear some key aspects of him holding himself accountable for his crimes.  But they don't leave angry - they say, 'maybe we can talk and listen more on down the road.'  There is justice and generosity in that.  

These problems, like racism, or violence against women are so big, we forget where we have the power to make a difference.  In so many ways racism is a crime against an individual or community.  I believe that the beginning of healing most injustices in our society at this time, not the least of which is racism, is through individual or small community response.  The very beginning of this  - and it's so do-able  - is to cultivate our ability to listen.

We are not very good at it anymore.  I wonder if we ever were, but now seems particularly bad.  And listening means not just listening to the words that are said, but understanding the feeling and true meaning behind the words that are said.  

I know that for the sad, unjust or hateful things that have happened in my life, it is a gift to be believed.  For me to be able to tell what happened and how it hurt me and for someone to listen and not tell me that I should think about it or feel it in a different way.  This is, in a way, one thing a therapist does.  Even more healing, might be for the person or persons who hurt me to listen to me tell my story and hold themselves accountable.  That would feel like the beginning of justice.  I think it would restore me in many ways.

Defensiveness is an enemy of listening and probably an enemy of peace and justice.  When I went into people's homes as a hospice social worker, often they were understandably defensive.  I was in their space.  I represented something awful and I asked nosy questions.  I think I became skilled at disarming people, in a way.  I didn't want them to be defensive.  I wanted to work together with them to find ways to alleviate suffering.  To disarm them, I listened to them.  And I believed them.  Even if they told me to go away (which sometimes they did.)

Maybe that experience is what dictates my approach and I know it is effective.  Listening and believing other people from a non-defensive position is healing.  Healing for the speaker and healing for the listener.  And in healing, there is dignity, and in restoring dignity and agency there is justice.

I would like to live in a world where we aren't afraid of one another and angry with one another.  I believe that there is enough love, power, and money to go around.  You getting doesn't mean me giving up.  As a white person, I am trying to be accountable for the ways I may personally have perpetuated racism, or just by being part of the system of history and community that I am, I am in a fabric of racism.  That is hard for me to say, I'm noticing - even as I write it.  And I write it not out of being under the sway of some 'liberal media' bias or white guilt or anything like that. I am writing is because, as hard as it is to say, I believe it to be true.  

So this is a little thing that I am doing.  It is not the only thing, but one pebble in the water.  

When I started writing this blog this morning, you know, I didn't realize tomorrow is the anniversary of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King's death?  But he is someone I admire for many reasons and I have absolute awe for the poetry of his words.  So I will leave you with these, because  in all of us there is a seed of light, and one way we can grow that is by listening to one another and granting one another the dignity that we also want to be granted:

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

Social Media + Outrage = Masturbation; Or, Thinking it Through Before We Post

Last weekend, I read an article that popped up on my Apple News about a Dane Cook (age 45 and a celebrity, kind of) and his girlfriend, Kelsi Talor (age 19).  This article was from People magazine and presented their romance as if it were just another storybook romance of famous people for public consumption and celebration, such as Justin Timberlake and Jessica Biel.  I felt very weird inside of me and that feeling was anger.  My anger is usually a slow burn.  I'm like, "What is that feeling?  Something feels yucky.  Oh, that's something really gross.  Is it gross?  Yes, it is gross and upsetting.  Is People magazine tone deaf?  Are really supposed to read this and think - 'cute!'???  Hello!  #metoo!"  I was, for me, outraged.

I thought about it for about 10 seconds.  Maybe I'll post this on my fb feed and just see what other people think.  I did.  I said something like, "Does anyone else find this disturbing?"  And I went to bed.

When I woke up in the morning, there were some comments.  Mostly, stuff like, "Yes. Ewww. Gross."  And one friend, a Professional Naysayer was like, "Maybe it's possible they are happy and fulfilling each others needs."  I am shorthanding that.  Then, he said, "what would you tell them if they came to you for therapy?"

At that point, I fought my desire to shoot back a further outraged response (not at my friend, I would expect no less - but a clarification about how this 'relationship' is an abuse of power) and I went on a run.

This blogpost is not about overtly about #metoo or this couple or the actual words I used to respond.  It's about the process of how and why we try to argue or connect on social media.  It's about our relationship to outrage.

And, I don't know about you, but I'm getting so tired of outrage - even my own.  Everybody is outraged about everything.  Newscasters are outraged.  My facebook feed is full of outrage.  Sometimes something outrageous just catches my eye and I read it just to make myself mad.  In October 2017 Yale neuroscientist, Molly Crockett published a paper on Outrage in the Social Media Age, which basically said we are getting inured to outrage.  It's like junk food snacking.  We go get an outrage fix when we are not even hungry and the findings are that we are less likely to 'do' anything positive to make the changes in the world we are so outraged about.

Ok, so back to the moment last weekend when I am going out for that run I mentioned.  I am thinking of these very acerbic things to say about how I will charge Dane Cook my D-list celebrity rate of $500 an hour to make him NOT into a narcissist anymore.  And then I start fantasizing about how I could have like a D-list celebrity reality therapy show like Dr. Drew used to have that Rehab show.  And then I think, "Why D-List?  Why NOT A-List??"  Then, I get out of that fantasy and start thinking if I really post that snarky comment what will be the result of that? And how people will think it's funny and I will probably get a lot of likes.  But is that really the kind of thing I want to say?  Do I enjoy "cheap shots = Likes?"   Also, do I have the energy for this shit?  Because...look, Katy, you've got to go to work today and also you are taking kids to a play tonight and having another kid spend the night.   So, no...maybe I won't go snarky.  Maybe I will just make a mature comment and make sure I end the discussion somehow.  And then my run was over.  And that's what I did.  So here were my steps:

1) Pause and go for a run
2)  Fantasize about the mean, snarky stuff I want to say
3)  Think ahead about what the results of my actions might be and why I might want or not want to say those outraged words
4)  Assess whether I have the energy for those results
5)  Make a decision based on how and where I want to spend my energy on a given day and how I want to represent myself in the world.
6)  Choose a more measured, less outraged response that also establishes a boundary (which was, "I probably am not going to make any more comments on this post because I have a busy day.')

In the end, I actually think outrage in these online formats is a lot like masturbation.  The tension we've built up is our righteous indignation about WHATEVER.  It wants release.  And 'luckily', through social media, we've developed communities of largely like minded people.  So when we are outraged on social media, we have a build up of tension and then a release of our tension and then we have the added reinforcement of our online community going, "yes, yes, you are so smart. I love this!"  (Did my analogy just get super-gross/weird?!?)  There is a lot of ego involved.  And it's not an experience where there is genuine connection and communication.  I think masturbation is a good thing, but it's not the same as good sex, which  ideally is about communication and connection and the other person as much as yourself.

In part, I think that's why most of the social media 'arguments' about politics and social issues I see and participate in often feel so frustrating and empty.  There is often no real relationship.

I know I am being purposefully provocative even when I make this analogy, but I will give a more serious example.

Another discussion I recently was involved in had to do with race and politics in a local election.  I knew I was stepping into a volatile area and trying to make a nuanced point and therefore I knew I was opening myself up to criticism.  I received the response I anticipated and I felt slightly attacked.  And I really thought about how and why I tried to put myself out there and what it felt like to be schooled in the ways I was.  It actually tapped into a deep pain inside me.

The pain was that these people, even friends, online, can't and don't know all my life experience.  The way working in death and dying all these years has developed certain 'muscles' in me.  The way it has made me practice mercy day in and day out.  To see that suffering, loss, physical pain, tragedy, courage and love are not owned by one group of people - not rich, not poor, not Democrat, not Republican, not women, not men, not black, not white.  Everyone deserves to be seen and have their humanity seen.  And these people online can't and don't know my own painful life experiences and how they make me tender and vulnerable in specific ways.  It's on ME to know these things about me and make good choices about how to take care of my own tenderness.   And all that being said, I am not more RIGHT than they are. I have just developed a certain way of experiencing the world.

What I think we need more of in this world is genuine connection.  I think we need to be responsible for how we go about seeking connection.  The change we want in the world and in our own lives starts with pausing and thinking it through.  The peace, justice, love, courage and beauty we want will start in person, one on one.  The real revolution will not be televised.  Or posted.