sarah xerta

As a white person, how do I speak about shutting up? Is it better to just do it, to just shut up? 

I’ve been thinking about this for several hours now. I have other things to do but am stuck on this question & won’t accomplish anything else until I attempt to answer it. And by answering it, am I answering it? Because obviously I have decided to speak about shutting up. 

But only to say: White people, we need to be better at shutting up. 

And by shutting up I mean literally just stop talking so much. Less output, more intake. I say this to you and I say this to myself. And the intake is equally important, because there is a second part to the act of shutting up, to willfully shut up, to make your shutting up make a difference, and that is to actively listen to the voices that your white voice inherently drowns out by being white. And this listening has to be active, meaning, you have to go searching for the voices of people of color. Don’t expect these voices to show up just because you’ve stopped talking – they won’t and that’s the problem. Marginalized voices are in the margins. It’s our responsibility to find them. 

For white people shutting up has to be willful because racism is willful. Because oppression is willful, designed to be willful. Because privilege is willfully invisible, operating on the illusion of not existing. 

For white people shutting up has to include active listening because racism is systematic and institutionalized, which means white privilege is systematic and institutionalized, which means no white person is exempt from white privilege. Shutting up will make space for the voices of people of color, yes, but if we don’t actively listen to those voices and continue to examine the function and manifest of our own white privilege, the voices we make space for will only continue to be marginalized every time we speak, because white privilege is inherent in how we speak, how we are heard.  

I speak often about the act of speaking, about willfully speaking, about taking up space, reclaiming narratives and reshaping realities, about the patriarchy and the intersection of abuse, trauma, rape, sexism and gender, and how so much of this has robbed me of so much of my voice. And it has, but that doesn’t change the fact that my voice is a white voice and heard as one. And recognizing the fact that my voice is a white voice and heard as one doesn’t negate my own experiences of oppression. And that’s what intersectionality (a theory first named by Kimberlé Crenshaw in 1989, by the way, yet still not recognized as a word by either tumblr or Facebook (Google?), which is evidence alone of how even vocabulary about marginalization is still marginalized) is all about – this crossing of ideas and experiences and being able to recognize and think about all of them with both criticism and empathy, recognizing that within systems of oppression exist other systems of oppression. Oppression is not a ladder but a multi-dimensional web and so our thinking must be multi-dimensional. 

Combating racism is one thing to think about and another to do, to willfully practice. Critical thinking itself is a willful practice but I’m thinking about how this manifests in the world, what we do with the thinking, how it shapes our words and interactions. And the practice is hard work because the practice is inherently flawed, i.e. my practice is inherently white (which does not excuse its whiteness). My critical thinking is inherently white, and that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t do it but actually that I need to do it more. I need to think critically about how I critically think. 

And while there are specific things to do (surround yourself with voices of people of color, absorb yourself in the art and literature by people of color – emphasis on “surround” and “absorb” because tokenizing is anti-productive i.e. read Claudia Rankine but don’t only read Claudia Rankine), I also hesitate to make a list of things “to do” because combating racism is not a to-do list. There is no “checking things off the list.” There is no “end” to racism, and if there was it wouldn’t be up to me to define it. But I can help define the beginning of the end of racism by defining the beginning of racism i.e. myself i.e. white people. 

Now, stop listening to me. Here: 

Khadijah Queen 

Bettina Judd

Morgan Parker

Shannon Barber

Nikki Wallschlaeger

Eunsong K

Mahtem Shiferraw

Ferguson National Response Network

ShordeeDooWhop

DeRay McKesson 

Apogee Literary Journal 

Sara Ahmed

Sam Griot