Are you still reeling in shock at the presidential election results? Are you pulling at your hair wondering, “How did this country get so racist??” Are you posting statuses about how it is now time to come together to fight racism in the face of current political threats? Have you found yourself saying, “Well, at least this administration is waking people up.”

Hi! I see you there! Welcome to the anti-racism movement. I know you were kind of hoping to sneak in the back of class in the middle of this semester and then raise your hand in a few days to offer up expert opinion like you’ve always been here — but you’ve been spotted, and I have some homework for you, because you’ve missed A LOT and we don’t have the time to go over it all together. I’m glad you are here (I mean, I’d really rather you arrived sooner and I’m a little/lot resentful at how often we have to stop this class to cover all the material for people who are just now realizing that this is a class they should be taking, but better late than never I guess) and I know that once you catch up, you can contribute a lot to the work being done here.

If you are just now feeling the urgency of the need to fight systemic racism, chances are, you are white. I know, I know — I’m starting off with blanket assumptions about you and that doesn’t feel good; you literally don’t have to tell me about it, I’m quite familiar! But seriously, you are probably white or white passing (yes, I’m aware that Ben Carson and Lil Wayne exist and some people of color are capable of holding on to baffling amounts of denial, but I do not have whatever power it would take to break through that level of delusion so let’s just stick with new white folk). I’ve written down this handy list of things that you’ve missed so far that you’re going to need to catch up on, on your own time. This knowledge and preparation will not only make your fight against racism more effective, it will allow us to continue our progress as you catch up.

If you are just now feeling the urgency of the need to fight systemic racism, chances are, you are white.
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This work is the worst.

Woah, I know — I’m starting off in the most negative way possible but look, I need you to know what you are signing up for. Fighting racism is one of the most difficult things you will ever do. I mean, reading this essay might be a little uncomfortable, but it is NOTHING compared to the conversations you are going to have to have, the privilege you are going to have to sacrifice, and the brutality and pain you are going to have to be able to look in the eye every day. Not only will this work get harder and harder the further you dive in, you will also get what at times seems like a very small return on your efforts.

If you want a fucked-up silver lining, you can always remember that people of color (POC) are also doing this work, never have the option of taking a break, and also have to live through the actual racism being fought in the process. So, buck up and get ready.

Your welcome parade. You missed it.

It was a beauty too — floats and streamers and everybody was clapping and cheering. But then it ended and we swept up all the confetti and everyone had to get back to work. Sorry.

Every idea you have for how we can better fight racism has already been discussed.

I know you might be saying “but how can you know that Ijeoma, you don’t know me?” I know. Trust me. I know. You are a 10-year-old explaining to a theoretical physicist how time travel might work. The theoretical physicist has already heard your theory and many others. She probably had some of those same theories when she was 10. And while your interest in time travel and your imagination and intelligence might well lead you to eventually help invent time travel, it will only do so after it has been paired with a lot of the education and experience that the physicist that you are trying to explain time travel to already has. But you are not actually 10, so your ideas are not cute. Keep them in your hat for now while you learn the basics.

Your journey to understanding that racism is a real problem and you have been contributing to it has already been covered.

Please don’t raise your hand to tell us all the tale of how you came to see that you are part of an oppressive system. We were there. When you didn’t know, when your obliviousness was contributing to our oppression, we were there being oppressed. When you were ignoring our cries for help, we saw you look away. As you stumbled along the path of recognition, we were the people you took down with you in each fall. We would rather not go over that all again.

But all is not lost, and your story does have real value — to people who are not in this room, who are afraid of acknowledging the part they play in a White Supremacist society. You can show fellow white people that they can survive the self-reflection necessary to fight racism. Please, share your story with them, it can do real good.

White People: I Want You To Understand Yourselves Better
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Your ramp-up period. You missed it.

When POC were very, very small, we got a few years of comfort and protection from some of the realities of a White Supremacist society. When we were safe at home with our parents, the effects of systemic racism were muted somewhat, although never entirely. Then when we were 4 or 5 and went to preschool we discovered we were four times more likely to be suspended from preschool, and by the time we went to kindergarten another kid called us a “nigger” or another racial slur, and from then on we’ve been neck-deep in that shit.

So, if you weren’t there, you missed it. Nobody is going to hold your hand through this. If you fuck up, you will be called out. If you slow us down, you may be left on the side of the road. If we are angry at white people, we will say we are angry at white people, and nobody is going to add “not all white people” for your benefit. You will find a way to keep going — we have.

Nobody is going to hold your hand through this. If you fuck up, you will be called out.
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Free, individualized education is not a thing we do anymore.

I know you would prefer a nice, safe sit-down with someone who would patiently walk you through all of this, but we have millions of people we need to get right and an entire system of White Supremacy to fight. We do not have the time or energy. Also — that “free labor from POC” thing is kind of how we got into this mess. The questions you are asking have already been answered by POC — some of whom have already been compensated for their time and effort. Google is your friend. If we have to live it, the least you can do is Google it.

We care about multiple things here — at the same time.

Yes, we are aware of how dangerous this administration is. No, we do not have “better” battles to be picking right now. We are doing multiple things at once, because we cannot be sure if it is the cops that will kill us, or the racist jokes at work fostering an environment where we are seen as unreliable and dispensable that will leave us unable to feed our families. But we know that it all can kill us in body and spirit, one way or another, so we will drag people for cultural appropriation and demand that schools provide a more diverse education to our children, while also raising alarm about the Muslim ban, ICE raids, and police brutality.

You could maybe help pick up some of the slack instead of trying to refocus our efforts in a way that makes sense to someone who doesn’t actually have to live with the consequences of what you think we should just “let go.”

Your privilege is the biggest risk to this movement.

That’s right: the biggest risk. The compromises you are willing to make with our lives, the offenses you are willing to brush off, the everyday actions you refuse to investigate, the comfort you take for granted — they all help legitimize and strengthen White Supremacy. Even worse, when you bring that into our movement and refuse to investigate and challenge it, you slow down our fight against White Supremacy and turn many of our efforts against us. When POC say, “check your privilege,” they aren’t saying it for fun — they are saying it because when you bring unexamined privilege into anti-racist spaces, you are bringing in a cancer.

Your privilege is the biggest benefit you can bring to the movement.

No, I’m not just talking nonsense now. Racial privilege is like a gun that will auto-focus on POC until you learn to aim it. When utilized properly, it can do real damage to the White Supremacist system — and it’s a weapon that POC do not have. You have access to people and places we don’t. Your actions against racism carry less risk.

You can ask your office why there are no managers of color and while you might get a dirty look and a little resentment, you probably won’t get fired. You can be the “real Americans” that politicians court. You can talk to fellow white people about why the water in Flint and Standing Rock matters, without being dismissed as someone obsessed with playing “the race card.” You can ask cops why they stopped that black man without getting shot. You can ask a school principal why they only teach black history one month a year and why they pretty much never teach the history of any other minority group in the U.S. You can explain to your white friends and neighbors why their focus on “black on black crime” is inherently racist. You can share articles and books written by people of color with your friends who normally only accept education from people who look like them. You can help ensure that the comfortable all-white enclaves that white people can retreat to when they need a break from “identity politics” are not so comfortable. You can actually persuade, guilt, and annoy your friends into caring about what happens to us. You can make a measurable impact in the fight against racism if you are willing to take on the uncomfortable truths of your privilege.

Thank God For Identity Politics
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You will get better at this, but at first you will fuck up a lot, and you will always fuck up a little.

You are a human being and human beings are inherently flawed. You are also a human being who has lived with an entire life of unexamined privilege and racist social programming. You are going to fuck up hardcore. You are here because you are a decent human, and because you are a decent human you are going to feel pretty shitty when you fuck up. You will probably be called out, you may even be dismissed by some folk, and that may make you feel angry and defensive along with feeling shitty. You will need to get used to the pang of guilt from realizing you have fucked up and it has hurt people. Because it will hit you again and again.

It is okay to feel guilty about things that you are guilty of. It will not kill you, but hiding from that guilt and responsibility can kill others. So feel the guilt, realize you are still alive and intact, figure out how to do better, try to make amends if possible, and move forward. You are not alone. We are all fucking this up in various ways, every single one of us. Right now, there are whole big problematic chapters in our movement. We are all trying to do the work and wrestle with the ways in which we are causing more harm than good. But we have no choice but to keep working, even when it sucks.

You are here because you are a decent human, and because you are a decent human you are going to feel pretty shitty when you fuck up.
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I’m glad you are here. I’m angry you are so late — have I mentioned that? I’m very, very angry you are so late because so many of us have been lost fighting without you. And you are going to just have to live with that anger for a while because you deserve it. But I am also glad you are here. I am glad you are seeing more clearly now and have decided that you no longer want to be a part of the problem. Eventually, I may get over my anger and I may even trust you, but until then I’m still going to need you to do the work to help dismantle the system that you have benefited from and have helped maintain for so long.

Because I do need your help, and I do know that you can help in ways that I cannot. Your reward may not be the warm welcome and heartfelt thanks that you might have been hoping for, but a more just and equal world will have to suffice.

A few days ago I caused a stir in my own tiny corner of the internet world by saying what I thought everybody already knew: If you support Trump, you are a White Supremacist.

When people talked about Hillary going too far when she said half of Trump’s supporters can be put into a “basket of deplorables,” I was left scratching my head and thinking: Only 50%?

If you support Trump, you are a White Supremacist. Full stop. Not just the passive amount of White Supremacy that we all end up participating in, in an inherently White Supremacist system — you are an active, hateful, dangerous White Supremacist.

Now some of you may be asking, as you have on Facebook and Twitter: “Ijeoma, are you really willing to call half of the U.S. population White Supremacists?” And to that my answer is hell yes. This may seem like a bold statement to some, but honestly, I can’t see why.

Human beings can quite easily fall in line with violent hatred and oppression; any quick glance through world history will show that to be true. Do you think that the Nazis came to power against the will of the German electorate, or with the support of the German people? Do you think that slavery was upheld purely by the few rich enough to own slaves, or by an entire society that even erected armies to defend it? And no, none of this can be excused away as “a product of the times” — humans are not like wine grapes; we do not have a few “bad years” that we can blame on the soil. If you recognize that these horrific systems of abuse, oppression, and even genocide were upheld by everyday people, then you have to acknowledge that everyday people are capable of some pretty heinous shit. You can be in the PTA and you can pay your taxes and you can volunteer at your local homeless shelter and at the same time you can be actively upholding the oppression of others. It has been done before and it is being done now.

Human beings can quite easily fall in line with violent hatred and oppression.
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So yes, half of the U.S. population can be actively working to uphold violent White Supremacy, and yes, Trump’s campaign is violently White Supremacist. Your grandma who supports Trump is a White Supremacist. Your buddy who supports Trump is a White Supremacist. That’s what happens when you actively support White Supremacy. Here’s a sample of what is a vibrant buffet of White Supremacy that Trump supporters are backing:

Make America Great Again is a call to White Supremacy: When was America greater than it is now? The ‘60s? The ‘50s? The ‘40s? How you answer that question depends on how white you are. I’m only half-white, so if I go back to any time before 1967, my very existence would have been illegal in many states. Hell, two decades after I was born, anti-miscegenation language was finally removed from the Alabama state constitution, so for me — I have between 2000 and now to draw from. Every period of time in U.S. history prior to this one was less safe and less free for people of color, so if you plan on “Making America Great Again” and you are referencing any time in the past — you’re asking for a return of White Supremacy.

Trump’s anti-immigration rhetoric is racist as fuck: I’m not saying that if you believe in tighter immigration rules you are immediately a White Supremacist (although you might just be), but if you go about it by insinuating that the Mexicans crossing the border are rapists, and if your proxies are warning of “taco trucks on every corner,” then you are trying to tap into a White Supremacist narrative of the black and brown brute and you are sure as hell dogwhistling that white culture in America is at risk.

Trump’s Islamophobic rhetoric is racist as fuck: Now, before you barge in letting me know that “Islam isn’t a race,” let me please remind you to sit the fuck down. Islam isn’t a race, but Trump’s Islamophobia sure as hell is racist. If Trump and his followers didn’t think of SCARY BROWN PEOPLE when they thought of Islam, Islamophobia wouldn’t exist. If Islamophobia wasn’t racist in nature, we’d treat all problems within other religious communities not affiliated with scary brown people the same way we treat Islam. If Islamophobia wasn’t racist, we’d be trying to “liberate” Mormon women currently being punished for their own rapes at BYU. If Islamophobia wasn’t racist, we wouldn’t have conservative politicians fighting against raising the statute of limitations on child sex abuse so that Catholic priests could finally face justice for their crimes. If Islamophobia wasn’t racist, we would have declared war on “Christian Fundamentalism” after the Oklahoma City bombing and the multiple deadly Planned Parenthood bomb and gun attacks over the years. If Islamophobia wasn’t racist, Trump would be seeking immigration bans on people from ALL countries that produce terrorists (which is basically every country), not just brown ones. But because Islamophobia IS racist, Trump has been able to stir up White Supremacist hatred and fear of the brown “other” and turn it into votes.

This is just a sample of the White Supremacy that has seeped into every corner of the Trump campaign. It’s not everything, but it’s enough. It’s enough to overshadow any possible positive you could entertain in supporting his run for presidency.

There is no compromise between equality and violent White Supremacy.
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So if you support Trump, you are supporting all of the above, and you are supporting White Supremacy. If you support Trump for other reasons, you are STILL supporting all of the above, and you are supporting White Supremacy. If you believe that you are actively against White Supremacy and yet you will support Trump, you are lying to yourself. People are being hurt right now by the racism that Trump is peddling, by the bravado that the legitimization of this election is giving to White Supremacists. What in the world could Trump possibly be offering you that would cause you to overlook all of the above?

And I’m not saying you have to vote for Hillary to not be a White Supremacist. I’m not saying that there aren’t some Hillary supporters who are white supremacists (see: everything I’ve ever written about this election for more). You CAN be a Hillary supporter, a Jill Stein supporter, a Gary Johnson supporter, or a die-hard anarchist and still be a White Supremacist. But if you are a Trump supporter, you ARE a White Supremacist (and yes, all 15 Trump supporters of color are perfectly capable of being White Supremacists, too). You looked at a campaign built on open, gleeful, hate-filled White Supremacy and you said, “sign me up!”

And I’m not willing to coddle you. I’m not willing to create a safe space for you to be able to elect White Supremacy into law without being called what you are: an unabashed, willful proponent of White Supremacy. There is no “middle ground” to be found here. There is no “compromise” between equality and violent White Supremacy. And there is no “gentler way” of confronting racism when my basic humanity as a woman of color is not enough to sway you against electing a regime that is built on the hatred and fear of people who look like me. And those of us directly harmed by the disgusting hate you want to elect into office will not forget that you traded away our safety and humanity for empty promises of “winning” and “greatness.” We see you for who you really are.

Right now, many would have you be another reason why we wait. You would be another reason why we harbor abusers.

Dear Al,

I don’t know if you remember me, but I snapped this selfie of us a little over a year ago. I was at the airport, waiting to board a quick flight from Seattle to Portland, when some middle-aged soccer-dad-looking white dude started waving and pointing frantically at his wife.

“Look!” he tried to whisper as loudly as possible as he pantomimed at a row of chairs a few feet away. His wife looked up at what he was pointing at, then looked at her husband and shrugged, disinterested. In absolute desperation he turned to me, since I was…there and obviously eavesdropping.

“SERIOUSLY. LOOK OVER THERE!” He mouthed at me and I looked where he pointed and right across from me, about 10 feet away, there you were. Al Franken. In real life. I just about lost my shit.

You saw me staring at you like I might actually explode and you kindly waved me over. I don’t know what it looked like to you or anyone else there — a 6-foot-tall, fat, black, 35-year-old woman blubbering like a dork about how much she loves you and how she’d had copies of your books since she was 15 years old, and how you kept her laughing through a Political Science degree — but I didn’t care. I’ve been fortunate enough to meet a few celebrities in my life, but meeting you — even thinking about it today, it makes me feel a little starstruck.

When I finally got up the courage to ask for a picture, as we were waiting for our luggage to be unloaded after the flight, you smiled and said, “sure.” You looked like somebody’s really nice dad. As we took a picture you said, “I really don’t like Mike Pence.” It was such a simple, yet weird, and yet completely accurate thing to say, and I thought I would die from happiness. I immediately changed my profile picture to the selfie of us and basked in the jealousy of all my political nerd friends.

Al, I’m so very sad at you. Is that a thing? I mean, I’m mad at you too, but mostly, I’m very very very sad at you. How fucking stupid and selfish of you to ruin yourself for us like this. We really needed you.

Al, I’m so very sad at you.

When the first allegations against you came out and your name started popping up on social media, I started googling, while a voice inside me was repeating a prayer of, “no, no, no, no, no, no, no.” When I saw the picture of you groping a sleeping Leeann Tweeden with a smile on your face, I closed my laptop and just said, “Fuck.”

I wasn’t shocked. I’m a woman in America. I stopped being shocked at finding out that men I admired and respected were capable of being predators by the time I graduated from second grade. I was…embarrassed. I have spent much of my adult life around the comedy crowd. My brother is a former comedian, and some of my dear friends are comedians. Your behavior didn’t seem at all shocking for the world of comedy — a world where today if you were to have a beer with just about any comedy dude, he would eventually tell you that he doesn’t think that anything Louis CK did was a big deal. In a profession that is seething with its hatred of women, you would have been considered one of the good dudes. One of the safer dudes. But these dudes are assholes. Young, gross, assholes.

I look at the smile on your face as you grope a sleeping woman like you are a 13-year-old misbehaving boy and she’s a cardboard movie cutout and not an actual human being, but you aren’t 13 in that picture, you’re 56 years old. And she’s a person. A person whose body you are using for a shitty joke. You were a 56-year-old man gearing up to run for U.S. Senate, and you still felt perfectly safe treating a woman like shit.

I’m not surprised you felt so safe doing it. I’m not surprised you also felt safe trying to kiss other women without permission, or grabbing their asses or boobs. I’m just deeply disappointed that you wanted to. I thought you’d be good enough to not want to.

I live in Seattle. Right now I’m surrounded by good liberal men who are lining up to say how much they believe women. Who are clamoring to express their outrage at the horrific stories they are reading as so many women say #metoo. But some of these men — a lot of them — are abusers themselves. A lot of them have taken advantage, forced kisses on unsuspecting women, groped women, exposed themselves to women, tried to manipulate women into having sex with them. While they are expressing their outrage, they are secretly hoping that their name won’t show up in a woman’s story. They have an opportunity right now to start to make things right. To come clean, take responsibility, and begin the work of growth and redemption. But they opt for just playing the role of a hero instead. They collect praise for saying all of the right things while kicking aside their victims.

Al, you could have done the right thing so many times. When you were condemning Trump for his abuses against women, you could have held yourself accountable as well. When you were offering support to women at the beginning of the Weinstein allegations and encouraging them to come forward, you could have decided to save your victims the pain of coming forward against you. The path to redemption then might have looked different than it does now. But you didn’t, and that really sucks. So now, it’s harder. Now, we all pay a little more.

When You Can’t Throw All Men Into The Ocean, What CAN You Do?

Because you were elected to represent the people of Minnesota, and in your power and fame you represent so much more. You are a part of the story of sexual abuse and assault in this country now. And as much as so many of my friends want to blame the “political operatives” of the right for your demise — you did this. You and your hubris and your feelings of entitlement to the bodies of women did this. You did this to yourself and us.

As the reports surfaced last night that you were planning to resign, I was trying to explain to my 10-year-old son why I was so sad about this. I explained that I had really admired you and had for most of my life, and I thought you were a really great Senator. But you had really mistreated some women, and you hadn’t been honest about it. And because we need Senators who respect women, and Senators who are honest and take responsibility for their wrongdoing, you had to leave. And now we all had to pay. We had to pay because as a society, we had been so permissive of the violation of women that even you — yes you, Al — thought that it was okay to treat women like objects.

My son asked, “So….is it a good thing that he’s leaving? Or bad?” And I answered, “There’s nothing good about any of this. But if he didn’t leave, it would be worse.”

Due Process Is Needed For Sexual Harassment Accusations — But For Whom?

When I was sexually abused, nobody believed me, because they preferred to believe that I was a liar than to believe a man was an abuser. When I was sexually harassed, people believed me, but they preferred to see me suffer in silence than to hold a man accountable. My humanity would need to wait for a more convenient time. So often women are told that when you look at the big picture, their humanity is just too inconvenient. When Donald Trump, a man with multiple sexual assault accusations against him — a man who admitted on tape to assaulting women — was elected president, tens of millions of Americans decided that the humanity of all of the women of America would have to wait until their guy wasn’t running for office.

And now Al, many in my own party are trying to convince me that the humanity of your victims needs to wait until a more convenient time. It needs to wait until we get the Senate back. It needs to wait until Trump is impeached. It needs to wait until Roy Moore is defeated. There will always be a reason to wait until a better time to do the right thing. And right now, many would have you be another reason why we wait. You would be another reason why Democrats don’t live their values. You would be another reason why we harbor abusers. And I would have never wanted that for you, but more importantly I do not want that for your victims.

You have an opportunity now to be a part of a new story, a story of justice and accountability and growth, and I’m glad that you are taking it.

Many in my own party are trying to convince me that the humanity of your victims needs to wait until a more convenient time.

You are not falling on your sword. You are not a martyr. You are not being heroic. And you are certainly not a victim. You are facing consequences for your actions. Consequences that hurt us all a lot. Not because they exist, but because you were able to rise all the way to U.S. Senate without facing them. So maybe this is what we, as a society and as a party that has always pretended to be better than this but never actually was, deserve. I’m sure you will not be the last hard loss on our path to redemption.

I don’t hate you. I haven’t deemed you trash and discarded you. I’m not getting rid of that picture of us. I’m not throwing out your books. But you can’t matter anymore. You can’t be a priority anymore. Your career and your power and what you could have been in the Senate cannot be the focus anymore. This last, long essay will be the last time I place you — and my feelings about you and my hopes for you — at the center of this. Because we’ve centered men like you for too long. There are women who can pick up where you left off. There are women who can go even further. And maybe now, now that we’ve shown that it might actually be possible to hold men accountable for their abuses against them, they will be more encouraged to do so.

I’m going to really miss who I thought you were, Al. And I really hope that one day you’ll be that person — I certainly think it’s possible, even probable. But right now, it’s time to see what women can be.

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Due Process Is Needed For Sexual Harassment Accusations — But For Whom?

After USA Today asked me to write about not believing in due process, I wondered: How often are we being suckered into a side of a debate that we shouldn’t even be having?

The first time I remember being sexually harassed at work was at my second job ever, working at a bookstore. There was a man there who always tried to work sexual innuendo into every conversation we had. He’d find excuses to touch my back or arm, and try to give me massages in the breakroom. He was constantly winking at me, licking his lips. He would bring a gym bag to work, and sometimes, when we were in the breakroom together, he’d unpack the bag like he was organizing it. He’d talk to me about his workout routine, how important it was for him to stay in shape so he could maintain his sexual prowess. Then he’d bring out a bottle of KY Jelly, and he’d slowly and deliberately place it on the table. Staring at me.

Sometimes managers would be in the room, pretending not to hear. Occasionally a manager would shake their head at him and tsk tsk, like he was a naughty child. He was not a child. He was 32. I, on the other hand, was a child. I was 17.

I had spent most of yesterday thinking of this recent flood of public sexual harassment allegations against rich and powerful men. While so many talked of the downfall of these men, either in shock at their depravity or in sympathy for their careers now sidelined, I couldn’t stop thinking about how much of my professional life had been spent navigating gender discrimination and sexual harassment. I thought about all the women (and some men, and gender non-conforming folx) that these men harmed, who would never get in-depth profiles discussing the tragedy of what they lost, exploring what they could have been if not for these men and the system that enabled them and so many other abusers to torment their victims with such ease.

So You’ve Sexually Harassed Or Abused Someone: What Now?

But now, with only a small handful of high-profile men finally facing some repercussions after years of abuse, there is already an effort to slow down. Is this becoming a witch hunt? Is this becoming a sex panic? Are innocent men at risk of being wrongly accused? Today’s headlines seem to be either dominated by the men who’ve been flaunting their abuse of women for years, even decades, with explicit details of all of the horrors they were allowed to inflict upon women — or about the men who might be at risk for being “unfairly” accused. The men who are now “scared to even talk to women” lest they be accused of sexual harassment. And the women…the women are forgotten completely.

I was in the middle of such ruminations when I got an email from someone at USA Today, offering a writing assignment.

“The Editorial Board plans to publish a piece arguing that the reckoning on sexual harassment is healthy and overdue, but every case is different and the accused deserve due process. If you are interested, we would love to have you write the opposing view,” they said.

The opposing view. I furrowed my brow trying to understand what they were asking. An opposing view to whether a reckoning on sexual harassment was healthy and overdue? An opposing view on whether each case is different and the accused deserve due process? I replied with a request to discuss further via phone.

I’d never interacted with USA Today before, so while waiting, I looked up the representative who had contacted me. She appeared to be a low-level employee who was tasked with putting stories together. It was unusual, as I’d almost always been contacted by editors directly when they wanted me to write a piece.

Now, with only a small handful of high-profile men finally facing some repercussions after years of abuse, there is already an effort to slow down.

She called just a few minutes after I sent the email. I asked her to please give me more details about the editorial that they wanted me to rebut. “We are going to write about how we think it is a very good thing that women are going forward,” she began and basically repeated the same thing she had said in her email: individual cases…due process…etc. “Would you be willing to write the rebuttal to that?”

I paused for a second, thinking of how to best reply.

“No, I can’t write a rebuttal to that because of course I believe in due process,” I answered, deciding not to delve into the side discussion of how due process is a legal term that doesn’t usually apply to private employment, “But I’d be happy to write a response.”

I told her that I’d be happy to write about how the fixation on “due process” for these men was an attempt to re-center the concerns of men. How the question itself was absurd, because if there’s anything these stories show, it’s that these men in their years of open abuse were given more than just due process — but the women, many of whom had tried bringing this abuse to those in authority years before, were given no process at all. I said I’d love to write about the countless women whose careers were ended by coming forward with the abuse they faced, about the countless women whose careers were never able to get off of the ground because of abuse and gender discrimination. Due process. Women would love ANY process. They would love to even be heard.

The woman from USA Today said she would take my ideas to the editorial board and get back to me.

Due process. Women would love ANY process. They would love to even be heard.

While waiting for her to call back I thought about a coworker of mine from years back, when I worked in marketing. She was smart, hard-working, funny, stylish, and social. She had been at the company longer than I had, but I was promoted past her in a few years. I remember talking to one of my mentors, an older man, about my frustration over her seemingly stalled career.

“She’ll never get promoted because she’s all tits and ass,” he said. “All the guys talk about it. People can’t take her seriously. You, you prefer to be known for your brain. That’s why you get promoted.”

He said this in an almost fatherly way, like I was supposed to be proud. But I knew my friend showed up to work every day with the intention of being known for her brain, just like I did. I just had different fashion sense and social anxiety.

When You Can’t Throw All Men Into The Ocean, What CAN You Do?

A few months later, my mentor and I were traveling for a work conference. We’d had a long dinner at the hotel restaurant and I’d thoroughly enjoyed nerding out over marketing strategies with someone I looked up to. Suddenly, while I was in the middle of talking about an ad campaign, I felt a hand on my knee. My mentor was staring at me with a look I’d never seen before. I stopped speaking, stunned.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

He stared at me for a second longer and then removed his hand.

“I should call it a night,” he said, and left to his hotel room.

His words from a few weeks earlier rang through my head.

“You prefer to be known for your brain.”

I started to become excited about the opportunity to write this piece for USA Today. To shift the focus of this conversation on a large national platform back to the women who’ve been harmed. To be able to directly counter the efforts of so many news panels and op-eds to stop women from coming forward before too many men are held accountable for their actions.

I was excited to shift the focus of this conversation back to the women who’ve been harmed.

USA Today called me back about five minutes later.

“I ran your idea past them,” she said, “But what they really want is to write that they believe that it’s great that these women are coming forward but that they believe in due process, and they want you to write that you don’t. They want a piece that says that you don’t believe in due process and that if a few innocent men lose their jobs it’s worth it to protect women. Is that something you can do?”

I almost couldn’t get a reply out, I was stunned by how blatant their request was.

“No,” I said, “No, it’s not.”

We ended the call and I just sat frozen in my chair for a few minutes. Did this really just happen? Was I seriously just asked by the third largest paper in the nation to write their “feminazi” narrative to counter their “reasoned and compassionate” editorial? Was I just asked to be one of the excuses for why this whole “me too” moment needed to be shut down? Was I just asked to be their strawman?

I remembered one tech job I’d held that was particularly saturated in sexual harassment. Where engineers would literally high-five each other after propositioning a woman in an elevator. I remembered how the women who went to HR were forever labeled “humorless bitches” by the men who faced no further consequences for their actions than a quick meeting telling them to “cool it down.” I remember accepting lunch with a coworker only to discover that this had somehow meant that I’d accepted a date. At 1 p.m. on a Wednesday. Over Chipotle.

On Spacey, Weinstein, Milo, And The Weaponization Of Identity

On my last day there I had an exit interview with HR, as was standard process. The HR manager didn’t ask me if I’d faced any harassment or discrimination in my role, even though I personally knew of at least five female employees who had come to her with complaints of sexual harassment.

Instead, she looked at me and asked, “Do you think you deserved your last promotion? Or do you think you were given it because you are a black woman?”

When I left the meeting, a manager nervously walked up to me.

“Are you leaving because I sexually harassed you?” he asked.

I blinked for a moment. Stunned. I remembered the engineer who used to come by my cubicle almost every evening after almost all the other employees were gone, while I was working late. I was very pregnant at the time and had gotten the job while in early pregnancy, and enough managers had hinted that they were sure I was just working there to get insurance coverage and maternity leave. Once I’d duped the company out of three months of half pay while I bonded with my new baby, they were pretty sure I’d never be seen again, having scammed them all into paying for my reproduction. So I worked late every night, even though I was a single parent with a little boy at daycare waiting for me, in order to prove that I deserved to be taken seriously. And once 6:00 p.m. rolled around, this engineer would saunter over. One night, after telling me once again how he’d slept with enough women over the years to make Wilt Chamberlain jealous, he leaned in closer and peered down at my pregnant belly.

“So….” he asked with a sly pause, “Are you planning on delivering vaginally?”

So on my last day, I stared at this manager. A man I’d considered safe. An ally. Even a friend. A man who was now asking if I was leaving because he’d sexually harassed me.

And I answered, “Honestly, the way things are here, I didn’t realize that’s what you’d been doing this whole time.” And I tried not to cry.

But yesterday, I was asked to write that I do not believe in due process. I was asked to write that I believe we should just immediately fire all men accused of sexual harassment. I was asked to write that if a few men are harmed to protect women, it’s worth it. As if that’s a real threat. As if that’s a valid fear. As if, in this world, a power shift of that magnitude is even within the realm of possibility. As if a lack of due process wouldn’t first come for women, trans people, and people of color. As if due process isn’t the one thing so many men and their enablers in this society are working so hard to avoid.

Yesterday, I was asked to write that if a few men are harmed to protect women, it’s worth it. As if that’s a real threat.

And all I could say was, “No, no I can’t.” And even in that, in my financial ability to say no and risk burning that bridge, I’m one of the lucky ones.

USA Today ran their editorial last night. I found it this morning. At the bottom of the piece they have a note in italics:

“USA TODAY’s editorial opinions are decided by its Editorial Board, separate from the news staff. Most editorials are coupled with an opposing view — a unique USA TODAY feature.”

But so far, for this piece, they don’t seem to have an opposing view to publish. At least not the one they wanted. Without it, without their extreme feminist scapegoat to compare themselves to, their editorial looks anemic, lackluster. It looks as weak and pointless as it is, if not as manipulative as it attempted to be. This time, they failed.

But I can’t help but wonder how many have succeeded? How manipulated this broader, international conversation on sexual harassment has been in order to so quickly shift the conversation to protecting men from the consequences of their actions, before the names of the women they’ve harmed are even known? I can’t help but look at the profession I’ve chosen and love and wonder how much of it, like every other job I’ve found myself in since I was a teenager, is actively working to harm women and protect those who harm women?

How often are we manipulated into prioritizing the abuser over the abused? How often are we being suckered into a side of a debate that we shouldn’t even be having?

How often are we manipulated into prioritizing the abuser over the abused?

These last two days, I was able to see one of the ways that this manipulation works in a shockingly brazen display. I don’t know if it’s because they had so little respect for my work or my intellect, or for my integrity — or if they just thought that as a feminist I’d jump at the chance to flush “due process” down the toilet. How often is this happening in ways that we aren’t able to so easily see?

I hope to be able to continue to write in a way that focuses on those harmed by abuses of power and privilege. I hope to continue to write with integrity and honesty. And I hope that we all can try to read with the same focus and the same integrity. And that we can all work together to be more aware of how we are being manipulated and distracted and misrepresented and shamed into believing that we do not deserve to be centered in conversations on our oppression. That we do not deserve to be heard. That we do not deserve justice. That we do not deserve “due process.”

Due process is long overdue.

Looking For A Comments Section? We Don’t Have One.

]]> https://theestablishment.co/so-youve-sexually-harassed-or-abused-someone-what-now-ed49a934bab1/ Fri, 17 Nov 2017 05:28:40 +0000 https://theestablishment.co/?p=3042 Read more]]> There is a path forward, past denial and scandal and shame.

Are you a man who has been outed as a sexual harasser or abuser? Are you a man who is reading about all these rich and powerful men being brought down by their past transgressions and hoping and praying that the gross shit you did that violated the humanity or autonomy of another human being won’t be brought to light? Are you a man who is right now swearing that you’ve changed, that you are not the foolish man you once were and you are appalled by your past actions, but also you remember them differently, but also you’d like us all to be able to move forward?

Are you a man who has sexually harassed, abused, or assaulted someone and you do not want to be that person anymore? Are you a man who wants to genuinely move past the wrong you’ve done?

There is a path forward, past denial and scandal and shame. There is a path to genuinely being the better person that you want to be. I’m writing this sincerely. I’m writing this because sexual abuse and assault is so very common in our society that chances are, someone I know and love and respect is reading this and knowing that they are guilty. I’m writing this because if we don’t find a way forward, this will keep happening. Even if you never harass or abuse or assault another human being again: If you don’t try to make this right, this will keep happening and you will have helped to enable it.

When You Can’t Throw All Men Into The Ocean, What CAN You Do?

Are you ready to get started? Here are some first steps you can take.

1. Stop calling your victim(s) a liar.

Don’t slander them, don’t ignore them, don’t try to intimidate them. Don’t try to get your buddies to vouch for how you would absolutely never do anything like this. When you hurt someone, and then tell them to their face that you didn’t hurt them, you are hurting them all over again. Do not make your victim carry this alone.

2. Don’t wait to be accused.

If the person you harmed has not come forward publicly yet, do not just wait in terror for them to do so. Do not force them to take the risk to their reputations, careers, and peace of mind that victims take when they come forward with abuses against them. If you can first come forward to the person you abused in a way that would not add further harm to them, do so. And then be honest with others. If you harassed someone at work, go to your boss and to HR. Come clean with your community. Come clean with your sons.

An important note: Unless you have the permission of the person you harmed, you absolutely must protect their identity and any personal details of what happened that might cause further harm to them to hear or to have their community hear. Anything you do must place the wellbeing of the person you harmed as a top priority. A simple statement of, “I did this, and it was a violation of this person. It was not okay and I’m very sorry” is a good start.

3. Pause before immediately saying what a better person you are now.

Oh, you just got called out for sexual harassment or abuse but you’re a better person now? How much better? Better because you aren’t harassing or abusing people anymore? Better because when you think about what you did you feel bad? How much better of a person were you before someone had to be brave enough to publicly discuss the pain you put them through? How much better of a person were you when they were carrying the pain of what you did every day but you got to pretend like it didn’t happen? You might be on the way to better, but you haven’t earned the right to make any public declarations of reform yet. Keep reading.

4. Understand exactly what you did.

If you know you did something wrong but part of you is still thinking, “this wasn’t really that big of a deal,” then you need to take some time and do some research. Research how sexual harassment impacts victims. Research rape culture and the lasting effects of sexual abuse and assault. Listen to survivors. Listen to them and respect their ability to interpret what happened to them and the impact that it has had on them. Believe them.

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You might be on the way to better, but you haven’t earned the right to make any public declarations of reform yet.
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5. Face the consequences.

Do you deserve to lose some friends? Yes. Do you deserve to lose some respect? Yes. Do you deserve to lose your job? Yes. Do you deserve to go to jail? If you assaulted someone — yeah. If your teenager was stealing from work and got fired for it, if you were a halfway decent dad you’d likely tell them to be glad for the opportunity to learn from their mistakes and to realize that actions have consequences. Well, what you did was worse, way worse — even from a business perspective. Even if it was “just” sexual harassment. You stole the productivity of the person you harassed, who from then on had to try to do their job and deal with your gross ass at the same time. You likely made anybody else who was aware of what you did feel unsafe, which contributed to low morale and higher turnover. You made your employer look bad. You spent your work hours playing grab-ass instead of doing your job. On top of just being very shitty and abusive you wasted company time and resources and you deserve to be fired for that.

If you ever want young men to believe in personal accountability you will take these consequences respectfully, gratefully even. Yes, it does indeed suck if you will now find it harder to feed your family but understand that YOU DID THAT. You, not your accuser, not your employer, not an “angry mob” on the internet. You did that. You did that to yourself and your family and your community. Apologize to them for what your actions have brought and know every day that you are not the victim.

If you don’t face any of these consequences, consider yourself a lucky beneficiary of a society that doesn’t give two fucks about sexual abuse and assault victims, and know that you did absolutely nothing to deserve such luck.

On Spacey, Weinstein, Milo, And The Weaponization Of Identity

6. Use your power for good.

Hey, remember how you felt so powerful and entitled that you were pretty sure you could sexually harass someone and nothing would happen to you? Remember how you were pretty sure that you were so well liked and respected that nobody would believe sexual assault accusations against you? The power that you had in order to be able to do this gross shit? It’s power you can use to actually stop this gross shit.

Hey, you hold the careers of other people in your hands and that makes it really easy for you to tell a woman that you’d ruin her if she spoke out about your sexual harassment? It’s literally just as easy to tell the dudes you work with that you’d ruin THEM if they sexually harassed women.

Man, people really like you and look up to you so you have the perfect shield for your past sexual abuses? You also have the perfect platform to start talking about your struggles with toxic masculinity and encouraging other men to do the same.

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The power that you had in order to be able to do this gross shit? It’s power you can use to actually stop this gross shit.
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Are you the dude who all the other dudes try to impress with their sexist jokes? You can be the dude who says, “hey man, that’s not cool.”

And if you for one minute used your power (and even if you’re an unemployed dude looking around his studio apartment saying “what power,” trust me, you have some over at least one person in your life) to harass, abuse, or assault someone and you are not now using that power to fight the harassment, abuse, or assault of others — you are not a man changed. You are a man with a debt that you must pay.

7. Do not expect forgiveness.

Yes, you may be doing this to be a better person, but it does not mean that others have to see you as a better person. The things we do cannot be undone. We must find other ways to get as close to making things right as we can, but if you’ve harmed someone, you have no right to expect to be seen by them or anyone else impacted by you actions as anyone other than the person who harmed someone. You have to live with what you did as long as they do.

This does not mean that you have to beg for forgiveness for all eternity. It means that you will have to find a way to move forward while also carrying that burden with you. It will remind you of why your work now to fight the culture that makes sexual abuse so prevalent is so important. It will remind you to not be complacent, to not abuse your power, to resist the lure of toxic masculinity. It will fuel your fire to reach out to other men you care about so that they, too, will not harm others and have to carry around the harm they caused forever.

When Forgiveness Isn’t A Virtue

And to some people — to a lot of people — you will likely be seen as a better person, because you will be a better person. But you will never have a right to expect or demand that.

We have a serious sexual abuse and assault problem in this society, and as a perpetrator of some of that abuse, you have an increased obligation to help fight. You are not alone. There are millions of men around the country looking at their past behavior and wondering what they can and should do about it. You can help them follow the right path by taking the first steps yourself. This is not easy. This open accountability for the wrongs you’ve done is very painful to go through. But it’s nothing compared to the pain you’ve caused your victim(s) or the harm your silence does to society by continuing to uphold a culture that makes this abuse so easy.

You can never erase this, but you can repair some of the damage done, and the damage your inaction is currently doing. You can be a part of the solution. And you have to be. You owe it to your victims. You owe it to us all.

I was just commenting a few weeks ago about how at least once a month a woman will reach out to me to let me know that a man I’ve worked with, socialized with, or even considered a friend, is an abuser. These aren’t tales of one incident, it’s almost always a pattern of abuse quietly shared by multiple women who are scared of being publicly known. Occasionally these are stories from women who made their accusations VERY publicly known—but they were quickly and violently shouted down by their own community and, almost immediately, the accusations were forgotten by everyone except for the women who had been abused and cast out.

These aren’t famous people. These abusers are local artists, activists, teachers. But many have found themselves in places of even minor prestige or power and used that power to abuse women—and keep them silent about it. Even in a group as small as two — say, in a marriage — certain men will use their power to abuse women (and many men and non-binary people as well, who are often silenced with the added shame of the “feminized” nature of sexual assault).

And along with all the ways in which women are constantly reminded of how unsafe and powerless they are when someone in their circle is revealed as an abuser, we now also have a spate of very high-profile and widely admired menwho are being outed as serial abusers.

Weinstein, Tambor, Hoffman, Louis CK, Seagal, Piven, Spacey—maybe it would save time to just start keeping lists of men we admire (I’m aware that not many have admired Steven Seagal in a while, but the point stands) whoaren’t sexual predators, and then slowly cross their names off as every news story breaks until we all explode from rage and frustration and disappointment.

Maybe it would save time to just start keeping lists of men we admire who AREN’T sexual predators.
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This is, I’m 120% sure, just the tip of the iceberg. For every victim who takes the monumental risk to come forward and is actually heard, there are almost certainly countless others who can’t or aren’t.

I hear time and time again from men who want me to make it clear when talking about rape culture that not all men are rapists. I hear time and time again from men who want me to believe that it’s only a few sick monsters committing all the rapes, and also that maybe women are all lying and there are no rapes. These are often the same men who also try to say in the same breath that “boys will be boys” and that men can’t control their desires as long as women continue to stubbornly exist in their corporeal form.

And no, as a mother of two boys I cannot believe that every man is a sexual predator and that every little boy is destined to become one. I would not be able to get out of bed in the mornings. But as a survivor of multiple sexual assaults, as one of the 20% of all women in the U.S. who report being victims of sexual assault (and this is not including sexual harassment and other waysin which women are made to feel unsafe in their bodies), as a citizen of a country that elected a man who proudly admitted on tape to sexually assaulting women as president, I will say this: This society is doing everything it can to create rapists, to enable rapists, and to protect rapists.

This society is doing everything it can to create rapists, to enable rapists, and to protect rapists.
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This society is broken, abusive, patriarchal (and white supremacist, ableist, hetero-cisnormative) trash. Not just in little pockets. Not just in dark alleys and frat parties. It’s fucking rotten through and through and has been forabsofuckinglutelyever.

I have not yet figured out how to drive all men into the sea. I’ve considered maybe taking a boat to the middle of the ocean to start shouting about the wage gap to see how many men would try to swim over to tell me that it doesn’t exist. But I’m very fond of a few men (including the two I gave birth to — nepotism, I know) and I also get really seasick on boats.

So if we can’t drive all men into the ocean and start over, do we just throw up our hands? Do we just excuse this rampant abuse as “locker-room talk” and “locker-room groping” and “locker-room rape” and “locker-room forced witnessing of masturbation”? Do we continue to insist that we do not have a toxic masculinity problem and these are just isolated cases of sick individuals who are abusing women and let everyone else off the hook?

I absolutely cannot give all the answers. I do not have all the answers. Women more capable than I have died trying to find a way to fix this.

But I do know this: Every single sexual abuser is 100% responsible for their actions and there is nobody else to blame than the person who is choosing to violate another person.

And I also know this: This entire patriarchal society is responsible for every single sexual assault that occurs.

Both of these things are 100% true at the same time, and if we want to battle rape culture—if we want to finally end the brutality that so many women have faced for pretty much the entirety of history—we have to start addressing both of these realities at once.

Every single sexual abuser is 100% responsible for their actions and there is nobody else to blame than the person who is choosing to violate another person.
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We have to face up to the fact that from the moment we get that sonogram and a doctor points to an imperceptible squiggly thing and says that it’s a penis, we start indoctrinating our assigned male children with massive amounts of toxic masculinity. We hand them toy guns and tell them not to cry and define their success through life by how well they can dominate others. We make countless movies where their only “romantic” goal is to find a way to get a woman who does not want them to sleep with them anyway. We show them image after image of men in nice suits, cigar in hand, a dead-eyed beauty draped on each arm and say, “This is what you should strive for. This is victory.”

But as a society, we don’t want to take responsibility for the abuse we create, enable, and strengthen. Because most of that responsibility lies with men and so many of them are very invested in keeping things the way they are — especially because they haven’t quite reached their life’s goal to be successful enough to be able to violate the consent of the most beautiful of the trophies we also know as women without consequence. Yes, everyone contributes to the patriarchy in some way — even women—but about half of us have had no say in the rules of the game, have never had a chance at winning, and have been given just as little say in whether or not we will play. For many cis, straight men, to fight the patriarchy is to risk discomfort. For the rest of us, it’s to risk your livelihood, your health, even your life.

Why Demanding That Rape Victims Report Assault Isn’t Helpful
theestablishment.co

As a society, we also don’t place responsibility on the individual men who are, even with their societal conditioning and enabling, still choosing with their own minds and bodies and patriarchal power to violate the consent of others in a myriad of ways. Approximately 3% of rape victims will ever see their rapist spend a day in jail. And while 1 in 5 female college students reports being the victim of sexual assault, we have a president who is actively working to make sure that the choice to rape a classmate will not endanger a rapist’s chance at graduation.

We instead place the entire responsibility for the damage done to women… on women. Soon-to-be women who wear spaghetti-strap tops to school, distracting young boys with their scandalous shoulders. Women who let a man buy her a steak dinner but then are rude enough to not suck his dick for dessert. Women who get drunk at parties. Women who go to parties. Women who wear bikinis. Women who wear burqas. Women who choose to sleep with other people who aren’t that dude. Women who slept with that dude once but then didn’t want to anymore.

Every day I’m trying to counter the flood of messaging my sons are receiving from television, music, movies, books, friends, and our own government that says that they have a right to a woman’s body. Every day I’m trying to counter the flood of messaging that my sons are receiving that says that overcoming a woman’s objections is romantic. Every day I’m trying to counter the flood of messaging that tells them that their manhood is defined by how many women they can have sex with. Every day I remind them that they are so much kinder, better, and just… more than these violently aggressive yet mewling combinations of bravado and entitlement that they see depicted as the pinnacle of “manhood.” And every day I’m reminding them that they are responsible for their actions, and that if they disrespect women, abuse women, violate the consent of women — I will be one of the first people in line to make sure that they are held accountable.

And every day I don’t know if it’s enough. Every day it feels like it isn’t.

But I have to try because I have no other choice. We, as a society, have no other choice. And if you’ve had the luxury to think that this is not an issue that you need to address because you aren’t “one of those guys” I suggest you pay attention to how hard so many of us women are fighting to save ourselves, our sisters, our daughters, and our sons. And get to work.

Or get in the sea.

I’m here to answer all your burning questions about becoming an Establishment member.

Hey, Ijeoma here. I’m sure you’ve seen a couple (hundred) posts from The Establishment encouraging you to become a member. Now, you may be asking yourself, “What is an Establishment membership?” or “Why should I join?” or “Why do you keep bugging me about it?” or “Who are you?” If this is you, then allow me to tell you all that you need to know about The Establishment Member Community.

What Is It? It’s basically a cool club you can join here at The Establishment for as little as $5 a month. Think of every club you ever wanted to join as a kid, double it, add sparkles, and then you have a membership with The Establishment.

What Do I Get As A Member? You get exclusive content created by amazing writers — LIKE ME (and some other people), you get to ask me questions about life in my upcoming members-only advice column (WUT), and you get to join our loving, lively, and engaging chat community on Slack. WE EVEN HAVE A BOOK CLUB, NERDS.

Why Do You Keep Bugging Me About It? Because we need members! Look, it’s never sexy to talk about money (okay, not true, it’s often very sexy to talk about money), but the truth is — in order to exist in this space as a voice of resistance and pay our staff and writers for the amazing work they do — we need funds. We will always need funds (unless one of you wants to give us A LOT of money and then we will stop asking for a while) and in our search for sustainable and ethical revenue (which included 20 weeks of intense research and discussion in the Matter accelerator program), we’ve decided that paid membership is the best way forward. It allows us to continue to produce widely accessible free quality content, while providing extra paid quality content to those who can afford to help support our work, at a very reasonable support level. All while maintaining our pledge to *actually* pay writers (if you’re a freelancer, you’ll recognize that this is more novel of a concept than it should be).

WE EVEN HAVE A BOOK CLUB, NERDS.

Why Should I Join? You should join because you value the amazing work that we are able to publish here at The Establishment. You should join because few publications so consistently support high-quality work from marginalized voices, and pay for that work. You should join because we do our upmost to ensure that when you read one of our thought-provoking articles, you aren’t going to be suddenly smacked in the head with the racism, misogyny, ableism, classism, transphobia, and other bigotries that often make their way into mainstream writing — marginalizing all but the most privileged audiences. You should join because part of economic justice means paying for the labor of others when that labor benefits us. You should join because the bonuses are fun and cool. You should join because in a time when so much of our media aims to shock or entertain, but not inform — we often do all three with clarity, ethics, and — yes, goddamnit — panache.

If you love The Establishment, and you want MORE of The Establishment — or if you love us just the way we are and you want us to be able to keep doing just what we’re doing, I hope you’ll become a member of The Establishment today.

Thank you for your support,

Ijeoma

SUBSCRIBE RIGHT HERE:

]]> https://theestablishment.co/stop-trying-to-feel-good-about-trump-supporters-and-get-to-work-b408c07b095d/ Wed, 20 Sep 2017 04:34:30 +0000 https://theestablishment.co/?p=3097 Read more]]> A viral video showing BLM protesters welcomed on stage at a pro-Trump rally upholds the forces of White Supremacy.

This morning I woke up to a few messages sharing the internet’s latest attempt at racial-feel-goodism — a viral video of Black Lives Matter protesters speaking at a Trump rally. The video, which already has 13 million views in less than a day, shows BLM protesters at a Trump rally called “The Mother Of All Rallies” (which…is kind of hilarious when it’s reported that fewer than 1,000 people showed up, but I digress). The protesters are at first insulted and dismissed by the speakers onstage, but then one speaker decides to give them two minutes on stage to patronizingly “show them what patriotism is all about.”

In a short and very pandering speech, Hawk Newsome, president of BLM New York, explains that BLM isn’t “anti-cop,” that they “aren’t asking for a handout,” and that they want to get rid of “bad cops” just like Trump supporters want to get rid of “bad politicians.” After the speech, Newsome is shown taking pictures with Trump supporters as he talks about how some of them came up to him after and said that they agreed with him. He says that he wanted them to see that a member of BLM was a “Proud American and Christian.” And that BLM members were “educated.”

The Abuse Of ‘Feel-Good’ Cop Videos

Newsome says, “I think we made some substantial steps, without either side yielding anything.”

Record scratch — Um, excuse me? Someone come collect your man Newsome. Please.

My gawd, where do I even start with the things that are wrong with this? Because… well absolutely everything is. I guess we’ll just start a list.

The Framing

Yes, the primary speaker is a black man, but who is really being centered in this video? Who is being humanized? Who do you walk away from this video saying, “see — they aren’t as bad as we think?” It’s not the BLM activists being humanized — they are having to showcase a certain set of behaviors in order to even be seen as human. They are having to highlight how they aren’t “like other black people” in order to even be heard. They have to be proud Americans, Christians, eloquent speakers, willing to shake hands with White Supremacists — all while White Supremacists in the audience scream that Eric Garner was a criminal who deserved to die.

What do the White Supremacists at the rally have to do? Patronizingly give two minutes of stage time, out of an entire day of hate speech, to BLM activists, and pose for a few photos with black people who just bent over backwards to appear nonthreatening to them.

The Pandering

“We don’t want handouts. We don’t want anything that’s yours.” Yeah, about that. White America: I, and many other black activists, DO want something that is yours. We want what you have that you stole. We want the profits you’ve made from the exploitation of our labor and the destruction of our bodies and souls. We want our fair share of space in your school textbooks. We want some of your congressional seats and city council seats. We want a bigger chunk of college admissions and job interviews.

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White America: I, and many other black activists, DO want something that is yours. We want what you have that you stole.
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Some of what you have, you stole. Some of what you have, you’ve maintained by shutting us out. Some of what you have, you don’t deserve. You know this. We know this. And this is why you hate Black Lives Matter so much. This is why you hated Dr. King and Malcolm X so much. Let’s not lie. Let’s not act like in a world of finite resources, if we correct a deeply unjust system, those who have profited off of that inequality will not lose out. It is this unspoken reality that has sustained White Supremacy — the knowledge that if white people do what is right, they will lose what they never had a right to. Let’s call it what it is, and let those allies who say that they are willing to fight against racism actually put their privilege on the line. We are who we pretend to be. And if we pretend that we are only here for hugs, and not for socioeconomic justice, all we are going to get is hugs. Like Dr. Martin Luther King said, “We’re coming to get our check.”

The Lesson

What is the moral of the story this video tells? That if we just talk peacefully, we’ll find common ground and we’ll recognize the humanity in each other? That if we just prove to those who have voted open White Supremacy into our highest offices that we are no threat to them, that they will…ask to get a picture taken with us?

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If we pretend that we are only here for hugs, and not for socioeconomic justice, all we are going to get is hugs.
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It should not be shocking to you that a White Supremacist at a Trump rally would get his picture taken with a black man. It should not seem revelatory that a White Supremacist at a Trump rally would let a black man hold his kid. Trump supporters are not evil monsters. They are human beings. And human beings are capable of having black friends, even black spouses, and still voting for policies that get black people killed. Human beings are capable of taking a friendly photo with a black stranger one minute, and explaining why Trayvon Martin deserved to die in the next. And that should not make you feel good. It should not give you hope. It should scare the fuck out of you.

I know that a lot of people — especially white people — have relatives who voted for Trump. I know that for many liberal white folk, it has been very painful to reconcile the relative they have known and loved, with the hatred and violence that that relative has chosen to support.

Know that this is how White Supremacy works. That you can go to church on Sundays, volunteer with your PTA, and vote for a man who is openly courting actual neo-Nazis. You can attend a rally and proudly stand next to someone holding a sign saying that Obama is a Muslim terrorist and still be considered a valued member of your community. You can love a black person, even give birth to black children, and still think so little of them that you would vote away their safety and security. The problem isn’t that we don’t see how Trump supporters are “people just like us” — the problem is, that is all we want to see. In our efforts to not reevaluate what whiteness actually means in America, we will absolve those who are actively strengthening racist hate of any responsibility for their actions.

The Lack Of Accountability

Let’s go back to this awful sentence that Newsome thought was a good idea to say — “I think we made some substantial steps, without either side yielding anything.” What the actual fuck does that even mean? Right now, we have a president who has already tried to ban Muslims from this country, declared war on free press, pardoned an abusive and racist cop who was targeting and torturing people of color, endangered the futures of millions of undocumented immigrants, equated anti-racist protesters with murderous swastika-wearing White Supremacists, brought us to the brink of war with North Korea, banned trans people from serving in the military, and basically more evil and oppressive shit than I thought it was possible for one president to fit into nine months of presidency. Not only did the people at this rally vote this horror into office, but after seeing what it has wrought, they are showing up to cheer it on.

When I Said All Trump Supporters Are White Supremacists, I Meant It

These are people who are, right this very moment, upholding staggering amounts of hate and oppression. And instead of being shown the reality of what they have done to this country…instead of being held accountable… instead of being told to own up to their racism, xenophobia, sexism, and transphobia…instead of being asked to help clean up the godforsaken mess they’ve created…instead of being made to feel the actual regret and shame that is absolutely necessary for growth when you have committed regretful and shameful acts…

…they get to fast-forward to feeling good. To proving to themselves and others that, because they can listen to a black person speak for two minutes and take a picture with him, that they are not racist. Then they get to go back to being racist as fuck.

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You can love a black person, even give birth to black children, and still think so little of them that you would vote away their safety and security.
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The Goal

Is this what we’re fighting for? For individual racists to want to be our friends and give us hugs? It’s sure as hell not what I’m fighting for. I’m fighting for the destruction of the system of White Supremacy. I’m fighting to make it so that, even if you hate me because of the color of my skin, you don’t have the power to ruin my life because of it. I’m fighting for political and cultural representation, economic justice, the destruction of the prison industrial complex. You are on a stage in front of people who are consistently voting to uphold the very systems you are trying to destroy, and instead of explaining to them how their choices are upholding these systems, you….beg for them to not see you as someone who doesn’t hate cops? What a waste.

The system of White Supremacy is vast and complex, but it is a system. And all systems have parts that we interact with, and can destroy. Instead of doing the real, and sometimes very unsexy work, of destroying this system, we are instead reinforcing White Supremacy by once again agreeing to try to prove our humanity to those who are actively working towards our destruction?

Let’s stop trying to take the easy way out. Let’s stop trying to feel good about a system that nobody has any right to feel good about. Let’s stop allowing ourselves to not only be distracted, but to be derailed by feel-good narratives that have us begging for the hearts and minds of individual racists instead of fighting the system that empowers them. Instead of finding a way to feel good about your Trump-supportive friends and relatives, let your love for them push you to see them as they are, and demand better from them. Demand that they act like the good, kind people that you thought they were — in real, quantifiable deeds, not empty words or photo ops. Every day that we delay in doing the work that is necessary to destroy White Supremacy, countless lives are crushed beneath its feet. Stop falling for lazy and manipulative “feel-good” racial narratives, and get to work building a reality that actually IS good.

“I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Council-er or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate who is more devoted to ‘order’ than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says ‘I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can’t agree with your methods of direct action;’ who paternalistically feels he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by the myth of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a ‘more convenient season.’”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

Everything short of racial justice is white supremacy. Everything.

Credit: Vlad Tchompalov/Unsplash

I’m going to say something about race that may seem to fly in the face of everything we’ve been taught about how to handle complicated and divisive adult issues—but, as unproductive as it may sound, it’s the truth: There is no compromise.

There is no compromise to be had, none whatsoever, when it comes to racial justice. There are no baby steps that are acceptable. There is no middle to meet in.

Everything short of racial justice is white supremacy. Everything.

There is no compromise to be had, none whatsoever, when it comes to racial justice.

If this sounds harsh or unreasonable to you, I really need you to understand why it is not. If this last election and the torrent of narratives against “identity politics” has you thinking that maybe, just maybe, some middle ground between white supremacists and anti-racists must be found, I need you to understand the danger this belief puts us in. Because the desire to make racial equality a topic which is up for debate, or racial justice a goal that we can ease ourselves into, is what has sustained the system of violent white supremacy for hundreds of years. I need you to understand, because I need you to understand what those who say that we are “pushing too hard” or “asking for too much” or “moving too fast” are really saying.

The average American will easily agree that they believe that freedom, justice, and equality are basic rights, rights we are born with. These ideas are woven throughout the entire narrative of our democracy. But in practice, very few people actually believe that freedom, justice, and equality are rights that every American deserves. When you enjoy your freedoms, and you tell those who want their freedoms that they have to wait, that they have to go slowly, that they have to give you time to make uncomfortable adjustments to the amount of privilege that their inequality has afforded you, what you are saying is, “You were not born with these rights. You were not born as deserving as me. I have the power and privilege to determine when it is time for you to receive freedom and equality, and my approval is conditioned on how comfortable and safe you make me feel about how that freedom and equality will impact the privileges I enjoy.”

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What is the compromise between justice and oppression? What grey area between inequality and equality exists? There is none. You cannot have a little injustice and call it justice. You cannot have a little inequality and call it equality. And whenever you decide that you have the power to slow or stop justice and equality for others — you are immediately ensuring the continuation of injustice and inequality by placing yourself above those seeking justice and equality. There is a claim of superiority inherent in believing that you have the right to slow racial justice. It is a claim of superiority that white supremacy has granted you, and that you cannot accept without becoming a willing proponent of this white supremacist system.

You cannot have a little injustice and call it justice. You cannot have a little inequality and call it equality.

Lives are ruined while we “wait our turn.” Children are expelled from school, young adults are locked away in prison. As people of color in this country we receive substandard health care, we are denied job interviews, we are denied bank loans, we are paid less, our neighborhoods are denied investment and infrastructure, we are locked in poverty, we are erased from history books and movie screens, we are harassed by police, we are murdered by the state. There is no amount of discomfort on behalf of white America that would make the continuation of this white supremacist system anything other than inhumanely cruel.

Those who want to uphold white supremacy, or even delay its destruction, are denying the humanity of people of color in this country. There is no nice way to ask for our freedom that will lead to it being granted. Believe me, we’ve tried. Even having to ask is an act of oppression in itself.

Your Calls For Unity Are Divisive As F*ck

We live in a country where people will try to convince you that if you do not prove to white America that you are worthy of freedom, justice, and equality — if you do not ask nicely, wait patiently, prove your worth with respectability and good deeds — that it is right that it would be denied you. We live in a country where people will try to convince you that you do not have freedom, justice, and equality because you have not done enough for those things.

We live in a country where people will try to convince you that pushing for freedom, justice, and equality in a way which white America has not pre-approved will only lead to more oppression, injustice, and inequality. We live in a country where people will try to tell you that white America is not at all responsible for the white supremacy it upholds, that their hands are forced by your refusal to make the prospect of your freedom, justice, and equality more comfortable for them.

Those who want to uphold white supremacy, or even delay its destruction, are denying the humanity of people of color in this country.

There is no compromise to be had. There is nothing between oppression and freedom that doesn’t guarantee our continued subjugation. We cannot trade away our humanity to those who claim to be allies in the hopes that what they will build in our name will be anything more than our oppression. We cannot ally ourselves to those who would be turned away by our demands and ever expect those demands to be met. So if there is no compromise, what can we do?

We keep pushing. We keep fighting. We check ourselves for the internalized white supremacy that tells us that we have to take it slow, that we have to settle for less. We check our allies for the internalized white supremacy that tells them that they are not required by their belief in justice and equality to fight white supremacy, no matter how uncomfortable it may make them. We show people how their words do not match their actions. We do not for one moment let white supremacy feel comfortable in our presence.

So You Want To Fight White Supremacy

We raise our kids with this same, uncompromising belief in our rights. We challenge any attempts to normalize our oppression. We continuously bring to light the racism that others would prefer live in the dark. We celebrate every victory and always know that it is not enough. We fight not for the hearts and minds of individual racists, but for the freedom, justice, and equality that we are overdue to receive and that they have no right to withhold. We push past our own individual liberation and comfort and fight for every last one of us. We comfort each other, hold each other, and make space for grief and despair and exhaustion. But we don’t give up. We don’t compromise our neighbors, our children, our humanity.

Do not let anyone tell you that your time has not come.

Do not let anyone tell you that you ask for too much.

Do not let anyone tell you that you should have to ask at all.

We don’t compromise our neighbors, our children, our humanity.

I do not know what freedom, justice, and equality will look like for us — I have never seen it with my own eyes. But I do know what our oppression looks like, and right now, it looks like the compromises of our souls that we are being asked to make every day in the hopes that it will somehow lead to our liberation.

We are worth more than this. We are worth the fight. We were born worthy.

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]]> https://theestablishment.co/so-you-want-to-fight-white-supremacy-2b5735f22f9/ Tue, 15 Aug 2017 03:17:26 +0000 https://theestablishment.co/?p=3405 Read more]]> There is no excuse and no negotiation to be had: We all must battle this violent, deadly system.

Hello fellow outraged human being. I am sure that the events of these last few days — the marching of young white supremacists through the UVA campus, and the assault and murder of anti-racist protesters, has left many of you shocked and horrified. Violent white supremacy is a shocking thing to see in action—and all white supremacy is violent.

If you are one of the many who are now saying, “This has gone too far, what can I do?” If you have the strong suspicion that counter-marches aren’t quite enough, but you don’t know where to take it from there, I’m here to help. Here are some things you may need to know first:

White supremacy is not just about the hateful actions of individuals or groups of individuals.

White supremacy is first and foremost a system. A system which puts the belief that white people are superior to other races into practice. It is this system that makes white supremacy as dangerous as it is, and it kills people much more violently and with more frequency than we’ve seen this past weekend in Virginia.

White supremacy is in our workplace, our school system, our government and our prisons. It is in our books and movies and television. White supremacy has been woven into the fabric of our nation from the moment that white settlers decided that their claim to land was more important than the lives of indigenous people. This is not a new problem. This is America.

This is not a new problem. This is America.
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The white supremacy we are seeing in the streets right now is not just Nazism, and to label it as such is erasive.

Yes, there are definitely neo-Nazis marching among the ranks of the White Supremacists who have been on the rise since the election of Obama made white people fear for their status in society for the first time in decades. These white supremacists draw a lot of inspiration from Hitler and the monstrous acts that Nazis committed. It is very tempting, then, especially with the general consensus among all decent people that Nazis are indeed a serious threat that must be taken seriously, to label all of these white supremacists Nazis. But Nazism is a distinct political ideology with a distinct history and actions. Further, when we think about the targets of Nazis, we think primarily of only one group: Jewish people.

Anti-Semitism has indeed been on the rise in recent years, and many of these newer white supremacists have used the hatred of Jewish people, and the imagery of Nazism, as a rallying point. The evocation of the historical trauma of the Holocaust is a tactic meant to shock everyone, make white supremacists feel powerful, and terrify Jewish people (although Jewish people certainly were not the only groups targeted by Nazis — Roma, homosexuals, disabled people and many others were murdered — , the targeting of Jewish people has been primarily how many Americans think of the Holocaust). But this hatred we are seeing marching through the UVA campus was not born in Germany. It is a home-grown problem. The United States has a long history of anti-Semitism, and while the imagery and swastikas may be borrowed from Germany’s past, this hatred is all-American. If we want to battle anti-Semitism in America, we must look at it as an American problem in the context of American history.

White People: I Want You To Understand Yourselves Better
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Further, today’s white supremacy has, as it always has, deep roots in this country’s hatred of non-white people — especially black Americans. It is important to remember that it was the fear of the rise of black Americans after the election of Obama that started the rise of violent white supremacy we are seeing today. Much of the recruitment points into this latest incarnation of white supremacy are the same as they have always been: the fear of the black brute coming for white women, “black-on-black crime,” the fear of white erasure and the devaluation of the white male through miscegenation, the fear of the loss of status, power, and resources to “inferior” blacks.

Our country’s entire social, political, and economic system is built off of the promise that poor and working class whites would always get more than everyone else — that they deserved more than everyone else. When the profits of white supremacy prove to be meager, because capitalism will always send the spoils to the top few, the anger of being cheated out of their just rewards is easily funneled into racist hate.

This hatred we are seeing marching through the UVA campus was not born in Germany. It is a homegrown problem.
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Today, that racist hate has plenty of targets: black people, Muslim people (yes, this is racist in its roots), Jewish people (who become not-white when it suits the needs of white supremacists), Latinx people, Asian-Americans, and Native Americans. To just label them Nazis not only erases the impact that these white supremacists have on non-Jews, it also points us to the wrong cause and, likely, the wrong solutions. It allows the majority of Americans to separate themselves from the problem and say, “these people are not us.” But they are “us,” because they are a product of the system that every person in this country with white privilege helps maintain. I know that sounds harsh; it sounds like I’m painting the majority of Americans with a broad brush, but the system of white supremacy does not care about your intentions, it does not care if you do or do not hold hatred for people of color in your heart—it only cares that you participate in the system.

So, now that we’ve established that white supremacy is not as simple as a group of marching, angry white people—that white supremacy is literally the air that we breathe—it seems daunting, hopeless, even, doesn’t it? But in fact, the opposite is true. You can spend the rest of your life fighting to win over the hearts of white supremacists one at a time, and if you won over one a week even, you would, at the end of your life, have not made a measurable dent in white supremacy. But systems, systems we can change. Remember, it was the threat to the system of white supremacy symbolized in the election of Barack Obama that so terrified white Americans. It was the thought that the levers needed to reduce the structural power of white supremacy were within the reach of non-white hands.

Because we all interact with the system of white supremacy, because we all uphold it to some degree — we all have some power to tear it down. And while discussions of white privilege can make many white people want to plug their ears in order to keep the shame of their participation in the oppression of others at bay, acknowledgement of that privilege is also the key to finding the places where you can make the most impact in fighting white supremacy.

The truth is: You’ve been trusted with the keys to the car, people of color haven’t — so, maybe you should take the wheel and make a hard left.

There are countless opportunities every day to disrupt white supremacy — especially if you are white. If you need inspiration, here are a few ideas:

Schools.

The racist mythology needed to morally justify white supremacy is disseminated first and foremost through schools. Do you know what is in your children’s textbooks? How is slavery being taught? How is the Civil War discussed? What conversations are had in class around Thanksgiving or Columbus Day? At what age are your children learning about the Japanese internment camps — if at all? What black history is being taught outside of black history month? Are any of the explorers, scientists, politicians, or artists lauded in class Latinx, Asian American, or Native American? Is the hatred and violence perpetrated against Muslim Americans and people of South Asian descent since 9/11 discussed?

Outside of texts, what is the racial makeup of your school board and school staff? How many children of color are suspended and expelled from your local schools? How does your school address racist, Islamophobic, and anti-Semitic bullying? Is your district outsourcing its discipline to anti-black police forces?

The system of white supremacy does not care about your intentions, it does not care if you do or do not hold hatred for people of color in your heart—it only cares that you participate in the system.
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Work.

What diversity recruitment efforts does your company have? How does HR handle reports of racial discrimination? Are your work social events diverse and inclusive? Who is getting promoted? Who gets to speak in meetings? What racial equity goals are written into your union charter? Ask these questions, and get your coworkers to ask as well. If you are white, do not leave the burden on the few people of color in the office to advocate for themselves in a system that has already shown it values their voices less than yours.

Money.

Are you supporting minority-owned businesses? Are you boycotting businesses that discriminate against people of color — not only through how they treat customers of color, but in the products they choose to carry, the politics they support, and the way they treat their employees of color? Are you donating to progressive political candidates of color? Are you supporting anti-racist activist groups, civil rights organizations, and immigrant advocacy groups? Are you voting for taxes and levies that empower and enrich communities of color? Are you seeing movies with diverse casts and shunning those that prefer to imagine an all-white world? Are you buying art from artists of color and rejecting the appropriation of that art by white artists?

When I Said All Trump Supporters Are White Supremacists, I Meant It
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Politics.

Are you voting in local elections, where your vote has the most power? Are you asking your mayor and city council about their police oversight and reform goals? Are you demanding that racial equity be a real and actionable goal of any candidate who gets your vote? Are you asking for city and state funds to go to projects to support communities of color? Are you voting for candidates of color? Are you paying attention to which judges and prosecutors will be granted the authority to decide the fate of the millions of black and brown adolescents and adults trapped in our racist criminal justice system?

Family.

If you are white, and your children are white, are you explaining white privilege to them? Are you introducing your children to cultures other than their own? Are the only people you have over for dinner white? Are all their dolls and action figures white? Are the characters in their story books and favorite movies all white? Are you children being taught to stand up for their friends of color and always speak out against racist bullying? Are you trusting in your children’s ability to handle some truth about racism in America — a truth that children of color never get the chance to avoid? Are you having tough conversation with your parents, your grandparents, your aunts and uncles? Are you letting family members know that their racist speech is a personal affront to you? Are you making anti-racism, anti-Islamophobia, and the fight against anti-Semitism a family value?

Are you trusting in your children’s ability to handle some truth about racism in America — a truth that children of color never get the chance to avoid?
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Socially.

White people, are you listening, without ego and defensiveness to people of color? How many of your good friends are not white? Do your friends of color feel comfortable telling you when you are being racist? When with other white people, what jokes are you letting slide in order to not make waves? What racist comment are you cringing at but choosing to ignore? In what ways are you helping to make white supremacists feel comfortable in their bigotry, in order to not make yourself uncomfortable as well? What friendships are you risking in order to help make your racist friends better people and to help make your friends of color more safe? How are you fighting the normalization of racism and bigotry in everyday life?

As you can see from this small example, there are a lot of ways in which you can fight white supremacy every single day. And now that you know that you can, you absolutely must. There is no excuse and no negotiation to be had. The fight against white supremacy is both arduous and urgent, thankless and endlessly rewarding, because people are being crushed by this white supremacist system every single day and every step we take will always be not enough—but still absolutely vital.

Those of us targeted by white supremacy do not get a moment’s rest — and if you are not targeted by white supremacy, that should keep you up nights as well. Do not give up, do not rest, until the system of white supremacy is reduced to rubble. You may not see it in your lifetime, but your efforts will help ensure that many more of us will live long enough to do our part.