For most Whites, racial guilt is unavoidable. How we deal with it makes all the difference.
Nobody likes White guilt. For us Whites the reasons are obvious. Guilt feels bad. We don’t want to go through life with the weight of racial guilt on our hearts, minds, and spirits.
For People of Color, the perils of White guilt are even greater. Well-intentioned Whites who are driven by their unconscious sense of guilt often attempt to “help” Non-Whites in ways that reinforce unconscious racial stereotypes and, while meant to help create equity, create and perpetuate inequality.
Most of us Whites, if we are to develop our racial awareness, will have to have some kind of experience with feelings of guilt. The processes that many of us need to go through, and the realizations that we need to have about how the system treats the races differently, are bound to push our guilt buttons and few things are more important to the development of racial identity awareness in us Whites than how we deal with it. This is because guilt not denied, not avoided, not wallowed in, but, dealt with appropriately, can grow to become a sense of personal responsibility.
To avoid feelings of guilt, some people throw out both guilt and responsibility. I used to say, “My family wasn’t even in America when slavery existed. I didn’t benefit from it at all.” Volumes have been written on the impact of slavery on the US economy and how all of that created wealth went on to fuel the post-slavery economy, which eventually did benefit my family which, by virtue of our European descent and physical characteristics, was able to “become White.” More immediately, the belief that I have to connect my privilege to slavery denies the relationship between those today who are disadvantaged by the system and those who have advantages in the system.
To avoid feelings of guilt, some people become hyper-vigilant or “politically correct.” They take an intellectual approach to race, and focus on surfaces and symbols, as if, once everyone says "the right thing," there would be no problems. The problem with “political correctness” is that it does not go far enough to address inequity. Many people in the social service field struggle with this. They “just want to help.” They think that by focusing on the people who are defined as “underprivileged” they are doing good work. Social programs are notorious for often exacerbating the problems of populations that are the targets of racism through their paternalistic approach to the problem of race. In the end, unconscious guilt contributes to the continued disempowerment of target populations and the entrenched power of those who already have it.
Rather than avoid guilt, some people wear it like a suit of armor. They reject any legitimacy of White society or culture, often taking on only Non-White modes of thought, action, and cultural symbols such as dress, food etc… They cannot separate the very real dominance of Whiteness from any other aspect of it, which is discussed at greater length in Stuck in the Middle without You elsewhere on this blog. This approach leaves Whites who might otherwise learn to practice social justice no legitimacy for their own cultural experience. I’m sure there are numerous other ways not mentioned here that people act to avoid guilt.
But where does this leave us? How do we deal with our racial guilt without somehow infusing our actions with it? The first thing we have to do is get honest about our thoughts and feelings about race in a nonjudgmental way. No one was born hoping to be a racist. Our society has trained us to act and think in certain racial ways and we are only doing what we were taught to do. There are no such things as bad thoughts or feelings, only harmful or helpful actions. Give yourself room to see the racial stereotyping you may do without judging it. Accept it if, for now, you feel frustrated with how much people talk about race. There are powerful forces at work on us Whites every day trying to convince us that there is no race problem. A look at the numbers: who lives in poverty, unemployment, life expectancy, and a host of other indicators, show that certain racial groups are having a tougher time of it than others in the US. You can either “blame the victims” or decide that society needs to move and change to create fairness.
As a developing White person, I struggle with finding people I trust to talk with about my Whiteness and my needs to develop my own racial awareness. We Whites are so averse to being seen as racist that we often automatically judge our fellows who may be struggling with their racial identities. Even when gathered to discuss racism, we police each other’s statements, if only to distance ourselves from any utterance a fellow White may make that strikes us as not reflecting the precisely correct viewpoint, as if we’re all supposed to create ourselves into perfect Non-racists with no mistakes along the way.
If you can’t find others to talk to about race, write me at this blog. I’m always up for a chat about Whiteness.
