I Don’t ‘Argue’ with White People About Racism
Tags: Social Media, Racism, Debate

Over the past year or so, particularly since May 25, 2020, people have asked me why I say I don’t argue about racism with white people anymore. I used to. I used to invite it and painstakingly justify, detail and argue my responses. I felt a responsibility to my people to participate in that labor, even when it was exhausting and fruitless. I felt a need to educate and to try in every case. But I don’t anymore. Here’s why.

I discovered that it was largely a waste of my time. I found there were two kinds of white people who engage with discussions on racism. Those who ask and those who argue. With experience, it’s easy to tell between them. They have certain tells you can pick out early on. I have more experience than I care to admit.

I’ve learned that discussing racism with white people who have one or more questions to ask can be fun and enlightening and very much worth the time and effort I’m under no obligation to give. I usually leave uplifted, having seen the light of understanding pop on behind someone’s eyes. It gives me hope and leaves me fulfilled in a way. White people who want to argue are better left ignored and they often see themselves out, as black people not willing to engage on their time and on their terms are likely too stubborn, bitter, unreasonable or are just not useful enough to stay around. There are more agreeable blacks, after all. I leave these conversations often feeling worn out, dejected or in the worst cases even unsure of my understanding of my own experiences.

White people with questions seem to have a certain level of understanding and respect already when it comes to engaging with black people about race. They understand that racism of the generational, institutional, systemic variety is something they do not face. It’s something they’ve only experienced through observation. They understand that it’s something that was deliberately built for their benefit to my detriment. They understand that it was built to be invisible to them and unavoidable to us. They ask questions about issues they witness, just like I’ve witnessed, but may not have processed the way that I have.

Racism frightens them because they know they can’t always trust their eyes. They know we’re looking through different windows. They’ve taken time to train themselves to listen to those alarms, to try and know when the circle they’re seeing is actually a square. It scares them. But, they’re curious about it. They need to know more. They have doubts. It can get irritating and they can overwhelm me, but I know what their intentions are and that they invite discomfort. When it comes to this subject, they want more than anything to peer through our window and see how their world looks through our eyes. They want the truth.

And then there are the white people who argue. They look the same at first. They ask questions and seem to have a grasp on what racism is. But you quickly find that they don’t. They don’t really understand how deep it is, how invasive. They don’t understand that every statistic they’ve seen, every article they’ve perused, every class they’ve attended, every television show they’ve watched and half the thoughts they’ve ever had have all been touched by a thread of that system. That somewhere their origins are choked by that big R. It seems too shocking, too frightening and too unrealistic to think that it could possibly be that powerful.

So these people argue, probably without even thinking about it or realizing they’re doing it. They try to find a way to make themselves feel as though it isn’t quite that bad. It couldn’t be that bad. They look for data that says it wasn’t that bad for black people while forgetting the people who run the agency, hire the people, write the questions, interpret the data and produce the conclusions are the product of generational, institutional, systemic racism in one way or another. Nothing was left untouched. Are these people who don’t believe their eyes because they know they can’t always be trusted? Or do they believe it can’t really be that bad? The results will always be colored by their outlook, and how deeply that invisible, unavoidable racism has taken root.

These are people who ask black people to prove racism, as though it isn’t obvious. They bring other black people and demand you explain why they don’t think it’s that bad. If they’re smiling, why don’t you smile, too? They don’t wonder if generational, institutional, systemic racism can color and confuse and lie to black eyes like it does to white ones. They don’t consider what four-hundred years or more of conditioning can do to generations of human minds. They always demand answers to hard questions before taking time to learn the answers to the easy ones.

And in those demands they don’t respect our time, our bodies or our emotions. They don’t acknowledge that racism is difficult for us to process and explain when we’re looking at the world through different windows. They don’t consider that not all of us have a sophisticated understanding of our oppression. They never try to listen and look through our window but instead demand that we look and explain what they’re seeing in theirs. And they have no empathy for frustration or anger or exhaustion. Worse, they often see those valid emotions as personal attacks, weak arguments or a dull mind.

The absolute worst thing is that they see the topic of racism as something that can be debated. That there’s an argument where one side can win while the other loses. They don’t or won’t see that the debate is over. It was over in 1619 when the first ships filled with the enslaved landed on North American shores. They already won. They’re arguing after their victory has been solidified by centuries of cultural, economic and military domination. Systems of white supremacy cannot and will not be denied. There is no proof that is needed to see racism is alive and powerful that can’t be immediately and overwhelmingly found at will.

So, I don’t argue. There’s no debate. There’s no question. There’s no point. But I do discuss. I answer questions about what I see when George Floyd’s murderer gets 22 years in prison, so a white person can see how it differs from their perspective. I’ll even explain why I feel that way. I don’t have to, but I will if I can. And that’s because I want white people who get it but know they really don’t get it to be the best allies they can be. Then, maybe, hopefully, they can argue with the people looking out their window, and tell them what’s really on the other side.