My Experience Learning About Systemic Racism

The first time systemic racism really, REALLY hit home for me was when my friend Tiffany got on Facebook live after Philando Castile was murdered four years ago and wept and talked about how she felt.

For the first time it wasn’t some abstract movement or cause, it was my friend hurting, and being willing to be vulnerable in front of her network via webcam on social media--a friend who I had laughed with, performed in a show with, and had great deep talks with, someone who I really admired and respected.

That was the day that the effects of racism were no longer in history books and musicals, they were in the faces of people I knew and loved. I saw the pain. I saw the fear. I saw how this was not abstract or “far away” to her, at all.

Later, Tiffany and I sat down at a coffeeshop and I told her how her posts on social media moved me, how they made me see things differently, how they spurred me to ask questions and listen.

She told me about her experience walking through the world, how she has spent a lifetime overcompensating to make white strangers feel comfortable. She smiles big. She’s chatty. She makes eye contact. If she’s walking behind someone she makes sure they know she’s there.

Just then a white girl at the next table over said to me, “Hey, I need to run to the bathroom, could you watch my stuff?”

Tiffany looked at me and said, “that never happens to me.”

“Strangers don’t ask you to watch their stuff?”

“No.”

Racism is overt and covert. It’s the assumptions you don’t even notice you’re making. I’m NO expert, but I know this: having conversations with black people, listening to their experiences, and not coming prepped with “another perspective” is a step in the right direction.

So white people, listen to the voices of minorities. Listen to what actual human beings have to say. And if you don't know someone who you can have these conversations with, lol, make a new friend that looks different than you.

And POC, thank you for sharing and please continue to do so. You never know who you are going to wake up with one post, one live video, or one conversation.