RACIAL JUSTICE DISTINCTIONS AND DEFINITIONS
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In our work toward the beloved community, a search for a common language and clarity around the meaning of the words and terms used by those with diverging opinions is crucial. Some terms may evoke discomfort due to their past and current cultural usage across various generations, the interpreter's experience, and various ways of understanding.
DISTINCTIONS
Antiracism ≠ Racial Justice
While antiracism is an appropriate and needed response to racial inequality, it is not enough to be against something. Racial justice is a proactive assertion of what we are for –justice/equity/fairness for all.----Race Forward.
While antiracism is an appropriate and needed response to racial inequality, it is not enough to be against something. Racial justice is a proactive assertion of what we are for –justice/equity/fairness for all.----Race Forward.
Racial Justice ≠ Equality
Things can be equal but still not fair. The goal of racial justice in NOT to make everything and everyone the same but rather to make things fair. "Equality" can be an effective concept (e.g.,"equal opportunity") to use, but equitable outcomes are the goal. ----Race Forward
Things can be equal but still not fair. The goal of racial justice in NOT to make everything and everyone the same but rather to make things fair. "Equality" can be an effective concept (e.g.,"equal opportunity") to use, but equitable outcomes are the goal. ----Race Forward
Racial Justice ≠ Diversity
There can be diversity (variety) without equity (fairness). Integration of and variety of different races can be beneficial, but it is not sufficient to produce fairness (equity). Diversity can be a tool for advancing equity, but equity is the goal. ----Race Forward.
There can be diversity (variety) without equity (fairness). Integration of and variety of different races can be beneficial, but it is not sufficient to produce fairness (equity). Diversity can be a tool for advancing equity, but equity is the goal. ----Race Forward.
Racial Equity ≠ Multiculturalism
Multiculturalism is the belief that different cultures within a society should all be given importance; racism is a system of social hierarchy based on the belief that white people have more value than non-whites. If we ignore the power dynamics embedded in the social construction of race and attend only to its cultural manifestations , racism will persist, even if things appear to be multicultural on the surface. [Note: These terms engendered a lot of controversy, with the range of views from the idea that multiculturalism is a worthy goal to the idea that multiculturalism is most often used in a tokenizing way.} ----Race Forward
Multiculturalism is the belief that different cultures within a society should all be given importance; racism is a system of social hierarchy based on the belief that white people have more value than non-whites. If we ignore the power dynamics embedded in the social construction of race and attend only to its cultural manifestations , racism will persist, even if things appear to be multicultural on the surface. [Note: These terms engendered a lot of controversy, with the range of views from the idea that multiculturalism is a worthy goal to the idea that multiculturalism is most often used in a tokenizing way.} ----Race Forward
Intentions ≠ Impact
In pursuing racial justice, focus on equity and fairness in opportunities, outcomes, and impacts. Assess policies and actions based on whether they help or hurt communities of color, regardless of intentions. ----Race Forward
In pursuing racial justice, focus on equity and fairness in opportunities, outcomes, and impacts. Assess policies and actions based on whether they help or hurt communities of color, regardless of intentions. ----Race Forward
Admitting Oppression Exists ≠ Recognizing One's Own Culpability/Complicity
The ability to recognize and acknowledge instances of a system of oppression is not sufficient for the work of transformation. Recognizing your role and complicity in maintaining and continuing the oppressive system is the next step to interrupting and dismantling to build a new way.
The ability to recognize and acknowledge instances of a system of oppression is not sufficient for the work of transformation. Recognizing your role and complicity in maintaining and continuing the oppressive system is the next step to interrupting and dismantling to build a new way.
Radical Hospitality ≠ Welcoming
Hospitality is a commitment to center the relationship and provide solidarity, a sense of family and belonging, and actions that support these. Welcome is a beginning and a temporary state.
Hospitality is a commitment to center the relationship and provide solidarity, a sense of family and belonging, and actions that support these. Welcome is a beginning and a temporary state.
Personal Bias ≠ Systemic Oppression
Systemic oppression differs from personal bias in terms of the power dynamics involved. Systemic oppression exists independent of the personal bias of the actors and/or beneficiaries. Personal bias may or may not result in acts of aggression and oppression, but systemic oppression always does.
Systemic oppression differs from personal bias in terms of the power dynamics involved. Systemic oppression exists independent of the personal bias of the actors and/or beneficiaries. Personal bias may or may not result in acts of aggression and oppression, but systemic oppression always does.
DEFINITIONS
Ally from OpenSource Leadership Strategies- Someone who makes the commitment and effort to recognize their privilege and work in solidarity with oppressed groups in the struggle for justice. Allies understand that it is in their own interest to end all forms of oppression, even those from which they may benefit in concrete ways. Allies are not self-declared; they are in relationship with and accountable to oppressed people.
Ally Cookies
BIPOC
BIWOC
Colonization from Colonization and Racism (film by Emma LaRocque)- A process involving the invasion, dispossession, and subjugation of a people. The invasion need not be military; it can begin—or continue—as a geographical intrusion in the form of agricultural, urban, or industrial encroachments. The result is the dispossession of vast amounts of land from the original inhabitants.
This is often legalized after the fact.
This is often legalized after the fact.
Inclusion from OpenSource Leadership Strategies - Authentically bringing traditionally excluded individuals and/or groups into processes, activities, and decision/policy making in a way that shares power.
Institutional Racism from Maggie Potapchuk, et al., “Flipping the Script”--The ways in which institutional policies and practices create different outcomes for different racial groups. The institutional policies never mention any racial group, but their effect is to create advantages for whites, and oppression and disadvantage for people of color.
Internalized Racism from Donna Bivens, “Internalized Racism”--Internalized racism is the situation that occurs in a racist system when a racial group oppressed by racism supports the supremacy and dominance of the dominating group by maintaining or participating in the set of attitudes, behaviors, social structures, and ideologies that undergird the dominating group’s power.
Microaggression from D. W. Sue et al., “Racial Microaggressions in Everyday Life”--Racial microaggressions are brief and commonplace daily verbal, behavioral, or environmental indignities, whether intentional or unintentional, that communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative racial slights and insults toward people of color. Those who inflict racial microaggressions are often unaware that they have done anything to harm another person. [Note: Many participants in the Collaboratory said that what we call “micro-aggressions” are in fact just aggressions because of the damage done.]
Oppression: From Merriam- Webster's Dictionary- a) To crush or burden by abuse of power or authority; b) to burden spiritually or mentally: weigh heavily upon.
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Racial Equity/Justice from Race Forward - The systemic fair treatment of people of all races that results in equitable opportunities and outcomes for everyone.
Racism from Racial Equity Tools--Individual, cultural, institutional, and systemic ways by which differential consequences are created for different racial groups. The group historically or currently defined as white is being advantaged, and groups historically or currently defined as non-white (African, Asian, Hispanic, Native American, etc.) are being disadvantaged.
Repression: From Merriam- Webster's Dictionary- a) to check by or as if by pressure (CURB); b) to put down by force (SUBDUE), c) to prevent the natural or normal expression, activity, or development of; d) to exclude from consciousness
Structural Racism from Aspen Institute Roundtable on Community Change--“A system in which public policies, institutional practices, cultural representations and other norms work in various, often reinforcing ways to perpetuate racial group inequity. The structural racism lens allows us to see that, as a society, we more or less take for granted a context of white leadership, dominance, and privilege. It has come about as a result of the way that historically accumulated white privilege, national values, and contemporary culture have interacted so as to preserve the gaps between white [people in the United States and people in the United States] of color.”
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Whiteness/White Identity from Widening the Circle of Concern--A set of physical characteristics and experiences generally associated with being a member of the white race. Due to worldwide anti-Blackness, primarily as a result of the imposition of white supremacist ideology through conquest, settler colonialism, and neo-colonialism, whiteness is seen by many cultures touched by this process as having inherent privileges over those who are considered “darker skinned.”
White Privilege from Peggy McIntosh, “White Privilege”--I have come to see white privilege as an invisible package of unearned assets that I can count on cashing in each day, but about which I was “meant” to remain oblivious. White privilege is like an invisible weightless knapsack of special provisions, maps, passports, codebooks, visas, clothes, tools, and blank checks.
White Supremacy from the Merriam-Webster Dictionary--The belief that the white race is better than all other races and should have control over all other races.
White Fragility from Robin DiAngelo, “White Fragility”--A state in which even a minimum amount of racial stress becomes intolerable, triggering a range of defensive moves. These moves include the outward display of emotions such as anger, fear, and guilt, and behaviors such as argumentation, silence, and leaving the stress-inducing situation. These behaviors, in turn, function to reinstate white racial equilibrium.