Going Beyond the 'N-Word': Racism and Anti-Blackness within Professional and Personal Lives

About 6 years ago, I tried to reconnect with a friend I had gone to Dartmouth College with in the 1990s. We'll just call him "Thomas". I saw that "Thomas" was on Facebook. I sent him a message to see how he was doing. Somehow, we started talking about things we remembered from college. I told him how I remembered sharing with him that I had been called the 'n-word' my first day of 7th grade. We had been sitting on stairs outside somewhere and he had been shocked that, "People still do that!?" It was 1995. He was white, straight, and from an upper-middle class background. He had grown up in Southern California and had shared with me how he had graduated Valedictorian of his high school class. We were buddies throughout college.

However, our re-connection via Facebook ended up being rather confusing to me. After I had reminded him about all the different things we had talked about during college, in particular, how I talked to him about how deeply affected I was by being called the 'n-word' as a child (in an all white school system), we started talking about the U.S. presidential election. He eventually ended up writing something like (sorry, I don't remember it verbatim and didn't save it), "I would never vote for a nigger." Though he was referring to Obama, I couldn't tell if he was joking or not. I'm assuming he was, but I was really thrown off guard and couldn't comprehend why he thought that it was okay to say or even joke about using that word. I ended up stopping our communication immediately. I thought that this just didn't make any sense. How could he not know how triggering "nigger" is for me? And especially after I had shared that childhood trauma with him? Why did he think it was funny to say that to me?

In 1997 or 1998, "Thomas" had told me that his mother would never approve of him marrying a Black girl. "Yea, she'd be okay with me dating, but not marrying." I remember being really confused by how he seemed so nonchalant about her beliefs. Alternatively, my parents really didn't care at all about who I dated or married. How could he be so calm about his mother's racism? During the same year, our two mutual friends had started dating each other. They were a heterosexual couple, black ("Henry") and white ("Jessica"). They were supposed to go to "Jessica's" family member's wedding together. However, "Jessica's" mother had told her that she was not allowed to attend the wedding with him because he was black. I remember the couple had gotten into an argument about it and I also remember her nonchalantly telling me, "Well if I have to choose him over my family, I'm going to choose my family." It was with the ease in which she had said this that made me very uneasy. Don't get me wrong: I know how hard a child/parent relationship can be; especially if you don't want to disappoint them, if you love them, and yea, if they are your sole financial support. However, what was disturbing was the 'ease' of which she had shared her thoughts with me about the situation-- without ever even saying something like, "Breeze, you are black and my mom's beliefs about dating black people as unacceptable must be really hurtful for you to hear." But no, neither "Thomas" or "Jessica" ever wanted to talk more about the implications of what it means for their parents, who are part of the racial-class status quo of the USA, to have these beliefs about black people (or perhaps anyone who didn't fall into their social-class category). After all, if Black people aren't good enough to marry their children, then they simply aren't good enough, period. And the implications of this really troubled my 21 year old mind. I remember thinking:

If we're not good enough to marry, then I wonder how "Thomas's" or "Jessica's" mothers think about us in other contexts. If they had to be on a jury and determine if a Black person on trial were guilty or not, would they automatically think they aren't as deserving as being considered as innocent as white peers in their social network? If these women worked at a bank and a black person came in for a home loan, would they feel like they were less likely to deserve it than a white person with the same economic background? If they were on a college admissions committee and saw that the applicant had marked 'African-American' as their racial identity, would they not weigh his achievements the same way they'd weigh a white applicant's?

After all, one just can't think that their desire for their child not to marry 'another race' doesn't impact how they generally feel about 'that other race' (and I put this in quotations to acknowledge that there really are no races; race is a social construct), even outside of the context of considering who your child should marry.

It has been a couple of years since the Facebook interaction I had with "Thomas." I have yet to re-connect with him. However, over the last few years since I became more and more active on Facebook, I have been able to follow a lot of my Dartmouth peer's lives who have Facebook friended me. It has been interesting for me to see the fan pages, political groups, etc., that many of my white peers follow and support. I am taken aback when I see some of their strong support of political parties such as the Tea Party, or their firm stance against immigration, or liking particular public figures who are blatantly racist and white nationalists in their thinking. Had they always thought this way while we attended college together ? Why would they want to be 'friends' with me on Facebook if their heroes are people who hate those who are not white? (Or just hate another population in general!?)

About a year after I had graduated from Dartmouth College, I moved to Princeton, NJ to take on a telecommunications job. I had made a new friend named "Curt" who was working at a hat store I would frequent. After hanging out for a few weeks, he invited me to go on a weekend trip to NYC to explore the Stonewall area as well as other vibrant areas of LGBTQ life in NYC. We hitched a ride with his friends, a white gay male couple, "Luke and Dan". While we were driving to NYC, a driver cut off "Luke". In instant rage and anger he yelled at the driver, "Nigger!" (the driver of the other car had been white). Everyone in the car went silent as they realized that this was kind of awkward with Breeze in the car. After a small bit of silence, "Luke" responded with , "Sorry. Great, now she probably hates me now." I responded with something like, "I don't hate you, but you really should be careful with saying that word." I think what was weird about this comment was that it was not really an apology as much as he was worried about how I would hate him. Was he not disturbed by his comment and what it represented about his consciousness and how structural racism and white supremacy had made him comfortable to say what he had? To think the way he did? He only seemed concerned about, "I wonder if Breeze now hates me"? It was an external response, not a deeply internal and critical response. I remember thinking something like:

He used the the n-word around me "by mistake". But, he was only worried that I 'hated' him for saying it. He didn't seem interested in questioning how his actions were shaped by racist social structures. The moment became about him and his image, not what underlies the ease of saying the n-word around a Black "friend." 

For the rest of the weekend trip, he didn't talk about it or offer a more sincere and deeper apology/analysis of what it means to be a white male and how he may collude with upholding racism and white supremacist ideas about Black people and other non-white folk (i.e. using "nigger" to insult someone). And perhaps this had more to do with the fact that we live in a USA in which white people-- at least during the end of the 1990s-- just don't feel comfortable about talking about that white elephant in the big USA room because they are collectively socialized NOT to talk about it in this "post-racial" age.

When I first started the Sistah Vegan Project, I was met with a significant amount of resentment and anger from white vegans who truly thought that if focused on how racialization and socialization affected black female vegans' collective epistemologies, I was creating disharmony, distractions, and 'playing the race card.' As I shifted from just black female vegan epistemologies, to understanding how neoliberal whiteness undergirds mainstream vegan philosophy in the USA, I opened up Pandora's box. When posting updates on my Facebook status about the work I was doing and the questions I had, I ended up receiving posts and emails from white friends (none I think were vegan) who didn't understand why race was so important to me. I even had a child hood friend unfriend me and call me a racist when I had posted about racism and white supremacy as structural and systemic problems. She sent me a post that 'reminded' me that she had grown up very poor and that we were friends and that she had never judged me because of my skin color. She told me she was not a racist and how could I post these types of questions and concerns that implied that she was, 'just because of her white skin color.'

I was amazed that she interpreted my research as a direct attack against her as an individual. This is common, as I have spent years trying to explain structures and systems versus 'individual racists'. No, having 'white skin color' doesn't automatically make you a racist, but let's start thinking about how all of our consciousnesses have been shaped by white racist structures in the USA. How has being racialized influenced how all of us experience our world, regardless if you identify as an 'individual' or 'overt' racist or neither? This is what I tried to share with her, but she completely disagreed with me and promptly unfriended me. For those who I have grown up with or went to college with and have not [yet] unfriended me on Facebook, I get the 'reminders' several times a year that, "I am not racist and don't care about skin color." Funny reminder, no? You know, when I receive posts, articles, updates from friends who analyze their embodied experiences about being fat in a fat shaming culture, trans identified in a trans-hating culture, or living with disabilities in an ableist culture, I know they are not individually attacking me as a slim bodied, CIS gender identified, able bodied woman. I completely understand that they are trying to understand issues of sizeism, transphobia, and ableism at the structural and systemic levels. I also understand that regardless if I am or am not a fatphobe, transphobe, or ableist, my consciousness has been affected and I have automatically earned certain privileges because of my body shape, my cisgender woman identification, and my able-bodied status. And yea, I want to know what I don't know, because of the ignorances that my privileges have produced in my consciousness. I am thankful that I'm asked to engage with these issues because I may very well be complicit. I want to eradicate the injustice, suffering, and violence that epistemologies of ignorance and privilege produce.

I still hold in my heart the wonderful memories and times I have shared with these friends, in spite of these clear instances of racial ignorance and misunderstandings. (As a matter of fact, that weekend "Luke" yelled "nigger" was a weekend that also inspired me to write about my experiences and develop them into the 'fictional' character "Cesar" in my newest novel Scars). However, maybe I'm naive, but I also hold in my heart that one day, my friends from childhood and college, such as "Thomas" and "Jessica" , will make the effort to reconnect with me one day. I fantasize that they will share with me a type of awakening and acknowledgment they have had about the realities of systemic racism in the USA; how they were able to realize that ignoring racism in any manifestation won't make it go away... and that they really are trying to do something to remedy it.

In the mean time, for many of us who are still hurt and confused, and seek ways of healing from ongoing racisms and/or racial micro-aggressions, I continue to do my racial equity and inclusion training and consulting as well as webinars, web-based conferences, and writing.

I will be offering this one below on February 25, 2019 as a webinar-workshop. Click on the image below to learn more about this workshop. I highly suggest taking it whether you are an animal advocacy professional or not. Why? Because I'm using the platform of animal advocacy to address these issues; anti-Blackness is a general systemic problem not only relegated to the domain of animal advocacy in the USA. What you learn at this event can be applied to your individual as well as professional life.

About the Author.

Dr. A. Breeze Harper is a senior diversity and inclusion strategist for Critical Diversity Solutions, a seasoned speaker, and author of books and articles related to critical race feminism, intersectional anti-racism, and ethical consumption. As a writer, she is best know for as the creator and editor of the groundbreaking anthology Sistah Vegan: Black Female Vegans Speak on Food, Identity, Health and Society (Lantern Books 2010). Dr. Harper has been invited to deliver many keynote addresses and lectures at universities and conferences throughout North America. In 2015, her lecture circuit focused on the analysis of food and whiteness in her book Scars and on “Gs Up Hoes Down:” Black Masculinity, Veganism, and Ethical Consumption (The Remix)which explored how key Black vegan men use hip-hop methods to create “race-conscious” and decolonizing approaches to vegan philosophies. In 2016, she collaborated with Oakland’s FoodFirst’s Executive Director Dr. Eric Holt-Gimenez to write the backgrounder Dismantling Racism in the Food System, which kicked off FoodFirst’s series on systemic racism within the food system. 

Dr. Harper is the founder of the Sistah Vegan Project which has put on several ground-breaking conferences with emphasis on intersection of racialized consciousness, anti-racism, and ethical consumption (i.e., veganism, animal rights, Fair Trade). Last year she organized the highly successful conference The Vegan Praxis of Black Lives Matter which can be downloaded.

Dr. Harper’s most recently published book, Scars: A Black Lesbian Experience in Rural White New England (Sense Publishers 2014) interrogates how systems of oppression and power impact the life of the only Black teenager living in an all white and working class rural New England town. Her current 2016 lecture circuit focuses on excerpts from her latest book in progress, Recipes for Racial Tension Headaches: A Critical Race Feminist’s Journey Through ‘Post-Racial’ Ethical Foodscape which will be released in 2017, along with the second Sistah Vegan project anthology The Praxis of Justice in an Era of Black Lives Matter. In tandem with these book projects, she is well-known for her talks and workshops about “Uprooting White Fragility in the Ethical Foodscape” and “Intersectional Anti-Racism Activism.”

In the spring of 2016, Dr. Harper was nominated as the Vice Presidential nominee for the Humane Party— the only vegan political party in the USA with focus on human and non-human animals.