How can one person work towards dismantling systemic racism?

Before healing and change can begin, we need to understand WHY racism exists and HOW people become racist.

Racism and discrimination are derived by negative emotions attached to a specific incident or experience. These negative emotions cause fear. Fear can lead us to irrational thinking.

What do we mean by irrational thinking? It is irrational to blame the actions of one person on someone else just because they may have the same color skin or they have the same job.  

Human behavior is driven by fear. There are many forms of fear. 

• fear of something different than me
• fear of financial insecurity
• fear of change
• fear of the unknown
• fear of not being good enough
• fear of not being in control of a situation
• fear that we or someone we love will get hurt or die
• fear that someone else will get the job that we want
• fear that someone is not doing their fair share

Human behaviors are driven by human emotions.

What can happen when we feel sadness, jealously, anxiety, devaluation, fear, indifference, anger, disgust, boredom?

Our ability to make choices, decisions, and to regulate our behavior stems from how we feel. Each of us has thoughts, beliefs, fears and feelings that have developed over our lifetimes. These thoughts and beliefs become part of “who we are” and drive our actions.

Many people believe the method for addressing racism is:

• “explaining” why we are all equal
• pointing to the constitution about justice for ALL
• posting quotes by MLK  

Those methods are important but they are NOT going to change a belief system, thoughts or actions.

How do we dismantle systemic racism?

Generation Text Online believes changing the way people act and react must begin with a conversation about their experiences, feelings and beliefs. Our work over the past decade in organizational behavior, culture and SEL includes these practices:

1.     We must form small groups with people of different races, cultures and backgrounds with the purpose of learning about others and their experiences.

2.     We must be open to listening to some else’s story without feeling defensive.

3.     We must acknowledge each person’s story, experiences and feelings.

4.     We must meet consistently (weekly) in order to build trust within our group and continue to share our experiences.

5.     Together, as a small group it will become evident what each of us can do within each other’s families and communities to change our beliefs.

6.     We must be committed to forming another group and facilitating the same process we have experienced in our own small group. Our role as a small group leader is to facilitate conversations to allow an opportunity for others to listen and learn what others experience and feel. This will allow for change in beliefs.

What can I do as an individual in the next 24 hours to work toward ending systemic racism in my school and community?

1.     Tell your story on video. Keep the narrative to what happened to you and how YOU felt. Post your video.

2.     Call Generation Text Online to learn how to set up the small group framework in your community or classroom!