David
Campt cried.
In
the final moments of his all day White allies workshop at The Unity Center in
San Diego, David’s throat caught. Unable to speak, he turned to look up at the
slide on the screen – an old black and white image of James Reeb. It was all
just too much – the grief, the loss, the hope, the courage, and the promise. Reeb
was a White Unitarian minister so committed to the Civil Rights movement that
he drove down to Selma, Alabama in 1965 to help register African Americans to
vote. He was beaten to death by segregationists. White ally work is hard.
Sometimes it’s very hard. But if Reverend Reeb can give his life, we can learn
to navigate an awkward conversation.
As
students of New Thought we are keenly aware that we do not see the world as it
is, we see the world as we are, and that any real or meaningful spiritual
transformation begins with a courageous act of introspection and house
cleaning. Most of us have spent decades plumbing the depths of our own minds,
rooting out error, and recalibrating the very mental processes by which we
construct our realities. And yet the work is unfinished.
Focusing on the Racism
Skeptic
There’s
a shift happening in the American zeitgeist, and it has been a long time coming.
Throughout our cultural discourse brave people are daring to peel back the
layers of shame and denial that hide from us the last frontier of our
awakening. It’s time. It’s time to finally put the issue of racism and implicit
bias front and center in our New Thought work.
The
good news is that there is a growing body of resources to help us accomplish
this sacred work. At the forefront of this movement is Dr. David Campt.
I
met David for lunch at a waterfront restaurant in San Diego. On the road half
of every month, David travels the country offering lectures and workshops
centered around his White Allies Toolkit, a training program designed to help
progressive White people learn how to have transformative conversations with
their White racism skeptic friends, colleagues, and relatives.
So
what’s a racism skeptic?
55%
of White Americans can be described as racism skeptics. They believe that
racism is no longer a significant problem. They believe that White people are
just as likely to suffer from discrimination as people of color. They’re tired
of talking about race. They say things like, “I don’t see color.” They think
the only racists left are those guys carrying Tiki torches at Klan rallies. But
White racism skeptics are everywhere – they’re teachers, principals, police
officers, mayors, ministers, and parents – and the narrative they share holds
center stage in our political and media environment.
So
how do we begin? That’s the question that haunted Rev. Wendy Craig-Purcell of
The Unity Center in San Diego. After deep, open, and heartfelt conversations
with the African American and White members of her congregation, Wendy began to
carve a path out of the wilderness. Built around Dr. Campt’s White Ally
Toolkit, Wendy created a curriculum that began the great unlearning. In our
White allies groups we read Debby Irving’s Waking
Up White, we watched Ava DuVernay’s documentary 13th, we shared numerous other articles, videos, and
resources. And we sat in a circle and began to open up about what it means to
be White.
It
was a dizzying ride, filling in all the gaps of our incomplete education – the truth
about slavery, black codes, Jim Crow, work gangs, lynchings, sundown towns, voter
suppression, inequities in the GI Bill, redlining, the criminalization of
color, disparities in crack and powdered cocaine sentencing, mass incarceration,
and the insidious presence of implicit bias in all of us – and all of it missing
from the official history we teach our children and tell ourselves. It isn’t
easy learning that so many of our American institutions were intentionally
engineered by White supremacists generations ago to shore up their own power
and deny it to others. And that as White people, we have unwittingly benefitted
from this unearned privilege our whole lives. But this is where the work begins
– with honest truth-telling. But now what? How can we entice racism skeptics
into this broadening understanding?
The R.A.C.E. Method
 |
| Dr. David Campt |
David
calls his work the R.A.C.E. method.
As
we initiate conversations with our racism skeptic friends, relatives, and
co-workers, the first step is to reflect. What do I need to do to
remain in an open and empathetic listening mode? How can I avoid falling into
the old habits of argument, judgement, and condemnation?
The
second step is to ask. What are some key questions I can ask to draw them out?
How can I gently guide them to talk not about their beliefs and opinions, but
about the personal experiences that led to those opinions? If they tell you
that “Racism isn’t a serious problem anymore. We even had a black President”
ask them, “Oh that’s interesting – tell me about an experience in your own life
that makes you to think that?” They might tell you a story about how integrated
and diverse their workplace is.
The
third step is to connect. Here we tell a story that aligns with and supports the
story they just shared. Tell them that you notice it too, that there’s a lot
more diversity in the workplace than there used to be. There has been a lot of
progress. That’s a point upon which you can both agree.
Finally
it’s time for the fourth step, to expand. Now that you’ve connected
and found common ground, gently nudge them just a little bit further. Help them
see, preferably with a personal story instead of a sermon, that racial
discrimination against people of color is still very real. You might offer an anecdote
where your own implicit bias reared its ugly head. With any luck your
confession will nudge them toward the recognition and acknowledgement of their
own implicit bias. I know it seems small, but it’s actually huge. When a racism
skeptic comes to see implicit bias within themselves, their whole edifice
begins to crumble.
As
Lao Tzu wrote in the Tao Te Ching,
“The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.”
We’ve
argued, we’ve preached, we’ve scolded, we’ve marched – and yet the problem of
racism persists. In fact it seems to be getting worse. Maybe it’s time for a
new approach. Maybe it’s time for empathy-based dialogue with our ideological
opponents. No one’s saying this is going to be easy. But the stakes are high.
If we are serious about awakening ourselves, and contributing to an awakening
world, it is essential that we break our silence about the wounds that still scar
the American heart.
Becoming a White Ally
As
we finished our lunch I asked David, “So what happened at the end of the
workshop the other day? When you showed us that picture of James Reeb and the
other White martyrs of the Civil Rights movement, and you choked up. After all
these years, and after all this work, what about that moment stopped you in
your tracks?”
He
looked up from his plate and spoke very slowly. “I think I’m moved most by the
tragedy of all the lost opportunities for love and connection.”
So
many of us have seen our families, friends, neighborhoods, and faith
communities ripped apart along partisan and ideological lines. So many of us
have given up.
“It’s
really hard to empathize and connect with someone who says a bunch of racist
stuff, or who believes that racism isn’t even a problem,” I said. “Every fiber
of my being just wants to walk away.”
“You think having a conversation is hard?” David
asked. “I’ll tell you what’s hard. Sitting down at a White’s only lunch counter
and being arrested, that’s hard. Getting
your bones broken by state troopers, that’s
hard. Getting killed by Klansmen, that’s
hard. If James Reeb can die, you can have a conversation with your cousin
Brad.”
Being
a White ally means becoming willing to wield our privilege as a force for good.
It means coming out of our denial and apathy and taking action. White people
have the power, and the moral obligation, to undo the structural racism built
into our consciousness and our institutions. My black friend Robyn put it best.
Pointing to herself she said, “We can’t do this. You have to do it.” She was right. White people have to do it. It’s
the only way to finally unravel the stranglehold racism still has on the
unrealized promise of America.
[This feature was originally published in the February 2020 issue of Science of Mind Magazine and is reproduced here with permission.]
