There’s this pattern that happens when a white or non-Black person is asked to take responsibility for racist behavior:
“This conversation is triggering. I will no longer engage.”
“I wasn’t trying to be racist. I’m neurodivergent.”
“I’m too sick to deal with this stress.”
At times, mental illness, neurodivergence, and/or disability is used as an excuse for racist behavior. Other times it is used as an excuse for why one can’t take responsibility for their actions. According to the logic of these common refrains, anti-racism is work that is supposedly reserved for abled people who have ample access to time, energy, and social support.
This line of thinking, is first of all, racist. It erases and devalues the ongoing anti-racist work that Black people and other people of color are forced to take on regardless of their ability, time, energy, and social support, which, due to structural racism, tends to be significantly less than that of white people. This line of thinking is also ableist in that it fails to recognize the agency that disabled people have over their actions. Ableism is a system of oppression that imagines neurodivergent and disabled people to be inferior and somehow less than human because their bodyminds do not work the same way as abled peoples’ do. The idea that a neurodivergent and/or disabled person is unable to unlearn internalized racism because of their disability is a denial of neurodivergent and disabled peoples’ humanity and complex personhood.
It is important to recognize that mental illness, neurodivergence, and/or disability can have a significant impact on how people communicate, process information, navigate their interpersonal relationships, and respond to conflict and calls for accountability. Some people may need direct communication and ongoing conversations to understand the feedback they are receiving. Some people may need to take additional time to process and calm their nervous system so that they can take responsibility for harmful actions and work towards repair.
As abolitionist organizer Mariame Kaba writes in her work on community accountability processes, “It is not process time when you’re in crisis intervention mode.” If a person is currently in a medical crisis, dealing with intense psychological distress or physical pain, they may not be able to accept responsibility for harm they caused or are actively causing, in that exact moment. This means that in our work to address racism in our interpersonal relationships, we need to be understanding of creating time, space, and access for mentally ill, neurodivergent, and disabled people to participate in ongoing processes of accountability and repair.
But, being attuned to people’s access needs and exercising flexibility and grace is not the same as absolving mentally ill, neurodivergent, and disabled people from taking responsibility for their role in perpetuating racism.
In my experience, mentally ill, traumatized, neurodivergent, sick, and disabled Black folks and people of color (who are also queer and trans) are some of the most politically active, dedicated, and thoughtful organizers and people that I know. People who are simultaneously struggling against racism, ableism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, and classism in their everyday lives are doing the hard work of cultivating care and humility so that we can build strong systems of community accountability and transform our interpersonal relationships.
Disability justice, a movement led by neurodivergent, sick, mad, mentally ill, and disabled Black and Indigenous people and people of color, emphasizes that fighting against systems of oppression requires centering our interdependence and the responsibility that we all hold for one another. In other words, there is no self-care without collective care. There is no disability justice without justice for all people impacted by racism.
You see, for people of color, racism is literally disabling. People of color are disproportionately impacted by structural and interpersonal forms of racism, which medical research recognizes as a social determinant of health. Because many people of color live and work in contaminated and polluted areas, are exposed to greater safety hazards, receive less frequent and lower quality medical care, and live with the ongoing effects of chronic stress and intergenerational trauma, there are higher rates of mental illness, chronic medical conditions, and disabilities in communities of color. And let us not forget that disabled people make up half of the people killed by the police and almost 40% of those who are incarcerated in the U.S.
When people of color, and let’s be real–this impacts Black folks in particular–say “I have a disability,” they are not afforded the same flexibility and grace as white neurodivergent and disabled people. Ableism intersects with white supremacy to regard white neurodivergent and disabled people as innocent and childlike, while Black neurodivergent and disabled people are regarded as criminal and dangerous.
If mentally ill, mad, neurodivergent, and sick and disabled queer and trans people of color who are the most impacted by intersecting forms of oppression can be open to feedback, unlearning oppressive behaviors, figuring out ways to work towards accountability, and leading others in social justice struggles, then white neurodivergent, sick, and disabled people can do this work, too–and they need to do this work, too–if we want to end cycles of organizers of color burning themselves out to the point of disablement and premature death.
Figuring out how to work towards racial justice as a neurodivergent, mentally ill, or disabled person may require some patience and creativity, but luckily, these are skills that many neurodivergent and disabled people have already cultivated in the struggle to simply exist in an ableist and inaccessible society. While some forms of activism–like marches, rallies, and phone banking–may not be widely accessible to disabled and neurodivergent people, taking accountability is something that everyone can practice.
In the Lace on Race community, nobody has to develop these skills on their own. By participating in this space, we are all committing to individually and collectively managing the “slosh bucket”–those accumulated triggers, pain points, and stressors that can splash onto others and dilute our capacity for reflexivity and growth if we’re not careful. We are all committing to “kind candor”–offering direct and nuanced feedback while never mocking, taunting, or punching down. And we are all committing to showing up–”visibly, reliably, and faithfully”–because that is the only way to truly build community and deepen our personal praxis.
While accountability is something we all must choose to take–following transformative justice activist Mia Mingus, I don’t believe in the concept of “holding someone accountable”–it is a responsibility that is both individual and collective. Here at Lace on Race, you can expect to be held, seen in your wholeness, and guided towards growth, so long as you are receptive. What is required is commitment, humility, and a recognition that there is no health and safety so long as racism exists.
Thank you to Steph Rojas for their feedback on this piece, in particular their point that disabled, neurodivergent, and mad people of color rarely get to use “disability” as a shield from accountability.
Join in the Bistro discussion below.
Lace on Race › Forums › Neurodivergence, Disability, and Taking Accountability for Racial Harm
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There have been quite a few occasions in the Lace on Race community where I have seen a white person comment and then another walker help them see how something they said was harmful and then the white person brings out their neurodivergence as an explanation for why they said what they said. But no explanation was asked for. This is part of a larger pattern of white people feeling the need to explain/excuse something we did and making this take priority over receiving feedback and working to root out our harmful behaviors. Do we need to explain/excuse why we were harmful? I think most of the time it is not appropriate to explain/excuse why we did something, especially if no one asked to hear why we did it. That in itself is harmful behavior because we are positioning ourselves as the focus again, the speaker, the person to be listened to and possibly cared for, instead of becoming the listener and the person doing repair/giving care. I know I have the explaining/excusing my behavior tool in my toolbox because I catch myself using it with my own children. If I use it with them, I will likely also use it with others. And of course as was written in the article, this tool is one that only white people get to wield.
I have also noticed a pattern of behavior in an organization I work with where very privileged white people call for a lessening of expectations by saying that a particular expectation would be excluding under privileged people from participating, and that sounds reasonable. It sounds like we should of course agree and lessen the expectation for that reason, but then when I look at who is actually benefiting by the lessening of that expectation, it is absolutely those same white people with a lot of privilege. This leads me to think about how important it is to not just hear what sounds like a reasonable socially-just argument, but also to look at how this argument actually plays out in practice. White people like me are constantly reframing things to benefit ourselves. So we might talk about ourselves as lacking privilege because we have to work so many jobs and so many hours and we have 3 kids and on and on, but it goes back to the can’t/won’t distinction. Are we working all these jobs because we don’t make a living wage at any of them? Or are we working all these jobs because we want to live in an expensive house in an expensive neighborhood and send our kids to expensive schools and also because we want to advance our own careers? Those are not the same thing. And yet if it benefits us, we are likely to advocate for lessening of expectations in order to support our own hoarding of resources rather than for the actual benefit of Black and brown people.
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Emily, work is particurlarly painful. I see it happen in my workplace where someone will say ‘let’s not promote that person of color. It will upset their life/work balance. They have too many problems at home right now.’ That would never be said of a white person. I celebrate that at least once so far this year, I had the courage, with kind candor to suggest that this was not an appropriate reason to not give a person a chance. Promote them. If it doesn’t work out, we’ll deal with it then. Update: they are doing fine:)
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Seeing and cherishing your orange here, Rhonda 🙂 Your walk inspires mine.
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Ugh external lessening of expectations equaling lessening potential…for people of color
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I am thinking about how this lessening of expectations leading to cutting off someone’s potential as it happens in education too since I’m a teacher. As soon as we start lowering our expectations of someone, we start closing doors for them.
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prioritizing my own explaining is a way of me sidestepping my own part. I like how you point that out here. Harmful is harmful no matter the package, and acknowledging my own harmful action, in this, my package, is my responsibility to own.
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That’s a great point about how white people frame ourselves as lacking privilege when really we’ve made choices to work multiple jobs with long hours, send kids to expensive schools, maybe go to expensive schools ourselves, etc… again it’s a rescinding of personal agency in how we handle choice points. I think we do this because if we acknowledge our personal agency, we have to face the truth that we’ve made conscious decisions to hoard resources but disguised them as being for the benefit of Black and brown people in order to feel better about ourselves.
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I think it’s both a lack of personal agency and dodging of responsibility but also a lack of recognition into how systems shape us. It becomes a sense of “well, that’s just how things are” instead of probing how these systems were build, how they continue to exist, and how our buy-in to them perpetuates them. If we don’t analyze our own place in these systems, how can we see how they hurt other people?
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I’m thinking about what a strong reflex I’ve observed in others and in myself to give explanations when called in. Whether the explanations are about “intentions” or about “reasons” such as disabilities, trauma, events, they are all centering which does further harm.
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Our excuses are revealing aren’t they? I’m really appreciating how this discussion is pulling apart the different choices we make/I make to work or stay busy and then use that as an excuse to not consider how my actions impact others or are misaligned with the North Star. The can’t/won’t distinction is so important. Thinking about these choices more deeply.
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“Do we need to explain/excuse why we were harmful? I think most of the time it is not appropriate to explain/excuse why we did something, especially if no one asked to hear why we did it.”
I have mixed thoughts about this — which probably means it’s a both-and. I’ve got more “why” than the average bear, but everyone has some “why” — it’s a critical human evolutionary component. How has it been adapted and distorted and corrupted by white supremacy? Because of course it will have been, and will be every day.
It’s not necessary for me to know why in order to stop or start doing something. I could act based on what I am told is or is not racist behavior. I could act entirely from the north star precept, to lessen and mitigate harm endured by Black and brown people and perpetuated by white people (including me) and white supremacy. I could presume the “why” to be “because the people involved are brown or Black” and be wholly accurate.
“If no one asked to hear why” — then “why” centers me and takes me away from those I’ve harmed. The “why” is additional harm when it becomes part of my outward antiracism.
It’s only appropriate in my inward antiracism, when I’m personalizing and rehabilitating myself. The “why” can illuminate for me broad areas of my white supremacy and enable me to identify a whole lot of racist behaviors at once, that all draw from a common “why” — and then recondition all those behaviors at once by dealing with the root.
But I think the phrase “explain/excuse” holds the heart. Because while explaining it during my inner work is useful, excusing it is NEVER okay. Excuse means it had/has to happen — and that’s not true about anything racist.
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>> Do we need to explain/excuse why we were harmful? I think most of the time it is not appropriate to explain/excuse why we did something, especially if no one asked to hear why we did it.
Yes, this is so true! As a habitual overexplainer, I find myself falling into these patterns in particular when I’ve been called out as a defense mechanism. It’s essential to recognize why and how it’s centering ourselves over the person being hurt. No part of a good apology (1) the sincere sorry, 2) offering a way to fix the problem, 3) genuinely saying how you will change in the future) involves a explanation.
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“Here at Lace on Race, you can expect to be held, seen in your wholeness, and guided towards growth, so long as you are receptive. What is required is commitment, humility, and a recognition that there is no health and safety so long as racism exists.” This is what draws me in. This commitment to see every single person as whole – no matter their label. It is in this space that I am able to refrain from sharing my own ‘white woman tears’ and asking a black or brown person to hold them because of my ‘previous trauma’. It is from this space that I do ‘not’ share my stories of sexual harassment because in this space they are at best a path for me to listen more intently and mostly irrelevant. I want to focus on the whole, beautiful, complete person in front of me and take responsibility for how I harm black and brown people so I can look for ways to quit doing it.
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I like how you reframed the idea that it is a positive to not have to explain ourselves. We are all on the same walk, with various afflictions and traumas, taking responsibility for the harm we cause. It is such an automatic thing, I think, to think that explanations and defensiveness is silently asked for but in reality, we can just accept that harm was caused and spend the energy moving forward to repair the harm and improve ourselves.
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<font size=”4″>Yes, loss/grief, medical/psychiatric challenges, neurodiversity are all real and should be accommodated, but not just for me, for all. Healing has to include accountability, with others and with myself. When I say I’m too tired, too busy, too anxious, or too unprepared to lean into this work, (those are my own I go to the most) then I’m not holding myself accountable to my own praxis or being who I say I am. As we say here, then I’m not holding my own hand, I’m expecting others to hold it for me. I’m still learning the extent of the ways I offend from a victim position and use my own struggles to cause further harm to others. I know it starts with seeing my own self, internally, eye to eye, holding my own hand, and then extending that same eye to eye respect to others and listening, internalizing and believing what they say I need to address in my behavior to make things safer for them. </font>
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I relate strongly to your comment, Rebecca, in this walk towards the North Star. For me I find I swing between times where I’m picking up speed and becoming more reflexive to times where I lose momentum and my reliability goes down. I think in the more reliable times I stop holding my own hand until that derails me. Then I forget that it starts with seeing my self first, as you said, to then hold myself accountable because I’ve let go of my own hand so it takes me longer to get going again when I stumble.
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I was listening to some Terry Reel this morning and he was talking about how relationships are a constant cycle of connection, disillusionment, and repair. I think the more often I think of this work as being a constant cycle between those things the better I’ll be. Otherwise I get stuck so easily in those destination mentalities.
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Thanks for this Rebecca. Accepting that it’s a cycle and having a plan to repair it to get going again in this work is doable. I thought I was seeing it as less a destination and more the white supremacy in me twisting and sabotaging what I’m doing but either way if I’m gonna beat myself up about it, I’m not going to be reliably making the world a safer place for BIPOC.
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Such a good reminder Rebecca about these cycles of relationships – connection, disillusionment and repair – and shifting how I think about them, remembering that it is a sign of growth that I’m learning to hold my own hand while these cycles happen. To work on causing less harm in the midst of them.
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“I know it starts with seeing my own self, internally, eye to eye, holding my own hand, and then extending that same eye to eye respect to others and listening, internalizing and believing what they say I need to address in my behavior to make things safer for them.” – I really need to sit with this tonight as it feels important for where I am walking currently. Thank you for sharing this reflection.
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I have seen this in the LoR community, used against Lace. When someone (ie a white person) is asked to account for a problematic comment, oftentimes a diagnosis is pulled out as a shield. When Lace reveals her own diagnosis in response that this work can still be done well with one, she is often met with silence. I am neither a person of color nor ND, mentally ill, or disabled, but I can find myself in seeking carveouts for other facts of life: a demanding job, a new baby, time needed to regain physical health, time needed to nurture my marriage and other relationships. Except EVERYONE has their facts of life. And Black and Brown people are continuously dealing with all of theirs PLUS being on the front lines against white supremacy. And it’s not about doing my list of life and adding on antiracism, well, not fully: it’s about integrating antiracism into every aspect of my life and pushing all of them to evolve in that direction.
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“And it’s not about doing my list of life and adding on antiracism, well, not fully: it’s about integrating antiracism into every aspect of my life and pushing all of them to evolve in that direction.”
This. I’ve been backsliding recently in treating antiracism as some sort of add-on to make time for separate from the rest of my day. I really like your phrasing of pushing every aspect of your life to evolve in the direction of antiracism. That means not making excuses for being unreliable (guilty). It means acknowledging that I’ve been unreliable and then course correcting. When my focus is on all the reasons, I’m reinforcing a pattern of centering myself and caring more about what people think of me than how effective I actually am.
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That’s a good point that we need to switch the mindset of anti-racism being an add-on. As long as it is an add-on, it will get sidelined. And when racism is interwoven in everything, how can we possibly be talking about add-ons. If racism is part of everything and no an add-on, then anti-racism cannot be an add-on. It must be part of everything. Anti-racism isn’t on top of everything I already do. Either anti-racism OR racism is everything I already do. If I am not choosing anti-racism, then I am choosing racism. There is no neutral.
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“There is no neutral “: that’s what I keep in mind any time I worry about the next step.
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“Either anti-racism or racism is everything I already do.” Yes. This is a helpful reframing.
I still find myself stumbling/getting stuck in wanting to change everything problematic overnight, and then getting discouraged when I inevitably relapse. When that happens, I’m not “getting it in” like Lace says. I’m not approaching this meal being offered here as an abiding community member… I’m consuming as quickly as I can so I can check my damn box and get back to whatever I was doing before. This disconnection between the work we do here and whatever I was doing before is straight up supremacist; it’s about maintaining my ego and ultimately my grip on power. Whatever I was doing before is evidently racist if I’m separating it from my work here.
Those walls between anti racism work and the rest of my life need to come down. That doesn’t happen all at once, though it needs to happen with all deliberate speed. It happens through intentional cultivation of new daily habits. This week I’m picking ONE habit to focus on- starting my day with LoR and within that identifying one anti racist thing to work on within all of my regular activities throughout the day. Appreciate you walking with me, Emily.
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Hearing this @jessie-lee and knowing that I also struggle with wanting to change everything problematic overnight… but that is not being the slow cooker that Lace calls us to be, to walk with all deliberate speed and to have love at the core. I’m curious what you’re working on today, and as I type (with a little kiddo snuggled into me) I’m grateful to be showing up here in whatever way it works for us – weaving anti-racist work into all the habits of our days.
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Mmm yes you’re right that love is not at the core of wanting to change everything overnight. That’s not in service to others; it’s self serving.
Thanks for asking! So yesterday my focus was on getting back to basics and simply showing up. M’s piece specifically was on my mind. Yesterday was a very… tumultuous day at school, the kind of day that I might be inclined to seek pseudo-recovery from through isolating myself. I fought that impulse and came here instead. I’m really focusing this week on re-cultivating daily reliability.
Love thinking of you spending some early moments in the day hanging out here while simultaneously snuggling your kiddo.
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Returning to basics, beginning again… so powerful and useful. I’m right here with you on cultivating daily reliability.
I’m sorry your day was so demanding and tumultuous, and I’m proud of you for noticing how your patterns work in these situations. I’ve found it profoundly useful to notice these specifics of how I isolate myself, how I might ignore the distortions in my own thinking as a result of my depression… and then take active steps to do things differently.
Also – and this is tied to isolation and not wanting to actually be seen… I’m hearing Marlise’s piece in my head too right now about common white women moves, politeness and not wanting to be seen but also using that as an excuse that people don’t know me… so can’t speak into my life. I wanted you to know that your reply and sharing that you were struggling with showing up here, got me out of bed this morning. I had my youngest kiddo sleeping smack up beside me from a bad nightmare last night and didn’t get the best sleep… but somehow knowing the specifics of your day, and how we/I often ask for carve-outs for recovery gave me the reminder I needed to put my feet on the floor and breathe in. Thanks for walking with me here Jessie.
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I sometimes forget how critical repetition is to retain what I’m learning so I can apply it daily.
I really appreciate your words of encouragement Catherine, and am so gratified to hear how my words helped you! 🙂
Noticing specifics of how I isolate (or engage in any other harmful pattern) and taking active steps is useful for me, too. That approach is more slow cooker-y than indulging that urge to try to change ALL THE THINGS at one time. What you said about not wanting to be seen so that people can’t speak into your life… that hit me. When my impulse is to isolate, I need to ask myself what’s at the root of not wanting people to speak into my life. I’m thinking that answer will hold some insight about what needs to change, what action steps I need to take. One thing I can focus on is noticing when I’m clenching at the thought of sharing details about my day with the group, and then take that moment to… share a detail or two of my day with the group.
Another thing I’m thinking of is cultivating a habit of resetting after school that doesn’t involve screens. I have been teaching weird hybrid school, and the screen fatigue is real (I’m sure you can relate!) When I don’t manage it well it definitely affects my reliability here.
I hope you get a better night’s sleep tonight, and if you don’t, we’ll keep walking together anyway. Shoulder to shoulder.
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I love how you get into the specific steps Jessie, and you’re always so focused on action and growth. I think the process of being known is quite foreign to many of us – at least it is to me, and it’s really only been through therapy (and actually group therapy) that I started to learn how powerful it is to be vulnerable with others, and to been seen in all my messiness and still loved, to still have worth. Learning to see myself this way – as always having worth – was actually at the core of my recovery from my depression (that and taking steps each day to do the hard things)… and it’s part of how I continue to manage it. Paying attention to the little feelings, the niggling discomfort … knowing it has value – means I am able to keep knowing myself, even as I learn new things about my ability to harm and see patterns of how my whiteness seeps into so much of my life.
I’m curious how you’ll get a little screen time reset (so very needed).. I’m a big fan of physical exercise as a way to help me connect with my body, even just a few jumping jacks or a dance party (my youngest kiddo needs daily pillow fights to help him with his screen exhaustion and self-regulation) – keep me posted. So grateful to be walking with you.
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I also started learning the power in vulnerability during group therapy 🙂 There is such possibility that arises from laying down our shields and being willing to let others into our lives without trying to control their perceptions of us (hello losing strategy…) This is a key ingredient of rooting out my internalized white supremacy, which thrives and multiplies when I leave it in the shadows. Shining a light on it in community has to be a non-negotiable.
I love the pillow fight as a reset for your son! I’ve been working this week on moving physically to transition between school and home. Walking my dog right after I change clothes, often with my husband when he’s home, helps me a lot. I crave that combination of movement, connection with my little family, and being outside after way too much screen time.
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Your highlight of the difference between antiracism as a checklist and antiracism as integration helps me anchor my thought that explanation is a critical part of the inward work. The checklist is the beginner’s antiracism — but if someone tried to follow a checklist for doing a cartwheel, they’d be doing all sorts of not-cartwheeling as they checked through it. At some point, the body begins to understand the cartwheel, is doing a sloppy cartwheel, and can get better and better. As my mind understands my white supremacy, my antiracism is further integrated into how I exist in the world.
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I identify with all of this. I tend toward wanting my carveouts too. I have to really hold my own hand with that one. I also appreciate your observation about integrating antiracism instead of adding it to the to do list. We all have these crazy to do lists. This is part of our lives. Like you said every aspect of our lives.
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Thank you for this, Alexia. This is a piece of writing I will return to, particularly when I am tempted to twist my own neurodivergence into an excuse in order to avoid accountability.
I’m thinking about how… white people who use disability as justification for racist behavior feel entitled to be “regarded as innocent and childlike” and to be catered to and given the benefit of the doubt in situations where WE are the real aggressors. Neurodivergent and disabled white people do this because it’s worked for us in the past. It’s worked in most places because our comfort is prioritized in most places. And when it doesn’t work for us in a space like Lace on Race, where we’re expected to take responsibility in one way or another, we start paging through our white supremacist playbook and then can get REALLY violent.
I love the language “centering our interdependence and the responsibility that we all hold for one another.” As I’ve learned here, accountability is not the same as harm. It is not a threat– as my own neurodivergence sometimes tricks me into thinking– but an invitation to community healing.
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Making assumptions about what others can/can’t do or can/can’t be accountable for is something white people, including myself, do daily. This piece described ways that these harmful assumptions perpetuate racism by either further oppressing people (disabled POC) or giving a pass to people (disabled white people). I’m locating myself in making assumptions about others and how I use that to give up, not see them eye to eye, or not even make an effort with them which is not in alignment with the North Star. I’m also thinking of the ways that I want to present myself (or not) so that I can have the benefit of the doubt ready to grab when I’ve cause harm or not met commitments. Letting go of the assumptions and being fully present in community without shields is what I’m learning to do while walking towards the North Star.
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I like this pointing out about assumptions. This is one of the ways that I cause the most harm: making assumptions. I want to approach each interaction as new. Not making assumptions about anyone’s capabilities.
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This article hits home for me since I am constantly trying to navigate through my neurodiverse brain in order to show up more consistently here. I appreciate that this topic is brought up here at LoR regularly. This keeps me accountable, gives me ideas to try new strategies and makes me feel seen in the community. I am reminded of the article written by Lace called “Bruised Oranges Matter Too” where she was so vulnerable about her own struggles and reminded me that ultimately it comes down to my volition and priorities. Lace says, “ Volition is hard for those of us with afflictions, which is to say all of us.” As I am regularly reminded here, it is really up to me to prioritize and like Christin said, integrate, anti-racism in my actions and energy. I know I need a mindset shift in how I approach the engagement here at the LoR community, for some reason I tend to feel like I need to have just the right conditions to sit down and engage in the reading, comprehension and writing to try and fight the brain fog that tends to make me feel like “I can’t” do it. Well, I need to gather my volition and just do it and I have to know that I can do it and I know the more I practice it the more I can trust myself to know that I can do it. This article reminds me that I am not alone in this struggle but also that I have to show up in engagement to make real strides towards the North Star.
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I’ve recently been revisiting the Claudia Rankine interview in the relational ethics series and the part where she says “it’s only hard because you don’t do it often” has really been reverberating for me. I also find myself waiting for “optimal conditions” for engagement but with that logic I could excuse myself forever from engaging. But engaging and integrating even when I think it will be hard will get more natural. Shoring up muscles, like Lace talks about.
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Honestly, I truly believe that it becomes less intimidating the more I do the work. I knew going into committing to the LoR community, that this would be incredibly hard for me but I also knew that it had to be exactly what would push me to keep going on the journey towards the North Star. I am looking forward to getting back into the “pinned posts” and all the other content available to work the muscles.
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Glad to be walking with you!
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I am glad to see you here @deewcares and I’m right there with you in building muscles so I can show up here reliably. As Christin mentions too the words of Claudia Rankin are powerful… it’s only hard because we don’t do it often. One thing I’ve found is that my brain – and my own mental illness is part of this – will look for all the reasons why things are hard, will focus on the difficult.. but if I counter these thoughts with actual steps I can take, and then do those steps… it’s actually easier than I thought it would be… in essence, these are distortions in my thinking. Distortions that are part of white supremacy, and help to ensure we don’t/I don’t more consistently dismantle it.
So, as I’m sitting here after successfully waking up early enough (an ongoing struggle for me – but this extra alarm clock does help… but still typing with two little kiddos on my lap now) I’m thinking about habits, and wondering how you’re thinking about being able to show up more consistently? What small change could you make in your day to make this happen? Walking with you.
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Thank you for sharing your struggle to keep up with your habits and that you have your kids right there with you and you still being able to engage here critically. I am definitely trying to work on my habits, I have struggled to maintain habits and routines my whole life. But knowing that the better I can form my habits, the better I can show up in the journey, has really pushed me to keep trying. There are simple habits I can implement like putting the dishes away in the morning so that I can fill it up as I go throughout the day and then run it every night. This connects to the work here and in other racial justice spaces I am in and challenging myself to become more involved in because it frees up the extra time spent catching up on dishes and scrubbing caked on food because it hasn’t been rinsed. Well, this idea is in my head but I still haven’t been able to implement it consistently. So, now it is a matter of my own volition, I just have to do it.
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It’s really helpful to me to remember Lace’s words about there’s never such a thing as treading water in racial justice work – that we are either moving forward or moving backwards. And as I think about building habits, I have found that the tiny tweaks are essential, constant adjustment of these changes in my life so I can become more resilient, relentlessly reliable. For instance – right now I have family visiting and adjusting to the new boundaries and being back in tricky relationship dynamics… so I’ve not been as good at my bedtimes, and just yesterday had to change the batteries in my second alarm clock… but you know what, it didn’t work and I slept in longer… and I could beat myself up about it, or I can remember that I’m learning to be anti-racist in all my actions and not look for carve-outs. And I can get this darned alarm clock working again!
I think what stuck out to me was your last phrase of “I just need to do it” because YES, it is in the doing that we actually live our anti-racist beliefs AND it is never one and done, it is returning and remembering to have grace with ourselves as we make mistakes, and then return and keep growing, keep learning to lessen and mitigate the harm endured by Black and Brown people perpetuated by white people (me) and white supremacy. We keep walking.
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I have similar issues too. I have felt like I need the perfect conditions to engage. That if I’m a little tired or had a rough day I won’t have as much to offer and my comments will be less than discerning. Like Christin said I need to integrate LOR into my life and be reliable.
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If we arrive here, having chosen to work toward racial justice and equity, then our disabilities and divergences are not of a nature that would prevent us from doing that work. Full stop. I have shown both agency and volition to do the work. All that remains is my capacity, and while only I can inventory that, it should in no way prevent me from the work, but instead only affect the timing or pacing or structure of the work.
And I should look at those things through the lens of WW-BIPOC-D? Black and brown people don’t really take accommodations in racial justice for their divergences and disabilities. The MAKE accommodations in their divergences and disabilities FOR racial justice. Because racial justice is, for them, simply justice.
I recently finished an acute depressive period of several months — the first one since joining this community. What I have learned here has given me an entirely new perspective on my disability, which has led to new tools for living with it. I continued to work steadily for racial justice through this community and elsewhere on all but a handful of my worst days. (In my last acute episode, I was either in bed or in a closed room doing 1000 piece puzzles for the duration…)
Our disabilities and divergences are part of us. They should never be an excuse for allowing racial injustice to persist.
(Thank you for the introduction to Mia Mingus!)
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There are ways in which my brain makes my life more difficult than it seems it should be. And flouting the stigma attached to needing help with that has been difficult and important and freeing and rewarding… for me… as a white woman…
It has been walking here, and being confronted and reminded by essays such as this, that has brought me to understand that I am 1) not as unique as I feel, regarding the “special” circumstances of my very “individual” needs, and 2) that the extent to which I can find accommodation for (even perhaps indulge) these “needs” is an incredible privilege.
Here, yes, I am not shamed and I am not excused. If I fall short of what is set forth as expected here, that’s for me to contend with and improve on, not for Lace to exculpate. The thing is… Lace is always here to receive the best I can give, when I allow myself to be known and transparent, when I demonstrate reliability and take responsibility.
I have some mental health things that are mind to deal with. There are people who are not helped to deal with similar issues as much as I am. There are people who are not given the grace I know I will be. And there are people having daily stressors pressed upon their minds and their bodies. I need to BOTH tend myself to keep myself well and strong AND be unremitting in how I speak against and work to alleviate the harm caused… the harm *I* cause as a white woman, that places such a heavy burden on others.
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*cross-posted from FB*
This reminds me of a comment I heard a speaker at a political rally make last year at a BLM protest after the George Floyd murders: “mental health is a privilege”. As someone who struggles with generalized anxiety and chronic depression, it was really uncomfortable for me to sit with that statement and I didn’t understand it at first. I now realize that to be able to claim mental health issues as a reason for not engaging IS a privilege. To assume that black and brown people don’t have mental health struggles that they could claim as a reason for sitting out is problematic; sitting out of racial dialogue for people in Black and Brown communities just isn’t really an option, as their survival and the survival of friends and family often relies on engaging. And if they were to sit out of the conversation, no one would have been there to pick up the microphone, as many white people and white adjacent people were already sitting out due to mental health issues.
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“There is no self-care without collective care. There is no disability justice without justice for all people impacted by racism.”
Racism and ableism are intertwined in some ways in that they are both systems of oppression that deny the humanity of someone either because of the color of their skin or their disability. I used to compare and conflate, to some degree, my experience of having a disability with the experiences of Black and brown people who endure racism. These oppressionsare not the same and conflating them is not only a form of erasure, but also white supremacy because (a) white people who are marginalized in another area such as disability use it as a carve-out, or send the messaqe that “I’m oppressed too, so withe’re just the same, I know how you feel, how can I possibly be racist?” As much as we are passionate about women’s rights, LGBTQ rights, and (sometimes, but more rarely) disability rights, where is that same passion when it comes to racial justice? Where is the consideration for Black and brown people with disabilities? As Lace said, BIPOC who live with a disability or neurodivergence are rarely extended any grace.
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“The idea that a person with disabilities cannot unlearn internalized racism because of their neurodivergence or disability is a denial of disabled peoples’ complex humanity and personhood.”
One of the most violent forms of oppression people with disabilities face is sociocultural expectations or assumptions about what we can and cannot do. We are either considered dispensible or handled with kid gloves. I have felt both, strongly. this is alienating, not helpful, and does not allow an authentic relationship of being held and seen eye to eye. I can trust in this community that I will not be handled with kid gloves, that I will not be assumed to be unable to unlearn internalized racism or do this work with as much resilience and reliability as anyone else. I am struck by the truth of what Lace shared, that Black and brown people with disabilities are often some of the most creative, resourceful, passionate, driven and determined people, either despite, or because of, these multiple oppressions and the resilience you have to build just to navigate daily life. I see Lace setting an example of that here that inspires me to do better. Honestly, anytime things feel difficult and I’m tempted to make an excuse or seek a carve-out because of my disability, I think of Lace, and the many Black and brown people like her who walk with steadfast resilience, encourage us to keep walking, and never seek a carve-out even in a world where you face multiple oppressions.
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One of the biggest ways I have caused harm to brown and black people in my life is to see people as ‘them’ as a ‘group’. As ‘black people’ or ‘brown people’.
One of the most fun things that have happened from taking this space out of this space into the real world is following the North Star and seeing all people, but especially brown and black people as unique, whole, individuals, and not ‘a group’. I have looked into so many eyes. Had so many conversations. Read so much poetry. Engaged in so many dialogues. Received so many rolling of eyes when I say something, well, not North Star. Beautiful and fun.
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This post helped point out that I’m not special and that I need to be the person I say I want to be. I need to stop with the busy excuses (everyone is busy) and keep walking. The conditions don’t have to be perfect for me to sit down and contribute. This did remind me too of the post about wp and manners and not wanting to be seen. I have to get in the game and be seen.
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Loving “seeing” you pop up all over the site these past couple days!
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Thank you! I’m feeling way behind and I’m working on my reliability. I have to remember to just keep walking.
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I was so struck by this line in particular: “But, being attuned to people’s access needs and exercising flexibility and grace is not the same as absolving mentally ill, neurodivergent, and disabled people from taking responsibility for their role in perpetuating racism.”
I think the absolution comes from the idea that our interactions are transactional — so not dealing with something “in the moment” is not dealing with it at all. But if we are in committed, reliable relationship with one another, then accountability is not transactional; that comes to us from the punitive model, from the logic of “you did x, you get y.”
And sometimes that logic is very appropriate, when there’s no real relationship at play — if an elected official breaks the law, they get impeached; if a writer/actor/director etc is revealed to be an abuser, their show is cancelled, etc — the clear logic of consequences is appropriate there, because there is no relational accountability.
But if we are in relationship with each other, then yes, we must be attuned to people’s access needs, and exercise flexibility and grace — that is part of accountability too. And we must not mistake that piece of accountability and relationship for absolution, and we must not *seek* absolution; we must work towards repair.
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I think a huge part of being in relationship is learning other people’s needs and finding the ways you can help meet each others’ needs – not in a transactional way, but in an organic, connected way. If we aren’t willing to make the time and energy to learn each other’s needs and either assume those needs or ignore those needs, we can’t really be in relationship with them.
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I think if we don’t tackle these issues with real truth and honesty and accountability – as this post does – then we’re failing at intersectionality. Intersectional justice must take disability into account while also not falling back on ablism as a way “out” of taking responsibility for our actions.
As someone who has found social interactions challenging for my whole life – and is most likely on the borderline of diagnosable as neurodivergent – I know I worry about being misunderstood or misreading a situation. And while I hope people have patience with me, it doesn’t absolve me from learning and doing better next time.
Thinking about the “crisis intervention mode,” I know that certain ways my brain works involves dwelling on things I’ve done wrong and pounding on them over and over. As we’re referred to it elsewhere, the “shame spiral.” For me, I’m able to hold my own hand by taking responsibility as best I can in that moment and then stepping away before I cause more damage. It’s about giving myself the time and energy to process while also minimizing the damage to the person who is already hurt. It’s not abandoning the conversation, but doing what I can and acknowledging to myself that continuing the conversation will end up centering me instead of the person hurt.
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