From Radha Lath: A highly qualified Black woman had to step away from a workplace environment that used and abused her, and was willing to overlook their own complicity.
This is why so many marginalized folks steer clear of institutional social justice endeavors. It is almost never for our well-being. These people took and took from her, and flat out refused to even stop doing stuff like TOUCHING HER HAIR and TALKING OVER HER SO REGULARLY that the few people willing to go on record for this article could remember multiple incidents when her bodily autonomy and professional expertise were outright disrespected.
I am enraged by the treacly praise of her now that she has left. What is the use of saying these gushy things about Black women when you won’t speak up for them in the face of active racist spite?
Do you know that BIPOC folks aren’t ignorant? That we see every one of your self serving moves, your denials, your turning to one another for hugs when our suffering, finally voiced, makes you feel attacked?
Do you realize that the most highly educated among you (and us non-Black POC) have a lot of unpacking and active unlearning to do, and that we do not deserve to thrive at the expense of one more Black woman’s peace, career, and her g-d d-mn right to not be touched without consent?
Do you even dare to ask the BIPOC amongst you how many of us you think of as friends have actually exited spaces because you didn’t make it safe for us to be there?
If we told you why, that you were partly responsible, what would you do about it? Would you waste more oxygen talking about your noble intentions and the other BIPOC who love you and think you’re awesome?
This is not some outlier of a story. The only people who pantomime surprise about our insistence on factoring in anti racism to our child’s college search are white. Everyone else knows how universities can really be for Black and brown people. Higher education spaces are where white, cis, abled supremacy hangs out, using complex jargon and colonizer-centered theories to remind us that we are supposed to be grateful to be in the academe at all. The power to effect actual curriculum decolonization is an even more distant goal.
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