People, all of us, have a tendency to frame our personal narratives in ways that ignore the types of oppression we
don’t experience, and the benefits we reap from them, because we have the luxury of being able to ignore them.
A huge part of unlearning oppressive behaviours is just
resisting the impulse to pretend any oppression we personally don’t experience is
irrelevant.
dear anti-racist white allies, stop othering yourself from white people. stop pretending you aren’t “that” white person. you are that white person. most likely, the majority of your friends are white. most likely, you appropriate aave. most likely, you still accidentally drop the n-word when singing along to the latest radio hiphop hit. most likely, you will get just the slightest bit uncomfortable around men of color at night. most likely, you have said something in the past month that relies on a racial stereotype. most likely, your attraction to poc has shades of exotification. most likely, your interest in poc cultures can border on cultural appropriation.
i know because those are all things i occasionally find myself guilty of, and it’s not okay.
stop forgetting that a huge part of being an ally is identifying what you do wrong, checking your privilege, and trying your hardest to overcome it so as not to perpetuate those harmful behaviors. being an ally is not about getting social justice points. being an ally is not about a warm fuzzy feeling for helping those less privileged than you. being an an ally is not about being superior to people in your privilege group. being an ally is about helping destroy the privilege you live in and it is just as internal as it is external.
If a problem a marginalised community faces seems simple to you and you’re pretty sure you know exactly how to fix it, but you’re not part of that community, chances are you don’t understand the complexity of the issue. Especially if your solution is for the marginalised community to change their own behaviour.
So if you ever feel the urge to tell someone how to solve the problem of their own oppression, this is a good time for listening and a bad time for you to be talking.
The Plains warbonnet is not a Cherokee thing. It is not a Navajo thing. It is not an Indian thing. It is a Plains thing.
Stop calling every silly thing you draw that even vaguely resembles a native “Cherokee” or “Navajo” or “Aztec.”
Stop drawing the warbonnet everywhere as the apparently definitive native thing. It isn’t part of all of our 600+ cultures.
Same goes for the tipi, not part of every one of the 600+ indigenous cultures.
Stop thinking that if a native person doesn’t have dark, “mahogany” skin, that their heritage is invalid. Even without admixture, we actually do have varying skin tones.
Stop wearing crappy fake warbonnets.
Stop wearing redface.
Stop using us as your silly mascots. We are people.
Stop saying “spirit animal.” It’s derived from a New Age bastardization of a something that actually exists in some of our cultures.
Don’t smudge. Cleanse all you like, that’s fine, but don’t smudge.
Don’t call us “Indians.” “Native American” isn’t great either, it is not our name, but it’s slightly better than “Indian.” “Indigenous” is also fine.
Don’t use NDN/ndn. That is ours.
Step off about our hair. If you meet a long-haired native, admire it if you like, maybe even ask them about it (RESPECTFULLY), but do not touch. The same applies for someone with short hair, but additionally for those with short hair, don’t say things like “oh you’d look more native/Indian/etc if your hair was long.” We didn’t all traditionally have long, flowing hair. Believe it or not, there are actually different haircuts existing in our various cultures, and aside from that ultimately it’s a personal choice, one does not need to have long hair if they don’t want to. Doesn’t make them any less native to have short hair.
Don’t pray to our spirits/gods/energies. Native spiritualities are closed, they are not for outsiders.
Don’t say “The Native Americans believed…” Firstly, the past tense is silly, we still exist and do things. Secondly, we are NOT A MONOLITH. As I mentioned before, there are upwards of 600 different Native American cultures.
Don’t ask about someone’s “Indian name.” That’s not only insensitive, the name you are referring to in that instance is something sacred, and might not be something that person wants to share with you.
Don’t call yourself silly crap like “howling wolf” or “flying eagle.” That’s also racist and insensitive.
Regardless of whatever you might think you’re doing, or what your intentions may be, if a native person tells you that what you’re doing is disrespectful, STOP DOING IT.
You aren’t honoring us. You’re just mocking us further, demonstrating your continued ability to treat us like shit and get away with it even now, centuries after our colonization began. Your feelings are not more important than our history and survival.
To those doing your best as allies, thank you, keep doing what you do. HOWEVER, don’t let opportunities to educate others escape you. By letting them continue to be ignorant, you are failing. Spread the message.
There will be no “please.” It’s been more than 500 years, and we still are made to be invisible in our homelands. Still we are treated like less. Some even think we all died long ago.
So, ally YOUR way or no ally at all? Isn’t that abusive towards someone that is offering allyship?
Instead of saying “here’s the point, and you’ve missed it”, care to clarify the point?
I see no point in “allyship” being comfortable. I mean, if you feel uncomfortable being an ally, why be one? If you are an ally, you should be comfortable with supporting the LGBT+ community.
Or is that not the point at all?
If not, then I’d like to ask something else that is still straying from “the point”: WHY does allyship have to be uncomfortable?
Because when you truly are able to engage in allyship that will require you to recognize that we are all living in an oppressive environment where we are taught, from day one things that ultimately hurt other people. That means calling yourself out constantly and recognizing that, YES, while you may not mean these things, you can be oppressive. And furthermore, while you may consider yourself an ally, you can still fuck up and perpetuate the harmful shit that people are trying to get away from. Allyship that’s worth something will require you to have uncomfortable conversations with people who are part of majority groups you belong to. It means calling out your friends, your family, etc and having conversations that may potentially alienate you.
But then our opinions just “don’t matter?” I’m just tired of the hate.. I understand the frustration but I just think it’s messed up to flat out say cis people’s opinions don’t matter. I’m really trying to be supportive and I don’t want to bother you but I’m tired of people getting annoyed with me speaking out just because I’m not trans.
this is so fucking YIKES. listen, if you were truly an ally, you’d shut up about it. i get that it’s personally offensive to hear that your opinions really don’t matter but they don’t. i mean obviously saying cis peoples opinions on ANY subject is dog shit is hyperbolic but seriously you don’t sound like an ally right now. allies are there to use their privilege and platforms to uplift the voices of the oppressed, not have similar weight. so please bye
I want everyone to read this message and read it very closely as it amplifies the reasoning for my last video.
Most people who pay attention to my content recognize how careful i am with my words and how often i even entertain the feelings of people who benefit from the oppression of marginalized people. My videos are filled with disclaimers and soft language that makes people in majority classes feel welcomed and comfortable. All too often i pander and gently handle people who benefit from the rape, murder and genocide of people. And at the end of the day thats a large reason why my content works. But telling this person that its possible for them to maintain internal biases that they were socialized with that they may unintentionally perpetuate was the last straw.
Let me make this explicitly clear; if you arent open to calling yourself out on your own shit you are not an ally. Your allyship is based in ego and your desire to be seen as a good person. Your allyship helps you and only you. It is not progressive and it is necessary in the maintaining of systems of oppression.
Calling myself out is the most uncomfortable and upsetting thing ive had to in my growing allyship to so many groups. At the center of my arguments is this desire to encourage empathy and care for people who will live lives you will never have. Unfortunately people like this do not care and i think its important for everyone to recognize there are people in our ranks who hold conditional support to out causes. This is why we should not prematurely celebrate people of majority groups who pay lipservice to our cause. No one needs to be celebrated to doing the right thing. As my momma used to say, you dont get a reward for doing what you’re supposed to do. Hold allies accountable. The people who support you will try to understand, the ones who dont will crumble and withdraw support.
Supremacy is easy to maintain, breaking it down is an endless battle and some are unfit for combat.
i’m gonna try to say this gently, because i understand that it’s easy to feel attacked in this situation, and this is something i had to call myself out on and struggled with…
here’s the thing about being an ally: it’s not about your ally status. by constantly checking and deconstructing our own internal biases and looking for biases elsewhere we are trying to break down systematic oppression and help to overcome centuries (sometimes millennia) of oppression.
by saying that you feel invalidated by being told you’re inherently problematic as a white/cis/abled/whatever person, you’re making this about you. the point of being an ally is that it’s not about you. it’s about the affected group of people and their voices and their struggle. we’re here to help them be heard and to support them however we can, but ultimately it’s their fight to win.
and really even when you’re an ally for a while you slip up sometimes. i’m queer and nonbinary and i still forget to use ze/hir pronouns. i still assume people are straight. i still catch myself saying stuff that enforces the gender binary without thinking. if i can be queer and trans and still think that stuff then how can i be a perfect ally to people of color? the point is when you live in a society like ours that enforces these hierarchies so harshly, next to no one is going to be able to perfectly reject those norms and support others, and those who do are overwhelmingly going to be part of the oppressed group(s) in question.
perfect allyship isn’t something you are ever going to attain, no matter how hard you work. that’s the bottom line. being an ally requires diligent work and attention to your behavior, it may get easier but it’s never gonna become something you don’t have to put effort into. if that makes you want to give up then you probably weren’t all that good an ally to begin with.
i’m happy to keep hearing these critiques, i want to be someone who tries to be inclusive and supportive of people of color and i’m happy that amazing people like kat are willing to put a lot of effort into teaching us how to do it because it’s not their duty to do that. for some it’s a job, but it’s mostly unpaid when it takes place on the internet. doing stuff like this is incredibly generous. we could learn to be allies by reading a bunch of complex books and articles from scholars (which i still do, i honestly enjoy that) which might end up taking years because you’d have to start in the 1700s. but people are taking the time to condense all of that for our benefit and i think that’s worth paying attention to, even if it may not be focused on sparing my feelings as much as possible.
“erfect allyship isn’t something you are ever going to attain, no matter how hard you work. that’s the bottom line. ”
you can’t say “I’m a clean person so I don’t have to wash” – you’re clean because you keep checking yourself for dirt and washing it off
similarly you can’t say “I’m a good ally so I don’t have to keep working at it” – if you’re a good ally you keep checking yourself for racism/sexism/ableism/bigotry/bias of all kinds and working to get rid of it.
I want everyone to read this message and read it very closely as it amplifies the reasoning for my last video.
Most people who pay attention to my content recognize how careful i am with my words and how often i even entertain the feelings of people who benefit from the oppression of marginalized people. My videos are filled with disclaimers and soft language that makes people in majority classes feel welcomed and comfortable. All too often i pander and gently handle people who benefit from the rape, murder and genocide of people. And at the end of the day thats a large reason why my content works. But telling this person that its possible for them to maintain internal biases that they were socialized with that they may unintentionally perpetuate was the last straw.
Let me make this explicitly clear; if you arent open to calling yourself out on your own shit you are not an ally. Your allyship is based in ego and your desire to be seen as a good person. Your allyship helps you and only you. It is not progressive and it is necessary in the maintaining of systems of oppression.
Calling myself out is the most uncomfortable and upsetting thing ive had to in my growing allyship to so many groups. At the center of my arguments is this desire to encourage empathy and care for people who will live lives you will never have. Unfortunately people like this do not care and i think its important for everyone to recognize there are people in our ranks who hold conditional support to out causes. This is why we should not prematurely celebrate people of majority groups who pay lipservice to our cause. No one needs to be celebrated to doing the right thing. As my momma used to say, you dont get a reward for doing what you’re supposed to do. Hold allies accountable. The people who support you will try to understand, the ones who dont will crumble and withdraw support.
Supremacy is easy to maintain, breaking it down is an endless battle and some are unfit for combat.
talking about 9/11 with white people is literally one of the most frustrating things ever because they won’t stop talking about their experiences (even if nothing happened to them personally), and when i, a middle eastern person, try to contribute to the conversation, i can’t get a fucking word in.
like what the fuck, nothing happened to you on that day – which, you know, thank goodness – so why the fuck do you insist on dominating the conversation? my daily life is still being effected by this even now, over ten years later.
but you’re not interested in hearing about how my fifth grade health teacher never again called on me or the arab girl in my class. you’re not interested in how whenever my family travels, all fourteen of us (a number that used to include young children) get “randomly” searched. you’re not interested in the fact that when i was asked to buy a propane tank for a barbecue, i spent the rest of the day stressed out and worried that the attendants at all the stores visited to inquire were all going to think i was making explosives (all stores in the neighborhood mysteriously were out of propane tanks in the middle of summer). you’re not interested in the fact that whenever my cousin prepares to fly on his own, his mother calls him to make sure he’s clean shaven so he doesn’t look “like a terrorist.” you’re not interested in the fact that when i was you’re not interested in the fact that i once witnessed a whole family of white people bypass the x-ray scanner for the old fashioned metal detector, but when i asked for the same treatment, i was denied; when i pointed out the (many) signs claiming that i had the right to refuse going through that machine, the tsa agent who mere seconds earlier berated me for my request went conveniently deaf. you’re not interested in hearing about how my sister was told “sorry about your leader” when osama bin laden was killed.
i could reference personal anecdotes until i went blue in the face.
there are countless people who have stories like this, stories that are grotesque and demeaning and terrifying. these are everyday occurrences.
but you’re not interested in any of that. frankly, you’re not even that interested when middle eastern and muslim (and sometimes non-muslim desi) people are subjected to extreme violence or killed. you guys got over chapel hill pretty damn fast. if you noticed it at all.
you don’t give a fuck about us, or our ongoing 9/11 stories. you just want to tell me about how horrible it was, sitting in class and listening to other kids get their names called on the pa system.
