Book Group: Me and White Supremacy

Today I am grateful for opportunities to take a look at the hard stuff of life and gain new understanding and insights. 

I am about halfway through a book that several of my coworkers and I are examining and discussing through a book study. The book is titled Me and White Supremacy: Combat Racism, Change the World, and Become a Good Ancestor, authored by Layla F. Saad.

Layla Saad talks about her book in this video from an Audible interview.

After George Floyd was killed and there was so much visible pain and anger playing out in the news, I knew I wanted to learn more and do more to help end systemic racism. And I felt pretty helpless and fairly ignorant. 

I read. I listened. I went to my first peaceful demonstration and walked in a small Black Lives Matter event in my local community. I delved deeper than I had before, and what I found was difficult but necessary. 

Having previously read about and discussed white fragility, white privilege was newer to me and something that I didn't understand. And I bristled at the phrase "white supremacy," thinking only of fringe extremists. In the book, it is defined as: a racist ideology that is based upon the belief that white people are superior in many ways to people of other races and that therefore, white people should be dominant over other races. 

Like most other institutions in the last months, people at my school experienced collective and individual pain and discomfort as we grappled with what had been brought to the surface. This is not about adding more shame and pointing fingers. This is about how we are each a part of the problem, often unknowingly, and how we can each be part of dismantling racism. 

So when the opportunity to join colleagues in a book study came along, I knew that I would take part. 

As Layla Saad says about her book: "This is not a book you read. This is a book you do." 

It's a 28-day reading and writing exercise. But I have had to take it in over a longer period of time. It is hard work, humbling, eye-opening. And I am grateful to be taking this journey alone and with others. My small group has our second discussion about the book this morning and I am looking forward to it.

I will share more in the coming days, but here are some more words from Layla Saad to close this post: 

“You cannot dismantle what you cannot see. You cannot challenge what you do not understand.”

“Your desire to be seen as good can actually prevent you from doing good, because if you do not see yourself as part of the problem, you cannot be part of the solution.”