Anti-Racist Reading Group

I really really kept on top of the contact person for this group in order to be able to gain collective permission to observe this group which meets in my building and met last night from 8:00 until 11:00.

My Urban Cultural Diversity Professor would not have minded of I had not been able to do the site visit for my mini-ethnography project but I was so psyched to observe this group and have the most detailed and thorough write up possible to support my research question and theories. In that regard, I can't really go into detail here about everything that took place until I have completed all my interviews.

This group is comprised intentionally of whites only in their 20s and 30s. The all white space is intended to be a safe place to express and discuss issues and experiences with racism including ways in which they have perpetuated racism without feeling uncomfortable or judged. And to a degree I understand this but I do believe now that I have had the chance to sit in on this group that whatever progress they feel they have been making will slowly begin to deteriorate if they don't open the group to people of color.I think it is really important that whites take responsibility for the huge role they have played in oppressing and continuing to passively oppress people of color but when you have white people alone educating other white people about these things an issue of unrealistic social reflection emerges. It just starts to sound like that safe space is about remaining safe and deluded. That's dangerous. The truth is that undertaking something like this can't be made easy because it simple is not! And it's not painless either, but I do think there must be a way to facilitate this kind of organization in a manner that draws the best out of everyone so long as everyone has similar goals in mind. And it's those goals that I need to study. I'm sure it's different for everyone involved.