Recognize that we are co-conspirators in racism

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I’m definitely a person who wants to be on the right side of history. But that’s my pride talking, frankly. As a point of my faith, namely the commandment to love my neighbor as myself, I also want to be on the right side of love and justice.

When I first heard of the term white privilege, I already knew enough about how racism and discrimination works in society that I wasn’t particularly triggered by it, as some are. . However, I was immediately curious about its implications.

I’ve heard white men in particular bristle strongly at the idea that they’re somehow privileged in our world just because they’re white and masculine. They only see through the lens of their own experience and know how hard they have worked and how often they feel like they have little to show. Thus, being called privileged is the opposite of their own lived experience.

Yet we are privileged. Although, as a member of the LGBTQ community, I have a comparatively modest understanding of what it means to be marginalized, it is not the same as racism or sexism. White gay men are still the most privileged among the rest of our alphabet tribe, and for the same reasons as the rest of society. It is best for those of us who even have degrees of fractal privilege to be among those who use it to better the human condition.

My only challenge in this area has been figuring out how to use white privilege to be a tailwind to the solution when my privilege is actually part of the problem. To be clear, I’m not saying I’m part of the problem because I’m consciously making things worse. I’m only part of the problem because I haven’t always understood that just being an ally isn’t enough. In short, I didn’t know what to do with the privilege I have of affecting greater equality for others.

In the meantime, it has always been my recommendation and practice as a white man to listen rather than talk about issues like sexism and racism. I try to share what I hear from those who experience it, rather than pretending to understand it myself.

I was shocked last week when a friend sent me a video of three black women on stage speaking at an event. One, Bettina Love, Ph.D. describes the difference between being an ally of social justice and an accomplice of social justice. I had never heard the term co-conspirator used in a positive way before.

She told a story about Bree Newsome and James Tyson the day Bree climbed a flagpole on the South Carolina state house to remove the Confederate flag in the weeks after the racist massacre at the AME Church by Dylan Roof.

When white male authorities came to stop this black woman from removing a Confederate symbol, they decided to electrically tase the flagpole in order to knock Bree down, presumably to her death. But James Tyson, standing at the base of the metal pole, protected her by placing his hand on it, knowing they weren’t going to electrify her as long as his hand was there. Because James was white.

This is an example of using white privilege. What I learned from this video is that James understood the difference between simply being a racial ally and being an accomplice to justice. James took a risk on his behalf.

I felt shocked by this potentially literally shocking story, because like a flash, I finally understood what the role of a progressive white man should be at this moment of our great human judgment.

We don’t have the luxury right now to just be allies. While it’s good to know what’s wrong with the world, and even to have effective tools to not contribute further to the problem, what the world needs from white men now is that we be accomplices of justice. We need more James Tysons.

We need more people willing to stand up and take risks. To stand with, to defend, to denounce, to use what society has given us by dint of our gender and our color to help insist on equality in our world.

James Tyson is not the hero of this day. This title belongs to Bree Newsome. She risked her life to remove an emblem of her own ancestors’ slavery from its undeserved place of honor on the South Carolina state house. But James rightfully holds his own as a co-conspirator of his heroism. He used his white privilege the way we are supposed to.

The flag was raised immediately after his arrest, but the gesture had the intended effect. Less than two weeks later, the South Carolina state legislature voted to make it illegal to display the Confederate flag on any public building. And the flag is definitely down.

Love your neighbor as yourself. Consider their humanity as equal to your own. Stand aside. To fight for. Kneel with it.

Wil Darcangelo, M.Div, is a Unitarian Universalist minister at Fitchburg First Ward and Lancaster First Church. Email [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter, Instagram and TikTok @wildarcangelo. His blog, Hopeful Thinking, can be found at hopefulthinkingworld.blogspot.com.

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