Anti-Blackness in my Actions

A self-reflective exercise in my personal experience

In an effort to grow in my determination to fight anti-Blackness, I feel that I must face and reflect on my actions surrounding the Black community. I have been undertaking this task for a few weeks now and I now realize that the endeavor is most difficult than I thought. However difficult I find the practice; I believe that it is my responsibility to improve the way I treat members of the Black community so that I may better serve our Black students.

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Term: Fall 2021

Learning Domains:

• Social Justice and Advocacy

• Personal and Professional Development

Learning Outcomes:

SWiBAT identify five instances of anti-Blackness perpetrated by him.

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Evidence

I think that my brain has been protecting me from acknowledging the racist actions that I have done. When we discuss the topic in class, I have difficulty thinking of things that I have done that are anti-Black. Below is a shortlist of some instances that I have reflected on.

1. I want to start by acknowledging that there is a strong anti-Black sentiment within the Latinx community that I grew up in. As a kid, I was inflicted with racist ideals that perpetrated Black people as aggressors and inferior people. I can’t say for sure what individuals taught me to think that way – perhaps there were too many. But I do know that the Latinx culture is in many ways, a reflection of European white supremacy ideologies. I think about the media and music that come from Latin America. I realize that we idolize people that are tall, blond, colored-eyed, and light-skinned. Very rarely do I see a Black person as a prominent figure in a telenovela or a movie.

2. When I was in high school, I used to tell my Latinx friends that I had only been mugged three times, and that all three times it was by a Black person. I don’t know why I said that but I’m sure I probably said it to fit in or to repeat the narrative that Black people are criminals. Looking back at it now, I realize that that wasn’t even true. I was mugged several times by other people. At least two times I was “jacked” by a fellow Latino and at least once I have almost robbed an Asian kid. In fact, the two times that people broke into my house, it was by Latino men. Yet, I only focused on the muggings by Black people.

3. While in the MSHE program, we were put into groups to write a collective paper. There was only one Black classmate in my group. We split the workup and then came together to read each other’s parts. Before I submitted the paper that included everyone’s parts, I ran the document through Grammarly without asking any of my group mates. As Grammarly made suggestions, I accepted the changes on behalf of my classmates without their consent. Then my Black classmate asked me why I changed her part of the paper. I simply stated that Grammarly suggested it and that I felt we would get a better grade without her grammatical errors. In essence, I erased my classmate’s voice from the paper. I made so many changes to her section that it no longer seemed like she wrote. I caused her mental harm, and I did it for class points. Points that I don’t really even care about all that much.

4. As part of the MSHE program’s summer session, we interviewed undergraduate students. I was in a group composed of two Latinx, two Asian, and one Black student. We all chose undergraduate students to interview. When we looked at the list of demographics of those we interviewed, we realized that the only Black undergraduate students interviewed were chosen by my Black classmate. I did what was most convenient to me and I only interviewed Latinx students. So even within our small group assignment, the Black voice was marginalized because I and most of my classmates avoided interviewing them as we should have.

5. My last point is surrounding the current status of my cohort and the Maywood Fair. About halfway through the semester, two Black classmates asked if anybody other than them was outreaching to the Black community. I remained silent. Then they offered cities that had a higher population of Black students. I wanted to say something, but I remained silent. Later the opportunity came to drive those communities and outreach, but I didn’t do it. After several discussions in class regarding the lack of Black participation in the Maywood Fair, I remained silent. Eventually, I began to speak up from time to time. Each time I was fighting the urge to remain silent. I realized that I’m so afraid of confrontation that I chose not to fight for Black students’ rights.

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Reflection

I met the learning outcome by writing about some self-reflection. I had spoken about some of these with classmates before, but this was the first time I put it into writing. I must say that it has been difficult to reflect on my actions in this manner. There is a lot of guilt, shame, and embarrassment associated with each one of these reflections. But I am choosing to take ownership of those negative feelings. I believe that I must face my actions if I am to truly grow as a person that wants to help our Black students. Anti-Blackness is so engrained in my upbringing and mentality that I don’t even realize I’m perpetuating it. I must therefore take time to reflect on my actions and the feedback from my colleagues so that I may continue to learn how to better serve all our students.