How to Be an Antiracist - Ibram X. Kendi
2019 One World Publishing
I come from the world of problem-solving. Identifying problems, defining problems, finding root causes, assigning action, verfiying results: these are the tools that are used to make permanent, positive change. Dr. Kendi understands this, and gets everything correct.
Definitions anchor us in principles. If we don’t do the basic work of defining the kind of people we want to be, in language that is stable and consistent, we can’t work toward stable and consistent goals.
Kendi provides definitions.
...race is fundamentally a power construct of blended difference that lives socially. Race creates new forms of power: the power to categorize and judge, elevate and downgrade, include and exclude.
In the above definition, blended means making groups out of individuals; a central idea in racist thought. Why does this happen?
...racist power creates racist policies out of raw self-interest; the racist policies necessitate racist ideas to justify them…
and
This is the consistent function of racist ideas - and of any kind of bigotry more broadly: to manipulate us into seeing people as the problem, instead of the policies that ensnare them.
and
One either believes that problems are rooted in groups of people, as a racist, or locates the roots of problems in power and policies, as an antiracist.
For your “I don’t see color” friends.
There is no such thing as non-racist or race-neutral policy. Every policy in every institution, in every community, in every nation, is producing or sustaining either racial inequity or equity between racial groups.
and
...post-racial strategy makes no sense in our racist world. Race is a mirage, but one that humanity has organized itself around in very real ways. Imagining away the existence of races in a racist world is as conserving and harmful as imagining away classes in a capitalistic world - it allows the ruling races and classes to keep on ruling.
So, before I run too far down the path of over-quoting for fair use, let me say here that Dr. Kendi’s writing is immediate and powerful. He deals specifically with ways that his thinking has been forced to evolve as he has become more and more educated. In turn, we can all benefit from his education.
The last pages of the book have specific actions that we can take to improve equitable outcomes for Black Americans, thereby creating a more equitable society for us all.
I can whole-heartedly recommend this book.