One of the Core Principles of the People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond (PISAB) is
learning from history. This principle states, “History is a tool for effective organizing. Understanding the lessons of history allows us to create a more humane future.” (https://pisab.org/our-principles/.) I believe that one of the ways to resist cognitive inertia is to learn from history and to be willing to look at how our assumptions may not serve us in a way that supports and upholds our humanity and the humanity of others.  

I recently saw a Facebook post from December 2020 by Dr. Brittany Pearl reminding people that just because something is a law doesn’t mean it’s humane (https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=11317673). We have had, and still have, many unjust and inhumane laws in this country. Pearl writes, “In case y’all forgot, slavery was legal, segregation was legal, marital rape was legal….Upholding and enforcing unjust laws isn’t moral.”  This reminds me of what Reesma Menaken says in his book My Grandmother’s Hands about the way that trauma becomes culture. Using lynching as an example, he says, “What happened to the men (and women) in the lynching photo(s), and to many, many other men and women like them, was deep and persistent trauma. This trauma got transmitted and compounded through multiple generations; eventually, it began to look like culture.” In the same book, Menaken cites a James Baldwin quote that sheds light on the reason people hold tightly to their unprocessed trauma.  Baldwin says, “I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.” What Baldwin discusses is a fear – and therefore, not always the case.  

For the sake of this article, I’m referring to my experience as a white person and other white people that I know and work with. As a therapist, I am keenly aware of the many defense mechanisms that our minds employ to protect us from dealing with painful and discordant feelings, many of which are not easily accessible to our awareness. When these defense mechanisms are connected to race, they tend to dig in deep.  As Robin DiAngelo says, “We [white people]  consider a challenge to our racial worldviews as a challenge to our very identity as good, moral people. Thus, we perceive any attempt to connect us to the system of racism as an unsettling and unfair moral offense. The smallest amount of racial stress is intolerable; the mere suggestion that being white has meaning triggers a range of defensive responses.”

For white people, the idea of seeing ourselves as oppressors can be so repugnant that we hide behind our subjugated identities and our identity as “good moral people.” I believe that subconsciously and unconsciously we fear that challenging our worldview will cause us to unravel and come apart. Therefore, we build well-guarded defenses to keep our fortresses sturdy and secure.  I often liken this to the game of Jenga in which players take turns pulling out pieces until the structure collapses. There is a deep fear in the heart of most of us white people of collapsing, yet I truly believe that it is the collapse that allows us to release unhelpful defense mechanisms and begin to heal. Sometimes, the structure is rotting, and we need to let the house down to build something more human, equitable, and sustainable. 

 I also believe that FEAR is at the core of white defensiveness.  Many of us white people push back against the term “white privilege” because we feel that in order for things to be truly equitable, we have to give up some of what we have (i.e., our piece of the pie.)  It took me a while to understand that sharing privilege doesn’t mean giving up on mine.  In all honesty, I’m not looking to give away my privilege, BUT I can work toward ensuring everyone has the same privileges.  Many of us (white folks) can’t imagine what this would look like so we fall back on the zero-sum story. Heather McGhee, in her book, The Sum of Us, defines this as “I will profit at your expense,” which is deeply embedded in white supremacy culture.  McGhee says, “The logical extension of the zero-sum story is that a future without racism is something white people should fear because there will be nothing good from them in it.” This brings us back to FEAR.  

When we live in fear and unmetabolized generational trauma, this cycle is doomed to repeat itself.  However, to quote Resmaa Menakem again, “When, over time, enough bodies heal from historical, intergenerational, and personal trauma and learn to harmonize, that harmony can turn into a culture of resilience and flow.” This healing is the key to pushing through cognitive inertia and creating a culture of “resilience and flow.” A culture of understanding.