Becoming Anti-Racist Every Day
![[Image description: On a turquoise background is an illustration of three raised fists signifying people of color. The text reads: 5 years of Anti-Racism Resources. The NAAFA logo also appears.]](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5e7be2c55ceb261b71eadde2/2af03975-934d-4a4b-bb1b-22f7f11cb45d/5+years+of+ARR.png)
[Image description: On a turquoise background is an illustration of three raised fists signifying people of color. The text reads: 5 years of Anti-Racism Resources. The NAAFA logo also appears.]
By Darliene Howell, NAAFA Administrative Director
Five years ago this month, NAAFA began sharing Anti-Racism Resources with our community. Today I want to share with you how my learning led to this feature and how we hope it helps our community. I offer these reflections as an example to other white people.
My white, Southern-born father held many stereotypical racist beliefs. As a child, I had strong feelings that the things that sometimes came out of my father’s mouth were just wrong, but I felt I could not speak up against his racism until I became an adult. As an adolescent, I vowed never to be like him. Throughout my adulthood, I made friends with folks of all races and ethnicities. I love every one of them. I would have easily said that I was not prejudiced (as my parents would have said). I was not a racist!
Then, while serving as the Board Chair of NAAFA, I made a negative assumption about a Black woman NAAFA was working with. As fate would have it, she found out how I’d viewed her. I didn’t know her, so I had no foundation for my judgment. But she could see what the foundation of my assumption was– derogatory ideas about Black women.
I was called out for my assumptions. I was shown how the judgment was based on racist stereotypes and assumptions about Black women’s motives. I am thankful for the time and emotional labor she and others put into helping me understand. I was embarrassed and ashamed– ashamed for what I’d thought, and ashamed at how deeply racism can run. But being ashamed is not enough in dealing with our own racist beliefs and behaviors. I was acutely aware of how my attitudes had injured NAAFA. Most importantly, I had injured the woman I had misjudged.
I was in my 60’s, and I thought I had figured out long before how not to be like my dad in this way. I learned that the work of becoming anti-racist is never over. Once again, I resolved to do better.
My resolution to change began with introspection and education, and then I worked towards action. I knew that each of these needed to be done all and all three to make progress. Having now seen my need for growth in becoming anti-racist, I needed to understand how racism is systemic. I needed to learn more about where it comes from and how it is still spread today. So I started reading. I tapped into our biggest means of learning, the internet, and found articles and writings on being anti-racist. I wanted to do more to educate myself, and not expect my Black friends or other People of Color to educate me.
That same year, 2020, the murders of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd by police officers brought into focus the systemic racist underpinnings of our country as a whole. Like many organizations, NAAFA committed to do more to embrace intersectionality and to become an anti-racist organization during this time. We published a Black Lives Matter statement, and we committed as a board to anti-racism training. (In 2023, NAAFA reviewed and recommitted to anti-racism in our message from the Board of Directors, Black Lives Matter Now & Always). I wanted to share what I’d been learning on my own with others, especially with other white people. As the Board Chair, I knew I could use my position to help others learn from both my mistakes and my attempts to do better. In August 2020 I compiled the first Anti-Racism Resources and we began sharing educational resources in the monthly NAAFA Newsletter. This was the main message: “NOT BEING RACIST IS NOT ENOUGH. ANTI-RACISM IS ACTION!”
Since then, NAAFA has offered Anti-Racism Resources in our newsletter and our website. Each month’s collection offers references to articles, videos, or podcasts to help educate our white constituency in how to dismantle systemic racism in ourselves and in the world around us. Over the last five years, other white members of the NAAFA Board of Directors have collected and contributed resources for this feature. I say specifically other white Board members because it’s as it should be and will continue to be. Systemic racism is white supremacy. Of course, our colleagues who are People of Color are invited to contribute if they choose to but the expectation for our board is that this offering should never be dependent on their labor.
I continue to examine my deepest beliefs and feelings of what I was taught and look at things from different perspectives. I need to question everything that I thought to be true and see if it is based on racist ideology. If it’s racist, throw it out and replace it with a belief and action that is inclusive and affirming! Becoming anti-racist is a process, an unfolding, an examination of thoughts and beliefs. It’s not something that someone else can do for you. You have to do the work. It will be uncomfortable and it will take time and repetition. Once you uproot one racist belief, you’ll have to move on to the next. And there will be a next. It’s not one and done.
