Sunday, June 29, 2014
The Lesion Journals: Top 5 Reasons Why MS SoftServe Rocks
The Lesion Journals: Top 5 Reasons Why MS SoftServe Rocks: Coming soon to a computer near you - MS SoftServe! In the event that you haven’t heard about the amazing work my buddy Amy Gurow...
Tuesday, July 16, 2013
Racists' Anonymous - in response to the Zimmerman Verdict
In response to the court verdict acquitting George Zimmerman of the murder of Trayvon Martin... (Why? One very eloquent black man has explained "why" here: )
Race was at the core of this case and race it why it became a symbol of such great weight and meaning. To us Trayvon Martin was not just murdered, he was martyred. In death he bore witness to the racism and oppression that blacks and other people of colour experience every day. Why was Trayvon Martin threatening to George Zimmerman? For the same reason that I am threatening to the mothers who claw their children back when I smile and wave back to them on the bus, the men who watch me like hawks when I pet their dogs on the street, and the staff who follow me in their stores. Everywhere I go I am a threat, an outsider, an other. I am a threat because you see me, or at least some of me, yet somehow you do not see this. In Trayvon Martin’s death and George Zimmerman’s trial the world, for a moment, saw. For a few short seconds all eyes turned upon a racially motivated crime, upon a black boy killed for blackness itself. But now the world has turned away because the court has comfortably ruled that blackness really is threatening and you really are justified in keeping watch for it in your communities and resisting it with deadly force. We were wrong, it seems. You will not see.
You will not see his martyrdom because it is woven into the frabic of your privilege, the cloth that the world has tied around your eyes. I will see it every time I look in the mirror, because in my brown skin is the crime for which Trayvon Martin died.
From "An open letter to whites about the black community and the Trayvon Martin case" on The Molinist blog
And here is what I say:
I acknowledge that racism exists.
I acknowledge that white privilege exists.
I acknowledge that I benefit from white privilege, and that I am a carrier of the social-cultural virus that is racism.
I acknowledge that I did not choose to be racist, but that I, and I alone, and responsible for the work of deprogramming my racism.
I have, in fact, been racist my whole life. It wasn't a choice I made. It's the way I was trained to see the world. The way I was trained to see reality. It wasn't a choice that anyone before me made either... my family is Good People. We all get along pretty well too.
We are not gun-toting right-to-life'ers; we all generally think that the KKK is fucked; many of us have lots of friends who are people of color... some of us are republican, some of us are Christian, of us are liberal, some of us are atheist, or even pagan. We are not war mongers, and though most of us might not identify as pacifists... our family culture is definitely to be lovers, not fighters.
Those in my parents generation lived through the Civil Rights Movement, and they were trained that Discrimination is Bad. The were trained that Racism is Bad. They were told, Don't Be a Racist. And so that's what they did... laws were made, and policies were put in place to stop people from being racists.
Those in my generation learned about the Civil Rights Movement in school. We learned how the United States used to be racist. How schools and neighborhoods used to be segregated. How people used to be judged on the color of their skin... we learned about how bad things used to be, and how it's sooo much better now... because we have laws and regulations and policies to protect minorities...
But did those laws and regulations and policies really fix anything? Did they actually do anything to stop people from being racist? Or did they just villify the idea of racism... and steal away the grass-roots movement, the real healing process... steal it away from the people and turn it into the prerogative of the bureaucracy... "It's not my job to stop racism... that's what those laws are for..." "I'm not racist, I'm a good person!"
But we are still racist. We are still acting out white supremacy. We are still complacently supporting the ideals and values of the KKK. And what does white supremacy culture look like? Oh, but it's subtle... subtle to us who live inside it, and see the world and the fabric of our reality through its lenses...
White supremacy looks like this:
“I visited Borders Books three or four years ago. I went to buy a book of poems by Gwendolyn Brooks, an African American poet. When I couldn’t find it in the poetry section, I went to the help desk and was told that it was in the African American section, five or sex shelves near the front of the store on which all types of literature by Black people had been placed. In another part of the store, in a similar setup, was the Gay and Lesbian section—literature of all kinds written by gay and lesbian folks. (I forgot to check to see where they had shelved James Baldwin, who was both Black and gay.)White supremacy is when a black friend of yours talks about their experience of racism in some small way, and you explain to them how racism has actually ended, about how the oppressive actions they experienced were not actually racism, how they're just being oversesitive.
[…]First, I realized that my sister, for example, was unlikely to encounter anything written by someone gay or African American unless she purposefully searched for those shelves, so her learning was curtailed by Borders’s marketing approach. Second, by organizing books in this way, I think the store was assuming that a reader would want something specifically by a Black author, as opposed to just reading a good novel that happened to be written by an African American.
Third…the rest of the literature section was not labeled “straight white fiction." Seriously. So a customer could go to the literature section and look through all the books, never aware that all she or he was seeing was fiction by white authors. The pernicious privilege is: simply don’t include the Other, and then act as though the picture is complete. In a sick way, it is brilliant.”
~ Frances E. Kendall, Understanding White Privilege
In the words of one eloquent black man who has gone to great effort to translate himself to a white audience:
I want racism to end but almost as much I want to stop being told by whites that it has. I want every white person I ever complain to about the years of piling slights, the extra hours at airport security, the half-seen glances from across the bus from eyes that fearfully refuse to meet mine, to respond with compassion and credulity and not to even think about explaining them away or ‘informing’ me that racism died with Rosa Park or MLK or whatever and they would know. I want white people to stop questioning my experience of racism, to stop defending every offender as ‘just doing his job’ or ‘just doing whatever.’White supremacy is any time we see a black kid walking through a white neighbourhood and assume they don't belong there. White supremacy is that I, as a white kid, could get arrested for shoplifting at the age of 17, and essentially get a very literal "slap on the wrist" by a community board, where a black girl would have had much worse consequences. White supremacy is acted out in our policing and court systems, but also in our schools.
[...]
Here’s the thing: it’s not about you. You are not the one who is slurred, you’re not the one who is refused service, and you’re certainly not the one who is shot in the street. It’s about us. I want you to acknowlegde that fact. To recognise that I experience racism.From "An open letter to whites about the black community and the Trayvon Martin case" on The Molinist blog
Students of color face harsher punishments in school than their white peers, leading to a higher number of youth of color incarcerated. Black and Hispanic students represent more than 70 percent of those involved in school-related arrests or referrals to law enforcement. Currently, African Americans make up two-fifths and Hispanics one-fifth of confined youth today.White supremacy looks like this:
The American Prospect, by Sophia Kerby
1 in every 15 African American men and 1 in every 36 Hispanic men are incarcerated in comparison to 1 in every 106 white men.And like this:
The American Prospect, by Sophia Kerby
 |
| U.S. population by race |
 |
U.S. inmates by race |
Among men born between 1965 and 1969, 3 percent of whites and 20 percent of blacks had served time in prison by their early thirties. Among black men born during this period, 30 percent of those without college education and nearly 60 percent of high school dropouts went to prison by 1999. -P.A.P. Blog // Human Rights EtcWhite supremacy is the criminalization and villainization of black men. "But," we say, "isn't there a very real reality there...? Isn't it true that those neighborhoods... those populations... those people are inherently more violent? Isn't it just part of the culture...?"
HELL FUCKING NO IT IS NOT. Violence and drug use... those are symptoms of depression. Symptoms of PTSD. Symptoms of the systemic and ongoing oppression that is being enacted on those communities. If we want to reduce crime, the solution is not putting more people in jail. It is exactly the opposite. PUTTING LESS PEOPLE IN JAIL WILL REDUCE CRIME AND POVERTY. Because when 1 in 3 black men is imprisoned in their lifetime, it becomes legal to discriminate against them. It becomes impossible for them to get a job, impossible for them to find housing, nearly impossible for them to turn their lives around to become stable, contributing members of the community in the way that the government, the way that white supremacy says they should...
And the incarceration is a self replicating, self-sustaining downward spiral of oppression, depression, destruction of communities.
So yeah, there are big fancy statistics that show clearly, without a doubt, that America is still racist. That we are still oppressing black people and people of color, systematically, institutionally...
But I'm a Good Liberal, I'm a A Good Person, and I was taught to Not Be Racist in elementary school... I'm not responsible for all of those black men being in jail...didn't they just "make some bad choices"?
But race has nothing to do with one's prevalence for criminal behavior. It has nothing to do with it. White people are just as likely to do drugs, engage in domestic violence, shoplift, and steel as people of color are. "But what about gangs? Don't they promote a culture of violence and crime?" Once again, that's a defensive mechanism, a very reasonable and understandable response to an ongoing campaign of violence and war being waged against their communities.
The unavoidable truth is that people of color simply face harsher punishments in the justice systems, and more intense interference and scrutiny by police in their neighborhoods, than white people do.
So again, I'm not a cop... and I'm not a teacher... and I'm not an employer... and I'm not a judge... It's not my fault that all of those black men are in prison. It's not my fault that George Zimmerman shot Trayvon Martin... I live in Seattle, after all, and that happened in Florida...
Except that I am responsible for the programming that I carry. I am still responsible for my actions. My complacency in the death of Trayvon Martin looks like this:
[paraphrasing: A white woman has a conversation in passing with a random man...] "I really like this library--" he said, and I said me too! but he was still going "--because there aren't a bunch of black boys here, so I don't have to worry about my bike getting stolen."And I, too, am ashamed, because I have been through this exact same scenario more times than I am even conscious of. And the question is how? How do I take responsibility for that? How do I stop being complacent? I have the same answere as Katie Prout: WE TELL THE TRUTH. WE BE BRAVE, AND WE TELL THE TRUTH.
[...]
This man did not have the same struggle for words. He saw the shocked look on my face and was quick to sputter, "I mean, don't get me wrong, I like black people. But other libraries have gangs of these kids roaming around, stealing things and causing trouble, and I just don't want my bike stolen, you know?"These kids. You know.
[...]
I was scared, and I didn't want to offend him, but as hard as it is for me to tell you this, in that moment, speaking up was less important to me than avoiding an uncomfortable conversation. So, however quick, I made a choice, and it was to stay silent.
Silence kills people. Ideas kill people. Allowing a narrative of the dangerous black boy to perpetuate in my white presence kills people. I made the wrong choice, and I am ashamed. [my emphasis]
From an absolutely brilliant blog post that I highly recommend anyone read all of: "White People" by Katie Prout
We tell the truth even when it's awkward. We tell the truth even when it makes us feel uncomfortable. We tell the truth even when it hurts someone's feelings. We tell the truth even when there are risks.
The truth is that white people are just as likely to commit crimes as brown and black people. The truth is that people of color walk through the world every day feeling the wounds of racism and oppression in all of the little tiny ways that we don't even realize exist. The truth is that the Scary Black Man is a person. And his life is every bit as precious and important as mine.
The truth is that every time we villanize someone... the Scary Black Man... the Drug Addict... the Criminal Thief... every time we create an Other, somewhere down the line our story results in real death.
The question, is not "How do we properly punish Zimmerman?" because I do not believe that punishment works. Punishing Zimmerman won't help end racism any more than imprisoning all of those black men stops violent crime. That said, finding Zimmerman guilty of murder could have been a powerful message saying that this behavior is not acceptable. Instead, we condoned his actions. We said "yes, it was reasonable for you to assume that this kid was dangerous based on racial profiling."
But the real question is "How do we heal?" How do we support the oppressed communities of color in healing from their decades of trauma..? How do we heal ourselves from the decades-long trauma of being racist? The trauma of being the villain? One place is to stop villanizing everyone. We villanize the Scary Black Man, and we villanize the Corrupt Police, and we villanize the Gun-Toting Racist... but all of that villanization and "justice" and punishment... it just keeps perpetuating the same cycles of violence.
HOW DO WE HEAL?
We begin by listening. We begin by acknowledging uncomfortable truths. We begin by forgiving ourselves. We begin by breaking down any and all construction of "other-ness". This is not to say that we ignore cultural differences. I am not advocating "color-blindness". Only that we see our wonderful, amazing diversity, and all of the beautiful different ways that people can be in the world, and celebrate that and respect it, and also know when any of us suffers, we all suffer. While all of those black men are in prison... while all of those communities suffer in violence and chaos caused by decades of oppression... I can have no peace. My healing is not complete without their healing, and my prosperity is meaningless without their prosperity.
Villainizing Zimmerman won't help us heal. He needs healing as much as any of us. But his healing is not the responsibility of the black community. His healing is my responsibility. It is the responsibility of his community. But most of all, it is his responsibility. Villanizing racism and equating it with the most extreme, most violent version of itself will not help us heal. We heal by bringing it out into the light, looking at it closely and understanding it. We heal by acknowledging its existence.
Racism is indeed a socio-cultural disease. It is an addiction. As a white person, I see how my complacency in the racist system is another way in which I have been trained to oppress myself. And like forgiveness, healing it is not a light-switch that I suddenly get to switch off and then be done. It is an ongoing, lifelong process. It is a process of being open and vulnerable. It is a process of allowing people say to me "This behavior you just did, it was racist." And it is a process of becoming brave enough to say these things myself, when appropriate.
But none of this can be accomplished without compassion and forgiveness. Because without those, we just continue perpetuating the cycles of violence... and each of us begins with choosing to have compassion and forgiveness for ourselves. For our deepest, darkest demons and monsters.
Wednesday, July 3, 2013
Layers of privilege, and the word "bitch"
Ok so there's a little story that's been stuck in my head. It's the story of how I got from a point of being defensive about my act of cultural appropriation, to realization, understanding, and gratitude to the people who were calling me out.
Nobody is asking me for this post, but it's stuck in my head and I gotta get it out. Because there's a lot of white people out there who just don't understand and I haven't been brave enough to go and bring up this conversation with them, like,
So in the first place, if it is a grey area, it was never my place to argue the nuances of it. That discussion belongs to the people whose culture I was appropriating. As a white lady with privilege, looking for ways to proactively de-construct and de-program my white privilege, it's my job to respect and uphold the most sensitive interpretation of that boundary.
And here's why: (bear with me, it's a story)
In the midst of my defensiveness, while I was spending a few days indulging in emotive petulance - even at the height of my self-justification - I just kept having flashes of the feelings I get when I try to call out dudes for various versions of sexism and male privilege, and the way they brush me off, all defensive and like,
[I am skipping the work of explaining why "bitch" is such a hurtful word to me, but a friend and blogger has eloquently explained it in detail here "On the Word Bitch". I highly recommend her writing.]
I usually don't call men out on using the word "bitch". Because telling a man that he is sexast is a scary thing to do. Because they get all angry and threatening, like, "What??? What the fuck are you talking about?" Or are supremely dismissive, which is often much worse. I don't usually put the effort into checking someone unless I am fond of them and feel like I have some investment in my friendship with them. I don't put the effort into checking people unless I have already have some respect for them.
And the thing is, that's often when it hurts the most to be dismissed. Some crotchety old dude who mostly spends time immersed in violent male culture of some sort, like, say the construction industry (a violent male space I have way too much experience in)... I don't have a lot of expectations. A guy like that uses the word "bitch" and it's easier to brush it off. But when some liberal, perhaps an activist guy, perhaps someone I think of as an ally... someone I feel safe around... bandies about this word... well that especially stings. Or this dude talks over me in a conversation, or ignores my opinions in deference to some other dude, or wants to hit on me or flirt with me in "professional" space, or say something about my appearance and be all like, "what, it's just a compliment, can't I give you a compliment?"
When a guy who I think I can feel SAFE around exhibits some sexist thing... I think: ok, well I'm friends with this guy, that means it's safe for me to check him. It's safe for me to say, "Hey, I think you're being kinda sexist there." And I hope he'll respond like, "oh thanks for letting me know, I didn't realize that was a thing".
But more likely, the response is something like, "Phfffff. Whatever, you're just being oversensitive." [insert dudely diatribe about the feminist conspiracy to disempower men]. And very rarely do I respond further. I usually don't argue much, I just mutter something like, "huh, your experience of reality is different from mine..." and let it go.
Because I don't feel safe. Being shot down once, I'm not likely to put myself out there and push the issue. Partly, that's just me... direct conflict is intensely difficult for me to deal with. A lot of that is Seattle's passive-aggressive culture... a culture of avoiding direct conflict. 'Cause let's face it: white people [the dominant culture of wealth and privilege] in Seattle seriously cannot handle direct conflict. We'll do almost anything to avoid it.
Another layer is my conditioning as a woman - conditioning that tells me to Always Be Nice, Don't Make Other People Feel Bad, Your Opinion Is Less Important Than Other People's Feelings. Conditioning that perpetuates the sexist programming that makes those guys think it's okay for them to insult each other with the word "bitch", or to refer to some fierce person who intimidates them, or whom they want to belittle.
[Here there could be a whole separate blog post about aggressive male conditioning giving men permission to make other people feel uncomfortable all the time... rewarding them for imposing their thoughts, opinions, dominance on others... I don't quite have time here. But this other lady wrote a great post about it...]
And then there's the further layers of hurt and betrayal I feel when I hear women use the word as a negative insult... and it can be so much harder to call them on it, because they often feel entitled, or they've internalized so much oppression and sexism, that they're even more dismissive of the conversation than men are.
Anyways... me and my passive-aggressive self don't generally push it much. If I do call someone on sexist language or behavior and it's batted down, I usually don't have the energy to counter. I shut down. I feel a little less safe around that person. I close myself off and share myself less. I may still be friendly, but I'm usually less excited about trying to hang out with them. I certainly don't allow them into my sacred space. I trust them less.
And maybe that dude is on their own time, doing their own work. Maybe they did hear my words, but they weren't brave enough to acknowledge it in front of the other dudes... maybe they'll come around to the realization slowly... but by the time they do, I've already felt shut down... I've already decided that I'm not as excited as I thought I was about being friends with them... I still trust them less.
So I thought about all of this. And I thought about all of the people who were writing angry comments about how much bullshit I was perpetrating making dreamcatchers. "It seems like a grey area..." "I think I'm being respectful..." and a whole bunch of people said,
And at first I got defensive, at first I started to say, "well actually, no, it's fine, and let me explain to you why..." which is exactly what dudes do when I tell them I think they're being sexist and they try to explain to me when and where it is appropriate for me to feel offended... they try to define my experience... And you know what? No one gets to define my experience but ME.
I realized, "Oh shit, I'm doing the same thing that those privileged sexist dudes do. I'm doing it to these people of color and indigenous people. Huh. No wonder they're pissed off at me..."
I am learning... I am a slow learner. De-programming my white middle-class privilege is an act no less profound than dismantling and re-assembling the fabric of my own reality. It can be destabilizing. It is pretty scary [where there is fear, there is power]. My process is slow, and often messy. I happen to be a little more melodramatic about it than some... But it also feels like freedom. And it is sooo much better than staying asleep, sick, complacent...
I try to remember this feeling and have compassion for the dudes when I tell them they're being sexist assholes... But sometimes the energy of getting up the gumption to confront people on their privilege uses up all of the energy we have for being gentle. Which is why, when people get pissed at me, I try very hard not to be defensive, I try to listen carefully to what they're saying.
I could have done better at that this last time, with the dreamcatchers. And that is why I ended up needing to apologise. The same lessons get repeated over and over again until we learn...
Maybe this experience and writing this post will help me be more proactive in calling people out on their privilege. Maybe it will also help me be more gentle about it, understanding that it's big work to tell someone to reconstruct the foundation of their perception of reality... Because while I understand the anger that many people feel about all of the layers of oppression.... and I generally agree that the anger is valuable and valid... I personally don't have the energy to be angry all the time. But I think I do have the energy to be gentle, and take on the work of helping to teach privileged people to see through other's eyes.
And certainly, it has taught me to be more responsive to people telling me when I am crossing a line, violating boundaries.
Nobody is asking me for this post, but it's stuck in my head and I gotta get it out. Because there's a lot of white people out there who just don't understand and I haven't been brave enough to go and bring up this conversation with them, like,
"Hey, you remember when I was doing that art project, and we talked about it, and we were both like, 'naw, dude, that's totally fine.' Yeah, remember that? Well just so you know, it actually wasn't fine."I haven't been brave enough, because the reaction I expect to get from many is basically this: "What? No, you're crazy!" Because the thing I wasn't brave enough to do in the first place was to ignore all of those other privileged white people who gave me all sorts of layers of excuses, and I wanted to hang onto the threads of approval from the few indigenous people who thought it was fine, who liked the art, who appreciated all of my consideration.
So in the first place, if it is a grey area, it was never my place to argue the nuances of it. That discussion belongs to the people whose culture I was appropriating. As a white lady with privilege, looking for ways to proactively de-construct and de-program my white privilege, it's my job to respect and uphold the most sensitive interpretation of that boundary.
And here's why: (bear with me, it's a story)
In the midst of my defensiveness, while I was spending a few days indulging in emotive petulance - even at the height of my self-justification - I just kept having flashes of the feelings I get when I try to call out dudes for various versions of sexism and male privilege, and the way they brush me off, all defensive and like,
"Naw, I'm not sexist, you're being over sensitive."And I thought about how shitty and shut-down that makes me feel. I thought about the nauseating punched-in-the-gut-feeling I get whenever I hear someone (of any gender) use the word "bitch" as an insult or negative curse. And I do hear it, OFTEN. And every time I hear someone say it, it hurts.
[I am skipping the work of explaining why "bitch" is such a hurtful word to me, but a friend and blogger has eloquently explained it in detail here "On the Word Bitch". I highly recommend her writing.]
I usually don't call men out on using the word "bitch". Because telling a man that he is sexast is a scary thing to do. Because they get all angry and threatening, like, "What??? What the fuck are you talking about?" Or are supremely dismissive, which is often much worse. I don't usually put the effort into checking someone unless I am fond of them and feel like I have some investment in my friendship with them. I don't put the effort into checking people unless I have already have some respect for them.
And the thing is, that's often when it hurts the most to be dismissed. Some crotchety old dude who mostly spends time immersed in violent male culture of some sort, like, say the construction industry (a violent male space I have way too much experience in)... I don't have a lot of expectations. A guy like that uses the word "bitch" and it's easier to brush it off. But when some liberal, perhaps an activist guy, perhaps someone I think of as an ally... someone I feel safe around... bandies about this word... well that especially stings. Or this dude talks over me in a conversation, or ignores my opinions in deference to some other dude, or wants to hit on me or flirt with me in "professional" space, or say something about my appearance and be all like, "what, it's just a compliment, can't I give you a compliment?"
When a guy who I think I can feel SAFE around exhibits some sexist thing... I think: ok, well I'm friends with this guy, that means it's safe for me to check him. It's safe for me to say, "Hey, I think you're being kinda sexist there." And I hope he'll respond like, "oh thanks for letting me know, I didn't realize that was a thing".
But more likely, the response is something like, "Phfffff. Whatever, you're just being oversensitive." [insert dudely diatribe about the feminist conspiracy to disempower men]. And very rarely do I respond further. I usually don't argue much, I just mutter something like, "huh, your experience of reality is different from mine..." and let it go.
Because I don't feel safe. Being shot down once, I'm not likely to put myself out there and push the issue. Partly, that's just me... direct conflict is intensely difficult for me to deal with. A lot of that is Seattle's passive-aggressive culture... a culture of avoiding direct conflict. 'Cause let's face it: white people [the dominant culture of wealth and privilege] in Seattle seriously cannot handle direct conflict. We'll do almost anything to avoid it.
Another layer is my conditioning as a woman - conditioning that tells me to Always Be Nice, Don't Make Other People Feel Bad, Your Opinion Is Less Important Than Other People's Feelings. Conditioning that perpetuates the sexist programming that makes those guys think it's okay for them to insult each other with the word "bitch", or to refer to some fierce person who intimidates them, or whom they want to belittle.
[Here there could be a whole separate blog post about aggressive male conditioning giving men permission to make other people feel uncomfortable all the time... rewarding them for imposing their thoughts, opinions, dominance on others... I don't quite have time here. But this other lady wrote a great post about it...]
And then there's the further layers of hurt and betrayal I feel when I hear women use the word as a negative insult... and it can be so much harder to call them on it, because they often feel entitled, or they've internalized so much oppression and sexism, that they're even more dismissive of the conversation than men are.
Anyways... me and my passive-aggressive self don't generally push it much. If I do call someone on sexist language or behavior and it's batted down, I usually don't have the energy to counter. I shut down. I feel a little less safe around that person. I close myself off and share myself less. I may still be friendly, but I'm usually less excited about trying to hang out with them. I certainly don't allow them into my sacred space. I trust them less.
And maybe that dude is on their own time, doing their own work. Maybe they did hear my words, but they weren't brave enough to acknowledge it in front of the other dudes... maybe they'll come around to the realization slowly... but by the time they do, I've already felt shut down... I've already decided that I'm not as excited as I thought I was about being friends with them... I still trust them less.
So I thought about all of this. And I thought about all of the people who were writing angry comments about how much bullshit I was perpetrating making dreamcatchers. "It seems like a grey area..." "I think I'm being respectful..." and a whole bunch of people said,
"Oh hell no. You are in, fact, being a privileged white jerk."
And at first I got defensive, at first I started to say, "well actually, no, it's fine, and let me explain to you why..." which is exactly what dudes do when I tell them I think they're being sexist and they try to explain to me when and where it is appropriate for me to feel offended... they try to define my experience... And you know what? No one gets to define my experience but ME.
I realized, "Oh shit, I'm doing the same thing that those privileged sexist dudes do. I'm doing it to these people of color and indigenous people. Huh. No wonder they're pissed off at me..."
I am learning... I am a slow learner. De-programming my white middle-class privilege is an act no less profound than dismantling and re-assembling the fabric of my own reality. It can be destabilizing. It is pretty scary [where there is fear, there is power]. My process is slow, and often messy. I happen to be a little more melodramatic about it than some... But it also feels like freedom. And it is sooo much better than staying asleep, sick, complacent...
I try to remember this feeling and have compassion for the dudes when I tell them they're being sexist assholes... But sometimes the energy of getting up the gumption to confront people on their privilege uses up all of the energy we have for being gentle. Which is why, when people get pissed at me, I try very hard not to be defensive, I try to listen carefully to what they're saying.
I could have done better at that this last time, with the dreamcatchers. And that is why I ended up needing to apologise. The same lessons get repeated over and over again until we learn...
Maybe this experience and writing this post will help me be more proactive in calling people out on their privilege. Maybe it will also help me be more gentle about it, understanding that it's big work to tell someone to reconstruct the foundation of their perception of reality... Because while I understand the anger that many people feel about all of the layers of oppression.... and I generally agree that the anger is valuable and valid... I personally don't have the energy to be angry all the time. But I think I do have the energy to be gentle, and take on the work of helping to teach privileged people to see through other's eyes.
And certainly, it has taught me to be more responsive to people telling me when I am crossing a line, violating boundaries.
Thursday, June 27, 2013
Lessons Learned from traveling in Colombia
Many of these lessons came out of work I did during an ongoing series of Ayahuaska ceremonies. At one point, while talking with a friend named Makensie, we were wondering "How do I carry this home with me? How do I go back to the place where everyone expects me to be the way I was before, and be this new person I am now?"
And I remembered meeting another traveller who had written himself an epic manifesto of his intentions for his trip, and I remembered wishing I had done that for myself starting out my own trip.
And in talking to my friend Makensie, I thought, "well let's write ourselves manifestos for going home and taking out lessons with us."
So we did. And here it is. It feels especially right for me to re-write this here and now, as I think I need a reminder.
LESSONS:
Hmmm. Repetition. I am a slow learner.
And I remembered meeting another traveller who had written himself an epic manifesto of his intentions for his trip, and I remembered wishing I had done that for myself starting out my own trip.
And in talking to my friend Makensie, I thought, "well let's write ourselves manifestos for going home and taking out lessons with us."
So we did. And here it is. It feels especially right for me to re-write this here and now, as I think I need a reminder.
LESSONS:
- I am not broken - I do not need to be fixed
- (neither is anyone else, nor the world)
- No part of human activity is outside the ecological systems of the earth - including violence and destruction
- THINKING is the opposite of consciousness - to Dream and to follow our Dreams is to be truly awake and present
- input from dad: "thinking is a tool" which is true! still not the same as consciousness
- In order to change the world, all we really have to do is to DREAM - to heal ourselves, enable others to heal themselves, to learn how to embody love
- But we cannot be awake until we are finished sleeping...
- When we dream of violence, we create it in the world
- I sleep until I wake up
- I dream my dreams, and follow their lead
- I dance/play/do yoga every day
- I am conscious of the flow of energy around me and I dance with it
- I do what I feel like
- I speak my mind without worrying about making other people unhappy or insecure (because sometimes, the act of asserting my boundaries might be offensive to others, and sometimes being offended/hurt/insecure is the work that other people are doing and I do not need to take on responsibility for that)
- I remember that Listening, Thinking, and Speaking are three different activities that cannot be done at the same time
- I do one thing at a time
- I pursue open, loving relationships with people am attracted to without a sexual agenda.
- I move at my own pace
- I AM MY AUTHENTIC SELF
- I practice communicating without speaking
- I embody love
Hmmm. Repetition. I am a slow learner.
Second half of my travel blog...
Ok so it´s been a good long while since I´ve updated...
I am [was] in the town of Salento, Colombia. This place is sort of like a magic fairy land... It´s in the low mountains of Western Colombia. Salento is definitely a tourist town, but in the sort of way where you show up, and you think, "holy shit, this is amazing, I want to bring everyone I love to this place...!"
I came here straight from a Hari Krishna farm about an hour away. The Hari Krishna farm had sort of a weird vibe [more analysis of that for other posts], so I ran away for the weekend, with two nice dudes from Portland. Austin and Travis are lovely, and when they said they were leaving the Hari Krishna farm, headed for this magical place called Salento, where psychedelic mushrooms can be found in the cow paddies all ´round the town... I decided to tag along with them for the weekend. What I found was waaay more than I expected, though.
When I started out this journey, I set an intention to seek out and explore healing sanctuaries. Well, I didn´t really have any idea how to find them, and after the melodrama of loosing my shit in the first week of my trip, and scary intimidation of being in a foreign country, and language barriers, and upfront and intense experience of intense misogyny and being harassed on the street simply for being female... I had sort of lost the thread of that intention. While I was still at the farm outside of Bogota (where they have solid internet), I was stressing myself out with neurotic anxiety, trying to figure out WHERE AM I GOING AND WHAT AM I DOING ON THIS TRIP??? I bounced back and forth between trying to find a gig teaching art to kids, deciding whether to spend money on Spanish lessons, going to the jungle, going to Ecuador... OMG, so many potential options! At various points, I nearly hyperventilated.
And then I landed in Salento... and my first night there, chatting with another person at the fabled hostel nested in the middle of mushroom-sprouting cow fields... I heard tell of an Ayhuaska ceremony... Now, I´ve heard a lot of things about this "drug", Ayhuaska. It´s culturally equivalent to Peyote, which is used by shamans in the deserts of North America. But Ayhuaska is a jungle plant, grows only in the Amazon. And in order to brew and administer it, a person is supposed to be a fully trained shaman. It´s NOT a recreational drug. In fact, for those using it without the right intention (healing, spiritual exploration), it often just make them nauseous and vomitty. It makes most people nauseous and vomitty, but also gives you visions about the world and it can teach you to understand yourself.
And so, with only a day´s notice, I found myself signing up for this ceremony. I was a little nervous, since I´d heard horror stories about opportunistic people rounding up a gang of gringoes, handing them a cup of ayhyaska brew to drink, and then abandoning them to the experience without support or guidance on the journey... But the people at the hostel assured me that this ceremony had no relation to those stories.
And in fact, they turned out to be right. What I had found was a healing sanctuary. A healing sanctuary of indigenous, South America culture and spirituality. That's pretty much what I had been looking for. At this point, I was a little more than a month into my trip, and even though all sorts of other amazing places in South America were pulling at me, I realized that this place... well there was no way I could find another equally good place to hang out within my small remaining time window of two months.
The best part about the maloka and community surrounding Taita Carlos in Armenia is that fact that there are all sorts of healing communities I could have found... including farms and monestaries and yoga centers... but the main issue I had with most of those places, is that they were run by rich (by local standards, at least) white people from the US or Europe, who had gone to cheap, "unstable" countries, and are working to "teach & develop" the local people. Well, as much as I'm sure those people have good intentions, they're also full of privilege, racism, and bullshit. I hadn't thought this all through totally before this trip, but it was there in my head, and I'm very glad I ended up where I did.
What I liked about the healing community of Taita Carlos is that it is a place where the travellers are students of the local people, and the local people are in charge, and they are consciously inviting foreign travellers to come learn with them. This is a crucial distinction, and will certainly inform the course of my future travels.
So, there are lots and lots of stories I could tell about my experiences at this healing center; some real, but more fantastical. But I don't think I'm gonna write them all out in this blog. I will turn them into fantastical stories and paintings and art.
So now I am home. I've been home for about a week. At this rate, I've got a continuing backlog of nearly a whole month on my blog, and sometimes thinking about all of the things I want to write about stresses me out... But mostly I'm working to practice the lessons I learned from my experiences.
I am [was] in the town of Salento, Colombia. This place is sort of like a magic fairy land... It´s in the low mountains of Western Colombia. Salento is definitely a tourist town, but in the sort of way where you show up, and you think, "holy shit, this is amazing, I want to bring everyone I love to this place...!"
I came here straight from a Hari Krishna farm about an hour away. The Hari Krishna farm had sort of a weird vibe [more analysis of that for other posts], so I ran away for the weekend, with two nice dudes from Portland. Austin and Travis are lovely, and when they said they were leaving the Hari Krishna farm, headed for this magical place called Salento, where psychedelic mushrooms can be found in the cow paddies all ´round the town... I decided to tag along with them for the weekend. What I found was waaay more than I expected, though.
When I started out this journey, I set an intention to seek out and explore healing sanctuaries. Well, I didn´t really have any idea how to find them, and after the melodrama of loosing my shit in the first week of my trip, and scary intimidation of being in a foreign country, and language barriers, and upfront and intense experience of intense misogyny and being harassed on the street simply for being female... I had sort of lost the thread of that intention. While I was still at the farm outside of Bogota (where they have solid internet), I was stressing myself out with neurotic anxiety, trying to figure out WHERE AM I GOING AND WHAT AM I DOING ON THIS TRIP??? I bounced back and forth between trying to find a gig teaching art to kids, deciding whether to spend money on Spanish lessons, going to the jungle, going to Ecuador... OMG, so many potential options! At various points, I nearly hyperventilated.
And then I landed in Salento... and my first night there, chatting with another person at the fabled hostel nested in the middle of mushroom-sprouting cow fields... I heard tell of an Ayhuaska ceremony... Now, I´ve heard a lot of things about this "drug", Ayhuaska. It´s culturally equivalent to Peyote, which is used by shamans in the deserts of North America. But Ayhuaska is a jungle plant, grows only in the Amazon. And in order to brew and administer it, a person is supposed to be a fully trained shaman. It´s NOT a recreational drug. In fact, for those using it without the right intention (healing, spiritual exploration), it often just make them nauseous and vomitty. It makes most people nauseous and vomitty, but also gives you visions about the world and it can teach you to understand yourself.
And so, with only a day´s notice, I found myself signing up for this ceremony. I was a little nervous, since I´d heard horror stories about opportunistic people rounding up a gang of gringoes, handing them a cup of ayhyaska brew to drink, and then abandoning them to the experience without support or guidance on the journey... But the people at the hostel assured me that this ceremony had no relation to those stories.
And in fact, they turned out to be right. What I had found was a healing sanctuary. A healing sanctuary of indigenous, South America culture and spirituality. That's pretty much what I had been looking for. At this point, I was a little more than a month into my trip, and even though all sorts of other amazing places in South America were pulling at me, I realized that this place... well there was no way I could find another equally good place to hang out within my small remaining time window of two months.
The best part about the maloka and community surrounding Taita Carlos in Armenia is that fact that there are all sorts of healing communities I could have found... including farms and monestaries and yoga centers... but the main issue I had with most of those places, is that they were run by rich (by local standards, at least) white people from the US or Europe, who had gone to cheap, "unstable" countries, and are working to "teach & develop" the local people. Well, as much as I'm sure those people have good intentions, they're also full of privilege, racism, and bullshit. I hadn't thought this all through totally before this trip, but it was there in my head, and I'm very glad I ended up where I did.
What I liked about the healing community of Taita Carlos is that it is a place where the travellers are students of the local people, and the local people are in charge, and they are consciously inviting foreign travellers to come learn with them. This is a crucial distinction, and will certainly inform the course of my future travels.
So, there are lots and lots of stories I could tell about my experiences at this healing center; some real, but more fantastical. But I don't think I'm gonna write them all out in this blog. I will turn them into fantastical stories and paintings and art.
So now I am home. I've been home for about a week. At this rate, I've got a continuing backlog of nearly a whole month on my blog, and sometimes thinking about all of the things I want to write about stresses me out... But mostly I'm working to practice the lessons I learned from my experiences.
Sunday, June 23, 2013
Apology
This apology is specifically in regards to these two blog posts, discussing an art project that I did in Spring 2012, and several pieces of which were hanging publicly in a radical community space this spring.
I was wrong. All of my arguments about why it was ok for me to make and display and sell dreamcatchers were justifications for actions that, deep down, I already knew were wrong. Because the thing is, I was violating my own integrity, and I knew it. I was violating the stream of own own consciousness as I have expressed it in this very blog...
I apologise for not listening sooner. I apologise for not listening in the first place, when I wrote the first blog post. I aplogise that it took me an entire week of listening this time for me to hear what you were saying.
And most of all, I apologise for having tried to use my own spiritual journey as a justification for bullshit.
At this point, my intention for the dreamcatchers is to reduce the prices enough to make them sell-able and affordable, and then give whatever profit I make from that to the Chief Seattle Club. For those that still don't sell ('cause, well, I have a lot of them...) I might turn them into random art installations in the woods.
Additionally, I want to say thank you. Even though your anger was scary and painful at first, thank you. Thank you for reminding me of the boundaries of my own integrity. Thank you for holding me accountable for the privilege and racism that I carry, and teaching me how to walk with respect.
So that is all I have to say to the people who were calling me out.
But to the white people, and all of the people who thought that this was a non-issue, who helped me write my justifications through conversation and encouragement, I have lots to say, because I want you to understand why I have come to this place.
And the answer is that it's not about me. It's not about my stifling my voice, or my spiritual journey. It's about listening. It's about the fact that when I speak, my voice is amplified by my privilege. And out of respect, I need to modulate my voice. And when someone tells me that something I'm doing is violation, it is my job to listen and respect - not to start explaining to them why, "well actually, I have every right to do this thing [insert examples of every time I try to call-out a guy for violating my boundaries and he gets defensive]".
And because we don't learn a lesson just once. We learn it over and over again, each time in a different layer, or a different context.
Because Healing & Forgiveness [deprogramming my internalized racism] are not a light switch or a button that I hit once and say, "ok that's done". They are a practice. A practice of learning a new way of walking.
I'm not done writing about this. Because judging by the number of white people I talked to who simply didn't understand why this would even be an issue, and then helped me produced infinite arguments about why it was just fine... we have a lot of work to do.
Bicycle Dream Catchers and Cultural Appropriation
Dreamcatchers and Cultural Appropriation, Redux
I was wrong. All of my arguments about why it was ok for me to make and display and sell dreamcatchers were justifications for actions that, deep down, I already knew were wrong. Because the thing is, I was violating my own integrity, and I knew it. I was violating the stream of own own consciousness as I have expressed it in this very blog...
"For those arbitrarily given a position of privilege: to support and promote individuals of marginalized groups, those who have been experiencing the most intense oppression for the longest time, is a deep act of protest. One so deep that it may start out feeling uncomfortable - like a protest against our own selves. But only in learning to let go of that power-over privilege can we really be free to find the power within ourselves. The power of interdependence and individual autonomy." Jan 2012So to all those People of Color, and People of Indigenous Heritage, and the White Allies, who called me out as doing harm, I have only this to say to you:
I apologise for not listening sooner. I apologise for not listening in the first place, when I wrote the first blog post. I aplogise that it took me an entire week of listening this time for me to hear what you were saying.
And most of all, I apologise for having tried to use my own spiritual journey as a justification for bullshit.
At this point, my intention for the dreamcatchers is to reduce the prices enough to make them sell-able and affordable, and then give whatever profit I make from that to the Chief Seattle Club. For those that still don't sell ('cause, well, I have a lot of them...) I might turn them into random art installations in the woods.
Additionally, I want to say thank you. Even though your anger was scary and painful at first, thank you. Thank you for reminding me of the boundaries of my own integrity. Thank you for holding me accountable for the privilege and racism that I carry, and teaching me how to walk with respect.
So that is all I have to say to the people who were calling me out.
But to the white people, and all of the people who thought that this was a non-issue, who helped me write my justifications through conversation and encouragement, I have lots to say, because I want you to understand why I have come to this place.
And the answer is that it's not about me. It's not about my stifling my voice, or my spiritual journey. It's about listening. It's about the fact that when I speak, my voice is amplified by my privilege. And out of respect, I need to modulate my voice. And when someone tells me that something I'm doing is violation, it is my job to listen and respect - not to start explaining to them why, "well actually, I have every right to do this thing [insert examples of every time I try to call-out a guy for violating my boundaries and he gets defensive]".
Lessons learned from my journeys with Ayahuaska:In fact, the part where I tried to use my own spiritual journey as a justification for my right to make and sell dreamcatchers might have been the most offensive part. Because if I am really sincere, if I really do want to understand the spirits of this land, and if I really aspire to the kind of Knowing that I was talking about... then the first step is to hold myself the strictest levels of respect for the violations that occurred in the past. Because I carry the heritage of the violence done by my ancestors. Because healing takes time...
Speaking, Thinking, and Listening, are three different activities.
Do one thing at a time.
And because we don't learn a lesson just once. We learn it over and over again, each time in a different layer, or a different context.
Because Healing & Forgiveness [deprogramming my internalized racism] are not a light switch or a button that I hit once and say, "ok that's done". They are a practice. A practice of learning a new way of walking.
I'm not done writing about this. Because judging by the number of white people I talked to who simply didn't understand why this would even be an issue, and then helped me produced infinite arguments about why it was just fine... we have a lot of work to do.
Friday, June 21, 2013
Dreamcatchers and Cultural Appropriation, Redux
*** This post is a lot of defensive justification for being called out on things I actually already knew were bullshit. I'm keeping it up as an act of transparency, and also because I hope that the whole process I went through might be helpful for anyone else in a similar position as me, struggling with similar questions. HERE IS A LINK TO MY FOLLOWING APOLOGY ***
So questions of cultural appropriation have come up again, surrounding some artwork I have made (original post and links to the art here).
And in general, the contention that people seem to have is with this part here:
I really want it to be a "complicated, fuzzy gray line".
But let's get one thing straight: I'm not arguing that I'm not racist. That's a given. In fact, I'd go ahead and say that I and every single person in my family is racist. This is not to assume that we are bad people, or that we made a decision to be that way. But that we are programmed by the dominant culture to make certain assumptions about reality - about human nature. To make certain assumptions about people of different ethnic and economic backgrounds.
And the question is how do I, as an individual, take responsibility for that?
But please, for a moment, allow me to step back from the issue of my individual privilege. Because in the case of me, a white middle-class artist, there is another layer - the layer of my spirituality. The layer of my own ethnic cultural heritage. I am a witch. I am a worshipper of the earth, and of nature, and the energy and animals of this greater, living organism. When I pray, I pray to Gaia. Some would call me pagan (a word that simply means "not christian").
And where are my own religious traditions, where are my holy people? Where is the unbroken line of wise-women and healers? For the most part, it doesn't exist - or it is so deeply hidden underground that I haven't been able to find it. They were burned. Burned at the steak. Hunted down and murdered by the Spanish Inquisition. My people were amputated, violently, from their relationship with the land, and convinced that our religious rites were evil devil worship. Our wise women were turned into the most reviled, most shameful villain of stories and fairy tales: the Wicked Witch, ugly, unlovable, evil.
And for me, as I and many, many others work to resurrect my own cultural heritage... the heritage of wise women, the heritage of knowing the land in which I live, and having a relationship with the spirits here... I often feel like a feral child. Like one who has been running out in the wilderness, lost and starving.
When I have had the honer to participate in religious ceremonies of native people in North or South America, I often had the feeling of being indulged by gods... by civilized adults who have taken pity on the feral child and allowed them to come inside. I do not intend that to sound petulant at all, either. I am learning more and more to shut up, listen, and observe. Learning more and more to see the subtleties of the ceremonies, to see how the seemingly small details of a ritual make a big difference in the flow and control of energy.
Learning to see how spiritual knowledge is the technology of an advanced civilization.
Why do I, as a white woman, need to look to the religious ceremonies of indigenous people? That's "their space". Am I fetishising their culture? I am certainly on an ongoing journey to resurrect my own cultural heritage of tribal nature worship. I work on this every day, and I participate in larger communities of people who identify as witches, identify with the heritage of European paganism. But in the ceremonies we make, I often feel a sense of... hmmm... a sense of not knowing what we're doing. Making things up as we go along. And there is a precious holyness to that, too. It is precious and exquisite and perfect, and there are so many wise women that I have deep respect for as my elders and teachers. But there is still that feeling...
And in many of the indigenous ceremonies I've been to, there is this deep knowing. A certainty, that I long for. The certainty that comes from an unbroken chain of ancestors, of knowing your family line so far back it goes to your creation story, and being taught the ceremonial protocols of that family. The certainty of knowing how things work, of understanding the flow of energy.
And in some ways, indigenous people have that privilege over the colonialists - the privilege of belonging to the land. I am very conscious of the genocide, conscious that so much has been lost, conscious that the genocide against the indigenous people of North America is still going on. Conscious that many, many people of indigenous decent feel ripped away from their culture, and children are stolen from their families.
And the dreamcatcher... that shape... I think it is the shape of the universe... I think that shape is a geometric representation of the math that holds reality together...and I want to investigate it the best way I know how - through artwork.
But the idea that I am taking up the space of others whose voice is suppressed is intensely compelling to me, and I want to take that lesson to heart. Again and again I learn the lesson of "shut up, listen, observe."
As for those dreamcatchers: I am not going to make myself famous with them, and "indigenous looking art" is not going to by my identifying style as an artist (nor was that every my intention). But I'm not going to destroy them, and I'm not going to stick them in a hole. Maybe they exist for the purpose of provoking uncomfortable conversation.
So questions of cultural appropriation have come up again, surrounding some artwork I have made (original post and links to the art here).
And in general, the contention that people seem to have is with this part here:
Most discussions I have had with people of color or people of native decent, who have spent any time thinking about this issue, expressed the plea/rebuke "just don't do it". Expressed the heartfelt belief that there is no "non-damaging" way for someone of the dominant culture to appropriate from an oppressed culture.People say, "and yet you did it anyways, and you are full of racist, colonialist bullshit." At first, I felt hurt and defensive - mostly because a lot of me agrees with them...
I really want it to be a "complicated, fuzzy gray line".
But let's get one thing straight: I'm not arguing that I'm not racist. That's a given. In fact, I'd go ahead and say that I and every single person in my family is racist. This is not to assume that we are bad people, or that we made a decision to be that way. But that we are programmed by the dominant culture to make certain assumptions about reality - about human nature. To make certain assumptions about people of different ethnic and economic backgrounds.
And the question is how do I, as an individual, take responsibility for that?
But please, for a moment, allow me to step back from the issue of my individual privilege. Because in the case of me, a white middle-class artist, there is another layer - the layer of my spirituality. The layer of my own ethnic cultural heritage. I am a witch. I am a worshipper of the earth, and of nature, and the energy and animals of this greater, living organism. When I pray, I pray to Gaia. Some would call me pagan (a word that simply means "not christian").
And where are my own religious traditions, where are my holy people? Where is the unbroken line of wise-women and healers? For the most part, it doesn't exist - or it is so deeply hidden underground that I haven't been able to find it. They were burned. Burned at the steak. Hunted down and murdered by the Spanish Inquisition. My people were amputated, violently, from their relationship with the land, and convinced that our religious rites were evil devil worship. Our wise women were turned into the most reviled, most shameful villain of stories and fairy tales: the Wicked Witch, ugly, unlovable, evil.
And for me, as I and many, many others work to resurrect my own cultural heritage... the heritage of wise women, the heritage of knowing the land in which I live, and having a relationship with the spirits here... I often feel like a feral child. Like one who has been running out in the wilderness, lost and starving.
When I have had the honer to participate in religious ceremonies of native people in North or South America, I often had the feeling of being indulged by gods... by civilized adults who have taken pity on the feral child and allowed them to come inside. I do not intend that to sound petulant at all, either. I am learning more and more to shut up, listen, and observe. Learning more and more to see the subtleties of the ceremonies, to see how the seemingly small details of a ritual make a big difference in the flow and control of energy.
Learning to see how spiritual knowledge is the technology of an advanced civilization.
Why do I, as a white woman, need to look to the religious ceremonies of indigenous people? That's "their space". Am I fetishising their culture? I am certainly on an ongoing journey to resurrect my own cultural heritage of tribal nature worship. I work on this every day, and I participate in larger communities of people who identify as witches, identify with the heritage of European paganism. But in the ceremonies we make, I often feel a sense of... hmmm... a sense of not knowing what we're doing. Making things up as we go along. And there is a precious holyness to that, too. It is precious and exquisite and perfect, and there are so many wise women that I have deep respect for as my elders and teachers. But there is still that feeling...
And in many of the indigenous ceremonies I've been to, there is this deep knowing. A certainty, that I long for. The certainty that comes from an unbroken chain of ancestors, of knowing your family line so far back it goes to your creation story, and being taught the ceremonial protocols of that family. The certainty of knowing how things work, of understanding the flow of energy.
And in some ways, indigenous people have that privilege over the colonialists - the privilege of belonging to the land. I am very conscious of the genocide, conscious that so much has been lost, conscious that the genocide against the indigenous people of North America is still going on. Conscious that many, many people of indigenous decent feel ripped away from their culture, and children are stolen from their families.
And the dreamcatcher... that shape... I think it is the shape of the universe... I think that shape is a geometric representation of the math that holds reality together...and I want to investigate it the best way I know how - through artwork.
But the idea that I am taking up the space of others whose voice is suppressed is intensely compelling to me, and I want to take that lesson to heart. Again and again I learn the lesson of "shut up, listen, observe."
As for those dreamcatchers: I am not going to make myself famous with them, and "indigenous looking art" is not going to by my identifying style as an artist (nor was that every my intention). But I'm not going to destroy them, and I'm not going to stick them in a hole. Maybe they exist for the purpose of provoking uncomfortable conversation.
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