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The Act of Listening, Especially When It's Hard

9/14/2016

12 Comments

 
This post took me a few days to write and get the courage to share...because for me this post is really hard.  I'm grateful that my job allows me to learn from the best in the field of engaging in race related conversations.  That being said, I'm white and I still suck at it.  Evidence in a recent  Facebook "conversation" that went poorly.  But I've learned to think of this as work, because that's what the "Courageous Conversations" class called it.  I've learned to think of engaging in the conversation as important to live my values, that silence is consent, that being neutral in the face of injustice is not the answer nor the way forward.  So here we are.  If you could read with a belief in my good intentions dear singular reader, I think we'll find our way onward together. 

Sunday September 11 passed and it was 15 years.  In the years since I've been humbled by people's experiences and loss. I like every other American have memories of that day, but some people's memories are more visceral and painful than others like mine. Finding out a classmate from business school was focused on renewable energy because he lost a brother that day and wanted to help get American dependence off foreign oil, that humbles me to this day.  About a month ago I watched The Falling Man, which is a horrifying refresh of the realities of that day, and of the sanitation we went through as a country to try to heal from this terrorism and tragedy.

But this year I wanted to do something other than post about it personally.  Rather than watch Zero Dark Thirty which has become my go-to way to deal with feeling terrorized.  Maybe I was inspired by the TED radio podcast the Act of Listening.  Maybe recently watching The Falling Man felt like enough remembrance of that day.  Maybe it was the fact that Straight Outta Compton on dvd was sitting on my table from Netflix that got me thinking.  Reminded me about #Oscarssowhite. And reading on why the ad industry's diversity initiatives are failing.  Got me thinking about Colin Kaepernick's nonviolent act of protest of kneeling during the anthem, and both the negative reaction he had received and the acts of support from fellow NFL players and one of my hometown female soccer athletes.  And my thought process was this: I wouldn't protest the anthem nor burn the flag, and I will fight for my fellow Americans Constitutional right to do so...but more importantly...why do they feel the need to do so? What is their experience that has driven them to do so on September 11, this sacred American day? 

I decided instead of looking online at the 9/11 remembrances and instead of posting on my Facebook, that this year I would spend that day listening.  That I would try to understand what I do not "get" based upon my own experience in the most accessible way I could: movies.  I would listen by watching Selma and Straight Outta Compton back-to-back as an active steeping in the African American experience and community.  And here's the thing that shook out for me by watching these two movies back-to-back that reach back to the 1960s and the 1990s:  how very little has changed.   Time has passed, but even this recent history has a way of repeating itself.

It's still hard for me to personally imagine kneeling during the anthem on September 11...but that's because I haven't faced the decades long injustices and struggle of African Americans in this country.  And if that were my experience, I would be hard pressed to find ways to get people to listen.  I would be out of avenues that weren't like kneeling during the anthem.  The backlash that has come to the leaders whose voices have been heard and led to change for these communities is severe.  In the 1960s, they were murdered.  In the 1990s, they were discounted and silenced in the mainstream media as thugs. 

What happened when NWA were interviewed by the mainstream media in the 1990s has almost no difference to the way we've engaged in the mainstream media about Black Lives Matter.  The average American and the media has only given space to address the "how" there's been engagement in the conversation.  The outrage at the method as a way to ignore the message.  I keep thinking what I would do if my voice wasn't heard and I felt my life was on the line?  Any rational human would say it louder or find new ways to get themselves heard, myself included. 

So through the act of listening in the way available to me, I empathized and I learned.  And decided firmly that it's not hard to see how we've gotten here at all.  I for one want to count my voice in with their movement for justice.  Silence is not the answer nor the way forward and I believe more people like me - aka white - need to be anti-racism not just not racist. 

I may just be one voice in the void, but I think it matters, because that's what enviro(ish) is all about:
Because you can despair that each action you take is only one tiny drop in the ocean....or you can be inspired that the ocean is made up entirely of tiny drops.

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12 Comments
Mike
9/15/2016 09:56:01 am

"Silence is consent." Sometimes, silence is survival.

I grew up in the part of Chicago
where it was both predominantly white
and predominantly black.
Where walking to school meant getting bruised by one group
and the beatdowns walking home came from the other.
I didn't belong to either group.
Didn't have a posse
or gang to save me.
When I got home I also got it from my parents
who wanted me to fight back against both
the white and black kids.
But two fists and courage were sand
against 12 white fists
and 12 black fists.
So I learned to be quiet
and to look away
and to give up fifty cents
that I had for milk money
if it meant I wouldn't have a black
eye to explain away
or a cut lip to lie
about and tell my parents
that yes I stood up to them
even though I didn't.

This stuff didn't get reported
by Harry Reasoner or Max Donaldson
or Kathleen Sullivan.

And that's why when I see
all the Black Lives Matter
and the photos of those victims of cops
I look for the others who aren't talked about.
The black on black victims.
The white on white victims.
The victims that aren't newsworthy
or who keep quiet.

Sure, I haven't been black.
I haven't been white.
But I have owned what I've lived.


(There's a spider at my desk
making a web between the two posts of light.
I know that if tear this web down
he will lie still like I did decades ago,
and hope the mean hands that ruined his handiwork
will just go away
so he can begin anew.)

Reply
Megan
9/15/2016 10:54:13 pm

Mike my friend you are poetry in 3D, and I honor and love and thank you for it! You're absolutely right. I think the hard part for me to realize is that until, for example, the availability of cell phone videos and the Black Lives Matter movement there wasn't a conversation for those who aren't black. Aka it wasn't something I thought about because it wasn't my experience. I think it's admirable to be the person who seeks out and looks for the voices and the people who aren't talked about and ignored/discounted because theirs are probably the most important. I worry that the tone and tenor of the national dialogue is getting even more divisive. Hopefully we can find a way to be inclusive of everyone's experiences in the content and way that we speak. XOXO

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Mike
9/19/2016 11:15:50 am

agree 100%. I think the interwebs are a good thing as it gives everyone a voice that they didn't have decades ago. The key is each sides's ability to listen.

so far in most cases, it's just bad karaoke, with everyone wanting to hog the microphone...

(i'm gonna save the bit above and see if i can clean it up and get it published somewhere :) )

Megan
9/27/2016 07:56:58 am

Sorry I didn't reply sooner...I think you absolutely should!!!

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9/22/2018 11:31:51 am

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Megan
11/30/2018 06:23:31 am

Thank you so much for stopping by! I have been a bit offline and not blogging in the Trump era but am excited to get back into it. I so appreciate this comment, it brightened my day and is motivating me for sure :) Stay tuned!

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11/30/2018 09:11:55 am

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5/18/2019 08:32:42 pm

Thank you downloadpopcorntimeapk.com :) I appreciate you stopping by and am sorry I've been so missing on my blog the past year. I'm working on posting new stuff and just did in case you want to take a look there too :) https://www.enviroish.com/blog/so-you-want-to-have-an-impact

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12/18/2018 09:33:36 am

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Megan link
5/18/2019 08:33:38 pm

Thanks popcorn time ios! I actually don't know what that means? I'm not much of a blogger as evidenced by not posting a blog for almost two years. Haha. What does an invite post involve?

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2/24/2019 06:24:24 pm

I admire people who can control their temper and listen than t argue. I believe that this kind of art is very helpful to make you grow, but at the same time, hard to understand. We are all aware that we are listening, but not all of us can understand. I think that if only people knows how to listen, there would be more peace on Earth. The art of listening is more than just a skill that everyone must try to improve.

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Megan link
5/18/2019 08:35:35 pm

Thank you essaybox reviews. 100% agreement. I like to think listening is a natural skill that comes forth from empathy. By really trying to understand someone else's experience and caring about their experience, listening is easy to do. We're in a real pickle though, since I agree that more listening is needed. But I'm an eternal optimist and believe there's always more goodness amongst my fellow humans :)

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