And it might help to ask, �Who benefits from this interpretation?� �What do they gain, and what is lost for other interpretations by holding onto this one view as the best-available truth?�
A young, thin and conventionally-attractive woman with shoulder-length blonde hair speaks out at an evening feminist anti-racism conference, wanting desperately to talk about her experiences with racism. Any thoughts of her talking about white privilege are quickly dashed. She has been wronged by racism herself, hurt, mistreated; she feels pain and frustration, compounded by the fact that no one will listen to her story. The women at the conference listen, if edgily. She believes that she has, herself, felt the terrible effects of racism. She has been subjected to harassment from Black men while walking in public, and this has scared her deeply. The men, in a group, made comments about her appearance. She feels there were threats, thinly veiled, as to her safety.
One white woman jumps in and offers her wisdom, knowledge based on years of knowing Black men, knowing the �truth� about Black sexuality. She assures the woman that the men meant nothing, that Black sexual banter is something that white women could stand to learn, that it means no more than what �hello� means to whites who, she adds, are really rather stuffy and inhibited, anyway.
I am uncomfortable in this offering. The two points already on the table, actual racism and this white sister�s experiences of feeling threatened, have been swept aside by a currently-irrelevant offering of �knowledge.� In this is redirection: the answering sister talks her interpretation of what really happened over what the victim woman says she experienced, and her feelings have not yet been adequately acknowledged.
Another sister, a leader of the group sponsoring the conference, steps in and tries to acknowledge the woman�s feelings, but falls short, and tries to redefine the labeling to a word besides �racism,� but the woman resists this. She argues now that this situation of which she speaks must be racism, for how could it be anything less? It is about people of two races conflicting, and one being hurt or threatened by the other. It is about �race� and it is about �-ism� so it is racism! No one has heard her yet again, and in frustration she leaves the conference.