Contradictions
I Know I Live in a Glass House, But Sometimes I Don't Care.
There are things I do that contradict my vision of who I think I am. For example, I like to think of myself as pro-environment. I believe the 97% of scientists who say climate change is real, and that we need to stop putting carbon into the atmosphere. Then when I open my garage door, I see an ’81 Corvette sitting there that gets less than 10 miles to the gallon of expensive, air-polluting fossil fuel (sigh). And, it has Historic Vehicle plates which allow it to bypass the state emissions inspection every year. Seems kind of hypocritical, no? (On an unrelated side note, I have come to believe that “Corvette” is a French word meaning “rathole” or “money pit” or “bad investment”. But I digress.)
As long as I’m on the subject of contradictory behavior, here is another one with which I struggle. I profess to love animals, but I stuff my gullet full of pork and beef and chicken and fish, and most every kind of meat consumed by Americans. I wear real leather shoes. (My belt may or may not be leather, I can’t tell.) I have a La-Z-Boy recliner and sofa covered with, you guessed it, soft, durable leather.
I do not claim to be perfect; I acknowledge that I live in a glass house. Occasionally, though, I feel justified in throwing a few stones, especially when someone has lobbed a few at me. This lengthy preamble is the beginning of a true-life tale about how a person’s self-vision of good personhood (not me) was contradicted by some questionable behavior. It all started with a review of a book I read (I used to work for the public library and one of the things I did was to review books for the website.)
The book was Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Man, by Emmanuel Acho, and my review was in the form of an open letter to the author and was generally favorable. I did take him to task for one thing, though. He wrote about the power of language and that it matters how a person chooses to use it. But he used a slang word for an entitled white woman who behaves badly in public and wants to speak to the manager and calls the cops on innocent black men who are walking their dogs. You know the term I mean. To use someone’s name as a synonym for bad behavior is not clever or funny. It is offensive and wrong. In my review/open letter, I called him on it. I asked him how he would like it if the name of his mother, or wife, or sister, was used to describe a black woman behaving badly in public. However, overall the review was mostly laudatory, and I ended by thanking him for making an effort to effect positive change on the world we all share. I submitted my review and went about my business. Here is a link to it: https://pima.bibliocommons.com/v2/comment/1934748004
Not long afterward, a fellow library employee, identifying as white, felt compelled to address me publicly over the library intranet to “counter” what I had written. In summary, this person listed several instances of black people being treated badly and said that it was okay to use a “white name” in this manner because black folks have been mistreated for so long. Say what? Like using this term was going to even the score? I was pissed. I was especially annoyed that, although the review made it quite clear that I found the term offensive, this person used it while addressing me. Twice, goddammit. Why was this person expressing support for someone by dumping on someone else? In what universe is that right?
I was angry, but I knew I had to be careful with my response, seeing as how it was a work thing and all. So, I thought about it for a few days and wrote this:
“Thanks for reading my review. I suppose this is not the best forum for a serious conversation. But permit me to make a few quick points.
I was surprised that Emmanuel Acho used the term in question, especially when he wrote so eloquently about how words matter. I had no problem with him commenting on acts of racism. My issue was with using someone’s name as an epithet. I believe that is wrong. So, I called him on it.
For the sake of context, here are a few other things I believe:
Black lives matter.
Systemic racism exists.
Amy Cooper deserved to have her life turned upside down for what she did. (Amy Cooper was the white woman who called the police on a black man in Central Park after he asked her to leash her dog.)
People of color have suffered some sort of mistreatment every single day since the first European set his lily-white foot on this continent.
You felt the need to “counter” what I wrote, and you certainly are entitled to your opinion. Honestly, though, I do not understand how listing those awful things somehow makes it okay to take a person’s name and use it as a synonym for bad behavior. Can’t see what good that does.
I do not speak out publicly on every wrong I see in this world, but, I will speak out on subjects of my choosing as I see fit. I support that right for everyone.”
I was rather proud of my calm, reasoned response, especially when my instinct was to say, “Go fuck yourself. I’m going to start using your name as a synonym for asshole.”
Interestingly, I never heard another word about it. Not a defense, not an apology, not an explanation, nothing. I suppose we each said what we wanted to say, so there was no reason to keep going back and forth. (It seems apparent, though, that by writing this little essay, I had more to say after all.)
As I ruminated on this encounter over time, I concluded that this was someone who wanted to be noticed as being on the correct side of the racial divide. Like, “Hey, look at me! I’m sticking up for black people and I’m white! I’m one of the good ones! I’m woke!”
Identifying as a good person for being supportive of those who have been wronged is fine. The good person thing goes out the window by using hurtful language against someone else and claiming it doesn’t matter. That is an obvious contradiction. Either words matter or they don’t, it cannot be both. People like the library employee either fail to see the contradiction, or do not care about it.
Making an epithet out of a “white” name is not going to do a damn thing to reverse 400 years of awful and regrettable history. So, why not be respectful and considerate to everyone? That way, there’ll be no reason to scramble for justification after dumping all over somebody.
