Censoring
“We’re not censoring, we’re educating!”
This is the kind of defense I’ve seen in many of the comments that I’ve seen on all kinds of posts about the “avoidance” of the term Brown Bag lunch because of “racist connotations,” as illustrated by an anecdote in this sermon by Melissa Mummert recounting an event at Starr King School for the Ministry (first brought to the attention of the blogosphere by PeaceBang, and since spreading like wildfire).
Rev. Mummert said herself, “I didn’t want to sound racist, so I stayed silent.”
DING DING DING DING DING!!
Here’s the thing, at least from my viewpoint. The way that Anti-Racism/Anti-Oppression work is portrayed in the Unitarian Universalist movement is inherently censoring. People (like me) are afraid to even dip our toes into discussions about race without having read all the “right” books and going to all the “right” workshops — we’re not indoctrinated into this sub-culture that is AR/AO “enlightenment,” and therefore feel unqualified to participate in any kind of meaningful dialogue. We’re afraid that we will be called racists, and we stay silent and frustrated.
The Lively Tradition has a wonderful take on this, in response to Left Coast Unitarian.
The larger point I want to make here is how we as Unitarian Universalists, or other liberal activists in general, talk about the choices that we make in how we live our lives. I find that we accuse the conservative Right of scrabbling for the moral high ground in most issues, but are very, very guilty of the same thing when it comes to things like AR/AO work, or “ethical” eating for that matter (Jamie has a response on vegetarianism that perfectly illustrates this).
When people speak about these issues with the goal of educating people about how to make “better” choices, they speak from a place of authority that implies that choosing to do anything other than the ideal, “anti-oppressive/ethical,” course of action is to choose to be oppressive or unethical. Don’t you think it’s pretty logical that when confronted with such an either/or dichotomy, people are going to feel pretty defensive about their choices, or even more protective of their claim to moral “authority?”
Sure, no one comes out and says, “If you call this meeting a Brown Bag lunch, you’re a RACIST!” but the connotation is certainly there. And that, I think, is a rather insidious form of censorship.
I have no idea how to make this better, but it’s something I really think we should work on. When the education you receive, be it from seminary or workshops or your minister or books or conversations, causes you to censor yourself not because of your own moral choices but because of a genuine fear that you will be seen as a racist or a murderer of bunnies/polluter of the planet when it may just be that you’re doing your best at living your life, there’s something wrong.
Comment by Jeff. W.
May 31, 2007 @ 10:41 am
This is very clearly written and I agree with it entirely. I hope that AR/AO people will read it, restrain their own defensiveness, and deeply consider how their own actions and inactions have created a climate of fear and disagreement that endangers their stated goals, goals that I think I can safely say we all support.