Nikki Lee Health

I’ve done racist things in my life, out of ignorance and because I grew up white in a world where children of color pick out the white doll as the nicer one.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqvJp2gXJI0   I’ve been an unconscious racist, which lends a certain innocence to my bigotry, and also makes my racism more deadly, because it has lived as a lens in my eyes.

Truly, becoming awake and aware is the first step to peace. Then comes feeling the pain, accepting responsibility and apologizing.

I can’t undo the past and make my grandfather alive again to apologize for his conduct in Portuguese West Africa in the 1920s, where he killed everything that he could to bring trophies home. I still have the coat made of the skins of leopards that he shot, and the hippopotamus tooth and skin cane, and the sable antelope and cape buffalo horns; he shot those animals because he felt entitled to take as much as he wanted of the riches of someone else’s country.  I have the written agreement he signed, transferring custody of a black woman to a buddy in exchange for a leather tobacco pouch, a straight razor, and a few other trinkets. The agreement has a disclaimer, the receiver of the woman is made aware that the woman is “violently cross-eyed.”  The transfer is clearly between 2 humans moving a piece of property.

I can’t undo the past and apologize to the 18-year old black man who was sold to an ancestor of mine in the 1800s for 1,000 dollars, a fortune. The young man was healthy and strong, and would be a good worker for decades; consequently he was worth the fortune he was sold for. Who was his mother? Where was his family from? What happened to them?

I don’t know what it is like to wonder each morning what hurtful, denigrating energies I will encounter as I move through my day.  I don’t know what it is like to have to be twice as good at my job so that people will take me seriously;  a black lactation professional has not the ease in her work that I do. A colleague has spoken to me about her experience. In a nearby city, black breastfeeding babies are twice as likely to be supplemented with formula. When I was a hospital worker, I heard many staff members talk about how “those women” don’t breastfeed.

I can walk through my neighborhood at night without fear; I can shop in a store without being followed. A policeman is more likely to do their job for me than to shoot me.  I do not fear for my children the way that this mother describes: http://www.bonbonbreak.com/dear-white-moms/

How much of today’s miseries stem from white colonials and missionaries who viewed the entire world, including the other people in it, as their oyster, and felt entitled to take and conquer and judge?  It takes unimaginable arrogance to walk into another land and rearrange everything in it to suit some white notions of religion, commerce, and culture. When Rudyard Kipling wrote of the “white man’s burden” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_White_Man’s_Burden , the poem was taken to mean that white imperialists have the burden of raising up the rest of the world. Today, I see the white burden as being the responsibility to validate the hurt and injury that we have caused to other humans in order to enrich ourselves, and then to apologize for it.

I am grateful to every person of a different ethnic, cultural or genetic background who has spoken truth to me, especially to Valerie Merritt. Ms Merritt busted me for my racist behavior back in the 90s.  I hurt her deeply. She was the first to open my eyes to the fact that I was part of the problem. I hope she is enjoying a full and fruitful life; I fear she is worrying about her sons.

We can’t undo the past. We can speak truth to each other with a loving heart. We can open our hearts to listen to others, and accept their experience as valid as our own. We can open our own eyes to see the hurt we have caused. We can make sincere apology, and all work together to change our ways. We can teach our children differently than we ourselves have seen.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-JjiaRJqKIU

I remember my oldest daughter raving about her 6th grade teacher. For weeks, I heard about this wonderful and inspiring woman; it wasn’t until the parent-teacher conference that I discovered the teacher was black. I felt happy that my daughter had spoken only about the exciting teacher; coming from a long line of racists, I believed that much of racism could be gone in 4 generations.

Now, I am not sure. Maybe it will take longer. Maybe everyone has to be involved. Maybe both. I do know that we must share this planet with each other and that will be more fun to do in peace.