blogging against racism

note of warning: i have terrible cramps today (yup, i'm broadcasting that on the internet!) and took a heavy duty painkiller. so this post will either be overly verbose (although that wouldn't be so different than my regular posts), overly hopeful (THAT would definitely be different than my regular posts), or just a little confusing.

that said...

similar to the world of real-life and real-people, i am finding that the world of blogs and bloggers is much bigger than i realized. It is more complicated than I knew and it has so much possibility and potential! although also similar to my experience in the real world, i feel like i'm not really sure how to tap in and connect to all that possibility.

i googled "white women, women of Color, anti-violence movement, accountability" and about six other variations on that, looking for articles and advice on how to deal with some of what's going on at my organization- trying to figure out how to use the privileges i have in order to work towards change in some way, even if that way is just internally within my own organization...
i keep rushing home after these incidents and flipping through "the color of violence" (incite) or "conquest" (andrea smith) or even "sister outsider" (audre lorde)- looking for answers.
and in those books and essays and insights, i find comparable stories and reassurance that i am not "over-reacting" or being too critical, because other people have also found these things to be problems.
but i don't really want to be reassured. because all the reassurance really points to is that the problems at my organizations are BIG problems that have been around for along time and that are ingrained in many aspects and parts of the "anti-violence" movement. so while i personally get to feel slightly validated and less "crazy-angry-bitchy" for complaining about this stuff, it's actually more depressing.
also in the past week or so, i've also been flipping through "uprooting racism," by paul kivel. it's basically a tutorial for white people on how to be anti-racist allies. it's got a lot of really good stuff (although it bothers me that at the end when he talks about the specifics of being allies to specific races and cultures, he doesn't have a section about Arabs or Arab-americans, because he's jewish, and i feel like jews have a particular responsibility to Arabs and Arab-americans...but that would be a whole other blog post so i wontt elaborate on that right now) - it goes from pretty basic definitions of racism and explanations of how racism and white supremacy work, to analyses of typical responses/defense mechanisms white people have to talking about racism and why those aren't valid, to some really good detail on the questions white anti-racists should be asking ourselves about how racism plays out in our communities.
what i've been wanting to read is "uprooting racism" specifically for white women working within the "anti-violence" movement. (my boss is one of the people who is making the necessity of a book like this feel very clear to me right now- when i call her out, she is generally pretty receptive- not always, but often- but she NEVER seems to see this stuff for herself. like she's pretty blind to incidents of racism...and to her own racism...but she does think it's a problem if someone else points it out). what paul kivel does, is he explores what white people need to actually DO to be accountable to communities of Color. reading books and essays is a part of that, but there's more, and he talks about that. the thing is that it's "general," and what "general" means in mainstream society is straight-white-male. and that's fine (well that's not fine but i mean that the book is addressed to that audience is fine) because it's really important that straight white males, and others who just know how to read books that are unspokenly written for a straight white male audience (which most of us do because we kind of have to in order to read most things), read and explore these issues. but what about those of us who aren't straight white males? there are more issues that are specific to the "feminist communities," "queer communities," and "anti-violence communities" that we need to explore, in the same way paul kivel explores those issues from a straight male perspective. And by the way, all those "communities" are in quotation marks intentionally. Just to point that out.
Anyway I've been thinking a lot about what it means to be a white anti-racist ally specifically within the anti-violence movement. I've also been reflecting on the fact that as far as I can find, nobody seems to have written about that specifically. Please correct me if I'm wrong. But it seems like there's a lot of work to be done in that area...i feel like we need to go beyond reading Incite's books and lending them to all our white friends, family, and co-workers (although that seems to work well as a first step). we need to identify how we can really be allies to women of color, how we can challenge our white co-workers, friends, and family to expand their analysis of "violence against women" to include women of Color (and i really mean HOW we can challenge them- because i think a lot of us know we should challenge them, but the way we do this has a lot to do with how it ultimately plays out and whether or not we are successful), how we can continue to challenge ourselves, how we can make sure we are accountable as allies, ...and more. so, where IS this book?
and thus we return to my original statement about the blogging world...
as far as i can tell, this "book," is on the internet, in a not-at-all-connected series of blogs, blog "comments," etc, written by white feminists who momentarily consider that the racism within the "anti-violence movement" is a problem. most of these bloggers seem to write one posting, which is followed by about a month long discussion, and then forget they had that moment of clarity...but still, it's there, instead of in print.
in addition, a lot of these white feminist bloggers who are momentarily struck with the fucked-up-reality of racism then proceed to read blogs by women of color to gain insight into their own racism, without having to read (okay maybe this is projecting but i don't think so) highly academic articles and essays. it's like a big conversation on racism (complete with white people then thinking it's their place to comment on the women of Color blogs and ask women of color bloggers to give them all the answers OR to argue with women of Color bloggers on what it means to be their allies...) happening over lots of time, on the internet.
and i'm totally excited to explore the possibilities of this world!
and i also don't really get how.
how do multi-author blogs work? how does one become a member of these online blog communities? is there a difference between multi-author blogs and those other things where a bunch of bloggers with different blogger-names seem to post...? in other words...HUH? The techy part of this is leaving me baffled but the political part of it is really intriguing...
so, in the spirit of blogging, i welcome comments on all of this.

alright, this is definitely just a little piece of a long-term conversation. within myself, with friends, and on the internet. and it's a little piece written, like i said, on heavy-duty painkillers, so it may not even make sense. but i wanted to get some of these thoughts out there in some way, because they're kind of pounding on my head telling me to let them out into the world.

and now i will go read more blogs...