What's a "poison spoon?"
In America, all white people are born with a poison spoon in our mouths. It's called racism.
I’m a white woman in America. I was born with the poison spoon called “racism” in my mouth. If you’re white, you were born with it too. It’s the same thing as being a white supremacist.
Yes, I just said that: you and me, white people, we’re white supremacists whether we know it or not, and whether we want to be or not. America was built on this premise and on our willingness to go along with this.
I’m not okay with this. I’m not okay with continuing to hurt everybody, but especially Black and Brown people, with my internalized racism.
So here, in this blog, I’m going to do the work of spitting out my poison spoon. In real time, for you and everybody else to see if they want.
This is going to be rough. I’m hurting and I’m mad as hell.
I used to love reading historical fiction. And I don’t think I’ll ever be able to enjoy it again. Because it turns out that the American history “facts” I was taught in my mainstream education were lies. Everything I’ve ever known as history was, in fact, mostly fiction. Was anything I learned about history whole, honest or true? Or was it all just a steaming pile of giant, polished turds?
I don’t know where this blog is going. I don’t know how often I will post or what that’s going to look like. If you want to take a chance on me, subscribe.
To anybody reading this blog who’s not white: I will take any criticism you want to throw at me. I’m not here to inflict more harm on you, because I’ve done enough already, but I know I will probably hurt you anyway. I’ve got strong shoulders. I’m the problem in America. Tell me what you think of me and my work to tear down my own racism, or ignore me completely. I’m probably going to look like an ass to you a lot of the time, and I’m just owning that up front.
To white readers: I’m going to look like an ass to you a lot, too. I’m going to swear here. Sometimes I’m going to admit to being impossibly naive. I’m never going to pretend not to be a racist again, as hard as that is to swallow for you and me. Before you criticize me for anything, unless you’ve already done your own work to dismantle your internalized racism, please read White Women (here) and The Black Friend (here) (FYI, both of these books are fantastic audiobooks as well), and watch the documentary “Deconstructing Karen.” But I know you’re going to criticize me anyway, so bring it on.
I’m keeping a list of the antiracism resources I think are helpful at FacilitatorOnFire.net/Antiracsim. If you want to support the work of antiracism, go to Race2Dinner (here). If you want to support the anti-gun work I’m personally heavily involved in, go to Here4theKids.com (here).
I’m going to fumble around and get a lot of things wrong here. But I’m going to keep showing up because I’m not willing to ignore the poison spoon of racism in my mouth any more.
Here to be honest and change for the better,
Kay Coughlin