Adding 'class' to the issue of 'race' broadens the potential awareness of poverty issues (especially the youth and community needs here, touched on at the first Town Hall Meeting). The kind of single-image view (for example, what we get from television) can then be seen for what it is, a form of racism. And it begins the dialog on class, which is interwoven with racism in part, and which illuminates a disprivilege connection shared across races.

Suddenly it's no longer 'them vs. us' and full focus on difference; it's a greater complexity, where we are different and alike and somewhere in between, and we can work together to understand all facets of this reality. There is rich tradition in difference, beauty to be learned from one another. And there is commonality, a language (for example, love and care for children) that transcends dialect and group identity.

I am tremendously interested in helping to start a group on race & class in Galesburg, and I'm very willing to facilitate its beginning and then step back and follow. Send me a pm here, send an e-mail to diana@thepeopleingalesburg.org, or even better, post a reply to this topic and we can begin the discussion publicly. I have ideas, but no expertise, only concern that racism and classism flourish in an environment of enforced silence.

I'm waiting for the list of interested participants to grow, and ideas to gel, some. There will be a signup sheet for this Action group (along with others) at the Town Hall Meetings in the back of the room.

In the meantime, other communities have handled the race issue head on, building stronger community cohesion in the process -- building bridges and creating allies and friends. I will add here what others have sent me, and what I've found. Please add what you have, too! --diana

While we're waiting for people to join this Action group, here's something to ponder:

Fox's Glen Beck is calling Obama a racist.

Race & Class Matters Action Group Update, August 22, 2009

While the issues involved have been hot topics during Town Hall Meetings, few people have stepped forward expressing interest in the Action Group. I am waiting for Knox students to come back to town, for the signup sheet to be passed through the audience at the next Town Hall Meeting, and for individuals active in the communitiy to suggest direction. I am tremendously interested in facilitating the group, but as one who cares, and not as someone who has direct experience with racism, or even the intersection of race and class.

If you have an interest in this group, you can contact me via e-mail at diana@thepeopleingalesburg.org, or place a note in the folder at the Galesburg Public Library for this Action Group, RACE & CLASS MATTERS, and I will pick that up and contact you.

Thank you! --diana Mackin

I was talking with someone about a mutual friend with a disability, and out of the blue came the words, "Those Black people want us to pay for what was done to them, with slavery and so on." Apparently reparations are on at least some folks' minds these days.

Had time allowed for the argument to progress, I suspect it would have veered toward the "I have to work for everything I get, and so should they." The first part of the sentence is undeniably true, for I was talking with someone who's decidedly working class, who has had to do sometimes back-breaking work for every penny earned, with plenty of obstacles strewn in the path of personal economic survival.

Racism isn't the only obstacle --class disadvantage creates its own, and so does gender bias, and so do the many other forms that disprivilege takes. What isn't arguable, though, is that racism isn't real, or that racism doesn't currently exist. So what if we have a Black president? The racism that does the most insidious harm is that which is embedded in our culture, or institutional racism. It's far less about my actions, or yours, although those can certainly be hurtful. It's more about how the system is set up to perpetuate past biases. The past has effects right into the present, and disadvantage can be a legacy rather than a single event, which brings me to the second part of the statement my cohort made, that 'they shouldn't be rewarded now.'

Are reparations the best way to poceed? Shouldn't we have a culture-wide discussion, first, and see how all members of this society feel, and why? How do you feel about the whole range of issues? And the specifics?

Being me, and so being unable to remain silent, I did offer my view. I said that I happened to believe in reparations. I didn't mention that back when the Native American nation that still held title to the Tacoma (Washington state) Tide Flats via treaty wanted to reclaim what was tens of billions of dollars in real estate in the 1990s, I was applauding their efforts. The entire city of Tacoma would have been returned to the Puyallup Nation if the US had honored its contract obligations. Of course that never happened, but it was certainly fun watching people try to justify the evasion of contracts from an era when other contracts were being honored, still.

Really what I'd like to see is a level playing field, where diversity of race and class and ethnicity and relion and belief are all honored, and access is just and reasonable for all.

I've had my say. How do you feel, and what do you think is most important, in this discussion, and in others regarding race and class matters? Do post it here and let's get conversation going! Thank you.

--diana (diana@thepeopleingalesburg.org)

September 18, 2009

On August 22nd, I sent out an e-mail to people I know (or know of) at Knox College who deal, directly or indirectly, with racism and classism. I explained the Action Group, and asked for input and direction -- from them, from their students, and from their contacts in the community (local and broader intellectual networks as well). To date I am in occasional, continual contact with two people from this group, but have yet to receive feedback beyond support; no one seems ready to join up and move forward, so far. I originally received input from a community member whose direction I am encouraged to implement. In all cases, continuing will require a group effort. While the dual issue topic wreaks at least small havoc in this community, and is more than occasionally devastating, change will be neither quick nor simple. I've been an activist for almost 40 years, and I'm in it for the long-term. I can keep this pot simmering until others are ready to add the ingredients necessary to concoct a Galesburg-specific stew of social change. As always, I will be stirring the pot when I think it's needed.

In the meantime, I will post relevant information here, on this thread. If there's off-line interest, I can provide whatever is here in paper format to the library. And I will begin a plan for contacting a larger number of community members whose experiences and wisdoms are needed here, too. My focus so far: young people (those who will inherit the culture we leave behind), local students and teachers and social-change workers (people in contact with large numbers of others and generally accustomed to pondering difficult subjects), community members who value their own groups' intellectual traditions and perspectives (almost everyone, no?), and anyone who understands that racism and classism diminish the potential in each person disprivileged by their effects, and demean that individual, cruelly and unnecessarily.

Again, if you have an interest in this group, you can post your input here, or contact me via e-mail at diana@thepeopleingalesburg.org, or you can place a note in the folder at the Galesburg Public Library for this Action Group, RACE & CLASS MATTERS, and I will pick that up and contact you.

Thank you! --diana Mackin

I'm interested in hearing what people think of this video with speaker Tim Wise:

The Start of White Supremacy

--diana

And what do you think of this?

On Being White by Marilyn Frye

Yes, Facebook is a space for activist theorizing, and networking ... and it's full of mid-50s women, some of us doing that activist theory! I posted this today:

Always thought it would shake things up if white people had to sit and listen to Black people, other people of Color, talk about everyday experiences. There are the people who yell out insults, and more, and then there are those who just cannot believe it happens and are willing to believe almost anything else ("Oh, really, it's just not that bad anymore!") I hear stories, I record them as exactly as I can, and I pass 'em on. I shake up comfy perceptions in one-shot intervals, but to create a space where people of Color spoke, were heard and were supported, and white people just stayed put and listened, tissues available as necessary, it'd be so much more!

In response to this, which left me drenched in tears yesterday when I first saw it:

Katrina's Hidden Race War

--diana

If you have any interest in working on issues of race and/or class(ism), please let me know. I'm continuing to do things outside this Action Group, given its quietness right now. But I would be happy to help facilitate whatever great ideas people come up with -- just let me know. --diana