Two weeks ago, I met a woman who liked to introduce herself as a citizen. This didn’t occur at coffee shops as much as it did at conferences. At these conferences, this woman in her eighties would follow the founders and directors and founding directors and stand up at the lectern and introduce herself as, first and foremost, a citizen. It’s not that she doesn’t have accolades to her name - she has them in spades - but her title as citizen is the one she holds closest, the one she claims hardest. “We are human beings and we should not be defined by our job status because that separates our personal life from our public life and in fact our public life is who we are as a person,” she told me. “We do not live in silos, and when we force people to do it, then we cut them into pieces.” There are moments in life that change you in the instant, and that was one of those moments for me. As this woman said, to be human is “to be entangled in stories” and particular stories change us on a cellular level, whether we realise it in the moment or once we’ve had the time to realise them fully.
For this woman, introducing herself as a citizen has become an intentional action to display a deep-rooted personal philosophy that anything she has done or will do as a human, has been achieved or will be achieved with others. “You can’t separate I from we. Both the self needs to grow and develop, but grow and develop with we,” she said. “Who I am, in both my private and public life has been shaped through a continuous interaction with others.” Talking to this woman reminded me of a New York Times article released at the end of last year, which highlighted new research on humility. A team of researchers had reviewed studies of the once-popular personality trait which is “characterized by an ability to accurately acknowledge one’s limitations and abilities, and an interpersonal stance that is other-oriented rather than self-focused.”
The research highlighted an experiment measuring individuals’ intellectual humility, which is essentially an awareness of how “incomplete and fallible their views on political and social issues were”. The results revealed intellectual humility was related to curiosity, reflectiveness and open-minded tendencies. It was more closely associated with these traits than the traits one might expect, such as a high I.Q or a strong political affiliation. The paper also revealed that between 10 and 15 percent of adults in the U.S. scored highly on measures of humility and these people are found to be less aggressive and less judgemental of other religious groups. Humility, intellectual or otherwise, nourishes our mental health and improves our ability to forgive ourselves and others. The most valuable outcome it provides, though, is that it facilitates our ability to walk through life with an “other-oriented” state of mind.
The woman in her eighties, who claims the title of citizen hardest, has worked for most of her life in social change, which she poetically explained as work turning people’s private concerns into public collective action. During our conversation, I asked her what advice she would give to a young person on a particular social issue, and this was her answer: I wouldn't say anything. I would prefer to listen to what the young person had to say. She would prefer to listen above all else. This conversation occurred before the current uprising. Yet the time we are living in is another moment, another story, changing us all on a cellular level and I have not written about it directly because it is not my time to speak, but rather to listen, and then amplify the necessary voices. So in the spirit of humility and listening and this moment; which has left many of us understanding that we will never understand, yet aware that we can do the work to become a useful ally in necessary change; in the spirit of all of this, I would like to pass the mic. What follows are the voices, work and profiles of BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Colour) and the necessary resources to help us become useful allies. As the late James Baldwin wrote in his acclaimed 1962 book, The Fire Next Time: “And here we are, at the center of the arc, trapped in the gaudiest, most valuable, and most improbable water wheel the world has ever seen. Everything now, we must assume, is in our hands; we have no right to assume otherwise. If we—and now I mean the relatively conscious whites and the relatively conscious blacks, who must, like lovers, insist on, or create, the consciousness of the others—do not falter in our duty now, we may be able, handful that we are, to end the racial nightmare, and achieve our country, and change the history of the world.”
Resources for allyship:
Active allyship:
Watch:
U.S.
13th by Ava DuVernay
When They See Us by Ava DuVernay
I Am Not Your Negro by Raoul Peck
Selma by Ava DuVernay
Just Mercy by Destin Daniel Cretton
Dear White People by Justin Simien
AustraliaMabo by Rachel PerkinsSamson and Delilah by Warwick ThorntonRabbit Proof Fence by Phillip Noyce
Read:
U.S.
Me and White Supremacyby Layla F. Saad
How To Be An Antiracistby Dr. Ibram X. Kendi
The Bluest Eyeby Toni Morrison
The Fire Next Timeby James Baldwin
Sister Outsiderby Audre Lorde
Australia
The Little Red Yellow Black Bookby AIATSIS with Bruce Pascoe
Quarterly Essay: A Rightful Place. Race, Recognition and a more complete Commonwealthby Noel Pearson
Dark Emuby Bruce Pascoe
Welcome to Countryby Marcia Langton
Listen:
U.S.
1619by The New York Times
Intersectionality Matters!hosted by Kimberlé Crenshaw
Code Switch by NPR
Australia
Blacademiaby Amy Thunig
Always Was, Always Will Be Our Storiesby Marlee Silva (recently launched)
Tiddas4Tiddas by Marlee Silva (produced by Mamamia)
Donate:
This article from The Cut has a great list of organisations seeking donations in the U.S. You could make a donation to:
This article from TripleJ Hack has some practical ways to support #AboriginalLivesMatter in Australia. You could make a donation to:
Shannan Dodson’s article on TripleJ Hack also has some great suggestions on how to positively engage with Indigenous issues.
Sign a petition:
Follow:
For an extensive list of U.S. resources, see this Google Doc compiled by Sarah Sophie Flicker and Alyssa Klein. For an extensive list of Australian resources, see this recommended reading list from Reconciliation Australia.
Instead of supporting this newsletter right now, please consider donating to an organisation assisting in crucial change during this uprising. For ease, I have linked to one organisation in both the U.S. and Australia.