UWM welcomed Dr. Ibram X. Kendi to campus to speak to students about how to be antiracist as a part of the school’s Distinguished Lecture Series on Tuesday Sept. 21.
During the lecture, “An Evening with Dr. Ibram X. Kendi: How to be an Antiracist,” Kendi and UWM Chief Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Officer Dr. Chia Vang, discussed the differences between being antiracist and being not racist, and structural racism, in front of a sold-out crowd.
According to Kendi, “people use the phrase ’not racist’ as a form of denial.” He explained that because a person usually says they are “not racist” before or after saying something racist.
“To be antiracist is to support policies that try to seal the disparities that exist,” said Kendi. “Being antiracist is to take action, to be racist is to take no action … and let the status quo of inequity to persist.”
For the status quo to change it will take young people who are willing to look in the mirror, at themselves and their actions, to make radical changes to society, according to Kendi.
“In order for us to create a society where we eliminate racial violence, inequity, where everyone feels a sense of belonging and that they matter we will need to engage in a tremendous amount of thinking, learning, identifying problems and solving problems,” said Kendi.
According to Kendi, one such problem is that people don’t fully understand the role of power and the relationship between policy and ideas when it comes to structural racism.
One example of this, that Kendi pointed out, is people who think black people are dangerous. When they see an increase in the number of black people being incarcerated, they dismiss the structural aspect of why that increase in numbers is happening and believe it is okay, because they believe black people are dangerous.
“People imagine structural racism runs on A.I., that it is a machine that reboots itself because people experience it as a structure,” said Kendi. “They don’t see the individual parts.”
Kendi used the push for new voting laws in Wisconsin as an example because of accusations of voter fraud.
While there is no evidence that any widespread fraud occurred, there are people who claim it happened. It is the push in policy that leads to the majority of supporters accepting the accusations of voter fraud as true.
In this instance the policy enforces these preconceived beliefs, and becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy to maintain power, according to Kendi. Policymakers know their base and can see the changing demographics in voters. This leads to a push for a discriminatory policy, which in turn leads to their supporters accepting the voter fraud accusations as true, because they wouldn’t push for these policies if it wasn’t happening.
“It takes work, resources, organization, courage, commitment and risk to put power to action to make change,” said Kendi. “You can’t do it at home with a book or scrolling Twitter, you need to join or help fund an organization.”