Reflections on the Microagressions Article

Not Present (724 words)
Being a young, white, heterosexual male, the number of microagressions I have experienced in my life will pale in many ways to those of other races, ethnicities, religions, genders and sexual statuses. However, I can think of a couple of examples in which it has come up, and in retrospect, how easy I think it probably was for me to break down barriers as compared to someone in situation where the roles were flip-flopped.

My first example comes from my time volunteering in the Hennepin County Juvenile Detention Center. For about a year and a half, I was a volunteer Chaplin there on Saturday mornings. It was a great opportunity, and while I was quiet faithful, I did end up using a lot of the time to do more discussion on life goals and planning for re-entrance into society. It was an interesting feeling for many of these young men who were mostly members of racial minorities. And, it was something I could see on their faces every time I walked through the door. An announcement would be made, “This is Matt, he’s here to talk with any of you about life if you would like.” Heads look up from card games, books, and meals for a second to hear the message, and then go back down to what they were doing. Granted, most days I didn’t hear guys say “what’s this white guy know about my life?” but it wasn’t unheard of. Rather, it was almost a weekly climb back up the mountain to regain their trust. Yes, I did have certain guys on each floor that were regulars who would smile when they saw me as much as I’d smile when I saw them. But there were other times where I’d spend the whole time I was there trying to make headway and not crack the barrier, because no matter what I’d say, no matter what I knew about their specific block in Minneapolis, there’s no way I could know THEIR life. And maybe they were right. Reading books, hearing stories, seeing the homes of those you work with may teach you a lot, but it doesn’t live the life for you. In a way though, I always told them that was an advantage to me. I knew the running tape that many whites would have in their heads about them. I knew what it was like to get the support to succeed and I had the opportunity to give some of that back to them. It didn’t always work, but those microagressions that I was able to break through ultimately turned out to be a blessing in that they brought the relationship I had with several of those guys even closer over time.

My second example of this sort of situation would be in some of my work for the Diversity Council, in fact. Though some of my work in one of the middle school programs, I have encountered more than a few situations in which I’ll hear, in a moment of frustration from one of the students, “you’re only singling me out because I’m [insert a race] or you’re a racist.” Now granted, these statements are coming out of an individual who has just been called out for talking or being generally out of line in class, possibly even having been warned before, so there is mostly likely some grasping for straws to deflect some of the guilt. However, therein lays some truth about some of the student’s feelings. I sure it is difficult in its own way to hear about diversity from a white male. Why should they have to listen to a guy like me tell them about the unique heritage of Mexican Americans? What do I know about what it’s like to be a woman in the present day? Am I black? Then don’t talk to the class about what is offensive to black people when we cover the stereotypes section. Now mind you, none of this really bothered me, because I knew it was something that would come up. However, it is something that I always liked to take note of, because it really did give me a view into the mind’s eye of that student. And it is in that mind’s eye that I could really get to the root of what made them tick.

Matt