White Women: Everything You Already Know About Your Own Racism and How to Do Better

Description

It’s no secret that women in contemporary society are conditioned to be “nice,” but did you know that an emphasis on being polite and an avoidance of conflict are characteristics of white supremacy culture? As the founders of Race2Dinner, an organization which facilitates conversations between white women about racism and white supremacy, Regina Jackson and Saira Rao have noticed white women’s tendency to maintain a veneer of niceness, and strive for perfection, even at the expense of anti-racist work.In this book, Jackson and Rao pose tough questions such as, how has being “nice” helped Black women, Indigenous women and women of color? Has being “nice” helped white women in their quest to end sexism? Has being “nice” earned white women economic parity with white men? Beginning with freeing white women readers from a commitment to niceness that upholds oppression, Jackson and Rao deconstruct and analyze nine aspects of traditional white woman behavior–from tone-policing to weaponizing tears–that uphold white supremacy society, and hurt all of us who are trying to live an equitable life.With a radically honest, real-talk style, White Women is a call to action to white women looking to take the next steps in dismantling white supremacy. As Jackson and Rao state, yes, it may be triggering, but without a trigger we have no shot.