The knapsack

Maddie (girl was on FIRE) wrote a very good comment on the blog last week about a TikTok she watched that got me thinking about an exercise I did for some kind of event I attended. We were doing some workshop and in one of the breakout sessions somebody made us line up in the center of the room and started asking questions. We were supposed to take a step forward every time something did NOT have to do with us and taking one back when it did. You should have seen the faces of some people when we finished the exercise. I wish I would have taken pictures.

That's because privilege is something that some people don't usually think about because it's been institutionalized. It's systemic, at this point. It's just the way it is. This is especially true where colonialism has left its ugly mark, which is basically, most everywhere. This whole situation with Black Lives Matter should make us think and keep us affecting change. It goes beyond these weeks. It goes beyond ourselves. So what if we play a game? I'll ask you some questions, and you, in the comfort of your own quarantine, will answer them. Get some paper and pen because this is gonna go the old-fashioned way. Ready?

Here we go:

1. Add three points if you can do well in a situation and not be called a credit to your race. If that could very well happen to you add one.

2. Add one if your ancestors were forced to come to the U.S. or forced to relocate from their historical lands in the U.S., add three if that did not happen to your ancestors.

3. Add three if in most cases when you ask to speak with the person in charge you will be facing a person of your race, add one if in most cases you would not be facing a person of your race.

4. Add three points, if when you learned about the history of this country and of civilization in general your racial group was primarily represented, if not add one point.

5. Add one point if English is not your first language, add three points if it is.

6. Add three points if you can be pretty sure you will not be hassled by store security while shopping because of your race, add one point if you can’t be sure.

7. Add three points if when you use checks, credit cards or cash, you can count on your skin color not to work against the appearance of financial reliability, add one point if you can not count on that.

8. Add one point if in a work situation you were the lead of a project team and going to meet with a client who didn’t know you, and the client might assume that colleagues who have come along with you, whom you actually supervise, are in charge instead of you, because of your race, add three points if your race would not be likely to cause this assumption.

9. Add three points if a traffic cop pulls you over you can be pretty sure you weren’t singled out because of your race, add one point if you can’t be sure you haven’t been singled out because of race.

10. Add three points if you can take a job with an affirmative action employer without having co-workers on the job suspect that you are unqualified and got the job because of your race, add one point if some co-workers are likely to think that.

Having fun yet?
I'm lousy at math, so you can go check what your score means if you check THIS PDF.

There are many iterations of this activity, but the one we did was one more easily done online. It's very telling that doing something like this is an outrage for some.

So points to Maddie for making me think about this. Did your score surprise you?

XOXO