I don't know what the solution is, but I'm about 100% sure that it's not being told that the onus is on marginalized minorities to coddle their racist as fuck oppressors in the hope that that will somehow magically make them see us as human beings, and not less than animals (Protip: racists view their pets with more love, respect, and humanity than they do their fellow humans who just happen to be a different ethnicity than they are).
It's not up to us to teach those that would rather see us dead or imprisoned for the color of our skin empathy.
I've seen with my own eyes black people (among other PoC), be as cordial, polite, and kind to racists, and still be treated with disdain, condescension, and vitriol.
Racists have to change themselves. No amount of coddling is going to do that for them. Even calling them out on it often has them double down on their hatred. Ultimately, there is a moment of realization that a racist must have, and that requires a lot of self reflection and an ability to look inward at themselves and the reasons why they feel the way they do.
I've mentioned it before, but I grew up in the Midwest. As a young black man, I learned about racism from a very early age, but even more so, I grew up on FOX news, and a conservative family that harbored some pretty hateful and disgusting views about non-blacks and other marginalized groups (but even I was prone to holding racist views about my own people; how fucked is that?). I was homophobic. I was transphobic, I was islamiphobic. I never outwardly treated the few people in those groups that I met in the Midwest any differently, but it was still there and in me.
It wasn't until I moved out of that environment, and started to interact with those that I held racist and phobic views of that I began to question what I was told my whole life by FOX news, and reinforced by those around me. But even more so, it wasn't until I acknowledged my own bigotry and racism, until I realized my own hypocrisy in that I was a staunch advocate for the civil rights of black people, but completely closed off and ignorant to the struggles of other marginalized groups that I began to change my views.
Like, who was I to, on one hand, desire for me and my people to be seen as human beings deserving of basic rights and humane treatment, and on the other, shut out those same struggles of those that wanted the same thing, but weren't a part of my own group. It was disgusting. I began to challenge my entire belief system and upbringing. Applying my views on my struggles as a black man to the struggles of immigrants, the LGBTQ community, women, indigenous peoples, etc etc. Finding the commonality and the compassion. The unity.
And it opened my eyes, and I changed. It wasn't the oppressed extending an olive branch to me, or trying to explain why I was a piece of shit. That wasn't for them to do in the first place. It was on ME, and for me, to realize that dark, shitty part about myself, exercise that empathy that I always felt I had for my fellow man, and work to become a more empathetic person to others, not just those like me. And what do you know? That shame and self reflection worked. The onus was on me, and me alone.
So forgive me if I don't subscribe to the newsletter for oppressed groups having to contort themselves to make racists and bigots and sexists feel comfortable enough to address their own shittiness, and then, somehow, accept that they are, indeed shitty, thanks to the kind words and acceptance expressed by the very people they don't see as human? Nah, that thinking is a very special form of victim blaming designed to not actually have to take responsibility for their part in the systemic oppression of marginalized groups, and therefore they're robbed of their need to self reflect and grow as a person.
