Advocating for anti-racism education, one ‘allyship’ at a time
By Saskia Rodenburg
A local workshop series organized by black women called “So You Want to be An Ally” has launched at the 25OneCommunity space in Centretown.
The series was created for white people to educate other white people about anti-racism advocacy and “allyship” – the ideal process by which privileged individuals in society can support marginalized groups seeking social justice.
The first session, “An Introduction to Allyship,” was held Jan. 10 at 250 Bank St. Series organizers Selali A-W and Sakinna Gairey are activists involved movements such as Black Like Me, an Ottawa-based group that hosts political and cultural events where black people “can find happiness, safety, support.”
The series seeks to lessen the emotional labour and other investments made by black people when they tell their stories of oppression, instead creating opportunities for white people to educate other white people about how best to combat racism and contribute to social change.
The challenges of allyship for white people can include unlearning ideas that have been ingrained in mainstream culture, and ensuring that well-intentioned individuals are not projecting and imposing their own ideas of what marginalized peoples need. Instead, the focus is on asking members of such groups how best to support them.
“What ‘So You Want to be an Ally’ does is show you exactly how to do that (allyship). It takes you through the introspection, through the guilt, you deal with whatever feelings you have and say, ‘OK, here you go now, you can do these things,” said Gairey.
Gairey added that after attending workshops, participants will have a support network of people who better understand allyship and can take action for social reform.
Allyship has become an integral force for social change in areas such as the #MeToo movement against sexual harassment and assault and Black Lives Matter, which includes efforts to end racial profiling and police violence against black people.
Hollywood elite and everyday citizens are taking action and speaking up against inappropriate behaviours, actions and oppressive systems and becoming allies to those who have been harassed and/or assaulted.
The ally session cost $25 per person, which was a sticking point for some on the event’s Facebook page. However, A-W pointed to a larger issue at play when people interested in participating in a social-change movement aren’t willing to pay a reasonable fee for appropriate training.
“I think it should be noted that people are even asking why we should ask for money for this event. It’s telling in and of itself that people are not used to paying for black labour or needing to do that,” A-W said in an interview.
The labour A-W is referring to encompasses the organization, work and emotional toll that is typically taken on by the black organizers.
The introduction session was facilitated by white woman Justine De Jaegher, who was approached by the organizers. She had worked previously with them on student movements and in other workshops.
De Jaegher explained that her desire to facilitate came from a place of wanting to support marginalized communities.
“The whole idea of allyship is to step up as much as you can to support marginalized communities. It was identified that facilitating these workshops is a way I could help folks in a way that they wanted and were asking for,” De Jaegher said in an interview.
The session featured definitions, activities and YouTube videos to help those in attendance better understand their positioning and privilege. One such activity was the power flower, a diagram made to show the privilege or marginalization people may face based on identities such as gender.
The focus of the workshops will continue to be the education of white people by white people with the purpose of building allyship and better understanding roles in social change movements, according to A-W and Gairey.
De Jaegher noted that it is uncomfortable to have conversations about systems of oppression that establish and maintain dominance over certain groups, but the awkwardness underscores the necessity of having the workshops.
“These are conversations we don’t have a lot and so they can be uncomfortable sometimes,” said De Jaegher. “But I’m always reminded that they can be so important — like the fact that people are so uncomfortable indicates it’s important to talk about these things.”
The organizers say it’s not for Indigenous peoples to teach white people or for people of colour to undertake the labour of teaching.
Such advocates of change are used to “putting their personal stories on the line” and “having to relive traumas and hard lived lessons just to re-put out information that we put out all the time and that’s already available,” A-W said.
There will be four more workshops in the series, including: Call Ins/Call Outs (talking to people about the impact of their words), Cultural and Language Appropriation (the taking and profiting by white people of cultural forms rooted in marginalized groups), Personalizing Activism and Direct Action.