Why Start with Urgency?
The first two volumes of SpitFire look at 4 characteristics of white supremacy culture (WSC); urgency, denial, defensiveness, and perfectionism. Tema Okun’s tool kit outlines 14, so why did we choose urgency to go first and why those four to begin the series?
Originally we wanted to do all four in one volume, but reflecting on the characteristics and listening to the contributors changed us and the pamphelts.
When we sent the articles for all four characteristics to River Drosera, the somatic educator we worked with to create the reflection questions, they asked us to give the articles more space. They said reading them all together it felt like a lot for their body to hold and consider and that pacing them over two volumes, providing for more time for rest, allowed them to go deeper in their reflection and awareness building.
With their feedback we noticed that putting all four into one volume felt urgent, almost frantic and overwhelming. So we reread Tema’s work and decided to slow down, we leaned into Sage’s medicinal slowness and took time to rest ourselves, and we learned from Vinni’s concept of time and worked when it felt right – not when we thought we ‘should’. And so it took us three years to get here and that feels right. It feels like we learned something and changed in the process.
Urgency was always going to go first, because we felt it so strongly. After that we wanted to reflect on denial, defensiveness, and perfectionism because those were the three characteristics we personally felt most strongly held us back. The traits that stop us from listening and trying. The traits we most wanted to work on and invite others to work on with us – but more about this in volume 2!
Yes, racial justice is urgent. This characteristic of white supremacy is challenging because we understand that racial justice and equity is urgent. White supremacy and racism threaten, target, and violate BIPOC people and communities every day.
White supremacy and racism invite and condition us into toxic thinking and behavior every day. We are called on, with this characteristic, to hold the volatile and tender contradiction of an underlying urgency about our immediate need for justice which is with us always with the day to day sense of urgency that too often defines our organizational and community cultures, leading to the consequences listed above.
White supremacy culture is not urgent about racial justice; white supremacy culture is urgent in the name of short-term power and profit. And white supremacy culture likes to engender a culture of urgency in those of us who are working to dismantle it because it knows that living with a constant sense that everything is urgent is a recipe for the abuse of power and burnout.
Real Respect Goes Deeper – Tsimka
“Both American and Canadian colonial projects were built for the profit and benefit of some to the detriment of others and the environment.“
“Tribal parks are an expression of modern Indigenous authority and self-determination.”
“We have been stuffed into the closet of our homes, on Indian Reservations, since the settling of our homelands as “Canada”. Canadians need to recognize that injustice and start thinking about a fair way to live on Indigenous lands.”
“People give land acknowledgements, but how does that empower a First Nation to govern their lands? It doesn’t. Real respect goes much further.”
“Tla-o-qui-aht governance is the rightful and alternative governance to the colonial control of these lands.”
“I ask my community to listen. Sit in the discomfort and find ways to support, or make, real change.”
Intro to White supremacy Culture – Tema Okun in collaboration with Kenneth Jones
“What is White Supremacy Culture? While white supremacy culture affects us all, harms us all, and is toxic to us all, it does not affect, harm, and violate us in the same way. White supremacy targets and violates BIPOC people and communities with the intent to destroy them directly; white supremacy targets and violates white people with a persistent invitation to collude that will inevitably destroy their humanity.“
“Our experience of white supremacy culture and our navigation of white supremacy culture is very different based on who we are and our lived experience, our race, our class, our gender, our sexuality, our religion … all the ways that the ruling class power elite use identity to define who is human and who is not, as well as all the ways in which oppressions intersect.”
“I want to be clear that these characteristics offer one way of understanding white supremacy culture, not the way. May this be a small contribution to a larger understanding… White supremacy culture is a devastating force in all our lives, used by ruling class power brokers to maintain vast and violent structural inequality. I will also say, with deep regret, that even those of us who are movement builders get confused about the difference between a tool and a weapon. I ask that we avoid weaponizing this information.”
“While I describe these characteristics separately or in groups, they never stand alone. I have pulled them apart to help us understand them better and they reinforce each other rather than act in isolation… My intention is to say that white supremacy culture trains us all to internalize attitudes and behaviors that do not serve any of us.”
“We are strongest when we are allowed to be vulnerable – with ourselves and each other. White supremacy culture does not allow for vulnerability. And that is a tragedy for us all.”
“Culture is powerful precisely because it is so present and at the same time so very difficult to name or identify. The characteristics are damaging because they are used as norms and standards without being pro-actively named or chosen by the group. They are damaging because they promote white supremacy thinking. Because we all live in a white supremacy culture, these characteristics show up in the attitudes and behaviors of all of us – people of color and white people.”
Medicinal Slowness – Sage
“WHAT IS THE MEDICINE IN SLOWNESS? Medicinal slowness is relational. Medicinal slowness is focusing.“
“When I gave myself permission to live a life that was uncertain, small, slow, and moment to moment, I unhooked myself from the doing identity and gave myself space to not know, and not need to know.”
“Slowness, in my mind, is not a speed but a way of being purposeful about how to spend time… it involves conscious choice about what is needed in that moment.“
“While busyness can be very distracting, Medicinal Slowness can create the space to better recognize what really matters (like clouds, or our dreams for the future, or supporting liberation). Capitalism keeps people so busy that there isn’t time and energy to follow through on what is important, or even the capacity to hear our inner voice.“
“Medicinal slowness is a chance to step back from busyness and the identification with busyness. It’s a chance to experience deep rest, to look around and appreciate where you are, to turn your attention to your instincts and intuition about what capacity you do and don’t have in that moment, instead of letting a to-do list drive your time (I love to-do lists but I try to write them more like menus / choose-your-own-adventure).“
“I didn’t used to know about the importance of slowness. I found slowness as a way to literally heal my brain through patience and space, and even though the type of mental health crisis I went through was entirely devastating, I’ve grown so much from having to learn about slowness. This time, and Medicinal Slowness, has been transformative.”
Love Separated by War and Borders – Marwo Abdi
“I escaped the refugee camp and I am forever grateful for the scholarship opportunity made possible by the generosity of Canadians. However I have also been missing my family, my mother, brother and two cousins, and been separated from them for about 20 years.“
“My children are growing up without their grandmother around and are not able to access the love and care of grandmothers. Grandparents provide meaningful traditional knowledge, including language, food, and connection to a culture that is far away. My children are missing an opportunity for learning about our culture and heritage, which is important.”
“The hope to reunite with my family began 3 years ago. Unable to bear the burden of family separation, and my family’s precarious situation in Uganda, I decided to approach my friends and share my story and my family’s situation. They were moved by our story and together we decided to apply for my family to come to Canada as privately sponsored refugees.”
“The group would need to fundraise enough money to cover the costs of my family’s living expenses for a period of at least one year, and then help with their settlement once they get to Canada. We need to raise about $56,000 in total, and before we could submit an application we needed to raise half that amount.“
“Refugees are already extremely vulnerable… always viewed as a burden and people who are coming here to take over the country and exploit economic opportunities. Unlike these stories, the truth is refugees are always vulnerable people looking for safety and the opportunity to build a life“
“I didn’t used to know about the importance of slowness. I found slowness as a way to literally heal my brain through patience and space, and even though the type of mental health crisis I went through was entirely devastating, I’ve grown so much from having to learn about slowness. This time, and Medicinal Slowness, has been transformative.“
