All week in all of my classes we have talked about oppression against many groups (anyone who isn't a white male experiences some type of oppression). Our conversations have been emotionally charged, and I felt really drained after every class. I felt guilty, because people kept asking, why haven't dominant groups changed anything? My response was, "because they don't have to," but after some reading I felt, "I don't know how to." Socialization and oppression are extremely large issues. We know there needs to be a change, but we don't know where to start.
And then in Lum's book, I discovered that these feelings are a normal, healthy part of the cycle in beginning a life dedicated to Social Justice.
"Once we begin to accept feelings of shame, guilt, anger, and other feelings of distress as normal human reactions to the horrors of injustice, we can become free to see ways in which we are all personally connected to the issue," (Lum, 108).
The Grieving Cycle stages are then explained. They include Denial, Anger or Rage, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance and Reorganization.
Many people live their lives in Denial about oppression and social injustice, and let's be honest, that is where I was before I started taking Social Work classes.
I experienced Anger and Rage when I saw Michelle Alexander's lecture on her book The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. (Check out this video if you're interested.)
I left her lecture feeling angry, but again, helpless.
Then I went back to the daily grind of taking classes like Research Methods, Statistics, Generalist Practice, etc., and I didn't really have to think about it anymore. It was there that I reached the bargaining stage: I was aware of injustices, but I was protecting myself by not understanding the full impact on myself and others, (Lum, 110). I was caught up (probably not really, but I was protecting myself) in classes and extracurricular activities.
This week I entered the Depression stage. "The magnitude and ramifications of oppression, when truly faced, can be so overwhelming that thinking about it can produce feelings of extreme helplessness and even despair," (Lum, 110). I really did feel terrible after each class discussion, with my peers of all different walks of life describing daily injustices and oppression. Growing up in Flower Mound, TX, I just never had to face reality. Flower Mound is the epitome of white suburbia, where people go to live in a little bubble of white people perfection. (My friends and I did experience the hardships of divorce, drug abuse, and suicide, but not poverty or oppression.)
The final stage, which I have not entered but look forward to is Acceptance and Reorganization. "Social Workers are able to reorganize their behavior and purposefully work toward finding solutions. They have an increased awareness of reality. They are empowered to bring about change. They have hope in the possibility of change," (Lum, 110). I'm sure our cohort will begin this stage as we start our community action projects in several classes.
The last topic I wanted to touch on was The Cycle of Liberation discussed in Chapter 7 of our Social Justice book. These stages include Waking up, Getting Ready, Reaching Out, Building Community, Coalescing, Creating Change, and Maintaining (Adams et el, 53-58). I mentioned before how draining the first 6 chapters of this book were, and also our classes. I mentioned how I felt guilty. I found I little relief in this chapter about the Cycle of Liberation.
In the Building Communities phase there were a few statements I found relevant to my feelings of guilt after our class discussions. "These dialogues serve to prove to people that they are not alone in their situation, that there are more strategies, ideas, and options than we had initially thought," (Adams et el, 55). And that we can begin to realize that we are both victims in a larger system that pushed us into roles, (Adam et el, 56).
I have to stop feeling guilty so that I can move forward! Only after I stop feeling sorry for myself can I start coming up with creative solutions in my community. Instead of feeling alone and helpless, I need to open my eyes! I have a whole cohort of peers in the exact same position as me. We have the ability to work together, to build our own community of change.
Who's with me? Here's some inspiration.
TAKE THE POWER BACK
Bring that shit in! Uggh!Yeah, the movement's in motion with mass militant poetry
Now check this out...uggh!
In the right light, study becomes insight
But the system that dissed us
Teaches us to read and right
So called facts are fraud
They want us to allege and pledge
And bow down to their God
Lost the culture, the culture lost
Spun our minds and through time
Ignorance has taken over
Yo, we gotta take the power back!
Bam! Here's the plan
Motherfuck Uncle Sam
Step back, I know who I am
Raise up your ear, I'll drop the style and clear
It's the beats and the lyrics they fear
The rage is relentless
We need a movement with a quickness
You are the witness of change
And to counteract
We gotta take the power back
Yeah, we gotta take the power back
Come on, come on!
We gotta take the power back
The present curriculum
I put my fist in 'em
Eurocentric every last one of 'em
See right through the red, white and blue disguise
With lecture I puncture the structure of lies
Installed in our minds and attempting
To hold us back
We've got to take it back
Holes in our spirit causin' tears and fears
One-sided stories for years and years and years
I'm inferior? Who's inferior?
Yeah, we need to check the interior
Of the system that cares about only one culture
And that is why
We gotta take the power back
Yeah, we gotta take the power back
Come on, come on!
We gotta take the power back
Hey yo check, we're gonna have to break it, break it,
break it down
Awww shit!
Uggh!
And like this...uggh!
Come on, yeah! Bring it back the other way!
The teacher stands in front of the class
But the lesson plan he can't recall
The student's eyes don't perceive the lies
Bouning off every fucking wall
His composure is well kept
I guess he fears playing the fool
The complacent students sit and listen to some of that
Bullshit that he learned in school
Europe ain't my rope to swing on
Can't learn a thing from it
Yet we hang from it
Gotta get it, gotta get it together then
Like the motherfuckin' weathermen
To expose and close the doors on those who try
To strangle and mangle the truth
'Cause the circle of hatred continues unless we react
We gotta take the power back
Yeah, we gotta take the power back
Come on, come on!
We gotta take the power back
No more lies
No more lies
No more lies
No more lies
No more lies
No more lies
No more lies
No more lies
Uggh!
Yeah!
Take it back y'all
Take it back, a-take it back
A-take it back y'all, come on!
Take it back y'all
Take it back, a-take it back
A-take it back y'all, come on!
Uggh!
Yeah!
Follow my personal blog.
Adams, Maurianne. Blumenfeld, Warren. Castaneda, Carmelita. Hackman, Heather. Peters, Madeline. Zuniga, Ximena (2010). Readings for Diversity and Social Justice: An Anthology on Racism, Sexism, Anti-Semitism, Heterosexism, Classism, and Ableism. New York: Routledge.
LilaWunderbohnen (14 December 2009). Rage Against the Machine- Take the Power Back. Retrieved 28 January 2012 from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APmUWC8S1_M
Lum, Doman (2011). Culturally Competent Practice: A Framework for Understanding Diverse Groups and Justice Issues. Belmont Brooks/Cole Cengage Learning.
Mediagrrl9 (11 March 2010). Michelle Alexander on "The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness." Retrieved 28 January 2012 from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WX6G0ICwJ1Q
Take the Power Back Lyrics. http://www.ratm.net/lyrics/tak.html
Zinn, Howard (2003). A People's History of the United States. New York: Harper Perennial Modern Classics.
Katy- I, too, really appreciated Lum's introduction of the grieving cycle into how we deal with our own emotions/thoughts/actions around social justice. I find that I vacillate between all of them at any given moment. I am not sure, but somehow, I think that getting in the trenches may be the only way to overcome this feeling of helplessness that I struggle with.
ReplyDeleteKaty- the discussions we've have in class, since we have all three classes together, are pretty intense and how you said it, we have to get over that shame and fear to be able to help the rest of the world. One great professor here in the social work department once told me "you have to stop and think about the person's situation, not your own..." (Miki Tesh) and that has totally stuck with me when I think about helping someone. Although I have to say that speaking out the way discussion is going really helps me think out of my box. I appreciated the reading on Adams chapter 7 because I feel like there is a way of the trenches of discrimination and subordination and all that is negative!
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