By Sarah Davies (she/her)
From my experience, people seem to have this belief that you are either overtly racist/sexist/homophobic/transphobic/ableist (and the list goes on), or you’re not. 0 or 100. Nothing in between. This idea completely disregards that fact that white people/straight people/cis-gendered people/able-bodied people commit micro-aggressions every. Single. Day. This completely undermines that basic ideology that exists in our society today, that you aren’t racist, or sexist, or ableist unless you explicitly say things that are offensive.
This issue is dealt with extremely well in the Stan series, ‘The Bold Type’, where white journalist Jane Sloane is constantly called out by her best friend, Kat Edison, for using terms like ‘woke’, as well as when Jane’s white privilege rears its head. Kat has a white father and Black mother, and through the series also struggles with her identity, as a Black, queer woman. While not perfect, ‘The Bold Type’ acknowledges and embraces these issues, and highlights how easily micro-aggressions can occur in everyday life, as well as how awkward it can be to call someone out on it.
One of my favourite quotes from The Bold Type. Another is ‘white girls really can’t say woke’
If you are confused as to what constitutes a micro-aggression (which can, and does, include cultural appropriation), here is an example. If you’re walking down the street, and you see a white man wearing dreadlocks with his white woman partner wearing cornrows, then pass a group of school kids saying ‘bye Felicia’ to each other, while scrolling through your Instagram feed and seeing pictures from a recent festival of people wearing Native America/First Nations headdresses, you’re in the middle of a micro-aggression party, my friend. Maybe you’re even walking past a store that sells white sage, or has it burning, in order to ‘cleanse’ the spiritual environment around it.
The issue is, no one knows where these phrases, and styles, and actions originated from, nor what their intended use was, so they don’t think of it as a big deal – it’s just the way society has evolved, right?
Wrong.
If you see a person wearing cornrows who is not of African or African-American descent, they shouldn’t be wearing them (looking at you, Kylie Jenner. Also, you Valentino. And you Commes Des Garçons – your fashion shows do not entitle you to style white models with cornrows). In my opinion, there is no counter-argument to this statement. From following Black women, men and activists on Instagram, and doing my own research, I found out the history of cornrows. While a massive part of the cultural identity for many African people who were enslaved during the 16th to 19th Centuries (yep, 400 years, in case anyone wasn’t aware), cornrows also had another purpose.
They became maps for escaping plantations, and leaving the horror (rape, torture, starvation, whipping, and basically inhuman treatment), inflicted upon them by white people (many of whom STILL profit directly from this through ‘family money’) behind.
So no, it’s not okay for anyone who is NOT of the African or African-American heritage, to be wearing cornrows. You are not only disrespecting the MILLIONS of people who died (either on ships where they were packed into the hold, each with an area of only four-five feet in length, and two-three in height) but also the cultural heritage and identity of Black people who live with this history every day, and have to deal with their inter-generational trauma from it.1
Using terms like ‘bye, Felicia’, ‘woke’, ‘yass’, and ‘bae’ also holds a myriad of issues. While I could write an essay on these issues, the summary is this: these words are part of AAVE (African-American Vernacular English). Black people created these words, yet get no recognition for that. Corporate companies then use these phrases, on t-shirts, to sell their products, in advertising, without giving any reference to the original creator, or financially compensating them. We, as non-Black people, then incorporate these words into our every day life, without thinking in any way, shape, or form, about where they come from, in a form of cultural appropriation.
That’s not all.
Particularly in places such as America, but many others as well, Black people are actually punished for using phrases they created in the first place. Employers feel they seem uneducated if they use these words, yet when white people use them, it’s on-trend. By using these words without giving any reference to AAVE, we are showing our ignorance. I will put my hand up and say I used to say all of these. Then I educated myself, and was educated by others, about the issues behind doing this.
Now, I don’t say them. It’s really that easy.
The cultural appropriation of items such as headdresses, and wearing costumes to Halloween/parties from other cultures is similar to this. I learnt, from Instagram account @lilnativeboy, that many Native students are prohibited from wearing their own culturally significant headdress items to graduation ceremonies – an undoubtedly important moment in a person’s life. HOWEVER. It is apparently perfectly okay for groups of white people to wear them to festivals and costume parties, usually with not much else on.
Yes, I am aware that festivals are different to graduation ceremonies – yet many others wear religious or significant items to graduations, and people can decorate their caps, so how is this different? The issue, much the same with using words like ‘tribe’, is that Native people are, again, actively looked down upon for using these terms and wearing these items, whereas non-Native people are allowed to, with no repercussions. It is a deliberate power imbalance, created by decades of systemic racism and discrimination.
White sage is, again, a huge issue for Native people. Stores like Urban Outfitters (US), Tree of Life (Australia) and online companies such as Amazon make a HUGE profit selling white sage. Too bad it is being used in the completely wrong way. Firstly, white sage is native to America, so while there are other types of sage grown around the world, the true white sage is being illegally stolen from Native peoples. You know, the same Native people who use it for actual culturally-significant and sacred ceremonies, and not to cleanse their room or crystal shop of ‘bad vibes’? Secondly, when companies take this white sage and sell it, they are leaving less and less for these ceremonies – as @lilnativeboy has stated on Twitter, ‘Due to the demand of white sage for twitter witches + non-Natives, some tribes have limited access to a sacred plant we have been using for centuries’.
None of the above is okay, and if you shocked or were unaware of these facts, it may be time to engage in a little more research, and I’m not only talking about reading academic articles. As I have mentioned numerous times, free social platforms are one of the best ways to learn. As I have also mentioned, if you are learning about these issues from people that it directly affects, it means they are using their own time and emotional labour in order to educate you and others, so financial support of them is imperative. What I have mentioned is only a tiny, tiny fraction of the micro-aggressions that are committed daily, by people just like you and me, and which contribute to the unequal structures our society has been founded upon.
Just like Kat, it might make you uncomfortable calling others out on it. It’s easy to change these things within yourself without talking to anyone about it. Once you realise the issues behind these terms, and actions, and styles, however, you may, like me, find it harder to ignore when you’re then faced with others doing it in front of you. In any case, the first step is educating yourself. I am still learning every single day, and to be quite frank, it shocks me how little I used to know of the world (yet thought I knew a lot), and the experiences of people different to myself. Intersectional education is one of the most important steps we can take to ending gender inequality, and all of the repercussions it continues to have around the world.
If there are micro-aggressions you have seen in action, learnt about, or are wondering about, please leave a comment and we can continue the discussion! We at OWP want to learn from you as much as you may be wanting to learn from us, and the way we do this is by talking. If you find yourself using micro-aggressions in your life, now that you know more about them, try to unpack the privilege behind them, and work on doing better. It takes every individual making an effort, to make a difference!