culture creators - city of dubuque
TRANSCRIPT
Culture Creators
Kelly Larson, Human Rights Director
563-589-4190; [email protected]
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On March 16, 2021, a white gunman in Atlanta, GA killed eight people, six of whom were women of Asian descent, at three separate massage businesses in Atlanta. The gunman defended his actions as not racially motivated and instead due to sex addiction, leading a law enforcement officer to describe the gunman as “having a bad day.”
“The really tough choices…don’t center upon right versus wrong. They involve right versus right. They are genuine dilemmas precisely because each side is firmly rooted in one of our basic, core values.”
--Rushworth Kidder
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After this event, I witnessed a lot of people taking a stand – on one side, I heard people talking about the ways in which our culture reinforces dehumanization of women and people of Asian descent and particularly older women of Asian descent. On the other side I witnessed people defending the law enforcement officer’s statement that the gunman had a “bad day” as a sign of the officer’s empathy for the gunman’s alleged brain health issues. Even as I say these words, I imagine some of you having an instant reaction of wanting to defend the side you are on. I get it. I had those reactions, too. Notice what you’re feeling and breathe so that you can actually THINK. Through all of this, I found myself returning to this quote and the endless tension we all have to learn to deal with between two core values many of us hold dear – justice and mercy. Do we demand justice for the victims or do we demand mercy for the perpetrator and/or officer? I would like to suggest that – on the level of individuals - this is a false choice.
Culture CREATORS
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There is a reason that I call these sessions “culture creators” – it is because we have a choice to create an alternative to these “either/or” “with us or against us” situations that our discussions about equity so often devolve into. We have a choice to stop recreating this pattern of taking sides and defending our particular version of “the high road.” It starts with asking the question: what are the competing values in this situation? Then we can ask “what would a world look like where do our best to satisfy both of these values at least to some degree?” These are hard questions and we often give up on them and go straight to arguing about “how.” Arguments about ”how” perpetuate problems because they are rooted in unspoken values clashes. We have to first be clear on our values – our “why” – in order to reach resolutions that honor the good in each of the different value choices. Today, I want to encourage all of us to hold off on the “how” and begin to envision what a culture would look like that values both justice and mercy. What are the possibilities? Today I’m going to give you my suggestions for the kind of culture we could choose to create.
March 19, 2020-February 28, 2021• 3,795 incidents
• Verbal harassment (68.1%) and shunning (20.5%) two largest proportions of total
• Physical assault (11.1%) third largest category
• Civil rights violations, such as workplace discrimination, refusal of service (8.5%)
• Online harassment (6.8%)
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The first possibility is to create a culture where we openly acknowledge the patterns of hatred and bias against Asians and Pacific Islanders in the United States, and ask the question – what actions could I take as a single individual right here in my workplace that would help to interrupt this pattern? Today I’m focusing on hate and bias directed at the AAPI community – similar numbers exist for a lot of other communities and the tips I will give can equally be applied to anyone who is feeling or being targeted on the basis of identity. The organization Stop Asian and Pacific Islander Hate reports that between March 19, 2020 and February 28, 2021, there were 3,795 incidents, with 68.1% of them being verbal harassment, 20.5% being shunning (avoiding people of API backgrounds), 8.5% being civil rights violations (like workplace discrimination or denial of service) and 6.8% being online harassment.
March 19, 2020-February 28, 2021• Women report hate incidents 2.3 times
more than men
• Youths (0-17 years old) report 12.6% of incidents and seniors (60 years old and older) report 6.2% of incidents
• Chinese are the largest ethnic group (42.2%) that report experiencing hate, followed by Koreans (14.8%), Vietnamese (8.5%) and Filipinos (7.9%).
• Businesses are the primary site of discrimination (35.4%), followed by public streets (25.3%) and public parks (9.8%). Online incidents account for 10.8% of the total.
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Women are nearly two and a half times more likely to report incidents than men; 12.6% involved people under 18 and 6.2% involved people over 60. Chinese people experienced the most incidents at 42.2%, followed by Korean at 14.8% and Vietnamese at 8.5% and Filipinos at 7.9%. Here in Dubuque, I have heard personal stories throughout the pandemic directed at our Marshall Islanders – including blame for the virus. Most commonly the incidents occurred in businesses at 35.4%, followed by public streets (25.3%) and parks (9.8%). Online incidents account for 10.8% of the total. So what does this mean for our own workplace?
Safety TipsIf you are a target:
• Safety First
• Stay Calm
• Speak Out (If you can do so safely)
• Seek Immediate Support
• Seek Emotional Support
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In our workplace, this means creating a culture where people who are engaging in activities to protect themselves are supported rather than acting as if they are “too sensitive” or “overreacting” or “making a big deal out of nothing” or “distracting from more important work.” Here are some safety tips from Stop AAPI Hate to consider if you are a target of hate or bias: Safety First: Trust your instincts and assess your surroundings. If you feel unsafe and you are able to, leave the area. Stay Calm: Take a deep breath, limit eye-contact, and maintain neutral body language. Speak Out (If you can do so safely): In a calm and firm voice establish physical boundaries, and denounce their behavior and comments. Seek Immediate Support: Ask bystanders for support or intervention. Seek Emotional Support: Once you feel safe, take time to recover and reach out to someone to talk about what happened. Remember this is not your fault, and you are not alone.
Safety TipsIf you are a witness:
• Take Action
• Actively Listen
• Ignore Attacker
• Accompany
• Offer Emotional Support
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In our workplace, it also means creating a culture where more of us are willing to interrupt these behaviors and offer support for people who are targeted. Here are safety tips from Stop AAPI Hate for individuals who are witnessing someone else being subjected to hate or bias: Take Action: Approach the targeted person, introduce yourself, and offer support. Actively Listen: Ask before taking any actions and respect the targeted person’s wishes. Monitor the situation if needed. Ignore Attacker: Using your discretion, attempt to calm the situation by using your voice, body language, or distractions. Accompany: If the situation escalates, invite the targeted person to join you in leaving. Offer Emotional Support: Help the targeted person by asking how they’re feeling. Assist them in figuring out what they want to do next. In other words – we create a culture where we take the harm that is caused by hate and bias seriously – including when it is emotional harm rather than physical harm.
Encourage people who experience or witness acts of hate towards the Asian American and Pacific Islander communities to report it:
• to the Human Rights Department at: https://www.cityofdubuque.org/1500/Report-a-Concern if it occurs out in the community and
• to the Human Resources Department if it occurs in the workplace.
Reporting
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Creating this culture also requires supporting the reporting of concerns and not downplaying them. This is why Human Resources has been working so hard to make sure policies around discrimination and harassment are in place and clearly communicated and that incidents are fully investigated. It is also why we have a Human Rights ordinance with an enforcement mechanism for the community. Reporting is important in order for us to address the next piece
IndividualAccountability
• acknowledging one’s responsibility for one’s actions;
• acknowledging the impact of one’s actions on others;
• expressing genuine remorse;
• taking actions to repair the harm to the degree possible; and
• no longer committing similar harm.
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Which is accountability. This is where most of our failures lie in large part because we confuse accountability with punishment and, worse yet, we are operating in a culture whose structures have largely been designed for punishment. There is a difference between accountability and punishment. Punishment is an act of further harm towards a single individual. Accountability is an act of care towards the larger community and our continued relationships within it. Punishing systems actually work against accountability by forcing the person who causes harm (often literally called the “defendant”) to defend, deny, and deflect, rather than take responsibility and acknowledge the impact of their actions. Someone who is accused is successful if they prove their innocence, rather than take responsibility. This is also where we can envision another way of operating – a culture - that includes empathy for the person who engages in an act of bias or hate while simultaneously holding the person accountable. A truly empathetic response has these elements of accountability associated with it: Taking responsibility for one’s actions, the impact of those actions on others, genuinely experiencing remorse, repairing the harm to the extent possible, and no longer committing similar harm. The rub, of course, is that the person who has caused harm must truly take accountability and many of us have been conditioned by the structures in our culture to defend ourselves – we fear taking accountability will mean punishment and blame. Ironically, it is the failure to take accountability that is most likely to land someone in the position of being punished through loss of a job or defending a lawsuit. Accountability also requires not continuing to cause harm – in other words, the person MUST learn from the incident. This is why there is a need to really keep track of incidents and to address repeat offenders with more than another opportunity to learn. We have to really OWN our own accountability.
SocietalAccountability
• acknowledge biases baked into the culture;
• use data as flashlight on patterns;
• listen to people most impacted;
• try new ways of operating;
• review, measure, adjust.
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Accountability also means looking beyond individual incidents to the larger system and the biases that are inherent within it. We have to look at the bigger picture that is driving much of the conversation, especially among communities of color. Unless you believe that being born with black or brown skin makes you inherently more likely to commit crimes, the disproportionality in our criminal justice system demonstrates we have a bias in favor of understanding and empathy for the white perpetrator and white victims and not offering the same understanding and empathy for perpetrators or victims who are people of color – this is part of why there was so much outrage at the officer’s statement about this particular gunman “having a bad day.” As I said when my daughter read the statement to me ”it wasn’t as bad as the day those victims had.” (I may have said it more colorfully than that, but you get the drift). Where our intercultural work has gotten stuck is in missing this crucial point: we are starting from a place – from within a culture – that already dumps most of the negative consequences of bias disproportionately on people of color. This is what needs to change and we do it by applying an equity lens – using data, looking at patterns, listening to people most impacted, trying new ways of operating, reviewing and checking the impact and adjusting. And we need to learn how to shift perspective, so I will leave you One of the things I noticed was that my gut reaction to the officer wasn’t outrage. It was simply “welp, here we go again – don’t expect a fair investigation in this case.” Why? Because this officer’s statement exposes a deep bias in our culture of giving men who do outrageous things to women the benefit of the doubt. We see it in rape cases, too. It starts from the premise that for some reason the man must not be fully responsible for his own actions. It’s not conscious or intentional. But it’s there and it impacts our ability, as women, to believe that the justice system will work for us. Now make it ten times worse by adding race to the mix. Sure, I can step away, regroup, and interrupt that gut reaction. I can remind myself that people are more complex than one thing they say. I can remember that I have those same biases – and more – ingrained in me. That’s the nature of culture. And I can keep working towards creating a culture where we really live some of the alternatives I described today. That is the choice I continue to make – some days more successfully than others. Thank you to those of you listening who also are making this choice.
SHARED RESPONSIBILITY
An appropriate “response” according to your “ability” and the situation.
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Thanks for listening to my musings today – go forth and be good humans.