At 9:45 p.m. on Friday, January 20th, my wife and I boarded one of three buses filled with mostly white women from Vermont to make the overnight journey to the Women’s March in Washington, DC. I didn’t wear a pink hat. I didn’t carry a sign. I wasn’t a bus captain. I just went to add my body to the bodies of other people who, like me, felt called to be there.
During the march, one of the things that moved me most were the men and their signs. It was an amazing feeling to watch them there, following us, showing their solidarity, acknowledging women’s leadership.
I wondered if the people of color at the march felt a similar way when they saw white people with Black Lives Matter signs. It made me wish I had one of those signs in my hand. It would have been a visible acknowledgement that I see the devastation, hundreds of years in the making, that people of color in this country have endured.
To my sisters of color, I know we are in a mess, not a new mess, but a worse mess than ever. I’m sorry that for so long you and your ancestors and your children have suffered so much and continue to suffer. I don’t share your experience, but I hear you, I believe you, and I commit to standing with you.
To my white sisters, I appreciate all that you are doing: marching; organizing; taking action. Given your efforts, I know that the words of women of color can sometimes sting, can feel unfair, but please try to lean in to the discomfort. Here is what I try to do. In my faltering way I listen, even when the stories may not line up with my own experience. I listen, even when the stories challenge my beliefs and hopes and dreams about what our country was and is.
It has taken me a long time to see how the legacy of slavery and racism has affected our country and how it affects me as a white woman. Right now, we have an opportunity to open our eyes in a new way and to learn about the legacy and workings of oppression (against people of color, against women, against poor people, against LGBTQ people) and how they intersect with one another. The consequences, which have always been clear to people of color on the front lines, are becoming clearer to white women, too.
So, my commitment will be to continue to listen to women of color -- they will always be more experienced than me at understanding and navigating the practices, policies, and attitudes that divide our country and support injustice. I can stand in solidarity with them, just as all those men at the Women’s March stood in solidarity with me.
I’d like to invite you to join me in doing the hard work of building true relationships with each other, across all the ways women have been divided. Maybe you have a pink hat, a sign, were in the streets on January 21st. Maybe you watched from home. Or maybe you turned away. It doesn’t matter. As each day passes, it becomes more and more clear that we are all in this together and we need each other. Let’s lean into the discomfort of challenging conversations, of misunderstandings, of building real relationships, based on hard truths. Let’s not let anyone distract us by criticizing this sometimes messy work. We can do this. We have to do this. The future of our country depends on it.
Photo by Karyn Vogel