I’m tired of hearing (typically in white, privileged spaces) “it’s not our place” or “we don’t know enough" to push forward new practices oriented to justice, equity, and transformation.

The implicit assumption: BIPOC folx will do this work because we have the lived experience.

Asking communities who've been long marginalized (and who are going through a lot right now) to figure it out before you get involved is not good enough.

I hope I don't need to explain why this is.

Remember: Funding is conservative & goes to Things Funders Can Touch & Measure, bc w/o lived experience of the issues, they need to prove change in terms their own can understand.

And we all know how well orienting to the whims of traditional power has worked out for the world.

So, just so we’re all clear, you’re then asking those who've long suffered to "figure it out”—the "it" being structural, historical, deeply embedded injustice—with literal peanuts.

I truly cannot describe how hard this is: To know what's at stake for your communities, get a pittance to try to reverse historical oppression, AND to have to prove results on timelines & in ways those w/ power can understand so that they’ll help move the field in that direction.

I know the structures are intentional and the people within them (for the most part) are not, but it literally feels like you are set up to fail all the time.

It’s enough to drive someone mad.

It is EVERYONE'S job to get involved.

Yes, know your role. Know where to lead & how to follow. But it IS your role. And if you’ve learned the ins & outs of mechanics to prop up the status quo, you can also learn how to dismantle it. (And it’s a helluva lot more fun, I promise).

I wish I didn’t have to say this. I wish “silence is violence”, “if you’re not part of the solution you’re the problem” etc weren’t such tired, eyeroll-inducing aphorisms.

But I do have to say it, even if there's blowback. And they may be tired but they're also true.

Be better.