Ep 20: The Insurrection and the Delusion of White Supremacy

Though the full impact and effect of the Insurrection that occurred that day won't be known for weeks, months, and years to come, April and Tracie take the time to reflect on the events of January 6, 2021.

Find April and Tracie's full bios and submit topic suggestions for the show at www.JewsTalkRacialJustice.com

Learn more about April’s work at Joyous Justice: https://joyousjustice.com/
Read more of Tracie's thoughts at bmoreincremental.com

Resources:
Hear more from Sonya Renee Taylor on the Delusion of White Supremacy on her YouTube Channel.

Listen to the playlist April created after the Insurrection. It's called Medicine: This is Our America.

Transcript

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- [Tracie] Today's conversation contributes to the task of making meaning out of the events of January 6th, 2021.- [April] This is Jews Talk Racial Justice, with April and Tracie. A weekly show hosted by April Baskin and Tracie Guy-Decker In a complex world, change takes courage. Wholehearted relationships can keep us accountable.- It's important that we as a collective, particularly within the Jewish community, but also in our country more generally, more deeply understand our country's history around racism and white supremacy. And it isn't fair, because hypothetically in a just, loving world, we wouldn't--the onus wouldn't be on us. And yet it is, because what we saw on January 6th, besides a number of different things including deeply disturbing images and destruction is the continual impact of white supremacist delusion. Continuing to play itself out until we engage in truth and reconciliation and reparations and create a new path for our country. I saw, I shared, as I shared with you, Tracie, that week what we saw, to me, was such an excellent depiction of the broader impact of white supremacy on our country. That often people only think about the way that it harms black people and people of color, but racism and white supremacy culture or I really love how Sonya Renee Taylor calls it a white supremacist delusion because it, to me it sort of softens it in a way and it states more clearly what it is. It's also self-destructing, its sole purpose is to continually grow and survive at all costs. Even the costs of its own people is to maintain power, power over in a toxic way. And it's so deeply steeped in violence that it's just going to continue to wreak havoc. Now what I take courage and hope and inspiration in is the fact that I do believe for various reasons as Van Jones said that,"This is the beginning of white supremacy's death rattle." But I think it's worthwhile for us to talk about this subject. I know I have a very different take than most people and there now have been a range of people who have spoken really brilliantly about this but I thought it would be nice for us to engage in conversation about it for at least a few minutes and share some of our Jewish racial justice-y perspectives on it.- Yeah, the thing that came up for me just now as you were talking about white supremacy and the way that it is, self-destructive was, I mean appropriate since we're living in this age of pandemic is that it really sounded like a virus that destroys its host, which is that metaphor is helpful too, in thinking about healing because a virus doesn't have to, it doesn't have to be deadly. So, you know, there, there are antibodies and other ways that the body naturally fights off viruses. So that was one sort of metaphor that was coming up as you were talking. And the thing though, specifically from our Jewish lens that I wanna name I've been thinking about this a lot lately especially since on January 6th, some of the photos, the juxtaposition is just striking of visibly Jewish Orthodox men who marched with the insurrectionists with carrying signs that said,"take America back," you know, with payes and the full, the full garb.- Regalia.- And also the the young man who was photographed wearing furs and holding a police shield is apparently the son of a very prominent family in New York Orthodox culture.- Wow!- Yeah, his dad is a New York judge Supreme court judge? I don't remember which circuit his dad sits on but the family is a prominent family within the New York Orthodox community. And he was in the inner sanctum. I mean that photograph of him sitting on the bench and photographs from that day included the man wearing the camp Auschwitz t-shirt and the the other guy wearing the 6MWE which thank you to the interwebs who taught me that means 6 million wasn't enough. And so what occurs to me is that this virus is so powerful. This delusion is so powerful that it actually has convinced some that the true threat is not the threat. I mean, and--- Yeah.- You know, and so is this, the same folks, the same white Jews who make excuses for, and somehow managed to justify the current talking points of the Trump administration are the ones who wanna disqualify my synagogue from taking part with them in any kind of activities, because we have a Black Lives Matter sign out front. So, you know, what's the real enemy here. Is it the fact that some black folks in the movement feel a kinship with Palestinians? Or is it 6MWE? Come on guys, like let's get real about what the threat is.- Right and really, and really right. Go through that and take a really close look at that. I just wanna notice the, that for some particularly but not exclusively people who are the descendants of those who survived and also didn't survive the Holocaust that that is, can be deeply upsetting to see those images. And as well as for black people to see Confederate flags in the Capitol Building can conjure up similar and different feelings of terror, right? And as you well know, and as people on our email list, well know I'm in a very different place with it right now but I hold space as someone who experiences a range of fear and terror and feelings around other things as well. But I completely hold that all feelings about this are important and it's important that we honor them as they arise so that we can access healing that we need. I wanna go back to something you said about this virus, that the way disease or a virus works in a system or when a cell becomes diseased often at times it's because it stops working, with the other organic, with the other cells and parts of the body around it that it has this toxic independence. And I didn't write down other notes. There's something specifically I wanted to say when you were talking about that, that came up, that I thought was very, an interesting corollary in the States. Oh right, is that and like a virus, there's not a lot of benefit. I mean, there is and there isn't, some could disagree with this, but if we look at the beneficiary supposedly the supposed beneficiaries, many of the people at the Capitol Building, like, it's just, this, it's this very smart virus, as you said, that works to shut down organs and systems and then cause a form of psychosis, where you think it's something outside of you that is the cause, and you are attacking other things as opposed to taking an antibiotic like truth and reconciliation, like intercultural dialogue and connecting with people across lines of difference when they have the energy and bandwidth and resource to do so, to create healing and communication, right? The point that I think I wanted to make as I'm remembering is that most people who have been taught this warped sense of thinking lifted up even as they're struggling financially. Like I just, I can't remember. Did I talk about this kid, I went to school with Mike Jones in when I lived in Southwestern, Virginia?- I don't think so.- Yeah, so this kid terrorized me first through third grade when I lived in the Roanoke area of Virginia. And I feel like hesitant about saying his name. It's such a common name that I'm and I'm trying to be sort of vague, but like and it was well-known that his father was a core leader in the Klu Klux Klan. And I always say it wrong. I always like that when I say it incorrectly in the KU Klux Klan, and that's how seriously I'm take it on some level, but, and he would call me the N word and dirt and various animal names and would harass me on the playground and all that ever happened to him when I would tell the teacher is sometimes nothing. Sometimes he would get a five minute timeout, right? And he bullied me constantly first through third grade. And I was so afraid of him and the threat of what he represented with his family. And I found him on Facebook a couple of years ago and occasionally, go and check his page, right? And he has a picture with one black friend. So I find that interesting. So I wonder if he's gone through some healing, you know, but like he's like, but then he's standing in front of the justice department with his middle fingers up and like his teeth are falling out and he's very skinny. Like he looks sickly and again, to me it's such a depiction of what white supremacy does is that it focuses it and also general, karmically, energetically, this is something that happens to all people like when you focus. That's why I work on forgiveness in my own life. Woo hoo! It can be very hard. Particularly when I've been specifically hurt or attacked you know, at times whether it's in relationships or things by strangers, you know, but it's really, I find it's very important to me to get to a place that the energy I put out is also energy that's within me, right? So I need to be really aware outside of a real practice of very intentional skillful releasing to get it out and let it go. But if I start channeling it that means I'm in a relationship, with whatever that is, right? And so when one is conditioned to have that level of hatred for another person, it comes at the expense at times of their wellbeing, whether it's their physical wellbeing or in their relationships or their mental health that there is that we are not independent of that energy, that we are projecting that we are channeling that, that energy, that means it means it's coming through us, which means we're becoming the source of it which means it needs means that there needs to be a well of that from within us in order to project that out at somebody else, right? And so I wonder if you have anything else to say cause I kind of wanna switch gears.- It's really interesting to me, what I'm grappling with right now is I think you and I spoke briefly about Isabel Wilkerson's Caste her book, Caste and sort of thinking about the racial, race as a caste system in the U.S and she's very compelling and that, and the against one's own interests, she deals with that directly. You know, we... economists look at choices that working class whites make and say, why are they, you know, voting against their own, their own best interest or working against their own best interests? And the caste system explains it's because it's not economic interest is caste interest. That is driving their decision-making. And so what I'm thinking, what I'm grappling with is, I believe you, I follow you. It resonates for me that when you're sending that kind of hatred out into the world it can't help, but, sort of, you know, eat you up inside. And I'm sort of thinking about like how knowing that we are living in this caste system, and figuring out how to like interrupt it. Like, what are the antibodies for that particular virus, as you're or what would be the antiviral medication that we could as individuals and collectively kind of bring into this space to help combat that negative energy that hierarchical thinking. And I'm still kind of pondering that, but that's where I was going when you were talking.- And that's where I was going, too. because I just wanted to name and maybe I wanted to make clear like that to me what was happening is, so what has, what happened on January 6th is what's happening in general in our country. We're just so used to, when we don't have an alternative we don't have something like the Capitol Building that's beautiful, we don't have a country in which there is desegregation, in which we're accessing the full capacity of our brains and living in a thriving, vibrant society. That is a leader in the world genuinely that engages with power and power with that we are able to access resources in our lives and our cities are set up differently, where we have easy access to a number of different things. And our children get to meet children from around the world and they're prepared to be global citizens and all of these different, like, and the toll of like, what would it begin to look like for each of us if there were so many people who weren't, I'm not referring to the pandemic right now, although that too, but just in general, who weren't plagued with chronic illnesses, because they got the healthy food that they needed, what would that do for our economies? What could the... like, what could those doctors, just even in their individual doctors and individual hospitals in their own practice if we had enough wellness would, that's totally within the realm of reason, this is not complex stuff. This is just some buildings in different places. And I'm saying like, it is huge shift but it's not like, it's, this is like I'm talking about building a colony in outer space, right? This is just shifting policy and property taxes, like which I know these are big things, but like shifting like just subtle shifts that would begin to help energy move, that would help us feel more comfortable everyone in each town to feel what would it be like psychologically for every person's brain in each of our countries in each of our counties and cities and towns around the country to feel like I feel safe, what if every person felt safe in every neighborhood.- Yeah.- To visit it, to be there, to work in, to play in, right? And so I understand that perhaps it might not be fully but to me in my mind it's so clear that this that what we were seeing is how white supremacy is deeply self-destructive and is completely illogical, right? And so I just wanted to drive that point home of like, if you're wondering what impact racism and white supremacy has on America that is a metaphor of what it is doing. It is messing up our abilities to function in effective, robust ways. It's affecting us around being able to affect policy for us to all feel safe. When we have racial justice, we will all collectively feel safer in our homes and in our lives also ending the patriarchy and misogyny would deeply help all of us feel safer in our bodies and feel better about our bodies, right? Men, women, and gender nonconforming people in between.- Absolutely, yeah, it, yeah, I think you're right there's.- Yeah, now there's another whole other piece about this that I wanna talk about, but maybe that's like a next episode. So with that, I think, you know, like, I mean, to me what I would say as a precursor or for a future episode is we totally have a pathway forward.- In the Jewish lexicon. I would say it's not in heaven, right? I mean, that's what HaShem says to us. Like, it's not in heaven for you to come get it. You have the power within yourselves.- Yeah, it's totally and we're doing it, to me, this is why they're doing what they're doing. Like these racists. One, so there's a couple different narratives here. And I think there's a little bit of truth and validity in all of it. Like there's a way in which it's been clear that that kind of thing hasn't been acceptable. And there's also a way that they are, this virus is acting up because it knows its days are numbered. If they were in power, if they had power, they would, like I just and I recognize that for some people. And I pray to God that what I'm saying and my sensing is accurate. So I wanna say this with humility, but with humility I state that from my reading this is not the same as Kristallnacht. This is not what this was. If for no other reason then these folks attacked the entire country, when make it like they did not pick a specific subgroup as a mob that represented the majority to target a minority. This is a group of people, that is going against or the losing party that is going against the majority of Americans who voted lawfully for this new reality. They are losing. And we all are still losing because of the ongoing impact of white supremacy, but it is starting to lose some steam. The arc that long arc has started to bend a bit more toward justice, which is why they felt the need to take the money they actually do have to fly to DC and make this ruckus. So I think I'm gonna stop there for now. I wanna dive into, and I maybe that could be a good first episode for our second season, everybody's listening in impromptu celebration, (cheers).(laughs) That's my neuro-atypical brain again, quick, gear change, yeah, I'm excited for the future. I want those in DC, especially people who were in the U.S Capitol Building and everyone around the country and the world, honestly, everyone who experienced trauma on January 6th of this year, individually and collectively gets the healing that you need in order to begin to feel whole again. And to notice that we are looking at a lot of work ahead of us but also a lot of possibility and potential. And so my hope and prayer for you is that you continue to heal. If that's what you need. I made a playlist for folks to help them move along. We'll include that in the show notes if you're not already subscribed to it that has songs of healing and songs of declaration of the freedom and wellbeing that we want for our country and each other across lines of difference within what we hope can truly become the robust multiracial democracy and just multiracial democracy that we dream America can be. Any other thoughts, Tracie?- I think I'll just close with saying that there's folks who keep saying"this isn't who we are." I don't think that's true. This is exactly who we are, but yeah, but it's not who we have to be. And that's what I wanna really focus on is that it's not who we have to be. We can be better.- We can be better, (laughs).- [Voice Over] Thanks for tuning in our show's theme music was composed by Elliot Hammer. You can find this track and other beats on Instagram at Elliot Hammer. If this episode resonated with you, please share it and subscribe to join the conversation, visitjewstalkracialjustice.com where you can send us a question or suggestion, access our show notes and learn more about our team. Take care until next time and stay humble and keep going.