White Women

Description

An instant New York Times Bestseller!

A no-holds-barred guidebook aimed at white women who want to stop being nice and start dismantling white supremacy from the team behind Race2Dinner and the documentary film, Deconstructing Karen

It’s no secret that white women are conditioned to be “nice,” but did you know that the desire to be perfect and to avoid conflict at all costs are characteristics of white supremacy culture? 

As the founders of Race2Dinner, an organization which facilitates conversations between white women about racism and white supremacy, Regina Jackson and Saira Rao have noticed white women’s tendency to maintain a veneer of niceness, and strive for perfection, even at the expense of anti-racism work.

In this book, Jackson and Rao pose these urgent questions: how has being “nice” helped Black women, Indigenous women and other women of color? How has being “nice” helped you in your quest to end sexism? Has being “nice” earned you economic parity with white men? Beginning with freeing white women from this oppressive need to be nice, they deconstruct and analyze nine aspects of traditional white woman behavior–from tone-policing to weaponizing tears–that uphold white supremacy society, and hurt all of us who are trying to live a freer, more equitable life.

White Women is a call to action to those of you who are looking to take the next steps in dismantling white supremacy. Your white supremacy. If you are in fact doing real anti-racism work, you will find few reasons to be nice, as other white people want to limit your membership in the club. If you are not ticking white people off on a regular basis, you are not doing it right.“This book dares to tell necessary truths. The kind of truths that can save lives, and if heard with an open mind and heart — may even help save the soul of this lost nation.” –Frederick Joseph, author of New York Times bestsellers Patriarchy Blues and The Black Friend

“In their recent The New York Times bestseller White Women: Everything You Already Know About Your Own Racism and How To Do Better, Jackson and Rao are clearly more interested in confronting and challenging the subtle yet devastating ways that racism shows up than soothing, coaxing and coddling individual egos.” — Forbes

“…what they’re offering is an opportunity for white women to free themselves and their communities from the toxic ideals of white supremacy and white culture, amessage that’s ultimately optimistic and even cathartic.” — Booklist

“WHITE WOMEN is not an easy read but is essential if you are dedicated to liberation for all and confronting white supremacy in all the parts of our lives where it hides so easily. This book is not an attack but an extraordinary gift, and I invite you to set your ego aside and approach it with humility and an open heart.” –Anna Paquin, actress and producer

“[Jackson and Rao] are clear and concise, making their points with no room for argument… [they] are especially astute in their investigation of the language regarding White supremacy… [a] highly insightful, useful text.” –Kirkus Starred Review  

“I am excited for what this book means for us all. In a world where critical race theory is banned in classrooms across the USA, because the white people were not properly taught to think critically about their complicity in systemic oppression, this book is timely. We tend to tiptoe around whiteness, and this book rips the bandage off. This is the book many BIWOC have been needing to give to the white women in our lives; from our white co-workers to our white mother-in-laws, this book is no-holds-barred. This is the answer to many of our prayers.” –Prisca Dorcas Mojica Rodríguez Author of For Brown Girls with Sharp Edges and Tender Hearts: A Love Letter to Women of Color

“Delivering clear and deliberate messaging, White Women enables white women to understand how our overt civility and desire to be nice above all else directly equates to racial avoidance and upholds white supremacy. It is the invitation you didn’t realize you needed: accept it!” –Jo Lorenz, writer and co-founder of The Progressivists social media network

“The rawness and realness of these dinners and experiences, the wisdom, and quite frankly the courage Saira and Regina have, has the potential to be some of the most transformational work we have seen in this space in the last few years. The setting is genius, a perfect way to set the stage for the intimacy and radical honesty needed for this work. I felt every story. As a Black woman who facilitates similar conversations in my work with organizations, I know it’s necessary to have these frank conversations. But the way Saira and Regina approach it, there is little room for the participants to hide from the truth. Even with all of the heaviness, it’s an easy and entertaining read. I believe anyone and everyone interested in this work should read this book.” –Michelle Saahene, Speaker, Coach, Community Leader

“This book is a sharply-defined lens through which white women who consider themselves allies need to see themselves, especially if they have any hope of stopping their patterns of harmful behavior towards Black and Brown and Indigenous folx of color, truly divesting from whiteness, and actually taking action in the fight against racism and white supremacy. I hate how necessary and important this book is, but for the white women who are willing to read with open hearts and ears, Saira and Regina tell it exactly like it is. If and when white women are ready to commit to racial justice, they need to move quickly beyond performative wokeness and graduate from fragility, and this book is a foundational text for that master class.” –Tina Strawn, author and activist

“A must-read for all who have grown tired and weary of those who want to preserve the niceness of social interactions because of the way a situation looks instead of placing importance on what the reality is.”— Library Journal

“White Women: Everything You Already Know About Your Own Racism and How to Do Better” is the book that will change the narrative. Regina and Saira approach the topic in a way that is not meant to placate the reader, but to challenge them to change. This is different than most who choose a warm and fluffy tone. They deconstruct the narrative that racism is normal, and put accountability back in the hands of those who uphold the systems that cause harm.” –Madison Butler, Founder, Blue Haired Unicorn

“White Women… is not an easy book to read. It’s also not a comforting read. It’s pretty raw and unflinching. It doesn’t pull punches. It’s upfront without apology and…Thank God!!! It’s a book that’s a necessary, urgent, must- read for white women who most definitely can do better.” – Marcie Alvis Walker, creator of Black Coffee with White Friends

“Rao and Jackson use poignant and sharp observations with moments of hilarity to highlight the institutional barriers we have to overcome to become a better society as a whole.” –Abby Govindan, Comedian
Saira (NOT Sara) Rao grew up in Richmond, Virginia, the daughter of Indian immigrants. For forty years, she wasted her precious time aspiring to be white and accepted by dominant white society, a futile task for anyone not born with white skin. Several years ago, Saira began the painful process of dismantling her own internalized oppression. Saira is a lawyer-by-training, a former congressional candidate, a published novelist and an entrepreneur.
 
Born in Chicago in 1950 Regina remembers an America where everything was in Black and white. Burned into her memory are; the beatings and horrific treatment of civil rights workers throughout the south, the Goodman, Chaney & Schwerner murders, the murder of Viola Liuzzo, the murder of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the murders of President John Kennedy and his brother Robert. The violence perpetrated on innocent people going about their lives, by white people. It is these memories that drive Regina to push for real change in America. Which is why she co-founded Race 2 Dinner.A Guide to Unlearning

A Conversation with Saira Rao and Regina Jackson

The book is centered on the Race 2 Dinner model, which has both of you moderating conversations between white women about racism and white supremacy. How is the book a tool for white women to confront their own racism, without you or other people of color holding them to account?

Saira: You can take a white woman to the water but you cannot force her to drink. Part of white supremacy culture is wanting everything handed to you on a silver platter—or in the case of anti-racism work, wanting us to hold your hand, tell you what to do, and hand out cookies for a job well done. It just doesn’t work that way. The work is messy. It is not linear. It requires you to dig deep and take your own personal journey. In other words, there are none of those boxes you adore checking.
          Our job isn’t to hold white women accountable. White women are grown-ass adults who need to hold themselves accountable, be in community with other white women who are deeply committed to anti-racism work, and will hold each other accountable with love and kindness, rather than with the judgment, competition, and fake niceness that define white women’s relationships with themselves and each other. We say at every dinner: start loving yourselves, start loving each other, start being in sisterhood with each other. Personal and community accountability—that’s what white women need, not us Black, Indigenous, and brown women babysitting their anti-racism work.

Regina: Part of R2D’s work is creating coursework for white women to: 1. Understand white supremacy, what it is, how it functions, and how they uphold and benefit from it, and 2. Work in community with other white women and Black Indigenous Women of Color (BIWOC) to be accountable for doing the work. Third, we have also created coursework for BIWOC to live their best lives by creating a life map for taking control of their own lives and living without fear.

When did you realize that your silence would not protect you? How did it change your priorities?

Saira: I think I have always known that my silence would not protect me, but for most of my life, I leaned into my non-Black privilege and adjacency to whiteness as an Asian American. I would say it became glaringly obvious right after September 11. I was coming up the subway stairs into the World Trade Center that sunny Tuesday morning in 2001 and was one of the many people sprinting up Church Street when the towers fell. I left my apartment that day as a model minority and returned home as a would-be terrorist in the eyes of white America. I knew that day, with certainty, that my silence would not save me. It nevertheless took me years to find my voice.

Regina: It was not until I started my own business that I understood I did not have to tiptoe around white people’s feelings. Many times, the truth is not pretty, but I am committed to being true to myself.

As you mention in the book, perfectionism and the lack of action and confrontation that result from it are a salient and oppressive feature of white supremacy. How have you maintained the energy and the motivation to continually confront instances of racism, both overt and subtle, in the face of a culture that would rather ignore it?

Saira: We are asked this question a lot: What keeps you going, how do you keep up the stamina? My answer is always the same: What choice do we have? White supremacy is killing us. All of us. When you see this clearly, and truly internalize what that means, you cannot not fight. My life, my children’s lives, your life, and your children’s lives all depend on each and every one of us interrogating white supremacy at every turn. The better question, I think, is what’s keeping you from fighting tooth and nail for the only thing that matters in this world: our humanity.
          Why aren’t you mad as hell that police are murdering Black people and little kids are getting massacred at school and our tax dollars are going to fund white terrorists whipping Haitian people and destroying Afghanistan and THE EARTH? How are you able to sleep at night? Why do you have more energy and motivation to confront your Black co-worker or Latino gardener or Asian manicurist for being late than you do to confront your own racist bullshit? WHY AREN’T YOU FIGHTING FOR YOUR LIFE AND YOUR CHILDREN’S LIVES?

Regina: I think what white people don’t understand is that doing the work is not optional for us. You either do the work or you end up as someone’s whipping boy. I have no interest in that position.

This book really is a “pulls no punches” kind of book. You even mentioned in your opening that some would put it down immediately. Why was it important for you to write this book in the most honest and direct way?

Saira: Even though white women try to tone police and gaslight us at every turn—if you said it nicer; honey attracts more flies than vinegar—we know it’s not the way we are saying it, it is WHAT we are saying. Namely, that you all are racist. All white people are racist, just like all Asian Americans are anti-Black. We have all been put into the sausage factory, and when you go through the sausage factory you do, in fact, become a sausage. In America, the kind of sausage is based on your skin color. So white people, who are at the top of the food chain, are racist. Period. We can say it with a smile. We can say it while delivering them a pretty cake. We can say it while massaging their feet. And they would STILL hate it. So we might as well say it as clearly and simply and forcefully as we can, because they’ll hate it regardless of how we say it.
          As for the honesty part, white people’s feigned ignorance of their racism is what keeps all this violence afloat. If you don’t acknowledge the truth, you can continue to cause your racist harm with a clear conscience. By telling the truth—and beckoning white people to tell their own truth—this foundational feigned ignorance goes poof, and we can attempt to get somewhere.

Regina: For more than four hundred years Black people have been the recipients of violence, hate, rage, jealousy, and denial of our humanity under the legacy of white supremacy.
          White people are the perpetrators of all of the above. I am tired of trying to convince them with morality, marches, demonstrations, and legislation, which frankly doesn’t work unless we as a nation uphold our laws. It’s time for every white person to look into the mirror, recognize the ways that they uphold centuries of hate, and make a commitment to themselves to just STOP causing other people pain and suffering because of the color of their skin.

Your work at Race2Dinner is centered on eight to ten white women at a time, yet the audience for this book is every white woman. Aside from the obvious “dinner party discussion,” how does this book differ from the everyday work you do? How is it the same?

Saira: This book is very much an extension of our work. The obvious difference is that white women can (and will) easily walk away from the book. But aside from that, all of the feelings white women have while reading it—all of that internal dialogue—THAT is the stuff that comes out at our dinners: The deflection, the gaslighting, the exceptionalizing, and the virtue signaling that happens in EACH AND EVERY white woman’s head? Every dinner. Every. Single. Dinner. White women are nothing if not consistent.

Regina: It differs in that a dinner can only impact a small number of people at a time, while this book can impact many thousands of people. The experiences will be the same: take no prisoners, look inside, tell the truth, and commit to change. Change only happens when staying the same is too uncomfortable to bear and is, therefore, no longer an option.

What is your favorite chapter or part of this book and why?

Saira: My favorite is Chapter 7: “Microaggressions” and How You Kill Us At Work. Your violence depends on gaslighting us, making us feel like it is us, as individuals, who are the problem: angry, divisive, not team players. By singling us out as the individual problems, you are able to deny the one gigantic systemic problem, namely WHITENESS and ALL WHITE INSTITUTIONS. In Chapter 7, we interview Black women, Indigenous women, Asian women, Latina women. They are in different parts of the country, in different professions, and the story is always the same: White women are horrible to work with. It turns your narrative on its head. We as individuals are not the problem—your whiteness is.

Regina: The chapter on white women and work. Because I can guarantee you that every woman of color has had to suffer through these unacceptable behaviors just to do the jobs that they were hired to do. It ranges from something as simple as someone thinking that you are too animated, to something as painful as someone else thinking that you dress too well for work. It’s all nonsense and it is debilitating. Just STOP!

Throughout this book, you refer white women back to their own experiences with misogyny and sexism. Why?

Saira: By bringing it back to sexism, an oppression that white women experience, we clarify how their unwillingness to see their own racism is analogous to men’s unwillingness to see their own sexism.
          This unwillingness is caused by white feminism, which is the tendency of mainstream feminist theory, discourse, and practice to center gender oppression to the exclusion of racial oppression. You’ll recall us talking about how white women will often say things like, “Well you don’t get how it is to be a woman on the receiving end of sexism,” as if we are not women too. We deal with sexism from white men and the men in our own communities, PLUS their white woman bullshit.
          Let’s be clear, white feminism is deadly. And it is pretty sad that we have to resort to making these constant comparisons to sexism for white women to see their violent ways. But we do. And it works.

Regina: White womens’ experiences with misogyny and sexism give them a lens through which they can understand their own racist behavior. Their racism takes a similar form to the sexism leveled at them: put-downs, aggression, hostility, and righteousness. The only difference is that they are emboldened to act in these ways because of their race, as opposed to the element of gender that emboldens men to act the same way towards them.

In the preface you state: “We decided to write this book after more than a dozen dinners. Different white women, different dining rooms, different neighborhoods, different cities. SAME CONVERSATION. You are nothing if not consistently WHITE.” What ways are white women NOT consistently white? Is that even possible?

Saira: Whiteness is whiteness. White womanhood is white womanhood. If the question is: Are there exceptional white women? I’d ask back: Why do we always have to exceptionalize white people? If the question is: Are there white women who are really and truly doing the work? The answer to that is: Yes. And it is white women who have no interest in being exceptionalized, praised, recognized as “not being consistently white,” who are the ones doing the actual work. The ones who aren’t asking us to teach them. They are seeking out resources on their own, they are finding community with each other, they are holding themselves and each other accountable, they are following many Black, Indigenous, and other women of color to get lots of perspectives. They are supporting radical, progressive candidates of color at every level. They are supporting Black-, Indigenous-, and brown-led businesses and nonprofits. And they are doing it without wanting us to throw them a parade.
          They are doing it because they truly and deeply know that white supremacy is killing them too. And the only way to stop this violent death is through their personal daily actions.
          So yes, plenty of white women are doing the work. They just aren’t your favorite white woman Instagram influencer or white woman celebrity or white woman Silicon Valley girl boss.

Regina: It is possible, but it’s only manifested by those who are committed to doing the inner work. This is not work where you attend a company-sponsored DEI session and you are good to go. This is work that requires you to be intentional about what you value in your life, to look in the mirror every day and decide to be an accomplice to antiracism, to listen to and accept guidance from Black and brown women, and to stop focusing on your feelings and centering yourself.

Questions for Discussion and Self-Accountability

Preface

What is the last thing you did or thought that was racist, that upheld systems and structures of white supremacy?

When you think about your life—from home, to work, to social—how do you see systems of white supremacy showing up?

Chapter One

Saira shared her story of white womanhood in this chapter. Knowing that you are not Saira, who are you in this story?

Perfectionism is a mirage. As you read this chapter, what were the ways that your own perfectionism arose in your innermost thoughts?

Chapter Two

Regina shared her story about how she had to “be mean” to be kind. In what ways did that story make you uncomfortable? Recognizing that you are not Regina, who are you in this story?

White women are socialized to be the peacekeepers and to diffuse tension. When you think about your role at home, at work, and with your friends, how do you see this show up? What do you recognize ‘behind the scenes’?

Chapter Three

White silence is violence. This statement has been repeated often—on march signs and T-shirts—but has rarely been personally digested. Identify a time when you were silent that you now regret. What is preventing you from speaking to it now?

White supremacy and patriarchy are two sides of the same coin. How has your silence been carefully crafted in service to both?

Chapter Four

As white women, your lived experience cannot include a racially intersectional lens. As you think about the ways you have shown up in the fight for women’s rights, what are the ways in which you have refused to consider how your own whiteness and racial privilege have impacted the civil rights and other movements by marginalized people?

As you read Saira’s story about a white feminist political action committee, what did you feel? Who were you in this story? What are some ways that you think it could have evolved in a more inclusive fashion?

Chapter Five

Saira and Regina both shared personal stories in this chapter. As a refresher, Saira’s story involved the white mother of one of her children’s friends and Regina’s involved a white woman policing yard signs. Name the reason it is easier for you to see yourself as the protagonist and then correctly identify why you would actually be the antagonist.

Your white entitlement is so normalized, it is often difficult to recognize the white supremacy within your everyday actions. In fact, most white women would deny that they ever engage in this behavior. Make a list of five entitled actions you recognize within yourself on a daily or semi-daily basis.

Chapter Six

Think back to your education: elementary, secondary, post-secondary. How many Black, Indigenous, and non-Black teachers of color did you have? How do you think this impacted both the style and content of your education, and the way you live in the world today?

We know that there are entire industries built around the failure of Black, Indigenous, and non-Black students of color. How have you been complicit with this?

How have you shown up to ensure that schools in your area are engaging in the heavy work of decolonizing and antiracist education? What questions have you asked about the curriculum being accurate with respect to our history: regional, US, and global? What questions have you asked about the library resources? What questions have you asked of school leadership about the hiring of Black, Indigenous, and non-Black people of color?

Chapter Seven

This chapter shared multiple stories of Black, Indigenous, and non-Black women of color in the workplace. Which story’s white woman antagonist is most like you? How? What are three ways that you can change that immediately?

We know that white women will statistically choose themselves and their advancement at work over their sisterhood with others, most especially Black, Indigenous, and non-Black women of color. Name at least one way you have stepped on another woman (and more specifically, a Black, Indigenous, and non-Black women of color) to advance or receive accolades. Within your own work context, name how you will prevent doing so in the future.

Chapter Eight

This chapter includes five definitions, with examples, of deflection techniques employed regularly by white women. Name at least one way you have engaged in each of these techniques to deflect from your own racism and complicity with white supremacy.

The grift of white supremacy goes hand in hand with the grift of white wellness. Take an inventory of the way you engage in platitudes, toxic positivity, and wellness culture. Name the ways in which your quest for enlightenment has actually been a study in white supremacy culture.

Chapter Nine

Name the ways in which you have made yourself the exception—giving yourself the title of ally or accomplice, when in reality you have acted in the capacity of a white savior. What do you see as the difference? How will this realization change you in the future?

How can you be an ally or a savior in the fight against something that also kills you? What are the ways in which white supremacy is hurting and killing us all? Going forward, what are the practical ways you will address white supremacy as a person who is both helped by and harmed by these systems?Chapter One

Your Quest for Perfection Is Killing Us.
And You.

If white womanhood is a house, your need to be perfect is the foundation.

Being perfect is the key to your happiness, to your success, to your very existence.

Perfect hair. Perfect clothes. Perfect grades. Perfect nails. Perfect weddings. Perfect bodies. Perfect adoring and supportive wife and mother. Perfect employee and colleague.

White skin.

The foundational principle of perfection in a white supremacist society like ours is rooted in whiteness. Without it, your As will never be straight enough, your MVP trophies not shiny enough, your flowery dresses a bit wilted. Of course, white skin alone doesn’t render you perfect, but without it, you have no chance. White skin is a necessary but insufficient ingredient of perfection. The con, of course, is there is no actual recipe for perfection. Every ingredient is ultimately insufficient, as there is no such thing as perfection.

Your endless quest for perfection is a trap. You will never be pretty enough. You will never be thin enough. You will never be smart enough or successful enough or rich enough.

Yet white women will die trying.

Saira should know. She used to be one of you.

Saira’s Story

As the daughter of Indian immigrants, I was conditioned from birth to be the white woman ideal. Sometimes the language was overt: “No, you can’t go to the pool. You’ll get dark.” Or “Priti is pretty, so fair.” But more often than not, it was coded.

“Assimilate.”

“Be more American.”

Of course, we knew assimilation and American meant white, not Black. Even before my parents arrived in the US, they knew the drill: white people at the top, Black people at the bottom, and they’d fall somewhere in the middle. How did they know? American television, films, and books are exported around the world. Our white supremacy is broadcast to London, Dubai, Delhi, Buenos Aires, Johannesburg, and everywhere in between. In the case of India, my parents were born into British colonialism. Even before they consumed American media, they knew firsthand that whiteness was king and queen.

Thanks to the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, my parents were able to leave their homeland, ravaged by the British, and seek out the “American dream.” The immigration act was made possible by the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which was passed thanks to the tireless work of Black people. While they were able to come to America on the backs of Black folks, once my parents got here, they worked hard to stay as far away from those same Black folks as they possibly could. Because they knew.

The American dream requires assimilation.

Assimilation to whiteness.

We, of course, can never be white. But we do the next best thing: we work our butts off to be as close to white as possible. This requires us to be as close to perfect as one can get, better than those around us, even better than our white peers. Better at school. Better at work. Better at sports. Better at charm. Better at cooking, cleaning, baking, breathing.

It should be noted that our actions, as South Asian immigrants, embody anti-Black racism. Our assimilation requires us to be as anti-Black as we are pro-white. It requires not only a rejection of Black people but also a rejection of ourselves, our own brown skin, our culture. All in a desperate, impossible quest to cozy up to whiteness. This is called self-loathing, or internalized oppression. Internalized oppression is required to assimilate, to become American, to become white. The con, of course, is we are never white, no matter how hard we try, no matter how much we believe otherwise.

And boy did I try, and even believe.

It was with this deeply held belief that I wrapped myself into my prettiest Laura Ashley dress, the one with white lilies on it, and shoved pearl earrings through my earlobes, a particularly painful act of self-loathing, as I knew my ears would be infected within the hour. It was a cool Charlottesville night, second semester of my freshman year at the University of Virginia. My hall mates (all white) and I set out together for the most time-honored of UVA traditions: sorority rush.

Even now, decades later, I can remember praying that I’d make it, that one of the prestige houses-Tri Delt or Theta or Kappa Kappa Gamma-would accept me, warts and all.

The proverbial warts being my brown skin.

It was with a profound sense of purpose and hope that I set out with legion other young women down Rugby Road, the central nervous system of UVA’s Greek system.

What a sight to behold. Young white woman upon young white woman, with the errant Latina, Asian, or Black woman. Every hair was in place. Every dress on point. Same with our jewelry and makeup. Perfect.

It never occurred to me to even consider rushing the Black sororities. They were so foreign, so other, so lesser, they may as well have been nonexistent. There were no Asian sororities, and even if there had been, I wouldn’t have rushed those either. Being Asian was lesser than white. I was going for the gold. I was going for the white.

We arrived in groups, giggling to assuage our nerves. A few women bragged about being legacies, how their mothers, grandmothers, and aunts were Kappas or Thetas here or Pi Phis or Tri Delts there. There was no such thing in India, so I did what I always did in such situations: I smiled and nodded, happy to celebrate the advantages of my white peers. House after house after house was the same. A sea of white faces, singing, dancing, welcoming us with donuts, cookies, and hot chocolate, while whispering to a select few blondes and brunettes about joining them at fraternity parties later on for real drinks. I cracked my best jokes, laughed heartily at theirs. I hugged hard and often. I sang along loudly. It was like I was auditioning for a Broadway chorus line.

Despite my best efforts, I got cut from Kappa in the first round. I was stunned. After all, I had just graduated from a private school in Richmond, like many of the Kappas. I had been perfect in high school. I was captain of the field hockey, basketball, and lacrosse teams. I was student body president. I was popular. I had played drinking games in suburban Virginia basements and jammed out with some of these women at Dave Matthews Band concerts. Not only had we played each other in sports, it was I who was the star of those games. If not best friends, we were certainly friendly.

And there I was, cut from their special club. Right out of the gate. Not worthy of even a second round of consideration.

A few months later, after I’d pledged a sorority that accepted more Black and brown women than the rest (three of us my year), I ran into one of those Kappas, a brunette who was a year older than me, a former field hockey rival.

“Can you chat?” Anne asked tipsily in a dank frat house.

“Sure,” I responded.

We went around back, where a handful of white guys were smoking cigarettes. They paid us no attention.

“Listen, I’m sorry about Kappa,” Anne said, tears already welling in her eyes.

“No problem,” I responded, “I’m happy at Phi Mu. But I was confused about the first round. I thought I’d make it at least a little further.”

“God, Saira,” she said, the tears flowing. “We all voted you through, and then a few stood up and said, ‘She’s not Kappa material,’ and Jenny said, ‘What are you talking about. A bunch of us have known Saira for years. She’s great.'”

Anne was now weeping.

“It’s okay,” I said, placing my hand on her back.

“But it’s not,” Anne said.

I knew what she was about to say. I felt sick, like I was about to vomit up crappy keg beer.

“They, they”-she trembled-“said, ‘Saira is not Kappa material.'” She rubbed the skin on her forearm.

Anne said this as though I were unaware that my skin color had made me not Kappa material my entire life. I spent the next hour comforting Anne.

“You know I’m not racist, Saira,” she said. “You know that, right?”

“Of course you’re not,” I assured her.

She looked up and down and lowered her voice. “It was Maggie, Ellen, and Suzanne. They were the ones.”

And there it was: the white woman throwing her own kind under the bus to absolve herself.

It was them. Not me.

You always tell on each other. By design, you must. In order to maintain your perfection, others must be rendered imperfect; perfection can exist only in relief to imperfection. This system of white woman perfection creates intense competition. You’re intimately familiar with this, how you stab each other in the back, rip each other apart, all in an attempt to make yourselves whole.

I didn’t point out the obvious, that Anne hadn’t stood up for me. Nor did she leave the room in protest. Nor did she leave the sorority altogether. Anne’s silence was every bit as violent as Maggie, Ellen, and Suzanne’s overt racism. But there was no time to point out these facts to Anne. I was too busy making her feel better.

I didn’t realize it then, but I do now. Anne performed every act in the white woman variety show. Her friends say something racist. She remains silent. She feels guilty. She confides in a woman of color. She cries, thereby centering her feelings over the racial harm. She throws her fellow white women under the bus in order to distance herself from their violence. She now feels absolved while simultaneously remaining a part of the racist institution.

As for me, the brown woman? I play my role dutifully. I experience the racism. The harm is exacerbated by my having to deal with the white woman’s tears. It has become my job to make her feel better about her silence, her complicity in the racism.

By the time we returned to the party, Anne felt better. I felt lousy. Anne rejoined her fellow Kappas on the dance floor. I walked back to my dorm and collapsed onto my floral comforter.

Fall gave way to winter. Laura Ashley became flannel shirts, jeans, and braided belts. The seasons changed but, still, I dressed like them. I listened to their music. I hung out at their bars, their frat houses. I took classes with them. They mocked me for studying all the time. I didn’t have backup plans. They did.

Like a Coach saddle purse, my self-loathing was something I carried everywhere during my time at UVA. A night out in late spring of junior year was no exception. A group of us, a smattering of white ladies from different sororities, were hanging out. One was Linda, a dear and treasured friend, a woman whom I considered to be a true sister; a woman who would break my heart decades later, but looking back on it now, I realize she started to break it that night. I just chose to ignore it.

This particular evening, we were sitting at an outdoor table at the Corner, UVA’s local hangout spot. The Beastie Boys’ Ill Communication was pumping through the speakers, and strings of white lights were wrapped around the trees, supplying a hint of magic. We ordered thin-crust pizza with sun-dried tomatoes and artichoke hearts and sipped beer from cans.

I sat next to Linda and across from Kate and Amber. We chatted about summer plans. Linda and I planned to stay in Charlottesville and get jobs. Kate told us about how her mother really wanted her to spend one last summer with the family at their Martha’s Vineyard home. There was a young East Asian couple seated a few tables over. Their accented English caught Kate’s attention.

Kate fixed her eyes on the woman, took a swig of beer, leaned in, and giggled. “Oh my God,” she said. “Amber, do you remember . . .”

Amber snorted before Kate could finish her sentence.

“Y’all,” Amber whispered. “Kate and I were paired as roommates first year.”

At that time, UVA randomly selected roommates for first-years. We received our assignments in the mail the summer before fall semester.

“And I about died.” Amber eyed the East Asian woman. “Kate Lee. Lee.”

They burst into laughter.

“Yeah?” Linda asked.

“Dude,” Kate said, leaning in. “Amber thought I was Asian. Lee.”

Linda started laughing, happy to be in on the joke.

“I seriously died,” Amber said. “Like, what the fuck would I do with an Asian roommate.”

The three of them burst into laughter. I prayed for the ground to open up and swallow me whole. I hoped they would stop, move on, but they didn’t. They kept looking at the East Asian couple and laughing.

“Guys.” I finally managed to open my mouth. “Um. I’m Asian.”

They paused and stared at me, surprised, as if I’d materialized out of nowhere.

Silence.

“Yeah, but you’re not Asian Asian,” Amber said, having scoured her mind for the right words.

But I am.

“Yeah, Saira,” Kate said, “you’re one of us.”

But I’m clearly not.

Linda looked at me adoringly. “We love you.”

Love me, but what? Hate them?

The most pathetic part of this story is that their grotesque words were accepted by me as compliments. In my mind, Amber, Kate, and Linda saw me so much as one of them that they forgot about my existence during this racist, xenophobic exchange. An invisible fly on a white wall.

I was able to stay, a welcome guest at that dinner, because I internalized their words. Unlike that East Asian couple, my English is spoken with a mid-Atlantic accent. I was with a group of white sorority girls, not one half of an all-Asian couple.

What does this story have to do with perfection?

For starters, there is nothing, literally nothing, that Black, Indigenous, and brown women can do to achieve the perfection of you. We can be more successful at school and at work. We can have more expensive clothes, bigger houses, take fancier vacations. Yet we will always lack the foundational qualification: being white.

What do you think would have happened had I pointed out how racist Linda, Kate, and Amber were acting that night? How do you think they would have reacted? Do you think I would have remained in their friend circle? Or do you think they would have cried? Insisted that they weren’t racist? That I had to know that they weren’t racist! I had to know that they were only joking. If I wanted to keep my social standing, could I have been radically honest about their racism, or would I have to make them feel better? Would I have to let it go?US

Additional information

Weight	5.8 oz
Dimensions	0.6300 × 5.0800 × 7.7200 in
Imprint	Penguin Books
ISBN-13	09780143136439
ISBN-10	0143136437
Author	Regina Jackson, Saira Rao
Audience	General / adult
BISAC	SOC010000, SOC031000
Subjects	emotional labor, feminist theory, feminism books, sociology books, new york times best sellers, best selling books, criminal justice, social justice books, feminism gifts, anti racism, feminist books, book for women, women books, intersectional feminism, womens books, regina jackson, saira rao, white women, white women book, civil rights, feminism, racism, SOC010000, SOC031000, social justice, law, Sociology, race, feminist, books on racism, womens rights, women in history, antiracism, books for women, anti racist, feminist book, feminist gifts
Format	General Trade