{"id":34836,"date":"2024-01-11T20:36:33","date_gmt":"2024-01-12T04:36:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/?p=34836"},"modified":"2024-01-11T20:36:33","modified_gmt":"2024-01-12T04:36:33","slug":"you-and-me-lets-meet-and-listen","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/you-and-me-lets-meet-and-listen\/","title":{"rendered":"You and Me…let’s meet and listen!"},"content":{"rendered":"

I want to share a story with you. It came to mind as I read the introduction of The Identity Trap. As I have shared in other blogs, I am a Consultant and I work with non- profit organizations, churches, and charitable foundations. During the pandemic, in July of 2020, I worked with a CEO that had previous experience working in the UN and had also held several positions with NGOs internationally. During a Zoom meeting, he used ta phrase as he was referring to my business partner (She is also African- American) and I that completely immobilized us. He said, \u201cYou people, you colored people could really benefit from our services in your community.\u201d In case you do not know, the use of the terms \u201cYou people\u201d and \u201cColored people\u201d is very offensive to African Americans, particularly those of a certain age and experience. He could tell by our reaction that he had said something offensive. We explained the Jim Crow roots of the phrases and suggested that he should not use \u201cYou People\u201d and perhaps he meant to say, \u201cPeople of Color\u201d instead of \u201cColored People.\u201d He became defensive and doubled down. He vehemently rejected that his statement was offensive and proceeded to tell us why we should not be offended. He said, \u201cI have friends, African friends that use \u201cColored People.\u201d This is not offensive!\u201d To bring some context to his perspective, he had worked with people of African descent outside of the United States and had worked closely with someone from South African. He is correct, the term \u201ccolored people\u201d is used to describe someone of mixed race in South Africa. We were not disputing that; we were trying to explain how his choice of words directed towards two African American women had offended us. He was trying to tell us that we should not be offended. We made no progress. So, what is the point of this story? Why did I share it? If we operate in a way that we believe that we can tell people who they are, how they should identify, and where they belong; we will always have division. It is crucial to have the conversation, to listen. It is extremely difficult to hear someone if you already believe that you have the answer. <\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Earlier this week, we were challenged with knowing and naming the areas that we have difficulty, our blind spot(s). Yascha Mounk has written a very insightful book. It made me uncomfortable, I struggled with parts of it. It did not help that I read the reviews before cracking the spine of the book. I have a particular blind spot that Henry Louis Gates, Jr. addressed on the back cover. \u201cThe question of who speaks for the group is one that yields no easy answers. Social identities connect us in multiple and overlapping ways; they are not protected but betrayed when we turn them into silos with sentries.\u201d(1) I have always had difficulty with one person representing an entire group. It is just not reasonable to expect to learn about an entire group of people from one person. No one person can account for an entire group\u2019s individual lived experiences, background, and influences. When politics enter the conversation, it becomes almost impossible to find a common ground. Mounk explains is as, \u201cthe identity synthesis is a political trap, making it harder to sustain diverse societies whose citizens trust and respect each other.\u201d(2) <\/p>\n

Identity is important. It is what allows us to capture our ancestry and lived experiences. I do not believe that it always has to be divisive. There are some difficulties if identity is used to exclude and not to expand. Mounk states, \u201cA society that encourages all of us to see the world through the ever-present prism of identity will make it especially hard for people who don\u2019t neatly fit into one ethnic group or cultural group to develop a sense of belonging.\u201d(3) I think that celebrating identity allows us to see a world that is beautifully complex. I believe it will usher in a conversation that can lead to a greater understanding. I believe that we have more shared commonalities than we have differences. know that the socio-political climate makes it difficult to hear one another. I acknowledge that this is not a typical blog and pretty sparse on academic sources. I decided that today, I would share one of my lived experiences in the hope that it might spark an interest in a greater conversation about me and about you. Let\u2019s meet in the middle and listen to each other. I’ll bring the Gumbo!<\/p>\n

1. YASCHA MOUNK, Identity Trap: A Story of Ideas and Power in Our Time (New York, NY: Penguin Press, 2024), Back Cover
\n2. Ibid., 14.
\n3. Ibid., 14<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I want to share a story with you. It came to mind as I read the introduction of The Identity Trap. As I have shared in other blogs, I am a Consultant and I work with non- profit organizations, churches, and charitable foundations. During the pandemic, in July of 2020, I worked with a CEO […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":174,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2310,551],"tags":[2981,2978],"class_list":["post-34836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-doctor-of-leadership-3","category-thriller","tag-gumbo","tag-mounk-dlgp02","cohort-dlgp02"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34836","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/174"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34836"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34836\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34843,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34836\/revisions\/34843"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34836"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34836"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34836"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}