update
Hey all.
I had a very interesting conversation with my team members a few days ago, which was both humbling and frustating (the keywords of this job). My supervisor and my coworker were talking about how they had made peace with all the frustrations of the work we do. They talked about their philosophical and spiritual discipline, and the importance of doing what you can with what exists. And I told them that I have NOT made peace with the the fact that we operate within a broken system, characterized primarily by defensiveness, greed, apathy, and kafka-esque beurocracy. I told them I am angry. My supervisor countered by saying, "yeah, but what are you going to DO about it?" Now, this is a question I ask myself daily, but it means something different to me than it does to her. To her, the question is rhetorical, because she does not see a way out. To me, it is anything rhetorical. I do not know enough or have not seen enough to be satisfied that we can not do better than this. My work is predicated on the notion that we MUST do better.
I thought for a while about the fact that I feel so differently about the conditions of our work, and I came up with two reasons. The first is that I am young. I have not come to this job with the complacency of maturity or a sense of absolute calling. It's just not my developmental reality.
The second reason is more depressing. The second reason is that I am white, and I therefore have more options. Racism is alive and well in our society (don't fool yourselves, people); the fact is that my coworkers do not have the luxury of anger in the same way that I do, because the political road is much rockier for them and their voices are much less likely to be heard in high places.
So all you white people reading this: I posit that our anger is a privilege. As a corollary to that, our anger is a responsibility as well. We have to have the chracter, strength, and motivation to do the things that others would do if they could.
With anger, hope, joy, and love, we could accomplish a lot.
I had a very interesting conversation with my team members a few days ago, which was both humbling and frustating (the keywords of this job). My supervisor and my coworker were talking about how they had made peace with all the frustrations of the work we do. They talked about their philosophical and spiritual discipline, and the importance of doing what you can with what exists. And I told them that I have NOT made peace with the the fact that we operate within a broken system, characterized primarily by defensiveness, greed, apathy, and kafka-esque beurocracy. I told them I am angry. My supervisor countered by saying, "yeah, but what are you going to DO about it?" Now, this is a question I ask myself daily, but it means something different to me than it does to her. To her, the question is rhetorical, because she does not see a way out. To me, it is anything rhetorical. I do not know enough or have not seen enough to be satisfied that we can not do better than this. My work is predicated on the notion that we MUST do better.
I thought for a while about the fact that I feel so differently about the conditions of our work, and I came up with two reasons. The first is that I am young. I have not come to this job with the complacency of maturity or a sense of absolute calling. It's just not my developmental reality.
The second reason is more depressing. The second reason is that I am white, and I therefore have more options. Racism is alive and well in our society (don't fool yourselves, people); the fact is that my coworkers do not have the luxury of anger in the same way that I do, because the political road is much rockier for them and their voices are much less likely to be heard in high places.
So all you white people reading this: I posit that our anger is a privilege. As a corollary to that, our anger is a responsibility as well. We have to have the chracter, strength, and motivation to do the things that others would do if they could.
With anger, hope, joy, and love, we could accomplish a lot.