It is at the end of this video that Collabyrinth’s work begins. Otherwise, the self-awareness “breakthrough” that occurs exists only to further serve persons of privilege–as if everything everybody goes through in the video is for the benefit of the white guy.more…
Many carry with them what might be described as a “broken truth” regarding other’s social identities that inhibit them from celebrating others’ full humanity. Broken truths can be difficult to name. Often a poignant story can help get at the heart of the matter, as it did at MountainTop 2015. This is a video excerpt of a retelling of Douglas Wood’s Old Turtle and the Broken Truth.more…
Melvin Bray had the distinct privilege of co-facilitating MountainTop 2015, 8-10 June, in Atlanta, GA. MountainTop is a multi-racial, multi-ethnic, intersectional summit of leaders of moral courage from around the US, convened by Auburn Theological Seminary and designed to advance a multifaith movement for justice. The 2015 theme was RACIAL EQUITY. This DesignShop was facilitated in conjunction with Rob Evans from Imaginal Labs and Melinda Weekes-Laidlow from Weekes in Advance.more…
At the end of this video is where Collabyrinth’s work begins. Otherwise, the cultural awareness “breakthrough” that occurs in the video exists only in service to white supremacy. The difficult, vulnerable, emotionally draining work of racial analysis, cultural awareness and cultural competency isn’t solely or primarily for the benefit of white people. Sure white people benefit by becoming better people. But people of color do this work in acknowledgement of their own human dignity, as well they should. People of color don’t exist merely for the betterment of white folks. Unless the result of work related to race is better ways of thinking and doingmore…
Melvin Bray helped a wonderful cadre of collaborators host Faith Forward 2015 in Chicago.more…
It’s All of Us: The Practice of Inequality The people must know before they can act. —Ida B. Wells Race like sexuality, is a place where power masks itself as nature. —Anthony Farley “To identify the practice of racial inequality, we must also have a framework for understanding what race is…. Anthony Farley offers a revision of the implied spectrum theory of sexuality to be applied to race, one that understands its structure as contingent upon situs and power. Race, like sexual orientation, is produced by social arrangements and political decision making. And these arrange ments, along with self-identification, are generative of the persistence ofmore…
This offers excellent critique of part of the design of the In Our Neighbors Shoes event in March 2015. As a part of the service learning, 8th graders participated in a simulation that was not quite as relational as it could and should have been and skirted too closely the edge of the trap into which Gwyneth Paltrow and so many others have fallen. The next iteration of such a fieldtrip will correct for the insight offered by Brittney Cooper in the excerpt below from her article “White America’s Gwyneth Paltrow problem: How it’s playing games with the lives of poor people” for Salon.com. more…
“It Wasn’t Me!”: Post-Intent and Correlational Racism “Today, there is no longer any single articulating principle or axial process which provides the logic required to interpret the racial dimensions of all extant political/cultural projects.” —Howard Winant “Americans generally disavow a belief in an ideology of racism. But we must understand the terms of that disavowal. What, precisely, is being disavowed? What is the definition of racism that we have rejected in our purportedly racially egalitarian society? In U.S. race talk, we generally define racism as comprising two components: intentionality and determinism. More specifically, racism requires both the intent to disadvantage someone on the basis ofmore…
Today Collabyrinth consultant Melvin Bray challenged an elite group of thought leaders and public speakers to be courageous by adopting the use of a “Consciousness Rider” as a way to encourage program organizers to pursue beloved community. Riders are additional stipulations beyond fees for service or property that programmers must meet if they want a speaker, band or artist to fulfill a contract. Producers of public events have no reason to do better, unless talent and consumers insist they do better. This is one way to do so. If you make your living in front of an audience, leave a comment, committing to use themore…
[EXCERPT]–“In war–whether a shooting war or a culture war makes no difference on this point–only some of the battles are carefully planned. Others explode as if from nowhere. A little skirmish or rearguard action can quickly turn into a major collision, a Battler of Gettysburg, for example. “Something like that happened in Indiana during the last days of March. A bill in the state legislature, a mostly sumbolic last stand by routed conservatives opposed to same-sex marriage, triggered a massive response from gay-rights advocates. Governor Mike Pence’s signature on his state’s Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) looked at first like a successful raid on competingmore…
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