White Silence takes place when White people avoid speaking up about racial inequalities, such as when witnessing discriminatory behaviours or during conversations about race. White Silence often stems from discomfort or fear of saying the wrong thing. However, it frequently results in the continuation of racial inequality and maintaining the current state (Sleeter, 2014). The following text uses examples of avoidant behavior and references from colonial historical contexts to explain the roots and consequences of white silence.
Framing & Perspectives
White silence often advantages White individuals by avoiding discomfort induced by discussion around racial inequalities. At the same time, it increases harm to BIPOC individuals by allowing racism to go unchallenged (Sleeter, 2014). Therefore, acts of White Silence serve White individuals to maintain their comforts, while ignoring and dismissing the needs and feelings of people experiencing racism. This dynamic neglects the experiences of BIPOC people and hinders real progress toward racial justice (DiAngelo, 2012).
However, even when White individuals choose to speak up, their actions can sometimes lead to unintentional harm. In some cases, such interventions may undermine the autonomy or self-efficacy of the person targeted by racism, especially if such actions overshadow their voice or assume they need to be “saved” (e.g., see White saviorism). Both silence and misguided actions can keep the existing inequalities and power structures in place (Sue et al., 2019). Addressing racism requires more than just speaking up; it means listening and being aware of one’s own privileges and position in society. It also takes effort to prioritize and center the voices of those most affected (Sleeter, 2014).
Relevance
White silence is not only a contemporary issue, it is also deeply rooted in historical and socio-political contexts. For example, there is little to no history of protests and confrontation against slavery and the Atlantic Slave Trade. Stories about BIPOC people in the Western world during that period are very rare or exist in a position of inferiority when compared to their White counterparts. The lack of a complete and dense conversation that includes People of Color and their stories might have contributed to a delay in the implementation of anti-racists practices and laws. In many European countries, for example, there is still a misperception about how colonialism and slavery exploited BIPOC people and about the overall consequences of the Atlantic Slave Trade, that are still felt to this day by those communities (Goodfellow, 2019).
Keywords: Racism, White Supremacy, Social Injustice, Racial Inequality, White Privilege
Connected terms: Microaggressions, Microinterventions, Ethnocentrism, Representation, Stereotype Threat, White Defensiveness, White Fragility, White Guilt, Whitewashing, White Silence, Xenophobia
References
DiAngelo, R. (2012). Nothing to add: A challenge to White silence in racial discussions. Understanding and Dismantling privilege, 2(1), 1-17.
DiAngelo, R. (2018). White fragility: why it’s so hard for White people to talk about racism. Beacon Press.
Goodfellow, M. (2019, December 5). Put our colonial history on the curriculum – then we’ll understand who we really are. The Guardian. From: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/dec/05/britain-colonial-history-curriculum-racism-migration
Sleeter, C. E. (2014). White silence, white solidarity. In Race traitor (pp. 257-265). Routledge.
Sue, D. W., Alsaidi, S., Awad, M. N., Glaeser, E., Calle, C. Z., & Mendez, N. (2019). Disarming racial microaggressions: Microintervention strategies for targets, White allies, and bystanders. American Psychologist, 74(1), 128.
