That Night
by Gregory BoydYouth Council is the week-long business meeting of Young Religious Unitarian Universalists (YRUUs) held annually in late July or early August. The meeting is usually held the week after Con Con, the Continental Conference of YRUU. The delegates to Youth Council are called Youth Council Members (YCMs) and constitute four different bodies: regional and district (Youth Council Representatives (YCRs), youth and adult at-large representatives, The People of Color Caucus (PoCC), and Steering Committee and the Youth Office who are there in a non-voting role. The purpose of Youth Council is to direct the course of YRUU on all levels for the year by using the Formal Consensus process to accept or reject resolutions, bylaws changes, and YRUU Fund for Unitarian Universalist Development (Y*FUUD) grant applications.
Youth Council has four equally important parts: Regional/District reports, Anti-Racism and Anti-Oppression analysis development, decision-making, and election of the new Steering Committee and People of Color Advisory Council to Steering Committee (PoCAC). PoCC and PoCAC are bodies of People of Color who have full "voting" rights at Youth Council and Steering Committee meetings, respectively. Both bodies are aware of how tokenizing (falsely representative) their positions of power are in YRUU.
PoCC and PoCAC were created out of YRUU's genuine desire to represent communities of People of Color in the Unitarian Universalist movement. The bodies were instituted at a time when there were no regional or district YCRs of Color. Again, this was the case this year—only the at-large and PoCC positions were filled by People of Color. For the under-representation of Youth of Color in YRUU, primarily, and many other reasons, secondarily, we do Anti-racism analysis development.
A large emphasis was put on doing Anti-racism analysis development. Each day, there was a 2-hour Anti-racism training that was part of the "Challenging White Supremacy" workshop. In addition, there was a variable amount of time for racial and other identity-based caucusing. However, it was very obvious that this key component did not have enough time. Because of Plenary, the business part of Youth Council, taking as much as three hours when scheduled for an hour and a half session, Anti-racism work was often rescheduled at odd times. And as the struggle toward an Anti-Racist/Anti-Oppressive YRUU is ongoing, rescheduling also caused the real Anti-Racism work to bubble up at unforeseen times.
On the fourth night of Youth Council, the Council community—tired and restless—had a decision to make that was brought about by the desire to build a healthy and strong community. This was the Council's first night to use the Formal Consensus process to accept or reject resolutions. This had been the plan, but it had also been the plan to begin this Plenary earlier and to have reached consensus on one resolution the previous day. It was already long past the bewitching hour, when one member asked that we break from Plenary for bed and pick up where we left off the next day. Another voice spoke up and asked that we stay through one more resolution in order to avoid the hazards of last year’s Youth Council: working on resolutions until 4:00 a.m. Everyone was tired.
Before long, there was a battle between the two requests. There were those people who wanted to stay up longer and have less work for the next day, and there were those people who felt that we needed to end immediately because they were tired. Those groups were the People of Color and the White People, respectively. Tempers flared. White Youth left the room crying. Other White Youth followed behind to comfort them. Some White Youth cried in the room about the fact that the community was breaking down because we would not agree to break. Other White Youth yelled that we were ignoring people who left the room or complained about not being able to leave the room. Everyone was tired.
Tempers flared. Youth of Color yelled about other situations where they stayed up late to do the work of the group despite being tired. Other Youth of Color cried about how the community was breaking down because we would not agree to get through one more resolution. Another Youth of Color yelled about how we were still here ready to do work despite those who refused to come back in the room. Another Youth of Color left the room because the situation was too much to take followed by a Youth of Color who went to provide support. Everyone was tired.
Soon after hearing everyone, we decided to take a break. There was a rift in the community, a rift between races. Could it be true? There was racism in YRUU? As we broke, in more ways than one, some fled, others walked calmly out of the room and most Youth of Color cried silently, but noticeably—huddled in a mass in a corner. The hunger pangs of racism resounded softly in the air as we cried. We all cried that night, the Youth of Color. I do not know about the White Youth, for after we came back together, we decided to hold racial caucusing and many of us avoided White Youth for the rest of that night. As a Black Youth, it was terrifying for me. For the first time in my life, I was so afraid of White People. I was afraid that they would try to comfort me. I was afraid they would try to hug me. I was afraid that they were going to tell me, "Don't worry, it's alright." It was not alright. It was fucked up what happened that night. It was fucked up what happened to me because of institutional racism. It was fucked up what happened to us Youth of Color that night. It was fucked up that 14–20 year olds were the perpetuators of racism in our "safe" community. I did not feel safe.
Everyone was tired that night that racism surfaced at Youth Council, Thursday, August 5, 2004. It seemed surreal at first. We did not know what was happening. But then, just as fast, the battle lines were drawn and it was a race war. Hold up, "How did it change so fast?" asked one Youth of Color. When I think about it, that's the funniest part. The racism that surfaced that night didn't just come about so fast, ze was there all along. Ze was the other at-large in the room that no one invited. Steering Committee didn't select zir to be there. And nobody would speak about zir or to zir. Yet racism had managed to crash our annual business party.
One of the strange things I learned that night was that it's all about racism. Of course this can be said about all linked oppressions (sexism, heterosexism, genderism, classism, prejudice, ablism, ageism, etc.), but racism is an easier common thread for me to see. We have all grown up in a racist society. Growing up and living in a racist society means that everything that we do is shaped by racism, power, prejudice and oppression. We all experience racism. The way we experience it is not the same, but we all know racism when we see it, whether or not we can name it, call it that or actively realize it.
All White People are racist and all
People of Color are race prejudiced.
"But that's a generalization!"
Whoever told you that generalizations are always wrong?
All apples have
a core. The previous is a true generalization. All White People are racist and
all People of Color are race prejudiced is another true
generalization.
Racist people and race-prejudiced people are not bad people. They are people on a journey through and within prejudice and oppression. We are all born into this journey, the anti-oppressive transformative journey toward liberation. What this means is that good people—even liberal religious youth—can be and are prejudiced. We may not be born prejudiced, but that does not mean we do not end up that way. Something we cannot control does not make us bad people. However, willingly refusing to admit who we are, what we do or own up to our positions of power and/or oppression in a racist society does make us bad people. We cannot sit by idly saying "I didn't create this problem;" or, "Racism doesn't exist where I live, everyone is White," or "I don't like to see colors, I see people and judge everyone on zir/her/his merits." If we who are on the cutting edge of liberal religion refuse to challenge racism and White supremacy, who is going to do it for us? Nemo.
Racism is still alive and kicking in YRUU and the Unitarian Universalist Association. It did not die back in 1968 with the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. Racism is not an issue of Black People. Racism is not an issue of People of Color. Racism is not an issue of having more People of Color at Youth Council or at youth group or at a con. Racism is not just about White People being oppressive. Racism and race prejudice are issues for all of us to deal with. Those of you who think you don't experience racism, look closer, for racism is just below the surface of every conversation you have, preventing it from being fully genuine, fully meaningful and even truly anti-racist. That is why on that night at Youth Council, we saw racism come to a head, erupting like a hideous bacteria-ridden blemish on the milky white skin of YRUU. Racism was right there, painful and ready to process. It was the last thing we wanted to deal with, but we had to, though we were all so tired that night.
Gregory Boyd is a bridging youth from Harrisburg, PA. He currently attends college at Boston University and is also a member of both the YRUU and Diverse and Revolutionary Unitarian Universalist Multi-Cultural Ministries (DRUUMM) Youth and Young Adult Steering Committees.
For more information contact youth @ uua.org.
Last updated on Saturday, April 19, 2008.
