09_23_2018

The Complexities of Embracing Diversity               

                Within the past several weeks, a sequence of unrelated experiences have helped me focus more clearly on one of the issues that appears to be contributing to the underlying divisiveness within our country.

                While I am well aware that part of the current President’s appeal to his base includes his frequent comments that reflect his underlying racial prejudices and his disrespectful and sexist comments about women, I haven’t really given much thought as to why his comments are resonating so strongly with his base.  His words range from thinly veiled innuendos to outright derogatory comments.  His comments also strike me as occurring from a self-proclaimed position as “top dog:” White,  male, and wealthy has put him at the top of the pyramid in his mind.

Post-election analyses required several months of investigation and reflection before the real reasons surfaced to explain his path to the presidency.  It wasn’t just about the economy and that some people felt like they had been left behind.  A large portion of his base support stems from a fear that whites – particularly white males – were angry at what they perceived as a loss of power as it was becoming more apparent that others in our society, namely women and minorities, believed that they should have access to the power dynamics and positions that provide opportunities for voicing concerns and influencing decisions

No doubt there will be countless studies in the future that analyze and dissect the meaning of moving from a position that assumes power as a birthright to a more egalitarian position of expecting to share power with others.  Such a shift will have many easily identifiable aspects as well as multiple more nuanced implications as shifts in status or assumed birthrights work their way through our systems and realities.

I’m going out on a limb here with my next statement but I will at least share my reasoning and the reader can be the judge of my logic.  My hunch is that as the country moves closer to a majority-minority populace, the biggest impact of such a shift will be on white males.  My hunch is based on the fact that white men have as a whole have held positions of power and authority in both the public and the private spheres since the country was founded.

As a white woman I have been aware of white male privilege for years while simultaneously pursing the knowledge and action steps required to claim my own voice without alienating men if possible.  As early feminists have repeatedly pointed out, women have contributed to this imbalance of power by raising sons to believe that they are entitled to behave in a manner that assumes that the world is meant to revolve around them.  As a result of navigating the forces in play to discover and claim my  own voice in white-male dominated domains, I haven’t spent much time or extended much empathy in trying to understand what the power-shifting experiencing feels like to men.  What does it feel like to realize that the ways in which men have been treated as privileged in the past are being replaced by expectations that are fueled by a desire for more equal partnerships and shared responsibilities?  One of my close male friends and colleagues acknowledged in a conversation we were having about the TV series Mad Men that his father’s generation was the last generation to anticipate such an entitled existence.  I could tell from my friend’s comment that his awareness of a change in men’s role in our society was aware of some loss for him but the loss was overshadowed by what he saw as the gains that men experience from forming more equal partnerships in their relationships.

On a similar note, I am very encouraged by some of the changes that I see occurring within the private spheres of our lives.  I witness many examples within families in which there is much more sharing of the responsibilities of parenting.  Men in these situations seem much more able to enjoy the benefits of developing their feminine, emotional sides and they clearly demonstrate stronger emotional bonds with their children and partners.  This trend that confirms that change is possible is encouraging, but there is still a long way to go as not all men and not all women want to see a change in the power dynamics that have prevailed for years.

But when it comes to the public sector, the dial of change seems to be meeting with much more resistance. Despite the numbers that show that women are outpacing men in pursuing and completing a college education women are still much underrepresented in CEO and Board positions.  Men clearly dominate the political spheres, and while women’s participation rates are increasing, the rate of change seems to be moving at a snail’s pace given the numbers that go in the equation.  Only recently has our country elected a woman candidate of a major political party to run for the presidency.

In other words, sexism and racism still permeate many of the country’s pathways to power.  In light of my view, it is not a surprising revelation to me that even though I have a very strong empathetic awareness. I have not invested much empathy into exploring what white men are feeling about the slow but ongoing demands for sharing the power.

As I noted in the beginning of this Blog, a string of unrelated experiences related to this discussion are causing me to pay more attention to the emotional overtones that accompany the push for more equality in sharing power. These events involved more personal interpretations and observations of what seems to be occurring, and the “personal” experience of individual white men has peaked my interest.

Let me share the specific examples that I’m referring to.  Recently a woman friend shared the story about the experience of a son of a friend of hers.  The young man – from a well-educated, liberal leaning family – served as an intern for a male Republican senator over the summer vacation.  At the end of the experience, the young man was quite vocal about how the Senator had convinced him that the country had chosen a path that will give minorities and women priority in all situations that will allow them to move ahead of men.  Unless such initiatives are checked and brought to a halt, white men no longer stand a chance of achieving economic stability or pursuing rewarding careers.  This story was the first time I have heard such an explicit translation of a white male’s interpretation of what it means to no longer expect that just because you are white, you are entitled to expect a privileged status as your birthright.

Shortly after this experience, I was having dinner with a couple that I have been friends with for year.  Throughout our meal, we were talking about the source of the anger and animosity that seems to be part of this President’s base.  The husband – a white male and a man that puts a lot of energy and work into being enlightened – shared his view that until white men are able to claim and acknowledge the feelings that they are experiencing about the shift towards a more equal sharing of power, they will never be able to process their grief that accompanies their perceived or real loss.  Unexpressed grief resides within one as unresolved anger.  His observations make sense to me when I think about Elizabeth Kubler-Ross’s Stages of Grief which begin with denial and then move to anger.

His wife and I quickly shared that we had each been finalists for leadership roles within our professions, and while we were at times successful in being selected as the finalists, we also acknowledged that in other searches, the nod went to a minority candidate.

In my case, I was disappointed at first at not being selected, but I quickly came around to understanding that if we were going to succeed in welcoming a more diverse workforce, there were going to be search results that selected highly qualified candidates that happened to be minorities.  Since both his wife and I had similar reactions to outcomes in which we weren’t selected, it seemed worth exploring why we were seemingly able to adapt to the outcomes without a lot of work.  The answer seemed readily apparent to both of us.  As women, we had never assumed the status of privilege or special treatment as our default position.

My final experience in this sequence of exploring white male privilege occurred when I attended Jean Lee’s Play, Straight White Men.  Clearly there are multiple story lines to explore in the play, and the playwright gives the audience just enough footholds to peak your engagement and curiosity without leading you to oversimplified endings.  The story centers on a widowed father gathering with his three adult sons to celebrate Christmas.  The play begins with what some might describe as “typical male banter” comprised of joking around but avoiding serious or emotional conversations at all costs.  Even with this surface level of conversation, it is easy to conclude that strong feelings of connection and love are evident among the four family members.  Towards the end of the play, the dialogue begins to go below the surface as the youngest son begins to show signs that the others interpret as his not being well or happy.  The family members assume that something is seriously wrong with the youngest son since in spite of his Harvard education and obvious brilliance, he has settled for a job in which he does the copying for the staff within a non-profit organization.

Here’s where the story line offers a chance to read a different message into the play.  The older brothers insist that in today’s highly competitive market to securing fewer and fewer high paying, prestigious jobs,  the secret is selling yourself in order to get ahead. At the same time that one brother is promoting this message he also acknowledges that he is leading a very bifurcated life in that he is ignoring his own values by publically appearing to embrace values that he doesn’t hold personally and that do not reflect a positive future for his bi-racial children.  So is the Play another take on the challenges facing straight white me to “make it” in a society that desires to be more inclusive?

These events have made me more conscious that I don’t really know how white men are feeling through these transitions, or if they have the communication skills and emotional awareness to articulate how they are feeling.  And while I know that each person has to ultimately do the work of understanding his own grief if he is indeed  feeling a loss, it may be helpful for women to understand that their communication and empathy skills may be helpful to men in unpacking their grief.

While it may not seem reasonable to expect women to assist since they have been victims of male power in some cases, it is worth the effort if we can find ways to diffuse the anger that seems to be controlling so much of our public discourse.  Efforts that lead to becoming a more just and equitable, diverse society are worth the work!