So We Want to Talk About Race

This is the monthly meeting of the PFC Racial Justice Initiative. We seek to increase understanding of systemic racism and to advocate for racial justice as an active, visible, secular participant in public events, offering educational programming, and providing material and volunteer support for local anti-racist work. 

This month we are going to examine the Ultimate White Privilege. "What's that?" you say. The concept was developed by Nancy DiTomaso, in a 10-year, multifaceted study of how our civil rights enforcement regime functions. In her book, The American Non-Dilemma: Racial Inequality Without Racists, DiTomaso measures the results of non-discrimination laws in employment and identifies the methods most commonly used to hire and promote people into managerial and professional positions which are not addressed by civil rights laws. Instead of reducing racial discrimination, this failure perpetuates micro-inequities which allow white people to receive the benefits of white supremacy without having to behave in ways that are seen as racist.
You can view a 2014 lecture by DiTomaso at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_NeqTjz13Q&t=3508s

Our title is a nod to the book So You Want To Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo, described by Andy Richter as "a user-friendly examination of race in America...Think of it as Race for the Willing-to-Listen."