Being Anti-Racist Means Fighting ALL Racism

Reflections on the workings of white supremacy

Hello friends,

I originally wrote this a few weeks ago after the Monterey Park murders. Since then, of course, we’ve had other examples of the pervasiveness and harm of white supremacy.

This is an anti-racism newsletter where I often talk about anti-Blackness. As a Black woman from the global Black diaspora, that’s my wheelhouse, in the main. That said, I believe in my core that being anti-racist means fighting all kinds of oppression based on the fiction of “race”, and that isn’t just about people who identify as Black. As committed anti-racists we need to support those from other communities facing racism - and there are many.

The awful event that brought this to mind was the mass shooting in Monterey Park, California, on the eve of Lunar New Year 2023. It had echoes of other murders we’ve seen in 2022 and before, Buffalo being just one example. One of the things that stood out to me most was that the shooter felt justified in targeting that community.

For me, this is one of the most malign legacies of the system of white supremacy - the targeting and hunting of people of the global majority. (And yes, people who identify as Global Majority can also act based on those norms). This system sees some people as worthy and others as expendable, some to be lauded, others to be demeaned, some to have unearned advantages, others to be deliberately disadvantaged, some to benefit, some to be exploited.