Fragile Logic: Examining White Fragility (Part 2)

Considering the classic definition of racism,¹ the logical first step in eradicating racial discrimination is to reaffirm the inherent value of all people, while simultaneously distancing ourselves from superficial differentiations—such as race. Advocating such departure from collective identity in his famous 1963 speech, Martin Luther King Jr. passionately proclaims., “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. . . . [that one day] little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.”²

Breaking the mold of divisive racial identification, we can seek individual distinctiveness through our meritorious accomplishment and defining character, while simultaneously embracing features of group identity which promote cohesion among subpopulations. For example, multiracial people identifying as Americans remain united by underscoring ideological beliefs (i.e., the underpinnings of our constitutional republic), while Christians find unity in the profession of essential Christian doctrines.³ Embracing such collective identities ultimately promotes a system of unified diversity, recognizing the unique contributions of individual members, while emphasizing the crucial importance of multicultural and multigenerational companionship, devoid of any socioeconomic (or other frivolous) division.⁴ Moreover, relationships arising from common worldview perspectives or shared ideological beliefs, ultimately prove more consequential than those organized around peripheral commonalities or inconsequential physical attributes.⁵

Progressing in the opposite direction, DiAngelo’s worldview highlights race as the foundational aspect of human identity, thereby nullifying any semblance of individualism, while requiring every facet of human existence to be interpreted through the lens of race.⁶ Unsurprisingly, DiAngelo specializes in whiteness studies, a field that presupposes the existence of “invisible structures that produce and reproduce white supremacy and privilege,” and places race at the center of sociological analysis.⁷ Explicitly revealing the single-mindedness of her worldview, DiAngelo writes, “I am a white American. . . I have a white frame of reference and a white worldview, and I move through the world with a white experience. . . . I was socialized as white in a racism-based society, I have a racist worldview, deep racial bias, racist patterns, and investments in the racist system that has elevated me.”⁸ Unfortunately, deciphering every facet of life through the collectivist lens of race will ultimately result in false attributions of casual relationships (as revealed in DiAngelo’s redefinition of racial terminology), while removing any basis for individual accomplishment or failure.

For example, people in the racial majority cannot be credited with achievement, as their success solely emerges because of racial factors. Similarly, since race serves as the sole determinant of a person’s character and circumstances, failure cannot be ascribed to anyone in the racial minority, as physical phenotypes predetermine the outcome. Thus, DiAngelo perceives white-supremacy as the foundation of western culture, producing a society that remains divided into a racial hierarchy, in which whites maintain oppressive social and institutional power over their “colored” counterparts—a perspective DiAngelo demands her audience to accept.⁹