On the Subject of Your Invalidations
Dear Friends,
If you try to tell me how I should feel or react to incidences of racial injustice, then I already know you don’t understand the issue and/or you don’t care. To be honest, I am not even trying to figure out what group you belong to either. I’m distraught, you’re confused, and the difference between our reactions has nothing to do with me “overreacting.”
While your race may give you privilege in society, it does not give you the privilege to dictate to black people (and their allies) how they should receive and react to acts of violence and oppression. If our expressions of pain make you uncomfortable, then telling us how to react won’t remedy your discomfort (nor our recurring pain). Working to take away what causes us to react this way -- will.
You say you are objective and well-intended, but do you even know what those words mean? hmm?
Let’s talk about that today!
Once again, as we have seen many times before, black people are confronted with travesties that pierce our collective consciousness and cause us tremendous angst. This time they came in the midst of a global pandemic and followed each other like wagons on a freight train. We watched Amy Cooper put on an Oscar worthy performance in an attempt to weaponize the police, and we riled because Patricia Ripley and Christopher Keys lied about being robbed by black men. To make matters worse, we literally streamed Ahmaud Arbery’s, George Floyd’s and Rayshard Brooks’s killings in our newsfeeds while waiting for answers about Breonna Taylor’s execution. WE 👏🏿 ARE 👏🏿 STILL 👏🏿 WAITING 👏🏿.
Breonna Taylor, an emergency medical technician (EMT), was 26 when officers falsely and recklessly stormed her Louisville home early on March 13 and executed her.
Despite the tragic circumstances surrounding her death, the police department has not provided any answers regarding the facts and circumstances of how this tragedy occurred, nor have they taken full responsibility for her senseless killing.
As we are trying to process all of this, and pulling ourselves together; some non-black people are peering in at us, through their rose colored lenses, and have invited themselves to comment on our expression of despair and outrage.
“Oh, that doesn’t happen”
“That’s only a few bad apples”
“Let’s wait until we have the facts”
These same individuals see our social media campaigns and demonstrations as uncalled for, inconvenient and inappropriate. They suggest that we can go about it another way. Although we have literally tried everything already. I mean, we have literal ‘bodies’ of evidence yet they continue to deny us the right to express how we feel. They also continue to deny the truth and reality of lethal violence toward black people.
This whole process of telling us how to feel and how to react - denying, rejecting and dismissing our feelings is an act of INVALIDATION. Telling us how we should feel sends the message that our subjective emotional experience is inaccurate, insignificant and unacceptable.
Why are our feelings being invalidated?
1. Some non-blacks believe they have objectivity because they are not personally (or racially) invested, and as such can bring “reason” into the conversation.
The truth is, they are just as biased as anyone else (some racially biased) – their perspective is influenced by their own experiences or lack thereof. It is also influenced by their position of privilege. Their understanding of racism comes through secondhand – filtered – diluted sources, while our experience is direct.
Their position of privilege also gives them a biased point of view on what “objectivity” means. The concept of objectivity is not absent of the dichotomy of “self versus other”. This ultimately results in the identification of the characteristics belonging to the “self” being regarded as valuable and “normal.” All else are relegated to the status of the “other,” and are deemed lacking in value, therefore, requiring adjustment to comply with the “normal”. As a result, this self versus other split, in conjunction with the historical position of privilege, has provided the justification for the oppression and domination of “the other,” which has been prevalent throughout history and now in the dictation of how black people and their allies should feel.
2. Telling us how we should feel is a form of manipulation that keep us where they think we belong.
Some individuals knowingly invalidate others as a form of control, manipulation, and psychological injury. Possible explanations are a low capacity for compassion and empathy, not understanding or valuing the importance of allowing individual the space to feel, and/or not knowing how to express it effectively.
There is also the possibility that they could be psychopaths…I am not ruling that one out. They are compelled to exercise their own control over other people as a mean to affirm their own sense of superiority. Some non-black people see the prospect of equal human rights and protection by the law as a threat to their own sense of superiority and resent those groups calling for it.
Sometimes it is presented as an image of friendly respect (false non-the less) to get from someone they do not respect, something that would not otherwise be voluntarily surrendered.
Some acts of invalidation occur unintentionally. There are a number of well-intentioned invalidators patrolling our newsfeeds and surveying our lives. They will often defend that the goal is to help someone feel better or differently—to an emotion they judge as a more appropriate, more desirable or comfortable for them.
There’s a thin line between support and toxic positivity.
Obviously you should supportive of your friends and encourage them to be happy, but there’s a fine line as to when this turns toxic. For example, telling human rights activists that, “there are phenomenal cops” when they are rallying for police reform to address societal inequities, sends the message of ‘you shouldn’t feel a certain way’. It conveys disapproval. It demands that the human rights activists shift their attention from the issue causing them angst to what you deem important - phenomenal cops. It also communicates that the person’s subjective emotional experience isn’t a valid one. Again, you have no authority to decide how a person should or shouldn’t feel.
If you ever get the urge to tell someone how they should feel…
Avoid offering unsolicited advice or becoming defensive. If you are amongst the target of the emotion, try to accept responsibility for at least a small part of the issue. If you have an idea on how to solve the issue, ask: “How can I support you?” If your offer is reflected, step back and focus on listening and learning.
Before intervening seek to understand. Listen and make and concerted effort to understand their position. The deeper you can understand where they’re coming from, the more validating you will be.
I hear you. I see you. I care about your feelings.
These sentences cannot be overstated.
While the immensity of our response to the deluge of recents violent acts against blacks seems new to some, the struggles which we are reacting to are not new at all. Our current reaction did not occur in a vacuum. It began long ago, in response to the continued violence and unjust treatment against black people and; the lack of repercussions for those culpable. What we are seeing now bears witness to these injustices and the cries of people generations before our existence.
To witness the suffering the of another human or to experience this pain yourself elicits strong feelings of pain and anger. Naturally, compassionate people want to fix things or make them better. When someone trivializes, minimizes or disavows those feelings and efforts, inevitably, our trauma is increased.
... and we ain’t tryna’ hear none a dat!