Right there, in the middle of the schoolyard, watching my classmates on the volleyball team train while looking extraordinarily athletic and naturally tanned, the 12-year-old physically weak and very white me didn't feel privileged. These girls were popular and beautiful by Colombian standards. They used to wear a pair of shorts under the school skirt. When training, they would tuck the sides of the skirt under their shorts, exposing more of their toned and tanned and gorgeous legs. I used to walk around during school breaks, wearing my skirt tucked in the side of my shorts, wishfully thinking that maybe that would make me a little like them.
The popular girls sometimes noticed me and, when they did, they used to compare me to a glass of milk. They would point it out, loud and in my face, very much as a matter of fact, and I never knew how to answer to that. It wasn't an overt insult that I needed to defend myself against or that I could escalate to the teachers for them to protect me. It wasn't even a criticism that I could unequivocally characterize as destructive. It was simply a statement of fact, without any 'bad words' that I could get upset at; without any judgement that I could readily identify as unfair. It was, however, a statement that always left me feeling defenseless and powerless, and less, even if that was not their intention.
Checking our white privilege involves an assessment of what we are not subjected to on a daily basis, or ever. And it is not just about not being subjected to loud and conscious acts of discrimination, but also not being subjected to those "everyday slights, indignities, put-downs and insults that members of marginalized groups experience in their day-to-day interactions with individuals who are often unaware that they have engaged in an offensive or demeaning way." It is in the context of these latter actions, defined by Derald Wing Sue as microaggressions, that the glass of milk memory came to mind, to realize just how privileged I actually am.
Looking for examples in my life of incidents that could fall within the definition of microaggression, the glass-of-milk experience is, in fact, the single one experience I could find. A very unusual and isolated experience that wasn't even racially motivated. It did impact the way I see myself, but it was not, in any way possible, a racial microaggression. Sitting at the table in the cafeteria with other white or white-passing people, I never had to worry about others questioning our motives for that "association." I have never had to worry about people asking me if "they can touch my hair" while reaching to touch it regardless of my answer. I have never had anybody act surprised when I say something smart. I have never been told how to do my hair to look professional at work. I have never had the need to join a protest to stand up for the rights of white people. I have never felt like my blood is boiling in my veins out of fear, not even once in the multiple times I have been stopped by the police because I am speeding or using the bus lane to cross the bridge. I have never had anyone tell me that when they see me they don't see any colour. I have never known, and will never know, what is like to be Black.
Glass-of-Milk me, however, always wanted to have a dark skin tone, like the one my little sister was born with and that I am always so jealous of. Throughout my life I took every opportunity I had to roast under the sun and turn myself into a darker version of me. It would last only a few days, but it was worth it. So many opportunities did I take that I ended up diagnosed with melanoma and condemned to my whiteness forever since 2014. To my Black friends, and to any Black person I meet, even if briefly, I always expressed my admiration for their skin complexion. I didn't want to be a glass of milk. I wished I were Black, I thought to myself and sometimes expressed it out loud and in their face, as a matter-of-fact statement.
And now I have to wonder what the Black people in my life, friends and strangers, really heard when I told them 'I wish I were Black'. I have to wonder if what I meant as an honest compliment (full of jealousy) may have been perceived as a microaggression. I have to wonder, because it is the only way to make my own biases visible to myself.
As Derald Wing Sue explains, microaggressions are invisible to the ones who execute them, because they come from a place of power. Our group experiences shape the way we perceive reality, and powerful groups will tend to think that their reality is the only reality that there is. If white people believe racism is a thing of the past, their natural conclusion is that no statement they make could be interpreted as racist. Their bias is so unconscious that it is invisible to them.
And I have realized that, in my white-passing existence, I may have not been immune to the blindness that comes with white privilege. It has never occurred to me to even consider that my I-wish-I-were-Black statement could be taken as anything but a flattering one. But, what do the Black people in my life hear? Am I unintentionally but unduly simplifying what means to be Black? Does my statement convey that I only see their skin tone but that I am blind to what they have been, and continue to be, subjected to on a daily basis, because of being Black? Do I fail to acknowledge that there is more to Blackness than just the colour of their skin? Could my statement be ever interpreted as a microaggression?
I don't have any final answers to these questions, but I have to ask them to start the conversation. I have been perceived as white without even knowing, and I could also be racist without any awareness of it. I know my intention, but a good intention without awareness is not enough to make meaningful change. Microaggressions are a common place among well-intentioned white people and in many cases they are completely oblivious to the harmful consequences of their actions or statements to the Black people in the receiving end. We need to rise above the reality as we perceive it and hear beyond our own voices. Yes, I see colour in Black people, and I like it, but I need to see more than just the colour. I don't get to dictate what Black people should hear when I say that I wish I were Black. I want to listen. I am listening.
