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Pact Press

How Can White Folks Join the Fight to End Systemic Racism?

September 16, 2020 1 Comment

Racism lives in our minds and bodies—to end it, we must first find and feel it. 

By Amy Banks MD

Like so many in our country, I am sick—not from the coronavirus, but by the ways systemic racism continues to shackle and kill people of color in our country and by the ways in which too many white Americans continue to deny it, look the other way, and/or fail to see how their lives benefit from it.

In the U.S., systemic racism is one of the primary default programs all citizens use to filter day to day experiences. The random fact of being born white comes with unearned power and an unseen advantage over people of color. I have learned from antiracist friends and colleagues that racism is so deeply embedded in our societal structures and subconscious minds that if you live your life without examining your biases and the biases of people who were instrumental in shaping your beliefs, you will inevitably replay the learned racism consciously or unconsciously.

For many white people, it is too easy to believe that you care deeply about social justice but are too busy with work, taking care of kids, or paying the bills to join an all-out war on racism. It’s been too easy to only think about Black lives mattering immediately following the killing of another Black person by the police. The mass of diverse protesters across our country are screaming in one voice that inaction is no longer tolerable. It is time for white people to take responsibility for changing the culture of racism by changing themselves and the unequal social structures they have created. Silence is not an option. 

In more intimate groups of well-meaning white people, I have heard many share how they feel stuck, frozen by guilt or fearful of doing or saying the wrong thing. They want to jump in but don’t know how or where to start. Taking responsibility must begin with an increased awareness of one’s own biases—how they were created and how they benefit all white people. Only then can any of us honestly own the role we are playing in perpetuating the status quo.

Racism lives in our bodies and therefore we cannot simply think our way of it. We cannot escape into our heads and create a new community ideal without first feeling the impact of racism. We must feel the pain that people of color have endured and to use that pain to fuel action for change.

Examining my own whiteness and unearned privilege takes me back to my roots in Maine, which remains the whitest state in the nation (2020). Here I can begin to understand how seamlessly my own racist education started and how deeply it lives in my cells. This is not an exercise in self-flagellation, but rather an attempt to see where it stills lives in me. I understand that it is impossible not to be racist when you grow up in an environment with toxic levels of bias, judgement and misinformation about people of color. I cannot become an anti-racist without owning and identifying where racism lives within me and in my communities.

To say that race relations were not on my radar growing up would be an understatement. In fact, in high school I was just coming out to myself as a lesbian and I was preoccupied with the injustices in the LGBTQ community in the later ’70s. In Maine, there was plenty of homophobia to worry about. However, for my family, that changed in the spring of 1979 when my father traveled on business to New Orleans. On his first day in NOLA, after eating dinner in the French Quarter, he and a colleague walked back to the Hyatt Regency. At the entry to the hotel, they were held up by two young men, and my father was shot and killed. 

Within hours, my family was told that “two Black men” had tried to rob my father and his colleague. This was my first substantive exposure to someone from the Black community. My family had been shattered by the murder and naïvely believed that the legal system in New Orleans would help us seek justice for the death of my father. We had no idea that what we were told was filtered through the New Orleans legal system well known for its racist attitudes. When the photos of the suspects, Isaac Knapper and Leroy Williams, popped up in our local newspaper, I remember looking at them closely and wondering what in their lives would have caused them to rob and kill. It never occurred to me that the prosecution would withhold exculpatory evidence at the trial and that one of the young men, Isaac Knapper, would be wrongly convicted for murder and sent to prison for the rest of his life. My family did not question the arrest and verdict for many reasons, but the biggest was that my family was solidly part of the white, dominant culture. One does not have to be an avowed white supremist to be racist—you simply have to be brainwashed 24/7 by a culture that defines health and acceptability as the birth right of all white people and associates people of color with violence.

When I found out in 2005 that the alleged killer of my father, Isaac Knapper, had been exonerated in the early 1990s, I was shocked and sickened. By then I had become a psychiatrist with a deep interest in issues of social justice and was well aware of the gross inequities that existed in America between people of color and white people—in health care, life expectancy, educational opportunity, housing, wealth … the list goes on and on. However, until I learned of Isaac’s exoneration, I had no way of knowing how entwined my own story was in America’s racism. The traumatic memory of my father’s murder was now exponentially more painful as it now involved the wrongful conviction of a sixteen-year-old boy. The anguish was now compounded by images of Isaac as a young man in the Louisiana State Penitentiary, Angola where he was sent to live out the rest of his life with no chance of parole.

By 2015, I was both curious and furious. Eric Garner, Freddie Grey, Michael Brown—the killings of Black men by police just kept happening. I decided to take personal action to more fully understand the horrendous racist event that my family had unwittingly been involved in. With much fear, I reached out to Isaac Knapper (who had been released after thirteen years and was living in NOLA) and asked to meet. In December of that year my sister, Nancy, and I met with Isaac and his wife in New Orleans. The meeting and our friendship have transformed my life. What surprised me the most was how easy it was to be together—how we didn’t stop talking and sharing the entire weekend we spent together. What disturbed me to my core was hearing Isaac’s personal experience of police brutality. How much worse his experience had been then I could even imagine. He shared his violent arrest at 5:45 a.m. when he was awoken with guns pointing at his head, the brutal interrogation where police beat him to within an inch of his life in an attempt to force a confession (it failed), and the utter disregard for his humanity at every turn of the legal proceedings. Yet, despite all he had been through (and continues to go through as a Black man in this society), he also listened to our story and our pain with deep compassion and caring. 

From left to right: Laurie White, Nancy Banks, Isaac Knapper, Amy Banks

One lesson I have learned from Isaac and his family is that the process of healing racism will hurt and at times, the risks you will need to take will be terrifying. But the pain is not penance for bad behavior (though there is room for that as well). When you hurt so badly you feel you will die—pay close attention. Feeling unspeakable pain may mean you have finally begun to feel clear empathy and resonance with the relentless agonies and indignities faced by people of color. You must walk directly into that pain to fully understand the price Black and brown people have paid for your/our white privilege. If you can’t stand it, don’t stop feeling, find someone who can help you hold it. Do you dare to risk everything to be part of the movement to repair the racial divide that has plagued our country since white people enslaved Black people over 400 years ago literally using their Black bodies to build America?

Isaac and I have established a deep friendship—one that feels more like family. It is a chosen family that I cherish. Within it I have had the opportunity to heal and to grow and to witness my own biases in a way that humbles me. We have chosen to write our story in an upcoming book, Fighting Time. In sharing our story, we hope to inspire people to move into the fear and the pain of systemic racism and to have the conversations that are desperately needed to see and feel one another and to help our society grow beyond our tragically racist roots.

Fighting Time, by Isaac Knapper and Amy Banks, M.D., will be published by Regal House Publishing/Pact Press in 2021.

Amy Banks is the author of The Complete Guide to Mental Health for Women, published by Beacon Press in 2003, and of Four Ways to Click: Rewire Your Brain for Stronger, More Rewarding Relationships, published in 2015 by Penguin. Her second book captures the work she has done over the past fifteen years studying the neuroscience of relationships and how essential supportive connections are to overall health and well-being.

References

Walker, Maureen. When Getting Along is Not Enough: Reconstructing Lives in Our Lives and Relationships. 2019, Teacher’s College Press, New York, NY

Kendi, Ibram X., Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America. 2016, Nation’s Books, New York, NY

This article was first published at Psychology Today

Filed Under: Regal House Titles Tagged With: Amy Banks, Fighting Time, Isaac Knapper, Pact Press, racism

A Conspiracy of Lemurs

May 12, 2020 Leave a Comment

The latest literary intrigue…

Filed Under: A Conspiracy of Lemurs Tagged With: Amy Roost, COVID-19, Joanell Serra, Pact Press, podcast

That’s My Story: William L. Alton

January 9, 2019 Leave a Comment

William L. Alton’s book, The Tragedy of Being Happy, will be released by Pact Press, an imprint of Regal House Publishing, on January 12, 2019.

The Tragedy of Being Happy William L Alton

There’s a fair bit of interest, scientific and otherwise, in the links between creativity and insanity. How crazy must someone be to be a good author?

I find that for me, insanity is the core of my creativity. I have lived with Schizo-Effective Disorder since I was 13. I spent 2 years locked in a maximum security psychiatric hospital until I escaped. Yes, I am literally an escaped lunatic. It took until my early Forties to find the right cocktail of drugs. I still live with some symptoms but have found a balance that works for me. In the beginning, I made up stories to justify my feelings and symptoms. I used them to pass the time. I used them to create worlds in which I was more than the drug addled, angry young man I was. As I got older, writing became the lens through which I interacted with the world. I am always looking at people and situation and asking myself, What if? The balance between madness and functionality is what allows me be both an educator and a writer. I am driven to go out into the world but require a lot of “down” time. As a writer, I find that I need to be open and willing to let go while maintaining the drive and stubbornness and need to sit alone in a room believing that the shit in my head is interesting to more people than me. To me, writing is about moving from survival to thriving.

Who or what inspired you? How so?

William L. Alton, Pact Press author of The Tragedy of Being Happy
William L. Alton

I became a writer because I was a troublemaker. I grew up in Arkansas in the Seventies. Back then, they still had corporal punishment in schools. I was in the office three or four times a week getting paddled. In the third grade, I had a teacher who was a Quaker. Instead of having us paddled when we caused trouble she would assignment poems for us to memorize and recite the next day to class. The first time, I refused. The teacher called my mother. My mother was not a Quaker. She absolutely DID believe in corporal punishment. After that, I memorized the poems and recited them. Because I was a hellion, I memorized a lot of poems that year. Later in life, I became an addict and lived with mental illness. When I sobered up and started my recovery, I had a teacher who introduced me to Shakespeare and Milton and Poe and Hawthorne. As important as that was though, that teacher also gave me the guiding principle of my life. I had done something stupid and was making excuses and he looked at me and said: “Bill, you can be as crazy as you need to be. Don’t be an asshole.” These two teachers are the reason I write. They are the reason I perform. They are the reason I am the person I am today.

What social issue or problem does your work address?

I write about mental illness, poverty, addiction and survival. I write about the hidden things and the hidden people. I write about the monsters in the closet and hopefully, one way of kicking their asses.

What difference do you hope your book will make?

I want people to know that they are not alone. I want them to read my books and maybe see ways to love the unlovable. I want people to see that those of us in the shadows are people too.

William L. Alton, author of Pact Press's The Tragedy of Being Happy

William L. Alton has a BA and MFA in creative writing from Pacific University and has published a collection of flash fiction, Girls, two collections of poetry titled Heroes of Silence and Heart Washes Through, and two novels, Flesh and Bone, in 2015, and Comfortable Madness. He lives in Beaverton, Oregon, where he works with at-risk youth.

Filed Under: Author Interview, That's My Story Tagged With: Pact Press, That's My Story, The Tragedy of Being Happy, William L. Alton

Writing Times with Frances Kai-Hwa Wang

May 12, 2017 Leave a Comment

Pact Press author Frances Kai-Hwa Wang

Most writers have day jobs and frequently have difficulty finding writing time. How do you manage it?

I have four children and nine jobs. I manage it by not sleeping. Ever.

How long have you been writing and do you perceive your writing to have evolved in any particular way that you would like to share?

I have been writing since fifth grade when I wrote a book review of “Old Bones” for Highlights Magazine. I did it for the money, $5. Since then, I have written news, feature articles, reviews, essays, columns, blog posts, prose poetry, and creative nonfiction, primarily for ethnic new media. I have also created multimedia artworks and I have hand sewn chapbooks. I speak often to college students and young professionals about Asian American history and media, challenging them to resistance and action. Regardless of the form, I find that I am always searching for meaning, for truth, for better understanding. My guardian angel once observed, “You’re the sort of person who doesn’t even know what you think until you’ve written it.”

What appealed to you about being a part of the Pact Press Speak and Speak Again anthology?

I love the Southern Poverty Law Center, Teaching Tolerance, and all the great work that they do!

What do you think is the responsibility of the writer in today’s polarized environment?

Make trouble. Move hearts. Incite people to action. #GoodTrouble

 Why do you do write? Why do you do what you do?

I really want to help empower younger Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders so that they do not have to go through the same stuff we did with identity crises, being a minority, always being “the only one.” I would love to spare people (starting with my own children) the angst of wrestling with who they are, what they are, how they fit in, and help them develop a strong sense of identity, culture, and pride. I advocate and speak up for the older generation and more recent immigrants who might not have the education, political awareness, or English skills to fight for their rights and their children’s rights. I talk to the mainstream because I figure that the best way to protect my children from racism and discrimination tomorrow is to educate their peers today.

 

Frances Kai-Hwa Wang is a second-generation Chinese American from California who now divides her time between Michigan and Hawai‘i. She is a contributor and essayist for NBC News Asian America. She has also written for AAPIVoices.com, NewAmericaMedia.org, ChicagoIsTheWorld.org, AnnArbor.com, PacificCitizen.org, InCultureParent.com. She teaches Asian/Pacific Islander American Studies at University of Michigan. She has published three chapbooks of prose poetry, been included in several anthologies and art exhibitions, and created a collaborative multimedia artwork for a Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center.

Frances has three chapbooks available from Blacklava Books

Imaginary Affairs—Postcards from an Imagined Life

Where the Lava Meets the Sea–Asian Pacific American Postcards from Hawai‘i

Dreams of the Diaspora

Connect with Frances:

 Website

TWITTER

FACEBOOK

Filed Under: Pact Press Titles Tagged With: Frances Kai-Hwa Wang, Pact Press, Pact Press Anthologies

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Regal House Publishing is the parent company to the following imprints:

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Pact Press publishing finely crafted anthologies and full-length works that focus upon issues such as diversity, immigration, racism and discrimination.

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