Brene Brown video: Charlotteville

Summary

Ms Brown ‘s video clip begins as a monologue designed for Facebook, detailing her reflections on the Charlotteville massacre and her conception of what white supremacy is, and ends with a dialogue in a question and answer session. She talks about the white supremacy which has not been acknowledged (owned). She emphasises that owning a story, you get to write the ending and if you don’t own the story, the story owns us and that is what is happening with the story of white supremacy.

Owning a collective story involves 3 concepts:

• Privilege, (defined as unearned rights),
• perspective taking – (seeing the world through a unique lens). For most white people, a white judeo-Christian version of the world is touted as the correct and only real version. All other versions are considered not real. Ms Brown contends that by believing other peoples’ stories as they are recounted to you is absolutely necessary if one is trying to see the world through another person’s perspective.
• Power (the ability to effect change). Its converse is powerlessness which she suggests is the “most dangerous state we can ever experience”. She makes a distinction between power (an infinite concept that can be shared) and power over (which is finite and cannot be shared). Having ‘power over’ disempowers others.

She continues her talk with reflections on the term “white supremacy” (the belief that in biological, emotional and cognitive ways, white people are better than black people). White supremacy draws its strength from dehumanising people. By dehumanising people it becomes easier to mistreat them. Ms Brown further suggests that even though no perfect approaches can be made towards rectifying prevalent white privilege, not attempting to address it is in itself a sign of white privilege by being able to walk away from the conversation.

In the question and answer part of her talk, she emphasises that shaming (and by definition dehumanising) someone is never acceptable. Shame is used when accountability is not working and she suggests that accountability should take precedence when dealing with white terrorism rather than shame. In conversations around the topic, creating a safe environment is important as trauma and vulnerability go hand in hand and creating an environment where vulnerability is exposed can lead to trauma. She further states that one of the biggest barriers to acknowledgement of white privilege is shame. Shame ignites two concepts – rationalisation and blame. Political correctness has been used as a weapon of shame as well as a tool for inclusivity. On a positive note, she said that it is not wise to ‘live’ in the conversation of white supremacy because we need joy and belonging in our lives as well. There needs to be some balance and taking care of ourselves. She states that anger is a great catalyst if controlled and used for positive change. She concludes by saying that in our every day lives, become aware and raise consciousness of instances of power, perspective taking, privilege and shame and ask questions.

Psychological concepts discussed

Concept	Discussion
vulnerability	What Ms Brown was trying to avoid when she had a breakdown. Vulnerability and trauma go hand in hand. The requirement to reduce vulnerability is to create a safe environment. Vulnerability is associated with weakness which in turn can be related to the dynamics of power in a relationship
fear	What Ms. Brown had prior to being honest about the cause of her breakdown
Pain & discomfort	What can happen when acknowledging a story in the process of owning it
courage	What is needed to own a story
empathy	Should include believing peoples’ stories – that these stories are an honest and truthful reflection of other peoples’ realities
powerlessness	Creates vulnerability and leads to violence, isolation, self-harm
disempowerment	Created by “power over”
shame	A form of dehumanising. Used when accountability is not working. One of the biggest barriers to acknowledgement of privilege. Shame is not a motivator. It ignites two things – rationalisation and blame.
dehumanisation	What is required to allow white supremacy to occur
Emotional offloading	What dehumanising and shaming are
Container building	Creating a safe environment
Joy, gratitude, love, belonging, purpose	Needed for life and fortification to carry on the conversation
anger	Catalyst for change if used correctly

Related Psychological Concepts

The talk outlines Ms Brown’s story of the acceptance of her definition of white supremacy and thus covers the psychological tools of storytelling and narratives.  In psychological terms, shame is considered a negative emotive reaction to a failure and is related to guilt and embarrassment. Shame has been defined as negatively judging ourselves taking into consideration standards we’ve set ourselves and also the standards other people have set (Lewis, 1971 cited by https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/overcoming-destructive-anger/201704/overcoming-the-paralysis-toxic-shame). Shame presupposes blame in that a shameful person can blame themselves, or other people can place blame on the person to be shamed.

Cognitive dissonance may play a role where contradictory beliefs are held simultaneously (eg. I don’t believe in white supremacy, but I have privileges attached to my being white). Other psychological concepts that are related include:

• Self-perception theory which suggests that attitudes are formed on the basis of behaviour. In other words behaviour will determine a person’s self-reflection on their attitude
• Balance Theory which suggests that people strive to maintain psychological balance through the interaction of both positive and negative positions (I don’t like African Americans, most jazz is played by African Americans, therefore I don’t like jazz)

Reflection

Much of what Ms Brown says makes sense. In fact, it can be seen as ‘common sense’. I was particularly taken with the idea that by dehumanising people, you are giving yourself license to treat them as objects rather than fellow human-beings and I can see that being relevant in many situations in South Africa today. In a riot situation, I can imagine that the police (and the rioters for that matter), do not regard each other as people with families and feelings. The same can be said in a war situation. Dropping bombs on Hamburg or London would have been easier because the perpetrators distanced themselves from the people they were killing and perhaps rationalised their actions as being ‘for the greater good’. Her talk gave me cause to think about my own relationships. I particularly applaud her approach to the concept of “shaming” as being of little benefit.

Letter to Ms Brown

Dear Ms Brown
I feel your talk made a lot of sense as throughout the talk you spoke about concepts (and justified them) which seemed to make sense to me. I feel that by listening to your talk, I have become more aware of my own story and feel I can take control of it. I have clarified in my own mind, the reason why so many atrocities happen in our society. Having said that, I wonder if these attitudes can ever change as they are so ingrained in society (which is why I believe wars continue to crop up around the world – the power struggles you talk about – power over rather than shared power). I fully understand that if everyone, in their own immediate environment, were to recognise the role of vulnerability, shame, dehumanising and power dynamics, the world would be a better place, but I feel that this would be a utopian ideal that cannot in reality occur on a large scale.

Kind regards
Christine Bothma