Trauma Won't Heal If We Won't Listen: Ahmaud Arbery and Our Long History
When a sexual abuse victim gets up the courage to tell what happened to her and she is disbelieved, her trauma is compounded. Her healing is delayed, her pain is multiplied, and she is set way back in her pursuit of recovery and wholeness.
What if the same is true for victims of racial trauma?
What if a major reason—maybe the reason—for pervasive and persistent racial division in our nation is that survivors simply are not believed?
For a country nearing its 250th birthday, we are far more racially divided than we should be. For a nation established on the truth “that all men are created equal” countless among us say equality is not their norm. How is it that 250 years into this experiment we are still a land divided?
In 2020, racial division persists because disbelief persists. Survivors cannot heal because they are not believed.
Hear me out. I realize this does not account for all the racial disunity in our nation. As long as sinful humans populate America there will be myriad reasons for racism. Extremists will remain.
But the large middle—the majority of the bell curve—is populated by people who are not overtly, intentionally racist, but who are also not actively listening, embracing a posture of humility, or taking practical steps toward reconciliation. These are steps that cannot be skipped over if our nation is ever going to experience some measure of domestic tranquility and unity.
The Middle Majority
I’m here in the middle majority too. We’re a population who does not see ourselves as racist at all. We love everyone. We teach our kids that everyone is equal. We would never hurt a fly. We think we’re objective, fair, and balanced.
When racially-motivated crimes first come to light here’s what we usually say first:
That could’ve happened to anyone.
That wasn’t race. That was unlucky/bad timing/an honest mistake.
Why are they pulling the race card?
We have to wait for all the details to come out.
There’s probably a reasonable explanation.
He shouldn’t have fought back.
She shouldn’t have gotten that attitude.
Don’t they know by now that they shouldn’t wear hoods/question the officer/run/go out at night?
I’m not racist. My ancestors were poor too.
This is 2020, racism is over. I’m tired of hearing this.
We’re not racist, we insist over and over. And when I look around in here, I think that’s largely true. The majority middle does not consciously believe we are superior and that those with brown and black skin are inferior. People in here do not endeavor to be racist. We’re not purposing, in a pre-meditated way, to dehumanize others.
But. But, can we pause here? Can we take a deep, collective breath, and courageously take an inward look?
We may not be willfully racist, but are we quick to listen and slow to speak? I think we are far more likely to deflect than to reflect. We are more eager to explain away another’s grief than we are to sit with their story. It is easier for us as to write off racial incidents than it is to look them full-on and admit that maybe, just maybe, we might be part of a cultural ecosystem that allows racial harm at best and creates it at worst.
The reality is that when black and brown Americans voice their trauma, we here in the middle are quicker to dismiss and disbelieve than we are to listen and receive.
Sexual and Racial Trauma Survivors Voice a Similar Cry
When survivors of both sexual trauma and racial trauma share their stories they bear great pain, grief, and shame. Both groups feel like they should’ve done better, somehow avoided what happened to them. Both groups carry fear and brokenness because of the violence inflicted upon them. Both groups wonder if they’re crazy because the cultural narrative does not match their experience. And both groups want others to believe them, to bring about justice, to help them protect others, to move forward healthy and whole.
“Why don’t they believe me?” is the cry of both populations. There is tremendous anguish in the voice of women whose parents, for example, don’t believe they were abused as children. There is tremendous anguish in the voice of black men when their country doesn’t believe they were unjustly slammed on the hood of a car and arrested. There is tremendous anguish in the voice of every mom of color who knows she has to prepare her children for mistreatment but her white peers think she’s paranoid.
“Why don’t they believe me?” is the unified lament of survivors of every kind of trauma.
And why don’t we believe?
It’s just easier not to. It’s easier to claim it’s all in the victim’s head or that they brought it upon themselves, then it is to both examine ourselves or examine the context that allowed the abuse in the first place. Parents whose children were abused on their watch have to ask: How did I let this happen? How did I contribute to the harm inflicted on my child? What guilt do I bear?
In the same way, we who are in the majority middle—if we pause and believe that the racial trauma might actually be real—have to ask: How can this be happening on my watch? How have I contributed to the harm inflicted on my brothers and sisters of color? What guilt do I bear?
Pausing, listening, and believing takes humility, patience, and work. Disbelieving is easier.
But in the face of disbelief, trauma will not only persist, but grow. Survivors deserve better. And if we want to move toward racial reconciliation in our nation, we’ve got to do better.
Real Critical Thinking
This is where the majority middle likely pushes back. Again, I’m there too, in the midst of these conversations. We say: You expect me to believe every story? Just accept them at face value? But what about the liars? There are African Americans who just want to make an excuse. So many “victims” just imagined what happened to them. To believe immediately is foolish and unjust.
But I’m not suggesting we shelve our critical thinking. I’m suggesting the exact opposite. I’m suggesting that we approach survivors’ stories with more objectivity, not less. As it is, our reflex is to write them off, to disbelieve, to wait it out, to assume there’s an unreported reason that will come out soon enough.
When it comes to both sexual assault and racial assault our first thoughts tend to be, Well what was she wearing? Well where was he driving? What’s his/her background? Subconsciously—and often very consciously—we blame the victim before we even hear the whole story. What if we replaced immediate suspicion with immediate compassion?
We must absolutely still do due diligence as we investigate claims and apply justice. A thousand times yes, let’s pursue real truth and real justice.
Truth and justice, though, will be elusive if our initial reflex is to explain away and disbelieve. Our aversion to the hard work and vulnerability and maybe even culpability required by believing survivors is what is actually clouding our judgement. I don’t want us to dismiss critical thinking. I want us to fully embrace it.
A Long History to Overcome
The division we’re experiencing in the United Stated began in 1619—over 400 years ago—when the first chattel slaves were kidnapped and brought to American shores (although trafficked Africans were likely present in the US from the 1520s—500 years ago). The Civil War in the 1860s centered on the slave trade. During reconstruction Jim Crow laws were implemented, enforcing racial segregation and institutionalizing the mistreatment of black Americans for almost another 100 years.
The Civil Rights Movement started in the 1940s and carried on well into the 1960s. It was just in 1965—only 55 years ago—that Alabama State Troopers attacked unarmed black marchers who were making their way from Selma to Montgomery in an effort to help more black Americans register to vote. It was only 52 years ago that Martin Luther King was assassinated. The last reported lynching of an African American at the hands of the KKK was in 1981; I was three years old.
Our history of racial violence is not just long, but also so very recent. How could we not all—both black and white—be deeply marked by this? How could we not?
Let’s be totally vulnerable and honest here. How could you and I not be shaped by the reality that slave owners looked like us and slaves looked like them? How could we all not be shaped by the reality that people with dark skin wore chains, were whipped, were lynched, were sprayed with fire hoses, were sprayed with tear gas, had to be escorted by armed National Guards to finally attend a court-ordered integrated school in Arkansas? These images, this history, is profound and it has shaped all of us.
For us in the majority middle, I think we look at those images and ponder that history and immediately think: Well, that was then. Well that was them. That is horrific, but that’s not me. And we’ve gotten into a deeply ingrained habit of deflecting any responsibility, any role, any culpability. It’s just easier to point fingers, to create distance, to say, That’s not at all me. That’s not anyone I know. That doesn’t even happen anymore.
But friends, this history did not just evaporate. We have to deal with it.
While I think the whole nation would largely agree that progress has been made, our African American brothers and sisters insist that mistreatment is not history. Daily we hear cries that violence has been done, racism is systemic, behaviors and norms and institutions in our country still dehumanize black Americans.
Can we in the majority middle admit that rather than critically thinking these claims through, we more often than not write them off and say racism is dead?
Christians, Let’s Lead the Way
This reflex of disbelief is tragic across the board, but it’s especially repulsive amongst us who claim Christ. You and I were rescued by a Savior who moved toward us. We have a God who pursues the meek, the brokenhearted, the downtrodden, the oppressed. Our God is Creator and he fashioned every skin tone we see. His very image is borne by every black man, woman, and child—if they grieve, we must grieve.
Our scriptures are full of calls to “to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God” (Micah 6:8). We are called to a ministry of reconciliation—not just between man and God, but also between man and man (2 Corinthians 5:18). More than anyone else in the United States, Christians should be leading the way in humility, compassion, truth seeking, and reconciliation. Our God is healer, reconciler, peace-giver and with his Spirit inside of us we can be too.
Please don’t shelve your critical thinking, please take it up. Let’s you and I do the hard work of understanding our nation’s history, which is replete with trafficking and violence against our brothers and sisters of color. Let’s honestly look at life from another’s perspective. What’s it like to work, walk, go to school, and just be a person with black or brown skin? What are black and brown neighborhoods like? Where are they? Why are they where they are? What are the influences that shaped black grandparents and great grandparents, and how do those influences shape black parents right now? What’s it like to be black and look for a job, try to get a loan, or enter a store?
What is the cumulative effect of our history for our minority brothers and sisters? Because it’s not nothing.
Reconciliation is going to take work—on our behalf. But the good news is we serve a reconciliatory God. That’s his heart, and we can and must do this work by his empowering Spirit. We cannot look at survivors with impatience and disbelief and just say C’mon, it’s 2020, let’s move on already. Our lack of engagement and empathy will make the wedge bigger, the divide stronger, the real trauma deeper. If we want peace and harmony, it’s our move. If we want to resemble the God who saved us, we must act.
So how do we do this? How do we replace our reflex of disbelief with genuine, patient evaluation? Here are five ways:
Recognize the Threat - It’s so easy from our largely homogenous neighborhoods and churches and schools to think that the problem is out there. Even if we agree that racial trauma is real and evil we are tempted to think it’s not a problem that we need to solve. While it’s true that we alone cannot solve it— only God can—its existence in our own nation, amongst our people, is a real threat to our humanity. Just as abortion is a threat to our human fabric, so is racism. MLK said so well in his letter from a Birmingham Jail, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.” We may not be the direct victims of racial violence, but we all suffer the consequences when anyone is dehumanized.
Beg God for a Spirit of Humility - As members of the majority culture we are accustomed to determining our own fate, telling our own story, having control of our circumstances. Delving into the stories of our minority brothers and sisters will be uncomfortable. We learned history through a majority lens. The stories of slaves, sharecroppers, African American artists and doctors and mothers, are largely untold. And their stories carry with them a banner of injustice, which we must be willing to hear. What if we committed ourselves to a period of listening—not responding, not explaining away, not saying yeah, but—just absorbing the real life stories of our countrymen?
Study History - As I said above our nation’s history informs the present. What if you and I committed to one year of consuming history from the perspective of African Americans? What if we committed to watching one movie a month, reading one book a month, listening to one podcast a month—some kind of commitment to a routine of ingesting history without talking back? This is real, helpful critical thinking. There are so many incredible resources available now but just two of my favorites in each category are: Movies - Selma and Roots (actually a TV miniseries); Books - The Warmth of Other Suns and Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry (one more: Woke Church by Pastor Eric Mason); Podcasts - 1619 (I know there is controversy surrounding the first episode, but episodes 4 and 5 are so very helpful) and Truth’s Table.
I have also found the Be the Bridge Facebook group to be a wealth of information and help to me. When you join (everyone is welcome) you commit to three months of just reading and listening, no commenting. It’s very eye-opening. The group offers free historical, worldview, and Biblical materials (see Units on the lefthand tabs) to get new members started.
Engage the Present - Racially motivated situations happen everyday. Rather than turning away from them, what if we turned toward them and employed critical thinking? Just in the past two weeks we’ve seen headlines about the murder of Ahmaud Arbery who was running in Georgia and gunned down by two white men, the murder of Breonna Taylor in her own home at the hands of Louisville Police who were after a drug suspect who was already in custody, and the video recorded by a black delivery driver in an upscale neighborhood in Oklahoma City who was held captive by two white residents who demanded to know why he was there and who let him into their gated community. These headlines are not unusual. Let’s commit to going beyond the cable news soundbites and wrestle with why they keep happening.
Remember our Future - Our Creator is also our Savior and Reconciler and one day soon he will be our Restorer too. Because Jesus “reconcile[d] to himself all things…by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross” (Colossians 1:20) we are reconciled to him and to all our brothers and sisters in Christ. When the Apostle John received a vision of heaven he says, “there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb” (Revelation 7:9). God made every person, people group, and skin tone. And we will all be together in heaven. We have unity in our Creator and Savior now, and so we must pursue unity now. At the center of God’s heart is reconciliation, and so it must be at the center of ours as well.
No Shortcuts
As with all kinds of trauma, healing is possible. But survivors must be believed. Their stories must be shared and heard, and their grief validated.
We cannot expect national unity and peace if we skip over national recognition, acceptance, and validation. You and I in the majority middle may not be willfully racist, but we must will ourselves—with God’s help—to be still, to be humble, to listen, and to actively pursue the ministry of reconciliation.
For further listening and reading:
All Things Episode 3: Why Bother with Black History?
Recommitting to the Imago Dei on Dr. King’s Birthday
The Gospel Demands that we be Bridge Crossers
Pursuing Racial Reconciliation in our Living Room
Pursuing Racial Reconciliation in our Living Room—Take Two
Empathy, Hidden Figures, and Philando Castile
Unearthing the Roots of Our Collective Racial History and Identity
Movie Ideas for the Whole Family on this MLK Day
All Things Episode 20: "Go back to where you came from:" a Christian Response