Witnessing Racial Violence

How people dialogue about social violence, forms of social oppression, and marginalization, is a window into the stories we tell ourselves about our nation. These narratives either help us to face ourselves and bring about change or chain us to the unjust systems and dehumanizing practices of the past.

Healing narratives create a container for our collective understanding and healing by affirming the social causes and the natural reactions of those affected. Dehumanizing and inflaming narratives deny and dismiss the social causes and gaslight those who express their anger, grief, or other feelings that disturb the dominant culture.

The murder of Tyre Nichols, a Black man, by five Black police officers calls for a critical analysis of the dehumanizing narratives.

In specific, these narratives deny and dismiss the role played by America's racial caste system and institutions. They logically conclude that race is not a factor in the murder. They inflame people of color by suggesting that their grief and rage have nothing to do with their racial identity and history. Research published by the American Psychological Association specifically showed that “The denial of structural racism appears to be a big barrier to racial equity because it allows for more victim-blaming explanations of systemic inequality.”

These also include narratives that gaslight people's reactions to racial violence, suggesting that the natural reactions of people of color to murder are either inappropriate or caused by psychological dysfunction. Professor Angelique Davis and Dr. Rose Ernst, defined racial gaslighting as a process that relies on "racial spectacles," as we are all currently witnessing. Their research found that acts of gaslighting "contribute to white supremacy at large."

In essence, narratives of denial, dismissal, and gaslighting function to rewrite the story we tell ourselves in ways that relieve the dominant White culture of responsibility and accountability at the expense of the oppressed subgroup, people of color.

Below is a brief narrative analysis based on the words White people use in talking about the recent murder.

Person 1: “I find the event excruciatingly, heartbreakingly horrific ... whatever the patterns that created this inhumanity.”

Narrative Analysis: The denial and dismissal in this comment enter when they say, “whatever the patterns that created this inhumanity.” That comment specifically omits race and the racial caste system. This kind of response serves to de-center the issue of race, blurring the focus and thus bringing an eraser to the central issue.

Person 2: “Memphis is peacefully protesting (much to the dismay of those who want to see us burn or tear each other apart). We’re here to honor Tyre and create change.”

Narrative Analysis: This case person engages in the gaslighting of people who respond to the murder with anger and outrage by focusing specifically on those who "burn and tear." Instead of affirming the pain and rage people experience, this comment serves to censor and morally police people’s outrage. This not only gaslights people’s reactions but further inflames people.

In fact, when people say, “I can readily see why people would want to tear and burn,” it actually calms the people who are most outraged.

Person 3: “This is a horrific incident, but justice is being served here. It is so unfortunate the evil that fuels these occurrences, but God will always prevail. His death will not be without purpose or meaning and it will spark goodness out of darkness!”

Narrative Analysis: This narrative is a particularly insidious form of gaslighting, suggesting that people should focus on the "goodness," even godliness, that can come out of horrific suffering. When offered only days after the brutal murder, it dismisses the agony people feel, inflames their suffering, and makes it easy to judge forms of feeling and expression that are more connected to the "darkness."

Person 4: “I just don't get that the narrative about black people being injured and killed is the only narrative people will listen to."

Narrative Analysis: This comment denies that race is an essential issue in Tyre's murder. This not only inflames those who are and have been injured by systemic racism but also relieves the law enforcement system from focusing on, in the words of W. E. B. Du Bois, the problem of “the color line.”

Person 5: “You do realize all the officers were black. These were five men on a power trip. Not everything is about race. I'm sick of people fueling the divide when it's about personal responsibility.

Narrative Analysis: This narrative denies and dismisses the issue of race entirely. This is perhaps the most dangerous type of narrative because it not only invalidates the daily experience of people of color but also suggests that there is no reason to respond to the event by addressing systemic racism.

This particular narrative caused the most confusion for my White community. In essence, people are questioning, “How can the murder of a Black man be a racist act when the murderers were five Black police officers? Answering that question is essential to the story we tell ourselves.

A healing narrative must include the fact that racism is mostly systemic—an institutionalized caste system, and the law enforcement system has been a central cog enforcing the caste system in the United States for centuries. Therefore, the story we tell ourselves about the unwarranted and unreasonable violence perpetrated upon a person of color, regardless of the race of the officer, must make clear that such murder is not only the result of one or more officers but a marginalizing and dehumanizing system.

This understanding was echoed by The Center for Police Equity, which said that their “concern has never been with the hearts and minds of individual officers or chiefs.… Any officer working in such a system risks finding themselves engaged in behavior that is racist in nature, even if they do not, personally hold racist beliefs or are themselves, Black."

This understanding of structural racism is also poignantly expressed in the review of James Forman Jr.’s book, The Black Police: Policing Our Own: “African American police officers have to negotiate and reconcile two historically distinct strivings — the strivings to be “blue” and the strivings to be “black” — in one “dark body…. how they perform that negotiation and reconciliation is not simply a matter of individual choice, individual agency, and individual commitment. Structural factors are at play as well.”

In summary, healing racism requires more than identifying "bad" police officers and prosecuting them. It also means bringing awareness to the narratives we carry as a culture, especially those that deny structural racism and gaslight responses to current events.