All in all very thought provoking I thought. That is the main reason why I give this 5 stars. When Kendi loops in his own personal history and how his thinking changed from racist to anti-racist behavior it sometimes get muddled. And I will admit that I laughed out loud when he decided that the issue with white people were that they were aliens. Like my God, I would have mocked him too. But all in all this was interesting. I don’t know if I would agree with other concept he has, but for me when writing books like this I determine if the book in question has me step back and take a look at my own thinking. I think one of the chapters that hit me the most is with Kendi describing how he saw other Black people that many in the community would consider [racial slur] and how we sometimes set ourselves apart from each other. And yes when growing up my parents and others had a different sense of their own selves when looking at people like them and then Black people that they consider ‘other’ because of their behavior, speech, etc.
“How to Be an Antiracist” is 18 chapters that get into things such as definition, power, culture, behavior, color, etc. I think the chapter that spoke most to me besides his definition of what is racist and anti-racist was the one on culture (Chapter 7) and gender (Chapter 14). Gender was very interesting to me because he owns that he had homophobic thinking which had to totally turn itself around after he met two African women while at Temple. I loved him linking his upbringing to also the commentary that came about when Alice Walker released “The Color Purple.” I can attest myself that Black men still complain about that book and movie for how it depicts Black men. And he further links it to a lot of social scientists coming out and saying that Black men in America have it worse than Black women. If you ever go on social media you can go and look up “hoteps” and you can see some of that thinking there. Lots of Black men in America are constantly saying that Black women do not have their back, do not do enough to make their men feel like kings, and need to be more subservient. Of course I say [swear word] that. I grew up in that type of household and saw what it cost my mother. I refuse to ever diminish myself for any man, I don’t care what color he is.
Some of my favorite quotes were:
Every time someone racializes behavior—describes something as “Black behavior”—they are expressing a racist idea. To be an antiracist is to recognize there is no such thing as racial behavior. To be an antiracist is to recognize there is no such thing as Black behavior, let alone irresponsible Black behavior. Black behavior is as fictitious as Black genes.
No evidence has ever been produced, for instance, to prove that Black people are louder, angrier, nicer, funnier, lazier, less punctual, more immoral, religious, or dependent; that Asians are more subservient; that Whites are greedier.
All we have are stories of individual behavior. But individual stories are only proof of the behavior of individuals. Just as race doesn’t exist biologically, race doesn’t exist behaviorally.
Ideas not centering White lives are racist. Beleaguered White racists who can’t imagine their lives not being the focus of any movement respond to “Black Lives Matter” with “All Lives Matter.” Embattled police officers who can’t imagine losing their right to racially profile and brutalize respond with “Blue Lives Matter.”
I will say thought that I can see why so many people had issues with the book though. Too many people don’t like thinking that they are racist. I often am shocked at how people get more upset about anyone thinking that then changing their behavior. I often side-eye and stay away from the people who say “I don’t see color.” That’s not a great thing and I wish people would stop saying that like it’s something to strive for. If you don’t see color you are being willfully blind to others around you and what they deal with on a macro and micro level every single day. I also see why some in the Black community would get upset about him calling out how yes in our own community/thinking we can have racist ideology. I really wish someone would do a deep dive looking at how the model minority in this country has led to distrusts between communities of color and even with one community looking down upon each other.
The flow of the book is quite good and he moves from topic to topic quite easily. When the book delves into the personal (his wife’s cancer diagnosis, his mother’s cancer diagnosis, and then his) it really shines. I also loved it when he accounts his thinking while going to school and then through higher education. The aliens one is still making me laugh.
The book ends somewhat on a bleak note with Kendi noting that nothing he sees today shows that the world and the U.S. is ready to move to be more anti-racist. But he still has hope and wants to keep fighting.