The Whiteness Project Analysis

This I Believe – The Whiteness Project

For this assignment I chose to reflect on the interview from “The Whiteness Project” by a 17 year-old girl named Leilani whose interview is titled “Stop talking about racism, just stop.” I chose to write about what she said because it really does reflect almost exactly what I feel about the topic of racism and “Whiteness” and everything related to the topic. In her interview, Leilani talks about how she feels that if people would just stop talking about race and making it such a big issue, then it would become less of a big issue and essentially less problems would arise from it. Although I am aware that race issues are real and that in the past they have had some very serious consequences, I have to admit that I agree that we, as a culture in the U.S., may have swung to the other side of the scale to
What’s it mean to be white?” Dr. Robin DiAngelo expresses how a lot of her white students feel that race doesn’t matter to them and it’s not really an issue in their life. Her argument is that white people often don’t realize the special treatment that they get, and that being aware of what it means to be white can help us to actually become more culturally competent. I agree with her in light of the fact that in some areas U.S. culture is, unfortunately, still quite affected by race and color; and if we are in denial of that fact it’s not going to help us to grow. However, I don’t agree that she can say that it isn’t true that across the board, students don’t really care about race. I feel that with this assumption, she is failing to take each person and their personal experiences into consideration, and also she is comparing young people today to an older, more stagnated concept of society at large. There is something to be said about the new generation potentially being more culturally open and more accepting; I think this depends on what they are