Discussions on race are always difficult to have, but they are important for the structure of our country and necessary to improve relationships between communities and institutions. As a white person, I came from a predominantly white community and school and I have always felt slightly uneasy when discussing race. I don’t think I have been left out from these discussions, but I understand that my place is less to speak on these issue, and more to listen to the experiences of BIPOC. I felt that this table talk provided a good space to have these difficult discussion and I was interested to hear from new people from a variety of backgrounds on their experience with race in America. It also made me examine my whiteness and the role that race and privilege has played in my life in my schools, communities, friendships, and achievements thus far. When I listened to other peoples experiences and addressed my own experience with race, it made me more confident to participate in these discussions and continue to work on dismantling racial divides in our country.

In this session of Table Talk, I did not know what to expect. Being a person who is labeled as a BIPOC off of a first glance and in a white dominated space, I did not think the talk would have went as well as it did. Having this talk is not an easy one as it makes people feel uncomfortable and choosy of their words, especially when the people involved come from different walks of life. Where BIPOC may draw some similarities from their experience of facing implicit bias. With that being said, in the breakout rooms, I was partnered with someone of a minority background, and in that I felt comfortable sharing my experiences. Although I had the confidence in sharing that same story with my other peers, I think this moment was very enlightening to all as each and every one of us could learn and grow from these experiences other people may have faced.

The TableTalk: Unpacking Whiteness and White Supremacy helped me understand the complexity of racism and the historical significance of structural racism in the United States. The discussion helped me realize how implicit bias and racism is truly ingrained into every aspect of society including social groups in schools and gentrification. Likewise, from this discussion I was able to better distinguish white imperialism and supremacy. Being an Asian American, the concept of white guilt was always hazy to me and this discussion helped me better grasps the different aspects of the phenomenon . Feeling guilt from witnessing other people from your race being racist was a foreign concept to me until this discussion. As an Asian American, I always felt like Asians were left out of the conversation of racism in American. However, this discussion made me realize how Asian Americans also have implicit bias that contributes to the pandemic that is racism. The discussion helped me realize that as a country, we have a lot more that we have to accomplish socially so that we can dismantle racism. This would involve a tremendous amount of reform in every aspect of America, as racism is structural in society. I think think that it’s important for us to realize that racism can not be dismantled overnight as it has existed as long as our country has existed.

I transferred to my middle school in seventh grade and was immediately faced with the problem of finding my place in one of the established friend circles. I thought I was lucky to find a group within a few weeks and often wondered what life would have been like had I been randomly assigned a different teacher for history class. In hindsight, however, it was not luck that landed me with my friends; rather, the inevitable pull of our backgrounds and our academic goals gave us little other choice. My previous friend groups had been mixed race, and so the stratification between the urban and suburban students and the white students and non-white students was clear to me. There were times when I wished I could make friends from different backgrounds, but stepping outside the lines and illustrating my own interpretation of friendship was never easy. However, I never thought much about why this system existed until the end of high school and the beginning of college, when the lines between friend groups on the basis of their race or neighborhood began to fade, and I never felt comfortable discussing the issue because I did not believe I could consider enough perspectives to fully understand it. The constructive discussions that I had with my peers this week were extremely liberating and enlightening, significantly different from the fearful tension I saw before. I was very impressed by the willingness of everyone to listen to the stories and opinions of others and understand that everyone came to the discussion with different levels of personal experience and therefore a different perspective. It saddened me to learn that my experience of subtle segregation in middle school was not an isolated or singular occurrence. I really appreciated the chance to discuss the topic of whiteness with a few of my peers, since now that the issue has become controversial it is even more important to recognize its continued existence and monumental impact.