Quiet Defiance: The Power of Introverted Protest
Memorial Day is right around the corner. It’s a holiday rooted in reflection and remembrance. Though, most sales ads declare it a celebration of inflatable pools that’ll be slime green by mid-June and all 👏 things 👏 barbecue 👏 flavored.
Maybe it’s because I’m a June baby or because I like gardening, but I’m more reflective at this time of year than at times like New Years anyway. I walk through the gardens and see what has pulled through the harsh winter, what’s struggling, what’s trying its damnedest to thrive no matter the conditions. (Want a lesson in tenacity? Talk to a violet. Those bad bitches will grow anywhere and look so adorable while doing it that you won’t have the heart to yank ‘em out.)
My brain can’t help but search for metaphors and deeper meaning in this shit. I’m like a smart-assed Robert Frost.
I don’t need to tell you this year has been a year. It’s like saying the sky is blue or cilantro is disgusting. It’s obvious to everyone! (Cilantro tastes exactly like the noxious gas cloud of cumber melon body spray that karate chopped you in the throat every time you walked into a junior high girls bathroom in 1998. Fight me.)
This year is different. I’m not waxing poetic about time and meaning while singing a dramatic refrain of “Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes” in my head as I normally would. (Well, I mean, now I am.)
Instead, I’m thinking a lot about what we’ve lost. Who we’ve lost. And as we approach Memorial Day weekend, I’m thinking about George Floyd. He was killed one year ago over the holiday weekend.
ONE YEAR.
One year of held breaths. One year of hard truths. One year of tipping points. One year with innumerable ramifications.
When I try to take in the scope of it, I land on one question. I’m not a spiritual person, but I can’t help but feel like we’re all being asked, “Do you give a damn?” I don’t really care where the question is coming from. I only care what the answer is.
Last week, I wrote about being in and getting out of the state of Languishing—or The Suck as I call it. I mentioned how an email from the brilliant Jeri Bingham helped pull me out of it. Jeri asked if I’d come on her podcast, Hush Loudly, to discuss how introverts protest (specifics on that podcast episode soon). It’s a topic I’m so grateful she’s exploring because it’s not talked about enough.
The term “activist” calls up images of bullhorns and rallies. Large crowds and lots of stimuli—the thought of which can make an introvert want to transform into a sofa cushion and silence their phone for life. The idea elicits a special feeling of “nope!” that's served up with an exquisite, locally-sourced guilt sorbet.
It sounds like this: If I’m not out there protesting like that, then I’m not really making a difference.
I had the same taste in my mouth during the #MeToo women’s marches and the Occupy sit-ins. I was there in spirit, but I couldn’t bring myself to be there to perform live (I like to make all my public appearances sound like I’m gonna roll up in a limo, shielding my eyes from the paparazzi flashes. Going to the grocery store with me is a fun time.).
So I did what I thought were “second best” options. I wrote. I had deep conversations on hard topics with people who shared my ideas—and those who didn’t. I read. I listened. I empathized. And where I couldn’t empathize because I couldn’t truly understand the oppression within another person’s lived experience, I tried my damnedest to sympathize.
Yet, what one year of lockdowns, and public closings, and social distancing has shown is that these acts of protest were never second best.
YOU DON’T HAVE TO SHOUT TO BE POWERFUL.
It’s not that introverts don’t protest. It’s that our protest looks different.
During the podcast episode, Jeri speaks of her friend, Collette. Collette is a higher ed professional and an artist who created a portrait of George Floyd. She did it to help herself process his death, but it ended up moving others as well. Her art, then, became a form of protest.
Paintings can be protest. Writing can be protest. Quiet conversations can be protest.
Sometimes we do these things for ourselves first. Then, when we realize we’re not alone in our experiences and we turn those things out to the world, they take on new meaning.
Many of the most powerful voices to be amplified throughout this year belong to introverts. In How to Be an Antiracist, a best-selling book that addresses racism in America, author Ibram X. Kendi talks about his experiences as a quiet Black kid. He went on to become a professor and a writer, perfect choices for a quiet, courageous contemplator. Dr. Kendi has a critical message, and he uses his introverted strengths to convey that message.
Ijoema Oluo is the author of another best-seller, So You Want to Talk About Race. (She’s also the creator of eye makeup tutorials that I’m OBSESSED with.) She confirmed that she’s an introvert—a bold one—in her latest book Mediocre: The Dangerous Legacy of White Male America.
“My education has served me well in this career, even if it was not what I originally imagined for myself. It also, like a job as an analyst likely would have, fits my introverted yet very opinionated personality. I spend a lot of time observing, thinking, commenting. I do not have to compromise my principles or soften my message to make friends or keep a job.”
Oluo’s incisive mind and strong narrative voice that hits at the heart of any point she’s making make her an incredible writer. Her proclivity for active listening and her hunger to learn and teach make her commentary even more powerful. These are the kinds of needed gifts that introverts have to offer.
Both of these authors have prompted me to reflect on my own biases and the places where racist ideas and policies have shaped my worldview. They did so in a way that made me want to go to work in difficult places within myself—all without ever compromising or diluting their message.
THAT is the power of a bold introvert who has found their voice and decided to use it on their own terms. Quiet powerhouses who demand the best of others because they’ve mined the best in themselves. In other words, heroes.
As an introvert and a white person, I’m sometimes hesitant to speak on difficult topics like this. I don’t want to fall into a trap of virtue signaling, or worse, say something from a place of ignorance and privilege that is harmful to the cause. Usually, I defer to people with much greater knowledge on the subject than I have. (Seriously, go read Kendi and Oluo if you haven’t already.) The problem with that reticence, however, is that this is a conversation we all need to be having.
This is the reason I was excited to talk about activism with Jeri on her podcast.
The burden of righting the wrongs of racism in America should not and cannot rest on the shoulders of its BIPOC citizens. The truth is, I will never know the fear or the rage or the sheer amount of courage needed to get through the damned day that Black folks do. I don’t have that burden. And just because I have other burdens, doesn’t negate my responsibility to shoulder some of this. It’s the only way forward.
It’s important for me and other white folks to “pass the mic”—to use our privilege to magnify marginalized voices in all places where decisions are being made. But it’s also important for us to be a part of the conversation.
IT CAN BE A CHALLENGE TO NAVIGATE THE SPACE BETWEEN STAND UP AND SHUT UP, BUT IT’S A CHALLENGE WE MUST RISE TO.
If you are a white introvert, let me assure you, you. will. fuck. it. up.
I, like Oluo, have an “introverted yet very opinionated personality.” (And water is wet. Who knew?) Sometimes I fuck it up, royally. I have fucked it up so many times. I will continue to fuck it up. It feels terrible. It’s embarrassing. I sometimes feel the urge to get defensive.
All of that will happen and all of that is okay so long as you don’t allow it to prevent you from trying again.
We’re learning and learning involves getting it wrong sometimes. Contrary to the cultural belief that seems to require that people have an authoritative opinion on everydamnthing regardless of their level of knowledge (Again, see Ijoema Oluo’s books.), it is okay to be wrong. Of course, it doesn’t feel awesome, but that discomfort is the catalyst for breaking through our racist thoughts—so we can then break through our racist policies and choose a better way.
OUR DISCOMFORT IS A REQUIREMENT FOR CHANGE.
I’d love to hear from you. What is your experience with activism and protest as an introvert? How have you used your gifts to make a stand? (Or where do you wish you would have but didn’t? Those can be equally powerful moments of learning and understanding.) Let me know. Let’s all be a part of this conversation.