Fragile silence

It’s the day after Waitangi Day, 1978. I report for afternoon duty and join the handover meeting. There are six of us in the room. I am the only nonwhite. The charge nurse’s first words are to me: “Like, I’m not racist, but did you see what those idiots did at Waitangi?” I know where this is headed, but I engage anyway.

“I did. What kind of idiots try to barge through a crowd when they could easily have gone around?

“I meant those Mowree idiots who threw eggs at the GovernorGeneral!”

“Seems tame in comparison to what gets thrown in Ireland.”

“You’re just lucky you lot didn’t get colonised by the Spanish!” “Lucky, like the Irish?” “What do you Mowrees want?” “I can’t speak for anyone else, but what this Ma¯ori wants is to know how my patients are before I start work.”

She stands and leaves the room without completing the handover. I look at my colleagues, who all avoid my gaze and my company for the rest of the shift.

Later that night I ponder the total inappropriateness of the charge nurse and the utter gutlessness of my colleagues. I realise that I had been expected to show more sensitivity to their sensitivity to the ‘r’ word.

‘White fragility’ is a term first coined by Dr Robin DiAngelo to describe the defensive moves that white people make when challenged racially, particularly about ‘white privilege’. These include emotions such as anger, fear, guilt, and behaviours including argumentation, recentering, distancing, silencing. While the average person of colour has spent years developing a thick skin when it comes to systemic racism, the average white person can go through most of their formative years without ever having to think about race. So even just hearing an ‘r’ word can be traumatic and create a negative environment for them.

Recently, a satirical group devised a simple system to help people of colour to foster a nonhostile environment for our fragile white friends and co-workers. Apparently, all we have to do is Stop, Ignore, Listen, Empathise, Never Complain, and Eat.

They only came up with this SILENCE system last year, so it wasn’t around to help me back in 1978. But if it had been, then this is how the handover meeting might have played out.

Charge nurse: “Like, I’m not racist . . . [stop and say nothing] . . . but did you see what those idiots did at Waitangi? [Ignore and say nothing] . . . I meant those Mowree idiots who threw eggs at the Governor-General! [Listen, but say nothing] . . . You’re just lucky you lot didn’t get colonised by the Spanish! [Empathise, either with a nod or a statement of agreement] . . . What do you Mowrees want? [Eat].

Unfortunately, I must interrupt this satirical SILENCE to confirm that not all white people are racist, even though they are all privileged by systemic racism. Oh, the fragility.

"I can’t speak for anyone else, but what this Ma¯ ori wants is to know how my patients are before I start work."