Cornelia Gipson: Unlearning Racism

Cornelia Gipson is trying to understand the hold that whiteness has on white people.

“I grew up black in Mississippi, and from the time I was 4, I knew I was black and what that meant,” she said. “How do white people come to understand they’re white? When did you first realize what it meant to be white?”

Gipson, who now lives and works in Nashville, asked me that question on a Zoom call that she initiated after reading my 2005 book, The Heart of Whiteness: Confronting Race, Racism and White Privilege. My answer: I didn’t think seriously about being white until I was 30. Better late than never.

Gipson didn’t want to lecture me but was looking for honest conversation, which meant not just grilling me but reflecting on herself.

For example, she told me about pursuing a promotion and getting rebuffed by a white colleague. When Gipson pushed back, pointing out her qualifications, the colleague said, “You don’t know your place.”

“I think of it as the night Trump showed up at my house,” Gipson said, when she had to acknowledge how quickly subtle white supremacy can turn blatant.

Part two of that lesson came when she recounted the incident to a white friend who asked, “What do you think she meant by that comment?” Gipson said it was a warning that black people in the company shouldn’t aspire to leadership roles. Put more bluntly: Don’t get uppity. Her white friend’s response: “But Obama is president. Do you really think she meant that?”

Gipson said that at the time of that incident she was well versed in systemic racism and had no illusions about white power. But both interactions surprised her, a reminder that she had learned to ignore racial realities in everyday life for the sake of getting along.

“I’m unlearning internalized racism all the time,” she said. Even at 56, Gipson isn’t done unlearning.

Gipson had questions for me about my book, but I wanted to ask her questions. For example, what did she think of DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) trainings in the corporations where she has worked? Gipson said she was always skeptical about their value, beyond allowing managers to check a box for HR. The trainings often were weighed down with jargon that didn’t speak to people’s struggles, she said. “In one sense, the attack on DEI is absurd since DEI policies and trainings didn’t accomplish all that much.”

The real goal in attacking DEI is to shut down honest education, she said. When Tennessee passed a law that basically prohibited any teaching that made white people feel bad, Gipson wrote in MS magazine, “What’s wrong with the truth? Absolutely nothing if one isn’t encased in fear with blinders to hold onto the........

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