Organizers, marketers, and others often say “we need to get [insert group name here] around the table.”
They assert that they need lawyers, people of color, youth, retirees, Muslims, atheists, farmers, CEOs, midwives, three-toed gnomes, or whatever, and then go off in to recruit that constituency.
Often this is well intentioned. Sometimes it is successful. And indeed, it is an important part of making our community institutions more representative and accountable.
But it isn’t always enough to drag people “to the table.”
Sometimes you have to move the table to them!
It isn’t enough to tell a vulnerable or oppressed community, “come over here,” when “coming over here” means leaving the security of an established community to enter a setting that is unknown and possibly hostile.
This is a common barrier in white anti-racist work. Liberal whites will say, with every good intention, “our door is open, we just don’t understand why they won’t join us.” Of course, there are valid reasons why people of color would be skeptical. Many people of color have seen to many cases where they have been used as props to make white people feel good, where they have been forced to explain issues of diversity of racial justice, or where their experiences of racism have been dismissed.
Even if your group is different, they have a reason to be skeptical.
ICPJ has a lot of table moving ahead of us.
For example, we have had only limited success in our efforts to include the Arab and Muslim communities. There are many reasons for this, one of which is that many Arab and Muslim Americans recognize that in a post 9/11 America, they are vulnerable to political persecution. Arab and Muslim Americans, especially immigrant Arab and Muslim Americans, are often subjected to greater scrutiny, greater mistrust, and greater surveilance.
In this setting, a reasonable coping strategy for them is to keep their heads down, be good citizens, and say out of controversy.
ICPJ isn’t designed to stay out of controversy. So, we’re going to have a harder time recruiting Arabs and Muslims unless we move the table.
One way we’re doing that is with this year’s ICPJ Annual Meeting. We’re featuring a speaker about the Liberty and Justice for All campaign dealing with due process rights for immigrants. This is both a good issue for ICPJ to deal with and it is a way to be in solidarity with vulnerable immigrant communities.
Hopefully it will move us closer to being more welcoming for Arabs, Muslims, or Latin@s. Even if it doesn’t, it’s the right thing to do.
Moving the table is hard work, but it’s better than keeping the table on inhospitable ground.