At the beginning of my career, I was laser focused on productivity and lifehacking. The idea that there were all of these routines and strategies we could implement in our lives to get more done, be more efficient, and avoid aspects of the daily grind was appealing to me, just as it was to many others. There's a capitalist critique in there somewhere, but I'll save that for another day. The point was, we were looking for shortcuts.
Looking for shortcuts is of course nothing new. We have entire diet, exercise, and pseudo-health industries built on the idea, and folks continue to bite on the infomercial advertising and unsubstantiated claims. Real change is hard. It takes work, commitment, and most of all, time. The same is true of social justice and anti-racist work.
Following the murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and others, we saw a renewed public outcry. Protesters took to the streets. The airwaves and social media feeds were flooded with frustration, anger, and sadness. They were also flooded with reading and listening lists. Social justice books flew to the top of best seller lists and podcast subscription numbers soared.
The intent was sincere, and the learning definitely began to happen. Perhaps more than at other points in history, white folks expressed an urgent willingness to learn, grow, and change. They wanted to understand systemic racism and system oppression more broadly, and most importantly, they wanted to fix it. The desire to fix a problem, even if it is one that has been clearly stated for over 400 years, is a good one, and should be encouraged.
However, that desire to fix doesn't present any genuine shortcuts. Unpacking and rethinking the entire racist history of this country can't be done overnight. There are no shortcuts when it comes to shifting an entire society. Hacks and shortcuts may sometimes work for those with the privilege, but real social change, starting with the most oppressed, will always take time and hard work.
I believed from the beginning that the measure of hope for this most recent round of protests did not rest in the numbers of protestors or the short-term learning that took place. Certainly not in the immediate future. The real measure of change will be whether the conversations, learning, and challenges are still happening five years from now, ten years from now. Will we still be committed, or will we have moved on to the next social media fad. You can't hack social justice. You have to put in the work.
