Chris Matthews, Obama and fault lines

Dear Chris,

Initially, so many people weighed in after your State of the Union remarks, the ones in which you said you actually forgot our first black president was black, that I thought there wasn't much for me to add to the conversation. But then I had an experience recently that made me realize that while a lot of people are talking about you, it doesn't sound like too many people are talking with you.
So, first let me tell you that I think one of the saddest things you said during your exuberantly rambling discourse was 'Maybe I shouldn't be talking about this, but I am.'

You took a risk. I'm not sure you would argue that it personally paid off, but it did get people talking.

So many people of good will are worried about making mistakes that often we just don't say anything in public, ceding the public discourse to those who sometimes have a less inclusive agenda, and preferring to let lose in private where we don't have the opportunity to get another point of view that could actually push our thinking forward.

The fact is, our increasingly complex diversity means we all will make mistakes.
But the answer shouldn't be to remain silent. Instead of being paralyzed by the specter of making a mistake, we need to get to the point where it's not the mistakes we make, but what we do with those mistakes that matters.
That brings me to my recent experience, where I made a mistake of my own.
It was at a diversity workshop where I was introducing our Fault Lines framework to a group of university professors. I thought it was going quite well, until someone pulled me aside to tell me our diversity framework didn't sit well with some of his gay and lesbian colleagues. Turns out that in their opinion I had conflated gender and sexual orientation. That certainly wasn't my intent. Our 'Fault Lines' framework is intended to give everyone the dignity of who they are as they are. Fault Lines also teaches that each of us also views the world from the prism of our experience, so it's entirely possible that this framework I have helped develop treats heterosexuality as the norm.

The person who pulled me aside was a straight white male, but he assured me the colleagues in question would bring it up. I waited, eagerly would be too strong a word, because who is ever eager to be publicly criticized. Anxious might be a better description, in both senses of the word. I was worried about being criticized and excited about learning something new that could help strengthen our program.

In the end, nobody brought it up, so I didn't get a chance to fully understand their point of view, but it's certainly something I've been thinking about since.
Chris, that's what I'm hoping you'll do, though I want to be clear that however misguided your thoughts were, you probably spoke for many other white people who were having similar thoughts.

Having said that, I have to admit, I was a bit taken aback by your remarks, though to say I was shocked would be a lie. I've heard that kind of thing my whole life, both about me or any other person of color the white speaker happened to find 'normal.'

Because that's really what you're saying, isn't it? That you don't think of the black person in question as black because far from fitting the stereotypes of a criminal, welfare recipient or some other pathological creature sitting at the margins of society, they could be just like you - except for their race. So, in an unconscious desire to avoid the cognitive dissonance of looking at a black person with whom you identify, you literally opt to white wash the experience.

There's a term for this, it's a form of white privilege, and you might want to think about the role it plays in your life and in your thinking as you talk about race on national television.

Again, I want to be clear that I'm not saying you shouldn't talk about race, or even that you shouldn't risk saying something else that will once again provoke conversation.

We have no chance of getting to that 'post-racial' place you talk about unless we are open and honest about how race shapes the way we think about each other. So, no, I'm not asking you not to talk about it, I'm asking you to think about why it is you forgot Obama was black and what that means about how you think about the majority of black people you walk past everyday.

Chris, I know we've only touched on the tip of the iceberg. Call me if you want to talk some more.

Best,

Dori J. Maynard