There’s often a disconnect between white people’s anti-racism education and material benefits for Black and Brown communities. 

When white people begin their anti-racism education or activism, they often cause harm by not following Black leadership and trying to find quick fixes. Folks come in eager, earnest and with urgency, but before long they tend to burnout or fade-out.

Burnout results from acting without intention, often seen as white saviorism. 

Who is being centered in the ways that you give? 

White saviorism is a pattern of behavior where people look for a quick-fix. For some, it also comes from a place of superiority and/or a desire to be forgiven.

It’s not bad to want to help, but how you help is more important. 

• Do it without centering yourself, taking credit or making yourself the hero of the story. 

• Do it without reinforcing the trope of Black families and Black children needing rescued. 

• Uplift the work of organizations led by Black MaGes.

This holiday season, you can stand in solidarity by putting joy into the hands of Black mothers and their families - and make it your tradition.

Reparations

Reparations paid in cash, labor and other resources to Black MaGes is essential to the dismantling of white supremacy and other oppressive systems. We build power when Black MaGes and BIPOC folks access resources and healing. To paraphrase the Combahee River Collective Statement, when Black MaGes are free, everybody’s free, because we’re always trying to free everybody. 

While politicians use reparations as a political football, Black organizers have been experimenting with ways to reclaim wealth and resources from white society, and redistribute them where they belong. Broke white people often think they’re exempt from paying their share. That assumption is indisputably wrong, since ALL white folks still benefit from slavery to this day—even when they’re in denial of those benefits. 

“I guarantee if you stop a homeless white guy on the street he’ll tell you about a rich relative he no longer f*cks with. That matters. Your proximity to wealth matters.” @thedididelgado

1. Get your white asses out there and start offering your time and services, because time is money and white folks have more than we do. Get creative.

2. You got any Black friends with kids? Offer them free childcare on the weekends. Set up a playdate. 

3. Are you a graphic designer or have access to a printer? Help your local Black-led racial justice org make logos and print stuff to help cut down on outreach costs. 

4. Got a washing machine? Offer to let Black folks do laundry at your place.

5. Resumé writing or driving lessons.

6. Make a Black person a partial-beneficiary to your pension, life insurance policy, and estate upon death. Contact HR at your job and ask for the form to add a beneficiary. 

7. Add Black folks to existing monthly services, like phone plans and TV subscriptions.

8. Add an additional authorized user to your credit card, to help them establish credit or co-sign cars and apartments that Black folks wouldn’t otherwise have access to. 

9. Frequent Black restaurants without gentrifying them, by ordering take-out and tip Black servers like their life depends on it, because it does 

10. Instead of trading in your used vehicle, give it away to a low-income Black family. We guarantee it’s worth more to them than your dealer will give you for it. Post it for free on Decolonize Abundance or Facebook and Craigslist. 

11. Donate to Rent for Moms and place the agency where it belongs – with the Moms. 

Want to learn even more? Check out this article from DiDi Delgado on how you can work reparations into any budget!

10 Ways To Pay Reparations If You’re a Broke Ass White Person (DiDi Delgado, Medium)