National Board member Karen Hughes shares two resources for engaging and talking with others about reparations.
I facilitate Rep Gen monthly virtual house meetings where the “reparations curious” gather to learn about our “reparations in action” approach and how we all can advance the broader reparations movement. Each meeting ends with calls to action. The first is always keep learning and talk with people in your networks.
For many, including me, the idea of talking with others is anxiety producing. Here is a Conversation Guide and a Racial Wealth Gap Learning Simulation to help you engage, listen and build people power for advancing reparations in your own social networks.
The Reparations Conversation Guide is from the Racial Justice Coalition. Most house meeting participants have heard me say “while only about 30% of white Americans support reparations that’s actually a lot of human beings! It’s a Rep Gen priority to find, engage and activate them.” Personal conversations are the medium and our personal awareness and stories are the key content. I don’t have to be reparations experts to help move the dial. Note: you get to research your own city’s history, harms, policies if you’re not from Asheville, NC.
Kate and Brian King organized the Racial Wealth Gap Learning Simulation I attended in Berkeley in July 2023. As another attendee said: “It was a fantastic experience and so instructive. The simulation really drove home the impact of cumulative policies on the wealth of Black Americans.”
Awareness of structural racism is essential for advancing reparations and this simulation is eye-opening. Several Rep Gen supporters are leading it for groups of 4 to 30+. Meg Bowerman co-leads an education and advocacy network of various churches who met at Kate and Brian’s event. Their goal is to lead Racial Wealth Gap Learning Simulations at 15 congregations in the SF East Bay this spring.
Frances and John Morse co-founded the Racial and Social Justice Committee at Channing House in Palo Alto, CA and have lots of experience organizing racial justice education activities in their senior residential community. In November 2023, they co-facilitated the Racial Wealth Gap Learning Simulation for 30 residents. According to Frances, “It was amazing. We’ve never done a workshop or an event or anything where people stayed all the way to the end – all two hours people were glued to their seats.”
If you might want to facilitate the Racial Wealth Gap Learning Simulation in your community of friends, family, colleagues, neighbors and organizations, both Meg and Frances can help you. Email [email protected] to connect with them.