I have a confession to make: I am more prejudiced towards people who are different than me than I would like to admit. You might even say that I am inadvertently racist at times. You see, I am inadvertently racist because, in my heart of hearts, I hold many prejudices inside of me towards or against those that are different than me. (Race, class, etc..) Pair my prejudices with my white privilege and I am what the problem is in this country. My privilege and my prejudices allow institutional racism to continue... if I let it, but we'll get there in another article!

I already hear people saying to me: “Brandon, you don’t seem prejudiced? You have black friends, you haven't ____ (cue every defense white people say against the racist accusation), etc…” You see, to me, racism comes in many forms: overt racism and invert racism. Overt racism is displayed outwardly. Invert racism is what we hide away in our hearts… all of our fears and stereotypes of the “others." My guess is that whether you are white, black, Asian, etc... you have certain prejudices. The difference is that since white people hold power in our society and are the majority, it makes this problem even more complicated...

When I became a Christian near my senior year of high school, it changed my perspective on a lot of things. In college, I slowly learned how prejudiced I actually was. I realize that not all of you are Christian, but the point of it is this: I was devastated. For you see, growing up, I prided myself on being the culturally sensitive one of my town and my mostly all-white school. Diversity was 'my thing.' All of those other white people were just ignorant. I was the "good white person." You could say pride comes before the fall, I guess. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

It was not until my sophomore year, through my friendship with a coworker who was black, did I realize how ignorant I was. That, paired with intense discussions of recent events in Ferguson last year, made me realize that institutionalized racism and white privilege existed. With that, I eventually realized that I also held many prejudices that I was both scared and sometimes unwilling to admit.

What could be the reason that us white people can’t see eye to eye with our friends of color on what is going on in our country? To me, although there are many reasons, I believe this one is the biggest factor: although desegregation happened years ago, we are still naturally segregated in America. There are black communities, white communities, Hispanic communities, etc… You don't have to look far to see that we go towards people that look like us!

Not only do we live in different places than the “others,” we also flock towards people like us that are of the same skin color. Looking at the whole picture, we have very few conversations with 'the others' in America. Lack of communication can lead to a breakdown in any situation in life, imagine how worse it gets when that applies to race talks! We are far from a "post-racial" society.

Some may not see anything wrong with befriending and living with people like us. In fact, it is, I'll admit, it is human nature. There are many arguments against this. I will speak from personal experience, but I would like to point out, lack of communication between different groups is many times how all of these stereotypes come about... Anyway, as a Christian, I believe I must stay true to Jesus’ message of loving our neighbor. As much as I sometimes don't like it, I cannot pick who my neighbors are. It's simple: Cross-cultural interactions are a part of the gospel of reconciliation that is required of Christians.

So what am I proposing to fix this communication breakdown? There is no simple answer, but we have to start somewhere. Quite simply, my white brothers and sisters, we need to be more intentional about placing ourselves outside of our white culture. Cross-cultural interaction, or displacement, occurs when we take ourselves out of our majority culture, and place ourselves in the minority culture. We must make more of an effort to talk with the “other” (whoever that is.) The road to racial reconciliation is a long and hard one that many people give up on. I will be honest; I have been hurt so many times trying to be friends with others of different cultures. However, to be blunt, my white brothers and sisters, we need to get over it. With years of mistreatment and racism displayed by white people, of course there might be some distrust at first. We always forget that history plays a part in our daily interactions.

Cross-cultural friendships can be hard, but the amazing thing is that I have learned not only more about what it means to be white and what white culture is, but I have also been able to taste what it looks like to be a minority in a majority culture through these friendships. I say “taste,” because as one of my amazing friends recently reminded me of, I will never be able to fully understand what it means to be black in America. For me, intentionally being around people different than me, I have learned, crazily enough, not everyone experiences what I, as a white male, experience. The moment I heard stories of racism and feeling out of place in the majority culture, it no longer became an intellectual argument, it became deeply personal to me.

This brings me to my final point in this article. We not only need to better communicate with each other and fight against institutional racism because it is the right thing to do, but because we need each other. Although this is a theme I have talked about this whole series, it it worth mentioning again. You see, when we interact with people different than us (culture, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity, etc…) we not only learn about others more, we learn more about who we are. It gives us a fuller picture of what the world looks like. To me, this reality makes it even more personal: God created everyone in his image. I truly believe that. I also believe what the Bible teaches: that every ethnicity and difference in cultures, etc., represents different aspects of God. When I interact with others different than me, I get a fuller picture of what my creator looks like. Indeed, cross-cultural friendships are where I have met God the most.

Before I conclude, you might be wondering at this point why I have not talked more about the fact that we as white people must advocate for racial justice in our system and fight against inequality. Well, yes, that is VERY important. We must all walk the talk. Yet, very often I see my people fight for racial justice on their Facebook posts while never making an effort to hang around someone of a different ethnicity than them. In the following article, I am going to talk more about how we, as white people, can displace ourselves.