Janet Gets Radicalized

From Free Thinking Through the Fourth Turning with Sasha Stone · 35:12

Show by Sasha Stone

Previously: A Terrifying Night in a Good Liberal Town | A Democrat’s Lonely and Hopeless Thanksgiving | Janet’s No Kings HalloweenIt was Halloween morning in Vista Butte. Another perfect day, of course. Was there ever anything else? A sky so blue it never looked real. A sun so bright it shames you for wasting a minute inside. Janet sometimes wished she could have a real Fall, a creepy Halloween. But in Vista Butte, it’s just another too-hot Saturday.Janet stirred in her bed, feeling bad for wishing for a real autumn. No one was luckier than she was. She knew that. The warm and inviting smell of freshly brewed coffee wafted in from the kitchen where she’d set the brew alarm for 7 am. But she wouldn’t get up just yet. She luxuriated in her sustainably sourced bamboo cotton sheets as her thoughts drifted to her plans for later. She’d been accepted back into the No Kings resistance group. They kicked her out after that embarrassing E-Bike incident. Her friends ghosted her, unfriended her on Facebook even. It was chilling to see just how quickly they could all turn. You think you know people, but they can always surprise you.You know me, Janet would say, you know I’m not a racist! You know that I smile and wave and am friends with many black and brown people. You know I hate Trump and MAGA too. I’m on your side, she pleaded. But it didn’t matter. She was marked, and no one wanted to be anywhere near her online or off. Janet even consulted with a virtual therapist who told her that she needed to own her part in it, to stop denying it, to admit what just being a white woman in America actually meant. What had she done to cause harm? How could she repair the damage?One of the books her therapist suggested she read just happened to be available at one of the free libraries near her street. Someone just gave it away. So Janet took it and went home to look up the reviews.There were others, too, Janet saw on Amazon that her therapist, a non-binary person named Jeba, had recommended she read.Jeba thought Janet might be secretly a racist. That was hard for her to hear. Those kids on the E-Bike were all white. One of them had a stepdad of color, but did that count? She said to the boys, “Go back to where you came from,” but she meant it as their neighborhood. But the story came out as if she said it as an anti-immigrant, a racist.So she thought the little pink book would help her. She spent many hours reading it, taking notes, and saying affirmations out loud. I will not be a racist today. Decentering myself is an act of careBeing uncomfortable does not mean I am being attacked.When in doubt, I can choose to observe, learn, and stay quiet.I am not neutral — my perspective is shaped by whiteness.This was a lot for Janet to take in. She never knew any of this about herself. She just tried to be a good person and save democracy from the fascists. And you know, eke out a little time for a glass of wine now and again? Was that so bad?So she decided to put some of her thoughts about being a secret racist on Facebook and to confess it to all of her friends and say how sorry she was and how hard she’s working now on being an anti-racist. She did the work. She owned it. No more micro-aggressions. For every post on Facebook where she admitted all of the times she was racist in her life without knowing it, she was rewarded with a cascade of likes. They warmed to her, talked to her again, laughed with her, and invited her back into groups where she’d been bounced.Maybe that’s why Jodi Mitchell, not Joni, JODI, called her and invited her to join the latest meet-up. The objective was ICE OUT of Vista Butte, and as long as the migrant refugees were hiding in their homes or wherever they lived — probably the apartments on the north end of town — no one should be enjoying themselves, especially in the 96% white town of Vista Butte. They would protest outside restaurants or house parties - anywhere there was fun and music and celebrating. Janet wouldn’t mind celebrating. It had been a while. She longed for those days of being young and drinking Cold Duck at sunset, something bought with a fake ID. Those old days of Vista Butte before it became, well, what it is now.She loved celebrating Halloween back in the day. But that was before she knew that she was nothing but a micro-aggression delivery device, and now she had to do the work. Her Halloween would be to ensure everyone was miserable until Trump was out of office.There was something disrupting her meditative thoughts and anti-racist aspirations. Was that music? Spanish language? Mexican music? It was too loud this early in Vista Butte. This was a quiet town. The rules were no construction before 8 a.m., but music? No one ever played music except on a Saturday night and then only until 10 pm. Then she remembered her neighbor, a slender middle-aged blonde from Germany, had told her last week that it was finally time to trim the large eucalyptus tree that stretched over both of their…

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