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Engaging Matters

Doug Borwick on vibrant arts and communities

Justice

June 3, 2020 by Doug Borwick

Black Lives Matter

It’s time (well past time) for old white guys to shut up and to highlight People of Color speaking for themselves about the natural outrage that’s all around us. Each of the following references are a exceprts from gifted writers. (But please read all of each article.)

  • New York Times columnist Charles Blow: The Destructive Power of Despair
    It is exceedingly dangerous to assume that oppression and pain can be inflicted without consequence, to believe that the victim will silently absorb the injury and the wound will fade.

    The protests are . . . about the savagery and carnage that [George Floyd’s] death represents: The nearly unchecked ability of the state to act with impunity in the oppression of black bodies and the taking of black life.

    Our intransigence on the issue of social justice and use of force by the police is making last-straw extremists of members of a generation that feels unheard and disrespected.
  • Orchestral conductor Brandon Keith Brown: Notes on Racism and White Supremacy in Classical Music
    I was enraged when Chicago cops ran up to my car at night and put guns to my head. I’m enraged I’ll never drive in the US for fear of being shot. I’m enraged that my heart jumps wherever I see police worldwide.

    Republicans and overt racist are not the problem. The problem is silently complacent self-proclaimed white liberal allies. They USE liberality as escapism, eschewing reflecting on their racism, while Blacks remain absent from their daily lives, minds and hearts.
  • Nonprofit blogger, Vu Le: Have nonprofit and philanthropy become the “white moderate” that Dr. King warned us about?
    The leaders of color I know, especially Black leaders, are exhausted, driven to burn out and despair, and often it is not because of overt racists and bigots, but by those moderates within our own sector. Often they are our colleagues, our peers, our supporters: board members and executive directors who are most concerned about offending donors or upsetting sponsors.

    Getting on the right path, the path heading away from white moderation and toward true equity and justice, will be hard to do. Let us take inspiration from Ruhel Islam, the owner of Gandhi Mahal, a beloved restaurant in Minneapolis that burned down during the protests. While white moderates lecture against violence and property damage as the right response to the murder of George Floyd and countless other Black people, Mr. Islam said: “Let my building burn, Justice needs to be served, put those officers in jail.“

I believe this is the first post in Engaging Matters’ nine year history that does not attempt to frame itself in the context of community engagement and the arts. This topic is too important to be subsumed in a discussion of community engagement; however, for anyone who truly understands community engagement, the connection is obvious.

Seek justice!

Doug

Image: Created by User:KeithTyler. It is a variant of the clenched fist motif which has been widely used by leftist, workers, and liberationist groups since the nineteenth century. The motif itself is not under copyright. –
Uploaded by User:KeithTyler, who created this image., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1682523

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Comments

  1. Jerry Yoshitomi says

    June 3, 2020 at 9:24 pm

    Thank you Doug!

    It seems that we must ask our Black colleagues to share some benchmarks/metrics that we as a field might strive to meet. Might your blog be a place to start?

  2. Diane Ragsdale says

    June 5, 2020 at 8:16 pm

    Hi Doug, thanks so much for this post (both the spirit of it and the content are moving). I was struck this week by the transparency of how the statement in response to this moment from ArtsEmerson came together. ArtsEmerson is co-led by David Howse and David Dower. If you click on the link below it takes you to the page that describes how the statement came together, with a click through to the statement itself.
    How the statement came together: http://artsemersonblog.org/2020/06/01/how-a-statement-comes-together/. I think the transparency of this page is quite moving and the statement written by Howse is exceptional. Thanks again for your post.

About Doug Borwick

Doug Borwick is a past President of the Board of the Association of Arts Administration Educators and was for nearly 30 years Director of the Arts Management and Not-for-Profit Management Programs at Salem College in Winston-Salem, NC. He is CEO of Outfitters4, Inc., providing management services to nonprofit organizations and ArtsEngaged providing training and consultation to artists and arts organization to help them more effectively engage with their communities. [Read More …]

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About Engaging Matters

The arts began as collective activity around the campfire, expressions of community. In a very real sense, the community owned that expression. Over time, with increasing specialization of labor, the arts– especially Western “high arts”– became … [Read More...]

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Community Engagement: Why and How

Building Communities, Not Audiences: The Future of the Arts in the United States Engage Now! A Guide to Making the Arts Indispensable[Purchase info below] I have to be honest, I haven’t finished it yet because I’m constantly having to digest the ‘YES’ and ‘AMEN’ moments I get from each … [Read More...]

Gard Foundation Calls for Stories

The Robert E. Gard Foundation is dedicated to fostering healthy communities through arts-based development, it is currently seeking stories from communities in which the arts have improved the lives of citizens in remarkable ways. These stories can either be full descriptions (400-900 words) with photos, video, and web links or mini stories (ca. 200 words) […]

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