Microaggressions

Josh Landy
Can subtle slights cause serious harms?

Ray Briggs
Are microaggressions in the eye of the beholder?

Josh Landy
Or are they a way to keep certain groups in their place?

Ray Briggs
Welcome to Philosophy Talk, the program that questions everything…

Josh Landy
…except your intelligence. I’m Josh Landy.

Ray Briggs
And I’m Ray Briggs. We’re coming to you via the studios of KALW San Francisco

Josh Landy
…continuing conversations that begin at philosophers corner on the Stanford campus where Ray teaches philosophy, and I direct the Philosophy and Literature initiative.

Ray Briggs
Today, we’re thinking about microaggressions.

Josh Landy
Microaggression. So that’s when somebody makes like an offhand remark or some minor action that insults other people because of their their race, gender, sexuality, that kind of thing, right?

Ray Briggs
Right. But they don’t always look like insults. In fact, sometimes the person committing the microaggression thinks they’re paying the other person a compliment.

Josh Landy
Oh, that’s interesting. So how does a compliment end up being a microaggression?

Ray Briggs
Well, like for example, if you tell an Asian American that they have excellent English, or a Black person that they’re extremely articulate, that might sound like a compliment to you, but it’s actually quite demeaning,

Josh Landy
Right. I mean, if someone was born and raised here in the States and grew up speaking English. I mean, that’s obviously a ridiculous compliment. And that’s just ignorance, right. But, but let me press you a little bit. Well, what would be wrong with describing somebody as articulate or well spoken whatever their race? I mean, isn’t that a compliment anyone would like?

Ray Briggs
Well sure, Josh, if someone tells you that you’re articulate, they’re probably not implicitly contrasting you with other Brits. They’re not treating you like some anomaly that needs to be pointed out. Whoo, a surprisingly articulate Englishman.

Josh Landy
Okay, I see your point, right. I totally get it. Sometimes people use those fake compliments that are really insults so that’s not good at all. But, but aren’t they’re also genuine compliments sometimes? I mean, I feel like sometimes people are, are trying to be nice. They don’t intend to demean any group or anything like that. So why would we call that a microaggression rather than just like a compliment that went wrong?

Ray Briggs
Well because when it comes to microaggressions, your intentions are not really what’s important. It’s the impact that really matters.

Josh Landy
Yeah, okay. So I see the point about the impact being the thing that matters, but should we totally sideline intentions? I mean, are we going for example, to condemn people for things they said, even if they didn’t mean anything bad by them because they caused a negative impact?

Ray Briggs
Well, if you cause harm to somebody who’s already marginalized and oppressed, you kind of need to take responsibility for that. You don’t get a pass for being racist, or sexist, or ablest or homophobic just because you weren’t trying to be.

Josh Landy
Oh, I mean, I totally agree that you could intend to do something nice, but mess up and still cause harm. And, and then, yeah, okay, right, responsibility’s going to attach, but doesn’t intention still matter, at least a bit? Like, let’s say I tread on your foot on purpose. In a case like that, clearly, I’m being a jerk, right. But if I accidentally tread your foot, I’m just being a klutz. And that’s at least a little bit less awful, isn’t it?

Ray Briggs
Okay, but what if I’m standing in a certain place because I’m part of a marginalized group? And that makes it really likely that people are going to step on my toes when I stand there? Should I feel better that none of them intended to hurt me? What if it keeps happening over and over again?

Josh Landy
Okay, that’s a really great point. But still, I feel like, isn’t it a little bit different from the case that I had in mind? So I was thinking of just like a one off situation involving a genuine compliment, or at least a genuine attempt to the compliment, rather than a repeated pattern of abuse.

Ray Briggs
Right. But microaggressions are a part of a larger pattern of discrimination. Like people of color being asked where they’re really from, one of many things that makes them feel like if they’re not white, then they don’t belong here.

Josh Landy
Okay, yeah. I mean, I totally see why that would be exhausting and infuriating. And hearing that every single day, that would be the worst. I’d really like to think that we can educate the next generation at least to stop being so crass and thoughtless and hurtful.

Ray Briggs
Yeah, I’d like to think so too, but it’s not just a matter of education. It’s not like people are just unaware of what they’re doing and if they realized they’d stop doing it. Microaggressions serve a function. They reinforce social hierarchies, and they keep marginalized people in their place.

Josh Landy
Hmm, well, gosh, I don’t know if I’d go that far. I mean, they’re definitely harmful. And they’re definitely bound up with systemic injustice. But are they really deliberate weapons?

Well, maybe our guest will be able to convince you. We’re going to be joined by Lauren Freeman from University of Louisville. She’s co-editor of a new book called “Microaggressions and Philosophy” and she’s also writing a book about microaggressions in clinical medicine, so I’m really looking forward to what she has to say.

Me too. I’ve read her stuff and find it absolutely brilliant. But first, we sent our Roving Philosophical Reporter, Shereen Adel, to find out what it feels like for people who experienced microaggressions, and what one organization is doing to help us identify, address and avoid committing them. She files this report.

Shereen Adel
So I have this friend. Her name is Yomna Osman. She’s a curator who lives in Oakland. But originally, she’s from Egypt. And since she moved out here, people can never seem to get her name right.

Yomna Osman
I mean, in California, less than on the East Coast. Either what, or Yoma, or Yona. Or they just can’t say it, and they keep asking me to repeat it over and over again.

Shereen Adel
We’ve thought about it and we’re left wondering, is that a microaggression? So we looked it up. Oxford languages says it’s a statement, action, or incident of indirect, subtle, or unintentional discrimination against members of a marginalized group.

Yomna Osman
So there’s something tiny that might be a mistake, but might not.

Shereen Adel
The name thing kind of does fit. Yomna says, for her, microaggressions are these tiny things that you get used to, but over time, they can cause harm.

Yomna Osman
It’s definitely frustrating. And it immediately makes me feel like I’m out of place. And it becomes really wonderful when I meet people or when I’m in contexts where people don’t stumble on my name.

Shereen Adel
She knows it’s not intentional, and she doesn’t get upset when people get it wrong. But it makes a difference when it doesn’t happen.

Yomna Osman
I think everyone likes to feel seen quickly. And I think feeling different makes that a little bit harder, and forces people to have to explain themselves. And I think microaggressions have a lot to do with that feeling unseen or misunderstood. And feeling like you have to do a lot of translation work for other people.

Shereen Adel
And it can make a big difference when other people help her do that work.

Yomna Osman
It was in a meeting once and someone stopped the meeting to be like, you’re all saying her name wrong, and that felt great. Like I sent her a thank you email, just a note on the side.

Shereen Adel
That action that Yomna’s coworker took, there’s actually an organization that teaches people how to do that: to step in and show support when they notice a microaggression or something worse. It’s called Training Active Bystanders or TAB for short. Here’s training coordinator Beryl Domingo.

Beryl Domingo
Training is really to empower people to assess a situation, to assess what is the action that you need in the situation.

Shereen Adel
Beryl is based in Massachusetts, but the group has been doing the trainings online, all over the country and even in Canada,

Beryl Domingo
We focus on the fact that we probably are harmed some time or another. And immediately that kind of makes the playing field level.

Shereen Adel
I actually went to a training session, but I couldn’t record it out of respect for people’s privacy. They asked us if someone had ever done harm to us, if we’d ever caused someone else harm, and if we’d ever witnessed harm being done to someone else. Even if unintentionally. Everyone raised their hand to every question.

Beryl Domingo
We also really focus on non-violence. The language that we use is not a violent language. For example, it’s about targets and [unintelligible] instead of you know, victims and bullies.

Shereen Adel
It’s not one size fits all. But the training teaches people how to be more alert and aware when harm is happening, so that we can respond when we see it. There are all kinds of things that prevent us from taking action. The TAB trainers call them inhibitors.

Beryl Domingo
Some of them when you are simply not seeing the how, or for example, when we’re feeling fearful of making a fool of ourselves, or might embarrass ourselves. So we might do something wrong. That’s another inhibitor.

Shereen Adel
Beryl herself actually found the group after something happened in her town that disturbed her. There was a couple at the post office who appeared to be from the Middle East, the woman was wearing a hijab.

Beryl Domingo
And one of the customers began to harass this couple by calling them names and basically saying that they probably have a gun. We should be careful, these people are dangerous.

Shereen Adel
The people in line didn’t know what to do.

Beryl Domingo
Basically froze and just stood there letting this happen.

Shereen Adel
Not long after, Beryl heard about the bystander training.

Beryl Domingo
It’s really an empowerment training and the understanding is that people will be more vigilant and willing to step up and intervene.

Shereen Adel
It’s all about learning that no matter how big or small, there’s always something you can do to make someone else feel seen. For Philosophy Talk, I’m Shereen Adel.

Josh Landy
Thank you for that fascinating and inspiring report, Shereen. I’m Josh Landy, and with me is my Stanford colleague Ray Briggs. Today, we’re thinking about microaggressions.

Ray Briggs
We’re joined now by Lauren Freeman. She’s a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Louisville, and co-editor of “Microaggressions, and Philosophy.” Lauren, welcome to Philosophy Talk.

Lauren Freeman
Thanks so much for having me. I’m really excited to be here.

Josh Landy
So Lauren, how did you first get interested in the philosophy of microaggressions? Was there like a real world injustice that caught your attention?

Lauren Freeman
Yeah, so I mean, as a woman growing up in a patriarchal society, throughout my life, I and most of the women around me, have always been told, you know, in response to some form or another that, you know, we’re overreacting, or we’re being overly sensitive, or we’re being too emotional. Or we’re acting like this, because we have our period, or whatever it may be. And for decades, I never really thought too much about it. I mean, I knew that those things were wrong and insulting and harmful, and that they undermined me in a number of ways. But I didn’t really think that there was a name for it. And then about six or seven years ago, I came across the term microaggressions. And it was just, my mind was sort of blown because all of a sudden, I realized that all of those comments that I’ve experienced, and that I’ve noticed around me, are actually an actual phenomenon, with a name that I can point to and recognize. And so I became really curious about it. And I started reading a lot about microaggressions and realizing that, you know, there’s a lot more to be said, and, and I think that’s how I find myself here today.

Ray Briggs
So Lauren, earlier, Josh was kind of skeptical that we could say what a microaggression is without talking about the intentions of the person doing it. What do you think, do intentions matter?

Lauren Freeman
Yeah, I mean, I think that there can be intentional microaggressions. But I think once we start talking about intentional microaggressions, we have a really hard time distinguishing microaggressions from just like outright aggressions. So I think we do want to leave room for the possibility of intentional microaggressions. But I think that for the most part microaggressions are, at least from the perspective of the one committing them, pretty micro. And the intentions, whether they are trying to do it or aware of the fact that they’re doing it is somewhat of a question that I don’t think really matters, I think we really need to guided by the perspective of the one experiencing them.

Josh Landy
That seems exactly right. And I think part of the power of the concept of microaggression is precisely that it captures phenomena where someone really thinks they’re saying something nice and yet they’re causing harm.

Lauren Freeman
Yeah, or they don’t notice all, like it completely flies under the radar, that they could have caused any kind of harm. And I think what’s what I mean, there’s been a lot of pushback, I mean, for many reasons, but one of the pushbacks about microaggressions is just about the the name itself, microaggression. And I think that that is something problematic, because the very term takes the perspective of the one committing the act, because from their perspective, it really is micro. But from the perspective of the person on the receiving end, it really isn’t micro, and it really isn’t micro for lots of different reasons.

Ray Briggs
So why are they called microaggressions?

Lauren Freeman
So, you know, the person who coined the term was a Black Harvard psychologist named Chester Pierce. And it might be, I want to read a passage that he wrote, because I think it’s really helpful in answering that question. He wrote, this is in his coining of the term, he wrote, “Most offensive actions are not gross or crippling.” And excuse the ableism there, that was his, he goes on to say that “they’re subtle and stunning. The enormity of the complications they cause can be appreciated only when one considers that the subtle blows are delivered incessantly.” So I think that if we were to just take an individual microaggression on its own in isolation from everything else, maybe we could call it micro, but that’s not how microaggressions work. And that’s not how I think we should understand them. Microaggressions happen within the larger context of, you know, oppression and overt discrimination. And so again, from the perspective of the person committing them, they might think, you know, why are you being so you know, why are you being so overly sensitive? Why don’t you just grow a spine? But it’s never just that one instance. And that’s why I think they are and can be profoundly harmful.

Josh Landy
You’re listening to Philosophy Talk. Today we’re thinking about microaggressions with Lauren Freeman from the University of Louisville.

Ray Briggs
Have you ever been on the receiving end of an insensitive comment? Do you think microaggressions are just in the eye of the beholder? Or is there an objective way to measure the harm they cause?

Josh Landy
Stereotypes, slights and systems of injustice, along with your comments and questions when Philosophy Talk continues.

Sticks and stones may break my bones but even supposedly nice words can hurt me. I’m Josh Landy and this is Philosophy Talk, the program that questions everything

Ray Briggs
except your intelligence. I’m Ray Briggs, and we’re thinking about microaggressions with Lauren Freeman from the University of Louisville, co-editor of “Microaggressions and Philosophy.”

Josh Landy
We’re back in the studio, but unfortunately, still not able to take your phone calls. So if you’ve got comments or questions, please email them to comments@philosophytalk.org. Or you can comment on our website, where you can also become a subscriber and gain access to our library of more than 500 episodes.

Ray Briggs
So Lauren, when I’m thinking about a microaggression, or whether something is a microaggression, I could look at it from multiple perspectives. Should I be thinking more about the perspective of the perpetrator or of the victim?

Lauren Freeman
Yeah, I mean, I sort of hesitate calling people victims of microaggressions. Because I think that again, sort of points back to this issue of intention. So I like calling them recipients because recipient, like a victim of a crime, you know, you think like somebody intended to commit a certain crime, but I think recipients sort of takes the emphasis away from whether or not the person who committed the microaggression intended to do so or wanted to cause harm. But I think that there’s one other interesting aspect of this that we haven’t really spoken about that I think is really important, especially for alleviating some of the concerns that that you raised at the beginning. And this is I think, like maybe the most interesting part about microaggressions is that, you know, all of the examples that we’ve given, and all of the examples that you gave at the beginning, were interpersonal microaggression. So there was an agent doing something or saying something that was harmful to a recipient. But there’s a whole other group of environmental or what I’ve called institutional microaggressions, where there’s actually no individual agent who’s doing anything, and yet a microaggression has still happened. So one example, so with the University of Louisville, where I work in the psychology department, there’s this long hallway, and in the hallway, there all of these beautiful portraits of all of these recipients of the most prestigious award in psychology that’s given at my university. And all of these recipients are cisgender, able-bodied, heterosexual, older white men. And so imagine what it’s like for a young woman of color, who wants to major in psychology, who walks down the hallway every single day on the way to all of her classes, and she sees all of these exemplars in the field, yet, none of them look like her. None of them share her identity. And so again, nobody’s saying to her, you know, you woman of color, you’re never going to succeed in this field. But there’s a sense in which the environment gives that message that if you want to be like one of these major players in the field, this is what you look like. Another pretty staggering example, if I may, is a lot of hospitals, their scales don’t actually go over 350 pounds. And so if a patient who weighs over 350 pounds has to get weighed, they’re often sent to two places that do have scales that go over that wage. One of them was garbage dumps, and the other, the zoo. Imagine being a patient and being told, you know, we can’t accommodate you here. But if you go to the local zoo, or garbage dump, they can weigh you there. And so you can see how there might not be an- you know, from the perspective of the hospital, this person needs to get weighed, they don’t have a scale, so send them to a place where they do have a scale, they’re not trying to insult them or harm them. But imagine what it feels like to be told those things. So again, there’s no intention in either of those two examples to cause harm, and yet serious harm has been caused in each case.

Ray Briggs
Those are some pretty egregious examples. I do wonder, though, so those sound definitely like cases where the environment is causing a microaggression against a person, but it seems like somebody had to make those design choices, like it does seem like there have got to be individuals or an individual responsible for that microaggression even if they didn’t intend it.

Lauren Freeman
Yeah, I’m not sure that you know, well, with with the people who’ve chosen a, you know, the winner of the award. Sure, you know, 50 years ago, how many women of color were getting PhDs in philosophy? But again, I think that and you know, for the individual who said, you know, we’re gonna cap scales at 350 pounds. Sure, maybe there was an individual or a design team at some point in time. But I think that, you know, we’re not, at least from my perspective, I don’t think I don’t think the right response is, let’s find that individual and blame them, right. The question is, why do we continue this? Why don’t we, you know, nominate people, you know, now, who are women of color and post their, you know, beautiful photographs on the wall? Or why don’t we, you know, make sure that we order special scales in each case, I think that again, the point isn’t to find the individual who may or may not have been responsible for all of these decisions, but to ask ourselves, how can we make good on these things going forward? Again, the focus isn’t the intentions, but rather, it’s on what can we do moving forward to make our environments and our systems more welcoming to people who are not members of the dominant group?

Josh Landy
I really like that way of thinking about it, so instead of focusing on intentions, focus on the impact, and then focus on remedies, focus on making things better. But I had a question about more ambiguous cases, right? I mean, there seems to be a sort of gray area where people are kind of confused. So here’s one example that I came across that Oxford University, at one point circulated a newsletter, you know, asking people to avoid doing certain things or saying certain things and, and one of the things that mentioned was making eye contact. So this newsletter said, look, you know, you- if you’re a professor, for example, you really need to make eye contact with your students. Because if you don’t, that can be a racial microaggression, an instance of everyday racism. And then they had- they were they were basically compelled to retract a few days later, because they’d received very understandable pushback. Because people on the autism spectrum, that would place a really unreasonable burden on them. So what about cases like these where it’s seems it’s like it’s quite hard to adjudicate? What to think about an action or statement? Is it really- is it a microaggression? How do we decide?

Lauren Freeman
Yeah, I think that’s a really good example. And it makes me think of, on my own syllabi, I used to write that, you know, students who need- I don’t like when students use their laptops, but I don’t forbid it because of, you know, learning differences and learning disabilities. And I had written on my syllabus, you know, if you use a laptop, can you please sit at the sides of the classroom to avoid while all the people behind you being distracted by your screen, and a friend of mine whose son needs a computer, you know, this person read it and said, you know, if my son were to see that, that would be so harmful to him, because he would receive that as I’m not welcome to sit wherever I want, I have to sit at the sides of the classroom. So, I mean, I think it is really important to acknowledge that these are really difficult cases. And, you know, for the most part, I think that our policies and our practices need to accommodate and keep in mind, the whole variety of different kinds of people. And so yeah, it might be the case that, you know, racist people don’t make eye contact with Black people. And that’s a real problem. But I think it is also the case that, you know, people who are on the spectrum don’t make eye contact, and that’s you know, again, that they’re not doing something because they hold these views about a certain group. I’m not really answering the question, and I acknowledge that. I think that minimally, we all have to sort of navigate the world thinking like, how can I try my best not to be a jerk? You know, that could be like our guide for what we do and what we think. And we’re gonna have to acknowledge that, I mean, you know, I write about microaggressions, I think about microaggressions. I don’t think we’re ever gonna live in a world where there aren’t microaggressions. Do I think that we should still try to live in that world? Yes. Do I think that well-intending people are going to implement policies that are construed as harmful by certain members of certain groups? Yes. But that’s why I think that, you know, the dialogue that happened at Oxford when that policy was written and then retracted. That’s a really important dialogue. That’s an important dialogue for all people to be made aware of, because I think it makes us see how our well meaning intentions can just misfire.

Josh Landy
You’re listening to Philosophy Talk. Today, we’re thinking about microaggressions with Lauren Freeman from the University of Louisville. And we have an email from Nancy in Altadena, California. Nancy said she was interested in finding examples, but everything she found was too obvious to be interesting. So Lauren, you’ve already mentioned one or two examples, but do you have another example that you think might fall in the category of not very obvious?

Lauren Freeman
Sure, sure, and this is going to be something that I’ve called an institutional microaggression, so often, you see gynecology offices called something like women’s care. And you might think, yeah, you know, women are the people who go to the gynecologist. But it’s also the case that people who are not women who have uteruses and cervixes also go to gynecologists. So transgender people, non-binary people, and they’re not women. And so when they walk into a space that’s called women’s care, and they don’t look like a woman, they don’t identify as a woman. Another one is that a lot of hospital intake forms only have two options for sex or gender, male or female. And lots of people don’t identify as either male or female. And so that’s an institutional microaggression in the sense that it erases all identities that don’t fall squarely into male or female. So those are two less spoken about microaggressions that I hope satisfy your listener.

Ray Briggs
So this actually raises a question for me about how people respond when you point out that they’ve committed a microaggression, or that somebody has committed a microaggression. And how better to respond, how better to like, take other people’s responses. So sometimes you point out this thing about like women’s health, to another person, and they respond by doubling down and explain why there’s no problem with it. How should we take that? Like, how should a person take that?

Lauren Freeman
I mean, yeah, this, you know, you obviously, it’s a difficult situation. On the one hand, you want to point out that somebody has, you know, done something wrong, or in an institutional sense that their, you know, employer is committing a kind of environmental microaggression. But on the other hand, you don’t want them to get so defensive that they stopped listening to you, you know, especially with regards to environmental microaggressions, one way of starting a conversation is to acknowledge that, you know, I know, this isn’t your fault, I know that you didn’t do this yet, you know, if we’re talking to like a doctor in one of these practices, we might say yet, you still you know, work in a place and support a place that is doing something harmful, just by the very nature of the name. So maybe that’s a good, you know, so you can just say like, you know, do you understand how that can be harmful for people who need your care who aren’t women? But you know, can you imagine what it’s like to be somebody who needs to see a gynecologist who isn’t a woman who has to go to a place called women’s care, and be surrounded by a bunch of women when they’re clearly not a woman, and in a gynecologist’s office, I think that, you know, a lot of my work centers around looking at first personal testimonies and narratives. And I think that can be a really helpful way of starting a conversation where you’re not talking about principles you’re talking about, like individuals and harm.

Josh Landy
Okay, so thinking about individuals with testimonies, we’ve got another email from Devon in San Francisco. Devon says, I grew up in Canada, my last name is Strolovitch. Well, he’s given away his identity. While living in France a couple of decades ago, people would often see my last name and ask, is that Russian? When I was feeling charitable, I’d reply, actually, it’s Romanian. But if I was feeling aggressive, so to speak, I’d say no, it’s Canadian. I always assumed Russian was a proxy for Jewish. Was I being oversensitive?

Lauren Freeman
I mean, I really, I really don’t like- so I’m also Canadian. I really don’t like putting the onus on the recipient, to make them question, you know, whether or not we’re being overly sensitive. I sort of always like to go to the default that if you think that you’ve experienced a microaggression, you probably have. If, you know, if you think that you’ve been harmed you most likely have. And it’s this weird sort of, you know, theory of knowledge kind of question like, how do you know that we’ve experienced harm? Well, you know, with regards to physical harm, like that’s the kind of knowledge that like you never doubt like, you stub your toe, you never question, huh, am I in pain right now? Like, of course you are. But I think there aren’t- it’s an analogous case with regards to one’s identity. And it’s really just the system and structure that is, you know, catered toward members of a dominant group. That is what makes you question whether or not you’ve experienced harm. If you’re not a member of that group, you might always question whether or not you’ve really experienced harm. And I think there’s something really important to note there, right, that we aren’t- we can’t always understand things from the position of the dominant members of a society. There’s something really important about recognizing that people who are in marginalized positions have a very different experience and do you experience harm in ways that members of more dominant groups might not recognize as real.

Ray Briggs
So I like the general principle to listen to people in marginalized positions. I’ve noticed that people in similar marginalized positions often disagree with each other. And so it seems impossible to just like, take everything a person in a marginalized position says sort of as gospel, but I take it, that’s not what you’re advising. But I think I want to know, like, what is the the more nuanced version of that thought?

Lauren Freeman
Yeah, so I mean, I think that, you know, the way that we- the context in which we have to understand microaggressions is oppression, like oppression is a complicated set of structural phenomena that immobilize or diminish a certain members of marginalized groups? Um, yeah, and, yeah, it might be the case that in individual instances, members of the same marginalized groups may disagree about whether or not a harm has been caused. But I think there is something really sort of contextualist about it. Right? Um, you know, all- there are patterns of oppression. And, you know, the examples that you gave at the beginning, you know, where are you really from, from a person of color, who is from the United States. You know, that’s something that most people of color in the United States have probably experienced at some point, right? The fact that one person one time might not take offense to that question, you know, maybe they haven’t taken maybe they’re taking offense, because they’ve been asked that question a million times. And it no longer bothers them, because they’re just so annoyed by it. Right? I think there are lots of reasons why in an individual case, one might not take offense. But I think it’s really important to look at patterns and look at patterns of harm. And to default, sort of the majority, like most people do take offense to that. And I think we need to take that seriously.

Josh Landy
Yeah, Lauren, reading your your work, which I thought was brilliant, I started wondering whether maybe you endorse something like a reasonable insider standard, right. So we think about the reasonable person standard, what would a reasonable person think, but you add the kind of very helpful nuance, that the reasonable person we have in mind, is somebody from within the affected group, somebody from a marginalized group who suffers these kinds of offhand comments day in day out. Do you think that’s a, that’s a good standard, this sort of the reasonable insider standard?

Lauren Freeman
So I actually don’t. Here’s why, because our norms of reason, like what is objectively rational, are inherently racialized and gender. So you know, think of tropes about like the angry Black woman, or, you know, women being overly emotional, right, throughout the history of philosophy, norms of rationality have been have been sort of purported to be objective, and everybody is capable of accomplishing them or occupying that position. But in fact, throughout the history of philosophy, you know, anybody who’s not a white man has been excluded from being capable of occupying that position of finality, right? Think of Kant, for example. And so I really worry about norms of reason, just because of the connotations of who throughout history have been considered irrational or overly emotional, where emotional is seem to be contrary to reason. So I wouldn’t worry about that kind of standard.

Josh Landy
You’re listening to Philosophy Talk. Today we’re thinking about microaggressions, with Lauren Freeman from the University of Louisville, co-editor of “Microaggressions and Philosophy.”

Ray Briggs
Whose job is it to prevent microaggressions? Should the marginalized have to educate those with more power? Or do we need to change society as a whole?

Josh Landy
Tackling prejudice one insensitive comment at a time plus commentary from Ian Shoales, the Sixty-Second Philosopher, when Philosophy Talk continues.

How about showing a little respect and calling people by their preferred names? I’m Josh Landy and this is Philosophy Talk, that program that questions everything

Ray Briggs
except your intelligence. I’m Ray Briggs. Our guest is Lauren Freeman from the University of Louisville. And we’re thinking about microaggressions.

Josh Landy
So Lauren, what can we do either as individuals or as a society or both to tackle microaggressions?

Lauren Freeman
Yeah, I know the question is not [unintelligible] for microaggressions I think is such a tricky one. In a sense, we we all collectively create and reinforce the social and political conditions in which microaggressions are occurred. And those background conditions are wildly unjust. So I think that in a kind of forward looking way, I mentioned this earlier, we all have a shared responsibility for creating conditions that repair systems of injustice, even if we aren’t all individually blameworthy, right, even if we didn’t all individually contribute to those systems and structures. So in general, I mean, I think this has become clear in our discussion, I’m sort of less worried about individual responsibility, individual psychology, and sort of diagnosing and trying to uncover the intentions behind a certain outcome. Because intentions are such a nebulous concept, and we’re often unclear of our own intentions, um, a lot of the time. You know, I look, I think a lot about microaggressions in medical contexts. And I think that there’s a, there’s an example within medicine that can demonstrate what I’m talking about. So we can ask ourselves, what are the seemingly small things that we can do to make environments less prone to microaggressions? And so we talked about some of these, like, you know, calling people by their preferred names and pronouns, making sure that all bodies can fit in examination rooms, making sure that forms don’t erase certain identities, making sure that the images in our waiting rooms, you know, are representative of diverse bodies, families and identities. And so we can collectively identify those things. And once we do, I think it’s our responsibility to improve upon them if or when we realize that something is going wrong, and that we can fix it. If we fail to do so, then I think we are, you know, blameworthy. But if, if we all recognize this, I think it’s all of our responsibilities to do what we can to improve upon the situation.

Ray Briggs
So we’ve got an email from Tim in Portland, Oregon who asks, can we think of substance users/abusers as an oppressed group? Largely, these behaviors are thought of as actions of choice, I’m not sure how to think about this. He writes, “my own trials with obesity give me pause. Is it helpful for a coach, therapist or doctor to microaggress in the spirit of the patient’s health?”

Lauren Freeman
Um, I would say absolutely not. First of all, you know, I think it’s pretty widely accepted that addiction is not a matter of individual choice, it’s an illness. And so the question is, would we microaggress somebody with another illness, and, you know, to try to make them better? Of course, we wouldn’t. I don’t think that insulting someone or offending somebody is a way to improve upon their health, I’m much more interested in sort of supporting somebody and recognizing the larger context in which addiction happens, as a way of, you know, helping to improve them. And I think it’s also worth noting that addiction, you know, intersects with, you know, lower socioeconomic class, often with marginalized identities, and it’s important to recognize that, you know, the identities of individuals are complicated. So there are other marginalized identities that might be involved in addiction, but I don’t think it’s ever okay to blame somebody.

Josh Landy
But what about the the other issue from our listener Ray, so you know, when I, when I go and see my, my doctor, you know, the doctor usually has me weigh myself. And sometimes, if I’ve put on a few pounds, the doctor talks about possible downstream consequences of increased weight for, you know, potential pre-diabetes and heart conditions, so I don’t want to reveal too much about my own medical history. Let’s assume for the sake of argument that those things were real, like, let’s assume that my doctors write about that. Is it appropriate for the doctor to say such things to me are inappropriate?

Lauren Freeman
So it’s interesting you say this, because I actually write about fatness and issues of weight on what within the context of microaggressions. And it’s actually a myth that it’s necessarily the case that if you’re fat, you’re unhealthy. And it’s a myth that lots of health care providers, I’d say probably most of them, subscribe to. And it’s really harmful. So people who are fat and I use that term very intentionally, the term overweight and obese are sort of pathologized, medicalized terms. And a lot of people who are fat sort of embrace that identity in the same way that queer people have sort of turned around the word queer and use it in an empowering sense. I think that fat people experience so many microaggressions every single day, all around, that I think I’m hesitant to acknowledge that there are good ways of saying you have to lose weight. Maybe there are, but I worry about a lot about the assumptions between being heavy or fat and necessarily being unhealthy.

Josh Landy
Lauren, you know, reading and thinking about microaggressions, I have found very few cases of pushback that have given me pause. Most of them. I thought, yeah, that doesn’t make sense. You know, everyone surely has to agree that being asked every day, “where are you really from?” is the very least, you know, annoying. But one thing that did give me pause was something I read by John McWhorter. He’s a professor, he’s a person of color, he’s an Obama-voting Democrat. He’s somebody who suffered microaggressions. He’s somebody who recognizes they’re undesirable, but he offers a couple of kinds of pushback, at least, for this sort of strong position, about microaggressions, one of which is, you know, he worries that it might be a kind of strong version of this might threaten the progressive coalition and alienate potential allies. And one example he gives is, you know, he says, look, it’s clearly an aggression for white people to say something negative about race. But it’s a microaggression to say something positive about race and a microaggression to state a kind of neutrality on race, right. So I don’t see race has been cited as an instance of microaggression. And so from McWhorter’s standpoint, he says something like, you know, that particular aspect of the microaggression notion seems fixed so that whites can’t do anything right. And he worries that, you know, if you’re, if they’re in that no-win situation, they’re going to be less motivated, to make certain necessary changes to kind of pull together to change society for the better. So what do you think about that worry about a kind of strong version of the microaggression position?

Lauren Freeman
Yeah, I mean, I think it’s helpful to maybe go back to the mantra of like, just try not to be a jerk. I just worry about, you know, people in positions of power, sort of determining, like, what we’re allowed to say, you know, like, if we think about, you know, medicine and academia, and basically like our society more broadly, I think we do value and champion justice and harm reduction. And if there are people, even if you can’t believe them, but if there are people, all of whom are members of marginalized groups who keep saying these kinds of things are harmful, I mean, I think we need to listen to them. You know, and I think it’s incumbent upon members of more dominant groups, to just sort of like, recognize that we don’t know everything. And there’s a kind of, you know, principle of charity here that that we have to, we can’t just stop listening to that. And I agree, I also worry about sort of this polarizing matter. And I don’t want people sort of all the time walking around on eggshells thinking, like whatever I say, could be construed as harmful. But I don’t think it has to be sort of that all encompassing. I think that, you know, if you’re told that you’d said something harmful, you sort of have to pause and say, oh, did I- well, that’s cocky. Like, how can I do better next time, instead of just like making it all about you and making a huge deal about it. I think these things can be blown out of proportion, and sometimes are. But I also think that it’s incumbent upon people who are not members of marginalized groups to really be guided by people who are.

Josh Landy
That’s really well said. And on that wonderful note, Lauren, I’d like to thank you so much for joining us today.

Lauren Freeman
Thanks so much for having me. This is a lot of fun.

Josh Landy
Our guest has been Lauren Freeman, Professor of Philosophy at the University of Louisville, and co-editor of “Microaggressions and Philosophy.” So Ray, what are you thinking now?

Ray Briggs
I just keep going back to Torrey Peters’ wonderful novel “Detransition, Baby” which is full of lovely little examples of microaggressions. And also full of examples of people being kind of politically litigious in a way that I think Lauren has not been today. And so it’s very nice. But the one I remember from “Detransition, Baby” is the the one where somebody his employer, finds out that he is trans in some way and actually gets it wrong what way he is trans in, previously has just been treating him normally. And after the employer finds out, he just starts asking a bunch of questions about gender neutral bathrooms in a way that is well intentioned, but deeply awkward. And it’s a wonderful funny scene and a wonderful, funny novel. And our conversation reminded me of it.

Josh Landy
Well, I’m clearly going to have to read that and you know, I’m mostly going to follow Lauren’s advice and try to be less of a jerk. I think this is just excellent advice for all of us. We’re gonna put links to everything we’ve mentioned today on our website, philosophytalk.org, where you can also become a subscriber, again access to our library of more than 500 episodes.

Ray Briggs
And if you have a question that wasn’t addressed in today’s show, we’d love to hear from you. Send it to us at comments@philosophytalk.org, and we might feature it on the blog.

Josh Landy
Now a man who covers a macro amount of material in a micro amount of time. It’s Ian Shoales, the Sixty-Second Philosopher.

Ian Shoales
Ian Shoales. I’m not convinced microaggressions are real. Well, they’re real enough but I suspect they’re a subset of macroaggressions, so we had toe stubbings as part of injuries to lower leg. America loves misery indexing, always finding new ways to shame others which America loves doing right now. Being caught out using a microaggression devises new ways to ask for help and brand new techniques of helping which use microaggressions to stop microaggressions. It’s like the massive array of medicines you see on television, big and specific at the same time. For headaches that come from stubbing your toe because of diabetes related clumsiness. The disclaimers come fast and furious. It’s not for toe pain, or a substitute for insulin. Not really for headaches in general but the very specific case that come from diabetes related toe injuries that can be treated with Prolerevax. Ask your doctor about Proleverax. Now microaggression can be a subset of racism and sexism as well as plain old hiding hostility under a bucket, but it’s definitely a subset of the left-handed compliment, subliminal messaging and hypnotic suggestion. Part of its allure is a person microaggressed may not quite get it. You think this makes my legs look skinny? Well, thanks, I guess. In the men’s rights movement, this is called negging and it’s considered a tool of seduction. The microaggressor follows up with phase two. Fun fact, you really don’t sweat much. Thank you. May I have this dance? Well, certainly you suave thang, and next thing you know, sex. I found personally that using drugs and alcohol was so much more dependable, and will lead to sex also to the corollary of mild self loathing. The true goal of microaggressions is the doubting of one’s own worth unless you’re stunted, how can you grow? These are common techniques and brainwashing if you follow the various documentaries about Nexium, you recall the women in that organization went from attending workshops about self empowerment to carving a guy’s initials in their flesh. That guy whose name I will not perpetuate got his techniques of persuasion from hypnotism and the related field called neurolinguistic programming. This also became the basis partly for self improvement techniques employed by Tony Robbins and others made famous at Esalen and move from quasi-mystical full guru Big Sur hot tub human potential movement interactions to workshops, and large windowless meeting rooms in airport hotels and before I know it, paradigm shift. Google, Uber, we work new corporate models. erstwhile employees are now contractors with no benefits, but tons of school spirit. Now NLP was started by two guys, Richard Bandler and John Grinder in 1970s. Of course, they grabbed concepts from psychology, philosophy, history, linguistics, and more to create a therapeutic tool. Practitioners establish rapport with the client consciously and sub using certain techniques to alter a client’s internal representations and responses to the world. Passive aggressive statements are uttered with complete confidence, creating a cognitive dissonance that could make you satisfied and successful. It’s not impossible. In fact, it’s probably already done. The client was often asked to step into the future to see what it was like to have achieved an outcome that actually had not yet been achieved. The two made quite a bit of money before the backlash set in in which was well this is load of hooey more or less it doesn’t work. And then the two had a falling out, each trying to take the NLP brand with them swinging to the back and forth forever not using time honored NLP techniques, apparently to resolve their differences. And finally, they said, Okay, fine, anybody can use it and the term is now not trademarked intellectual property, and is owned by nobody, which is why it’s safe for me to say, I’m the only true practitioner of neurolinguistic programming in California. You seem smarter than I thought. So bring your checkbook tothe Oakland Marriot this weekend. On second thought, let’s make it a Zoom. Pandemic or not in exchange for time, travel and money saved. Please address me as your NLP Master Practitioner. And I’ll say those clothes make you look thin and help you with your diet plan. Also with the backdrop on your Zoom setting, I think it looks nice, not cluttered at all, I can help. A lot of people say you can do better. I gotta go.

Josh Landy
Philosophy Talk is a presentation of KALW local public radio San Francisco and the trustees of Leland Stanford Junior University. Copyright 2021.

Ray Briggs
Our executive producer is Tina Pamintuan.

Josh Landy
The senior producer is Devin Strolovitch. Laura Maguire is our Director of Research. Cindy Prince Baum is our Director of Marketing

Ray Briggs
Thanks also to Merle Kessler and Angela Johnston.

Josh Landy
Support for Philosophy Talk comes from various groups at Stanford University and from the partners at our online community of thinkers.

Ray Briggs
The views expressed or misexpressed on this program do not necessarily represent the opinions of Stanford University or of our other funders,

Josh Landy
not even when they’re true and reasonable. The conversation continues on our website philosophytalk.org where you could become a subscriber and gain access to our library of more than 500 episodes. I’m Josh Landy.

Ray Briggs
And I’m Ray Briggs Thank you for listening.

Josh Landy
And thank you for thinking.

Crash
We’re the only two Black faces surrounded by a sea of overcaffeinated white people patrolled by the trigger happy LAPD. So you tell me, why aren’t we scared?