How To Be An Ally If You Are A Person of Privilege
By: Frances E. Kendall, Ph.D. (PDF here)
One way to work for social justice is as an ally. The gay and lesbian community realized ten or fifteen years ago that, without the help of straight allies, gays and lesbians don’t have the clout needed to fight heterosexist and homophobic legislation. Gradually the call for allies has spread to other communities in which discrimination is systemic.
What it means to be an ally varies greatly from person to person. For some, it means building a relationship of love and trust with another; for others, it means intentionally putting one’s self in harm’s way so that another person remains safe. Each type of alliance has its own parameters, responsibilities, and degrees of risk. For example, being an ally to someone who is in a less privileged position than I am requires different work than is necessary if the person has privileges like mine. There are also a variety of styles that an ally can use. Some of us are bold and audacious, others are more reserved. The common bond is that we align ourselves with a person or people in such a way that we “have their backs.”
Those of us who have been granted privileges based purely on who we are when born (as white, as male, as straight, and so forth) often feel that either we want to give our privileges back, which we can’t really do, or we want to use them to improve the experiences of those who don’t have our access to power and resources. One of the most effective ways to use our privilege is to become an ally of those on the other side of the privilege seesaw. This type of alliance requires a great deal of self-examination on our part as well as the willingness to go against the people who share our privilege status and with whom we are expected to group ourselves.
[Note: In the following descriptions of ally behavior, the governmental term “target groups” refers to those who are at greatest risk of being targeted for discrimination, e.g., people of color, women, gays and lesbians, people with disabilities, and so on.]
1. Allies work continuously to develop an understanding of the person and institutional experiences of the person or people with whom they are aligning themselves. If the ally is a member of a privileged group, it is essential that he or she also strives for clarity about the impact of privileges on his or her life.
2. Allies choose to align themselves publicly and privately with members of target groups and respond to their needs. This may mean breaking assumed allegiances with those who have the same privileges as you. It is important not to underestimate the consequences of breaking these agreements and to break them in ways that will be most useful to the person or group with whom you are aligning yourself.
3. Allies believe that it is in their interest to be allies and are able to talk about why this is the case. Talking clearly about having is an important educational tool for others with the same privileges.
4. Allies are committed to the never-ending personal growth required to be genuinely supportive. If both people are without privilege it means coming to grips with the ways that internalized oppression affects you. If you are privileged , uprooting long-held beliefs about the way that the world works will probably be necessary.
5. Allies are able to articulate how various patterns of oppression have served to keep them in privileged positions or to withhold opportunities they might otherwise have. For many of us, this means exploring and owning our dual roles as oppressor and oppressed, as uncomfortable as that might be.
6. Allies expect to make some mistakes but do not use that as an excuse for inaction. As a person with privilege, it is important to study and to talk about how your privilege acts as both a shield and blinders for you. Of necessity, those without privileges in a certain area know more about the specific examples of privilege than those who are privileged.
7. Allies know that those on each side of an alliance hold responsibility for their own changes, whether or not people on the other side choose to respond or to thank them. They are also clear that they are doing this work for themselves, not to “take care of” the other.
8. Allies know that, in the most empowered and genuine ally relationships, the persons of privilege initiate the change toward personal, institutional, and societal justice and equality.
9. Allies promote a sense of inclusiveness and justice in the organization, and hold greater responsibility for seeing changes throughout their conclusions.
10. Allies with privilege are responsible for taking the lead in changing the organization, helping to create an environment that is hospitable for all.
11. Allies are able to laugh at themselves as they make mistakes and at the real, but absurd, systems of supremacy in which we all live. As many oppressed people know, humor is a method of survival. Those with privilege must be very careful not to assume that we can join in the humor of those in a target group with whom we are in alliance.
12. Allies understand that emotional safety is not a realistic expectation if we take our alliance seriously. For those with privilege, the goal is to “become comfortable with the uncomfortable and uncomfortable with the too-comfortable” and to act to alter the too-comfortable.
13. Allies know the consequences of not being clear about the other’s experience. Some of these are:
• Lack of authentic relationships
• Lack of foundation for coalition
For allies with privilege, the consequences of being unclear are even greater. Because our behaviors are rooted in privilege, those who are in our group give greater credence to our actions than they might if we were members of groups without privilege
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