1,000 Paper Cuts

Good Morning Everyone,

We've made it to the end of another week, and we are ready to usher in spring tomorrow!  This is good news for all those folks ready to open the windows, get outside, and sweep out the cobwebs!  As we touched on yesterday, however, sometimes with the good comes the bad, and the bad I am referring to was an abhorrent national news story yesterday about an act of violence against Asian-American people in an American community.  

I won't go into the details here, but I will say that it is a disturbing trend of violence and hate speech against Asian-Americans around the United States.  Many would attribute this rise in violence to the negative stereotypes perpetuated by some of our leaders during this past year managing the COVID-19 crisis. Not surprisingly, hate speech has unfortunately followed as a result of the tone set by our leadership's inaccurate stereotyping and microaggressions.  

I don't want to focus too much on the specific act that happened yesterday.   What I do want to focus on is how we, here at Crossett Brook, stand strongly in condemnations of racist speech, hate speech, and micro-aggressions against Asian-Americans and any other BIPOC or cultural minorities at school, in our local community, and in our country.  

When you say racist things, make derogatory jokes, or demean someone by using their identity as a negative slur (As an example, "that's so "R" word or that's so gay.")  You are weaponizing those words and using people's identity against them, you are creating unsafe environments in which people that identify as disabled or LGBTQ have to exist in.  It doesn't cut it anymore to say, "oh, I'm just joking," or "we're just joking," or "it's just how we talk to each other."  Your words matter and they have an impact on those you aim them at directly, as well as any people around you.  Even if negative words don't land hard on those around you, they poison the water, so to speak, and help to further inaccurate stereotypes rooted in negativity and intolerance.    

Imagine for a moment, weaponized words said directly to a person, or just generally overheard in a public conversation.  Imagine them like a paper cut.  Paper-cuts hurt, and nobody wants to put up with them.  Now imagine a person hearing words like that multiple times a day, or hundreds of times a week, or thousands of times a year.  You can imagine that that would be unbearable.  This metaphor is not mine.  The description of hate speech and microaggressions being like paper-cuts was something I heard in the video below.  Tiffany Alvoid brings the metaphor to life at the beginning of her TED talk.  (The entire video is about 9:00 minutes long but worth the watch).  

Just in case you don't get a chance to watch the whole thing, I want to mention  Alvoid's suggestions for preventing microaggressions and hate speech.  She suggests that before you speak, you practice PAUSing!  When you pause, THINK about whether what you are about say is helpful, kind, or supportive.  If it is not, you should then FILTER your thoughts and not say that thing.  These are good easy tips for helping our community to be a more inclusive and welcoming place.  

I want to implore you not to contribute papercuts to your fellow school-mates.  You might see your words as a small slip or slight, but they could be the hundredth paper cut of the day to the person they land hard on.  Please be kind!  Don't contribute to the culture of weaponizing words!  Be a force for good!!

Have a great weekend everyone!

Mrs. Hempey