It was a few days after the insurrection at the US Capitol and my client Susan was loaded for bear (me). She was a client of twenty plus years so she knew exactly where I stood on politics. She fired the first shot over my bow. And then she fired a second and third shot directly at me. Normally, I would have veered off into a conversation about her family or her friends, but this time I drew a line in the sand.
Her radical-right thinking steeped in veiled racism was not happening in my house, not today and for the first ten minutes of the massage we argued—and I mean we argued.
Oh, I forgot to mention that I was PPE-ed up. I had a N95 on, a disposable medical mask over the N95 and a face shield over all the masks.
Guess what I learned?
When your face is covered with two masks and a face shield and you argue with your client while you’re rubbing her back, you get f-ing hot.
Oh. My. God.
My face was on fire which made breathing hard. So, I flipped up my face shield and pushed the half-open window all the way open.
There was more arguing. Sweat rolled down the back of my neck and I couldn’t see out of my fogged-up face shield.
I flung off my fleece. And after a few more minutes of back-and-forth with Susan I realized there were no more clothes that I could take off and no more windows to open so I had to end the conversation or pass out from heat prostration. At that point, Susan said, I guess you don’t want to work on me anymore.
No, I love working on closet racists.
I didn’t say that even though I really disliked her at that moment.
But here’s the thing, though Susan is a closet racist there’s another part of her that’s kind and thoughtful and doesn’t act tribal white.
I don’t understand how the rules work in Susan’s brain. And I’m not sure when I’m going to get tribal-white Susan or nice-person Susan.
Here’s what I actually did say to Susan: We disagree, but I still want to work on you. The second I said that, I was surprised though I shouldn’t have been.
Why was I surprised?
Because after George Floyd I was ready to dump all my racist clients on the spot.
Why I shouldn’t have been surprised was because a few weeks before the fight with Susan I did the opposite of dumping racist clients.
Joe has been a client of mine for about a year-and-a-half and I really like him. One, he’s really nice and, two, he’s super-competent.
Early in his career he was on a Navy nuclear sub. After the Navy he worked as an engineer at a local nuclear power plant. No, I’m not a fan of nuclear power, but if those plants are running I want Joe(s) operating them because I know Joe(s) won’t cause a meltdown.
Joe has been retired for a year. He’s single, never had kids and is 100% devoted to his extended family which includes his sister, a niece (Jill), and her daughter, Joe’s great niece (Ashira).
Joe adores Ashira—so much so that pre-COVID he spent most of his free time at his niece’s house playing with and helping to take care of Ahsira.
The father of Ashira, Darnell, and soon to be husband of Jill, welcomes Joe with open arms into their home. By the way, Joe is white. Jill is white. Darnell is black. And Ashira is biracial.
And that was the third reason why I liked Joe—because he wasn’t a racist. I mean how could he be with a biracial, great- niece? Then came George Floyd and the protests and the riots and from Joe’s lips I heard very subtle racist’s murmurings.
For instance, one time Joe was trying to explain to me that that police don’t racially profile by using himself as an example of never being hassled by the police.
I did mention that Joe is white, right?
Okaaay…maybe that was an isolated incident of seeing the world through white eyes.
But over the next few massage sessions, Joe kept bringing up the George Floyd protests and he kept hyper-focusing on the rioters while never acknowledging that most of the protestors were not rioters. It soon became clear to me that Joe was denying that racism existed and his political leaning provided cover.
Oh, f***, I thought, Joe is a racist, too. Not a card carrying extremist, but a decent person with racial blind spots that keep us stuck in racism and could prevent his niece, Ashira, from ever experiencing racial equality.
What was I going to do with Joe?
My first thought was to let Jill and Darnell take care of massaging the racism out of him. After all, they had to know that Joe had some racism baked in, right? Let them work it out.
But that was not only lazy, it was also in direct opposition to what I promised I would do and that was to NOT sit on my skinny, white ass and do nothing to fight racism.
And here’s the thing, I had an entry point into Joe’s world—my color. And I don’t mean that in “I’m about to infiltrate some secret white club” way. What I mean is that Joe and I share a general experience of being white in the US.
And like Joe I never got stopped by cops unless I did something wrong like drive around with an expired car registration, and no, I never had to get out of the car or put my hands on the dash.
But I also get that just because I don’t experience racial profiling as a white person doesn’t mean that racial profiling is a made up thing.
What’s blocking Joe from seeing that? I don’t know. But I can’t begin to understand his situation by sitting on the sidelines. I can’t let him know that other white people think differently by never taking the time to engage him.
So, the last time Joe went slightly racial on me, I just listened to him. After he was done I said, We have different ways of looking at things and I really enjoy our conversations. Later, when it’s COVID safer, would you want to grab a beer and shoot the breeze?
He said, Sure.
Theresa has been coming to see me every other week for more than 25 years. She’s active in her church community outreach and did many years of volunteer work for Action AIDS. She’s the first person to send me a Christmas card and donates to animal rescues or any charity event I’m involved in at a drop of a hat. Theresa is also a subtle racist.
After George Floyd, she avoided politics and social issues in the massage room. I was happy to follow her lead and I expressed interest in a trip that she took to Europe a while back. So she brought me a 40 lbs box of albums and memorabilia to look through.
I’m not sure yet how we’re going to get from photo albums to her becoming aware of her racists views, but I’m pretty sure that listening and finding mutual interests is a good starting point.
Alright, so I’m crossing some therapist/client ethical boundaries, to engage racist clients. But to me, if I can possibly make a difference with racist thinking, it’s worth it—which brings me back to Susan.
She’s less accessible than Theresa or Joe because her racism seems the most intractable. And to be honest, I don’t hold out much hope for her changing. That said, the easy way out is to call her a lost cause and let her spread her racism. Or I could use my white card to enter her world, where I can shut my mouth and listen. And maybe when she feels like she has talked enough, she just might ask me what I think.
So, next massage I’m going to listen to her. If she’s spewing racist hatred I will push back. But if she’s not, I’m going keep looking for that crack.
What crack?
I’m not sure. Maybe it’s the crack that leads her back to her humanity in the midst of a racist moment. I’m just going to have to figure it out as we go along.
So, that’s what I’m doing in the massage room to fight racism. After George Floyd, I wanted to go ballistic and purge all my racist clients.
But ultimately that didn’t seem like it had the most potential for doing something positive to influence change.
For all I know, engaging racist clients might be a field of land mines. I’ll let you know.
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Dear Mark, Thank You for sharing your experiences honestly on a subject we never talk about (white privilege, because the elephant in the room is always so heavy), & yes i know the elephants in a massage room aren’t EVER as heavy as the ones people of color bear on a daily basis…I guess I just want to say Thank You, & may all your Elephants be manageable Blessings in Disguise to make this world a better place…Simply with your intention, I believe you do make this world a better place…….. Namaste’
Hey Leslie, I wanted to thank you for pointing me in the right direction. We had an email discussion during the protests and I was all about shouting down the hardcore racists, but you were advocating a moderate tack with clients, noting the nuances of racism. Some white clients simply don’t understand that they have white privilege or that they have some racist ways of thinking. And for them I need patience (in addition to good intention:-)