UER has so far participated in nine White Privilege Conferences (WPC), starting with WPC 4 in 2003.
LG Shanklin Flowers and Dvora Slavin attended WPC 4 to evaluate whether or not it made sense for UER to participate. We decided it did, based on the Conference's goal: "to create an environment where honest dialogue and understanding could occur rather than eliciting guilt and shame. No purpose is served through white folks feeling bad about being white."
These Conferences have met yearly. Each is four days long. UER's goals were to support the above perspective, support the work of the Conference and it's organizers, share what we know about healing the hurts of racism, and experiment and learn how to present our work in a wide world setting.
We brought our first United to End Racism (UER) delegation, nineteen Co-Counselors, to WPC 5 in 2004. The theme was the prison system as a racist institution. We presented five one-and-a-half-hour workshops and one daylong workshop (as well as our daylong workshop for the delegation before the Conference started). Our basic workshops were "Healing the Damage Done by Racism," "The Role of Young People in Ending Racism," "The Role of White People in Ending Racism," and "Healing the Damage Caused By Internalized Racism." We also led a workshop reflecting the theme of the Conference—"Our Experiences in Doing Healing Work within the Prison System."
Our pre-Conference daylong workshop was entitled "The Role of Listening and Emotional Healing in Ending Racism." We also offered daily support groups. Our exhibit table attracted many people and was an additional place for people to learn about UER and be listened to. We played an unexpectedly prominent role in the Shabbat banquet on Friday night. The organizer of the Conference was aware of the unique relationship between Jews and people targeted by racism and the role that anti-Jewish oppression plays in derailing the work of ending racism. He decided to offer a Shabbat dinner and presentation on Friday night. Several of the Jews in our delegation were involved and played a good role.
We influenced other parts of the Conference—the Conference organizing committee, the people of color caucus, the white caucus, and the youth institute. All in all we had a good effect on our first Conference.
WPC 6 in 2005 was once again held at Central College in Iowa. When we showed up at a Conference organizing meeting to help put folders together (we always made it a priority to help with the organizing whenever we could), a cheer went up—"Yay, UER is in the house!"
There were twenty-five folks in our delegation, many of whom had attended WPC 5. There was also more Midwest representation.
We again had our own workshop to get us discharging and well connected. We then worked hard—presenting our daylong workshop and our four basic workshops (see WPC 2004) along with our daily support groups and exhibit table.
The theme of this Conference was women and racism, so we added workshops on "The Intersection of Racism and Sexism," " Women's Issues," and "Race, Gender, and the Economy." We also added a daily fundamentals class for folks who wanted to know more about RC and UER.
Interestingly, the people who had met us at the last Conference showed up again at our workshops. These folks were becoming good listeners and shared these skills with others at the Conference. Folks who were meeting us for the first time often attended more than one of our workshops.
What we had learned from the last Conference showed up in a number of ways. We were much better organized. We could pay better attention to our relationships with the Conference's people of color and white caucus leaders and improve our relationships with them. We were able to develop relationships with Asian, mixed heritage, and LGBTQ constituencies. As a result we were able to positively influence how the Conference thought about these groups.
We again led the Shabbat banquet. Since the Conference took place over Passover, we organized a Seder that created a very Jewish space while at the same time emphasizing everyone's liberation.
Having so many RC leaders from the Midwest made it possible to get a number of Midwesterners involved in RC.
The focus of WPC 7 was on youth. There were sixteen folks in the UER delegation. We presented a daylong pre-Conference workshop and a one-and-a-half-hour conference workshop on this topic, with a great group of young people and young adult leaders participating. We also did two daylong pre-Conference workshops on the "Role of Listening and Emotional Healing in Ending Racism." The first was for folks who had never participated in our workshops. The second was for experienced people, to delve deeper into the process of healing from racism.
We noticed two things in particular at this Conference: (1) several presenters who were not Co-Counselors had started using mini-sessions and paired listening exchanges and referenced our work, and (2) the visible, close, and deep relationships among members of our delegation drew people to our work. Many people commented on how unique and refreshing our tone and connections were.
WPC 8 in 2007 met in Colorado Springs, Colorado (USA). We presented our usual workshops, support groups, and exhibit table. There were twenty RCers in our delegation, a majority of whom came from the Southwest, particularly Colorado. As a result we were better placed to offer RC to local folks after the Conference, and several classes did start up. The new UER folks from Colorado gained confidence in presenting RC as they watched the experienced people teach RC in a wide-world setting.
We found some new slants on our regular work. Our basic workshop, "Healing the Hurts of Racism," emphasized RC as a tool for revolutionary movements and looked at the role our work can play in activism. The workshop on internalized racism included a piece on Latino/as and African Americans and how capitalism pits these two groups against each other. We began to have more impact on thorny issues related to GLBTQ and mixed heritage groups. We also added more RC fundamentals classes during the day, which were quite successful.
The 2008 Conference was held in Massachusetts (USA). The theme was the intersection of race, gender, class, sexual orientation, and other systems of inequality. It was sponsored by the Social Justice Education Program in the School of Education at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Barbara Love (RC International Reference Person for African Heritage People) was a professor in this department and was instrumental in bringing WPC there. She played a big role in shaping the Conference, including a moving and inclusive Shabbat banquet.
We had our largest and most experienced delegation—twenty-six people, mostly from the Massachusetts RC Communities. With this level of experience, we could add new and challenging workshops that looked more directly at activism and current events ("Listening As One Tool for Social Change Activists: Healing from the Effects of Global Capitalism" and "Institutional Racism and Race, Gender and Globalization: Building Alliances Between Women from the Global North and South"). We also added daily listening projects, which were tremendously successful and greatly appreciated by the organizers of the Conference. We continued to be helpful with some tough conflicts around issues of sexual orientation and mixed heritage.
Confusion about anti-Jewish oppression and the Middle East was evident at a talk after the Shabbat banquet. We held a workshop the next day—"The Intersection of Racism and Anti-Semitism," and this clarified both internalized Jewish oppression and the Middle East conflict. Many participants said they were greatly relieved to hear such clarity after being upset by the events of the night before. UER delegates continued to dialogue with others about this issue.
WPC 10 2009 took place in Memphis, Tennessee (USA). We had a record number of workshops. Not only did we present our basic workshops; we also held workshops focused on the South, on education, and on backing black leadership (this was the year a black U.S. president, Barak Obama, was elected). The workshops were called "Southerners Ending Racism: Listening and Emotional Healing as a Tool," "School Leaders as Proponents for Ending Racism: Using the Tools of Listening and Emotional Healing," and "Backing Black Leadership: Using the Tools of Listening and Emotional Healing." We continued our introductory RC classes and our listening projects. We also presented an introductory lecture that was advertised broadly in Memphis, and several people attending the lecture later attended our workshops at the Conference.
We were much better organized around outreach and post-Conference strategies. We set up support groups for monthly conference calls to share highlights and follow-up. Each group had a leader and organizer, and the leaders and organizers set up a quarterly conference call to talk about how their groups were going. This led to more people participating in RC after the Conference. An RC class started in Memphis, and Barbara Love led a weekend workshop there for folks who had been introduced to RC at the Conference.
WPC 11 2010 took place in Wisconsin (USA). For the first time, our UER delegation was almost entirely locally based—in this case, with mostly Wisconsin delegates. Two of the delegates were from Minnesota because the Conference is going to be there next year (where we will again have a locally based delegation).
It was a smaller delegation than in the past. However, we presented all of our basic workshops, conducted our daily support groups, staffed an active exhibit table, and did our listening projects.
WPC 12 2011 took place in Bloomington, Minnesota (USA), just outside Minneapolis. The 12-person delegation was again locally based, although one person came from Wisconsin where WPC was in 2010, and one from Albuquerque, where WPC will be in 2012. An extensive group of over 30 local volunteers added resource and logistical support.
Our daylong institute and 3 workshops emphasized fundamental concepts and their application to ending racism for an audience of anti-racism activists. The all-day institute was entitled "Healing the Hurts Imposed by Racism: Listening as a Vehicle for Change." Our three workshops were: "Healing the Hurts Imposed by Racism: Listening as a Vehicle for Change," "Skillful Listening as a Tool for Effective Anti-Racism Action," and "The Role of Young People in Ending Racism." We offered this last workshop twice, and it featured a panel of two young people and two young adults experienced with RC.
We staffed an active exhibit table, often with three or four people at a time. The table functioned to inform conference participants about our workshops and support groups, to provide information and perspective, and to listen to people on a variety of topics. We also conducted daily listening projects, which had a good effect. One evening after a specific disruptive upset at the conference the conference organizers asked for UER's assistance. One of the things we did was to add an extra listening project, deploying eight sets of listeners. We reported back to the conference organizers on what we had done and learned, and they appreciated our action here. Upon the request of the conference organizers, we also listened to specific individuals at various points during the conference.
Lastly, as in years past, we led support groups for the Conference. We were also able to attend the other caucuses that were offered and played a good role there.