My foot tapped nervously as the nominees were read for LinkedIn’s 2017 sales kick-off leadership award. My fiancee, Ty, was nice enough to hold my sweaty hand as videos from family, friends, and co-workers recognized our contributions over the years. I felt honored to be considered along with other colleagues who make fast, high-quality decisions.
When the presenters announced that I was the award recipient, I walked up to the stage in front of 2,500 people, told myself to take a deep breath, then grabbed the mic.
Ultimately, I thanked my team, Migos, my family, then all the close friends who supported my personal and professional development up until that point. Everything was smooth up until the conclusion of my speech, which caused a few murmurs and stirs in the crowd. I ended saying:
I knew I was going to receive mixed feedback. Most people, white and non-white, approached to congratulate me and agreed with my comments about white male patriarchy. But I also received stern, cold, and confused expressions.
Bell hooks, feminist, and social activists all define white male patriarchy as the prevailing political and economic hierarchy of power.
As a concept, white patriarchy does not refer to a specific person or group of people. In other words, no one person can represent white patriarchy. However, a person can support, uphold, and or perpetuate white patriarchy. The amplifier can be of any race, sex, nationality, class, religion, or sexuality. It is a question of values and privilege rather than personal identity.
So yes, a white male can be a supporter of imperialist white supremacist capitalist patriarchy, but so can a working-class African American woman or a middle-class Hispanic gay man. Stacey Dash is a perfect example. In a recent interview, she claimed: “there shouldn’t be a Black History Month because there is no White History month.” #byefelicia
Like most black people, I juggle with the ever-surfacing sentiments on the generational effects of slavery, segregation, redlining and other attempts to degrade and dehumanize people of color. This juggling act, which some call "code switching" is not easy, and, if anything, speaks to the systems in place that people of color continue to combat today.
If you’ve ever seen Selma, Birth of A Nation, or Ava Duvernay’s latest Oscar-nominated documentary,13th, you were able to put an image to the brutality and reckless disregard you read about. There are brutal and honest, and, what people don't understand, is that these films are based on the past and current events.
People often argue whether it was worse in the past or not, but I think it all is bad.
I mean, during the worst years of the lynch mob, during Jim Crow, 161 Black Americans were lynched. More than a century later, in 2015, 258 Black people were killed by US police (U.S. Dept. of Justice). And according to the Department of Justice, today’s incarceration rates disproportionately impact men of color. One out three 3 black men and one out of six latino men can expect to be imprisoned (Equal Justice Initiative).
So who's to say our problems are in the past.
So when I talk about white male patriarchy, it refers to the system that was put in place due to the previous agenda of keeping non-whites outside of the fold, as well as forcing people of color to live on the margins. What's crazy is that many of the lawmakers and politicians are still in their respective seat/office today.
It's this framework that keeps people of color outside the corporate boardrooms and executive positions because “that’s just the way it was.” Now I’m told that people of color are absent from tech and corporate America because there is a “lack of talent” in communities of color. My mom knew the preceding reason was bullshit and so is the latter.
There are black inclusion groups at LinkedIn and other employee resources groups all throughout tech that mentors young people of color frequently.
Last week LinkedIn hosted a VC'ed town hall to discuss the recently challenged immigration executive order and we heard first hand about the new harsh realities from the people we care and work closely with. The were distraught and spoke on being disconnected from loved ones and fearing what's to come from a xenophobic regime.
It should not take seeing an employee suffer to really rethink your position on an issue, but that's where society is, we're all human beings.
When will we see the participants of the Women’s March show up for Black Lives Matter or movements?
The fact of the matter is I don't need my white male co-workers to acknowledge that white patriarchy exist. I can look in the eyes of the minorities in the town hall, my award, and at the disproportionate representation of whites and people of color in Corporate America. Whether they see it or not.
