In a Crisis, Find Your Ring
Libby explains Ring Theory and how it can help people know what to say and to whom in a moment of crisis. Content note: this episode will talk about the outcry against police violence toward Black people and how Ring Theory can help white people respond and support the movement for Black lives.
Resources
How Not to Say the Wrong Thing by Susan Silk and Barry Goldman
Stacey Patton on White Women's Tears and Social Media
Didi Delgado's Podcast and Facebook and Patreon
Kate Anthony: 5 Racist Anti-Racism Responses “Good” White Women Give to Viral Posts
Confronting racism is not about the needs and feelings of white people by Ijeoma Oluo
How to be a good white ally, according to activists
Scaffolded Anti-Racist Resources
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WHERE TO SEND YOUR RESOURCES
Invest in your local community - patronize Black-owned businesses.
Support local organizations creating alternatives to policing. Here's are some places to start:
Donate to your local Black Lives Matter Chapter
Donate to your Local Bail Fund
Donate to the National Bail Out (if they're still taking donations)
Transcript
This moment still doesn't quite feel like the time for the episodes I had planned, but something came up in recent conversations that I thought might be helpful, and which is also applicable to other moments of crisis. I also wanna be on that. It's uncomfortable speaking right now, because as you'll understand better, after listening to the rest of this episode, it's very important to me that I stay in my lane or ring as I'll go into later, I am going to talk about race in this episode, but I am not any kind of expert or scholar while am personally committed to being anti-racist. I am also white grow, growing up with a lot of privilege and I may not get it right here, but after some careful thought and conversations with my friends and family, it felt important to offer this episode to you rather than saying nothing and fumbling my way through is part of the work of undoing racism.
When there's a crisis, it can be like an earthquake. You know, there's an epicenter where people get hit the hardest, but the effect ripples outwards, and it can shake you, even if you're not in the middle of it. And it can also be hard to know where to put your feelings or what to say about it and to whom. This is something that all of us have experienced in moments of crisis. And I'm also noticing that right now, a lot of white people are confused about it as we are yet again, confronted with the destructive impact of white supremacy in America. So to help, I'd like to introduce you to ring theory. This concept was created by Susan Silk, a clinical psychologist. It was first described in an article in the LA time written by her and her friend, Barry Goldman, Susan opened the article by describing how, when she had breast cancer, years back, she didn't want any visitors in her hospital room.
But for some reason, one of her colleagues felt it was really important to see her after her surgery and really pressed to be able to visit her. And when Susan insisted, she wanted no visitors. The colleague said, Susan, this isn't just about you. And Susan was like, oh really? My breast cancer. Isn't about me? It's about you? Now. You might be thinking as I did wow. How could someone be so clueless and make one else's cancer about them, but in a crisis, it can be confusing where to put your grief, even when you're not in the middle of it. Even if you're not in the epicenter, something horrific happening close to you can knock you over. And those feelings can be overwhelming. And if you haven't learned what you're supposed to do, it is easy to say the wrong thing. Maybe most of us know better than to ask a sick person to accommodate our needs in their moment of grappling with their illness.
But there are all kinds of other ways that we might stumble to help people in this situation. Susan came up with something called the ring theory. It's very simple. You draw a circle and this is the center ring. And you put the name of whoever is in the center of the current trauma inside that circle, in the case of Susan's cancer, that was her. Then you draw a circle around that circle. In that ring, you put the names of the people who are the closest to that person or the situation. Then you add another ring around that one, and you include the names of the people who are the next most impacted, and then add another ring, which would be the next level out from there, and so on. And so on. Once you're done, you have what Susan calls your Kvetching Order. The person in the middle gets to yell and cry to anyone they want whenever they want.
And if you're in an outer ring, you get to Kvetch too, but only two people on the outer rings from you. So if you're speaking to someone on any of the rings that are smaller than yours, your role is to help you listen, you hold space for their grief, their pain, their anger, their sadness, you offer compassion and you center them and their needs, your needs go to the outer rings. As Susan puts it, you dump out and you send comfort in. Ring Theory has been really useful to me because I'll be honest. I haven't always had the best instincts when it comes to how to appropriately respond to a crisis. I've discovered some additional nuances too, that I've found useful, which is first be careful about ways that you might be covertly, centering yourself in a situation. One way I've seen this is people offering support to someone in a center when that just isn't appropriate, receiving care is intimate and vulnerable.
And so usually people only wanna receive certain kinds of support from people they are close to. So the folks that are just one ring out from them might be the people that they really only want to receive certain kinds of support from and receiving work from someone where you don't have like a close relationship can feel like an intrusion of your boundaries. It doesn't mean that if you're on an outer ring and you care about the person on the inner ring, but you're just not close to them that you can't offer any support. It's just that sometimes your role in providing support will be small and it might go unacknowledged. If you find yourself wanting to show some key care towards someone and you don't have an intimate relationship with them, you might have to find another way to give something like maybe just sending a card or a note or doing something anonymous.
It's just really important to always remind yourself that the crisis is at the end of the day, about them, not about you also don't underestimate the importance of supporting someone in an outer ring who is then supporting someone in an inner ring who is then supporting someone in an inner ring, providing support for someone you do have a connection to, and who is closer to the center than you, but who isn't in the center can still make a huge difference. I mean, that might look like providing care for the caregiver or the caregiver's caregiver's caregiver, because at the end of the day, we all need care. Finally, don't assume that someone in an inner ring can offer you no care. I know that sounds sort of the opposite of what I've been saying, but hear me out. I've been in situations where someone close to me is going through something hard and I've instinctually just resisted bringing up the hard things going on in my life to them and avoided asking them for things that I need from them or even bringing up difficult topics of conversation that are going on between the two of us.
I had the worry that if I, I asked for something, anything that I'd just be piling onto their grief or worry and adding to their stress, and maybe also worried that they just couldn't handle tackling difficult things that I needed. And that is sometimes true. Some people who are in the center or close to the center ring truly do have no bandwidth for providing you any care. But I wouldn't assume that assumptions are not only a missed opportunity, but they're also making decisions for someone else about what's best for them or deciding for them what they're capable of, which can actually harm your relationship. Sometimes even though someone is in a crisis, they are available. And sometimes even desires of providing support to you around something that they aren't the center of just as receiving care is intimate. So is giving it. And so that helping someone else can actually make you feel close to somebody, it can also make you feel competent and empowered when something is going terribly wrong in your life.
And you feel overwhelmed and powerless. And so depriving our partners or other friends or family members of whomever from caring for us, just because they're having a hard time, maybe depriving them of much-needed connection and distraction and empowerment. Also squashing your own needs just because someone is going through a hard time can also harm a relationship. If it's something that really does need to be addressed. I mean, obviously read the room but don't be afraid to ask someone if they have the bandwidths to give you something, if you need it just also be okay with hearing. No.
Okay. So content note here, I'm now gonna shift to address mostly just my white listeners here for a moment, because I want to offer you a way that you can apply ring theory right now, if you're white in America, I really strongly encourage you. If you're a white person in America to employ ring theory, as you work through what might be coming up for you right now, as we confront police violence against unarmed black Americans, it's a story as old as America itself, but I'm seeing that the spotlight is now turned up so brightly on it, that some people are only just really seeing it for the first time. By way of example, I think this is the first time I've gotten this many emails from various online businesses that I patronize wanting to me to know very specific that they support black lives matter, that they think black lives matter, and that they stand against police violence.
And I think that's really great. And I'm very heartened by how many new people are joining the conversation. But also it's important to understand that this issue is something black people have been shouting about for decades. So it isn't a new idea, even if you're new to the conversation. And if you are new to the conversation and you're white, it's extremely important as you proceed to participate, which I hope you will. It's important to understand which ring you are in. It's understandable that if you're just now becoming conscious of exactly how disproportionately dangerous it is to interact with the police, if you are black in America, that you might be uncomfortable you might have questions. You might have a lot of feelings, especially if you were unaware of your privilege as a white person, lots of emotions might come up for you and that's normal.
You might be feeling some grief, shame, anguish, sadness, helplessness, fear, anger, empathy. You might also feel confused, uncertain, upset and possibly even triggered. And all of that is reasonable. But if you're white, it's important to consider where those feelings belong. Remember the ring theory, if you're white, you are not in the center ring. So whatever is coming up for you around the current conversation about racism and in America and the role the police have been playing, it's important to take it to the outer rings. The perspective I'm sharing here is drawn from the writing of numerous black scholars, too many to name. But I just wanna name a couple that I have read, including Stacy Patton and DD Delgado, and just countless others who've written about how whiteness centers itself in nearly all aspects of American life. This can be very hard to see if you're white and it can also be hard to stop doing.
If you're used to centering yourself by default, here are some examples of where you might need to actively work to decenter yourself as a white person. Right now, for example, you might come across an idea or perspective that you just don't understand or have never heard before. If you're new to some of these ideas, that's reasonable, but don't ask a black person to explain things to you. That's like asking someone in the throes of grief from losing someone. They love to explain how grief works to you. That's asking them to do work when they are in the center ring and should only be receiving support. Does that mean though that you have to sit in your ignorance? Absolutely not. Just take it to the outer rings now, what does that mean? Well, honestly, I'd start with Google because one thing I found is that if someone is sharing in an idea or perspective, that sounds really obvious to them, but what's totally new to me is that there's probably been a lot written about it somewhere so I can just go look it up.
If that's not working for you, I bet you can go to the outer rings. I bet there are plenty of people there who might be able to educate you. If you politely ask them. Now, sometimes you might come across an idea or perspective that is challenging to you or that you disagree with. That's fine. But if the person sharing that idea or perspective is a person of color, they're in an inner ring. And if you are in an inner ring, your job is to help. So your job is to listen and send support. And if you've got a problem with what the person is saying, take it to the outer rings. What might that look like? Maybe reach out to a friend or a family member that you trust and ask them to rumble on this idea with you or talk to your therapist or your coach.
If you have one, just, you know, that's where you need to go. You also might feel defensive right now and you might feel inclined to say things like, you know, not all white people are not all cops, or you might feel incline to make some kind of big show about how you are one of the good ones in some kind of way. And again, that's a really reasonable way to feel. Also, it's the equivalent of telling someone who just got hit by a car and is lying on the street, bleeding that not every driver hits people. And while I didn't hit you with that car, and actually I am a very good driver. See, look at all these and articles I've read about driving. This is not the moment for that. <Laugh> I mean, it's okay to wanna feel like a good person.
It's okay to wanna defend people. You know, who are good, but take it to the outer rings, ask someone who loves you to listen and hold space for your need to be good. Don't put that on black people. Finally, you might be just hurting right now. You might be stuck in your shame around your privilege, your heartbreak, over how black people are treated in America. And you just want to show solidarity and support. Even here. It's important to be careful. Anthony wrote a wonderful blog post about this. Actually, she gave the examples of how white people, particularly white feminists who are trying to show solidarity and be antiracists actually end up making things about them. I think that this neatly parallels, the other example that Susan silk brought up in her ring theory. She tells a story of a friend of hers who had a brain aneurysm.
And after being in intensive care, she was in really rough shape. And one of her friends came to visit and was pretty shaken up by her appearance. And the friend steps out of the hospital room and says to the woman's husband, oh my God, I wasn't prepared for this. I don't know if I can handle it. That's not a wrong way to feel, but it's absolutely the wrong thing to say to this woman's husband. And so similarly, if you're white and the way America disenfranchises, incarcerates, and murders black people cause you a lot of pain and grief. Yes, you should feel those things. And you do get to cry and scream and vent and whatever it doesn't mean you're pain and anger and grief and shame about all of these things. Doesn't matter. It doesn't mean that you can't ask for support. You just take it to the outer rings.
Also, if you're white, make sure that you are paying attention to not broadcasting Kvetching, right now. It now it's a time to really be mindful about what you are putting out into public spaces. And that includes social media right now is a really good time to pause and listen and amplify black voices. Especially if you have a platform, lots of followers, lots of people paying attention to you, decenter yourself, and center black voices right now, cuz really anytime that you are putting a microphone, whether figurative or literal to your feelings right now, whether it's talking to a reporter at a protest or on Facebook or Twitter, you are taking up space in the center, take it to the outer rings. Talk about this stuff, but talk about it at home with your family, with your friends, with your coworkers, with people who will listen to you and poor comfort support and whatever resources you can toward black lives. If you're looking for where to send your resources, I have some links in the show notes. So to recap, when there's a crisis, the best way to figure out what to say and who to say it to is to find your ring. You send support to the inner rings and you get support from the outer rings and in our nation right now, black Americans are in the center that may be uncomfortable for you if you're white because whiteness is often at the center, but on the outer rings, there is so much crucial work to do. And that is especially true right now.
