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SHAMING WHITE PEOPLE WILL NOT END RACISM

Last year, an organization that promotes dialogue invited two authors to hold a “respectful exchange” about racism. I was one of them. The other was Robin DiAngelo, author of White Fragility. I accepted the invitation. DiAngelo declined. And that was before she went viral. White Fragility has become a bible for diversity advocates in institutional…

Blog-Vision-Agenda

LIFE LESSONS 101

How do you avoid being manipulated — whether it’s by family, friends, bosses, politicians, or media pundits? You must always remember: If you don’t have a vision for your life, someone else will have an agenda for it. I taught this lesson in my first Moral Courage class years ago, and it applies even more…

Blog-Chinese-Muslims

How #BLM Can Surprise its Detractors

For most kids in America, the school year is coming to a close. But the civics lesson has only just begun. With protests against police brutality sweeping the nation, there’s a lot to learn about how to be effective, engaged citizens. As an educator of moral courage, I teach young people to do the right…

Blog-Improv

Yes, And…

In work and in life, one of the scariest things to do is negotiate with someone who disagrees with you. It takes moral courage to start, and sustain, that conversation. When I teach this skill, a crucial part of my method is improvisational theater (“improv”). Each participant has to accept what every other participant is…

Blog-Murtaza

HEALING DOESN’T MEAN CHEERING UP

I teach courage for a living. Over the course of  20 years, I’ve researched, studied, written, filmed, and spoken about the skills needed to exercise “moral courage,” which means doing the right thing in the face of fear. For all of my expertise, though, I’ve absorbed something counterintuitive these past few months: that the quietest,…

Blog-Swing-Left

YOU WIN BY NOT STRIVING TO WIN

Bruce Lee, the martial arts master, would teach his students to “be like water.” What he meant was, water always gets to where it needs to go — even in the midst of obstacles. Water doesn’t demand that those obstacles disappear, or label them as the oppressor. Rather, water washes over them, glides around them,…

Constructive Conflict

Increasingly, I’m speaking at colleges and universities about the hottest topic going: how to achieve diversity and inclusion. Most educators see diversity as a matrix of skin colors, genders, religious affiliations and sexual orientations. But diversity is also about airing different perspectives. At institutions of higher education, intellectual diversity should be a no-brainer. It’s not,…