What Is Antiracism? The Answer From Ibram X. Kendi

This article is an excerpt from the Shortform book guide to "How to Be an Antiracist" by tIbram X. Kendi. Shortform has the world's best summaries and analyses of books you should be reading.

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What is antiracism? How is knowing the answer important to combating racism?

Ibram X. Kendi’s book How to Be an Antiracist shows how the opposite of a racist is an antiracist. So, what is antiracism and how it different from being not racist?

Keep reading to find out the answer to the question “what is antiracism?”

What Is Antiracism?

Ibram defines antiracism as a collection of antiracist policies and ideas that cause racial equity.

So, what is antiracism in practice? An example of an antiracist idea is the belief that no race’s culture or subculture is better than any other’s.

Examples of antiracist policies are the Immigration and Nationality Act (1965), the Refugee Act (1980), and the Immigration Act (1900), all of which encouraged immigration to the US from non-European countries. Although, in various ways, these acts favored non-Europeans over European immigrants, the acts were antiracist rather than racist because they promoted equity among immigrant groups. In other words, they aimed to rectify the current and historical imbalance that favored White immigrants.

Steps to Ending Racial Inequity

There are several steps the Antiracist Research and Policy Center take to end racial inequity that you can take too:

Acknowledge that the problem is caused by policy, not people.
Acknowledge that racial inequity is intersectional.
Find out which specific policies are causing inequity.
Come up with new antiracist policies to replace them.
Determine which individuals or groups have the power to put antiracist policies into place
Educate the public about specific racist policies and antiracist replacements
Connect with antiracist policymakers to get the new antiracist policies implemented
Get rid of racist policymakers by asking antiracist policymakers to force them out of office
Make sure the new antiracist policy is having an equalizing effect.
If the new policies aren’t working, look for new policies, not new people.
Keep an eye on policymakers to make sure no new racists policies come into effect.

What Is Antiracism From Ibram X. Kendi’s Perspective?

Shortly after graduating from the doctoral program at Temple University, Ibram went to a lecture in 2010 in which Boyce Watkins, a finance scholar, talked about how racism was a disease. Ibram had based most of his ideas on racism on Toure and Hamilton’s work and thought racism was more like an organ—it was an integral part of society and incurable.

Ibram didn’t want to change his idea of racism, and this isn’t uncommon. It’s hard for people to change beliefs that they hold strongly. An antiracist can have as much difficulty redefining racism as a racist can.

As Ibram studied racism further and the Black Lives Matter movement launched, Ibram began to reassess his ideas about racism. These were his steps to working toward being antiracist:

He stopped denying that he could be racist at times.
He revised the definition of racist to the definitions given in this book.
He listed the racist ideas and policies he subscribed to.
He acknowledged that he held racist ideas and supported racist policies because he grew up in a racist country.
He understood the definition of antiracists as described in the book.
He worked towards gaining power and changing policy.
- For example, Ibram took a position that had the power to make policy and donated money to organizations focused on policy changes.
He acknowledged intersectionality.
He thought antiracist ideas.

What Is Antiracism? The Answer From Ibram X. Kendi