When I started that project, I thought racism was something that happened in the past, and when people were talking about it now, they were just making too much of it or complaining or whatever. And doing those transcripts, I realized how much of a problem it was. How damaging it was to people who were experiencing racism and discrimination, and in every story that I was typing, that I was transcribing for that work, the damage would be caused by white people.
Jessie’s experience gave her a newfound perspective on what Black people in America were dealing with and who was the cause of many of our struggles. So she dedicated herself to making change. But as Jessie was working to help the people that her people were oppressing, she found out that the oppressors included people in her own family.
JESSIE: I was on a trip with my father to see a great-aunt of mine. She was the sister of my grandfather, my father’s father. When I was at her house, I pulled a book off the shelf, and it was Thomas Dixon’s The Clansman, and I said, “Aunt Marie, how come you have this book?” She’s like, “Oh, I don’t know. I think it was your granddad’s.” “Why did he have this book?” “Oh, you know, he was in that group.” I was, like, “What?” It was this very kind of nonchalant revelation that my grandfather had been in the Klan.
My father happened to be there, and I was, like, “Daddy, what’s going on? He was in the Klan?” He’s, like, “Yeah, they were just trying to help people.” Also, very nonchalant about this revelation, and he knew that I was writing this dissertation on the Klan and hadn’t told me about it, about his father. That upset me. That disturbed me. That unsettled me in a way that it didn’t my family, and they were just totally casual about it. It was really for them no big deal. But I sat with that news for the next, I don’t know, a couple of years or so, and just couldn’t shake it, you know?
Eventually I realized that I didn’t want my grandfather’s last name, which was my last name, Harper, to be on the book that I was writing. So I decided to change my name. I’d never liked my first name anyway (it was Susanne), and I started looking around for white women who had fought against racism to change my name to one of theirs. And it was a short list.
I remembered someone I had read about in graduate school. Her name was Jessie Daniel Ames. She was actually from Texas, and she had started something in the early 1900s called the Association of Southern Women for the Prevention of Lynching, which was actually a white woman who was saying, “Not in our name,” you know? Like, “You’re lynching Black people basically in the name of protecting white women, and don’t do it for me. I’m not going to stand with you; I’m not going to let you get away with this.” So I decided to take Jessie Daniels as my name.
Jessie’s choice may seem drastic for some, but it is inherently no different from that of the Matthews family. She identified a legacy of racism and bigotry and decided that she wasn’t going to be associated with it. But more important than just walking away from it; she’s doing something about it, beyond her own family.
Jessie finished up our interview by addressing why she felt it was important for her as a young white woman to make combating racism a part of her life and why it’s important for other young white people to assess their privilege and power as well as the historic and current racism people have faced and continue to face.
JESSIE: I think it’s so important for young white people to rethink the lessons that they’ve been handed down from their parents, from their elders, from their teachers, from whomever, about what it means to be white. If white people would just listen, if they would read those stories [by people of color], if they would take them in a way that they were not trying to interrupt and interject their own narrative on top of it, I think that we as white people could do less harm to other people. Right now, today, ongoing.
The world is lucky to have Jessie, as she’s doing great work and is setting an example for white people around the world.
But as Jessie mentioned, she wasn’t always this person, and many white people feel exactly how Jessie once felt, that people of color, particularly Black people, are just complaining when they speak up about racism. Which is what happens when the lives of people of color are just concepts to many white people, when we are just the Black bodies they see on the evening news, or the Latinxs that politicians claim are illegal and taking jobs from (white) citizens.
The types of white people who accuse people of color of “complaining” are the types of white people who tell their nephew it’s not okay to love and have a long-term relationship with a Black woman. They are the types of people who don’t have a problem with one of their family members being a member of the KKK.
Those types of people are not me, and if you learn anything during our time together, they won’t be you. Not only that, but those types of people shouldn’t feel comfortable in their racism around you. Those types of people should know you’re going to speak up, regardless of who they are.
Because we’re the type of people who stand for something, and when it has to be, that something will be people of color.
Let me start by saying again, I’m not an advocate of violence. While I have gotten into my fair share of tussles over the years (I will never lie to y’all—they were for good reason), I prefer to talk things out. Which is why it breaks my heart every time I have to go full Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson on people.
As I see it, there are levels to Dwayne Johnson. There’s lovable him in kids’ movies like Tooth Fairy, there’s mid-level him in WWE as “The Rock,” and then there’s full him, shooting things, throwing things, and smacking people, which is him in the Fast and Furious series.
One of those instances happened during my freshman year of college at my school’s spring concert, which I had been waiting months for. The spring concerts were the stuff of legends. Unlike at high school, where a concert meant the school band or choir performing, a concert in college meant real musical acts, famous musical acts, and, of course, after-parties.
That year, the artists Lupe Fiasco and Soulja Boy were going to be performing, which meant the party would start during the concert.
If you’ve never heard “Donk” by Soulja Boy, go listen NOW. You’ll see exactly why I said the party would start during the concert.
The night of the concert, everyone on campus was excited, but none more than the freshmen. For many, this was our first-ever concert, and it was the first school “party night” for all of us. It was also the night when the campus was full of people who didn’t attend our school, because students were allowed to bring guests to the show. I was attending the concert with Jayvon, Cory, and a few friends from campus.
So basically it was a ton of teenagers underage drinking and partying, many of whom didn’t even attend the school. What could go wrong?
When we arrived at the on-campus arena, I had never seen anything like it in my life. There were thousands of people, none likely older than twenty-three, each one wearing their best outfit, and everyone seemingly looking to hook up with someone. It was everything my nineteen-year-old self had ever dreamed of.
After standing in line for about an hour, we finally made it in. It was crowded, hot, and sweaty. It was perfect.