A Conversation About Colonialism

How we can hold a dialog space to process anger and discomfort

Jul 18, 2023

Claude’s Exploration #9

I recently had the chance to record a conversation with Matthew Green and Jacob Kishere, where we explored how we could sustain a dialog on colonialism that could bring us closer rather than create more polarization.

Jacob is a philosopher, and is used to holding deep dialogues on his Youtube channel SENSESPACE. Matthew Green is a reporter with whom I have been talking a lot lately about how to deal with such sensitive topics in a healing way.

You will find in this article my account of how this conversation came to exist. But to be honest, I would rather you watch it, or listen to the podcast version, as it is the experience of the conversation that matters even more than the ideas behind it.

You can also find Matthew Green’s own account of it on his brilliant Resonant World Newsletter, and more about Jacob own exploration of dialogues in his deep Substack culturepilgrim

Why do I need a Conversation about Colonialism ?

It all started in March 2022 on the first weeklong retreat of the Timeless Wisdom Training (TWT), a 2 years long program led by Thomas Hübl about learning to integrate individual, trans generational and collective trauma through deep inner work and relational practices.

On the last evening there, I met Matthew, and we started a conversation that is still going on today, over one and a half years later.

Although I was impressed by his pedigree (he had been a war reporter in Iraq and Afghanistan, had published a book on war PTSD, and at the time was still working for Reuters before switching to a Climate change news organization), what I enjoyed most was his ability to put into words what we were experiencing, and to hold together a conversation at meta level. So we started talking and making sense of what we were experiencing in this individual and collective process work in TWT.

About a year later, we started collectively broaching the subject of Colonialism in TWT. And in this space I was surprised to be confronted again with my usual pitfall on that topic.

I realized that even in such a trauma informed space, it still wasn’t easy or comfortable to discuss Colonialism and Racism.

And the thing is, it triggers anger in me when I realize that many people don’t deem colonialism a topic that would concern them.

And it triggers even more anger in me when I try and explain its relevance, and I am faced with the discomfort that my anger seems to trigger in them in return.

Personal and Collective History and Denial

Being a black, mixed race woman born and raised in the French Caribbean from a lineage of both black slaves and wealthy white bourgeois, I am quite familiar with how much the wealth of the western countries, including my own, is derived from Colonialism, and how much it comes with a price of denied and unconscious pain and oppression.

Without getting into the complex historical and economical analysis that could “prove” it, it should be quite obvious to anyone that the exploitation over centuries of other countries' natural resources and human labor has led to a tremendous increase in western wealth, that we all benefit from today, while taking it for granted. (You can read there a very efficient summary I got from chatGPT on the key points underlining this argument).

It is also obvious that violence, exploitation and oppression were required to enforce this system, which resulted in lasting trans generational and collective traumas that are embedded in the fabric of our society, of which systemic racism is only but one direct consequence.

And I am always amazed that most people in western countries seem to systematically undervalue the impacts of Colonialism on today’s society, and its manifestation through conscious and unconscious discrimination.

But then, the first sign of trauma is denial. We simply can’t see it, as it is the first protection mechanism that is here to protect us from something that is too painful to look at.

The consequence of this is also that when people express the anger that comes from the legacy of being on the “wrong” side of Colonialism, this anger is seen as a threat, and is not easily welcome.

The best example for me are the recent riots we have been witnessing in France after 17-year old Nahel M. was shot by a policeman for not complying with his order to stop his car.

Most people don’t seem to realize how much of these young people's anger is rooted in the trauma of colonization by France, specifically in the Maghreb area.

It’s not so long ago that Morocco and Tunisia were French protectorates, and Algeria was actually French territory until the traumatic liberation war of the 60´s.

After World War II, these countries supplied an abundant immigrant working force on French soil, that helped build the prosperity of the ”Trente glorieuses”, the Glorious Thirty (period of huge economic growth in France from 1945 to 1975).

This results nowadays in an estimated 4 millions of people being part of France for 2 or 3 generations now, that, to say the least, were not given an equal share in the prosperity they heavily contributed to.

And yet, when the riots exploded, the tale that occupied the news space was about violence and danger and breach to collective security, and risk to the republic. As a matter of fact, a crowdfunding for the policeman family raised over 1 million euros in a few days.

The anger of those who feel rejected and exploited by society is seen as a threat, and that fear prevents from looking at the root causes and the social responsibility that comes with it.

That makes it so much more important that we can find way to create spaces where we can safely look at the past, atour present conditions, and try and heal from that collectively.

How healing can be found in dialog spaces

In a smaller group than the full 400 participants of the Timeless Wisdom Training, I had the chance to voice the need I felt that the pain I was experiencing from the legacy of slavery would be witnessed by others without me being rejected by them.

This was a beautiful moment, because some people in the group felt safe enough to voice their discomfort, and how they were afraid they wouldn’t be able to witness me properly. And by not trying to fix or change anything, just by allowing their voices and mine, we could hold together the pain and the discomfort, and we could all feel seen.

After I started writing here about my personal history and my view on unconscious biases inherited from colonialism and patriarchy, Matthew reached out to me, and shared how reading those, and witnessing me sharing in this smaller group, had helped him witness his own discomfort and examine what could have been unconscious racist biases that he was not aware of inside him before.

This conversation was so powerful, and so healing for both of us I believe, that it was the starting point for considering having that kind of conversation in public, which in turn led us to Jacob’s SENSESPACE.

Because what I am truly longing for, is that these old collective trauma can surface in such a safe environment that we can look at them, digest them, and stop being held back by its unspoken violence and history.

And if feels like this is the kind of space we are already creating with these small conversations.

Watch the conversation on Youtube or listen to the podcast version on Spotify.