Inclusion, Belonging, Racial Equity, and Antiracism

00:05 Inclusion. That's another big one.

00:08 And that is one of those words that sometimes is controversial.

00:12 So the the key word in terms of defining inclusion is authenticity.

00:17 Authentically bringing historically marginalized individuals or groups into processes, activities, decision making, and policymaking in ways that shares power.

00:29 So that means that just because the norm of an organization is a certain thing that remember, we talked earlier about white centeredness.

00:38 Well, that's based on tradition, right? And is that a bad thing? No, because we all, were born into this situation.

00:46 But we can help to reverse that, because we need to remember what I said earlier is that there are multiple norms based on your lived experiences, ways of being all the group affiliations that you have that make you who you are.

01:00 So one of the big controversial parts about inclusion is oftentimes people it leads to term tokenism.

01:10 So I'm just gonna put so many women, so many black people, so many white people, so many white men in nursing, or whatever it is.

01:17 We don't have a lot of men in nursing, regardless to what it is, but you're just cherry picking by numbers.

01:23 And then you sit people at the table and you don't have a voice.

01:26 So when we say sharing power, we need to make sure people feel like they belong, which brings me to the next concept of belonging.

01:35 So if not only do you bring me in as a diverse person, but you hear me.

01:40 And I know that you hear me based on how you include me.

01:44 And I feel like I belong because I'm not just sitting in a space as a token to fill a metric.

01:49 I'm sitting there because you actually value what I have to say.

01:54 And my contributions are used.

01:56 And so when we talk about feeling welcome.

01:59 It's a feeling of security and support when there's a sense of acceptance.

02:04 And you see some definitions that talk about tolerance.

02:07 Well, I always like to refu... and tolerance, and I like to adapt definitions and change it to acceptance, because tolerating means that you just allow me to be there, because you have to.

02:19 But when you accept me, I'm allowed to be my authentic self, without judgment and feel psychologically safe, and feel that I actually have a chance to advance in an organization when we talk about it from that space.

02:33 If I'm a patient, I show up, and I feel like I am going to be treated with respect and dignity.

02:38 Regardless to if I'm the only black person in there, and I'm the only female, you can still make me feel like I belong based on how you treat me, based on not letting any kind of isms show up.

02:50 And I keep using black as an example, because I'm black.

02:53 but that doesn't matter who it is.

02:55 It could be a white person in a space of all black people in a space of all indigenous people.

03:00 My whole point is that focus on the humanitarian principles.

03:05 And then what is racial equity? It's a genuinely non racist society.

03:09 And in order for that to happen, we have to talk about racism. Slavery was real.

03:14 These systems that still exist, are real.

03:18 And people tend to try to obstruct some of this change because of fear.

03:24 And I think if we focus on that, and knowing that we're not going to judge the person.

03:29 Fear of change is real, no matter what it is, right? Fear of losing something, fear of losing power and control, that could be pretty scary.

03:38 So that point, I think I'm making the say that no matter how you feel, based on what I've said about everything else, you can still have conversations with people that hopefully help them to transform their thought process is better not losing anything.

03:53 We're just going to share. Right? So we're gonna let everybody play with the marbles in the sandbox, and have an equal opportunity at winning the game, right? If you don't win, it's not because someone withheld something from you.

04:07 It just as the way the game played. But if the game was played, rather.

04:11 So if the game is played fairly, and we're all following the same rules, that's the point.

04:16 And then what is anti-racism? Its policies and practices of opposing racism, and this says promoting social tolerance in terms of what the definitions when you read them.

04:29 But again, I revise those definitions all the time.

04:33 And it's policy and practice, not just the policy or practices and practice.

04:38 You have to do both of opposing racism.

04:41 And again, you can apply this broadly.

04:44 So let's oppose rather discrimination no matter what.

04:47 The policy and practice of opposing discrimination, promoting acceptance regardless of any of those identifying characteristics.

04:56 So again, we don't want to tolerate.

04:59 Allowable deviation from a standard because remember, there's no one standard.

05:03 We all have the right to, what? Exists authentically as who we are.

05:08 And tolerance is definitely superficial.

05:12 And I said it earlier, but I want to reiterate.

05:14 It means I'm dealing with you because I have to, not because I want to.

05:18 That's a key.

05:19 Because when you deal with someone because you have to, again, that's where those negative and hostile behaviors come in.

05:25 because I'm resentful.

05:26 Because someone is making me have to do this.

05:29 We can't do that in terms of organizations and working with our colleagues or in terms of taking care of patients.

05:36 So acceptance is definitely the first step in the transformation process.

05:41 And that acceptance is not only of other people, but accepting that you are a human being who has biases, who may always have biases, which is why I don't say bias mitigation.

05:53 Because you might not reduce your biases, but you can reduce how you let those biases show up.

05:59 So once I'm aware that I have it, I may always have it, but I'm not going to allow it to negatively impact my relationships with people.

06:07 So it can't be about allowing.

06:09 It has to be about shifting and balancing power dynamics, equity, and including so that people can feel like they belong.