Oblivious Realizations

I have a few friends that have always stated that their hearts beat for racial justice. I usually respond (at least internally) way to go friend you kick butt. I usually want to operate with proper treatment of human beings but fighting for justice for people is not really something that warms my heart. So, I encourage it from a distance and I am glad that someone has done it. I think it is admirable all around…just not me.

My trip out here has been about empowering Central Africans through accounting. I want to allow them the honor and authority to control the money for their program. I have received comments from white people (both direct and indirectly) that you really shouldn’t be letting the Africans control the money. They can’t be trusted and that is a dangerous thing. Recently the African leadership has told Bob my co-worker (the Chief Operations guy for Africa) that the interactions they are having with Bob is highly unexpected. They are used to working for white people (and Christian organizations) but it is always “you will do this” or “you will do that”. They hardly ever ask for a dialogue. They hardly ever want their input or opinion. Everything we are trying to do is through them…so we are trying to present the ideas or the issues and have the Africans work with us to come to a conclusion. This really is a foreign way for them to be treated. I have begun to realize that honestly my job isn’t accounting. It is to fight for these men and woman to be trusted and to develop into who they are meant to be in the face of old white mentality that they can not. I am fighting for justice in the cloak of accounting. I am really not about getting clean water to the villages, or AIDS training to the people, or care for orphans. I am about fighting to encourage these guys that they can make a difference by themselves. They don’t need the white man’s help up…who would have thought I would be in the justice game.

Around the same time I was realizing this, I asked Bob if these guys struggled with me being a woman. He said absolutely. I then put examples out there of is the reason a few of the men do not respond to my emails until I badger them and have you badger them because I am a woman. He said absolutely. Ironic, I am fighting to treat them like humans and not a race…and some still see me as a sex and not a person. I know I have probably dealt with sexism in jobs before but I am so oblivious I never noticed and keep plowing ahead. I don’t know how I will operate as I actually know what is going on….try to still be oblivious and state the facts I guess.