Name of Person Reporting Incident:
Anonymous
Location of Incident:
A Bay Area nonprofit therapy center focused on addiction
Time/ Date of Incident:
2007
Circumstances of Incident:
- Discrimination based on: gender, race, ancestry
- Event by type: microaggressions in the workplace, harassment in a public place
Description of the Incident:
Both me and a coworker (I’m a Black womxn and she was Dominican) were asked to sign documents making fiscal statements about the organization that we knew were wildly untrue. I handled grants and she was the accountant. The documents should have been signed by our white female supervisor, who was also the executive director. After we both refused, we both started to be reprimanded about performance and publicly ridiculed in front of a plethora of staff by the executive. It was obvious retaliation and she wanted us to know it. Like many nonprofits that I have had direct contact with, the board provided little to no oversight to the executive and had no contact with the staff. So she was basically unsupervised and regularly fired and punished womxn of color and queer womxn whom she seemed to hire with the intent to abuse – and also, like many white-lead nonprofits, she hired womxn of color as cover for her racists practices. She regularly pitted employees against each other and did things to threaten our take home pay whenever challenged. In my experience, many nonprofits operate with no oversight of out-of-control executives whose megalomania is very thinly veiled.
What have you thought about since the incident took place?
I was very relieved and grateful to get out of that place as were all the other womxn of color whom I’m still in contact with. I know that restorative justice practices need willing participants and of the tyrants I’ve known, none of them are willing to even consider restoring themselves or others. So in that regard, womxn of color have to have spaces to heal with each other intersectionally acknowledging the vast diversity within our own group. I have also thought about the fact that nonprofit boards need a reality check, understanding without just internal practices and oversight that they’re no better than the corporations that abuse communities and then provide funding to fix problems they themselves created.
How were you affected by what happened?
It was a turning point in really understanding that people in power, especially in nonprofits, often have no intentions toward justice and certainly engage in very little if any training on their own role in preventing justice. Up to that point, I operated with a lot of trust and optimism and a strong belief in allies just because people self-reported that way. After that, I took a long time to observe people’s patterns before determining if they were an ally or not. Also, it was just plain hurtful, so I have worked to avoid those situations and get out of them more quickly. My healing after leaving that job was mostly because of the support I received and offered to the other womxn of color who had worked there and been abused in that workplace with no recourse other than quitting.
Who else was affected by what happened and how?
At least six other womxn of color that I know of and one queer womxn was publicly humiliated, had their jobs redefined to reduce their pay, and were regularly threatened by that executive.
What do you think needs to happen to make things as right as possible?
Honestly, I think the wrong the place does because of its leadership is equal or greater than the good that comes from the therapeutic practices it provides. I think justice would be the place being closed and that executive somehow held accountable for her actions. As far as restoring the womxn who were subject to the workplace aggression, they have all created their own justice by removing themselves from the situations and seeking more justice aligned sources of income.
What do you need for your healing?
I need for the entire industry, specifically in the Bay Area to be under scrutiny specifically related to its racial and class-based abuses of staff. Individually, I received several therapeutic supports both formally and informally within my own communities.
