Good morning!
Welcome to Digestable, your mouthful of things happening in the world.
Today’s ferments:
I used to wait all semester for course evaluations.
Teachers often reminded us that classrooms are not a democracy, which meant you had to do what they said. Almost all the teachers I know outside of my own formal learning experience are wonderful—generous, intelligent, caring, curious. But most of the teachers I had at school were antagonistic; thus, my months-long storing of feedback.
It seemed only reasonable that this experience we co-created—spending dedicated time learning specific material—would be informed by all of the people in the room.
I still believe this, now: that everyone should have the option to participate in setting terms of engagement; that hierarchy for its own sake is ineffective and a hindrance to good work; that decision-making should adhere to a process, not just a ‘because.’
Underneath these ideas is the concept of nothing about us without us, a phrase invoked by the disability justice movement and others. No policies or expenditures or zoning amendments or whatever, without the people who are directly impacted by those choices. In climate organizing, this looks like the prioritization of those on the ‘front lines,’ who are impacted first and worst by the climate crisis.
Enter the racial justice protests of 2020, which more so than other earlier eras of political organizing led to a wave of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion meetings and hiring of Black CEOs. The list goes on; in response to mass political action led by Black people, a deluge of virtue signaling followed. Corporations and nonprofits alike took to ‘doing the work’ in a way that maybe eased the white guilt of their staff, but rarely made meaningful change for BIPOC staff (or challenged white supremacy more broadly).
A hallmark of this time was asking Black people, usually for the first time in an entity’s history, to sit on committees, to speak at events, to consult on organizational DEI work.
This is class evaluations, turbo charged: Black people are constantly forced to pretend to be okay surrounded by white people at work, navigating systems designed for white people, negotiating histories defined by confinement and erasure of Blackness. In the spirit of ‘nothing about us without us,’ asking for feedback and guidance in 2020 might have seemed like a good start.
No matter how scathing or constructive or articulate my class evaluations were, teachers continued to rule over classrooms and dispense punishment as they saw fit. Asking for feedback while maintaining a commitment to existing systems isn’t generous or equitable. Rather, it’s a way to let frustrated constituents blow off steam—or waste energy—in a way that doesn’t threaten those systems. That’s what happened in 2020, too.
Offering the opportunity for feedback as an olive branch is almost a good idea. We do need to learn from a wide range of people about what works for them any and everywhere, because most structures that shape our world were designed to suit the needs of cis straight white Christian men, and either ignore or destroy everyone else.
But this offer, unaccompanied by a willingness to actually take the feedback and redesign the structures within which that feedback was given, is empty.
If you live in a college town, you’re familiar with another common way that feedback is gathered: the paid focus group. Usually, researchers are investigating a topic, and they have a desired population they’d like to learn from. Posters with tear-off contact information abound; participants are compensated with $100 on a Visa gift card or a free meal.
You get together in a room, or on Zoom, and answer questions the researchers have prepared. You spend time, and get some compensation in return. Researchers have to factor in the influence of compensation on the population that self-selects, but this can be a paragraph in the introduction. You leave; the team codes their data, writes their paper, and life goes on.
Or, on an individual and professional scale, you’re brought in as an expert to consult. Sometimes that expertise is borne of lived experience (as a trans person seeking medical care, or a mixed-race person filling out the census), or training (as a communications expert, or a transportation planner). You do your work, get your money, and peace out. Ideally, this exchange feels alright, since you’re being compensated for your effort and insight.
The exchange of money for feedback isn’t an ideal. While this strategy values feedback, it also commodifies it. Commodifying stuff does not help us build a world rooted in informed, participatory decision-making (see: global capitalism). As always, we need to change the system that determines how we value everything. Often, not trying to do things at too large a scale helps, but asking for feedback even on the scale of a classroom, or an organization, or one on one, can be extractive despite being at a small scale.
But we have to do it; we need each other’s input to do big and small things well. Next week, I’ll try to get at how.
The Second Look
Half-baked cultural criticism from Gabriel Coleman.
One of the things Lena and I have in common is our childhood experience giving feedback to our teachers. Maybe this is just a thing that happens when you have a teacher as a parent and you realize they’re just as human as you are. So in honor of that shared history, here’s some unsolicited feedback for a venue that hasn’t left my head:
Do you want to have a bad time dressed up as a good time? Then look no further than Southside Social in Belfast. The bar is the epitome of “sometimes things that are expensive are worse.” You could easily convince yourself that you must be having a great time in a bar with such an immaculate vibe, but when you take a second look at any specific aspect of the venue, it becomes apparent that Southside Social is a budget venture with the veneer and pricing of a tasteful establishment.
So you walk in and the vibes are immaculate, right? The bar and booths are all nice minimalist wood. Simple taps with their logos stripped away emerge from a backsplash of square light-gray tile. The lighting is all soft globes hanging from the ceiling. You squeeze in at one of the high tables in the center of the space, apologizing to the guy in the booth behind you whose leg is sticking too far out to let you ease onto your stool. The tabletop is this chunky rainbow-flecked formica, the right amount of dated kitsch that comes across as flawlessly cool. You take a moment to admire the DJ, spinning on high from a subtly lit recessed alcove above the taps, framed by the backsplash.
The drinks are classics with a twist, a “southside” sunrise with mezcal instead of tequila, a “weed-groni” that includes a splash of CBD ginger soda, nothing too exciting but a bit of fun. You order the “dirty” mojito, made with spiced rum. It arrives with lime wedge and mint sprig, served in a tall glass filled with… crushed ice? The only place I can think of that still serves drinks with crushed ice is the corner bar in Castle Rock, Minnesota. In fact your friend’s not-tequila sunrise is filled with crushed ice too, as is the Blue Malibu down the table. You glance again at the cocktail menu. Why would you add lemonade to a Blue Malibu? Isn’t it plenty sweet already? And why would anyone serve a negroni with soda, CBD or otherwise, unless you wanted to water it down?
But the cocktails aren’t so expensive and there’s food to think about so you let it go. Your mojito is 90% ice so you end up finishing it before you’ve even finished with the menu, so your friend goes to get another round while you head back to order food. Lucky Duck Chinese is one of these business-inside-another-business deals: a red-curtained glass cube at the back of the bar where a host takes orders next to a red rotary telephone. While you wait to order you watch the small vintage television mounted in the corner. It’s laying some black and white film you don’t recognize, but its vibes are immaculate. The window reads “Authentic Belfast Chinese,” even though you heard the place is run by white people. Still, you’re hungry and hopeful. You order the salt chili chicken for your friend; without any other vegetarian options on the menu, the veggie curry is your choice. The host hands you a buzzer.
You get back to your stool, maneuvering again around the booth behind you, and put the immaculately designed buzzer on the unexpectedly chic table. You and your friend talk a bit, but the DJ is a little too loud to have real conversation so instead you notice things. You notice that the person behind you had his leg sticking out because the booths are only really big enough for 1.5 people per side. The space between your chair and the booth is big enough for about 0.75 people. You notice that there’s no door to the kitchen behind Lucky Duck’s curtain, the host has to leave the little glass box and go through a different door to retrieve orders. You notice your drink is already half gone, and will the ice to melt faster so you have something to distract you from how loud the music is. Why do places insist on hiring a DJ when there’s no space to dance and the music is too loud to talk?
Suddenly the buzzer vibrates, immaculately. You take it back to the host and exchange it for your order. The food is in a paper bag inside a branded plastic bag with a bespoke order tag stapled to it. You think you’re supposed to think, “it's just like ordering real Chinese food!” but instead you think “Why are we being given a bag at all? We’re eating in the restaurant.”
You get back to your tight squeeze of a stool and unpack the food, the multiple bags looking less immaculate now that they’ve become waste disrupting the vibe of the formica. There are no chopsticks, just one of those wooden forks restaurants always give out because they’re compostable even though they don’t separate compost. Your curry and rice are neatly separated in the takeout container by a cardboard wall so strong it would make both China and Belfast jealous. Scooping rice over this barrier with your wooden fork is immediately infuriating and it doesn’t help that the rice is more seasoned than the curry.
You sip the small amount of water that has since melted into your icee mojito. You finish your food. You squeeze out from the table to head to the bathroom. You walk through the bathroom door and are immediately greeted by the harsh buzzing glow of fluorescent lighting. Of course.