This is NPR's Life Kit, I'm Ari Shapiro.

White people are taught not to think of our race.

You know, we live in a society that turns race over to two people of color.

They have a race. We're just people.

And so we see ourselves as outside of race.

And that's problematic for many reasons.

That's Robin D'Angelo, the author of White Fragility.

One goal of her book is to have white people examine their own whiteness.

She says white people have some go-to excuses.

Like, I already get racism as bad.

Or I marched in the 60s when people push them about racism.

But D'Angelo says that kind of thinking not only misses the point,

it often shuts down any opportunity to grow.

There's so much potentially rich insight that we can gain from

deeply reflecting on our own racial experiences.

In this episode of Life Kit, I talk with D'Angelo about the specific steps

we as white people can take to better see our own personal biases

and not get defensive when looking at the ways we're complicit.

So how do you define racism in a way that incorporates both the overt and the insidious

aspects of it? More specific than just I know it when I see it.

Oh, I would actually challenge anyone who's any white person who says,

I'll know it when I see it.

...