While I get what you’re saying, Alison, and your descriptions are valid up to a point, your putting labels on people isn’t helpful. Are there five types of black people in America? How well would it go over with you if a white person wrote something like this about you? Which group would you fall into?

This is a complicated issue. A lot of white people find themselves thinking and feeling things at times they know are wrong because we’ve all been tainted by systemic racism. We have to struggle against it. Are we bad because we struggle, because love and acceptance of all doesn’t come as easily to us as we’d like it to?

Fear of the other, especially when it’s been so strongly encouraged for so long, isn’t easy to eradicate. The best way is by focusing on our commonalities rather than our differences. We can only do that by getting to know each other better.

In the one positive category you assign to white people, the ally, you have a subset, the self-appointed ally, who you treat with disdain. Where does one get the official endorsement?

I don’t think we turn hearts and change minds with shame and labeling. Shaming people might change behavior sometimes, but it also builds rage and the rage of racist people is one of main reasons they’re racist: rage, fear, and programming.