When the Minority Becomes the Majority

This article also available as a podcast here.

“Uh, bitch – can I hold the mic? – Don’t – Please can I hold the mic? – You can’t – I would like to say that, okay, I would like to say that…

I can’t be a singular expression of myself, there’s too many parts, too many spaces, too many manifestations, too many lines, too many curves, too many troubles, too many journeys, too many mountains, too many rivers, so many…”

-Solange Knowles¹

Gathering as people of color has been one of the most powerful tools of healing. Having a space to explore oneself outside of the eyes of the mainstream climbing culture that pushes us toward conforming and assimilating is the best thing we can do for self care. And after being comfortable in that space, taking that new or honed identity into the overall world keeps us grounded as people of color.

Here we will take a critical look at what happens in affinity spaces when it is dominated by certain racial demographics of people of color and what effect it has upon those who are still a minority in that space. We will examine umbrella terms for people of color, observe Climbers of Color’s “BIPOC Climb Nights”² within the Seattle area, look at the community through the lens of Black and Indigenous climbers, and view the demographics of local non profit boards for climbing.

Affinity spaces are the expression in an event format where demographics of people gather from a shared identity or idea. These spaces can be anything from racial identity to gender. Terms have surfaced attempting to capture certain overall racial demographics for racial affinity spaces: POC³, BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and/or People of Color)⁴, people of the global majority⁵, etc. These terms are imperfect. Finding a term that will simultaneously unite us yet recognizes our individual struggle is always an ongoing conversation. We do not define ourselves by our proximity to whiteness, therefore using the term ‘non-white’ is not an empowering term. Including the word ‘white’ within a term to describe oneself shifts focus away from BIPoC.

The use of BIPOC by organizations has a specific function. For Climbers of Color, it’s a small love letter to Black and Indigenous, especially since the term POC has been a form of erasure⁶. “Looking at history again before and after segregation, there are a number of times POC groups have been targeted for hate crimes and denial of immigration. Their stories and struggles are valid. With that being said, no other two groups have been so discriminated against, hunted, vilified, and killed on this land as much as African Americans (Black Americans) and Indigeneous Peoples. The discrimination has never stopped and continues today. BIPOC (Black, Indigeneous, People of Color) does not set any groups above the other. However, we do seek to call special attention to the inexcusable atrocities committed against Black and Indigenous groups in US history. All POC community struggles are very real but we need to have extra scrutiny with issues concerning BI communities.”⁷ A number of Climber of Color’s applications specifically ask if the applicant identifies as Black or Indigenous. Their most recent application for BIPOC climbing gym scholarships⁸ even went a step further to ask if anyone identified as Indigenous Hawaiian aka Kānaka Maoli and/or Polynesian, another severely underrepresented group usually lumped under the huge umbrella term Asian American and Pacific Islander or AAPI.⁹ Applications for POC largely leave minority groups behind. And now, the term POC leaves Black and Indigenous behind.

Is Climbers of Color really living up to their word? A quick look at the demographics of the group raises a few concerns for anyone who is a minority within groups of POC.

First, let’s explore the term ‘minority’. In simple terms it means a smaller number than the majority. It could be taken on as an individual identity or a way to express a group within a group. Historically it has been used in conjunction with the term people of color (POC). ““Minority” is often used to refer to a group that is smaller and nonwhite. When people use the word “minority”, they rarely specify race or background. Many people use “minority” when they mean African American, Asian American, Native American, or Hispanics and Latino. The word holds the connotation of an “oppressed group”. The way it is too often utilized minimizes historically marginalized people and promotes erasure. The people who are considered part of “minority groups” are diverse and deserve the proper context. The world is not a place where everyone can nor should be described under one term.”¹⁰

The term minority is an umbrella term attempting to capture many shared experiences. For the expressed interest of this blog, I am going to use the term ‘minority’ to simply describe anyone whose demographic (race, gender, disability, etc) leaves them outnumbered in a group of people. For a moment, let go of the connotations held on from previous definitions of the word.

I am going to take a micro look at the Seattle, WA climbing community in particular. The history of segregation starting with Seattle’s redlining¹¹ shows “[s]egregation was first imposed on Asian Americans, who have outnumbered African Americans through most of Seattle’s history. In the following decades, new tools of segregation would be used to make the boundaries firmer. Racial restrictive covenants (see database and article) and deed restrictions prevented by Blacks, Asians, and often Jews from renting, buying, or occupying property in most parts of the city and surrounding county.”¹² The immoral rounding up of Japanese Americans in 1942 to internment camps ensured the destruction of their community and land ownership, but on the whole the Asian demographics have otherwise been a majority in Seattle.

This is reflected in the climbing community. Hanging out at the climbing gyms on a regular basis, it is difficult not to notice who takes up the space. On any given day, the majority of the gym is made up of whites, followed by Asian descent (mostly Southeast Asian, including Filipino/a but excluding Indigenous Hawaiian/Pacific Islander), followed by a smattering of people who fit into neither category.

White folks have long been defensive when their demographics or behavior have been called out. “[W]hen people of color call attention to their white peers’ casual racism, it is interpreted as an attack on the white person’s entire personhood. Instead of dealing with the specific situation, white people who are called out tend to feel the need to defend themselves, asserting that they are good people so they couldn’t possibly have done something racist.”¹³ Excluding people of color intentionally or unintentionally is a form of racism in and of itself. When someone has stated “Gosh, there are a lot of white people in this space” it is often met with arguments such as “Does that mean you want me to leave?” Of course not! It simply means pass the mic to someone outside of your demographic because you are the majority. As the majority, they have a responsibility to be allies to the minorities that are integrated into the group. That’s what equity and inclusion are all about: listening to the minority whether it be of race, economic status, gender, sexual identity, etc.

Another justification for being defensive used by white people when it’s noted they are the majority demographic in a space is “Well, I struggled. I was poor at one point.” First of all, if the discussion is centered around the conversation of race, socioeconomic status (aka how much wealth/money a person possesses or has possessed) does play a part. However, it is downright insulting for a white person to have it in their mind that all people of color are poor and to compare their struggle as a white person with low income to a person of color with low income, especially Black people¹⁴. Absolutely white people can be and are underprivileged in their socioeconomic status, but we must separate the two categories. “The issue with poverty is that it’s both a cause and a consequence of factors in the economy and society and personal decisions. So you’ll find some groups that have higher poverty rates than others in no small part due to their inability to generate a lot of income on their own as a result of historical, economic, social, and personal factors.”¹⁵ Factors such as non-citizen status, gender, education, people with disabilities, employment, generational wealth, single parenting, and race all play into income. And they all intersect with history, society, and personal factors. And most importantly: socioeconomic status can be changed unlike skin color. People with dark skin color, will have that skin color and all associated treatment of it for the duration of their entire lives due to colorism in the US.

After being clear about why it is important for white people to be mindful of any minority demographics in a group setting, let’s take a look at when those minorities within overall society become the majority within affinity spaces such as dedicated climb nights for racial demographics.

In an effort to get more people of color into climbing, Climbers of Color started POC climb nights a few years ago hoping to shift the racial demographics of the climbing scene in Seattle. To uplift the underrepresented and minorities of the climbing community. How has this effort been going?

Taking a glance at their social media, one cannot help but notice that a large amount of volunteers, course participants, and climb nights are majority of Asian descent. This in and of itself is not offensive: Seattle has a large Asian population (including Filipina/o and excluding Indigenous Hawaiian/Pacific Islander). Within the Seattle area, Asians make up 15.3% of the overall population, Black 7.3%, American Indian/Alaska Native 0.5%, Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander 0.3%, and Hispanic/Latino/a/x 6.7%.¹⁶ Climbing communities are usually a reflection of the overall racial demographic of the surrounding area, save for Black communities where the population is too poor to afford climbing gym fees on land being gentrified.¹⁷ And Asian people deserve a safe space as do all POC. First let’s explore who we are talking about when the term Asian is used.

“The Census Bureau, which uses the OMB standards, defines an Asian person as “a person having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Indian subcontinent…”¹⁸ The term Asian is also problematic as it attempts to encompass a wide range of differing ethnicity such as Chinese, Japanese, Cambodian, Indian, Vietnamese, Korean, Malaysian, Pakistani, of the Philippine Islands, Thai, Hmong, Bangladeshi, Nepalese, Burmese, Indonesian, and Laotian to name a few. Having such a broad term, like the terms to describe POC, leaves people underrepresented with an incorrectly implied homogeneous experience.

The term “Asian” and “Asian American” was actually inspired by the Black Power movement¹⁹ in the 1960’s. The Black Power movement is one of the most successful examples of a varied demographic of people coming together under one umbrella term to make change for human rights to those who had been without. Even within the Black community there is a wide variety of culture, skin color, and socioeconomic status. And in coming together, they were able to build a community and hone their initiatives for change. This movement was also a source of pride: believing in one another and uplifting Black people in the fight against racism.

Adopting this idea from the Black Power movement, the Asian American movement expressed: “Instead, ‘Asian American’ — rather than describing our personally felt identities or describing our family histories — expresses an idea. And that idea is that as Asian Americans, we have to work together to fight for social justice and equality, not only for ourselves, but for all of the people around us.”²⁰ It was a chosen term that became used widely within the United States, especially after the murder and atrocities afflicted upon Vincent Chin.²¹ Before this term was instated, oftentimes different ethnicity of what Americans would deem as Asian today did not see much in common with one another. At the time, all the different ethnicity of the Asian continent in the US were small in number and a minority within the general population.

The use of the term Asian and Asian American as a uniting tool was very effective. On the flip side, it can also encourage those less acquainted with faces of people of color, especially Asian faces, to label an overwhelming amount of people with different a ethnicity as being the same. Having anger toward people about the Coronavirus pandemic has resulted in a blind rage for some toward anyone with an Asian appearance, furthering the misguided stereotype that all Asians look and are the same. It has also been a direct manifestation of the yellow peril rhetoric used to dehumanize Asian people²². This has been most apparent in the 2020 attacks on Asians around the United States, which rose by 76% with more than half the offenders being white and 21% being Black²³. Being Black does not absolve one of being correct or knowing how to relate to other racial demographics. However, if you look at the breakdown of the numbers, “…the actual number of reported incidents targeting people of Asian descent last year was relatively small, with 274 crimes, compared with the number of incidents targeting Black people. In 2020, there were 2,755 reported incidents targeting Black or African American people in the U.S. — a nearly 40% spike from the year before — making them the most targeted racial group by a wide margin, according to the FBI.”²⁴ Also, take note that even this article citing does call the Asian attacks crimes and the Black attacks incidents which implies shared blame with the victim of the actual crime.

None of this is acceptable. Violence against people is never acceptable. The major point to take home is that the 70% spike is a new thing for Asian people in general. There is a history of violence against Asians²⁵ but Asian people have never been as vilified, hunted, and slaughtered in the same way Black people and Indigenous people have in the history of the US. The shock is real, the violence is real, and for a lot of Asians it was a wake up call that unfortunately reminded them that they are still not white. Within history there has always been cases for the fight for assimilation into whiteness ²⁶ because, let’s be real, there is power in whiteness within US society.

In taking these traumas into consideration it can be easy to start a trauma war in which our collective experiences are pitted one against the other to take home the defunct trophy of the most hurt. This is not the intent of this article. The goal of this article is to remind people to be respectful and mindful of what happens when the Asian minority becomes a majority in climbing spaces for POC meant for healing.

The expression of Climbers of Color being majority Asian has been met with responses such as “Does that mean you want me to leave?” and “Well, I struggled. I was poor at one point.” Sound familiar? When Asian people step into a space for POC in Seattle, they generally become the majority demographic in that space. I have already outlined the problematic term Asian, so let’s look at this from a Black and Indigenous perspective and why this shift from minority to majority can be impactful to other racial groups in a negative way.

When climbing in climbing gyms, as a Black cis gender woman I never get anything equivalent to the nod from Asian people. The nod is “a swift yet intimate statement of ethnic solidarity.”²⁷ Seattle freeze aside, I am actually largely ignored by white and Asian people alike in climbing spaces. Having radically different hair, features, speech, and overall demeanor (I’m Haitian, I can get quite loud and excited) makes me stand out in a crowd. I would like to acknowledge my privilege with being light skinned and blending sometimes, however, I am different enough that I do get stared at quite often in climbing spaces in Seattle, without the nod. Read my other article Hip Hop in Climbing: Part V: Snousha²⁸ for more. There is something to be said about finding community and similar people to climb with, but at some point you have to ask: am I only climbing with fellow Asians/people who are similar to me in appearance/culture/ethnicity/race/socioeconomic status? If the answer is overall yes, then as a majority now you are perpetuating what white folks engage in: exclusion (intentional or not). POC only climbing spaces are meant to be building community in a constructive way but also to take in other cultures/races and value them and their views. I do not feel like Climbers of Color climb nights have cultivated this spirit having witnessed several anti-black instances during these events. Unfortunately these instances did not happen to me personally and I do not have consent to share those experiences.

Another Black climb night participant present for other organizations’ BIPoC climb nights has seen similar trends. Shea Freedom²⁹ who has traveled to different climb nights on the West Coast has seen a similar trend of majority Asian participation. “When I said Asians aren’t BIPoC but they are POC, I never expected to be called racist, or be told that I was trying to choose who is and who isn’t marginalized. Especially as a Queer Black Trans man who grew up in foster care. As a Queer Black Trans man climber, I have never met another Black Trans climber. I also have never met a majority Black climbing night: not in Utah, not in Oregon, not in Washington. And my soul is vying, my spirit is dying to be in the presence of other Black people, especially in spaces that are dubbed ‘BIPoC’. I think we ought to call these BIPoC spaces POC spaces because they are not represented in the majority by Black or Indigenous.” Shea shared. It is easy to use the term BIPoC as a blanket all the time, but if there is no one in a space or photo for sure of Black or Indigenous descent, PoC would be the correct term to use.

And what of Indigenous people? An Indigenous climber (who shall remain anonymous) graciously shared with me: “I think how they feel is their own trauma, but that some just didn’t get that they are more privileged and it can be exhausting to be in a “bipoc” community made up of 90% PoC…I think most of why I am embraced in the Asian climbing community is because they mistake me for being asian. 95% of the time they say, oh I thought you were part Asian/[enter whatever country origin they thought]. And then they say “cool!” Ask me 20 questions and then never speak of it again.” This raises several issues: 1. Indigenous peoples are erased due to not being recognized as Indigenous (by no fault of their own usually) and therefore feel invisible already. 2. People who make up the majority in a space need to allow others of different ethnicity/race/culture/gender identity space to talk about themselves. It’s called being an ally.

A big part of an ally is also speaking up to incite true diversity and keep accountability. When certain local boards for climbing are examined, we do see a worrying trend: the most “diversity” on the board is of Asian descent. This is not diversity or inclusion. This is white folks being comfortable with white adjacency in a form they are used to: non black and light skin. A specific example is the Washington Climber’s Coalition (WCC)³⁰: a mostly white run organization with what appears to be an all cis gender board: one Indigenous/Latino man, two Filipino men, one Filipina woman, and one Vietnamese man (not all board members are shown on website, this is from local knowledge). It is commendable the WCC does have one Indigenous person. Although Indigenous people do struggle with being invisible either by being mixed with African ancestry or having light skin that passes as white, at the end of the day skin color does play a part in rating competency, reliability, trustworthiness, and overall humanity. The lighter the skin and/or the closer to European beauty standards, the higher a person is usually rated for employment and board positions³¹. When we look at the Mountaineers board³², a disturbing trend continues: six Asian presenting individuals (two women presenting). Where are all the Black people? Where are all the dark skinned people? We have had this discussion before in my other article Hip Hop in Climbing Part III: “Counterculture”.³³ Who on these boards have done the work to be true allies? The question is begged because it is not being reflected in their board choices.

One theory of boards being made up of a small margin of diversity is socioeconomic status. Admittedly, some Black folks and Indigenous folks do have low income. If an individual is struggling financially they are less likely to take on board positions, especially boards for expensive recreational hobbies such as climbing. Take into account that not every Blank/Indigenous person is interested in climbing and it cuts down options even more. For Asian folks, there are those with lower socioeconomic status, but a majority of Asian people that we are noticing on boards probably have wealth. According to the Census Bureau, Indian Americans make the highest median income of any ethnic group then followed by Filipino/a Americans.³⁴ This is a sweeping generalization, but is also eerily similar to what we do witness on local boards. It is wonderful to have wealth and have the time, energy, and will to volunteer for boards. But without taking a critical look at who is making decisions for organizations, climbing will largely remain un-diverse and non inclusive without true allies who will bring in and advocate for other demographics of race and socioeconomic status.

The power for Asian people comes in the form of them being more easily white adjacent. But in having their own struggles, they also need support as well. “It’s the mix of privilege and exclusion that gives us just enough power to speak up but not enough to gain equitable access to opportunities and safety.”³⁵ Everyone needs a space to be themselves, but not at the expense of other communities of color who are always in the minority.

Climbers of Color’s climb nights leaning heavily toward un-diverse attendees poses a difficult situation. How to ensure a space will have equity and inclusion when the majority is used to being a minority and is new to being an ally in the situation? The key is education: education on Black people and issues, education on Indigenous issues. People of color can hate white supremacy and still be anti-black and/or anti-indigenous. Entering a space especially for POC does not magically make that person anti anything, it takes work and it takes effort. We can only hope the majority participants will take the time to educate themselves as an ally to the minority in the space. We need more solidarity in climbing spaces as allies to one another as people of color.

Resources for education:

158 Rescources to Understand Racism in America

The African Americans: Many Rivers to Cross

Asian Americans on PBS

An Indigenous People’s History of the United States

Local Seattle Climbing Areas Indigenous Tribe-Snoqualmie

Asian and Black Solidarity

Click here to start your education on Hip Hop in Climbing

Works Cited