White Fragility: Introduction Summary & Analysis

Robin DiAngelo, who is a white woman, and her colleague, who is a Black woman, are leading a workplace diversity training workshop. During the workshop, DiAngelo acknowledges that white people hold social and institutional power over people of color. In response, a white man in the room pounds his fists on the table and yells that it’s impossible for white people to get jobs anymore. DiAngelo observes that 38 of the 40 employees in the room are white—only two are people of color. She wonders why the man is so angry, and why the other white people are remaining silent in the face of his outburst.

White people in the United States live in a deeply unequal society, and they benefit from that inequality. As a result, they are insulated from racial stress and feel entitled to their advantage. Any challenge to their racial worldview is seen as a challenge to their identities as good, moral people, and they become defensive, angry, afraid, guilty, and often silent. These responses uphold the existing racial hierarchy because they restore racial comfort and repel any challenge to their worldview. This concept is what DiAngelo terms “white fragility.” It is a powerful means of control and protection of white people’s advantage.

As a diversity trainer, DiAngelo is amazed at how many white people are angry and defensive over the assertion that they are connected to racism. These reactions are especially strange in places where there are few or no people of color in their workplace, or among people who have few relationships with people of color. DiAngelo observes the beliefs that prop up these responses: the idea that only bad people are racist, and that racism only involves intentional acts. But recognizing racism as a system can help white people receive feedback, learn, and grow. However, at the moment, white people often respond with anger and denial rather than gratitude about being informed about problematic behavior so that they can correct it.

Race is a complicated social dilemma that influences every aspects of our lives: where we live, our schools, our friends and partners, our careers, how much money we will earn, and how healthy we will be. DiAngelo’s goal is not to provide the solution to racism or to prove it exists (she starts with that assumption). Instead, her goal is to explain white fragility, how it protects racial inequality, and how to counteract it.