Adulting Amy

As I come to the end of another Black History Month,I think about how far we have come in the fight of inequality in our society. But one of the most difficult things to overcome is implicit bias. I did comic about this last year. Unfortunately, this has been a repeated issue in Sheila’s life. Despite being an accomplished law partner, she isn’t received with the same respect as others due to outdated perceptions. As I continue to push through with this comic, one thing I want to do is to feature other cast members, many of whom identify as minorities. While it’s funny to see Amy self-medicate with alcohol or draw TJ in some outlandish costume with a beer in his hand, the last thing I want to do is “tokenize” some of the other characters.

This comic was inspired by a talk given by Michelle Silverthorn, who spoke at my company. She gave some really got into some real nuanced examples on how colleague of color may be seen, and the kind of unknown biases they are up against. Michelle, like Sheila, is a lawyer, and one thing she remarked on was that as you get towards the top of an organization, you see less and less diversity. If someone has less representation in the big leagues, then others cannot envision that person as a peer, so the person has to work that much harder. They will be held to higher standards. Something I have wondered is, when I made mistakes, was I given more grace being a white person? I realized that most of my immediate circle was white, but I have been fortunate to have colleagues, professors, and leaders who were not of the same racial or ethnic background. But perhaps one day, it will be less of a “surprised pikachu” moment when we see people of all backgrounds in high levels of an organization.