I just came across this video (c/o Sylwia B), where Bell discusses white responses to racist acts by white people:
A lot of people in this country, predominantly white people, get focussed on racism as individual acts that are debated: was this racist? Was this not racist? And even if they it is racist, they go, ‘That was racist, let’s fix that racism.’ But they’re not thinking about fixing [gestures broadly] racism.
I feel like this has happened with Ksenia Parkhatskaya, who has recently been confirmed to teach at Drag the Blues, a blues dance event in Barcelona. She has become the target for vitriol (because she’s the clear ‘example’ of racism), when the bigger issue is why organisers in Europe hire this sort of racist, and why white dancers are happy to overlook racism in their teachers when they go to events. It’s as though they think ‘Well, she got called out, she apologised, now it’s fixed. And anyway she’s a nice person/amazing dancer and I want to be like her and do her classes so I’ll support this event anyway.’
She’s had the opportunity to commit multiple offensive acts _because_ people keep hiring her and giving her a platform.
So if you are hiring her, you are not only condoning her thinking and actions, you are also enabling it, and providing her with a platform and status that _consolidates_ her status. Because we see this happen with various high profile dancers around the world (eg William Mauvais making a literal nazi salute at a huge public event _and still getting hired again_; known rapists being publicly reported _and still getting hired again__), the real problem isn’t so much the interchangeable individuals, but the systems and institutions that structure our dance communities.
