Don’t shut people down.
The point of being an ally is to leave space, to make space, for others.
It isn’t appropriate to shut people down just because you disagree with them, or you don’t understand their perspective—especially if you haven’t really heard them out.
Claiming to be an ally, when it suits you or improves your image because others are watching, that’s performative allyship—not the real deal.
Proceeding to decide for others what they should think or how they should feel, that’s the opposite of being an ally.
Others will have a different lived experience than you. The perspective of folks with minority (or socially perceived minority) identities may not reflect the majority worldview, it’s likely they won’t. That’s kind of the point.
Their thoughts, feelings, and perspectives are valid, but society doesn’t necessarily give them much, if any, room to share those thoughts.
The job of an ally is to make space for others, to hear what they have to share—especially if their perspective is different than yours.
It’s okay to not understand, or to be confused, that’s part of the learning process.
If anything, ask for clarification, if you don’t quite understand something that’s been said, rather than partially hearing what others have to say, then immediately shutting down, tuning them out, correcting their view point, or ignoring their thoughts all together.
That isn’t the behaviour of an ally.
Being an ally involves stepping into a commitment to learn—to learn about the systemic disadvantages that others are faced with, to learn how their voices aren’t heard enough.
In order to learn, it’s necessary to make space for others, to hear what they have to say and share, to listen to those voices—the ones that society has a tendency to marginalise or overlook.
Heck, why not level up?
Become an accomplice. Take the learning you’ve acquired and actually do something with it.
An accomplice seeks to use what privilege they have to actively reduce and remove the barriers that others face.
But before one can get there, it’s imperative to learn how to listen.
Listening is how we learn, and listening to the lived experiences others have, to their views and their needs, is exactly the learning that must happen, before any meaningful action can be taken.
So, whether you’re an ally or an accomplice, at this point, listening is always a worthy skill to develop—it’s the first step to learning, understanding, and knowing how to help.
Because being an ally or accomplice isn’t about an identity you hold—it’s about what you do, it’s about how well you listen to the voices of others.