You showed your Whiteness: you don’t get a ‘good’ White people’s medal

The White liberal is a person who finds themselves defined as White, as an oppressor, in short, and retreats in horror from that designation. The desire to be and to be known as a good White person stems from the recognition that Whiteness is problematic, recognition that many White liberals try to escape by being demonstrably different from other, racist Whites. When good White liberals exhibit certain behaviors the expectation becomes a good White people’s medal; through the use of a counternarrative, our attempt is to problematize the good White person’s identity and subsequent reward that many expect because of some deed or some political stance they made.