Uncomfortable Truths Are the Only Ones That Heal

I am always struck by the complexity of how deeply I relate to the vignettes, stories, and voices from diverse racial and cultural backgrounds. There is a perception I constantly have to reframe: many people around me including those I love, have never had to face their internalized cultural racism. I have often struggled with the language to explain what I was sensing (Holt et al., 2022). That awareness has shaped me, protected me, and harmed me in countless ways.

The readings from my SW school assignments constantly validate for me that oppression is not only blatant acts of discrimination, it is embedded in everyday structures such as workplaces, schools, grocery stores, and social policies that privilege some while harming others (Baines, 2022). Anti-oppressive practitioners argue that these harms must be examined at micro, mezzo, and macro levels, because oppression persists not only through actions of individuals but through institutions and systems that reproduce unequal access to safety, belonging, and resources (Butler, 2013). That truth resonates with the way I experience the world the constant noticing of what others prefer to ignore.

Even this week, in one of my practicum meetings, I experienced these dynamics firsthand. There was a “big gaping wound in the room” and no one addressed it (Baines, 2022). The silence felt suffocating, and it impacted me deeply. The framework of anti-oppressive practice makes it clear that nothing in social work is politically neutral; failing to name injustice allows harm to continue. Something I learned that I hadn’t fully connected before is that social work ethics do not allow us to simply be “not racist.” Anti-racist action is a professional requirement, not a personal preference. That shifted my understanding of what accountability looks like in practice. When someone is willing to speak the uncomfortable truth, others, especially fellow social workers and people of power, we have an ethical responsibility to respond, support, and amplify, rather than retreat into safety or silence. I keep seeing people in “authority” in social work, be silent or oppress each other unconsciously.

I have come to realize that I am one of those truth-tellers. I used to believe that was only the role of public figures such as the authors, speakers, and women I’ve admired all my life. But the literature reminds me that anti-oppressive practice is rooted in everyday frontline resistance and in refusing to minimize or individualize social problems just to maintain comfort (Cross-Denny, 2022). I learned that my neurodivergent communication style is not a barrier to justice work (Holt et al., 2022)  it can actually be a strength. The readings helped me see that directness and truth-telling can interrupt oppressive silence rather than cause harm, which reframes something I once viewed as something that made me “broken”. Truth-telling is not an act of aggression or harm; it is an act of solidarity and healing that can disrupt generational trauma and open pathways toward justice.

At times, my neurodivergence may play a role in my in ability to pretend that everything is fine when it is not. But I increasingly understand that what others call “politically incorrect” is often just naming the elephant in the room before it crushes someone more vulnerable (Holt et al., 2022). Avoidance only protects privilege.

The texts highlight that when practitioners individualize social issues through labels, diagnoses, or bureaucratic distance we depoliticize suffering and ignore the root causes of inequality (Cross-Denny, 2022). When we say nothing…when we play nice…when we protect people from discomfort instead of confronting oppressive conditions…we become part of the problem (Baines, 2022).

Silence is not neutral.

Silence becomes the mechanism that keeps oppression intact.

The resources provided as well as my own search for more emphasize that anti-racist practice is not optional (Menakem, 2017). Social workers can be expected to oppose racism overtly, not just internally acknowledge that it exists. There is no safe middle ground of believing oneself to be “not racist.” If inequity is allowed to persist unchallenged, then racism remains unchallenged and that causes real and ongoing harm.

That is why my tolerance for “social niceties” has grown thin, I have spent a life time playing multiple parts to keep others comfortable. But I feel a deep responsibility to speak honestly not to shame or wound others, but to bring forward the truth that can allow healing to begin. The history of social work shows that progress has always come from those who dared to resist, to advocate, to disrupt patterns of silence, to build consciousness and community power from the ground up (Finn, 2021). When I deny that part of myself to avoid reactions from others, I feel the weight of that suppression physically and emotionally. It is suffocating and bone achingly sad. It fundamentally contradicts the very reason I am in this profession.

I recognize that the people who once told me to stay quiet, even when motivated by protection or their version of love, were unintentionally harming me. They feared the backlash I might receive for resisting oppression. But the harm of being forced into silence was worse. Staying quiet dulled my integrity, and disconnected me from the very sense of justice that has always been a core truth of who I am.

I am no longer willing to perpetuate that harm, not to myself, and not to others.

Being a social worker is a passion, a calling and a drive and requires courage, accountability, humility, and the willingness to engage in discomfort (Gibran, 1923). It calls us to confront the painful realities that shape lived experience, while believing that transformation is not only possible but necessary. Perpetuating yesterdays harms, with silence today, continues to feed the soil of tomorrows harm.

I know now that my truth-telling is not a failure of professionalism. It is part of the lineage of social workers who refuse to look away. It is how I honor my commitment to this field, to my clients, and to the possibility of a more just tomorrow.

Baines, D. (2022). Doing Anti-Oppresive Actions: Chapter 1- Introduction| Anti-Oppresive Social Work Practice (4th ed.). Fernwood Publishing.

Butler, S. (Director). (2013, September 30). Cracking the Codes- The system of Racial Inequity [YouTube]. Perelta Colleges. https://youtu.be/0OU_rH0OpbY?si=3faIFdwrRDc3sD1Z

Cross-Denny, B. (2022). Integrated Social Work Practice Book. Cognella Academic Publishing.

Finn, J. L. (2021). Just practice: A social justice approach to social work (Fourth edition). Oxford University Press.

Gibran, K. (1923). The Prophet. Knopf.

Holt, A., Bounekhla, K., Welch, C., & Polatajko, H. (2022). “Unheard minds, again and again”: Autistic insider perspectives and theory of mind. Disability and Rehabilitation, 44(20), 5887–5897. https://doi.org/10.1080/09638288.2021.1949052

Menakem, R. (2017). My grandmother’s hands: Racialized trauma and the pathway to mending our hearts and bodies. Central Recovery Press.