Saying hard things in civil rights investigations
Some things are hard to talk about.
There’s a lot going on in our country right now. There’s a lot to talk about race and racial inequity. These very same issues come up when you investigate civil rights complaints, and they’re sensitive and it’s hard to know what to say.
In my work as an investigator I have said a lot of words and phrases that are difficult, sensitive and sometimes shocking.
Typically when I use difficult words or phrases I’m repeating something that was already shared with me verbally or in writing by someone else. I might be asking somebody “Did you say this insert quote here?” or “What specifically did they say to you?” The responses and actual words used are sensitive and charged and hard to say and hard to hear.
Sometimes it’s hard to know how to talk about the facts of a situation you’re investigating without adding hurt, upset, or offending.
I think there are some things you can do to take care of issues of discrimination and harassment while also remaining sensitive.
One of my suggestions includes prefacing saying something that might be difficult or offensive with a statement acknowledging such. You might say, “What I’m going to say might be hard for you to hear and it might be offensive.” Another thing you can do is make sure that you’re stating clearly that you are using a direct quote and you do so ONLY for the purpose of clarity and not to further hurt, harm, or offend.
This is such a worthy discussion right now especially. I think in general people mean well. They don’t want to cause hurt or harm. And it’s difficult to know what to say, if anything, while you’re conducting investigations into issues of civil rights. You will come across words, phrases, and topics that are sensitive and you have to be so mindful that you do your job to carefully find out what happened and help resolve the issue without causing further upset or hurt.
