MILS Anti-Racism & Anti-Bias Statement

MILS condemns the rise in antisemitism, anti-Palestinian racism and Islamophobia in public discourse since the October 7, 2023 attacks of Hamas on Israeli citizens, and the ensuing regional violence. We stand in solidarity with all communities against hatred and violence, and denounce hateful and bias rhetoric and actions of all kinds. Although we realize events are moving quickly, we support the October 9, 2023 and October 17, 2023 statements of the American Bar Association. We join with the ABA in calling on members of the legal community to recognize the humanity of all people, including both Palestinians and Israelis, when commenting on the crisis and to ensure that employees, students, and others can respectfully express their diverse views without fear of retribution

Statement in Solidarity for Racial Justice

We, the Board of Directors of the Mindfulness in Law Society, take a clear and unequivocal stand against systemic racism and injustice by our legal system and add our voices to the growing chorus of compassion sounding across the world -- a chorus of solidarity with the families and communities of those who have lost their lives to racist violence.

We support the Black Lives Matter movement and acknowledge the centuries of violence perpetuated on people who are Black, Brown, and Indigenous People of Color (BBIPOC), all in service of maintaining unearned white privilege. We acknowledge the roots of slavery that underlie the continued trauma and suffering of BBIPOC that has existed for hundreds of years due to racism. 

We honor the lives of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and Rayshard Brooks, killed by law enforcement officers, and Ahmaud Arbery and Atatiana Jefferson and countless others who have died as a result of the violence and hate crimes stemming from racism and constructs of white supremacy. 

We acknowledge that we, personally, have much work to do to retrain our minds and hearts to undo the lifetimes of racist rhetoric and teaching. We vow to work to better understand our prior complicity, conscious or unconscious, and the most skillful, compassionate steps forward to support Black, Brown and Indigenous People of Color in the law. 

We commit to using our specialized knowledge and influence as judges, lawyers, legal professionals, law students, mediators and meditators to effect immediate and positive change. We support and join the brave chorus of protest that will not, and must not, be silent in the face of oppression. Our aim is to influence the legal community to use mindfulness, awareness, kindness, and compassion to change the legal system and thereby help alleviate suffering caused by anti-BBIPOC racism.  

This is within our reach and responsibility because mindfulness is a skill that helps us to notice our thoughts and reactivity and supports us to bring awareness to our emotions, habits and biases. Mindfulness practice heightens awareness to the suffering caused by racism, reorienting us to our universal responsibility to facilitate change. MILS works to help any and all of the individuals who, together, make up the legal system, learn and practice mindfulness, awareness, kindness and compassion. We do so in service of our own hopes that, one day, the system itself can become truly just. It is our aspiration to make it so. 

I have learned to use my anger for good….

Without it, we would not be motivated to rise to a challenge.

It is an energy that compels us to define what is just and unjust.

    -     Gandhi

Law exists for the protection of the people. Why do we protect people? Compassion. That’s my view.

-         The Dalai Lama