Anti-Racism Task Force | Well Clinic, San Francisco

We are part of a society where the lives of Black, Indigenous, and other People of Color continue to be blighted by structural racism, lack of opportunity, health disparities, and direct violence by agents of the state and others. Organizations and businesses, including our own, have for too long been complacent or complicit.

Well Clinic has failed throughout its history to appropriately center the role of racism inside the profession of psychotherapy as well as inside our own organization. Our leadership is all white and our staff is majority white. We have been complicit in the ways that racism has continued to operate and dominate American culture and the marketplace we exist in.

We feel deep sorrow, regret, and humility in waking up to this and acknowledging it. We probably can not fully understand the harm that we have caused as a result, but we are engaged in learning and bring as much consciousness as we can to this ongoing process of advocating for BIPOC by committing to and being vocal about anti-racism.

As a community of healing professionals, we firmly support defunding the police.

It is clear that an institution with its origins as the Slave Patrol simply can not be part of a just and equitable society. Not only does it materially endanger the lives of Black people specifically, and has since its inception, but it also represents a way of viewing people and problems in society that is harmful to everyone.

The interlocking systems that create the majority of what the police are dispatched to address are solvable and as a society, we have an ethical obligation to heal, repair and not to perpetrate new trauma on already marginalized and traumatized members of our community.

To this, we have created a document that aims to provide resources as alternatives to calling the police for those located in the San Francisco and East Bay areas. You can download it here.

We are committed to installing anti-racism into the blueprint of our operations.

Well Clinic hereby affirms and pledges more fully, to act in solidarity with those who are targets of this violence and inequity in their everyday lives. We have therefore pledged the following concrete action steps to embody our affirmation that Black Lives, Black Minds, Black Education, and Black Health, Matter – and we will continue to publish updates to this list as we accomplish certain objectives and create new ones.