Kaya Oakes thoughtfully explores forgiveness through the lens of victims in her book Not So Sorry
Rev. Carol Howard wrote of the book:
“Kaya Oakes challenges those slippery, PR-constructed apologies that leave us rolling our eyes. But she does more than that. Throughout Not So Sorry, Kaya Oakes listens to the voices of victims, allows us to wrestle with our assumptions, and leads us on a path to restore justice.”
In her own words, here is Kaya Oakes’s Book Notes music playlist for her book Not So Sorry:
When we ask someone for forgiveness, what do we really want, and what are we actually asking for? When the #MeToo movement surged, I started to notice a pattern in the many apologies issued by celebrities, politicians, athletes, church leaders and everyday people who’d been exposed as abusers. In asking for forgiveness, they were often vague about what exactly they were going to do in order to change. Oftentimes, mealy-mouthed statements about “working on myself” only led to their re-emergence a few weeks or months later. It was often as if nothing had actually happened.
And what goes on in the mind of the person who was abused when they’re asked to forgive? Our more open conversations about mental health and trauma mean that we’re also more articulate about internal processes of coming to decisions about forgiveness, but we still hear from the wrong-doers far more often than we hear from those who were harmed. As it turns out, for abuse victims, granting forgiveness puts the onus on revisiting the harm on them. And that can not only be painful, if forgiveness is granted, it often leads to abusers continuing to abuse.
When I began reporting and doing research on how Americans talk about forgiveness, these patterns of abuse followed by vague pleas for forgiveness became starkly clear. And it happens not only on an interpersonal basis, but in our national conversations about race, reparations, genocide, power, guilt, religion, and gender. Not So Sorry is the culmination of years of writing and thinking about what we really believe about forgiveness, and how those beliefs have been warped by historical wrongs, power dynamics, America’s Puritan religious roots, and our obsession with the notion of clean slates.
So how do we put a soundtrack to all of that? I took a lot of long walks while writing and editing this book and preparing for its publication, and a few songs would often loop in my head. It’s not a long list, but it’s one that I hope will offer potential readers a glimpse into how music can offer us some alternatives to reflexive “I’m sorry” statements.
Peter Gabriel, Solsbury Hill
I’m not actually much of a Peter Gabriel listener (like a lot of Gen Xers, I’d sigh every time MTV replayed the “Sledgehammer” video, which happened at least a dozen times a day). But a closer listen to the lyrics of this song reveal Gabriel’s quest to break away from the past in an unapologetic fashion. He’s leaving people behind, and he’s not sorry about it.
Kendrick Lamar, Bitch Don’t Kill My Vibe
”I am a sinner, probably gonna sin again.” And he’s not sorry about it.
Fleetwood Mac, Silver Springs
Recently I heard this song on the soapy teen show The Summer I Turned Pretty (terrible title, and I’m embarrassed to admit I watch it), and it was a reminder that every generation reinvents Fleetwood Mac in its own image. But on an album full of “fuck you” songs this one stands out for Stevie Nicks’ refusal to be apologetic about her feelings. Lindsey Buckingham sucks anyway.
Frank Ocean, White Ferrari
It’s a great breakup song, and if breakups don’t get us to think about apologies, we’re probably dead inside.
Leonard Cohen (covered by Anhoni and the Johnsons), If It Be Your Will
Some years ago I went to see the documentary I’m Your Man, which featured a tribute concert where a bunch of musicians covered Leonard Cohen songs. The covers are mostly terrible but Anhoni’s ethereal, unearthly voice is the perfect partner for some of Cohen’s most searching lyrics about God (however you define God) and human suffering. What’s more human than feeling remorse?
Joni Mitchell, Hejira
I hate the clarinet solo on this song just as much as I love the lines “we’re only particles of change I know/orbiting around the sun/ but how can I have that point of view/ when I’m always bound and tied to someone.” Perfection from an artist who’s unapologetically herself whether we like it or not.
D’Angelo, The Charade
America’s original sin of slavery and racism returned to the forefront of our national conversations in 2020, and D’Angelo, who’d been cooking up an album for years, had enough and decided to release Black Messiah just as thousands of hollow apologies were being offered for racism. This song, with its heavy Prince musical influences, sounds groovy and fun until you listen to the lyrics: “all we wanted was a chance to talk, instead we got outlined in chalk.” A brutal reminder that our country has never really apologized or atoned for slavery in a meaningful way and that the consequences play out every day.
Stevie Wonder, Heaven Is Ten Zillion Light Years Away
This book is hard on American Christianity’s notion that forgiveness is always owed, no matter how painful the harm done has been for the victim. But I often listened to this song while writing it, because Stevie Wonder makes the case that we can reclaim God (or whatever our higher power might be) and reclaim a God of justice. And I’m no theologian, but I think that God wouldn’t want us to go around offering hollow and meaningless apologies to one another. Because that’s not actually being sorry for hurting someone, it’s being sorry for yourself.
also at Largehearted Boy:
Kaya Oakes’s playlist for her book The Defiant Middle
Kaya Oakes’s playlist for her book Radical Reinvention
Kaya Oakes’s playlist for her book Slanted and Enchanted
Kaya Oakes is a journalist and author of several books, including The Nones Are Alright and Radical Reinvention. She teaches writing at UC Berkeley and is a contributing writer for America magazine and speaks on topics related to religion, writing, and feminism from coast to coast and abroad. Her work has received multiple awards, with her essays and journalism appearing in The Guardian, Slate, Foreign Policy, The Washington Post, and On Being. She was born and raised in Oakland, California, where she still lives.