Speaker 1: Good morning, peeps, and welcome to wok F Daily with
Speaker 1: Meet Your Girl Danielle Moody, Recording from the Home Bunker. Folks,
Speaker 1: I'm very excited to welcome back to woke a F Daily,
Speaker 1: friend of the show and colleague on Outspoken for iHeart
Speaker 1: Bridget Todd, who is the host of There Are No
Speaker 1: Girls on the Internet. And Bridgitte and I get into
Speaker 1: a really interesting conversation as we enter into the last
Speaker 1: week of Pride Pride month, but not the last week
Speaker 1: of Pride, where we're talking about, you know, artificial intelligence,
Speaker 1: which you cannot escape a segment or news story headline
Speaker 1: these days without somebody talking about artificial intelligence and chat
Speaker 1: GPT and whether or not we think that AI is
Speaker 1: going to destroy the world or whether we think that
Speaker 1: it's going to be something that is going to aid
Speaker 1: in our progress. And the conversation that I get into
Speaker 1: with bridget is one that I've been grappling with in
Speaker 1: my mind for quite some time, which is that if
Speaker 1: the people right behind these technological advances are of the
Speaker 1: same mind, meaning are the same white cysts, hetero, you know,
Speaker 1: male people, If they're still the same people that are
Speaker 1: in control, then how do we not think that bias, discrimination,
Speaker 1: outright bigotry is going to be embedded in these new systems, right, Like,
Speaker 1: we continue to believe and look at different advancements and
Speaker 1: think like this is going to be the thing that
Speaker 1: takes us to the next level, But we haven't fundamentally
Speaker 1: dealt with the shit that has kept us, the country,
Speaker 1: and the world under the thumb, under the knee of
Speaker 1: white supremacy. Right. So when we have these conversations, and
Speaker 1: you know, I reference in my talk with bridget about
Speaker 1: a Netflix documentary that I've talked about on WKF before
Speaker 1: called Coded Bias, that was on Netflix. You know, when
Speaker 1: we talk about technology, when we talk about you know,
Speaker 1: these technocrats, it is still white, cis hetero men that
Speaker 1: are in control of the future, right, And they are
Speaker 1: the same ones that are in control of our past.
Speaker 1: And what do I mean by that, Well, look no
Speaker 1: further than Governor Ron DeSantis and Greg Abbott and others
Speaker 1: who are dictating what it is students and people in
Speaker 1: their state can learn about and know about our nation's history.
Speaker 1: So when you have this same biased, racist, misogynistic, homophobic, transphobic,
Speaker 1: islamophobic people and that mentality that is still in charge.
Speaker 1: How do you think that we advance out of racism.
Speaker 1: It's like this idea which is so fucking stupid that like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: when the racists die off, they don't they fucking reproduce, right,
Speaker 1: They groom their children in their ideology, then they rise
Speaker 1: up and they get into positions of power, and they
Speaker 1: continue to blanket society through their industry in that ideology.
Speaker 1: So it's like, if you don't get to the root,
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter what is born on the tree, because
Speaker 1: it's always going to be fucking poisonous. And that's the
Speaker 1: thing in America that we continue to just not get right,
Speaker 1: like we never want to go to the root of anything.
Speaker 1: And that was my same understanding with you know, talking
Speaker 1: about the Juneteenth Holiday, it's like you want to give
Speaker 1: a federal holidays something that you don't even understand. People
Speaker 1: want to say, oh, well, they were just the enslaved
Speaker 1: were just late in finding out. No, it was a strategy.
Speaker 1: It was part of keeping people enslaved and tied to production.
Speaker 1: So it was about money and free labor. We continue
Speaker 1: to have conversations about, you know, oh, should we have
Speaker 1: reparations or should we not? And who is having that
Speaker 1: commra who gets to decide the very people whose ancestors
Speaker 1: did the fucking instructions and the very people who got
Speaker 1: to benefit from the torture and the rape and the
Speaker 1: enslavement and the selling off of humans, and the breaking
Speaker 1: up of family, the breaking up of culture, the wiping
Speaker 1: away of history of knowing. So until we want to
Speaker 1: have real conversations about power, until we want to have
Speaker 1: real conversations about the root of the root, than anything,
Speaker 1: anything that is about quote unquote technological advancement or human
Speaker 1: advancement is always gonna be steeped in the shit we
Speaker 1: refuse to discuss, recognize, and acknowledge. So coming up next,
Speaker 1: my conversation with podcast host Bridget Todd. Folks, I am
Speaker 1: so excited to welcome back to wok f our friend
Speaker 1: Bridget Todd, who is the creator and host. There are
Speaker 1: no girls on the Internet, Bridget Happy Pride.
Speaker 2: Happy Pride, Danielle, thank you for having me here. I'm
Speaker 2: so excited to be back one of my favorite shows.
Speaker 1: I love when you come on. I'm so excited that
Speaker 1: you two are on outspoken and on iHeart. I think
Speaker 1: that they are doing a really great job in terms
Speaker 1: of finding such diverse talent, showcasing, you know, the breadth
Speaker 1: and depth of the community. So I'm very excited about
Speaker 1: that and to have you back. So I want to
Speaker 1: jump in first with talking about the thing that has
Speaker 1: been keeping me up at night, which is AI, Artificial intelligence.
Speaker 1: Everybody is all hip and in love with chat GPT.
Speaker 1: It is making life so very easy. But funny enough,
Speaker 1: a group of CEOs ranging from I think it is
Speaker 1: Coca Cola to Xerox to Zoom CEOs gathered together for
Speaker 1: a Yale summit and forty two per They did a poll,
Speaker 1: and forty two percent of them believe that AI is
Speaker 1: going to cause our inventing doom, you know, the end
Speaker 1: of society as we know it, in the next five
Speaker 1: to ten years, not the next fifty years, the next
Speaker 1: five to ten. And so I wanted to talk to
Speaker 1: you about all of the conversation around AI, the politics
Speaker 1: around trying to regulate, trying to have our Octanegerian politicians
Speaker 1: regulate something when they barely understand social media. So, you know,
Speaker 1: please give me your thoughts on all things.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, what a good topic. I don't even
Speaker 2: know where to start. I guess I would say it's
Speaker 2: kind of a good news bad news situation. In my book,
Speaker 2: I think that I at first was coming from a
Speaker 2: place very much where you're coming from too, write this
Speaker 2: idea of like, oh my god, I'm hearing that AI
Speaker 2: might change everything, we might all be out of jobs,
Speaker 2: that might cause our our our doom. Not in one
Speaker 2: hundred years, but in five years. But I actually did
Speaker 2: a really interesting interview with a tech critic named Paris
Speaker 2: Marx who hosts the podcast Tech Won't Save Us, and
Speaker 2: that interview really helped me put things in perspectives. One
Speaker 2: of the things that they said was that AI, the
Speaker 2: people who make that technology, kind of need for there
Speaker 2: to be a big hype cycle where even if we're
Speaker 2: talking about it in terms of doom and gloom, that
Speaker 2: is actually helpful for them because it helps them market
Speaker 2: this idea that AI is going to change everything. AI
Speaker 2: is going to take all of our jobs. AI is
Speaker 2: going to be this big shift in all of our
Speaker 2: thinking and the way that we do everything. Even if
Speaker 2: it's even if we're talking about it in a way
Speaker 2: that is scary, that seems alarmist, that is actually good
Speaker 2: for them because it helps us all get comfortable with
Speaker 2: this idea that AI is is here to stay. We're
Speaker 2: all gonna have to get comfortable with it. It's kind
Speaker 2: of if you look at the way that people talked
Speaker 2: about cryptocurrency, maybe like a couple of years earlier, it
Speaker 2: was a similar kind of hype cycle where it was
Speaker 2: very easy to believe this is going to change everything financially,
Speaker 2: you know, a couple of years from now, we're all
Speaker 2: going to be using crypto, our bank's going to be
Speaker 2: using crypto. That didn't really pan out, And so it
Speaker 2: is important to think about in what ways are we
Speaker 2: all feeding into, like a really common hype cycle by
Speaker 2: get just sort of like giving into the idea that
Speaker 2: AI is going to change everything. So that's one. So
Speaker 2: I don't think there's a need to be quite so
Speaker 2: doom and gloom, although I completely get where that comes from. However,
Speaker 2: here's the bad news, which is that AHI most certainly
Speaker 2: is going to change a lot of things, right, And
Speaker 2: one of the things that Paris told me is that
Speaker 2: they believe quite strongly that AI is simply going to
Speaker 2: it's not going to replace workers. It's just going to
Speaker 2: make life more miserable for workers. So you'll have more
Speaker 2: survengeous of workers. You'll have more expectations of workers. You'll
Speaker 2: have workers being paid less for the work they've been
Speaker 2: doing already. You'll have knowledge like knowledge workers having that
Speaker 2: work be devalued because the people who make financial decisions think, oh, well,
Speaker 2: AI can do it better, even though we're not quite
Speaker 2: there yet. Right. If you ask chat GPT to write
Speaker 2: an episode of woke af, you probably laugh at what
Speaker 2: they came up with. Right, So they still need commentators, podcasters,
Speaker 2: knowledge workers like you and I, Right, And so one
Speaker 2: of the things I really do think is that when
Speaker 2: the people who make decisions about how money is made,
Speaker 2: how people are employed, what their employment looks like, when
Speaker 2: they are buying into hype cycles around AI and what
Speaker 2: it can do, that's when I really get worried. And
Speaker 2: it's kind of exactly what you're saying. I don't think that,
Speaker 2: you know, our lawmakers really have enough understanding of AI
Speaker 2: to be making laws that will actually regulate it. I
Speaker 2: don't know if you saw a bunch of lawmakers were
Speaker 2: pulled the head of chat GBT, Sam Altman, in for
Speaker 2: a hearing, and before that hearing, they reportedly had a
Speaker 2: dinner where Sam was showing these lawmakers all these different
Speaker 2: tricks that A I could do, and it seemed like
Speaker 2: like a trade show, right, and they were all really
Speaker 2: like oohing and eyeing, and so you know, that's a
Speaker 2: much more cozy relationship between people who are meant to
Speaker 2: be regulating and the people who make the thing that
Speaker 2: is meant to be being regulated that I would like
Speaker 2: to see. And so it's not all I don't think
Speaker 2: that you necessarily need to be coming from a place
Speaker 2: of like doom and gloom. But it's not all good
Speaker 2: because we know the people who make decisions, the people
Speaker 2: who are supposed to be, you know, regulating this technology,
Speaker 2: we really can't always trust them to make decisions that
Speaker 2: are good for all of us, you know.
Speaker 1: And I think that one of the things that you
Speaker 1: bring up that is worth unpacking too is about workers, right,
Speaker 1: And you're talking about knowledge workers versus you know, I
Speaker 1: guess hands on workers, factory workers, delivery type people who
Speaker 1: we write we at one time we wanted to say,
Speaker 1: during the pandemic, these people were what were they essential? Right?
Speaker 1: But we don't pay them like they're essential, and we
Speaker 1: don't respect them like they are essential. But nonetheless that
Speaker 1: when it comes to more information, more knowledge based kinds
Speaker 1: of careers and professions, those will not be at risk
Speaker 1: yet because the technology just is not there. To your
Speaker 1: point about podcasting, to the point about writing a sonnet,
Speaker 1: or you know, developing something that does require creativity innovation,
Speaker 1: but not just the know how of doing it, but
Speaker 1: really the intellectual strategy and understanding of how to do it.
Speaker 1: AI is not strategizing, right, it is just doing and
Speaker 1: pulling information. But when we look at these more skilled
Speaker 1: hands on jobs. If I'm looking at an Amazon factory,
Speaker 1: for instance, right, if I'm looking at a Starbucks for instance,
Speaker 1: there is something to be concerned about with what happens
Speaker 1: to those jobs. Right if I'm building a world where
Speaker 1: smart cars God willing, hopefully not the ones Elon Musk built,
Speaker 1: but where the smart cars are now the Amazon driver
Speaker 1: and delivery person, where I'm going into seven to eleven
Speaker 1: or any convenience store and instead of having a checkout person,
Speaker 1: they're all just one personed right where I can go
Speaker 1: in and do this. And this already exists in Japan,
Speaker 1: it already exists in parts of in parts of Asia.
Speaker 1: What do you think then happens to those workers and
Speaker 1: how do we even if it's not about setting the
Speaker 1: guardrails yet of this future technology that's here, but we
Speaker 1: don't under really understand the implications of the damage that
Speaker 1: it can do. We're only being told really about the
Speaker 1: pomp pond look at this, you know, good things. How
Speaker 1: do we talk about it from a worker's perspective and
Speaker 1: the harm that can happen to our economy.
Speaker 2: That's exactly the conversation that we need to be having.
Speaker 2: I think that you're exactly right. I think we're seeing
Speaker 2: so many people get really wrapped up in the rah
Speaker 2: rah or even the I think the other side of
Speaker 2: that coin is the real doom and gloom and erasing
Speaker 2: the fact that it is workers who are the ones
Speaker 2: who I think are going to be impacted. And so
Speaker 2: what I really get concerned about is people who make
Speaker 2: decisions being swept up in the ra ra ai hype
Speaker 2: cycle and then thinking, oh, well, we could have a
Speaker 2: robot car replace the Amazon delivery driver, we can have
Speaker 2: a robot barista replace the human barista, without thinking about
Speaker 2: all of the ways that that is not one going
Speaker 2: to threaten workers make all of our lives more miserable
Speaker 2: because the technology is not there yet. And so I
Speaker 2: really think that breaking out of these hype cycles is
Speaker 2: super important and making sure that the people who are
Speaker 2: signing the checks, hiring the workers, making the decisions, you know,
Speaker 2: really understand that when we talk about technology it really
Speaker 2: has to come from a place of people first, and
Speaker 2: that means breaking away from the hype cycle that can
Speaker 2: be so tempting to get wrapped up in. But you're
Speaker 2: exactly right. I think that the people who are the
Speaker 2: most that threatened by this are human workers, and so
Speaker 2: making sure that we have conversations that are centered in
Speaker 2: that reality that are not just pie in the sky
Speaker 2: science fiction, you know. But again, it is so easy
Speaker 2: to get swept up in that. I think a lot
Speaker 2: of our lawmakers have gotten swept up in that. I
Speaker 2: think a lot of the people who make decisions and
Speaker 2: write checks, and like the ones who are who have power,
Speaker 2: I think that we were already in a place where
Speaker 2: they have just abandoned this understanding of how can we
Speaker 2: have this conversation in a way that centers people, humans
Speaker 2: and workers. You know.
Speaker 1: The other thing too, And I believe that we've talked
Speaker 1: about this before when I've had you on in the
Speaker 1: documentary Netflix documentary Coded Bias, right, there were all sorts
Speaker 1: of conversation about how we are literally coding bias, taking
Speaker 1: what we know as racial discrimination, misogyny, you know, anti blackness,
Speaker 1: anti LGBTQ, plus you know, sentiments and placing them, right,
Speaker 1: we're making them technologically advanced and so again in order
Speaker 1: to protect what I see just on its face already crumbling, right,
Speaker 1: like our morals and our values as a country, the
Speaker 1: dignity and respect that all people are deserving. And then
Speaker 1: we're looking to the future and I'm just like, who
Speaker 1: you think is creating this technology? It's like, so how
Speaker 1: do we also know? It's like you had these billionaires
Speaker 1: that we're doing their rocket ship race to get you know,
Speaker 1: to get to out of space, and I'm like, all
Speaker 1: you're doing with this dick measuring contest is gonna export,
Speaker 1: you know, into the atmosphere, like export off the planet.
Speaker 1: The racism, the misogyny and hatred that is here.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, if I like yes, so if yes, yes, yes,
Speaker 2: this is what keeps me up that night. Right. First
Speaker 2: of all, these are the people who, for whatever reason,
Speaker 2: believe that they should be in charge of shaping what
Speaker 2: the future looks like for all of us. The fact
Speaker 2: that we are being told that if our planet does
Speaker 2: not survive because of climate collapse, we need to put
Speaker 2: all of our collective futures into the hands of Elon
Speaker 2: Musk to take us to another planet. Oh dear, are
Speaker 2: you kidding me? Are you kidding me? And it's exactly
Speaker 2: what you said. I think that the tech billionaires, who,
Speaker 2: let's be real, are mostly cis, mostly straight, mostly white.
Speaker 2: These are the people who would like us to believe
Speaker 2: that the technology that they build is neutral. It's just
Speaker 2: the technology doesn't have any bias, right, but right I
Speaker 2: know is that's complete. BS. Technology is not neutral. It
Speaker 2: comes coded into it all the different biases homophobia, transphobia, misogyny, racism,
Speaker 2: fat phobia, all of those different things are coded into
Speaker 2: that technology. And so until we get to a place
Speaker 2: where those people are able to really see and like
Speaker 2: meaningfully grapple with all of the ways that they are
Speaker 2: propagating these bad things in our society and building it
Speaker 2: into the technology and then being able to be like, oh, well,
Speaker 2: it's neutral, Like the technology can't be racist. We know
Speaker 2: that's BS. Until we do that, we will never actually
Speaker 2: meaningfully get a handle on this. And yeah, I think
Speaker 2: that when it comes to AI, there are so many examples.
Speaker 2: Even if anybody listening played with things like the lensa
Speaker 2: app where you fed in a couple of selfies and
Speaker 2: it gave you AI generated images of yourself, we'll come
Speaker 2: to find out though it wasn't AI generated necessarily. A
Speaker 2: lot of that was just pulling from existing images out.
Speaker 1: On the web.
Speaker 2: And so when black women fed their selfies into it,
Speaker 2: some of them would say, oh, they made my features
Speaker 2: look a lot more European, they lighten my skin, or
Speaker 2: they made me more kind of conventionally attractive. That's not
Speaker 2: coming from nowhere. That's coming from us humans. And so
Speaker 2: until we as humans get to handle on these you know,
Speaker 2: negative things and dynamics in our society, it is simply
Speaker 2: going to be like recreated and made that much worse
Speaker 2: by this technology. And it's such a drag because this
Speaker 2: technology could be so powerful if the people who are
Speaker 2: making it actually did examine that, and it could I
Speaker 2: could imagine all kinds of ways it could be used
Speaker 2: to break away from these harmful binaries and biases. But
Speaker 2: it's not until these people really examine these biases and
Speaker 2: how they are are replicating them. We're just going to
Speaker 2: continue replicating the same harmful crap that we already see
Speaker 2: in society.
Speaker 1: And I think that that's right. I think that the
Speaker 1: you know, much like anything right, that the people who
Speaker 1: have the power to create them, their product is only
Speaker 1: as good as their intentions, right, And so you can't
Speaker 1: create from a place of neutrality because there is no neutrality, right,
Speaker 1: not in this country, not in the world. And so
Speaker 1: unless you're going to do some real internal examination of
Speaker 1: self and how your own lens you know, sheds light
Speaker 1: on how you see others, it is going to be
Speaker 1: you are going to continue to code in bias right,
Speaker 1: without having any type of intentionality around it. And I
Speaker 1: do you know, I'm not. I mean, I am a
Speaker 1: doom and gloomer, but I also am somebody that has
Speaker 1: seen the ways in which technology obviously has been able
Speaker 1: to bridge disability gaps, build you know, build community that
Speaker 1: wouldn't normally have been right to be able to expose
Speaker 1: people to images, movements, and issues outside of their own
Speaker 1: front door. We got that, you know, that connectivity because
Speaker 1: of technology. And it's just it worries me because these billionaires,
Speaker 1: the ones that are in control, these technocrats, are not
Speaker 1: ones with solid intentions about bettering humanity. And that's where
Speaker 1: I think, like the conversation needs to.
Speaker 2: Be absolutely I would even go further. I agree that
Speaker 2: they are not people who are meaningfully interested in bettering
Speaker 2: society and using their technology to do that. I would
Speaker 2: argue that what some of these people see as a good, full,
Speaker 2: meaningful life is so radically different than what you or
Speaker 2: I or I would say the majority of the world
Speaker 2: would see as a full and meaningful life. Like there's
Speaker 2: this very popular engineer, Lex Friedman who I once was
Speaker 2: listening to an interview and he was talking about how
Speaker 2: he has this fantasy of when you get up in
Speaker 2: the middle of the night at three o'clock in the
Speaker 2: morning and you go to the kitchen to like sneak
Speaker 2: a snack, you could eating ice cream because you can't sleep.
Speaker 2: He in his fantasy, he would have a smart refrigerator
Speaker 2: that he's able to share this as a as a
Speaker 2: meaningful moment between him and his smart refrigerator. He wants
Speaker 2: to have a genuine connection, And I was like, I
Speaker 2: don't what if what if I want to connect with
Speaker 2: my partner and my family and my friends. What if?
Speaker 2: What if what looks like a good life to me
Speaker 2: is not a life where I am spending more time
Speaker 2: with screens exactly exactly. And so you're you're asking people who,
Speaker 2: let's just be real, don't always have the most healthy
Speaker 2: or the most healthy outlooks on what connection looks like
Speaker 2: and what a good and a full life looks like.
Speaker 2: We are asking them to design our future. And so
Speaker 2: I would I would really say, like the future that
Speaker 2: they see as a good future and the future that
Speaker 2: the rest of us probably see is a good future
Speaker 2: are two vastly different things. Then we got to ask, well,
Speaker 2: who put them in charge of designing what our collective
Speaker 2: future will look like?
Speaker 1: Yeah, because when I think about the ways that we
Speaker 1: could utilize technology in order to stave off our climate crisis,
Speaker 1: When I think about the ways that we could utilize
Speaker 1: technology in order to better coexist inside of nature, how
Speaker 1: we can use what, you know, the technology that is
Speaker 1: that trees do to talk to one another to build
Speaker 1: fertile ground, and be able to translate that into something
Speaker 1: for people like I think about, Wow, amazing, you know,
Speaker 1: I think about the sci fi that I read written
Speaker 1: by black women like Nidi Okafor and Octavia Butler, when
Speaker 1: I'm thinking about, like, where there is opportunity, it seems
Speaker 1: very rich, but not if it is the same cis white,
Speaker 1: hetero strict men that are in charge of it, it
Speaker 1: is just going to be the same shit, but in
Speaker 1: robot form.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, And it breaks my heart because there is so
Speaker 2: much innovative, creative, interesting out there thinking being done by
Speaker 2: black and brown and queer technologists and people imagining futures
Speaker 2: that we can't even see with our eyes. Yet there
Speaker 2: is so much of that out there, and yet the
Speaker 2: people who have the power and have the money and
Speaker 2: take up the most space, they're not having those conversations.
Speaker 2: What they're saying are really harmful ideologies like long termism,
Speaker 2: which says like people like you and me and probably
Speaker 2: ninety percent of the people listening, we are too focused
Speaker 2: on the day to day of like paying our bills
Speaker 2: to think long term. And so what we need to
Speaker 2: do is gather all the white techie, billionaire folks and
Speaker 2: think about what we're going to do when climate collapse
Speaker 2: comes for us. And they're the only ones left right,
Speaker 2: they're thinking about the future in these ways that are
Speaker 2: so regressive and harmful, sometimes outright eugenicist that just yet
Speaker 2: just like leave us out in the cold while they're like, oh, well,
Speaker 2: this is going to be better for everybody because we're
Speaker 2: the smartest and we're the most genetically advanced, and so
Speaker 2: future where we're okay and y'all are doing, God knows
Speaker 2: what is better for everybody. And that it makes it
Speaker 2: breaks my heart that that is the thinking that takes
Speaker 2: up the most space, and that is the thinking that
Speaker 2: it seems like these people have just determined like they
Speaker 2: know best for us, and they certainly.
Speaker 1: Do not no, absolutely not switching gears. With just a
Speaker 1: few minutes that we have left, I do want to
Speaker 1: ask you, you know, how you are feeling about Pride
Speaker 1: during this time and this season it is, you know,
Speaker 1: I've I'm interviewing folks, you know, all month long with
Speaker 1: our you know theme around the fact that you can't
Speaker 1: ban queer joy. We partner with Glad in order to
Speaker 1: elevate you know, voices of folks and that is their
Speaker 1: theme as well. How do you feel this month?
Speaker 2: I had a very so I'm in d c our
Speaker 2: Pride Parade was last weekend, which I attended. I had
Speaker 2: a very a lot of emotions around Pride. I think
Speaker 2: it is. I used to be one of those people
Speaker 2: who was like, pride is so corporate? Do we really
Speaker 2: does ore community really need this anymore? How wrong I was?
Speaker 2: You know, this year, when pride is being threatened, when
Speaker 2: pride is being used as a way to attack our communities,
Speaker 2: when pride is being used to smear and demonize our
Speaker 2: trans siblings, particularly trans youth, I really celebrating it felt
Speaker 2: different this year, and I don't really know what to
Speaker 2: do with that. And I remember going to a like
Speaker 2: a queer dance party, and I have to say, like,
Speaker 2: on the one hand, I was happy to be experiencing
Speaker 2: joy and be around other queer people who were also
Speaker 2: experiencing joy, but I was a little bit like, I
Speaker 2: was like, I want to know where the exits are right,
Speaker 2: I want to like, I want to like. And that
Speaker 2: was the first, probably the first time celebrating a Pride
Speaker 2: where I felt that way, where I felt like I
Speaker 2: just felt like the kind of euphoria and joy that
Speaker 2: you that we all deserve to feel that pride is about.
Speaker 2: I was not comfortable experiencing that because of this dynamic
Speaker 2: that is pushed by a small but vocal number of
Speaker 2: extremists and so yeah, it was. I think I think
Speaker 2: that it it showed me why we need pride, yeah,
Speaker 2: and the importance of celebrating and commemorating our communities. But
Speaker 2: I it was it was kind of a privilege and
Speaker 2: a luxury to be annoyed by how corporate pride is
Speaker 2: a few years ago, and this time around I really
Speaker 2: felt how how significant it is. And yeah, just it
Speaker 2: really alarms me how much we have, how much ground
Speaker 2: we have lost, and I to center the conversation around
Speaker 2: corporations and like, is targets celebrating pride or you know whatever.
Speaker 2: But I do think that that can sometimes be a
Speaker 2: barometer for the public and the fact that a small
Speaker 2: handful of extremists have been able to sway that because
Speaker 2: I think glad It's put out a survey that shows
Speaker 2: that most Americans are are cool with LGBTQ people. Right,
Speaker 2: It's like we are talking about the way that a
Speaker 2: small handful of extremists have been able to essentially hold
Speaker 2: the country hostage from this progress because they know they
Speaker 2: are losing, because they know their their sentiments are unpopular,
Speaker 2: and it really is alarming.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it is, And I feel the same. I
Speaker 1: think that again, it was a privilege to only have
Speaker 1: to focus on the corporatization of Pride. A couple of
Speaker 1: years ago, I would have known, ever thought that we
Speaker 1: would be in the place that we are right now,
Speaker 1: which is a place of you know, of danger and
Speaker 1: particularly for our trans brothers and sisters. Last thing for you,
Speaker 1: tell us about the new season of your show on Outspoken.
Speaker 2: Yes, so we are in our fourth season. We just
Speaker 2: launched it, super excited about it. We are doing a
Speaker 2: series that we're calling Present Future, and so as we're
Speaker 2: all thinking, as our conversation about AI kind of demonstrates,
Speaker 2: we are in this weird moment when it comes to
Speaker 2: things like AI social media platforms. I don't know if
Speaker 2: you saw that glad report that just came out about
Speaker 2: how Twitter is doing such a terrible job of amplifying
Speaker 2: and supporting LGBTQ voices.
Speaker 1: Like I didn't need a report, but I.
Speaker 2: Surprise reporting what we already knew. So it does feel
Speaker 2: like we're in this really weird new place when it
Speaker 2: comes to technology, and so it seems like this far
Speaker 2: off future that we've all been referencing is here right now.
Speaker 2: So on my Podcas Hast on Outspoken, there are no
Speaker 2: girls on the internet. We are exploring what it means,
Speaker 2: you know, when it comes to technology, social platforms, media,
Speaker 2: and the future, and making sure that marginalized voices, women,
Speaker 2: queer folks, trans folks, people of color do not get
Speaker 2: lost in those conversations. That we are centered in those
Speaker 2: conversations because we belong at the forefront. We belong, you know,
Speaker 2: amplified and centered and having our stories and experiences, voices
Speaker 2: and voices being grounded when we talk about what the
Speaker 2: future of technology looks like in our world. So please
Speaker 2: check it out.
Speaker 1: Amazing folks, do check it out. I'm always so excited
Speaker 1: when I have the opportunity to speak with the bridget
Speaker 1: and just the work that you do, the conversations that
Speaker 1: you have on your pod. There's always such good cross pollination.
Speaker 1: So thank you friend for making the time to join
Speaker 1: me on WOKF daily. I appreciate you.
Speaker 2: Oh Danielle, I appreciate you so much. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: That is it for me today, Dear friends on woke
Speaker 1: a f as always power to the people and to
Speaker 1: all the people. Power, get woke and stay woke. As
Speaker 1: fun