Speaker 1: Keep on riding with us as we continue to broadcast
Speaker 1: the balance and defend the discourse from these hip hop
Speaker 1: weekly studios.
Speaker 2: Welcome back to Civic Cipher.
Speaker 1: I'm your host, rams' ja big shout out to my
Speaker 1: man q Ward who is out globe trotting, but.
Speaker 2: Have no fear. We have a couple of special guests
Speaker 2: with us today.
Speaker 1: Special guest interviewer Leanna Taylor of the Arizona Pet Project.
Speaker 2: Well and our guest of the hour. He goes by
Speaker 2: the name of Boulet.
Speaker 1: He's a writer, speaker, Vegan Pisces those are important, and
Speaker 1: the former executive director of RVC, a nonprofit in Seattle
Speaker 1: that promotes social justice by developing leaders of color, strengthening
Speaker 1: organizations led by communities of color, and fostering collaboration among
Speaker 1: diverse communities. He currently writes the blog Nonprofit af and
Speaker 1: is involved with community centric fundraising. We are going to
Speaker 1: continue to have a fantastic conversation diving into nonprofit work
Speaker 1: and how it could be better and some of the
Speaker 1: things to look forward to after we discuss ba BA
Speaker 1: becoming a better ally BABA and Today's Baba. Sponsored by
Speaker 1: Friends of the Movement. You can sign up for the
Speaker 1: free boter wallet from Fotmglobal dot com to support black
Speaker 1: businesses and allied businesses as well as make an impact
Speaker 1: with your spending. Again, that's Fotmglobal dot com today. To
Speaker 1: become a better ally, we would like for you to
Speaker 1: support NAF. I'm going to share a bit from NONPROFITAF
Speaker 1: dot com. You can contribute by a Patreon. Nonprofit AF
Speaker 1: publishes every week. Each post takes many hours and multiple
Speaker 1: bars of dark chocolate to research, write, edit, and find
Speaker 1: and insert pictures of baby animals. Join the NAF community
Speaker 1: by being a Patreon patron and donating a couple of
Speaker 1: bucks each month on Patreon. Thank you for keeping this
Speaker 1: going and also one time donations can be made through
Speaker 1: PayPal and you can also subscribe for email updates. Again,
Speaker 1: that's at NONPROFITAF dot com, the site that is championed
Speaker 1: by our guest of the Hour. I'd also like you
Speaker 1: to pay attention to the eras on a pet project.
Speaker 1: Our guest host, Leanna Taylor heads the Arizona Pet Project
Speaker 1: and from their website support the Arizona Pet Project at
Speaker 1: Azypetproject dot org. Extended helping hand to families with pets
Speaker 1: and needs in need. By becoming an Arizona Pet partner,
Speaker 1: our partners make the important work we do in our
Speaker 1: community possible. With your support, we provide our most vulnerable
Speaker 1: community members in crisis with free services like veterinarity care,
Speaker 1: temporary boarding, pet food assistants, and lost pet reunification. Again
Speaker 1: that's Azpetproject dot Org. I think that both of these
Speaker 1: are fantastic initiatives. And I know, at least you know,
Speaker 1: we don't deal with pets all that often on the show,
Speaker 1: But I do want you to know that I have
Speaker 1: become a believer. I'm not the biggest fan of pets,
Speaker 1: but I become a believer in the connection that humans
Speaker 1: and animals have and how important that is for people's
Speaker 1: mental health and obviously a dispreportioning effects can inities of color.
Speaker 1: So again, Azypetproject dot Org. All right, back to the
Speaker 1: man of the hour, Leanna. Yes, I want to sho
Speaker 1: start us off.
Speaker 3: All right, Well, we're going to dive into a couple
Speaker 3: of more difficult topics, topics you and I have talked
Speaker 3: a little bit about over the past couple of months.
Speaker 3: But before we do that, you use the imagery of
Speaker 3: unicorns a lot in your work, And I wondered if
Speaker 3: you would tell the listeners why why unicorns? And how
Speaker 3: do we use that as a call to action for
Speaker 3: getting more leaders of color involved in nonprofit and philanthropic work.
Speaker 4: Yeah, a few years ago I was writing this blog
Speaker 4: post ranting about how people don't want to pay for people.
Speaker 4: They want to pay for supplies and things, you know,
Speaker 4: food sandwiches, or they don't want to pay for the
Speaker 4: people making the sandwiches, And I was like, who do
Speaker 4: you think it's going to run these programs? Is it?
Speaker 4: Do you think it's going to be like elves and
Speaker 4: unicorn horns magically if you have nowhere and the image
Speaker 4: of this of the unicorns a kind of a mascot
Speaker 4: because we are we're magical, where we as nonprofit leaders
Speaker 4: are expected to be unicorns, to perform miracles on magic
Speaker 4: and constantly scrambling for resources all the time. So that
Speaker 4: kind of caught on and it's become kind of this
Speaker 4: unofficial mascot of the nonprofit sector here. But I think
Speaker 4: I think that we need to learn some other lessons.
Speaker 4: Unicorns have very sharp horns. We've been like this nice, magical,
Speaker 4: friendly creature, But I think we need to stab more
Speaker 4: with our horns. So horns of equity and justice. I
Speaker 4: think that's right.
Speaker 3: That's the important part, horns of equity and justice, and
Speaker 3: we'll use it to stab people in the face, which
Speaker 3: I believe is a direct quote. The other question I
Speaker 3: wanted to ask you is those of us in nonprofit
Speaker 3: have had a mortal enemy, and that enemy is hummah.
Speaker 3: Can you tell the listeners why.
Speaker 4: Oh no, we don't have a moral enemy. I love hummus.
Speaker 4: We love hummus, but is also and it's also like
Speaker 4: a good symbol for our sector. Right. It is nutritious,
Speaker 4: it's delicious, it's cheap, it's filling. That's that's the nonprofit
Speaker 4: sector and oftentimes underappreciated because people are like, oh, it's
Speaker 4: just hum miss, But a good Hummus takes a lot
Speaker 4: of work and skill to make the right balance of
Speaker 4: the heini and lemon juice and everything that is. That
Speaker 4: is very important. So I don't know where I'm going
Speaker 4: with this.
Speaker 3: I guess yeah, and I guess my immortal my mortal
Speaker 3: enemy ship with hummus is just that it's at every
Speaker 3: nonprofit event. It is apparently the only thing that both
Speaker 3: thunders and nonprofits can afford.
Speaker 2: Well, you know what that brings me the.
Speaker 1: Thought the last eight months, about eight months.
Speaker 2: Have been particularly troubling.
Speaker 1: You know, this show covers a broad range of topics,
Speaker 1: but obviously since October seventh, a lot of things have
Speaker 1: have shifted. You know, once upon a time there was
Speaker 1: this really strong pro black movement, let's call it twenty twenty.
Speaker 1: Maybe a year after that, there was this really strong,
Speaker 1: pronounced stop Asian hate movement, and you know, we had
Speaker 1: to shift gears and accommodate these these movements because these
Speaker 1: were communities in neat And then, of course, since since October,
Speaker 1: we've learned that Palestinian people in particular, and to a
Speaker 1: larger extent Muslim people have kind of been enduring something
Speaker 1: that is particularly channeling here. I want you to help
Speaker 1: for our listeners, help help connect some of the issues
Speaker 1: surrounding that. In other words, how does what's happening in
Speaker 1: Palestine connect to American issues?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean we talked about October seventh and what's
Speaker 4: been happening, but you know, what's been happening to Palestine
Speaker 4: has been going on over seventy five years since Nakbav
Speaker 4: I think nineteen forty eight and the US government has
Speaker 4: been supporting Israel and setting weapons like and sending dollars
Speaker 4: every single year, like I think about four billion dollars
Speaker 4: a year, and recently it's like an additional fourteen billion
Speaker 4: dollars of our taxpayer's money is going there to fund
Speaker 4: this genocide of Palestinians. And we're also like stopping, we're
Speaker 4: vetoing ceasefire deals where we're basically enable link this genocide
Speaker 4: that Israel has been committing. And I think that we
Speaker 4: should care because this money could be used here to
Speaker 4: solve issues over here in the United States with veterans,
Speaker 4: with homelessness, with the environments, also with education. There's just
Speaker 4: we we still have like the Flint water crisis, Like
Speaker 4: that's not gone away. People are still having issues accessing
Speaker 4: clean water in parts of the US. And meanwhile, we're
Speaker 4: just sending money over to a foreign country to commit genocide,
Speaker 4: and so we should be paying attention. This is just
Speaker 4: not like had something that's happening over there to other people.
Speaker 4: We're supporting it. We are complicit in enabling this genocide.
Speaker 4: So we absolutely do need to care because it's our
Speaker 4: money funding.
Speaker 3: It, and it's been it's been pretty quiet in the
Speaker 3: nonprofit sector in speaking out about this, and I think
Speaker 3: that's a frustration that many people in the social justice
Speaker 3: movement and who were involved in the BLM movement in
Speaker 3: twenty twenty, there seems to be a massive disconnect between
Speaker 3: people's understanding of how this particular issue also relates to
Speaker 3: the struggles that you know that people here have been fighting.
Speaker 3: And I know you wrote a really poignant blog piece
Speaker 3: about that. Do you mind touching a little bit on that.
Speaker 4: Yeah. I mean, we've been talking about equity and justice
Speaker 4: for a long time in the sector in society, right,
Speaker 4: and it seems that we've forgotten a lot of the
Speaker 4: lessons that we've been learning that we should be learning
Speaker 4: about standing with the oppressed, about power dynamics, you know,
Speaker 4: Like I think people always say things like, oh, you know,
Speaker 4: it's complicated, or it's a war. It's not a war
Speaker 4: when one side is the fourth largest army in the
Speaker 4: in the world, the fourth most powerful army in the world,
Speaker 4: which is Israel, and the other side doesn't even have
Speaker 4: an army right and no supplies and no support from
Speaker 4: any Western power like the United States or Canada. So
Speaker 4: it's not an equal footing here. So I just feel
Speaker 4: like we've been trying to learn things from BLM and
Speaker 4: from other movements that are really vital and important, and
Speaker 4: we've just kind of we've just lost we've lost the
Speaker 4: lessons we've learned, and it has been very frustrating when
Speaker 4: right now we really do need to be using these
Speaker 4: lessons that we've we've been learning.
Speaker 1: So, yeah, yeah, there's a there's another you know, there's
Speaker 1: a lot of things that you know, you're making a
Speaker 1: broader connection to kind of the goings on in the
Speaker 1: government and the things that are necessary, the things that
Speaker 1: actually can create the changes and the outcomes that we
Speaker 1: would like to see on the ground. Again, those of
Speaker 1: us closest to the problem are often closest to the solutions.
Speaker 1: So one of the things that I know you're familiar
Speaker 1: with is the idea of reparations and how that could
Speaker 1: impact and shape outcomes. So talk a little bit about
Speaker 1: reparations and kind of where that falls in the overall
Speaker 1: equation here.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we're going to move away from this charity, this
Speaker 4: philanthropy as charity and like a hobby for the rich,
Speaker 4: into towards actual the philanthropia as a mechanism for justice
Speaker 4: and we do need to talk about reparation. It can't
Speaker 4: just be a hobby for rich people anymore. It needs
Speaker 4: to be about how do we restore to wholeness communists
Speaker 4: that have been affected negatively affected by white supremacy and
Speaker 4: just awfulness over over the past several hundred years or so.
Speaker 4: So I'm glad to see that more and more people
Speaker 4: are talking about reparation, and more governments are starting to
Speaker 4: think about doing things such as buying land and returning
Speaker 4: that land back to native communities, or ensuring like providing
Speaker 4: reparation for descendants of people who were enslaved. Like these
Speaker 4: are things that are really critical, and it does, and
Speaker 4: you know, like it takes different forms. There could be
Speaker 4: like major efforts to try to do restorative reparative work,
Speaker 4: but I think each of us can also think about this.
Speaker 4: I was talking to a friend of mine who attended
Speaker 4: a workshop where she discovered that her family's wealth was
Speaker 4: built on literally stealing a Native family's land. And when
Speaker 4: she discovered this, she had this epiphany where she wanted,
Speaker 4: you know, she was committed to when she gets her inheritance,
Speaker 4: she is going to return one hundred percent of this
Speaker 4: money back to the Native community. It's fantastic, and we're
Speaker 4: starting to see more and more donors taking up these
Speaker 4: conversations which in the past they have never really touched
Speaker 4: on because again, we've been treating them as heroes. We've
Speaker 4: been trained to We've been trained to treat.
Speaker 2: Them that way.
Speaker 4: And now I think that we need to understand we've
Speaker 4: been underestimating our donors and our the funders of ability
Speaker 4: to actually have some very difficult conversations and uncomfortable conversations,
Speaker 4: and I think we need to have these conversations that
Speaker 4: we're going to be effective in creating this just an
Speaker 4: equitable world that we want to see.
Speaker 1: Talk a little bit about, you know, for our listeners
Speaker 1: because we haven't delved into it too deeply, but talk
Speaker 1: a little bit about the kind of the land back
Speaker 1: hashtag land back movement, because I feel like you kind
Speaker 1: of touched around it, So just touch on that a
Speaker 1: bit too, because I think that's something that is kind
Speaker 1: of a special movement in and of itself.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I am not native, so I am I'm definitely
Speaker 4: no experts on this, on this movement, but I do
Speaker 4: believe in it. I do support you know that the
Speaker 4: importance of recognizing just the injustice is that have been
Speaker 4: done to Native communities, the lands that were stolen. I mean,
Speaker 4: we have to acknowledge that we're on well on stolen land.
Speaker 4: But it's not enough to just acknowledge it. We need
Speaker 4: start thinking about doing something. And I think some governments,
Speaker 4: state governments, I think some probably in California and some
Speaker 4: other places I know in New Zealand as well as
Speaker 4: other countries, are thinking about, Okay, how do we actually
Speaker 4: return land to Native communities.
Speaker 3: Canada just had a couple of pretty historic land transfers
Speaker 3: back to the indigenous First Nations communities. One was in
Speaker 3: my hometown of Vancouver, right in the middle of the city.
Speaker 3: People said it couldn't be done, but it is. And
Speaker 3: then the other one is up in a Blueberry River
Speaker 3: area for the indigenous peoples there. You know, Canada's got
Speaker 3: a long, long, long way to go before they right
Speaker 3: the wrongs of centuries of abuse of power and genocidal actions.
Speaker 3: But I was heartened at this first step because I
Speaker 3: think it shows that it can be done real quick.
Speaker 1: While we're here, I want to make sure that I
Speaker 1: take them to acknowledge and thank you for this.
Speaker 4: VU.
Speaker 1: I want to acknowledge that we are broadcasting from the
Speaker 1: unseated ancestral lands of the Akima Odam peoples. So you
Speaker 1: know this much we can do right now. So I
Speaker 1: know that we could spend all day talking about that,
Speaker 1: and I appreciate that much. And I asked for that
Speaker 1: only because I know you're not native, but you know,
Speaker 1: you just seem to be more familiar and working in
Speaker 1: that space. And that's something that's a conversation we've yet
Speaker 1: to have. We've been trying for some time, but getting
Speaker 1: the right person here to have that conversation.
Speaker 2: We're still working on it.
Speaker 3: I think it's also just it's really important in talking
Speaker 3: to somebody like VU who really is an expert in
Speaker 3: nonprofit work. How does all of this intersect, Why do
Speaker 3: these seemingly individual issues matter when we're talking about broader
Speaker 3: community change and that intersectionality of struggle, How this issue
Speaker 3: relates to this issue, and how those of us in
Speaker 3: nonprofit really are beholden to think about all of those
Speaker 3: structures and systems that have upheld status quo so we
Speaker 3: can work together to dismantle them all.
Speaker 1: Now, I want to talk to you about burnout.
Speaker 2: And perhaps you know.
Speaker 1: Backlash against DEI work and if that is contributing to
Speaker 1: or does contribute to to burnout in the nonprofit sector.
Speaker 4: Yeah, definitely. I mean, we have a lot of factors
Speaker 4: creating burnout in the nonprofit sector in the first place,
Speaker 4: the lack of pay, the unstable funding, unpredictable revenues model
Speaker 4: that we have what we rely on, the whims of
Speaker 4: donors and funders. That has been very challenging. I mean,
Speaker 4: there's a lot of underpayment in the nonprofit sector and
Speaker 4: people leave because they can't afford to work here, and
Speaker 4: it's very frustrating. We lose a lot of really good,
Speaker 4: dedicated people this way. And recently we have another factor
Speaker 4: to consider, which is after the Supreme Court kind of
Speaker 4: overthrew affirmative action, and now that has opened a door
Speaker 4: for conservative movements, right wing movements to start suing organizations
Speaker 4: who are trying to support marginalized people, such as Fearless
Speaker 4: Fun we're just i think trying to get more funding
Speaker 4: to yeah, and so yeah, it's given them permission to
Speaker 4: just go and sue everyone who just wants to have
Speaker 4: some start doing some restorative justice work. And our sector leaders,
Speaker 4: funders and others, instead of kind of doubling down saying
Speaker 4: we believe in DEI, we need to double down, we
Speaker 4: need to maybe increase our own lawyers to fight back
Speaker 4: against these lawsuits. Many of these leaders go the opposite way.
Speaker 4: We just run scared and become very risk averse and
Speaker 4: start decreasing work. And they're funding around DEI, which is
Speaker 4: very frustrating because it was really a challenge trying to
Speaker 4: get funding for DEI work in the past before all
Speaker 4: of this happened, and now we're having even less and
Speaker 4: less chances actually getting the funding that we need to
Speaker 4: advance the kind of community that we that we believe in.
Speaker 2: Well, the state of affairs.
Speaker 1: Might feel bleak, but around here we are always optimistic.
Speaker 1: So let's talk about what we can do. Maybe some
Speaker 1: advice for folks who maybe are some best practices for
Speaker 1: individuals listening. These people might not run nonprofits, they might
Speaker 1: not be intimately familiar with the nature of that type
Speaker 1: of business model, but these are people that feel like
Speaker 1: we are collectively in pursuit of a better world for
Speaker 1: all of us. What advice or what best practices would
Speaker 1: you offer to our listener today in terms of what
Speaker 1: they should be doing and could be doing to create
Speaker 1: meaningful changes in and around the areas in which you
Speaker 1: feel are most likely to create impact.
Speaker 4: Yeah, well, I mean that would take us a lot
Speaker 4: of time to discuss, we would think. But I think
Speaker 4: right now people just need to be more aware and
Speaker 4: to have more conversations and to be okay with being
Speaker 4: in this sort of discomfort when we're having these conversations,
Speaker 4: because I don't think we can get anywhere if people
Speaker 4: as soon as they feel a little bit uncomfortable they
Speaker 4: start kind of running away and not participating anymore. I
Speaker 4: think it takes a certain amount of privilege to be like, oh,
Speaker 4: I don't want to be involved, I don't want to
Speaker 4: think about that stuff. Because for many of us from
Speaker 4: our sas communities, we have to think about this stuff
Speaker 4: like we can't get away from it. So I would
Speaker 4: say for those of us those who have privileges, and
Speaker 4: I think all of us have some sort of privilege
Speaker 4: in some ways, right, I mean, like I have male privilege.
Speaker 4: For example, I have an able body privilege. I have
Speaker 4: neural typical privilege. And I had to start thinking about,
Speaker 4: like what what does that mean for me? And how
Speaker 4: do I actually contribute to making the world better. So,
Speaker 4: for example, I had been ranting about all these things.
Speaker 4: For a long time, I've been speaking up against you know,
Speaker 4: like Israel's action and genocidal behavior against Palestinians, and that
Speaker 4: has cost me a lot of followers, speaking engagements and
Speaker 4: so on. But I understood. But I know I am
Speaker 4: a privileged person and I can take the hits and
Speaker 4: be okay with that. Like I think those of us
Speaker 4: who have more privilege need to be thinking about that
Speaker 4: privilege and figure out how we actually use this to
Speaker 4: make the world better. And that means sometimes we got
Speaker 4: to take the flak because you know, like marginalized people,
Speaker 4: women of color, disabled people, trans people have often taken
Speaker 4: a lot of the hits over years and years, and
Speaker 4: it's really time for us who have more privilege to
Speaker 4: step in.
Speaker 1: Well well said, I know that this conversation should be
Speaker 1: continued and will be continued.
Speaker 2: So let's do uh.
Speaker 1: Let's let's make sure that people know you know your
Speaker 1: social media so that they can tap in with you
Speaker 1: and get your thoughts, and of course, mention the website
Speaker 1: one more time where people can find your blog.
Speaker 4: I'm at nonprofit AF dot com and you can find
Speaker 4: me on Instagram at nonprofit AF dot com. As well
Speaker 4: as Facebook and Twitter. I'm still calling it Twitter.
Speaker 2: And then Leanna make sure people know how to find
Speaker 2: you as well.
Speaker 3: Definitely, And I just want to give a shout out
Speaker 3: to Community Centric Fundraising dot com as well. I think
Speaker 3: that people should get involved there figure out how we
Speaker 3: can reshape and reimagine what nonprofit and philanthropy looks like.
Speaker 3: Sorry dot org, so sorry Community Centric Fundraising dot org.
Speaker 3: But yeah, there's lots of helpful tools and ways, and
Speaker 3: I think just kind of getting a firmer hand on
Speaker 3: what that means so that we can reshape that together
Speaker 3: as a community, and then people can find my organization
Speaker 3: at Azypetproject dot org as well. And on social media,
Speaker 3: We're on Instagram, LinkedIn Facebook, we have opted out of Twitter,
Speaker 3: slash x, and we are at the Arizona Pet Project.
Speaker 2: Listen.
Speaker 1: I'm not mad at at the opt out of Twitter
Speaker 1: slash x so hashtag same. But if you would like
Speaker 1: to follow us, we are at civic Cipher on all platforms.
Speaker 1: Of course, you can download this in any previous episodes
Speaker 1: at Civiccipeer civiccipher dot com.
Speaker 2: Try to give us a follow on.
Speaker 1: YouTube because we are growing there and your support would
Speaker 1: be well received and also don't be afraid to make
Speaker 1: a donation again at civiccipher dot com. I'd like to
Speaker 1: thank you both for being on the show today and
Speaker 1: until next week, y'all peace,