Speaker 1: Good morning, peeps, and welcome to WIKA F Daily with
Speaker 1: Meet your Girl Danielle Moody recording from the Brooklyn Bunker. Folks,
Speaker 1: interesting poll numbers have come out this week with regard
Speaker 1: to President Biden and the fact that a majority of
Speaker 1: Americans do not think that he is doing a good job.
Speaker 1: That comes on the heels of many Democratic governors deciding
Speaker 1: that guess what, COVID's over and so much in the
Speaker 1: same way that news broke about Coachella and stagecoach not
Speaker 1: using any COVID nineteen precautions, basically saying that you're going
Speaker 1: to come and party with us at Coachella at your
Speaker 1: own risk. Democratic governors are now doing the very same
Speaker 1: thing where they are getting rid of their mask mandates
Speaker 1: because people are quote unquote tired. I don't know how
Speaker 1: many times that we have to go through and repeat
Speaker 1: the same behaviors over and over again expecting a different result.
Speaker 1: That is, in fact the definition of insanity. And that's
Speaker 1: the way that our politicians, whether they be Republican or Democrat,
Speaker 1: have been operating over the last couple of months. You
Speaker 1: had the omicron variant that yes, was it less deadly
Speaker 1: for those that were vaccinated and boosted, of course, but
Speaker 1: did it give us some insight into how this virus
Speaker 1: has been mutating, which is that each iteration becomes more
Speaker 1: and more contagious, and that the thing that protects us
Speaker 1: all is wearing masks. Right, Social distancing for a while
Speaker 1: now has not been a thing, but masks and particularly
Speaker 1: those that are not cloth, but our K ninety five
Speaker 1: or ninety five masks, have been keeping people safe. So
Speaker 1: why is it that now once people again have adapted
Speaker 1: to these rules, have adapted to this reality, have become
Speaker 1: accustomed to it, whether it be on public transportation federally
Speaker 1: regulated public transportation like airlines, why we would decide now,
Speaker 1: at a time when the omicron surge in many parts
Speaker 1: of the country is now on the decline, that we
Speaker 1: would turn around and start the same behavior that we
Speaker 1: had before, let our guards down, and then in a
Speaker 1: couple of months when news breaks that there is some
Speaker 1: other new variant that is incredibly deadly, that is all
Speaker 1: of the things, then trying to get those same people
Speaker 1: to go back to doing what it was that they've
Speaker 1: been doing for the past two years is going to
Speaker 1: be damn near impossible. But you know who cares because
Speaker 1: midterms are in a couple of months, and that's apparently
Speaker 1: the only thing that politicians care about. I am so
Speaker 1: aggravated with this entire situation and scenario, just people believing
Speaker 1: that they can have what mind over matter like the
Speaker 1: virus gives a fuck. But you know what I think
Speaker 1: at this stage in the pandemic two years in that
Speaker 1: what we have learned is that no one is going
Speaker 1: to protect you. No one other than yourself is going
Speaker 1: to have your best interests and your public health and
Speaker 1: safety in mind. Everyone else is out to make a
Speaker 1: dollar or get a vote, right, And so basically, politicians, businesses,
Speaker 1: all of them are just gambling right on your well being.
Speaker 1: So if at this point you are still looking for
Speaker 1: guidance right, whether it be from the president, your governor,
Speaker 1: your school board, or what have you, then you are
Speaker 1: looking in the wrong place. You're looking outward when you
Speaker 1: need to be looking inward. I no longer trust any
Speaker 1: of these outlets. I'm going to be honest with you.
Speaker 1: I'm not trying to spread misinformation, but I'm going to
Speaker 1: be real. I don't know what is provoking the decisions
Speaker 1: that are being made, because I don't think that it's
Speaker 1: public health. I don't think that people are following the science.
Speaker 1: Do I think that, yeah, there are ways that we
Speaker 1: can adapt to this new normal, Yes, absolutely, But to
Speaker 1: pretend that COVID no longer exists, to just throw up
Speaker 1: your hands, you know, democratic governors and fucking concert venues
Speaker 1: and just be like, oh, we're just over it. Watch
Speaker 1: and wait, is all I will say on that Watch
Speaker 1: and wait. You know, I was reading Political Playbook like
Speaker 1: I do most mornings, and you know, another alarming piece
Speaker 1: of news has come to my attention. But you know,
Speaker 1: it's a same old, same old story of how terrible
Speaker 1: Democrats are at messaging. And the question that Political was
Speaker 1: posing was whether or not Democrats were going to come
Speaker 1: up with a response to the culture wars that Republicans
Speaker 1: are waging. That's number one, and number two, whether or
Speaker 1: not Republicans we're going to give up the ghost, give
Speaker 1: up Donald Trump, and figure out who else is going
Speaker 1: to be the leader of this party. I think that
Speaker 1: those are the wrong questions to be asking. One. I
Speaker 1: think that if anybody with eyes ears riot have been
Speaker 1: paying attention to what Republicans have been up to over
Speaker 1: the past five plus years, and if you want to
Speaker 1: include the Obama years, which is when we got our
Speaker 1: first inkling into the direction that this party was headed.
Speaker 1: The fact that Politico is still flinked framing the Republican
Speaker 1: Party as an actual party and not a cult that
Speaker 1: is hell bent not on culture wars, but on creating
Speaker 1: a civil war two point zero, on using their misinformation,
Speaker 1: using their racism, using their misogyny, and weaponizing the pandemic.
Speaker 1: The fact that still in fucking twenty two, now that
Speaker 1: years after living through the Trump administration, after living through
Speaker 1: the insurrection, that we're still not calling out what Republicans
Speaker 1: are doing as dangerous to our democracy and still framing
Speaker 1: a narrative that makes it seem as if there are
Speaker 1: two equal sides to the preservation of our republic is
Speaker 1: bullshit and it is just bad journalism. How about that?
Speaker 1: How about it just as bad journalism to continue to
Speaker 1: frame it as if we have two cohesive, normal political
Speaker 1: parties where one isn't about the entirety of our democracy
Speaker 1: just being destroyed, blown up with your voter suppression, your racism,
Speaker 1: your celebration of anti semitism, islamophobia, all of these things.
Speaker 1: The fact that you have outlets that are now by
Speaker 1: the way Politico has been bought right by the Murdochs.
Speaker 1: The fact that you are having these outlets, still have
Speaker 1: casual conversation like this is a normal midterm season that
Speaker 1: we're in is so frustrating and it's just fucking false. Right,
Speaker 1: And then Democrats still twirling their thumbs, right, twiddling their
Speaker 1: thumbs as if we don't have a sense of urgency,
Speaker 1: as if you haven't recognized that Republicans are using the
Speaker 1: same playbook they've been using for the last four fucking decades, right,
Speaker 1: except now they've utilized technology so that their misinformation and
Speaker 1: their hate can spread faster. Why is it right that
Speaker 1: following the very eye opening campaign of Glenn Yuncan in
Speaker 1: Virginia and his win after the Obama coalition successfully had
Speaker 1: courted the state of Virginia into the blue column, how
Speaker 1: you don't pay attention to the misgivings there and think
Speaker 1: that running old candidates is not a fucking thing, It
Speaker 1: doesn't excite the base. How about paying attention to your
Speaker 1: base in the same way that Republicans pay attention to
Speaker 1: and are scared shitless of their base. How about doing that?
Speaker 1: How about not just pretending right that you can shrug
Speaker 1: off their attempts at quote unquote parental control and not
Speaker 1: likening that to the way that white parents were riled
Speaker 1: up in the nineteen fifties about school integration. How is
Speaker 1: it that Democrats are still sitting around wondering what to
Speaker 1: do or thinking that ignoring the claims and the lies
Speaker 1: that Republicans are throwing out is somehow a winning strategy.
Speaker 1: It isn't. And you know what I saw this week
Speaker 1: as well. I follow Congresswoman Corey Bush, who has been
Speaker 1: a guest on the show, follow her on Instagram, and
Speaker 1: she posted a tweet that she had tweeted earlier in
Speaker 1: the week, which that saying basically that Democrats who are
Speaker 1: trying to out republic look in Republicans is not a
Speaker 1: strategy that is going to win, right, And I'm just like, no,
Speaker 1: it's not. And how is it that everyone else sees that?
Speaker 1: And yet there's no pivot, there's no stop pivot and
Speaker 1: reflect right on how we need to utilize our heavy
Speaker 1: hitters like Corey Bush, like aoc to teleb, like all
Speaker 1: of these people like il Han, right, these people who
Speaker 1: are savvy, who are smart, who know how to communicate,
Speaker 1: who have large followings How is it that they are
Speaker 1: not in charge of democratic messaging right so that everyone
Speaker 1: else can then follow suit. I don't get it. I
Speaker 1: don't get it, but you know I do because it
Speaker 1: is the old guard, right, the Octanagarians who are still
Speaker 1: in charge of the gavel and who are still have
Speaker 1: the bully pulpit, but they're not using it in the
Speaker 1: right way to compete with the tactics of the twenty
Speaker 1: first century. They just are not. And it is evident
Speaker 1: that Schumer doesn't do it, Pelosi doesn't do it, Biden
Speaker 1: isn't doing it. No one is painting the Republicans as
Speaker 1: who they are, a threat to our democracy, a racist
Speaker 1: right reimagining of America that is going to be worse
Speaker 1: than the first round of Jim Crowe. How is it
Speaker 1: that the same administration, the same candidate that said I'm
Speaker 1: in it for the battle of the soul of this
Speaker 1: nation does not get what it is that Republicans are doing,
Speaker 1: Which brings me to my guest coming up today, Really
Speaker 1: excited for you all to hear this conversation with a podcaster,
Speaker 1: Julie Koehler, who is the co host of the podcast
Speaker 1: White Picket Fence and White picket Fence Right seeks to
Speaker 1: really uncover right the lies that white people have been told,
Speaker 1: to really unpack it. In their first season, it was
Speaker 1: busting the myth around white women being progressive and voting Democrat,
Speaker 1: where Julie will tell us that hasn't happened in forty
Speaker 1: years now. Anybody paying attention to politics inside the Beltway
Speaker 1: understands that fact. So then the question is, if those
Speaker 1: are the data points, then why does the Democratic Party
Speaker 1: still try and court Karen as if Karen is trying
Speaker 1: to go to the dance with you, she ain't and
Speaker 1: she hasn't in forty years. Right. The second season of
Speaker 1: White picket Fence was an examination into how families right
Speaker 1: have shifted during the time of the global health pandemic,
Speaker 1: Schooling kids at home, the realization that we don't really
Speaker 1: care about kids in this country outside of the womb,
Speaker 1: because if we did, right, if we actually believed the
Speaker 1: mantra that children are our future, then maybe we wouldn't
Speaker 1: have had fights over the child tax credit or you know,
Speaker 1: having parent to leave. As one of the only industrial
Speaker 1: nations that does not have that guaranteed right, there are
Speaker 1: countries that offer a year six months in America six
Speaker 1: weeks and we're telling you to stuff your baby in
Speaker 1: somebody else's care, right, and for you to make just
Speaker 1: enough money to be able to cover that, but nothing else.
Speaker 1: And we've accepted that, we've accepted that reality as the norm,
Speaker 1: and it shouldn't be. And so that is the second
Speaker 1: season of White Picket Fence, And Julie and I on
Speaker 1: today's show, we'll get into a conversation about white privilege,
Speaker 1: about white guilt, about how we hold up a mirror
Speaker 1: to white America and say, look at yourself. You are
Speaker 1: both responsible for some good and some devastating violence. How
Speaker 1: is it that white people cannot see themselves as fully
Speaker 1: dimensional humans? Right? Earlier this week, you know, I was
Speaker 1: sent a bunch of clips of the young black boy,
Speaker 1: and I believe it was in New Jersey at a
Speaker 1: mall who got into an altercation with a white boy.
Speaker 1: Cops were called and guests who ended up in handcuffs
Speaker 1: for thirty minutes. Right, guess who was ushered and spoken
Speaker 1: to and probably a very respectful manner. What did that
Speaker 1: black boy do to you? And I'm sure that that
Speaker 1: wasn't the language that was used. Right. Why is it
Speaker 1: that in policing. It is so common for you to
Speaker 1: have white police officers refer to white boys as son right,
Speaker 1: to look at them as a reflection of themselves, and
Speaker 1: to see black people, regardless of the situation that they
Speaker 1: walk up into, as the aggressor the one that needs
Speaker 1: to be put down. And you want to tell me
Speaker 1: that policing doesn't need reform in this country. How many
Speaker 1: fucking times do we need to see these videos? How
Speaker 1: many fucking black people need to lose their lives? Right?
Speaker 1: And I'm just you know, I'm just tired, right, Like
Speaker 1: I'm literally exhausted, as I know so many black people
Speaker 1: are by the bullshit, Like we can't get anywhere because
Speaker 1: we have to still convince white people of their own
Speaker 1: moral monster behavior, right, as James Baldwin said, moral monsters,
Speaker 1: fucking gaslighting the people that you are abusing, as to
Speaker 1: tell us that we're just too sensitive and there's no
Speaker 1: abuse happening. But we run video after video after video,
Speaker 1: victim after victim after victim of white supremacy, only to
Speaker 1: tell only to have them tell us, oh, we're kind
Speaker 1: of interested, and we'll march with you for a good too,
Speaker 1: and then we're going to go back to our lives
Speaker 1: because it's too inconvenient for us to really unpack the
Speaker 1: hard truths of this nation. I'm just tired of it.
Speaker 1: And I said yesterday, you know, I can't imagine the
Speaker 1: trauma that that young boy felt. I have no idea
Speaker 1: what the cause of the fight was. I don't really
Speaker 1: fucking care. All I know is that if cops roll
Speaker 1: up to a fucking situation and there are a black
Speaker 1: kid and a white kid, right that are that are
Speaker 1: interlocked in violence, then both of them should be sat down,
Speaker 1: both of them, right, should be handled in the same way.
Speaker 1: Why is that so fucking difficult? Why racism? Right? But
Speaker 1: white people will look for every other excuse right as
Speaker 1: to tell you why black people should continue to be brutalized. Right,
Speaker 1: they will look for every other reason. Oh he was big,
Speaker 1: Oh we thought he was older. Oh this it's bullshit,
Speaker 1: it's racism. Just look in the mirror, you know it.
Speaker 1: I got to tell you that with each advance that
Speaker 1: is made, with each you know, a couple of steps
Speaker 1: forward that we make in this country, it just seems
Speaker 1: that we just boomerang right back to the beginning. And look,
Speaker 1: I know, and I talk to people who have been
Speaker 1: active in the civil rights movement, you know, for their
Speaker 1: entire lives for the last sixty plus years, right, because
Speaker 1: we in America love to believe that Jim Prow was
Speaker 1: so long ago. Meanwhile, most of us have you know, parents,
Speaker 1: grandparents who all grew up in that that are still
Speaker 1: fucking alive. Right. So America's racist history wasn't a hundreds
Speaker 1: of years ago. It was just the other day, and
Speaker 1: we need to wake up to that reality, folks. I'm
Speaker 1: very excited to welcome to Okay f Daily for the
Speaker 1: first time, Julie Kohler, who is the host of the
Speaker 1: podcast White Picket Fence with Wonder Media, a podcast that
Speaker 1: really does an interesting job of looking into the issues
Speaker 1: that are affecting women, that are affecting our society, UM.
Speaker 1: Talking about difficult conversations about race, white privilege, UM, and
Speaker 1: you know, and family, right and how our family in
Speaker 1: the latest season, how families were impacted during the last
Speaker 1: two plus years of living in a pandemic. Julie, welcome,
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. It's great to be with you.
Speaker 1: It is great to have you so talk to me
Speaker 1: about White Picket Fence. First of all, like I just said,
Speaker 1: before the name Stellar. I can't I can't believe that
Speaker 1: that name was not taken UM like one hundred is
Speaker 1: it is so fantastic talk to us about um the
Speaker 1: ideas and the themes behind white picket Fence. Yeah, thank
Speaker 1: you so much. So, you know, I think the name
Speaker 1: sort of gives a hint at some of the ideologies
Speaker 1: that we really work to unpack in the podcast while
Speaker 1: examining a few different topics. So the first season of
Speaker 1: our podcast really was a deep dive into the politics
Speaker 1: of white women and what we call the fractured and
Speaker 1: often frustrating politics in the way that those politics are
Speaker 1: manifest in our society. I think there is kind of
Speaker 1: a myth that white women are more progressive often than
Speaker 1: white men. And while we do see some gender differences
Speaker 1: in how white women and white men vote, you know,
Speaker 1: the majority of white women for the last forty years
Speaker 1: have voted Republican, and we tend to kind of be
Speaker 1: a little bit surprised by that. And so we really
Speaker 1: did a deep dive into, you know, the ideologies that
Speaker 1: shape white women's politics and you know, kind of how
Speaker 1: that continues in today's society. And in the second season
Speaker 1: of the podcast, which just aired this past winter. We
Speaker 1: take we take a look at a lot of the
Speaker 1: same ideologies that we examined in the first season about race,
Speaker 1: about gender, about families, about our economy, and white women,
Speaker 1: white womanhood, and we really look at how that has
Speaker 1: prevented public investment in the kind of family supports, the
Speaker 1: kind of what we now call care infrastructure, childcare, family leave,
Speaker 1: the child tax credit benefits that would make family life
Speaker 1: so much easier for the vast majority of us. Why
Speaker 1: has that been so challenging? And obviously the pandemic brought
Speaker 1: this to a head. So many of us have been
Speaker 1: suffering so deeply during the pandemic, And we really take
Speaker 1: a critical lens at you know, why here we are,
Speaker 1: fifty years later after the national childcare was first proposed
Speaker 1: and passed by bipartisan majorities in Congress. Why we're still
Speaker 1: coming up short, and why this is still a fight
Speaker 1: fifty years later. You know, Julia want to I want
Speaker 1: to dig into your first season. And I say that because, um,
Speaker 1: you know, I am no and anybody that has listened
Speaker 1: to woke f or democracy ish I go after white
Speaker 1: women a lot um and I think for the for
Speaker 1: the main reason that you stated at the at the
Speaker 1: opening that there is this belief, um, and I don't
Speaker 1: know where it came from, So hopefully you can provide
Speaker 1: some insight, um, this belief that white women are more
Speaker 1: progressive than they are right when we have said for decades,
Speaker 1: those people that are embedded in politics have known that,
Speaker 1: particularly married, straight white women vote alongside their husbands. Right.
Speaker 1: I wrote a piece following the twenty sixteen election, which
Speaker 1: I think again was this startling, eye opening, you know moment,
Speaker 1: not just for you know, for for our country obviously,
Speaker 1: but for the world, for our country and the fact
Speaker 1: that oh my god, we had a white woman on
Speaker 1: the ballot. You could see a reflection of yourself, right, yeah,
Speaker 1: finally to become madam president. And over fifty percent of
Speaker 1: white women voted for Donald Trump, an outward celebrated misogynist.
Speaker 1: So you know, Julie, what what came up for you
Speaker 1: in your first season kind of research and investigation about
Speaker 1: the why here? And is it is? And do you
Speaker 1: feel like we need to unpack the why to kind
Speaker 1: of let go of the myth so that we can
Speaker 1: so that we can move on. That's absolutely right. I
Speaker 1: think we have to first have a very cleared eyed
Speaker 1: analysis of what is happening if we want to effect change.
Speaker 1: And so I wanted to put the twenty sixteen election,
Speaker 1: which was I think, you know, once again sort of
Speaker 1: a surprise to many of the kind of you know,
Speaker 1: political chattering class, although not too many, sort of deeply
Speaker 1: entrenched in in movement politics, that yes, a majority of
Speaker 1: white women voted for Donald Trump, despite or perhaps because of,
Speaker 1: his positions that white women, and I wanted to put
Speaker 1: it in a context of of, you know, white women
Speaker 1: have long been complicit and not only just complicit with
Speaker 1: structural racism and white supremacy in this country, but active
Speaker 1: perpetrators of And I also thought it was important to
Speaker 1: sort of take this out of the context of we're
Speaker 1: just having a conversation about those conservative white women and
Speaker 1: actually look at how this is a story about all
Speaker 1: of us, about all of the ways that you know,
Speaker 1: white womanhood is structured in such a way that allows us,
Speaker 1: even those of us who may identify as progressive, to
Speaker 1: sort of selectively engage on issues of race, and you know,
Speaker 1: the issue of kind of who has the privilege of
Speaker 1: being awakened because we did see the twenty sixteen election
Speaker 1: as kind of this galvanizing moment right with the Women's
Speaker 1: March and all of these kind of previously a political
Speaker 1: or not terribly politically active white women suddenly got very
Speaker 1: engaged and said, oh my gosh, this is a crisis.
Speaker 1: I need to fight for my country. But why were
Speaker 1: you asleep? Why were we asleep? Why have we not
Speaker 1: been awakened at every point in our history? And what
Speaker 1: is it going to take to continue that engagement and
Speaker 1: to really build what the writer Heather McGee talks about
Speaker 1: in her brilliant book to some of us as the
Speaker 1: solidarity dividend, Like, what is it going to take in
Speaker 1: this country for us to all be invested in the
Speaker 1: idea that if we work across racial lines to build something,
Speaker 1: to build a public good, that we will all do better.
Speaker 1: And So that is what I really wanted to example
Speaker 1: and kind of the historical underpinions of the ways that
Speaker 1: even in progressive movements, so we take a critical look
Speaker 1: at suffrage and the second way of feminism and the
Speaker 1: way that our you know, white feminist ancestors often turned
Speaker 1: their back on our black feminist sisters once they secured
Speaker 1: critical rights for themselves, And what is it really going
Speaker 1: to take to build a different, intersectional, sustainable, progressive feminist
Speaker 1: movement that can really deliver both racial and gender justice
Speaker 1: in this country. Julie, why do you think that, like what?
Speaker 1: Why do you think that white women prefer to stay
Speaker 1: in slumber? What is it? And is it just the
Speaker 1: if I don't pay attention, if I don't tap in,
Speaker 1: then my rights, as you said, we'll continue to be secured.
Speaker 1: If I make too much noise, right, if I put
Speaker 1: too much skin in the game, then I'm risking my
Speaker 1: own liberty and how and I don't want to risk
Speaker 1: my own liberty in order to secure someone over there? Yeah?
Speaker 1: What is it? Well? I think on one level, we
Speaker 1: have been thoroughly indoctrinated in this country with the myth
Speaker 1: of the zero sum game that I can only have
Speaker 1: what's mine if it comes at the expense of someone
Speaker 1: else and someone else gaining some degree of you know,
Speaker 1: whatever it is, wealth, comforts, security, dignity will come at
Speaker 1: my expense. And so I think we really need to
Speaker 1: be pushing back against that. And I think what is
Speaker 1: one of the really difficult things about trying to create
Speaker 1: this investment in the solidarity dividend at large is that
Speaker 1: we are trying to create a society that we have
Speaker 1: ever had. So we have you know, we have never
Speaker 1: seen what it would look like. On the other side,
Speaker 1: what an anti racist society, the benefits it would deliver
Speaker 1: for all, and so it really sort of takes this
Speaker 1: leap of faith, right that I have to believe that
Speaker 1: it will be beneficial to me, my children, my family,
Speaker 1: my community, even though I don't I haven't experienced it.
Speaker 1: I don't know what that looks like. And we're you know,
Speaker 1: in a media environment and a political environment that is
Speaker 1: constantly throwing racist fear mongering. Yep, you know our way
Speaker 1: and constantly you know, reinforcing this. If this happens, you're
Speaker 1: gonna you know, it's going to be at your expense. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think, you know, it's it's just some powerful work
Speaker 1: that we have to do to overcome, you know. It's
Speaker 1: What's what's so interesting, um, that you're saying, is that
Speaker 1: I started my career thinking that I was going to
Speaker 1: be in the women's movement. It was my desire when
Speaker 1: I went to college, and you know, I majored in
Speaker 1: political science, but my goal, you know, what my passion
Speaker 1: was at that time was to be a part of
Speaker 1: the women's movement. So I interned at the National Organization
Speaker 1: for Women, which later became my first job out of college,
Speaker 1: and it would also be the first job that I
Speaker 1: quit because I had never felt so invisibilized as a
Speaker 1: black woman, as a queer woman, my experience as an
Speaker 1: intern versus the actual like infrastructure of the organization. Things
Speaker 1: that I had heard right being said about women of color,
Speaker 1: this idea that somehow everyone else needs to leave every
Speaker 1: other part of themselves behind in pursuit of the quote
Speaker 1: unquote greater good, which hearkens back to, you know, suffragious time.
Speaker 1: Oh you know, why are you giving rights to these
Speaker 1: black men before you are your own wives? And then
Speaker 1: you know we're going to turn them into our enemy
Speaker 1: in the pursuit of our greater good. Black women want
Speaker 1: to work in coalition. Indigenous women want to work in
Speaker 1: coalition because community understanding is the fundamentals of the societies
Speaker 1: that we come from, right, But it isn't the same,
Speaker 1: And so I wonder, too, how much is it our
Speaker 1: lie that we tell ourselves around Americans, White Americans individualism
Speaker 1: that doesn't then allow allow white women to be a
Speaker 1: part of the greater collective, which is how the rest
Speaker 1: of us from marginalized and underrepresented communities have always had
Speaker 1: to navigate through life through those safety nets of family,
Speaker 1: whether biological or not, because of the way in which
Speaker 1: we've been treated in society. So you have to build
Speaker 1: your own safety net. So how much is it in
Speaker 1: the way that we have been socialized right that doesn't
Speaker 1: allow for white women to see themselves as part of
Speaker 1: the larger community of women and people. Yeah, I think
Speaker 1: that is. I think that those kind of individualistic mindsets
Speaker 1: are so pervasive and have indeed infused, you know, all
Speaker 1: of these movements for social justice, including the women's movement.
Speaker 1: So yes, I think that's a big piece. And I
Speaker 1: think the other piece is just the blinders that privilege
Speaker 1: puts on one and this kind of ability to opt
Speaker 1: out of seeing race when it's convenient not to do so.
Speaker 1: And you know, I really tried to ground the first
Speaker 1: season of the podcast and some of my own sort
Speaker 1: of reflections on the narrative I've told about myself, because
Speaker 1: I think a lot of this is like unpacking the
Speaker 1: stories we have ourselves and the way we view ourselves.
Speaker 1: And you know, I grew up in this progressive, largely white,
Speaker 1: liberal community, suburban community in Minnesota at a time when
Speaker 1: there was like, you know, kind of it was a
Speaker 1: state of sort of public investment. We believed in the
Speaker 1: common good, We believed in all these kind of public benefits,
Speaker 1: and believing this kind of myth about this progressive utopian
Speaker 1: not utopian, but you know, like kind of very good
Speaker 1: meaning you know, good community and then really having that
Speaker 1: I mean shattered. You know, obviously I questioned that you know,
Speaker 1: had a more political, politically nuanced understanding of that as
Speaker 1: I aged, but particularly when Minneapolis has become ground zero
Speaker 1: for violent policing and these horrific murders of black men
Speaker 1: at the hands of police officers, you know, and some
Speaker 1: of the largest racial discrepancies on almost any measure of
Speaker 1: well being, and sort of how this progressive myth kind
Speaker 1: of um prevented clear sightedness about the inequity that was
Speaker 1: you know, hiding in plain sight my whole life. And
Speaker 1: so I think that it really is incumbent upon all
Speaker 1: of us to do that critical analysis of the stories
Speaker 1: we tell about ourselves and sort of this belief we
Speaker 1: want to have in our own goodness and really look
Speaker 1: at the ways that by not attending to race or
Speaker 1: selectively attending to race, we are maintaining, we are actively
Speaker 1: perpetrating and maintaining a deeply racist stated status quo. And
Speaker 1: you know your own inequity, right because because the reality is,
Speaker 1: you know, the at that none of us are free
Speaker 1: until we're all free, right, And it is it is,
Speaker 1: it is that sentiment and that reality that unless we're
Speaker 1: going to and as I say on wok af often,
Speaker 1: unless you're going to do the hard work of interrogating
Speaker 1: your own feelings, and I will go so far as
Speaker 1: to say interrogating your own history, because there is this
Speaker 1: desire I think that you know, the original big lie
Speaker 1: wasn't one about election fraud. It was one about white
Speaker 1: American exceptionalism and the belief that you know, the desire
Speaker 1: right now is to erase the our violent origin story
Speaker 1: in this country, to preserve the big lie that white
Speaker 1: people came here to you know, spread goodwill and do
Speaker 1: all the right things in America. And you're just like, oh,
Speaker 1: but if you actually listen to the stories of those
Speaker 1: that were oppressed, then you don't look like this great
Speaker 1: savior right there, the home of the brave. You don't
Speaker 1: look like the myths that you've been putting up. The
Speaker 1: myths don't hold up over time once other people have
Speaker 1: the microphone in their own hands and are able to
Speaker 1: narrate their own stories outside of what they've been fed.
Speaker 1: That's exactly right. And I think, you know, even though
Speaker 1: I would have been someone, I think probably my whole
Speaker 1: life would have been raised with a political awareness about,
Speaker 1: you know, the fact that American exceptionalism was someone of
Speaker 1: a myth. I think I still believed, and I talk
Speaker 1: about this in the first season of the podcast, in
Speaker 1: this myth of sort of our own my own specialness
Speaker 1: as kind of a enlightened progressive white person, and you
Speaker 1: have to also combat that, right, Yeah, that is also
Speaker 1: a myth, and that there is nothing special about ourselves
Speaker 1: and our communities and you know, and that we are
Speaker 1: all have a responsibility to be doing more, better, different
Speaker 1: And I really believe that, you know, the way that
Speaker 1: this anti supposed critical race theory issue has taken off
Speaker 1: is at its core a protection of that belief in
Speaker 1: our own goodness, right, and a and a very visceral
Speaker 1: desire to not engage in anything that could challenge that.
Speaker 1: Like this is a story about you know, this is
Speaker 1: a fight over the narratives we tell ourselves and we
Speaker 1: get codified as truth. And if we don't address that
Speaker 1: and change that, like that and the possibility that that
Speaker 1: could change is so deeply threatening to folks. So how
Speaker 1: do you feel, Julie, how do we go about the
Speaker 1: collective unpacking? How do we go about you know what
Speaker 1: I what I often say, putting the mirror to the
Speaker 1: face of white America and saying that you know, as
Speaker 1: James Baldwin said so many many years ago, you can't
Speaker 1: change things that you don't face. And the desire right now,
Speaker 1: right through the pushback with critical race theory, which I
Speaker 1: continue to remind people, is not taught in K through
Speaker 1: twelve schools. It is taught in law school as an elective,
Speaker 1: and in some law schools not all right that if
Speaker 1: the force behind the pushback is to hold on to
Speaker 1: this make believe of white American exceptionalism, then how do
Speaker 1: we go about forcing people to look in the mirror,
Speaker 1: forcing white people to look in the mirror and say,
Speaker 1: like you have the ability to be both monster right
Speaker 1: and innovator right, Like you have like you are also
Speaker 1: a complex human right that isn't just about being Glenda
Speaker 1: the good Witch, right, like, there is all of these
Speaker 1: other levels. So how do you think that we continue
Speaker 1: down this road when now there's just so much pushback
Speaker 1: their actual laws and policies going on the book to
Speaker 1: make sure that, as Ron de Santis said, don't feel uncomfortable,
Speaker 1: so that they don't feel any discomfort, can go along
Speaker 1: just for the get along. Yeah, No, I think that
Speaker 1: mean we should call all these laws like the codifying
Speaker 1: of white fragility laws, right, that's what they are, right,
Speaker 1: like the protection of white fragility, to make sure that
Speaker 1: that is not challenged. And you know, I think it
Speaker 1: taps into sort of the way the unique ways that
Speaker 1: white women's racism has always been manifest in this country.
Speaker 1: There's a wonderful book called Mothers of Mass Resistance by
Speaker 1: Elizabeth Gillespie McRae, and she was a guest of mine
Speaker 1: on the first season of the podcast where she talks
Speaker 1: about how these battles of her education have long been
Speaker 1: sort of where it's been socially sanctioned for white women
Speaker 1: to kind of activate their racism, right like from the
Speaker 1: anti from the anti integration, anti school busing campaigns of
Speaker 1: the nineteen sixties and seventies to now what we see
Speaker 1: around you know, both the sort of anti public education
Speaker 1: in terms of like the uproar over you know, school
Speaker 1: closures and mask wearing and public health measures to the
Speaker 1: anti so called critical race theory debates. But I mean,
Speaker 1: it really is this way of protecting my comfort as
Speaker 1: a white person in the masked in this I am work,
Speaker 1: I am giving myself to my child's best interests. Right this,
Speaker 1: this white womanhood has been constructed and that I am
Speaker 1: a you know this this my you know again, my goodness,
Speaker 1: my my caretaking, my my mothering. So what is it
Speaker 1: going to take to change it? I mean, one, it's
Speaker 1: why I wanted to, like, you know, have some of
Speaker 1: these public conversations, yeah, that both examine sort of the
Speaker 1: big picture and the personal and hopefully start to prompt
Speaker 1: more people to have these conversations. But then, you know,
Speaker 1: kind of moving into the second season in the podcast
Speaker 1: where we look at the care caregiving crisis in this country,
Speaker 1: I also think it's going to take policies that put us,
Speaker 1: that provide benefits to us and build that solidarity dividend
Speaker 1: that that show us concretely that there are better ways
Speaker 1: of orienting society in ways that we all benefit. And
Speaker 1: I think if we could get some of these, you know,
Speaker 1: if we can change some of our policies, I also
Speaker 1: think that helps us change our narratives. So I don't
Speaker 1: think that like they're they're interconnected, right. I think narrative,
Speaker 1: narrative and the stories we tell need can lead to
Speaker 1: different kind of policies, and different kind of policies can
Speaker 1: also lead to different narratives. I think it's a really
Speaker 1: iterative process. But I do think that if we can
Speaker 1: have some investment, some greater investment in the common good
Speaker 1: that allows us to build bridges and to see one
Speaker 1: another's dignity and to really show kind of the common
Speaker 1: humanity that we need to be all invested in building
Speaker 1: and forging. Julie, what is coming up next with a
Speaker 1: white picket fence force for season three? What will folks
Speaker 1: be looking forward to? Yeah, well, we're early in our
Speaker 1: in our thinking right now, but I really would like
Speaker 1: to sort of knit together our first two seasons because
Speaker 1: I think the issues that we unpacked in both of
Speaker 1: those are coming to a head politically. You know. I've
Speaker 1: really been interested in the in the first two seasons,
Speaker 1: in these moments of political disruption, Donald Trump's election, the
Speaker 1: Black Lives Matter movement, and particularly the mass demonstrations that
Speaker 1: arose in the wake of George Floyd's murder, and what
Speaker 1: we saw sort of at least a momentary building of
Speaker 1: interracial solidarity in the wake of that, and then this
Speaker 1: public health crisis that caused massive shared pain, particularly for parents,
Speaker 1: and again particularly for mothers who were affected most dramatically
Speaker 1: by lack of childcare and lack of public accessible schools,
Speaker 1: and all of these I think disruptions could have been
Speaker 1: a moment of tremendous political transformation where we really those
Speaker 1: solidarity dividends. And what we've seen in the wake of
Speaker 1: all of these is a tremendous rise of racist backlash.
Speaker 1: And so I think we're at this very precarious moment,
Speaker 1: and I just so I'd really like to look at
Speaker 1: why again, why are we seeing this racist backlash in
Speaker 1: this moment, Who's behind it, how are they messaging this,
Speaker 1: and what do we need to do to do something differently, Like,
Speaker 1: we have a choice in how we engage at this moment,
Speaker 1: and I'd like to offer people a different path forward.
Speaker 1: I love that Julian I can't wait. I can't wait
Speaker 1: for it. I can't wait for the third season. And
Speaker 1: you know, I will say that I don't often, you know,
Speaker 1: have an opportunity to really delve into the psychology of
Speaker 1: white women, which is what you have done, and really,
Speaker 1: you know, create this historical arc that then brings us
Speaker 1: to this current space and place right because the questions
Speaker 1: that I think that a lot of us have is
Speaker 1: why are we here? Right? And I would argue, because
Speaker 1: we don't have the courage, we don't have the courage
Speaker 1: right to look in the mirror, We don't have the
Speaker 1: courage to say that America isn't exceptional, right, that the
Speaker 1: belief of that exceptionalism is what has left us open
Speaker 1: for the vulnerability of our empire to collapse right without
Speaker 1: you know, without understanding who we are and how we
Speaker 1: got here, how do you chart a path forward? And
Speaker 1: that's you know, that's just the reality. And so this
Speaker 1: has been a really wonderful conversation and I hope that
Speaker 1: you'll come back to Woke AFU sooner rather than later.
Speaker 1: I would love that. It's been wonderful to talk to you.
Speaker 1: Appreciate you, folks. The podcast is White Picket fence. Make
Speaker 1: sure to check out the first two seasons so that
Speaker 1: you will be prepared for season three. Now, folks, for
Speaker 1: our transition into our woke moment of wellness. And I
Speaker 1: want to say, I really appreciate folks dropping notes and
Speaker 1: telling me that you are walking, telling me that you're
Speaker 1: caring for your plants, telling me that you are really
Speaker 1: being intentional about your wellness. And like I said at
Speaker 1: the top when talking about COVID, if we are not
Speaker 1: taking responsibility for our own health and well being, we
Speaker 1: cannot assume that other people are going to take responsibility.
Speaker 1: And at a time when our health and our public
Speaker 1: safety are all just up in the air, it is important,
Speaker 1: it is more important than ever that we take care
Speaker 1: that we make those doctors appointments, that we work out,
Speaker 1: that we eat well, that we stay hydrated, that we
Speaker 1: stay grounded and connected, because, as I continue to say,
Speaker 1: things are going to get a lot worse before they
Speaker 1: get better. So, you know, here's something that I want
Speaker 1: to share a lot of people tell me that you know,
Speaker 1: they've tried meditation and you know it doesn't work for them,
Speaker 1: or they fall asleep, or you know, they just they
Speaker 1: don't feel whatever. They think is going to be that
Speaker 1: dreamy state of of meditation and what I want to offer.
Speaker 1: And again, I use one app right now, but I
Speaker 1: know again there are many and they are free. But
Speaker 1: inside Timer, not only do they have guided meditations, meaning
Speaker 1: that you can just listen to people talking and guiding
Speaker 1: you through meditation, but they also have really beautiful music.
Speaker 1: And so even if you know quote unquote meditation, sitting
Speaker 1: and listening or breathing on your own for a certain
Speaker 1: time frame doesn't work for you, I would encourage you
Speaker 1: to check out just the beats and the melodies and
Speaker 1: the music that are on these different apps, whether it
Speaker 1: be three minutes, ten or twenty or more, as a
Speaker 1: way to help us level out our cortisol levels and
Speaker 1: just you know, get lost in the music. You can
Speaker 1: do that while walking, washing the dishes, you know, laying
Speaker 1: down right before you go to sleep. But if meditation,
Speaker 1: if listening to a guided medic aation and doing that
Speaker 1: kind of breathwork isn't your cup of tea, that I
Speaker 1: encourage you to listen to some music and during that
Speaker 1: time just doing your own breathing in counts of four, right,
Speaker 1: So do you breathe in holding for four seconds and
Speaker 1: then exhaling out through your mouth. Try to do three
Speaker 1: rounds of that where you're counting in your head to
Speaker 1: four as you're inhaling, you hold for four and then
Speaker 1: release for four. Try three rounds of that. Try it today,
Speaker 1: Try it right after the podcast. See if you find
Speaker 1: that your shoulders relax right, that your body loosens up,
Speaker 1: and that you can actually feel your breath change. So
Speaker 1: try and do those breathing exercises while you're just listening
Speaker 1: to that serene you know music, whether it is their
Speaker 1: wonderful violinists, piano harps, like all of these things. It
Speaker 1: doesn't take a lot of time, but again it's that
Speaker 1: intentional time where we're looking to connect and align with
Speaker 1: our body, with our breath, with our emotions and really
Speaker 1: using right that time for ourselves and being intentional about it.
Speaker 1: So give that a whirl and let me know in
Speaker 1: the comments section what you think and how you're reacting
Speaker 1: to it, folks. Coming up next is my conversation with
Speaker 1: Julie Koehler from White Picket Fence. Make sure to check
Speaker 1: out her podcast as well. I think you will enjoy it.
Speaker 1: That is it for me today, folks. Here on woke
Speaker 1: f daily as always. Power to the people and to
Speaker 1: all the people. Power, Get woke and stay woke as fuck.