What does it mean for White men to define their unfiltered experience, living in the US in the '20s?

Loran and Jenny host a focus group with four White men who share their experiences of race and racism in the US today. When was the last time you heard a White man talk about what it means to be a White man without supremacy or shame?

Are any stereotypes or tropes outdated?

What are we getting right?

What are we getting wrong?

In this first episode, we meet each man as he shares with us a bit of who he is and how his ability to be in good relationship with himself and others is/n't impacted by race and racism.

This conversation is part of a larger approach this season to talk about race at the intersection of gender. Please also make sure to check out Episode Two with Breakthrough for Men founder, Fred Jealous and Episode 8 "Beyond White Supremacy: Healing White Men as form of Violence Prevention and Harm Reduction."

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In the episode, Loran gives a rather long and detailed list of empirical data which speak to the irrefutable data points of White manhood as it exists in 2022:

White men make up 58% of the US House of Representatives, 60% of State Wide officials, 63% of county officials, 67% of US senators, 72% of elected prosecutors, 76% of governors, and 91% of sheriffs.

61.8% of the US prison population

51.7% of all mass shootings since 1966

White men are more likely to have heart disease than anyone else by race or gender (nearly 8 percent of all White men)

Middle aged White men have the highest suicide rates of any race or gender. Suicidality increases eye further if I White man is unmarried and even more so if the White man has a high school diploma or less.

The life expectancy of White men is 75.5 which is lower Asian and Hispanic men and women’s life expectancies as well as Black and White women life expectancies; all of which are in the upper 70s/lower eighties.

Of business owners in the US, more than any other by race and gender are White men at 41%, according to Forbes.

The Center for Employment Equity out of the University of Massachusetts Amherst finds that:

• White men’s advantages are weaker, and sometimes absent, in occupations that require educational certification. Educational requirements favor women’s employment.
• For working class jobs, White men face considerable employment competition from minority men in these same states with large minority workforces.
• White men have advantaged access to high paying white and blue collar jobs in most states.

319 of the nearly 400 people arrested at the or in connection to the insurrection at the US capitol are White men, 79.9%.

The Chicago Project on Security and Threats (CPOST) out of the University of Chicago finds that

• The odds of sending an insurrectionist was six times higher in counties where % non Hispanic whites declined.
• Among Americans, believing that blacks and Hispanics are overtaking Whites increases odds of being in the insurrectionist movement three fold
• Among conservative Americans, fear that blacks and Hispanics will have more rights than whites increases odds of being in the insurrectionist movement two fold

55.7% of White men do not have a college degree.

The Federal Bureau of Investigations' Uniform Crime Reporting Program finds that White men are disproportionately arrested in nearly every category they control for:

71% of all arrests made for arson are for White men, sex offensives (72%) rape (68%), liquor law violations (78.4%), DUIs (81%), aggravated assault (61.9%), burglary (68.1%), fraud (65%), embezzlement (62%) vandalism (67.6%), illegally carry or possessing a weapon (54.4%), drug abuse (70.6%), offensives against family and children (67.4%), and disorderly conduct (63.7%) white men.

More White men than any other race and gender (except White women) receive food stamps. Or the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits (or SNAP benefits) at 15.5%.

Of those who wrote, edited, drafted, voted, debated, and passed the US Constitution’s first 15 amendments (out of 27) — the governing document by which all other laws are evaluated on their legality 100% were by White men.

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TRANSCRIPT DISCLAIMER: The following transcript was auto-transcribed by Descript software. It will be updated and cleaned in the coming weeks. Please reach out if you would like a transcript in the interim.

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Welcome to our podcast. We’re so glad you’re here refocusing on Whiteness without supremacy or shame. Listen. Like. Follow.

Instagram: @the.spillway | Facebook: @WithoutSupremacyorShame

For a transcript of this episode and more, please visit our website, www.thespillway.org

Mentioned in this episode:

The Spillway Community Guidelines

1. Engage sequentially. The show is a serial not episodic. We do this so we can build relation and find common ground and context. 2. We stay in our own lane. The Spillway is about White people talking to (predominately) White people about White people and White culture. We're not out here to critique anyone's actions but our own. 3. Our combined fabric of destiny. (3a) As Dr. King said, our humanities are deeply interconnected to each other. Racism negatively impacts me, too. (3b) The Spillway is one mechanism within a larger framework needed to sustain racial equity and justice. We're not a one-stop shop. 4. No one right way to liberation. We all share the same goals, but not every method works for every person. If this doesn't work for you. That's okay. Maybe it works for someone else.

Like, because that's been so frequent, I'm wondering like what, what or how

that lands if we like play the entire focus group and don't stop it when

there's something that we want to say, or like, want to analyze in that

moment or like talk through, um, just because that's how I'm seeing it show

up in other spaces one, but then two, um, I am terrified that someone's

going to take this episode of context.

I mean, they're going to anyway

and I have to start believing that they're not, we now have safety mechanisms in

place at the top of the episode, that's asking them to go back to the beginning

if they don't that's their problem.

And then there's, did you hear the whole disclaimer?

So there's that disclaimer, then there's the second disclaimer, when we

do the, like the introduction piece.

So if they're still taking it out of context, I don't I'm, I'm not holding

myself accountable to that anymore.

They're doing

that

anyway, because they wanted to have people like receive it however they can.

And so now that there's like two pieces in there, if they're still

coming in and scooping things out, up out of context, right.

That's where I'm at now.

It was more of like a fool me once, shame on me, fool me twice.

Now, what shame I kind of like where I'm at with the, with the piece.

And so in holding this, I just feel like we're going to be able to talk

a lot more about what the individual said, as they're saying it, versus this

kind of like larger reflect of what were the main takeaways kind of deal.

What are your thoughts, feelings, and reactions.

Um,

I'm here for whatever you need.

Um, I think, no matter again, we, I just said this, I think no matter, or

you said, you said this, I think no matter what we do, somebody can take a

sound bite from anywhere and just like fucking make it whatever they want.

Right.

So regardless of how many disclaimers we have, um, I think if we're gonna

interject into the, the conversation, like that's what you're thinking of.

Right?

Like somebody says something and then we go, oh, that's problematic or whatever

the fuck we say, and then unpack it.

Is that what you're thinking?

So I think that's a great idea.

Um, I do think that that's going to make it really long, even longer

than when we just did the intro.

Unless you have specific things that we're saying.

Um, no.

Um, so we can do it and then you can cut it down if you want.

But I don't know.

I imagine this is a two part episode, so,

okay.

So, so then yeah, whatever you want to do, I'm here

for okay.

Um, I

just don't know how are we going to do this?

Hurry up.

Do we have hand signals?

Like, are we going to listen to it and then in real time, and then

we'll listen to it in real time.

Um, how about for the intros at least, um, we'll that each person

kind of introduced themselves.

And then in between each of them, we'll do like a pause, stop, pause, stop.

If we just say at the top, we we've already recorded this.

We've already like we've already come up with a way to talk about the focus group.

And we're revising that as we are experiencing, we have this like really

literal reminder of the violence.

Of white nationalism, white and male nationalism.

And so trying to be more thoughtful and intentional about how we put

this forward means that we're going to use the thing that we've already

created, and then cut that up into small, more digestible bites so that

we can have more fuller conversations to make this more relational.

That sounds good.

a whole, whole lot of data is about to come your way.

And upon listening to this episode a few times in the post-production process,

I just want to name that it might be easier for folks to look at the show

notes or the spillways website, which has all of this data written out.

The focus group starts at around the 13 minute mark for folks who just want

to skip ahead or you can try it out.

And if you get lost, just know that 13 minute mark is your anchor

back into the swing of the episode.

It really just not that it was really important to have this data collected

and put into one place to kind of encapsulate what we know as a base

about white men before talking and listening to white men's experiences,

white men, what do we know about them?

What don't we know, it seems like everyone has an opinion about white men,

but what do the cold hard facts say?

And user be aware a lot, a lot of data is about to come your way

and I'm going to try to go slowly.

If it's helpful.

All of this data with links may be found on our website@thespillway.org.

But before we begin, I just want to say that I'm painting a picture with this.

One of my favorite classes and Mander graduate was a statistics course

where among many things we spoke at length about the human bias,

which creates and presents data.

I can tell you that 44.3% of white men have college degrees, which is more than

any other race and gender, except for white women and Asian men and women.

I can also tell you that 55.7% of white men don't even have college degrees.

A majority of white men have never been to college.

Both of these statements are accurate 44.3% and 55.7%.

But they both evoke different emotions.

Don't they?

One says, oh, you're fine.

You have it better than other people.

The other says, whoa, that's more than I would've thought

one says, let's compare people.

The other says let's build.

And this isn't about either or thinking this is about holding both simultaneously.

So this is going to feel jarring.

I mean, it's been a doozy putting it all together, but I think it's

worth it so that we can hold the complexities of the human condition

within like the white male experience.

So let's just start here.

How many white men are there?

The us census bureau reports that white men make up 30% of the us population, 30%.

And this number is going to be important.

A lot of it because we're going to work in percentages for the most part.

But does this number surprise you?

Is it lower?

Is it higher than you imagined?

30%?

You select 10 us citizens at random.

Three of them will be white mountain.

Let's go deeper, according to the bipartisan reflective democracy campaign.

And this is just a group, which kind of recaps elections as of the 2020

elections, white men make up 58% of the us house of representatives.

60% of statewide officials, 63% of county officials, 67% of us senators,

72% of elected prosecutors, 76% of governors and 91% of sheriffs.

I told you bought a beta.

We just started, but what does this say when we're talking about social

power or electability and white men, despite making up 30% of the U S

population white men also make up 61.8% of the U S prison population.

51.7% of all mass shootings since 1966 have happened at the hands of white men,

more than any other race and gender.

What does this say about our criminal justice system and white men?

According to the CDC, white men are more likely to have heart disease

than any other by race or gender.

And this is nearly 8% of all white men.

The American foundation for suicide prevention finds that middle

aged white men have the highest suicide rates of any race or gender

suicidality increases even further.

If a white man is unmarried and even more.

So if the white man has a high school diploma or that.

The life expectancy of weight mountain, according to the CDC

is 75.5 years old, and that's lower than Asian and Hispanic men.

And women's life expectancies as well as black and white women's life

expectancy is all of which are in the upper seventies, lower eighties.

What does this collection of data say about the life of white men of business

owners in the us more than any other by race and gender are white men at 41%.

And that's according to Forbes the center for employment equity out of

the university of Massachusetts Amherst finds that white men's advantages

are weaker and sometimes absent in occupations that require educational

certification, educational requirements, paper women's employment, and for

working class jobs, white men face considerable employment competition

from minority men in these same states with large minority workforces.

Lastly, they find that white men have advantage access to high

paying white and blue collar jobs.

In most states, PBS reports that 319 of the nearly 400 people arrested at,

or in connection to the insurrection at the us Capitol are white men, 79.9%.

Hold this figure.

When you hear that the odds of sending an insurrectionist was six times

higher in counties where the percent of non-Hispanic whites declined in the

population that among Americans who believe that blacks and Hispanics are

overtaking whites, it increases the odds of being in the insurrectionist movement,

threefold that among conservative Americans, the fear that black and

Hispanic people will have more rights than white people increases the odds of

being in the insurrectionist movement.

Twofold.

All of that data comes from the Chicago project on security and the threats

out of the university of Chicago.

Speaking of universities, 55.7% of white men do not have a college degree.

Let's revisit the figure that white men account for 30% of the us population.

When you hear these figures from the FBI, it's their

uniform crime reporting program.

And it's showing that white men are disproportionately arrested in nearly

every single category that they control for 71% of all arrests made for arson

are by white men, 72% of all sex offenses from white Madden, 68% of rape white men.

78.4% of liquor law violations, 81% of DUIs, 61.9% of aggravated assaults.

68.1% of burglaries.

65% of fraud.

62% of embezzlement, 67.6% of vandalism, 54.4% of illegally carrying or possessing

a weapon 70.6% of drug abuse, 67.4% of offenses against family and children.

63.7% of disorderly conduct.

White men hold these numbers.

When you hear that more white men than any other race in gender except white women

receive food stamps or the supplemental nutritional assistance program benefits.

Snap enough.

That's we call them at 15.5%.

Of those who wrote edited, drafted, voted, debated, and passed the U S constitution.

First 15 amendments out of the 27 that we currently have in 2022,

the governing document by which all other laws are evaluated on their

legality, 100% were done by white men.

This is a lot of data and this data isn't just numbers, it's people's

lives and hearts and bodies.

Let's just take a moment to appreciate that we have this data.

Maybe appreciate it feels like the wrong word.

Maybe it's about appreciating how we very rarely put these numbers

together in the same conversation.

The good, the bad, the concerning, the scary, the sad, the in-between,

the fuller picture of white man old.

These figures hold this data as we go into this Congress.

So do you want to tee all this up?

I would love to.

It was, um, coordinating.

Let's see.

Let's count.

Um, there was me, there was you, there was J there was T there

was teach and there was Sam.

So what does that?

Six, six people's schedules.

That was one thing.

Um, we're all in different parts of the us, I believe.

Um, So I had to be wrapped in and out because of the thing.

So, but I, I was there for, for the questions.

And so what we did was we had them all come in and we said, hello.

And I think you told them what we were doing.

And they were all really nice and, and, and here for it, which I wasn't expecting.

And so then they all went away and we invited one person at a time into like

the room, you know, the zoom room.

Um, and we, I asked them a series of questions, you know, name will,

you know, fake name, um, date of birth or age and all that.

Um, and they answered them some in more detail than others, um, which is fine.

And it was, it was interesting.

Um, and then.

Then then the F after that, we did that with everybody individually.

And then the focus group was we invited everyone back into the main zoom room.

And you started out with the COVID question.

I think the only thing that I want to add, that's a really great tee

up to us is we did all of this as confidentially as possible.

Oh yeah, absolutely.

So I met with one person and that one person then created this kind

of like a really beautiful bouquet of like experiences and demographics

within white manhood to come together and have this conversation.

Um, and so Jenny and I really don't know any of these humans

outside of this conversation.

One of them.

I met previously once before to talk about this, and then we emailed a couple

of times to try to get this together.

Um, but a lot of that was so that they could speak openly and

freely about their experiences.

And then when we share it, it cannot be traced back to anybody

which is important, given cancel culture,

right.

Or anything too.

There's this other piece of they are bigger and larger than themselves.

They, they represent their culture and their community has weight Madden

right.

In this podcast, in this podcast

episode.

Right?

So they, uh, you're hearing one voice, but that one voice is representative

of whiteness and white culture, which helped you raise and socialize

and educate these white men about what's coming out of their mouths.

And so like, one of the things that we love to do and with culture is

individualize everything, oh, hold on.

That's your experience?

That's your experience?

That's your experience, but we're completely missing that.

So many other people share our experience.

Right?

I just want to make sure that when we're talking about these men, we're

understanding and experiencing them as a reflection of white culture and white

men, not as an individual experience.

I think that's what I'm trying to like, put the point home on.

And why is that important?

Because I think a lot of people are going to listen to this and go, oh, well then

that's just that one person's experience.

Oh.

That doesn't like equate to all white men, but that's just that one person's thing.

And yeah, it's not going to be every single white man on the face of the

earth or within the United States, but it will be a sizable portion.

Does that make more sense?

It does.

I just know.

Yeah, that was perfect.

Um, so you know, me, I have a hard time when people are like, you know, fuck

individual experience, like bothers me.

I'm not saying that we don't have collective experiences or there

aren't through lines to experience.

So I just that's, that's my, my thing, I guess.

So that's why I'm kind of like, Ooh, I'm a little uncomfortable

with that, but it's fine.

So we don't need to worry

about that.

No, but again, if you're having that experience much, like you're having

an experience, other people are going to have that exact same experience.

Uh, no, this is their individual experience and we have to honor

their, I think there's needs to be space for both.

Right.

But I think what, what you're saying, and I think what you're saying

right now is that the most important piece of this is that these folks

are coming together in a shared experience of male whiteness in the.

And I think that that's important.

So, so absolutely.

I think that's important.

I probably just needed to say it out loud

and I appreciate that because it is, again, for me, the tick, the tic-tac

experience, the tic-tac phenomenon, you think you're so isolated and insular

in your individual experience, and then suddenly you see thousands of

other people going, oh my God, I have this exact same thought experience

behavior, and you go, oh fuck.

Wow.

I thought it was so unique and special and I'm not,

but you are, and you're not right.

Both and both and

all

those multitude, somebody call out.

And then, um,

well I think this larger thing that also has to be part of this

conversation is we are not clinicians.

We don't have that language.

Like that's just not part of our.

Um, personhood or education or training in any capacity?

I think they know that with me,

these are just two white people all talking about why people miss without

dependency or shame privacy or shame.

And we're just kind of going, whoa, we just heard from four way people who don't

really have any understanding of our kind of framework and they're putting them

through that framework with their consent.

Right.

And also, I think it's something to be said that they showed up

because we weren't just like, we didn't just throw them in blind.

Like they knew what they were.

They knew what the topic was

real quick.

Also, we're going to have this like little noise that way, you know, that

we are dropping out of the focus group and into a kind of reflective space.

And then we will acknowledge when we're going back to the focus group.

Just so everyone's clear, you're going to hear this noise

when we're about to start holding space for what they've just said and

unpacking it a little bit further.

All right.

All right.

Let's start this recording.

First step we have Jay he's 36 years old, but lives in a predominantly suburban

slash urban leaning area and is a social work professor with a private practice

and works in community, organizing

political party, if any,

yeah, affiliate liberal.

Um, but I wouldn't say I'm an extreme liberal by any means

religious affiliation.

Um,

agnostic leaning, atheist

partnership status, if any,

currently, uh, engaged to be married in three

months.

Who did you vote for in the 2016 election?

2016.

I voted for Hillary

Clinton, 2020,

uh, but

ethnicity, Swedish, Finnish, Scottish.

Do you have a kilt?

I do.

I have a family crest, actually not a killed.

I don't want to kill it with my family crest on it, which

is kind of golden.

Super cool.

I love it.

Really great.

It looks like a newsy hat, you know, like I should still leave papers.

Um, and I have the world's tiniest head, so I look whole Arius in it

and I'm so glad I snuck that question in there.

Can you pinpoint around when your family immigrated to the U S.

My maternal side, came to Ellis island in the late 18 hundreds, 1880s, 1890s.

I don't know about my maternal side.

That's a lot more

chaotic.

Okay.

So are you familiar with the Kinsey scale of sexuality or zero to six?

One to six?

Yep.

Okay.

So no six is completely attracted

to same-sex and zeros completely attracted to opposite

sex.

Okay.

Zero to six.

Zero is exclusively heterosexual.

Six is exclusively homosexual and three is bisexual.

Like the general thing, you know, um, stereotypical

knowledge of what a bisexual is.

Then we've got one which is heterosexual, incidental, homosexual tendencies.

Then we've got two, which is heterosexual, more than incidental,

homosexual tendencies threes.

The bisexual force homosexual more than incidental, heterosexual

tendencies, and five as homosexual incidental heterosexual tendencies.

Uh, given that scale, what I'm hearing is I'm probably more like a two, I've had

some physical intimacy with men limited, not super interested in it, but open

to it.

Okay.

In your family growing up, were you raised to be racist and the sec is a two-parter.

And how were you taught or how were you taught?

Not to be racist?

Um,

I grew up in the rural Midwest in Ohio.

My family is not overtly racist, nor did they teach any specifically

over racialized behaviors, but I was told not to see color.

So colorblindness was built into my upbringing and a disregard and a lack

of understanding of systemic racial issues was absolutely a part of the

world that I grew up in a very, very

white world.

Which of these three ideas or movements do you most closely

align with all lives matter?

Black lives matter, blue lives matter and why

black lives matter because the history of racism in our country is really

the foundation of the narrative of who we are as a S as a society.

And I do believe maybe it's a platitude that until black lives matter,

um, there won't be liberation for

any others on a scale from one to 10, 10 being a lot or frequently.

How often do you think, just think not talk about race or racism?

Uh,

daily, almost in my profession, I teach courses on advanced social justice.

I teach classes in narrative therapy where we're consistently

analyzing the intersections of identity in therapeutic processes.

I teach substance abuse classes where we talk about systems that.

Create, uh, addiction within marginalized communities,

predominantly black and brown.

And I run anti-racist trainings.

How often do you talk about race with people of color?

Probably in some way, maybe like every other day or at least the

bare minimum once a week at a maximum four or five times a week.

Also my fiance is a person of color, so we're, you know,

engaged in that at the home.

You know, I don't, I don't come home to a purely white family, so.

Gotcha.

Okay.

How often do you talk about race with other white people?

Um, quite regularly, probably a couple of times a week.

Um, as part of my job at the university and part of my teaching, if I didn't

have the teaching and the classes to do it, and I only had sort of

university meetings, it might be once a week, twice a week at the most,

but pretty frequently.

How often do you talk about race?

In

like message boards or like in zoom?

I don't know.

Lauren what?

Social

media.

Oh

yeah.

Um,

yeah, actually I really, you know, as a millennial, I don't

care much for social media.

I don't know why I say millennial, but I don't care a ton for social media.

I don't do a lot of postings, but I have found if I look historically, I

don't post photos of me at concerts or food or you, my latest workout.

I tend to post racial and social justice things if I post and that's maybe once

every two months, it's pretty rare.

Gotcha.

I don't want to, I'm careful of, um, what's the term.

Oh my gosh.

Um, when you just want to present an image of who you are, that's anti racist.

Um, I'm drawing a blank

on the term.

That's okay.

That works.

How comfortable are you talking about race and racism in general?

At this point in

my life, I'm extremely.

Um, five years ago, less, 10 years ago.

Not much at all.

What's your most recent level of education working on a doctorate as we speak.

Oh, wow.

Okay.

You don't like to play small dude.

You're like getting married, working on a doctorate, like

I got one life to live.

I'm going to, I'm going to it to the wheels fall off.

Um, I don't have any favorite parts at the very ending was like, do you talk about

race online and hosts and message boards?

And I was like, oh my God.

And then he like goes on later to say like, as a millennial, I was

like, buddy, you don't need the RD.

Call yourself a millennial after you thought that the only thing

online was a message board.

We know, we know where's

your AOL handle, your aim message.

I know, you know, what's crazy to me too is, and we've

talked about this before.

I feel like.

So, um, social media is such a huge part of social justice at this current time in

the world, or at least, you know, talking about it or making it more visible.

Um, a lot of the white folks that we've spoken to don't do social media.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That's like across the board, I'm a sudden that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And you'll, I think we hear that later from some of the

other folks on this episode.

Right.

And that's just

right.

I'm like, who's, I mean, I know people of color doing a lot of social

justice work, social media, and then there's you doing the white people need

to get their shit together version, but I don't know of anyone else that's doing

what's for sure.

If you want to burn in between,

right.

I mean, you might have more of your finger on the pulse of foods doing that.

I mean collectively there's maybe an eye, like this goes for like Instagram,

Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

I can maybe think of like 15 people.

I always forget about LinkedIn.

Yeah.

Yeah.

The other thing that was really interesting too, and I've

noticed that I do this too,

is in naming our ancestry.

We can like name very eloquently, like one side of the family tree, but when

it comes to the other side, that's um, I think Jayden's of like a bit more chaotic.

Oh my God.

We just like, don't even go into it, but we like hold onto the one

of like, oh no, I know that we came here after slavery and bed.

Um,

But the, like the one that's a little bit more chaotic and maybe that's just

what I do, but like, no, sorry, go ahead.

I just think that it is because it can be messy, more messy and more chaotic.

We can have like more routes that like deeply tie into the American

enslavement system and genocide system.

And so I think sometimes we like glaze over that.

Like, I think in much the same way, like Jay was like, oh no, it

wasn't overt racism, but right.

But I was taught X, Y, and Z, but even with, but even within that, uh, but

even within that change, the implicit racism isn't even named as racism.

It was, I wasn't out of overt racism, but I was taught color blind, like

ideology is, but not using it as racist.

See,

when I heard his, when I heard him say that it's a little bit chaotic,

I was like, oh, I get you not on the, uh, like connection to racism level.

But the like, my, my family history is that the, the matriarch of my father's

side told a lot of really special stories that may or may not have been true.

So nobody really knows, like, we're sure that they came from Italy, but we

have no idea when, um, so like when he said that that's where my mind went.

I was like, oh, did you have a sketchy relative that made up Fibbers too.

Yeah, I guess it could be that too.

Right.

There is lost to

history.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I think it is.

I just brought it up cause I was like, hadn't thought of your, your

thoughts before, but it's, it's true.

Like who wants to bring up that

stuff?

I think it has, because they've been in a lot of shared spaces recently with

other white folks who are very quick to not make their American ancestry.

I like us ancestry.

Um, but then once you get into like small breakout rooms, they're like, oh,

Hey, I actually want to talk about this.

And like, we're totally here to hold space for it.

But it's like, oh, like within a shared larger communal space, you

don't feel comfortable talking about like, oh wow, you are a

direct descendant of slave owners.

Uh, and so sometimes that's sometimes now like messy or it's complicated.

Just kind of like, just perks me up a little bit.

Where are your line?

10?

I go up near like, oh, let me probe that.

Um, the other thing I wanted to mention was it was interesting to hear about

like, thinking about racism and like not talking about racism, like by

himself and then with folks of color and then with other white people.

And so for Jay thinking about racism was a lot because it happens daily.

Um, but then it was interesting when he talks with other white

people, which he said happens about one to two times a week.

He says it's more frequent.

Yeah.

I didn't catch that first, but you're right.

Yeah.

And then talking with folks of color, I think he said one to four times

a week, one minimum, four maximum.

And so that would actually be more than the more frequently of one to two times.

And so there's this weird kind of inconsistent story happening

around how, what, like, what is frequency that the, um, the

numerical understanding of frequency changes throughout those questions?

I also wonder.

When, when I asked the question, um, do you feel did,

what did I ask this question?

Like, did we get an answer if he feels more comfortable speaking with

white people or people of color?

Or did I just ask the like generic, how comfortable do you feel?

Okay.

So I wonder what the answer to that would be.

Yeah.

I was also really surprised.

He was like, oh yes, very comfortable.

And I was like, oh, I wonder what that feels like.

Yeah.

Do you not feel bad for yourself?

I mean, at home and with you, right.

And like, you know, but, and that's true for white people and people of color.

Like for me, like I don't, when people, you know, I'm, I'm actively working

on addressing things when people say them, but it makes me really sweaty.

And so, but I was like, wow.

I wonder how it feels to not like rain, sweat from your pits when you start

talking about it to somebody, let me

think.

Maybe that's because he's also a teacher.

Oh, that's true.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And so there is also, I think that kind of, that advantage of it being in your

curricula or a textbook and saying, oh, here, we're talking about it because

it's part of our, just like our syllabus.

And so we're talking about it, but like, without that civil by, would we still be

talking about it in the same frequency or

capacity?

That's true.

Also, I don't speak to a lot of people every day because of the work that I do.

So even just regular conversations are hard for me.

Cause I like forget how to talk in a normal tone of voice.

Yeah.

Anyway.

All right.

What's going on?

Okay.

Next week we have Sam he's 29 years old, that lives in the suburbs and is

training to go into computer coding,

political party, if any, if any, you know, none.

Okay.

Sure.

Um, religious affiliation, if any Jewish partnership status, if

any, in relationship, who did you vote for in the 2016 election?

Nobody.

Um, what about 2020 Trump?

What's your ethnicity?

Uh, middle Eastern.

Can you pinpoint around when your family immigrated to the

U S decade and point of origin?

My grandmother

is 81 and she came here when she was three.

So 79 years ago puts us, do we meet roughly,

roughly like this totally fine.

We don't need

to get peas on my mother's side.

And then on my father's side, think it was like the hundred and something years ago.

Okay.

And they both came from middle east, the middle east.

Um,

my father's side came from like, uh, Spain, Turkey, Israel kind of situation.

It's not certain where my mother's side

came from Syria.

Okay.

Now this one, um, are you familiar with the Kinsey scale sexuality?

I

am.

I've heard of it.

I've experienced people talk about it, but I don't know much about it.

Jenny explains the Kinsey scale to Sam in much the same

way that she did for J you'd.

Like, I'll just give you a sum up of how I conduct my sexuality and you

can sound great.

Um, I'm generally, uh, only interested in women, um, but I'm

also generally only interested in men who are kind of feminine.

Right.

But also not too feminine.

Um, the way that it goes is like, when I'm perfectly sober, I'm exclusively

involved with women when I am not.

So.

Um, if someone really catches my fancy, they catch my fans

in your family growing up.

Were you raised to be racists, be racist or, you know, if you

weren't, how were you taught?

Not to be racist?

Um, I was taught by my mother's parents, I think is more accurate than saying

I was taught by my mother to, um, to really, to see people as, as people.

And if you look at someone as if like they're white or a

minority, Your own because they're there they're a person, right?

The things that they are, are more important and you'll learn from them.

That's like a Jewish proverb that says like, you should drink in

the dust of someone's feet, right?

Like no matter who they are, even if you think that they're an idiot.

And then on my father's side, my father doesn't believe he's

racist, but he is so racist.

So, uh, I'll go with a stick with like my mother's side for

the moment.

Which of these three ideas or movements do you most closely

align with all lives matter?

Black lives matter, blue lives matter and why?

Um, I'm going to have to go with that.

I, I can't choose any of them because I know they all have political meanings

and I don't know them all like in depth enough, but as far as I'm concerned,

I just want people to do whatever they want so that I can do whatever I want.

And we can all just kind of like support each other and also like leave each

other about how often do you think about race and racism?

So not talk about it, but actually think about it in your head?

Probably more often than not, because I think that we're going about it.

Oh, gotcha.

What'd you say like at least once a day, maybe more sounds about right.

Okay.

How often do you talk about race with people of color?

Uh, I talked to people of color a lot.

But I don't think we ever talk about racism because I think that just

sitting in and chatting as like people with people means a whole lot

more than talking about like, and my issue is, is X, Y, or Z, unless

I feel oppressed in this way or not.

Um, how often do you talk about race with other white people?

So much

more than black people?

So much more likely?

It seems like white people just like, they want to talk about it all the time.

And it's like, they, because everybody has an issue with looking in the mirror and

not being able to say I'm a good person.

Right.

So like, For years, people were sitting around saying like,

oh, like I'm a good person.

Cause I'd go with the morality of like my religion or my country.

And it says do this.

And then all of a sudden social media is a big thing eight years ago.

And then all of a sudden, um, race is everywhere you look and suddenly you're

going and telling these people that they followed, what they were told was good.

And then all of a sudden, now they're being told, oh, but like,

you're a man and you're white.

So you are the problem.

But what do you mean?

I had, I had two children.

I supported my wife.

I've supported my kids.

I followed, geared at my church.

I did all this good stuff.

And all of a sudden you're telling me that like, I'm the problem?

Like, like you feel let down by everyone in anything and

you feel isolated and alone.

I'm sorry, I can't go past that one.

It's so loaded.

It's

muted.

Sorry.

There's a lot.

And I was making notes what I was doing, cause I was like,

oh man, I got to remember that

one.

No I can't.

We get to the end of this one

the first.

Oh no, go ahead then.

So one thing I was thinking that people might say a certain maybe group of folks

might say is, um, well he's not white.

He's middle Eastern.

Okay.

Okay.

So what's the, like, I can just see that coming up.

You know what I mean?

Okay.

What's the answer to that

ethnicity is different than race.

So with ethnicity is your culture fits like, happens on

top of a racialized culture.

So, and I've actually been like a really strong proponent of adding middle Eastern

north African into a racial demographic category for like the U S census.

Because right now the U S census only allow us, or like accepts Hispanic

as an ethnicity in the United States.

I know, and it really is.

It's like Hispanic or other, and they just recently added two or more races.

And so it's becoming more and more complicated.

And so, like not only is it middle Eastern that Sam was talking about,

but also the Jewish identity too.

And there's a very long history of Jewish people not being identified

within whiteness and white people, not allowing Jewish people into whiteness.

And so that is, and it should be its own episode.

Um, and, um, in the spaces that I've been in, there is more and more conversation

about where is Jewishness now in terms of its, um, identification or assimilation

or amalgamation into the larger bucket of white culture, uh, and white people.

And so, yeah, there's this like historical appreciation and analysis and the

current reality to a Jewish that a lot of Jewish people identify as white.

And then a lot of white people identify other Jewish people as white, a lot

of stuff.

Um, one thing you did say was they added two other races to the sentence.

Did you mean ethnicities?

I am I confused?

You know, it's two, two or more races.

That's the category two or more.

It's not that, I don't know what those two are.

It's that it's, it's literally, that's what it says.

Two or more races so that you could be biracial try.

Okay.

I'm sorry.

I was like, oh no, I'm lost in a sea of verbiage.

Welcome.

Here's an order buoys.

Now I get it.

Okay.

Two or more, right?

The

den.

What does that mean?

Yeah.

What does that mean?

And what are these pieces?

Um, but there are a lot of Jewish people who identify as way and

there's some Jewish people who don't.

Right.

Um, and there are some people with a middle Eastern identity

that identify as white.

And there are some that don't right.

This very particular person.

When we put out all of the feelers and readers for this focus group,

we said, you have to identify it as.

Gotcha.

Okay, good.

Cool.

Yeah, I do.

Oh, okay.

Wonderful.

Sorry.

I was just thinking about that.

Um, I already have the same amount of notes that I had for Jay.

Um, let me stop.

Okay, so go

ahead and you go

start here.

Um, There was some, so there's this like interesting through line from

you right now about the scripts, the, like the predetermined scripts that

he felt that he had to internalize in order to be a good person.

Um, and you were told that you, these are the things you have to do to be

good, that you have a wife that you have children that you're married,

that you volunteer, you go to church, either all of these things, and

then suddenly you're the problem.

There's that like script that you have to follow, which I think is really

fucking fascinating because we talk a lot about how within this larger

fabric of destiny, white people are impacted by race and racism as well.

And in much the same exact breath and capacity thing, Sam is pointing

on the ways that patriarchy and heteronormativity also impact him too.

But this idea that, oh, you have to have a way from them.

You're a good person.

If that script's driven into having two kids has to be driven into you.

And I, just, to me, it makes, it makes his answer to his sexuality so much more

enlightening because he's like, I don't know, I want to do this thing, but I have

to make sure that I am in neighborhood ed

in order to say, oh, I was in bridge,

right.

To cross through that script and say, I could finally not have

to memorize that script anymore.

Right.

And they can do what my, my body or my heart wants to do.

I thought that was so freaking fascinating,

how I also thought it was really interesting how open he is.

Like I was sort of expecting, like now that I've listened to Jay's answers

and I've listened to Sam's, I was sort of expecting Jay to be more open

about his answers, but he was sort of like, you know, like, oh, well,

my, my fiance is a person of color.

And then, but not that didn't expound on that, whereas, and he was like,

and these are the things that I am, uh, you know, my ancestry is, um, you

know, but that side's a little squiffy.

And then, you know, with Sam, he's just like, well, my dad's racist,

so we're going to go with my mom's.

So I, you know, I just, and then he was like, oh, I voted for Trump.

And then also was like, My dad's so racist, so I don't

want to be associated with him.

So it's just like, oh my gosh, you do contain multitudes.

I think you also run up this other piece that I was thinking about with Jay,

that I wasn't able to fully articulate.

And it was when he was talking about how often he talks with

folks of color about race.

And he said, oh, maybe one, four times max.

But when I come home, I'm not coming home to like this all white space either.

But like that space wasn't included in his one to four estimate, which I thought was

really interesting as if he's not talking about race and racism at home and maybe he

is, but it wasn't part of his like initial gut response of like, oh yeah, no, this

is like, when I wake up and go to sleep.

Um, but back to Sam, how can you be like, oh, no, but like, not my dad's side.

Like, can I, like, I'm trying to think about like a person's ability to

compartmentalize your parents teach right.

And they'd be like, oh no, no, no.

Like that was stupid.

I'm not going to do that, but I'm going to do this other one

and like on a conscious level.

Sure.

But there's so much unconscious shit where I'm like, oh God, my dad does this.

Or, oh God.

Oh, my mom does that.

I realized that after she died, I was like, oh God, where do it?

My mom does this.

And I only know that because now that she's not here, it shows

up in different ways of like, oh God, this reminds me of her.

And I didn't, wasn't doing it consciously.

Well, no.

Sam has an incredible level of awareness though, at least so far.

What were those

self-awareness social awareness?

No, I would, I would say not social.

I would say self and, and.

I think whether his awareness is, is skewed one way or another by something

else is a different thing altogether.

But he seems to have, you know, I dunno he takes up space in a way that I,

with a confidence that I'm not used to.

I think

interesting like a white man confidence.

No, it's just like an anybody confidence.

Oh yeah.

Like I've never, yeah.

I was like,

That's how I experienced it.

Like Sam was a varied, charismatic human.

Like, I feel like you could drop Sam into just about any situation or scenario.

And Sam would immediately be the cruise director,

the tour guide with the umbrella.

Yeah.

Know where the conversation is going.

Nowhere.

The next event was, or at least rally the troops to go to the next thing.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Two other things that I was thinking about how much do you think about it?

More often than not.

So that, to me, that numerical value is I'm having more thoughts about

race and racism that I'm not thinking about race and racism, but then when

you like forced an answer of like how many times a day it was once a day.

So again, this like disconnect and frequency, but then.

How often are you talking about race with folks of color?

And his answer was not about his feelings, but rather he didn't want to hear folks of

colors, feelings, because he said, I think it was, um, oh, my issue is X, Y, and Z.

This is the way that I am oppressed.

I thought that that was really interesting.

I don't want to talk to them because I don't want to hear their problems

with race and racism, because I think there's more value in talking

about like what we have similar, like what we have together, like what we

have together and what unifies us.

But like not wanting to hear someone else as hurt or harm.

Right.

And he didn't want to hear that with white people either.

He's like white people.

I know he was like, why people want to talk about it all the time?

And that was a really red impression of Sam.

Um, but yeah.

Yeah.

So yeah, his, his, his like, uh, I don't want to talk to anyone about race

or racism, like the negative impacts.

Let's just like, not even talk about it.

Right.

So there's just so much with him even like, just from the word, like, oh

yeah.

We're not even done with him yet.

We're not

even done with him yet.

Let's play the rest.

How often do you talk about race online, specific to like, like social

media, how comfortable are you talking about race and racism in general?

Very comfortable.

And what's your most recent level of education?

I had

a.

Yeah.

He said, he's very comfortable talking about race and racism.

And he also said before that he never talks about it with people of

color and he hates talking about it.

Well, he didn't say hate that's wrong.

Implication of not wanting to talk about with white people either.

Right.

So that's

good

catch.

Yeah.

So how are you?

Thank you.

A little stuff and plus, um, no, but no it's because you brought that up.

Cause I was like, I didn't even realize that he was like being weird about it.

Right.

Um, and then I was like, oh, shoo.

So there's that it's like with Jay's unconscious disparate.

Is that disparity the right word between when he.

You know how much he talks about it and how comfortable he is.

Right.

Is that same thing I wonder is that's going to be a through line with everybody.

I wonder if it, well, I mean, we're two out of four people right now.

Let's see if it continues.

It seems like it would before, already like 50% of participants.

I mean, we have a sample size of four, so this isn't like the largest or

most thoughtful qualitative research on the planet got to start somewhere.

All right.

Well, yeah, let's go to this next year.

And there's T he's 44 years old lives in the suburbs is a current master's

of social work student after a career in the high-end jewelry market,

political party, if any,

um, definitely not a party.

Now I find it a little bit suspect.

Um, religious affiliation, if any,

um, decidedly anti organized religion.

If anything, I had said Buddhist, um, when I purchased.

Yeah, mindfulness.

That's my spirituality

partnership status, if any single.

Okay.

Who did you vote for in the 2016 election

who was in the 2016 election?

Um, it was Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.

Um,

I would've voted for Hillary if I voted and I'll admit I've voted a limited

amount of times in my life, but I've spent in the past decade overseas.

So that's part of the reason why,

um, what about 20, 20, 20,

20?

Um, I didn't vote

ethnicity.

Can you pinpoint around when your family immigrated to the

U S decade or point of origin?

Sure.

We can do the U S uh, when I was 10 years old.

So that would have been 87

from.

And you lived here since then?

Um, well, yes, with the exception of the past decade,

you said that.

Okay.

Are you familiar with the Kinsey scale?

Yes.

I think I'm always ready to say my friend of mine has a rated me alternatively as

a Kinsey one and a Kinsey negative 40.

So take that as you like.

Okay.

Let me

again, Jenny starts explaining the Kinsey scale.

Yeah, actually you don't need to.

I sort of recall.

Yeah, no, he writes me as a zero, generally speaking.

I think if I rated myself, I would say somewhere around zero to one,

zero to one.

Okay.

In your family growing up, were you raised to be racist or if not, how

are you taught to not be racist?

I was taught not to be racist, but there were decidedly.

Um, Racist things sort of within the culture of my upbringing in the sense

that, uh, actually in recent studies, uh, social justice class, there were things

that were raised that, that allowed me to have some interesting conversations

with family pointing out the things that were decidedly racist and having

discussions about them, which was a

good, which of these three ideas or movements do you most

closely aligned with all lives matter?

Black lives matter, blue lives matter and why

black lives matter?

Because I mean, well, I suppose that or all lives matter, but I

feel that all lives matter is, or blue lives matter is decidedly.

Those are responses to black lives matters.

So for me, black lives matter is what is the important thing?

Um, if anything, just, uh, reducing.

Any person's suffering.

Um, but, uh, yeah.

How often do you think about race or racism?

So not necessarily talking about it, but just, you know, do to

do, and you're thinking about it.

Um, I think I'm probably, actually since my recent class, I actually quite a time

before that I'm cognizant of it daily.

Um, I'd say I'm aware of daily, the sort of impact I'm sort of in a

different way now than perhaps I was.

How often do you talk about race with people of color?

Not that often.

Unfortunately.

Yeah.

Um, I would say outside of the social justice class, I took, I've engaged

in a few conversations, but yeah.

Opportunities have not been many.

Um,

um, how often do you talk about.

No.

Sorry.

How often do you talk?

No.

What is wrong with my face?

Hang on.

How often do you talk about race with other white people?

Um, more frequently than, uh, with people of color.

I mean, I'd say it sort of, it will come up in a conversation

at least once a month.

Hmm.

Okay.

How often do you talk about race online?

So we're asking this question.

Not at all.

I'm just not an online person.

Oh, okay.

So no social media or anything?

Doctor, how comfortable are you talking about race and racism in general?

Comfortable.

Yeah.

Okay.

What's your most recent level of education, which you kind

of already answered, but currently

my master's.

So prior to that, my bachelor's, but um, yeah,

fucking T

T.

Okay.

With the two tier with the T pinkies up.

Um,

I still can't for the life of me, and this is just me in my own

bias, being a queer person, being non binary, being HIV positive.

I am so deeply connected and invested in what is going on politically because.

Some very large parts of my body require a deep understanding of

what's happening politically.

Right?

Well that's yeah.

I was thinking that I was like, oh, that's your privilege?

Not to vote

to like, really think through like, wait, who was in the 2016 election.

Right, right.

That is seared into my memory.

That is so indelible to 2016.

If someone were to just say the words, 2016 would go, oh right.

Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, like.

Right.

He was also out of the country though at that point.

And even though it was huge news, sometimes I think, you know, living

here, it felt bigger, big, huge.

Yeah.

But maybe in other parts of the world, they don't have their, their finger

on the pulse of American politics, you know, like, I don't know.

Right.

I mean, that creates a really lovely and generously large excuse for

him that likes to if he wants to, but also like democracy, I think.

Yeah.

Just like my love letter to democracy, again, like it's for

those who show up and those who are allowed to show up can show up.

Right.

Um, but then to like completely be like, oh, I'm not even going to show up at all.

Right.

Because Sam did the same thing of like, oh, I didn't vote.

Yeah.

Well they can't, they, you know, I don't want to say they, I mean, it gets

get, I understand what you're saying.

Yeah, yeah.

I mean, yeah.

I feel the same, same way as, uh, a bisexual person with a uterus,

you know, who identifies as female.

Um, so elections matter to me a lot.

Um, also, you know, and also it's like, well, you get this, that's your right.

Not to vote, I guess.

It's yeah.

It's like, my eye is twitching.

Cause I don't really know.

Yeah.

It's also right.

Like fine whatever individually.

Yes.

But it, it definitely comes from a place of, uh, thinking like, well,

I'm not going to vote because I don't believe for either of them.

It's like that individualistic, that process that you were talking about

earlier, instead of being like, it's important that I vote because I have

friends that are non-binary and black and native American and you know, or whatever.

I have a partner with a uterus or.

You know, healthcare.

Yeah.

I don't want my food stamps cut off.

Yeah.

Right.

Or, yeah,

yeah.

Yeah.

I believe in centering the specific type of education

within my child's public school.

And I'm sure that wasn't even a thought through any of their head, like,

oh, I need to vote for others also.

Like not, I'm not, and I'm not making a moral judgment on them.

I'm just saying like, that's what we're talking about.

Right, right, right.

We'll also just, and the male white male privilege, right?

Yeah.

Like they've, haven't been taught to think like, oh, let's vote

based on other people's needs too.

It's not just about you.

Well, and I think that, that goes back into the, it's not about

an individualized experience.

This is about the collective experience.

That's true.

Yeah.

I think I am dipping, dipping in a different way upon.

No, no, no.

Well, I think that it's important to point that out because I think at the

top of the episode, you were like no individualized experiences so important,

but we also so deeply tied to these like larger and broader themes of, oh, well

this is just like a general stereotype or cliche of the white male experience.

And here we're seeing it like fed to us in this very explicit

way and we're going, oh, wow.

Yeah, that's actually kind of accurate.

Yeah.

It's sort of, yeah.

Yeah.

And I mean, I.

I'm trying to hold space for the fact that they are, they live, they,

you know, have that right to choose if they're going to vote or not.

I always think about that when I think about privilege and advantage,

it's not that we don't want other people to have privilege or advantage

it's that we want to, everyone, everyone should have privilege with

everyone should have that advantage.

Everyone should have the ability to go like, oh, I don't want about it.

Doesn't matter.

Everyone should have

that privilege.

Yeah.

Right.

Like when, you know, it was Biden and Trump, and there was a lot of.

White folks that I saw on social media that were like, you know, black voters

need to show up and black voters.

And I was like, at the time, at the time, I was like, yeah, you know, let's all

go to, you know, because I'm an idiot.

And I was like, yo, and then, uh, now I'm like, but why is it there?

Why did they have to show up?

Why aren't we fucking showing

up?

Yeah.

And also a lot of our states make it so they can't.

Right,

right.

Get a Johnny.

Get it.

I know.

I hate how anyway, we're, we're not here about me.

Um, I just hate, I just hate how blind.

That's all.

Yeah.

Welcome.

Welcome.

A thousand times.

Welcome.

I appreciate that.

There's a few more things about teeth that I would love to talk about.

Oh, go, go,

go.

I also have another thing, but

what is the Kinsey scale one to negative 40 ma

also.

Why did I laugh so hard about that?

I was like,

so funny

looking back on it.

I'm wondering what,

oh yeah, yeah.

That's right.

You did.

Why were you laughing?

Why is that funny?

Why is that fucking funny?

There's nothing funny about that.

I am so exclusively heterosexual that I'm willing to break this scale.

Yeah.

I am like anti whatever.

Like w like, I don't even know what it means.

I don't either.

And either I don't either

meaning like hate gay people.

Like, what did this person believe when they were talking to, to you

that you're a negative four day?

Like, I just read that or receive that as like a queer person is like,

oh, you could be like more than a zero, or like, less than that.

Like how, how does that figure?

I

mean, this scale is just, it's an imperfect measure of like

something that's hard to measure.

Right.

So,

So that friend took it to, I love that they've had a specific

conversation about the scale too.

Like what, who does that?

Um,

so this also to me connects to, so like you're talking that

you're having conversations about sexuality, which is great.

We don't know when that's happening like that hasn't been identified for us.

But then as soon as we're talking about racism or talking about it with

folks of color, this 44 year old says that a class he took recently has

seen him have these conversations.

So that means within, he did not start having these conversations, at least like

in communicating that to us, he did not start having conversations of race and

racism until he was in his mid forties.

Right.

And then he's very comfortable about having these conversations there.

That is again, very comfortable.

And I don't know about you.

But I'm not very comfortable doing anything until I've done it a lot.

That's just me.

Right.

But to be able to take one class and be like, oh, this one

class has changed my experience.

I can definitely empathize with that, but I don't feel like it.

Um, and I don't think that this is what T was saying, either that

it's made him this expert or now he's this like kind of sewer of,

oh, no, sorry.

That wasn't what I was doing

playing that's it.

I didn't, I didn't receive it that way, but I feel like there's this other

piece of, oh, well, I'm immediately comfortable doing this thing when we all,

I think within this, like whiteness or so many of us within whiteness are so

uncomfortable talking about whiteness, that one 14 week class that met once

a week for like two hours, three hours maximum is going to do that for you.

But to me it turns into this.

Oh, if you, and like I experienced this a lot, I think within these answers

of, if you talk about it even just a little bit, that makes you comfortable,

but it's actually not in depth.

It's not thorough.

It's not cross racially.

It's not, uh, like intra racially, like with other white people, or

like, just thinking about it enough or taking that one class is enough.

That's all you need.

You don't need any more.

And we become these like pseudo experts in race or racism.

Right.

And he did also say, you know, not enough, I don't have

these conversations enough, but then again, he said that he was very

comfortable.

Yeah.

Yeah.

How often do you talk with folks of color?

Not often, unfortunately, white people about once a month,

once a month.

I wonder where that.

Probably like maybe news sent, who knows, I guess.

Um,

there's also, so this is the third time that it's happened

saying this other pattern.

Have you asked, how were you taught?

Not to be racist?

No, one's answering that question.

No one has answered that question.

People are only answering the, uh, where you taught to be racist or if

not, how are you tend not to be racist.

And so I think like that implies one, that everyone was taught to be racist,

which I think they're all articulating and in some varied capacity from implicit.

Um, but that we're not using that language.

And how interesting that is that we're like dancing or skirting around that,

you know, with tea also, there was like this and this happens.

I feel like a lot with, I mean, he didn't specifically live in England.

The whole time, um, that he was out of the country for sure.

But I feel like this happens with British folks sometimes where they're like that

like British folks that have, you know, either be bopped in and out of the U S or

like live in the U S ex-pats, whatever.

Um, they're like, well, I wasn't here then anyway, because there's a lot of

England likes to pretend that it was.

You know, they're like, yeah, the U S is awful.

They're super racist.

My mom talks about this all the time.

Like how went in schools?

They were taught like, oh yeah, they, the United States is they're bad.

They own slaves task task, but it's like,

yeah.

Also where did, where did all those folks come from?

Also, if you look at the trajectory of slavery, it starts

with England, but it's fine.

But it was not to, you know, I mean, that's where I come from,

so, you know, that's my ancestry.

Um, so I guess I should probably take responsibility for that.

Um, but I just noticed that that very like, you know, my British folks that I

know are like, well, I wasn't here anyway, so I didn't vote cause I wasn't here.

Hmm.

That's a really good.

I never thought of it that way.

Yeah.

I mean, it does feel good to be able to be like, well, I wasn't

a part of that awful thing.

Right, right.

Why do you think that this brings up a really important point that we're like

talking about how, you know, a majority of white people, when we immigrated

to the U S we were fleeing some type of harm in Europe, but that doesn't

because that's kind of like where ancestry kind of stops, um, through

our family lineages, we never think about the ways that we perpetrated harm

within our ancestral lines before that.

Um, because when we talk about intergenerational harm and how it goes

back 300 years, if your family came here, like Sam's like, T's within the

past hundred years, you still have 200 years of intergenerational trauma that

you're holding in your body right now that is located in house within your.

Right.

Or like within Sam's case, like within the middle east Syria and Turkey and Israel.

Yep.

And so that's being played out here too.

Yeah, for sure.

Yeah, for sure.

Yeah.

Let's listen to this last, last lovely human human.

Lastly, there's teach he's 34 years old, urban leaning, suburban and works

as a janitor and an education setting,

political party.

If any Democrat religious affiliation, if any.

Um, with the organization, I'd say I'm agnostic

partnership status.

If any, I'm

in a domestic partnership, not married.

Um, who did you vote for in the 2016 presidential election?

The 20 16 1 was Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump

in that one, but I voted in the more recent one.

Okay.

Who'd you vote for?

Not Trump.

And what's your ethnicity?

Can you pinpoint around when your family immigrated to the U S like

what decade or point of origin?

On my mom's side, my mom's mom's side is Italian.

So they were here in the early 19th century, maybe the thirties or forties,

uh, before that, on my dad's side and my mom's dad's side, they, as far as I

know, I've been here since the Mayflower.

Soon after Jenny explains the Kinsey scale for teach.

Probably a zero to a

one, zero to a one in your family growing up.

Were you raised to be racist or if you weren't, how are

you taught to be not racist?

And my immediate family, I was taught to be not racist, but I have a lot of

extended family that swings the other way.

Um, uh, was they touched me not raised.

That's a tricky one.

Cause I, I came from a very white area.

So there really wasn't any diversity, at least when I was

up until about the age of 12.

So as far as like inclusion and that sort of thing, I don't think

there's anything really put into practice that helps me with that.

It was just kind of average.

I just remember my mom, you know, preaching inclusivity,

whatever in a hypothetical medic.

Which of these three ideas or movements do you most closely

align with all lives matter?

Black lives matter, blue lives matter and why black

lives matter because that movement already understands that all

lives and blue lives matter.

It's just, they're trying to remind people that black lives matter too.

When a lot of times people forget

that.

How often do you think about race or racism?

So not necessarily talking about it, but just in your everyday

go on about your business.

And you're thinking about it a lot.

I think about it a lot.

My son, I have a son who's nine he's biracial.

So his mom is black, I'm white.

So a lot of times the, you know, race relations in the country and in the

world, will I take them personally because of that, you know, there's just.

A topic of interest for that reason, you know, I worry a lot about him.

And just about those things that someone of, uh, you know, anyone with

minority children would worry about.

How often do you talk about race with people of color?

Really not often.

I mean, I don't really have a lot of friends of color these days.

Um, I do talk about an option with white people, but, um, I mean, as

far as minorities, you know, people who are in my life, it's really just

my son's mother and her parents.

And we don't really speak about race too often.

How often you said, ha um, how often would you say you talk

about race with white people?

Um,

I was talking about it with my partner a lot.

She's white, and so it's a pretty frequently.

Um, a lot of times has to do with issues in the news or, you know, day to day

things that pop up, um, probably daily.

How often do you talk about race or engage with, um, about

race online, like social media

nowadays?

I don't really, but I used to, I used to, I used to try to call

out my family members a lot.

Like I was speaking about earlier, the some extended family who has have

racist tendencies, I feel like I would often push back every time I could.

Um, if they posted something racist or, you know, questionable anyway, um, I

stopped doing that because it didn't, I don't think any minds were changed.

Um, I just, I don't know if that's where my energy is best to use.

How comfortable are you talking about race and racism in general?

Comfortable, um, as comfortable as I can be with getting uncomfortable.

I mean, I, I think it's important to talk about and I feel like as white people,

we don't really talk about it as much.

We're kind of just on top of the food chain.

I mean, even those of us who want to see a more inclusive world, I feel like

it's, it's easy to just kind of blend in and not really fight the good fight.

So I can't remember what the

question I, oh, that's okay.

I said, how comfortable are you talking about race or racism?

Pretty comfortable.

And I'd say, I try to do it.

I try to make an active effort to speak about

it.

What's your most recent level of education?

Uh,

do the year of college,

his answers are a little different and my assumption would be

that that has a lot to do with his.

Like his involvement in his sometime, but that may not be completely accurate.

Um,

We can speculate for sure.

Sure.

Right, right.

I just want to make sure that I'm not like, and this is why.

Um, cause I don't know, but I, yeah.

Yeah.

You said something that's like really beautiful ways.

I think about it all the time.

All the time, because I worry about my kid.

Yeah.

And so he's like deeply, deeply connected through his child into this

broader conversation of racial justice.

Only through his child though.

He was very clear about that.

Right.

He's not talking about with anybody else.

No.

Uh, oh, well let me rephrase that.

He's not talking about it with folks of color.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But as with this partner on a daily basis, he

was white, but they have those conversations.

Yeah.

Right.

Anything.

So yeah.

There's that other interesting part too, where.

Um, there's this, I think, larger narrative around, um, people with

college degrees, um, who are more connected to social justice spaces.

Um, and so here is this person who doesn't have a college degree, but

was even reiterating some talking points of the left by saying, um, I'm

comfortable with, but however much you can be uncomfortable with that, right?

That like this human is doing work outside of an academic setting or

circle about race and racism, which I think sits in really stark contrast

to someone like T who is like a decade older than, uh, and is entering the

conversation for the first time.

So yeah, like something's different for sure.

Yeah.

Yep.

And he also didn't vote in the 2016, which was fucking crazy to me.

Yeah.

Well, and, but, okay.

So it was fucking crazy to me.

And then also I remember talking to white folks during that election and like us

talking about who we're going to vote for and me being like, oh, Hillary, for sure.

And having people say either they weren't going to vote or they were voting for

Trump because they hated Hillary so much, which is a different conversation.

I'm sure.

But I just that's, that's what I heard a lot from, from white folks that I

was, I mean, I didn't sit down and do a census or anything, but you know, the

people that I knew that would be were willing to talk to me about it, it wasn't

because they liked to Trump necessarily from the folks that I talked to.

It was that they hated Hillary that much more.

Yeah.

I think too geographically, it's important to point out.

Your in New York.

Stateness again now.

Yeah.

Oh yeah.

No, that's very different.

Yeah.

I'm one of those wonderfully forgotten industrial towns of New York state.

Yeah.

There's a few states where you can totally vote ideologically

rather than practically.

And if you like New York state and California are two such states

because they are so heavily democratic and lean democratic for so long.

And so I understand that there'll be some people will be like, no, like even

though Hillary is going to take the state that kind of ideological push.

I guess I just didn't make any sense to

me.

Right.

Well, I think that, that again goes to that like privilege of, oh

no, no, no, no, no, no, I don't.

It doesn't really matter.

I'm going to come in up here on ideological means rather than right.

And also I sh I shouldn't paint myself as like some, some Superman

of social justice at the time.

I wasn't even that, wasn't why I was voting for Hillary.

Just to be clear, I cannot sit in a seat that says, oh, I voted for Hillary

because of, you know, social justice.

No.

Interestingly teach also said that his ethnicity is white.

I know.

I heard that.

I was like, Lauren's gonna say nothing.

I don't know either.

I was just like, okay.

You know, I think a lot of people don't know the difference

between ethnicity and race.

Uh, okay.