What does it mean to work to be White while working to end White supremacy and shame cultures?

Loran and Jenny sit down with Lynn Burnett (Founder, CrossCulturalSolidarity.com and The White AntiRacist Ancestry Project), Jared Karol (Founder, JaredKarol.com and author “A White Guy Confronting Racism”), and Jill Nagle (Founder, Evolutionary Workplace and acclaimed author) to talk about working with other White people in conversations of racial equity.

Who's are these Whites of the Round Table?

Lynn Burnett is a former high school history teacher, and the founder of CrossCulturalSolidarity.com and the White Antiracist Ancestry Project. At Cross Cultural Solidarity, he has built over 100 racial justice history resources, and aims to turn the site into a place where people can plug into the entire universe of racial justice history. The premise of the White Antiracist Ancestry Project is that it will be easier to mobilize masses of White people for racial justice if they have powerful and inspiring examples of White antiracism to guide and inspire them. Based on that premise, the project aims to mainstream essential stories and lessons from White antiracist history.

Jared Karol is the founder of JaredKarol.com, a consulting firm specializing in guiding White people to confront racism and be unapologetic antiracists. As a trusted advisor, he guides executives, people managers, and dedicated change agents at Fortune 500 companies, startups, and nonprofits. A sought-after professional speaker, panel moderator, leadership coach, and facilitator of difficult conversations, Jared’s storytelling approach inspires and influences individuals and groups worldwide. His first book, A White Guy Confronting Racism: An Invitation to Reflect and Act, was released in November, 2021. An avid reader, accomplished musician, and active meditator, he lives with his family in the San Francisco Bay Area. 

Jill Nagle has been published or reviewed more than 150 times in the genres of business, personal growth, fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and social commentary, including American Book Review, The Women’s Review of Books, Zendeskblog, and many more. She founded Evolutionary Workplace, and Wisdom of The Body: Beyond Talk Therapy, and cofounded Awake Parent Perspectives. She is a regular contributor to AfroSap-ee-o-file, and you can see her Medium.com articles with a link in our show notes . With Dr. Cleo Muh-nah-go, she co-facilitates the 22nd Century Leaders program for white anti-racist leaders, whose next cohort starts in September 2022.

==========

During the episode, Loran references “Accountability Abuse” and mentions some resources. Start here:

• Tada Hozumi, Understanding Accountability Abuse
• Ian Arawjo, On dehumanization, accountability abuse, and transformative justice

=====

Materials Referenced in the Episode

We Will Not Cancel Us: And Other Dreams of Transformative Justice, Adrienne Maree Brown

The Wake Up: Closing the Gap Between Good Intentions and Real Change, Michelle Kim

==========

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.

How boring would that be?

That one really damaged us.

Huh?

Happily ever after?

Oh, God don't even get me started.

I mean, you can get me started if you want.

We'll be here for a while.

So buckle in.

Right.

Yeah.

And

I think about every single close relationship that I've been

in, there has been conflict

'cause that's life, but we were raised to be like, "okay, well

there's conflict in this relationship.

So that means it's no good."

Yeah.

Conflict helped me understand myself better, but that was only, I think part

of that too, as though that like, I wanted to understand the conflict more

and my actions and how they contributed.

And co-created a reality in which that conflict could occur.

I'm laughing.

Not because what you just said is like, you are probably the only person who

was like, "I actively wanted to go towards the fire and figure out how it

started while it was still on fire."

Yeah.

I mean...

it's burnt you a couple of times, but also

Keeps my therapist busy.

Keeps your-- bless, bless that human's heart.

Bless.

Blessings no take backs.

No, but it's true.

You grow.

I mean, I don't think it's the only way you can grow in a relationship

is perfect, but it's a very important part of how we learn.

Yeah.

It is.

It is like, even think about like love languages and how I didn't even

know that they were love languages until I had to use that exact

language of like, "oh, this feels.

Weird that the language that I'm using, isn't landing for you in the same way."

And then that's when partners have been like, "oh no, this is

the way that I express my love."

And I think it's the same thing when we're in conflict of like,

"oh, wait, I feel like I'm receiving this in a different or weird way.

Is that actually conflict or are you just expressing yourself in ways that

feel normal or like natural to you?"

Right.

And how am I receiving your information?

I dated an Italian once.

They were so loud, so loud and I always felt like I was being yelled at.

Oh really?

I wonder who else is Italian and loud in your life?

Hi, Jenny!

It was not me, by the way.

No, it wasn't.

It was not you.

I had to say this person's like, "um, uh, I wasn't intending for the

conversation to, to go to this like really heightened or like elevated place."

And they were like, "what are you talking about?"

And it was like, "I just feel like you're yelling at me right now.

Um, you're just being very loud."

And then that's when I like.

I literally got like the Italian hand.

"I'm Italian

I will smack you.

And that is my symbol of love," but all like not all Italians are

going to smack you as their symbol of love, but that's just like, what

this really lovely human was saying.

Right?

Like, this is, this is how I respond.

Yeah.

Right, right.

Oh my,

How did we get here?

I don't know!

We kind of, we went

on a, we went on a journey and we ended up in relationship, which is

what we're talking about anyway.

Right.

Because I think this is the first time--well, no, it is the first time that

we've had more than one other person.

So that changes the dynamic too.

Like how are we going to talk to each other?

Like, whoa, what does that look like?

What are we, you know,

well, I think too, there's this thing that White people do

when we get together of, especially like, especially the White

Liberals, we love to get together.

And then whoever says the, like the, the most shaming thing.

Other White people are so quick to be like, "yes, absolutely.

Yes, yes, yes."

Right.

And really try to double down on it.

Uh, and I feel like that's just part of the shame culture that

we're so deeply invested in of.

"Oh, let me also shame White people so that the attention is not on me.

Right?

Like "I'm going to line up behind this person, so you can't see me."

Right.

"I will be in a perfect cutout, the perfect silhouette cutout.

So you cannot see me at all because,

"so you can't see me at all so that you, so that if you do know

I'm there, you know, that I'm on the rights, the right side of things."

Right.

And so I'm so excited to be in a room full of White people that acknowledge this that

are going to be like, "actually, we're not going to use shame in this conversation."

What are we supposed to call this?

Like I was thinking of like "White people doing the work".

What about like something like, so it's, uh, so it's, we're

kind of going around in a circle,

Like a focus group?

Like a focus group...

Like a White people's focus group?

Like a White people's focus group, but that sounds kind of clinical.

Hello?

Hello?

Where a White people focus group.

What about my God?

Whites of the round table?

I hate you so much.

"The Whites of the Round Table"

I hate me too.

It's okay.

Wow.

I mean, right though?

What is the story?

It's the King Arthur's like court, right?

You're asking the wrong

person.

With Sir Lancelot?

I don't know the Alamo so, but yes.

Yep.

Camelot?

This is what this is all about?

Yeah.

This is all about Camelot and The Sword and the Stone

is also a part of that story.

So we're coming back to Disney.

You're welcome.

You are a gift.

You are a gift and a treasure.

Oh, just here to serve

hello and welcome to The Spillway podcast.

I'm Loran

and I'm Jenny.

We believe three things hurt.

People can hurt people,

White people are hurting

and our healing is possible.

This is a podcast devoted to understanding the complex nature of

living as White people in America,

without

supremacy or shame.

A few months ago, I started an organization, The Spillway around

supporting White people to work through perpetrator-induced, traumatic stress

PITS, and intergenerational trauma.

I offer this service with the acknowledgement that healing work is

merely one mechanism within a larger network required to sustain our collective

movement towards racial justice.

I seek to grow services available rather than redistribute, where we put

our efforts in funding and to get this message out there, I've asked one of the

most compassionate ferociously tender, hilarious, and incredibly smart humans

right now, Jenny, to join me in this podcasting journey, Jenny and I come

from similar yet separate backgrounds.

Importantly, we offer incredibly different perspectives sometimes just by who we

are as people and other times may by the very different identities that we hold.

We are committed to building compassion, understanding, empathy,

and patience into the present and future of Whiteness and White culture.

We cannot change the past, but we can change the future through

the actions we take today.

We seek to embody the work of James Baldwin, Sonya Renee Taylor,

Kazu Haga, Resmaa Menakem and Kai Cheng Thom and countless others

asking for White people to, in so many words, get our shit together.

Since starting The Spillway.

There's been consistent feedback sometimes within the same space

that White people are engaging.

This work with closed hearts and closed minds.

This work can be difficult and beautiful.

It is an exercise in vulnerability and unlearning perfectionism with real world

consequences in an age of seven, second judgments, we hope The Spillway and our

living in it can give others the courage that is needed to join us in this work.

We know that attempting to be vulnerable and consenting to learn in

public is incredibly terrifying work.

And yet we have to start somewhere.

Conversations of race and racism.

Aren't going away anytime soon and given our incredibly different places in the

world, we're trying to create a middle ground where White people can talk

together and create action around the paradox of being White in the U S where

we are simultaneously the perpetrators and the victims of race and racism.

We seek to embody the work of countless activists of Color who have

been calling White folks to seek our own healing around race and racism.

So here are.

Two White people committing to the work of individual and collective

healing around race and racism for White people, healing ourselves.

It's no one's responsibility, but our own let's heal together and grow to stop the

impacts of race and racism in the lives of people of Color and our lives as well.

Welcome to our podcast.

Lynn Burnett is a former high school history teacher and the founder

of Cross Cultural Solidarity.com and the White Anti-Racist Ancestry

Project at Cross Cultural Solidarity.

He has built over 100 racial justice history resources, and aims to

turn the site into a place where people can plug into the entire

universe of racial justice history.

The premise

of the White Anti-Racist Ancestry Project is that it will be easier to

mobilize masses of White people for racial justice if they have powerful

and inspiring examples of White anti-racism to guide and inspire them.

Based on that premise, the project aims to mainstream essential stories and

lessons from White anti-racist history.

Jill Nagle has been published or reviewed more than 150 times in

the genres of business, personal growth, fiction, nonfiction poetry, and

social commentary, including American Book Review, the Woman's Review of

Books, Zendeskblog, and many more.

She founded Evolutionary Workplace and Wisdom of the Body: Beyond

Talk Therapy and the co-founded Awake Parent Perspectives.

She is a regular contributor to AfroSapiophile and you can see her

on Medium.com with those articles and a link on our show notes with Dr.

Cleo Manago.

She facilitates the 22nd Century Leaders Program for White

anti-racist leaders whose next cohort starts in September, 2022.

And last but not least is Jared Karol, who is the founder of Jared Karol.com

a consulting firms specializing in guiding White people to confront racism

and be unapologetic anti-racists.

As a trusted advisor, he guides executives, people, managers, and

dedicated change agents at Fortune 500 companies, startups and nonprofits.

He is a sought after professional speaker panel moderator, leadership coach and

facilitator of difficult conversations.

Jared's storytelling approach inspires and influences

individuals and groups worldwide.

His first book, "A White Guy Confronting Racism: An Invitation to Reflect

and Act" was released in November, 2021, an avid reader accomplished

musician and active meditator.

He lives with his family in the San Francisco bay area.

Folks who are listening in.

I don't really know what the amazingness that I gotta see right now.

And so it may be helpful for us to actually situate

your name with your voice.

That way we know who's talking.

So I'm going to maybe just throw this out there.

There's like a little popcorn question, just so we can get names with voices.

Um, but if you could introduce yourself in the ways that you like

to introduce yourself, but then also if you could add the work that you

do, but if you could tell us as if it were a Hollywood blockbuster movie

title or tagline, what would that be?

Okay.

Alright I'll go first.

I'll go first.

This is, this is Jared Karol.

He him pronouns callin in from Oakland.

California.

The 510, for people, uh, unfamiliar.

Um, and I work with White folks.

Really, my specialty is facilitating conversations as holding space for

people to have the conversation.

Um, and gosh, if I were to put a tagline, which is interesting because

I'm actually preparing for a TEDx talk and I have to kind of come up with like

the title of my talk and it's going to be something taken off of the Lao Tzu

quote, "if you want to awaken all of, uh, humanity awaken all of yourself.

So something around that, it probably won't be that exactly,

but something around that idea of to do this work, uh, you have to

really do the work on yourself, which I have been doing for decades.

As I imagine, all of us have been

That's really lovely, Jared.

Thank you.

Welcome.

I'm Jill Nagle.

My company is Evolutionary Workplace and

I help White people dismantle White supremacy from the inside out.

And often that involves helping them find their own superpower

that they weren't aware of because not everybody can or should try

to do this work in the same way.

That's a really lovely way to put that.

Thank you.

Welcome Jill.

Hi, my name is Lynn Burnett.

He/him, East Bay, California, and I run a website called Cross-Cultural

Solidarity.com, uh, which has over a hundred racial justice history resources.

And I'm hoping to build that into a landing place for people to plug into the

whole universe of racial justice history.

And I'm also building a project called the White Anti-Racist Ancestry Project.

And the basic premise of that project is that it will be easier for us

to mobilize masses of White people.

If there are powerful and inspiring examples of what truly excellent

White anti-racism looks like.

So I'm not sure how to put it in the Hollywood form, but that's what I'm up.

That's what I'm up to.

Thank you.

And welcome.

Why don't we just jump in with some of these questions and make this as

conversational as we want it to be?

Uh, this is such a lovely, I just feel such a welcoming and excited presence to

be here, to talk about, uh, Whiteness and how we are White people showing up doing

the work of dismantling White supremacy and being in fellowship with each other.

I'm wondering with you folks, what does, or do you feel a sense of

community with other White people?

And if so, where are we feeling that?

Or where are we trying to find that kind of connection?

I feel some of it right here.

Um, I don't know you so much, Loran, and you Jenny, and by the way, I'm

also, um, Ohlone land in Oakland.

Ohlone land AKA

Oakland, but, um,

Do you hear that echo?

Yeah, we heard it too.

Hi everyone.

It's Loran here about two weeks after recorded this conversation, but for

some context, I emailed Jill, Jared, and Lynn the pitch for this episode

on a Monday, what you're listening to happened only four days later.

Given the short turnaround time, Lynn ended up going over to Jill's house

to have a quieter space, which is more conducive to podcast recording.

Jill and Lynn are physically in the same room during this otherwise

largely virtual conversation.

This echo is going to go away.

It just took a couple of minutes to figure out the audio

logistics, but even re-hearing it.

Now I love this echo because it reminds me of the tremendous gift that it is to

be in the same physical spaces, building a movement of social equity and justice.

Let's return to the conversation.

When I started doing this pro cultivators or White anti-racist series,

Jared and Lynn were two of the first people that I found that I reached out to.

And they said, "yes".

And I was so excited and I started getting to know both of them for a little while.

I was meeting with Jared informally, the cafe, and we would talk about this stuff.

And I'd like to re-up that.

Like for Lynn and Jared to meet each other since we're all in the same

place, but those things have meant a tremendous amount to me because

I've been at this a long time, you know, a few decades ago when I first

started talking about this, I couldn't talk to other White people about it.

Even my best friends, they would get defensive.

They would start to say, "oh, Jill's got, her little cause you

know, kind of, oh, you know," a little bit of kind of patronizing

or condescending distancing there.

I, I couldn't get anyone interested and to me.

It was such a vital issue.

And so to have other White people who care and not, not only care, but are

building such a significant portion of their lives around this feels,

extremely validating and welcoming to me.

Um, so yes, like these folks here and some others too have really felt

like necessary community for me.

Yeah, Jill

and, uh, Loran, I love that.

I love the, just the question, you know, do we find community with,

you know, with other White folks?

I'll say that not, no, not necessarily, but not, not, not, not, not.

And what I mean by that is this idea of, you know, when we talk about like

belonging, you know, and you know, Brené Brown, um, I've been influenced

by her a lot in, in my work in general.

And especially my anti-racist work, this idea like to, to belong, we have

to belong to ourselves first and really like, know who we are, you know, why

we care, why we're doing what we're doing, you know, all that stuff.

So I feel like I'm pretty solid on, on that, but I'm sure we'll get

into, you know, in this conversation.

And so it's less about, you know, where are the White

people to be in community with?

It's about, here's what I, here's who I am.

And here's what I'm about.

And there's so many different communities that I'm in professional,

social, athletic, musical.

I mean, there's just a lot of different communities that are, some

are all White, some are mixed some are, you know, they're just, they're

they're, they are what they are.

And so I look at it as like, you know, if you're interested in these

conversations, like let's talk about it and if you're not, then that's okay too.

But.

If you're not and you're opposed to it, or you have something that's going

against my values or, or, you know, the communities that I'm trying to

create, then, you know, then we'll have a different kind of conversation.

So it's less about really for me, like seeking community and

trying to find communities.

But it's like when I do have it, like, it's awesome.

I think like many people, I have a desire for stronger community and

kind of coming out of the COVID moment.

It's feeling really alive for me that I want to, you know, do

some rebuilding of community.

When I worked with different White anti-racist groups around the

country, that's something that feels alive in pretty much every

organization that I work with.

There's a desire for stronger community.

As for community with White people specifically, it feels important for

me to have White anti-racist community.

And it also feels important for me to have to be in community.

With other White people who are not necessarily organizing their lives

around strong anti racist commitments.

No, both of those things feel important to me right now and say there's a core,

maybe half dozen people who are White folks who I really connect with strongly

who I really trust or really admire who I feel a deep bond of connection with.

And even if we only see each other once, you know, once or twice a

year, I feel like that's kind of my local community or the core of it.

And then I also feel a sense of community of White anti-racist community.

Nationally.

Like every time I'm working with groups across the country, even if

I only see those groups or those people, like one time, I have a sense

that I'm in community with them.

Like we're in this together.

Even when things get difficult or get tense or people aren't necessarily on

the same page or people are giving each other pushback or whatever's happening.

Like, I feel like that's also part of being in community.

Like I feel like even at the national level, I feel like, um, the world

of White anti-racism, I almost feel like we're in a village together.

It's kind of like when you're in a village, you have to figure

out how to work together and get along together in some way.

So I've had moments like during workshops where I'm kind of like, "alright, there's

like some moment of disagreement or some tension, but we're still here."

Still in community so work let's work together.

And then I also have this desire to return to community with White people

who are not necessarily steeped in a strong White anti-racist commitment.

I used to have that in a spiritual community, but because I had

some political disagreements with that community, I left

during the Trump administration.

And I have yet to I've yet to rebuild a strong sense of community

with White people who might just be focused on other things in their life.

And that feels important that I do that as well.

Why does it?

Why,

why does it in particular feel important to you to have that?

It feels to me like it's important for me just to, I'm

trying to think of how to say this.

Is it more on like a personal level or is it, is it also

connected to the work that you do?

It's connected to the work that I do, but not in such a way where

I'm like trying necessarily, it doesn't feel important for me to be around.

Just let's just say, ordinary White folks, because I want to help move them in.

It's not about that.

It's more like just being present, just being present with, with people who don't

necessarily share all of my commitments and being in community with them, not

for the sake of any strategy or, or moving them, but, but almost just for

the sake of me being able to, to, to be comfortable with and to be in connection

with, um, just the, the broader experience of how White people are showing up in

the world and what their experiences

yeah.

To, to reach out into an experience that maybe you don't know anything

about or feel connected to.

Um, I think that's really important just in life in general, to not only be

attracted to things that we agree with.

Um, and people that we completely agree with.

Um, one of our other guests was talking about being willing to be in conflict

with others, um, in, in a supportive, you know, environment, um, is, is

really important in building community.

And I think that I was attracted to what you were saying.

Cause I felt like that was kind of, um,

yeah, Jenny, me too.

And I'm glad you're saying that because Lynn, um, I've been

heavily influenced-- it feels like forever, but it's just last summer.

I read this thin volume by Adrienne Maree Brown called "We Will Not Cancel Us."

Yeah, I see some head nods and it, it really gets at what you said, Lynn,

and then what you were just kind of supporting that Jenny, the idea of.

Just because we're, you know, we're all, whatever in this work together, we all

come at it from, and even in these, in our opening kind of statements, right.

We we've kind of, I've felt we're all coming at it for different

reasons and at different angles, with different skillsets and different.

Uh, you know, kind of hows and whys and all these things, and that's like,

how, how, how would it be otherwise?

And so I think there's sometimes this dogma of like, wait a second,

you're doing it slightly a little bit different than I'm doing it.

Or then I would like to do it and that's wrong.

And so in this book, she talks about like, basically what you

said, Lynn like, wait a second.

Is that really the, the, the conversation we want to be having.

There's so much opportunity to build community, to build movements across

differences and bridge differences, where there's so much more we can do

together with all our different angles and skill sets and, and et cetera.

So that really resonated with me.

Yeah.

We talk a lot.

Well, at least this first season, we've had a lot of, um, discussions of other

guests and with each other, uh, Loran and I about how prevalent cancel culture is

within the White anti-racist movement.

How do we make space for White people to heal in racial equality work with that?

Or, you know, is it, is it even necessary?

Which I think it is, but, um, I'm interested to know what you guys think.

I think it paints a

lot of paradoxes.

And to me, the wonderful thing about a paradox is that it is an apparent

contradiction and apparent contradiction is not a real contradiction.

So there's apparently a contradiction between doing anti-racist work

and centering White people.

And for me, the way to look at this is that centering White P-- there's different

stages, different levels of the work.

And so if somebody says, "Hey, I want to create a series about anti-racism,"

and somebody says, "well, what about racism against White people?"

In the sort of knee-jerk reactionary unexamined way?

That's an example of centering White people that takes away.

From dismantling White supremacy takes away from anti-racist work.

And I think when people say "centering Whiteness," they're often

talking about that sort of thing.

However, there's another stage where White people who get into this work.

If you get it, you start to wade in a little bit and you go,

"whoa, racism impacts me too.

I've been brainwashed.

I've been culturated to these things that are just as much a part of

perpetuating problem as stopping violence against Black and Brown people."

Something had to happen to Derek Chauvin for him to be able to

commit such a grisly murder.

What happened to him?

That's where I think, um, centering Whiteness comes in when we center

it in order to examine and repair.

The damage that's been done to White people that could allow them that

could create the conditions that the psyche, the psychic mindsets

that would produce such violence.

And in order to do that, we need to make space for, for example, White tears.

There's a paradox because in one circumstance, White tears could

endanger Black and Brown bodies and another, in a safe space.

White tears may be exactly what's necessary for a White person to heal

from the trauma that could enable such violence in the first place.

Right.

That's something we've, we've talked about a lot also because, you know,

I'm hyper aware of White women tears.

Right.

Um, and we talk about that a lot because I cry literally all the time.

Loran and I have just about anything.

It doesn't, you know, whatever it is, I'm crying, Loran and

I have known each other for.

Decades, and this is just true, but now I'm hyper aware of when I feel emotional

and it is all about context, right?

Like if I'm in a space and my tears are going to negatively affect, uh, affect

people of Color, that's different than if I'm in the space with you guys.

And I'm explaining how I feel grief over what something I did or something that

happened, um, related to race and racism.

So it is, I think I agree with you.

I think it's a context thing.

Yeah, absolutely.

And I think, um, I mean, even before you just said that I wrote

down "context is everything."

So maybe some of you have read Michelle Kim's book, uh, "The Wake

Up" and she lives in Oakland too.

She's a, um, she's a 5-1-0.

Um, and she's awesome.

So if you don't follow her on LinkedIn and other places, you know, please do, and her

book is great and it's so multi faceted and dimensional and awesome in many ways.

But one thing she emphasizes is just that that context is, is everything.

I think sometimes the question, you know, is there, is there, should there be, or.

How is healing for White people, like, uh, you know, a thing?

Or necessary?

Like, absolutely.

And it's, it's within, you know, it's the context in which that is,

uh, you know, achieved or worked towards is, is, is really important.

Something I've been thinking about, especially more lately, like, uh, that

it is about like my own healing, but not in like a narcissistic egoistic way,

but like kind of what more towards what Jill was trying to capture, like how

do I heal so that I can show up more consistently, more effectively, more

genuinely authentically, et cetera.

And I think the thing that I want to lift up is that.

You know, if you're a White person and you're wrestling with experiences of

guilt or shame or feeling embarrassed or being worried that you're racist or being

worried that people will perceive you as racist, or if you're feeling defensive.

Um, or if you have fear, you know, anxiety around Black and Brown people,

or if you're turning on Fox news and you're feeling, you know, a fear reaction

to the narratives, there, like, none of that is a positive life experience.

You know, like all of that is taking away from you having a beautiful life.

So I feel like there's healing to do there.

But the other thing I want to say is that in terms of showing up for the

movement, in terms of building a beautiful world, that works for all of us, like

the movement needs us to have vibrant.

Strong spirits.

The movement needs us to have clarity and energy and a spirit

of connection and solidarity.

And it's only when we work through the guilt and the shame and the things that

need to be healed, that we can show up for the movement in the way that the

movement really needs us to show up.

All of those emotions are things that drain us that drain our energy.

Um, they take our focus away from, from other more beautiful and productive

things that we could potentially focus on.

They prevent us from connecting more deeply with people.

And so ultimately when we do that healing, we just on a personal

level, have a more beautiful and inspired life that we can live.

But we also show up and create the world that we want to live in.

I really appreciate how there's this really solid through line through

this conversation about context.

And I think we in this space have found ourselves in many different

contexts, um, talking with White people about anti-racism and.

One of the pieces of The Spillway is to have in so many words, try to study

Whiteness and study White people so that we can find these themes so that

they become less opaque so that we can start to actually hold them tangibly.

And we define them as White people for White people in a neutral,

however much we can space with both the positives and the negatives

of the experience of being White.

So in trying to find those themes of what Whiteness and White people are or

do or don't do, I'm curious if you find, do you find a consistent pushback in

themes when you work with White people?

Um, anti-racism what are those themes sound like or look like?

Or how do they show up?

Cause sometimes they're not actual words.

Sometimes they show up physically and we embody that kind of response.

What, what, what's the pushback that's happening in our workshops or in our

conversations and our relationships?

Well, do we have a couple of weeks?

No, Loran, it's such a, it's that's a great question.

Um, and I love how you distinguish, and I think people who do this work, whatever

their racial background understand it, but it's important, the difference

between Whiteness and White people.

Right.

And I think that goes back to the previous question discussion we were having, right.

That, you know, when, when we're centering.

Uh, you know, around centering, right?

Like in a way we have to, we have to bring Whiteness to the F to the forefront.

Is that centering?

I don't know.

Maybe it is right.

So that we can recognize it and talk about it and start to understand it

so that we can be better White people.

So it's, you know, that's, I think that's important, but for me pushback, I mean,

there's so many buckets of pushback.

Um, I try, well, I would say I try, but just the nature of my work, my kinda my

day job, and also my, my other kind of work is mostly working with people who are

already at least leaning in a little bit.

And so the pushback isn't like, you know, the, this is stupid

or, you know, what about it?

I mean, there's a little bit of that, but it's really more around the discomfort.

And so it, it centers the, well, I don't know how to have that conversation,

or I don't know if I want to challenge so-and-so because he'll probably get

angry if I call him on his racism.

So it's censoring the feelings in the, in the, you know, the very real

relationships of, you know, that White people think about when they're not

thinking about, you know, racism and that's, you know, pretty typical.

And so I think though, that's the pushback, but then I'm trying to say, all

right, well, let's put it in perspective.

So what's more important, your discomfort, at maybe having a tough conversation

with your White colleague or your White family member, or, you know, the

stopping or at least mitigating the harm that is being done by not having

these conversations to people of Color.

So I think that kind of dynamic that I see a lot, and I would imagine, you

know, Lynn and Jill, you do as well.

And what these buckets, um, with our con I think, yeah, that's consistent.

Of, uh, uncomfortability of the fear of leaning into these new conversations or,

uh, new relationships that we're having.

I'm also trying to figure out how we center love and these relationships, where

we sent her more compassion and empathy and understanding in these conversations

of racial justice and racial equity.

And, and as we were talking earlier about cancel culture, uh, and accountability

abuse with in anti-racism work, I'm wondering how we shift this paradigm into

one that is more compassionate and more connective and receptive to connectivity

than about shaming and expanding shame culture within justice work.

Um, I had a personal turning point in 2015, shortly after Dylann

Roof had killed a room full of Black church goers in their Bible study group.

And I was looking at a picture of him and he had that same sort of

glazed over dissociated dysregulated.

Look that my autistic son, would get in his eyes just before he

had yet another violent tantrum.

He's now a lot better.

Um, but I had this moment where this, this knowing just kind of suffused my body,

which was, "I am not separate from him.

The same system that created him also created me.

We are part of the same collective White psyche."

And right around this time, I noticed that the White people around me

were doing and saying things pretty much exactly the opposite of that.

Calling him a monster calling for him to be locked up forever.

No.

And I thought wait a second.

You know, from the sense of connection, I started to, um, formulate the idea

for these White on White workshops, how to talk to the other White people.

And I brought my sematic body-oriented, um, counseling skills in to help

people slow down their reactions, to what, like what happens in our

bodies when we monstrify, if you will.

And even if you want another White person, "oh my God, what's

actually happening within us?"

How do we slow that down and be with it and consider, just consider the

possibility of engaging them as another human being as if we were members of the

same family and in some profound way, we are all members of the same family.

We would draw them in just like when my son was having a tantrum,

I wasn't going to monstrify him.

I wanted to draw him in and say, "what's going on?

How did this happen?

How do we make you feel more comfortable and safe?"

So you do this.

And as White people, I think that's where, you know, some things that

Lynn and Jared have mentioned about doing the work within ourselves.

How do we expand our capacity for being with the hard feelings that come up when

we see other White people doing violent and harmful, sometimes fatal things.

Uh I'm going to try to weave the pushback that I receive together

with the question that Loran brings forward, about how to we love each other.

How do we support each other?

You know?

So I get, uh, three primary types.

Of, I would say critique.

And I would say that they're, uh, well, first of all, just lay them out.

The first type of critique that I get is that lifting up, learning from,

teaching, talking about White anti-racists history, there's a concern that it

might veer into White centering or that it might veer into White savior.

Saviorhood the second type of critique that I get is that they're concerned

that if people are giving money to fund the projects that I'm working on,

then they're giving money to a White person to write about White stuff.

And there's a concern that if people are giving their financial resources to

that, that means that they're not giving the" financial resources, the Black

and Brown led racial justice efforts.

And then the third critique that I, that I get, I would say happens in like one

out of every three workshops that I do.

There's someone in the workshop who says, you know what?

Learning from the legacy of Anne Braden or whoever.

This is really interesting, but we're working on a specific

local concrete issue right now.

Like maybe we're trying to fight off the school board takeovers or

the CRT backlash or whatever it is.

And even though the life of Anne Braden is interesting, I don't know how it's

going to help us in our organization, do a better job at fighting a specific local

battle that we happen to be fighting."

In other words, there's a critique that learning from the history and the legacy

of how White anti-racism has been done well in the past to some people, it

feels more abs-- it feels too abstract.

But the thing that I want to emphasize here to connect to Loran's question about

like love and solidarity and connection is that when these critiques come up

in, in, in this space of community, then even if people have really strong

feelings around them, if we have an opportunity to talk these out, we

develop much more nuanced understanding.

Of how White anti-racism takes place in the context of community, we

can evolve through these critiques.

And I think that each of those critiques is valid in its own way and

not only worthy of exploring, but I would say very important to explore.

And when we are able to discuss those in the context of community, not only do we

develop more nuanced understandings, but we also build community through exploring

some of those topics through exploring the very topics that there might be some

edges around, you know, that's often where a lot of community building happens.

Where it gets into a more toxic kind of pushback.

Typically in my experiences, in an online setting, you know, if it's on some social

media and some response, people can feel like if someone feels like they're

encountering my project for the first time, they think I'm centering Whiteness.

Sometimes they, as a White person, they might have a feeling that their role as a

White anti-racist, if they see something that's White centering in their eyes,

that their role is to stamp that out.

You know?

And so when that happens, there's no nuance, there's no community,

there's no connection, you know?

And so I just really want to encourage anyone listening to this that what we

need to be doing is White anti-racists is having conversation is listening to

each other is not jumping to conclusions and judgments because there are a lot,

you know, I can respond well to each of those critiques, but it takes a

lot of nuanced thinking and we, and we have to be willing to at least hear out

where the other person is coming from.

And in my experience, when we do that, once again, it builds community

more nuanced understandings.

And it's typically in my experience, just on the social media side of

things, is that the pushback can, you know, be negative rather than positive.

And it's easy on the internet, right?

The anonymity of the internet, because you can make your profile private.

And put a picture of the sea on there and say anything you want, um, without

really feeling the consequences of the other person's reaction.

And I'm not saying the internet is bad or social media is bad.

I think it builds a lot of great community.

And especially during COVID, you know, it was how we stayed connected to each other,

um, in a lot of ways for a lot of people.

But I think, I think one of the, the flip sides of that is, is that, and I don't,

I don't believe that the people believe that they're being cruel for no reason.

Like, I think a lot of folks have this feeling that like, oh,

like you said, I have to stamp this out, but they're not there.

The other person is just a little circle with a face on it.

Right.

And some texts, they're not actually a living human being

breathing in, in that mindset.

Right.

And so you just write whatever you think you need to write to get.

Somebody to stop doing or saying whatever they're doing or saying without being

connected to them, their humanity.

And I think that's so easy on the internet.

Yeah.

And I think with not only is, um, are those conversations building community,

but they're also building a really vital skillset, which we all need if

we're going to survive on this planet, you know, slowing down, tuning in.

Um, and that's what I've been really excited about this last year.

In fact, I've even started, um, going through like oftentimes on

LinkedIn, for example, A Black person will post something Black positive,

like Emmanuel Acho, for example, posted about his, um, he wore a

pinstripe suit to an awards ceremony.

And on the pinstripes, you saw this to Jenny, were the names

of all these different, um, Black people had been killed.

And so I started scrolling through to find the inevitable White person

who says, "well, what about all the White police officers who were

killed?", these kinds of things.

And I start engaging them.

And I asked, "would you be willing to talk with me offline about your views

so that I can practice these skills and provide examples to other people?"

Because I think we need to be having these conversations.

And as you might guess, very few people are willing to actually

show up face to face and do that.

But I think it's, um, disarming to have somebody not cancel them, to have

somebody say, "tell me more about that.

What makes you think that way?"

Tell me where that first, you know, to, to actually inquire in a nonjudgmental way.

Um, and it's a skill, it's a skill that I've been trying to work on in myself

and help other people work on too.

Jill.

I mean, you, just, with that little bit, you just shared, captured several things.

One, I think why we connect so easily and so well, um, and this idea, you

know, when I was listening to you, Lynn, I wrote down a few things

to say, this idea of weaponization of gatekeeping of absolutism.

And I'm sure there are other words that we can think of that kind of captures

and yes, online, it's a, maybe it's a, it's exacerbated or more, more

severe, but it's also in person or, you know, in other communities as well.

And you know, this idea that I love, you know, what you said, uh, Lynn,

like "I have to stamp this out" and to me, you know, I've been doing

this work and I, you know, I know Jill, you know, my story, I don't

know if everyone else knows my story.

You know, my dad was a, it was a gay man and he was HIV positive

and he died of AIDS in 2000.

He was a White man.

So it was, it wasn't about race.

But my entry into, you know, entryway into kind of social justice work and

equity work was through through that.

And so for many years, I was your classic social justice warrior

who was not interested in Newark.

Partly because I didn't realize that there was nuance.

It was good, or it was bad.

But now with my infinite wisdom and maturity, right?

No, but seriously with, with, with time you look back and I, look, I

see myself how I used to see things and interact with people or not.

And I see like what you described Lynn, as, as that, you know, I see things

like, well, my anti-racist educator told me, it's like, that's great that

you have an anti-racist educator.

But like just one?

One perspective?

And that's kind of your thing, like what does that mean?

My anti-racist educator?

So there's these very kind of, almost like myopic, almost, maybe in

some cases like performative, like the commitment is genuine, but the

actual embodiment isn't there yet.

So I think that speaks to what you were talking about, Jill.

How do we recognize that and absorb that critique, that

criticism, that weaponization, that, that gatekeeping, right?

That, that kind of Black or White, no pun intended.

Right.

Um, and I think that's, those are the skills, those are super important skills

for anyone doing this work, whether, you know, like us who were kind of, you know,

teaching others, facilitating others, uh, holding spaces for others, or whether

you're just kind of, you know, new into this world and you want to be part of it.

Like those are really important skills.

Cause it's, it's easy to just to go go the, uh, the cancel route and it's rarely

helpful or, or, you know, productive.

Yeah.

W w when people do go that route, I often get the feeling that they probably

share a lot of my commitments, you know, they probably want to see the

same kind of world that I went to see.

So we, we probably, even if that person.

It might in this moment feel like they need to shut something down.

Um, I'm trying to think of how to put, like, we're, we're

probably on the same side here.

And when I see that happening, I try to have some level of

empathy when that happens.

And I'm not saying that this is always the case, but I think that a lot of

people who are coming with a fierce kind of ""let's shut this down energy.

I think a lot of those people are pretty new to White anti-racist practice.

And I don't think that that's always true at all, but I think a lot of these people

they're just coming into figuring out what it means to be a White anti-racist

they're in a process of learning.

And one of the things that they've learned as important to do is to

shut down something that seems White centering or, or, or whatever, you know?

So to me, I'm kind of like, you know, this is the stage that they happen to be at

in their own White anti-racist evolution.

And if anything, they probably need people.

In their lives or community in their lives to help them work through

that and get to the next stage where they can actually be more productive

at doing what they're doing.

Jared, you talked about being the bomb thrower at one point.

Totally.

I, I was, I was throwing bombs at anyone who, who had, you know, sit

under the grenade and go get exploded.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

Yeah.

We've all been there, I think.

Well, I think Lynn Lynn, you captured it, I think.

And maybe this is true for, for all of us.

I, and not that I don't see myself, I don't consider myself or see

myself or title myself as an expert.

Right.

It's not like I have the answers, but what I do have is, you know,

at this point about 22 years of experience doing this work, what

you just captured, Lynn, I think is exactly it for, for me personally.

Like I can go back 15 years in my life for maybe even 10 years.

Right.

And go, yep.

That's kind of how my mind was working.

And so using myself as a barometer, like to see, you know, what my

path has been, you know, as Jill said, I do use that, that language.

Like I was a bomb thrower.

I saw something that was, you know, wrong, you know, in air quotes or bad.

And I was gonna, I was gonna fix it.

I was gonna stop it.

Or if I couldn't stop it, I was going to let everyone know that it wasn't okay.

And that I wasn't going to stand for it to what end though.

I was much less effective.

Uh, people, it was easier to dismiss because there weren't very many, if

any people like we're describing, as you said, Lynn, like that say,

"Hey, tell me more about why you feel so strongly about that."

Right.

I'm sure there were people, but I think a lot of it was, you

know, just getting like, wait a second, let me be reflective here.

Like, is this actually working now?

No.

It's not.

So I think that it's, you know, to see ourselves in other White folks is really

part of this work without shaming or judging, but recognizing, so, yeah,

I'm glad you bring that in a Jill.

So, um,

I also wanted to flag, you know, we're all being human is to be a

receiver and transmitter of the culture or cultures that we grow up in.

And all of us in the United States of America are steeped in White supremacist,

capitalist heteropatriarchy and part of growing up and finding that, that puts

us out of alignment with our values is the kind of time and labor intensive

process of noticing how we reproduce.

Those ways of being those artifacts within ourselves, like with individualism,

like with this intense right/wrong polarization and making people wrong.

And I, you know, I got off on being right when I was younger, I got off

on being able to talk circles around people and it didn't occur to me that

this itself was part of the culture that I was purporting to transform.

And that my way of showing up in the world was not transformative.

It was in fact reinscribing that.

So it takes time to realize practice, to undo them and find other ways

of showing up when you're, you know, you recognized or rewarded

for being an arrogant know at all.

I like to think that we can all change, that we're

not stuck ideologically.

Uh, emotionally, physically, and the places that we find ourselves in.

And I, I don't see that a lot in our movement work as there is.

I really, I connect a lot to the words, "accountability abuse", and that once we

hold someone accountable, we then-- how do we move forward and pass that to say,

yes, uh, rehabilitation, reconnection and restoration have happened.

And we are now mindful of the past, and we're still going forward into a future

that is co-created and that is loving and empathetic and compassionate and full.

And I'm wondering how we send her more forgiveness and more grace in our

work, not only for ourselves, but for the people that we're working with and

for the people that we're trying to be in connection and community with.

Moving this conversation forward.

Loran, could you just give a brief definition of accountability abuse?

I think I understand what you mean, but I'm not a hundred percent sure.

Sure.

So it's fairly similar and connected to cancel culture in that "we want to

hold you accountable, but then we will never let that accountability on, uh,

w we'll never, we're never, we're never going to take our foot off the gas.

You will forever be held responsible for these actions."

And so that would be the abuse of holding accountability, abuse with them.

Um, we'll also put in the show notes, uh, some really great pieces

that have, uh, been generated around accountability abuse.

So that folks can take a look and read that because it's a really fascinating

kind of lens and understanding, cancel culture as, as a form of abuse.

Uh, I love that Loran and I liked, I liked the way you described it.

It closely, you know, I mentioned weaponizing before.

It's kind of like weaponizing, you know, truth or web

weaponizing, you know, history.

Uh, and, uh, and I don't want to go down the, like, you know, oh, White

people are abused, you know, like reverse racism route or anything.

But I think there is that, uh, I know I've experienced that.

And, and to your point earlier, Jenny, like a lot of it online, um,

especially the last couple of years.

Cause you know, most everything I'm I've been doing is been virtual

or on social media, but yeah.

Um, one thing I learned from like doing leadership development, this isn't really

necessarily related to anti-racism work, but I bring it in is like this idea

of like assuming future capability.

Right.

And I think that speaks to, you know, maybe, maybe the antithesis of what

Loran, how, how you were describing, you know, accountability abuse,

because of the accountability abuse.

It's like, yeah.

Foot on the gas, like you did this thing.

There's no hope for you.

But assuming future capability says, Hey, you know what?

You messed up, you caused harm.

Let's talk about it.

And you know, let's see how you change.

And if, and when you do change, then, then we're good or at least

we're on the path to better.

Can I piggy back on that?

Yeah, please.

So one of the phrases that, um, I've been really alive

around lately is "normalize repair."

Normalize repair.

Because if you look at all of you, if all of human history were, let's say

packed into 24 hours, it's only been in the last 15 minutes that we have had

the luxury of canceling one another.

Because before that, you know, I had to rely on your killing

the bison and you gathering the berries and you making the fire.

And this person watching my kids while I went to gather, you know,

fruits or something, we were, we have been interdependet for so long.

We couldn't afford to cancel each other.

And now we have the quote unquote luxury.

We have the capability of cutting people off, who we love, and people are quicker

to go and repair their cars and their computers and their broken fingernails.

And they are a freaking relationship that they love and it breaks my heart.

So I want us to normalize repair and oftentimes people are more afraid...

They build up in their minds that coming face to face and working things out.

And I'm speaking here as someone who's done a lot of mediation, um, and seen

that, you know, when people are willing to come to the table, that's 88% of the work.

And the rest is, is pretty easy to do with some skills, some basic skills.

Um, but people build up in their minds that somehow I'm coming face to

face with the person that they have a conflict with is going to be bad.

It's going to be harmful.

It's going to be painful.

And usually they feel so much better at the end.

And so I want to find ways to normalize repair, which is a whole other, have a

lot of thinking, a lot of projects, a lot of spilled, a lot of pixels on that one.

And I think it's deeply, deeply connected to.

Um, what we're talking about here and how we can get through some of

the disconnects that anti-racist White people find ourselves in

Looking at the time we're going to go into our last question.

Unfortunately/fortunately, uh, as we continue moving on with our work in our

lives, uh, so I want to actually, if we can do a go-around moment, cause I would

love for everyone to respond to this one.

It's a two-parter.

Do you want to share a little bit about where we can find you in

the work that we can engage with you in outside of the podcast?

Please let us know that here.

And then there's part two.

You've got this very literal microphone in front of you, uh, with

a whole bunch of presumably White people listening to this podcast.

What do you want to tell White people from you to them?

What do, what do you want them to hear?

What you want them to know?

Um, or what do you want to ask White people in this moment?

Second question's a little bit bigger than the first one.

So...

SO people can follow my work at Cross Cultural Solidarity.com.

That is also the home of the White Anti-Racist Ancestry Project.

So people can find those resources there as well.

Uh, there are multiple ways to support the project and when people

do, they also stay plugged into all the forthcoming resources.

And events.

So that's one way to stay in touch with, uh, with what's going on.

And what I would say is because I'm focused on White anti-racists history, and

I see that history as providing sources of guidance and inspiration of, for White

people doing White anti-racists work well.

And I would hope listeners would walk away with would be, you know, I hope that they

might find some guidance and inspiration in the history that I'm lifting up.

But beyond that, I hope that you feel into your own, uh, what, what you need

in your life to feel inspired, to feel sustained, to feel your own growth.

And I hope that whatever it is that you find that.

That's really lovely, Lynn.

Thank you.

So, um, you people can find me at Jared Karol

it's J a R E D K a R O l.com.

Um, and there's a link to the book that I wrote, uh, that came out last fall

called A White Guy Confronting Racism.

You can also go to that.

A White guy confronting racism.com and not super active on social media.

I do have a, uh, an Instagram handle, A White Guy Confronting

Racism , mostly active on LinkedIn, although decreasingly these days.

Cause I actually have a full-time job, uh, in this space, by the

way, uh, at a great company called Translator, a great company.

Um, so those are, those are there's where you can find me.

What do I want White people to know?

Um, I want White folks listening to this to recognize that racism impacts

you just as much as it does a maybe not just as much, but it impacts us all.

And that this isn't a.

You know, saving or, uh, you know, uh, it's not an altruistic thing or a

philanthropic thing to save or do better for Black people or for Brown people, for

other people of Color and recognize that it's about humanity, including your own.

It's about healing as we talked about earlier, including your own.

And so tap into that part about, um, when you're not feeling your,

and other's full humanity, when you feel like there's something missing,

I don't have an answer for you.

I don't think any of us does, but tap into that and sit with that and see what

is it calling you to do differently?

I like that, Jared Karol!

Thank you, Jill.

So, I am at EvolutionaryWorkplace.com.

I also, my medium.com works sometimes appears on AfroSapiophile.

I love that word.

Um, I am seeking agent representation right now for a book I'm working on

How White People Benefit from Dismantling White Supremacy."

Um, and I sometimes post on LinkedIn as well.

And I have a group on Facebook called "Whites, Dismantling White Supremacy,"

which everyone is welcome to join.

For White people.

I want to invite you to get curious, especially around the

places where you find yourself, you notice your body feeling tense,

or you feel ashamed or defensive.

I want to invite you to get curious, really allow spaciousness, to just be

with, be with what's happening in body.

Because I think that's where all of this repair starts.

How is White supremacist mythology living in our own bodies in so many

different ways and to not fight it or judge it, but simply be with that.

It's a really lovely way to end this.

On a lovely note, Jill.

Thank you so much.

Jill, Jared, Lynn, this has been an absolute pleasure and dream come

true to bring you all together in this space and talk about these

very important topics of dismantling White supremacy as White people.

Thank you all so much for joining us today.

It's so great to see people out in the world doing this work.

Oh my god, right.

However, it differs from how we would do it, or they would,

you know, each of them would do it.

It's so hope inducing that we have folks out there who are

willing to put all of their lives into, you know, anti racist work.

But again, not on the doorsteps of people of Color, not putting White healing,

you know, taking it out of their court, letting them do all the things that they

have to do to even survive in this world.

That that's really wonderful.

I, and the thing that keeps blowing my mind is: I would not have known about

them, unless I was doing this work where I intentionally changed my search key terms.

Right.

But that had to do with like my own awakening as a White person,

trying to find and commune with other White people about dismantling

White supremacy and shame as a White person with other White people.

Right.

I've never, ever would have thought about that if it wasn't for you.

So I never would've known they existed without you,

right?

Well, and I that's because I was so deeply invested in this,

like anti-racist woke culture.

That was "no, no, no, actually White people don't have any

answers and cannot be trusted.

Shouldn't be trusted."

Yeah.

And so I think that that was really lovely thing about the space was

seeing and experiencing these really beautiful humans doing this work.

Showing up for each other and showing up for ourselves.

Yeah.

Like they know each other and like hang out and do stuff.

And like, you know, that's not many of them are on social media.

I noticed.

Right.

That was also really telling like, what does that mean?

Should we take The Spillway off of social?

You know, I've thought about asking you about that.

Like, is it really helping anyone or is it just creating a space for

people to, for, you know, for lack of a better word, trolls to come in

and be like, man, you know, like, is that taking, but then also then you

limit, you kind of limit your audience.

But then also, what kind of audience do you have from that?

I think to me, it's like the TikTok phenomenon of, I didn't know that other

people existed until I was on Tik TOK, that like act, think, believe, behave

have the same riduclous idiosyncrasies.

Yeah.

As I did until Tik TOK was like, oh wow.

You and thousands of other people have this exact same similar experience.

I wouldn't have known that unless I was on that social media.

And so for me, being on social media, it's also this, like, I don't know if it's

like beacon to say, Hey, here's another White person trying to do this work.

Like let's join.

And, and I have found some like, really beautiful people through that

experience, but I think, and also The Spillway is this giant, like, um,

Like foam pit for people to jump into with their anger and their hurts and

their frustrations and as confusing as it is for me, sometimes I know

actually, oh, well, this isn't about me.

This is, this is about them.

Uh, and their experience with their own concept of being White

or Whiteness or White supremacy.

And that's why I think that The Spillway channels are so important.

Uh, social media channels is because it is sometimes the only foam

pit that people are jumping into.

That there's going to be another White person there with their hand

outstretch saying "here, let me help you out of this foam pit."

Like you just needed a face plant in here, get it out.

Um, and come on, like, let's just talk about this.

It's like Jill was saying, uh, like going through the comments, like,

actually let's talk about this.

Like, tell me more about this.

Where, why do you feel this way or what's leading you to believe these things?

Uh, let's talk about it.

Let's talk it out.

And if we don't have a space to talk it out, if we're just going to continually,

uh, block and cancel and unfriend, anyone who we disagree with, then we're

just gonna, you know, devolve further and further into our echo chambers

and, uh, devolving into that space.

Isn't really helping anyone, uh, at it's hurting us in the long run.

We have to figure out a way back to each other and sometimes we just kinda