Bishop T.D. Jakes and Opal Tometi on the way out of our American crisis

On Monday, May 25, George Floyd, a 46-year-old African-American man, accused of using a counterfeit $20 at a deli, was killed in police custody. The next day video captured by bystanders, and spread widely on social media, revealed how brutal and inhumane Floyd’s arrest and last living moments — at the hands of a white cop — really were. Since that video’s release, protesters have taken to the streets in at least 140 cities, demanding justice not only for George Floyd, but also for Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery and all black lives. On this episode of Back to Biz with Katie and Boz, Katie Couric and Bozoma Saint John speak with Bishop T.D. Jakes, founder and senior pastor of The Potter’s House, and Black Lives Matter co-founder Opal Tometi about what that justice should look like. They discuss the desperate need to not only stop the harm against black people but also repair centuries of damage and why everyone has to step up and speak up for the benefit of all. “This is not a black people’s problem. This an American crisis,” Bishop T.D. Jakes says. “The choice you really have,” Opal Tometi says, “is to be a part of justice or know that you are impeding justice.”  

Click here for a detailed list of anti-racist resources.

Click here for more information or to support Black Lives Matter.

Click here to sign up for Katie Couric’s morning newsletter “Wake-Up Call.”

Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hi everyone. I'm Katie Couric and I'm Bozma st. John
and this is Back to Biz with Katie and Bows.
We had a very different episode plan for this week.
We're going to talk about the future of education, specifically
college education, with the president of Wesleyan where Bows went
to college, and the president of uv A where I
went to college. But we couldn't stand by and watch

(00:25):
what was transpiring in cities all across the country following
the brutal killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis without addressing
this issue. Bows. Yes, it's all compounded, you know. I
think with even the killings of Brianna Taylor and Ahmad Audrey,
they've all fired up a need in this country for

(00:48):
not just conversation but action. And I think it's the
right thing for us to also act in getting a
conversation with two really influential people who have a lot
to say about this very moment in time, and you
can help us to not just understand what is happening,
but give us the history of what has happened and

(01:09):
also help us feel hopeful for the future. So we
decided to invite Bishop T. D. Jake's on the show.
He's just an extraordinary man, a good friend of yours, bows,
and someone I've interviewed through the years. How do you
know Bishop Jake's Oh, Bishop Jake's legendary. You know, his
words from the Potter's House are ones that not only

(01:32):
I listened to, but my mother listens to. I don't
think the Sunday goes by without hearing Bishop Jake's booming
voice in our home. But also I had him at
my house in January. We held a dinner um with
Hillary Clinton for vital voices, and he came and gave
a beautiful prayer at the start. And I decided then

(01:53):
and there we should be best friends. And so I'm
enforcing that now by calling in this favor. And also
Opel to Maddy, who I had not met until today,
and she was quite extraordinary. Again, she's a friend of yours.
All roads lead to bows, by the way. But tell
us how you know Opel, Opel, I've always been impressed

(02:15):
by from Afar until a few years ago, UM, when
I met her in person. She had been one of
the co founders, as you said, of Black Lives Matter UM,
an organization started seven years ago. But we are both
of West African descent. She is Nigerian and I am Ghanaian,
and we find ourselves in many of the same conversations

(02:36):
and now part of the same group. We call ourselves
the West African voltron Waves for short. And so there's
a group of about seventeen of us who all hail
from different parts of West Africa, and we have conversations
around so many things. But Opeal certainly has a powerful
voice in this space, and it just made sense that
if she's my sister in the group, then we might

(02:56):
as well also invite to hear her voice in public. Well,
the conversation was amazing, and we began by just really
asking people to share how they were feeling after this
very trying, upsetting, disturbing, weak and Bishop Jake said he
had never cried so hard for someone he didn't know,

(03:19):
and began by sharing with us where his head and
heart are right now. The raw bar, very tortuous, relentless
and merciful behavior of it all was overwhelming. Uh. To
see that, to view that, and to understand that there

(03:40):
but for a camera, uh, a phone camera, we would
never have gotten the truth about what happened, and that
truth is still being challenged by every legal trick imaginable.
But somehow, in a wave, when I heard uh, George

(04:02):
Floyd on the ground screaming for his deceased mother and
saying I can't breathe, I thought he became emblematic of
an oppressed society that cannot breathe economically, socially, educationally. Uh,

(04:22):
so many areas where the oxygen that would cause underserved
communities to serve has been with hell and uh we've
been pressed down on some more than others, but we've
been pressed down on in a way that he becomes

(04:42):
an emblem of a of a group of people that
are suffering. And it's not just likes. It's brown's, it's
it's poor whites, it's Middle America. It's so many people
now that fit within that context of I'm not having
access to the oxygen of opportunities. Yes, yes, yes, I

(05:03):
mean that says it so poetically. In fact, um, I
have felt very much the same, you know, in that
this idea of or this image of being suffocated, you know,
by a system that is not built to allow you
to flourish or even simply to live, is what is

(05:25):
probably most viscerally felt right now, although it happens again
and again and again. Um. Opal, we know that. Of course,
you've also been in the conversation for quite some time,
you know, having founded co founded Black Lives Matter. Um,
what are your thoughts? How are you feeling currently? You know,

(05:47):
to be honest, UM, I am feeling really deeply paid.
I am grieving for people. UM. I am scared about
what the future whole old, and I know that that
is what so many of our siblings across the country
are experiencing in this moment. Um, I feel similar to

(06:12):
what you will. We're both just sharing, just witnessing another
life being taken in front of you for everybody to
see in broad daylight, in such a barbaric and unconscionable manner.

(06:32):
Um My, it's so deeply disturbing. It's so deeply disturbing,
and I, um, I'm sad for us that this continues
to happen. You know, it's been happening for generations. So
we know we didn't get to this moment overnight. We
know that there's been a build up. We know that
it's been seven years since Black Lives Matter was first created.

(06:55):
It's been so many years, and even in the midst
of a pandemic. We see that anti black racism continues
to persist in such a violent manner, and it's disturbing,
it's enraging. You see that there are people across the
country who have just had enough, They have had enough,

(07:19):
and so my heart is really with with them, with
with all of us who are are sitting and looking
and thinking. And my next is my daughter, Next is
my son, Next is my auntie, my uncle. It is
so real, and despite where we even might be on
the socioeconomic you know, we still see that it's happening

(07:41):
to so many of us. And we're always, you know,
one step removed or one relationship or neighborhood removed from
these kinds of stories and cases. And you know, I am,
I am, I know that it's not just this one
case either. Night. So we more recently heard about the

(08:03):
story of Brianna Taylor, an e M T and essential
worker who was gunned down in her own home in Louisville, Kentucky.
And I'm just thinking about her, I'm thinking about a
mon Verry are very I'm thinking about so many other
people and so many names that we may not even

(08:24):
know because it wasn't captured people weren't able to get
to kind of use attention that we see happening in
these other cases. But the reality is that people in
their neighborhoods and their local communities are aware of these stories,
and so they're out for the for the people and
the voices that weren't heard at the larger discussion. They're

(08:45):
out for their very neighbors and people within their own
community and cities that we're also harmed by this extrajudicial
violence that we're seeing in our communities. So I'm I'm
paying aimed, and then i also feel so hopeful because

(09:06):
I'm looking around and I see that people have had
enough and as they've sat through and you know, try
to manage their time and their lives in the midst
of this pandemic, they're they're taking stock of what's to come,
and they're looking around and they're hearing these stories and
they're saying, enough is enough. It's my duty to be

(09:29):
out there and demanding justice. It's my duty to work
and to ensure that we have a multiracial democracy that
works for all of us. It's my duty to affirm
and to work for a world where black lives matter.
And in that I'm I'm very hopeful because we see
a very vibrant multi racial movement for black lives those

(09:51):
I know that you told me that your heart hurt
and your spirit is tired, and you can he are
the pain and Opal's voice. You can hear the pain
and Bishop Jakes's voice. And I know that that you
feel the same way. Yeah, yeah, I mean we you

(10:11):
and I, UM, when we were talking about, you know,
even having this episode, which of course we felt both
felt that it was necessary to have the conversation and
for us to have the conversation. UM, I felt tired.
You know, I'm tired, and my spirit feels tired. And
I think even in part of this conversation, UM, in

(10:35):
talking about what we are seeing, maybe the lessons we
can learn out of it, the ways that we can
move forward in it. Uh, if it's not too much
to ask, I'm I'm also looking for some inspiration and
some motivation, you know, because leadership requires a lot. It

(10:56):
requires a lot of your heart, it requires a lot
of your head, It requires a lot of innovation. And
I was already tired from COVID and being inside and
trying to figure out how to make businesses run and
keep uh, you know, employees happy and motivated and all
of that, and myself my own spirit and uh, with

(11:17):
these incidents and as you said, open you know, those
that are not captured, I think it has been. It
has been. It just hurts, It hurts, and it's tiring.
I also recognize the implications to all of us, you know.
Certainly I am very much focused on blackness, you know,
and my shirt today says I love black people, because

(11:39):
I want everybody to remember that. You know, I have
a love of black people, and we should have a
love of black people. But I'm also aware as I
interact with my you know, colleagues that endeavor and in
other spaces who are non black, um, that they are
feeling things too right, uh, and and trying to also
navigate their emotions. And Katie, I know that you and

(12:02):
I had a conversation about these things, and certainly we're
going to get to it in some of these conversations here.
But I think you probably feeled a lot of questions
from um, non black people as well. And since you're
a human being as well, you know, it would be
good to understand how you feel. Well, I feel similar
feelings that you all feel, and some different feelings because

(12:26):
of my life experience. I feel repulsed and and infuriated
by the cavalier lack of humanity that we witnessed in
the murder of George Floyd. And I feel embarrassed and

(12:49):
ashamed and guilty, uh, because of all the benefits I've
enjoy and appreciated because of my skin color. And I
think I've been thinking about that a lot. I think,
like many people, I've had a a quiet evolution in

(13:14):
my thought in probably the last decade or so, an
appreciation of what white privilege actually means and in all
its incarnations. And um, you know, I've been covering these
stories for some time. First of all, Bishop Jake's you

(13:37):
know you You and I had many conversations through the
years on the Today Show. I started there in nine
and shortly after that Rodney King happened, you know, And
I think I'm incredulous that this keeps happening and happening
and happening. And some of it is an indictment of
the news cycle because it gets a lot of attention

(14:01):
and then it fades away and it gets a lot
a lot of attention. But the accumulated pain, particularly for
the Black community is something that I don't think i've
I've appreciated enough. I think I've been a bystander, and
I think I have a high degree of empathy in

(14:23):
general as a person. But your empathy can only get
you so far if your life experience is so dramatically different.
So I'm trying to understand how I can be less
of a bystander or less of a witness and help
be a change agent. And because I think I am

(14:45):
in a position where I can do that in my
own way, with my own people who respect me or
or think of me in a positive way. So I've
think it's been a tremendous wake up call. I think
that you know what Opal was saying, how she's also hopeful.

(15:08):
It does feel like this is different, This time is different.
It's a watershed moment, and that it's an opportunity hopefully,
I say, prayerfully that progress can actually be made and
that we can start grappling with some of these insidious problems,

(15:31):
seemingly intractable problems that are the product of generations of
attitudes and an oppression, and finally begin to figure out
a way that we can make things right. And you know,
I wanted to jump in and say something, Um, if

(15:53):
we look at the murder and isolation, um, and and
the series of behaviors done to individuals and isolation of
the system that empowers the behavior to continue, well, we
will not. We will we will not really do George
Floyd or mud or both of them, John or any

(16:17):
of the many other days we could call it any favors.
If we don't acknowledge the fact that the police report
had to be changed when the video came out, If
we don't acknowledge that the autopsies differ depending upon who
did them, If we don't take the deeper dive into
a criminal justice system that enables this behavior and supports

(16:44):
its own in this barbaric behavior. If we don't address that,
then then it will remain a murder, whether it's tried
as a murder or not, and it won't at least
become a martyr to a bigger understanding of a system
that seeks to correct itself. I am hardened and encouraged

(17:07):
at the fact that this does not feel like a
black people's problem this time. When I see flights in
the street and brown people in the street, and young
people in the street, and and old people. When I
see behind the scenes executives and elected officials having deeper conversations,
I'm kind of encouraged. I have been on the phone

(17:29):
with a series of influential pastors, UH, black and white,
a huge amount of white pastors trying to come to
grips with us, And what I tried to make people
understand is that being black is a lot like being
a molested child. When somebody has power over you and
they abuse that power over you. The same symptomatic conditions

(17:50):
exist in our community that would exist in a molested child.
In my forty three years of ministry working with molestation,
one of the horrific things about it is to not
be believed. And there's something about this time that that
we're starting to feel like maybe somebody believed us this time.

(18:11):
Because historically, if you bring it up your race baiting, UH,
you're you rushed to judgment too soon. All the evidence
is not in. We're waiting on the process. There were
all of these little things that were said to thwart
your voice out and to shut you up, and then
the system chewed you up and spit you out in

(18:32):
a barbaric way. Uh. With Courter pointed attorneys and and
and and crafty judicial switches. Uh, there's something about this
time that I'm starting to feel like maybe somebody's hearing us,
Maybe somebody is believing us that we don't. It's bad
enough to be mauled in the process, and it's worse

(18:55):
to not be believed. And Uh, the the real, the
real abuse is to be traumatized by the event and
then be traumatized by the fact that you have to validate,
you have to prove that this ugly, horrible thing is real,
and nothing that you present is accepted as legitimate. And

(19:17):
on the heels of COVID nineteen and what that has
done to us as a community, black, white, and brown,
to be in isolation for all of these weeks and
still not be safe, and still not be free to
cover our mouths and our nose and our ears, and
and to every time you go out the door sneeze
or get a scratchy throat, you wonder are you next?

(19:39):
For all of the hundred thousand people who died on ventilators,
we have not recovered from from that. We we we
have not recovered from medgar evidence. We've not recovered from
dr King, We've not recovered from Jim Crower slavery, only
because the moment you're you're trying to get better, something

(20:01):
else comes and takes you back and triggers you right
back to that same spot again, Like an abuse child.
There are triggers, and these triggers keep shooting into us
until there's almost nothing left. I feel like the headboard
of winning Mandela's bed post shut through with holes. In
South Africa, I feel like, Uh, we have had to

(20:25):
be silent because we have not been believed, and we've
murmured amongst ourselves until all of a sudden, the murmuring
has become a scream, a scream so loud and so piercing,
uh that it has become inconvenient. And I'm listening out
in America, who wants to shut up the screen more
than than they want to stop the abuse that was

(20:48):
so powerful? And what you name Bishop? This kind of
repeated abuse, this repeated violence over generations, historical trauma, current traumas,
current abuse and afflictions. Uh, these types of endemic hardships
and our communities, And this is all why Black Lives

(21:11):
Matter was created seven years ago. We knew we had
to name that anti black racism and our society was
quite literally killing us, not only in the streets, not
only at the hands of police, but we're looking at
our economic system, the health care system, the education system.

(21:31):
Um just abysmal impact when you look at our communities
and how it's racialized, and how racism is quite literally
cutting our lives short. And it was because there was
this deafening silence around how just how vastly different the

(21:52):
black experiences in this country compared to our counterparts. And
we had to name it because for far too long
there was a silence. And what we say now is
that to be silent is to be complicit. To be
silent is to set on the sidelines and act as
if you have no power or agency to make a difference.

(22:16):
And we can no longer have that. The status quo
of a black pain and black death is is intolerable.
We can't live like this anymore. It's it's not only
a symbolic death, but it's real material consequences in our lives.
And so it's important for us to recognize that we

(22:38):
have actually been flexing our muscle over the last seven years.
I and I say that I want to name it
because I think it's important for us to understand that
there have been people who've been speaking out. People have
been speaking out ever since they were taken and slaveships
and kidnapped. They've always resisted, We've always tried to fight UM,

(23:01):
We've always advocated for ourselves. We've always taken care of
our people in our own communities. We've always done that.
And I'm really looking at people like Sabrina Fulton, Trayvon
Martin's mother, who also speaking out a lot in this moment,
and it's just naming the fact that they are tired,
we're all fed up. We don't want to see this

(23:22):
happen again. I think what's important now to also recognize
is that in this particular case, right, so, we've been
talking so much about George Floyd, but it's not just
one police officer, there were four involved, but not only
the four involved, but you have entire precincts, you have
entire budgets that are allocated to policing of our neighborhoods

(23:45):
in this way to allowing for the abuse to continue,
and so our community members, the organizations that I work with,
the movement that is growing every single day, is demanding
that we defund the police that we from their budgets
that are already over overblown. They have so much at

(24:07):
their disposal. As you're seeing even now, we see that
there are militarized police presence all across the country. We
see tanks, we've seen grenades, we've seen um all rubber
bullets being used. We've seen a lot of military equipment
within our local police force. And so I think we

(24:29):
just have to reconcile with the fact that they are
very armed, they're overly resourced, and it's high time that
we begin to resource differently, we begin to adjust the
budget to support communities being safe on their own terms.
And the communities that I've worked with from New York
to Atlanta to l A. Folks are demanding that they

(24:52):
have the resources to seek job opportunities, that they're able
to ride this subway for without fear of harassment, that
they can jump the turnstyle. If they don't have the resources,
they can still take the train. Um. People are are
looking for our education system to be well funded, social
workers and mental health care workers to finally have the

(25:12):
budgets that they deserve to deal with real crises in
our communities. And that's what safety really looks like to us,
and I think it's important that we name that, that
we begin to collectively reimagine what safety looks like when
we look at one another with eyes of dignity and
respect um and we look to restore the versus punish

(25:38):
and take away. So, in terms of UH actionable results
coming out of this, I think the federal government has
an opportunity, whether they use it or not, to penalize
UH police departments that do not provide policing of themselves

(25:59):
by denying funding to them as a way of incentivizing
them to become more effective at respecting the law that
they impose upon us. But where I but where I
do think we need to raise their financial UH fluidity
is in terms of the compensation that we pay the

(26:21):
good police officers, so that we can get more quality
people into these positions and pay them on a level
that requires a certain intellectualism about them, because I think
one of the problems is the low pay scale and
the low quality of police officers that are permeating the

(26:45):
the police establishment. That we're getting people some of everybody,
poor training, poor background, poor compensation, long hours, UH little
respect on their side, And I think instead of buying
more machine guns and and and weapons and turning it
into a military military state, maybe we could get more

(27:09):
benefits and more compensations for the widows for the wives
of people who died, and fires pulling our babies out
of burning buildings. I don't have a problem with police
officers in general. I pastor many of them black and white,
and I just left the precinct where there there are
good people. I have a problem with the silence of

(27:30):
good people who will not speak out against the ones
that are corrupt. I have a problem with the fraternity
that is imposed in that society, whereby you are required
to be more loyal to each other than you are
to the law that you pledged and gave an those
two uh. And I think that if we raise the pay,
and raise the bar, and raise the standards until we

(27:51):
had professional, more professional people in that position and showed
more appreciation, and then then segregated those viral, infectious individuals
that hide behind blue in such a way that we
can lift the burden because the police officer, it's a
bad time to be a police officer right now, and

(28:12):
the police officers are bearing the shame of of of
of some of them. Uh, and we have to find
a way to restore the dignity to that office as well.
We're going to take a short break, but when we
come back, we'll talk about how to find a strategy
for the struggle. Let's return to our conversation with Bishop

(28:48):
Jake's and Opal to Mattie. Why is it so hard
open to weed out the bad apples? You know a
lot of people on my social media channels were saying
unions arbitration, not to mention what Bishop Jake's was saying,
this thin blue line where they protect each other at
all costs. And there are good police officers, But how

(29:10):
does the culture need to change, How does the process
need to change so that we can separate the bad
bad police officers and get them out of there. It's
not that there's just one you know police officer that's
a you know bad apuler, one good, three good, and
pretty much I don't it's it's I don't think it
works like that. We have deeply entrenched cultures, and we

(29:35):
have deeply entrenched histories, um, and we have laws that
continue to change to protect this institution. And as we
look back in our history policing, actually what began as
slave patrols. You know, I'm gonna be really honest and
right with you all because I think this is a

(29:55):
time for us to have these types of you know,
radically real conversation where we don't hold back. But the
history of of of law enforcement really is rooted and
the capturing of people who were trying to just get free.
And we have years later, this law enforcement that continues

(30:16):
to exhibit such lethal racial bias. Listen, Racism is rampant
and it runs throughout our society period. You know, it's
it's the corporate if it's the education system, it's in
healthcare system. Is there and the problem is that we

(30:37):
have racist policies, racist values, racist ideologies that operate in
less than a second. And there are reports that show
this is a lot of data that shows is and
it's happening. You know, law enforcement are making decisions based
on these entrenched biaces that they can't even conceive of themselves.

(31:00):
Else they're not processing it, they're not conscious of it.
It's called implicit bias because it's this unconscious dehumanization that
is happening. And so when you're empowered to use lethal
force and you have these types of biases that are
pervasive throughout the society. Then we do see these types

(31:20):
of outcomes. We do see that black people are the
are experiencing the acute impact of racial bias when it
comes to policing. This is just a fact, and I
think we just have to get honest about that. We
have this history and that racism is not only in
this particular profession or field. But the problem is they're

(31:44):
able to use these guns. These people are not you know,
they're not trained social workers or mental health care workers,
and so they're coming into various situations and operating with
the main tool that they know to use, and that's
forced and that's violence. And so we're seeing the lethal
impact of that. Hopeful it is exactly correct. The other

(32:08):
thing that makes it so damning is as an executive,
as a CEO, as a leader, as a pastor, when
you have masses of people, I'll re see thousands and
thousands of people. You're going to have people who go wrong.
You're gonna have people who have mental health issues, You're
gonna have people who do things that are reprehensible. But
if you don't judge that, if you don't, it's not

(32:30):
what happens, it's how you handle it. If you don't
handle it, If if you've got a d A that's
in the pocket with the police department. If if you've
got a plea bargaining deal going on with somebody who's broke,
that makes a plea bargaining deal that makes him locked
up for life. We've got people in jail waiting to
to to to even see a judge, sometimes a year,

(32:51):
two years through the misappropriation of the criminal justice system.
We all know it's wrong. It's about partisan issue. It's
not like the Democrats are the only ones who are
saying it's wrong with the Republicans are the only ones
who said. Both parties are admitting the criminal justice is flawed.
Even the President is admitting that the that the criminal
justice system is flawed. The problem is nobody wants to

(33:15):
fix it. And it is a system. It's not just
a person, and it's not just the case. It is
a system. And I think that's what my sister is
pointing to, is this is what we mean by systemic racism.
The fact that two men who previously had been involved
with the police department could shoot to death a black

(33:37):
boy who is jogging and go for months walking the street,
whereas we can't take a cigar from a cigar shop
without being thrown down in the floor and arrested immediately.
This misappropriation of justice where you can go in and
murder people having a Bible class in a church service

(33:58):
and the police officer is just take you out to
get a sandwich at Burger King, not shove your face
down into a pavement, into your your mouthless bleeding. That
this is not done in a fair and equitable way.
And you you, I mean anybody. You could be blind
and see the difference and the distinctions between the two.

(34:20):
But there is a comfortable blindness that comes with privilege,
because when you are a privileged person, you can choose
the community you want to see. But when you are
an underprivileged person, you have to exist in two realities,
the reality that you're born into and the reality that
you bank with, the reality that you live in, and

(34:42):
the reality of the community you hope to climb into.
And so you can you cannot. You cannot be a
black person with a g e d and not understand
white culture. But you can be a white person with
a PhD and not understand Black culture. That's what a
that's brilliant. I'm gonna I'm gonna quote you on that,

(35:05):
Bishop Jakes, because I think you're so right. But you know,
I wanted to ask you because you said, Democrats know
that they're the system is broken. Republicans know the system
is broken. You said, even the President knows the system
is broken and needs to be fixed. So why isn't

(35:27):
it being fixed? What are the obstacles that keep impeding progress?
That's a great question. I wish I was smart enough
to have the answer to that one. I can say
that there's been some small strides beginning, strides made on
a federal level as it relates to the criminal justice system.

(35:48):
I oversee the Texas Offenders Reentry Initiative, of which we've
were taken almost forty people through our programs. So I
live in this reality, and there has been some work
done on a federal level, it has not been enforced
on a state level, where the vast majority of African
Americans are incarcerated, seventy percent of which are incarcerated for

(36:09):
non valid crimes, many of which are incarcerated for laws
that have now changed and have now been legalized, but
they're still incarcerated. Uh, it's it's justice can be bought
in this country. It's not whether you're guilty or innocent,
it's it's the type of attorney and the investigation and
all of that. So if you don't have access to capital,

(36:30):
you don't have access to justice and those all of
these things are problems that need to be fixing. It's
a tangled way, and I'm not absolving us of all responsibility.
We need to be more engaged in the political process.
We need to be voting more in the mid term elections,
and we have a tendency to focus on the presidential
elections and not the midterms where the d as are chosen.

(36:51):
And the people who are making these kinds of diseases
and holding them accountable. We don't tend to know who
to hold accountable, and we need that's really white people
and brown people to hold them equally accountable. I don't
think there is a notion in our community that in
order to get a good lawyer has to be black,
and in order to get something done you have to

(37:12):
be black. But I think America needs to dispel that
myth by white, black and brown all screaming out, what
is your agenda for the black community, how are you
handling the troughs? Because historically we have rewarded d a's
based on how many people they locked up. So when
you start talking about cultures that are existing, the tougher
you are on crime, the more likely you are to

(37:34):
be elected instead of rewarding people for using a more
reason or balanced approach. One other quick footnote. If I
am White in America and I have a drug problem,
it's a sickness and I go to rehab. If I'm
Black in America and I have a drug problem, I'm
a criminal and I go to jail. It totally is

(37:55):
a matter of which side of the city you live in,
how it is perceived or handled. That's atrocious, that's utterly atrocious.
It can be the same drug and on one side
of the street, I get mercy and compassion and oh,
our present thoughts are with you and you're going into
a treatment center and all the curies that you have,

(38:18):
and the other one, oh my god, you're a criminal.
Dragon into jail and lock them away as long as possible,
se for nonvalent crimes, incarcerated. So when our women are
looking saying where are the men, I know exactly where
they are. They're locked up. When our children are asking
where are the fathers, A huge majority of them are
locked up for things that we don't do. We don't

(38:39):
commit crimes more readily or more frequently than our white counterparts,
but we are seven times more likely to be incarcerated
when we commit the same crime. That's a real problem.
So when you try to get us to to trust,
it's hard to trust. Going back to Opal's point, the
same people who and for slavery, the same people who

(39:02):
turned water hoses on us during Jim Crow and the
civil rights movement, the same people that pressed our next
into the ground. It's hard to feel safe. When you
see a police officer patrolling your community. You feel, oh
my god, thank god, they're watching out for me. I'm good.
When we see blue lights flash behind us, I don't
care how much money we have, how many degrees we have,

(39:24):
or what university we matriculated from. There is an anxiety
that inherently comes upon us, both physically and ancestrally, because
we feel the threat that anything could happen. Wow, that
was that was just Oh I don't I don't even
think I can continue to articulate because I'm feeling very

(39:45):
emotional and all the things that you're saying, um and
certainly even you know on social media, I've been saying
that I don't want the responsibility of fixing this, you
know anymore. I've been, I've been and so tired of
the question. And I do recognize what you're saying bishop about,

(40:06):
you know, participating in that. There are certain responsibilities that
black people have in order to make sure that the
oppression that we're feeling systematically does not continue. But it
is so tiring to continue to have to answer the question,
but what do I do? You know, how do I
do it? From those who are not necessarily feeling this

(40:28):
every day and not fielding those questions every day, and
perhaps not even feeling the responsibility of having to answer
the question, but rather push it off on the people
who are being affected disproportionately by it. And I know
that Opal, there are probably thoughts that you have around
that too, But I would love to also talk about,
you know, what happens next? You know, in our conversations

(40:50):
around this issue, there are many I mean, Katie and
I have had so many conversations around what happens next
and what people can do because we certainly under stand
the fact that these are conversations that need to be had,
but they're difficult to have, you know, especially if you
are non black and you want to have a voice

(41:11):
in the conversation, perhaps you say things that will take
you out. You know, there's the danger of that. Certainly,
there have been many colleagues of mine over the past
few days who have asked, what can I do? What
can I say? I want to say something. I don't
just want to sit by, you know, as Katie was saying, Uh,
but but what what are the solutions? You know? How

(41:33):
do how how do we help? I guess is my question? Um,
because there are certainly people who want to have a voice,
who want to participate in the dialogue, and who have
good intentions, but will not do it out of fear
that they will also miss step. The greatest justice is
the will of the people themselves. And I'm not just

(41:56):
talking about black people, and I'm not just talking about
black people in the midterm, he like, so, I certainly
think we need to be represented there. This is not
a black people's problem. This is an American crisis, and
we are standing right on the edge of going back
into visuals of bringing in the armies and shooting down

(42:17):
people in march and things that that are so reprehensible
they're scary, or on the other extreme of burning down
cities and town We're teetering with valance against violence, wicked
against wicked, evil against evil, and all we really want.
There's a cheaper, easier, calmer solution, the easier thing than

(42:37):
all of the expensive things that we're getting ready to
do to each other. It's just justice. Justice is free.
It would cost less, It would be better for the budget.
It would be the right thing to do to call
right right and wrong wrong, than it would be to
spend millions and billions of dollars so that we can

(42:59):
dramatize an exacerbate what is already a horrific situation. And
I am concerned right now because I really don't know
what tomorrow is going to bring. I don't know when
I wake up in the morning, what I'm gonna see
on the screen. I don't know whether it's going to
be safe to come out of my house. I don't
know whether I need to call all of my grown
children back home and huddle together for fear of our lives.

(43:21):
I don't know because there's such a feeling of powerlessness.
I don't know what's going to happen to understand the
people who are concerned about the burnings and and and
and and the rioting and the looting and all of that,
and that needs to be stopped. On the other hand,
that if we keep treating that which is a symptom
rather than treating that which caused the symptom, we're going

(43:45):
to continue to treat symptoms without cure. We have a
cure for this. It's just justice. It's just right. It's
already been written, it's just not being applied. We don't
have to recreate it. We just have to follow through
on it in a blind fashion, irrespective of race, color, gender,
or orientation. That's right. That is absolutely right. And I'm

(44:09):
I'm so happy to hear you name that so plainly
and so simply. Um. Why we created Black Lives Matter
in the first place was in essence to demand justice.
But like capital j justice, not just one person um
has a case or there's one indictment or one jury

(44:32):
case or what no, no, no, no no. We need wholesale,
systemic justice. We need a transformation of our society, and
that requires embedding justice all across the board, embedding equity
all across the board, um repairing the years and years
of damage that's been caused. You know, so much of

(44:56):
what we're seeing even now, and why the the protests
are so large and why it's more of a rebellion
is because people have been living in destitution. People have
been living and dealing with so much hardship. The pandemic
was really and the pandemic is still going on. Let

(45:17):
me just say it like that, but it really symbolizes
that the bottom has fallen out for so many people.
This country is not working for them. The way that
is currently set up is not working. When you have
within a month, month and a half, thirty forty million

(45:38):
people UM calling and needing unemployment, when you have people
who are without healthcare overnight, when you have um entire
you know, communities, and you have tens and thousands of
people needing to use the soup kitchen within a matter
of of a week losing their job. You know, people
are are struggling, and that means that they were already

(46:01):
living handsome mouth. I think this pandemic has so exposed
and laid bare such inequities that existed that that coupled
with situations like Ahmad are Very or George Floyd. It's
just it almost just poured gasoline on this simmering problem.

(46:28):
And I think in some ways it just it's undeniable,
just as that video is undeniable about what happened to
this man with the police officer with his hand in
his pocket, as this man is crying for his life.
There's just there's there's no way to explain it except

(46:52):
for to see it as it is. And you know,
when when you all talk about justice, Bishop Jakeson and
Opal and Bows, you know, I hear this and I
say yes, And as a white American, I think, what
can I do? What can I do? Because I feel

(47:14):
it's such an overwhelming problem, and you think systemic racism,
you have to change the systems. How in the world
do we go about doing that? How can I be
not just an ally but join forces with you and
for other people listening who do have different life experiences

(47:36):
than you do. How can how can we be there?
And I know this, Bows is what you don't want,
but I need guidance, I need help, and I need
your wisdom. I don't think that you have to be
a woman to speak up against rape. I don't think
you have to be a child to speak up against

(47:57):
child abuse. And I don't think you have to be
black to speak up against racism. And I think we
need your voice, we need your vote, we need your outrage.
That one of the things that has blessed my soul
was to see somebody angry that didn't look like me.
I cannot tell you how therapeutic sometimes two tears. To

(48:22):
see the moments in this process where police officers have
taken off their guns and joined in the march. To
see the moments in this process where lines of white
people have stood in between the police and the black
markers are just glimmers of hope. Where where you want
to say black lives matter, that's how you show black
lives matter by joining in and lifting your voice. You

(48:45):
don't the notion that you have to have the same
experience in order to have the same outrage. It's not true.
You do not have to have the same experience to
speak up on a child as abused. We have laws
in place that are clear and detail about what happens
when a child even mentions that they're being abused in
this country, and child protective services and this and that,

(49:07):
and we all know exactly what you do immediately. And
I don't want you to feel a foreigner from this
pain any longer. I want you to come and sup
and sit down at the table and and feel the
pain and join in it, I regardless to whether that
is your background or not, Like I sat with you
when when women were being abused in the workplace, like

(49:28):
I sat with children who were being molested in the home.
I don't want the wall to be built around the
color of our skin. I wanted to be around the
ideology for which we want our country to represent. We have,
at this present moment a decision to make as it

(49:49):
relates to what does it mean to be an American?
And if it is going to be inclusive, then we
we live up to the red, white, and blue. And
if it's not, let's just make the flag one color
and take all of the different colors out of it.
We have a decision to make at this moment, and
I'm sixty some years old. It doesn't make a whole

(50:11):
lot of difference for me, but for my grandchildren, for
my little grandchildren who are driving me crazy and leaving
toys all over the place that I step on in
the middle of the night. I would like to go
to sleep one day and lay down in my grave
knowing that I left this world better than I found it.
And I don't think you have to be black to
feel that way. I don't think you have to live

(50:32):
in South Chicago to feel that way, or Watts or Harlem.
You just have to. We aren't asking white people to
be black. We are asking Americans to be human. And
I think that's something within our grasp that we all
can do. And use your voice and your connections and
your associations and your connections with the CEOs, and go

(50:53):
to your country club and demand better and demand better
of your elected officials, not because you're black, not because
you understand blackness, but because you are human. Yeah, let
me pick up on the convicious point because I'm so
moved by this, like, demand better, and we need to

(51:15):
demand better, and we do need all hands on deck
right now. Um, this is clearly bigger than any one
of us. Uh. We have a movement that is vibrant,
it is very leaderful. So you'll see people from you know,
all walks of life, all identities and tenders and so on,

(51:35):
all walks of life all over. So we are a
very leaderful movement. But what we're calling for and what
the better looks like for us, is stop the harm.
First of all, stop the harm, right. We need to
be demanding that. That's basic, basic, basic minimum. And then
we need a repair of the damage. Right. So it's

(51:58):
not just enough to say, okay, we're of law enforcement,
is you know, stop doing this, stop doing that. No,
there have been families who have lost loved ones, there
are people who are wrongfully locked up, there are there
are families that have been torn apart for decades, and
we're tired of it. And to repair the damage and

(52:18):
the pain and the hurt is the only way to
make things quote unquote better. That is justice, not just
to stop the violence. But no, okay, you've you've harmed somebody,
So what is the compensation? How do you repair it?
How do we make sure the neighborhood is rebuilt? Those
are the kinds of conversations I believe that we need
to be having because real safety for our communities is

(52:41):
the ability for people to to live, the the ability
for people to love, the the ability for people to
be able to work and go to and fro without
fear of violence and fear for their lives. I just
want to say this one little point. Marching in the
streets and and and exercise think our amendment rights to

(53:03):
be able to speak up and to to to lift
our voice is important and it draws attention. But everybody
on here knows that real decisions are not made on
sidewalks in the street. They are made in boardrooms, in
business rooms, behind the scenes where a lot of our
voices don't get to be heard. And so to those
influential people white, black or brown who make it into

(53:26):
the room where decisions are made. Because decisions are not
made in marches, Attention is drawn in a march. And
what happens is we've seen a lot of marches. We've
seen the women march right after the election, We've seen
the Latinos march, We've seen Black people march. Now we're
seeing to everybody march. And it draws attention and it

(53:47):
gets pressed, and that's good. But if it doesn't go
beyond the public display of volumeless activity and headlins and
ratings and pay skills that are based on ratings, down
to the boardroom to the country clubs, where real decisions
are made. That's where we need a revolution. Thank god
for what you're doing on the street, but where we

(54:08):
really need a revolution is in the room where it happens,
and most of the time we don't get in that room.
It's easy to do something wrong when you try to
do it for us without us. You cannot do it
for us without us. That means that we can't have

(54:29):
men making decisions about women, and women are not sitting
at the table, and you can't have white people making
decisions about what you think are to happen in black
communities if you don't bring in black thought leaders and
bring us around the table, and there are plenty of them.
It's not like we don't have smart, bright, black influential

(54:50):
people who can really address this. It's just that they
are never invited into the room because we want we
want calm more than we want right and we're not
willing to be uncomfortable and we're not willing to have disruption.
But any CEO will tell you that if a company
never has disruption, it never grows. And so the challenge

(55:14):
today is to stop saying that there there are no
black leaders are absolutely they're graduating every day with doctorate
degrees who are articulate and intelligent and well spoken, who
can speak to issues, and there's affluence and then there's
influence that they're not the same thing. Let's stop just
calling on people because they have a lot of followers

(55:34):
and start getting thought leaders in who have a A
A S yeah, a strategy. I was by the word
a strategy for the struggle, and they are here and
they are waiting to be ushered into the room. The
baton needs to pass. I'm not saying that Black Lives
Matters is over, but it needs to pass because even

(55:57):
black people only think you're doing something if you're holding
up a sign, But real power is behind closed doors.
And we need both things going on, not one or
the other. We need both things going on, the public
display and the private discussion, and that will bring about
a change when we come back Bishop Jake's and opele

(56:20):
To Matti and Bosma St. John on the fierce urgency
of now. Now back to our conversation with opal to
medi and Bishop Jake's, who share their glimmers of hope
for the future. I am encouraged that we are talking

(56:45):
like we have for for a long time been like
a bad marriage where nobody said anything and as long
as the house was quiet, at least we weren't fighting. Uh.
In spite of the disruption of the conversation, I think
this is very healthy, even and if you say the
wrong thing, and even if you get uh, Jack did
the conversation, so to speak uh, to let your voice

(57:09):
be heard. America is trying to heal itself, lested destroy itself.
So I'm encouraged that we're having a conversation. It is
far healthier to have a debate, even if we don't agree,
than it is for us to have political correctness and
be silent about suffering. Secondly, I am encouraged by the
fact that both parties are starting to think that the

(57:31):
black vote is within their reach. I think it is
bad when we when we sell ourselves completely out to
a party and not a policy, and hold both sides
accountable to policies, not parties, but policies that benefit our
communities in a way that spawns creativity on both sides.

(57:52):
To compete for this volume of votes that we have
and then get out there and vote to make a change.
I'm encouraged by that. I'm encouraged by some of the
things that I have seen happening in terms of government
trying to find itself and fix itself. It's not there yet,
but the conversations are emerging between Democrats and Republicans. Some

(58:13):
of the most important fields have passed because they joined
together and stopped fighting for a few days and decided
to make some decisions. All of those things are really
encouraging to me that we can get through this, and
if we do it now, the fierce urgency of now
has never been more appropriate to be said than at
this moment, because we stand we're dealing with a pandemic

(58:36):
and economic collapse and a sociological collapse all at the
same time, and and we cannot wait to fix this
months and months away. Our economy won't do it, the
pandemic won't do it, and the sociological construct of our
community demands that we fix it now. And that needs

(58:57):
to happen right early. Wow. Oh hard act to follow,
although something tells me you'll do it. To be quite honest,
you know, what makes me hopeful is that we are
actually having this discussion, that we are in the midst

(59:19):
of this challenge, that we see that there is an
obstacle and within that obstacle. I believe there's an opportunity, UM.
We have an opportunity to really address generations upon generations
of injustice. We have an opportunity right now to rectify uh,

(59:40):
the skills of justice. And I think what we're seeing
is that there are people who have said, enough is enough.
Let's have that conversation right now. We're demanding it take
place because for too long, our lives were lived as
though we were we were a secret right. We were
living in this shadows of injustice, having to tolerate the

(01:00:02):
injustice UM time and time again. And so folks forced
the conversation. They've forced not only the conversation, but they're
forcing a course of action to take place. I think
the reason that we do see the corporations, the reasons
we do see elected officials and other people engaging in
these discussions right now, is because people said, you know,

(01:00:24):
enough is enough. We're fed up, and we need to
have this discussion now because my life matters, and pandemic
or not, people were already living on the brink. And
then you see the ways in which the pandemic also
demonstrates how racism is playing out in our society. When

(01:00:45):
you have one third of the pen the people who've
died of COVID Night Team are African Americans. It just
tells you that we've already been living with such dire
concerns and dire needs. And it's not just black people,
it's people of all hughes. And so what I see
now is as my moment of hope, is that I

(01:01:07):
think the obstacle itself shows us the way it shows
us that we have these various entry points to deal
with the injustice. You know, we see people who aren't
able to pay their rent or their mortgages. Okay, moratorium,
let's call for the moratorium. We see people who don't
have money for their food and day to day expectes. Okay,

(01:01:28):
let's have this discussion and a plan of action around
a universal basic income. Let's have these real, frank and
honest conversations about what it's going to take to keep
people safe and living in their homes and with their
families together and without the violence that we're experiencing as
we walk down the street or re engage in every

(01:01:48):
day forms of life. So I think that the fact
that we're in this and that we're in this moment
where there are massive rallies and protests and so on.
Is actually an opportunity for us to look ourselves, you know,
in the eyes for the nation, and are elected officials
to hold up a mirror and say, what can I

(01:02:09):
actually do? How can I make a just solution right now?
How can I partner with local community groups and community
members who have actually been devising plans around these injustices
for many, many years. So many people have already done
all the reports, They know the numbers, they know exactly
what kinds of checks and balances are needed for accountability

(01:02:33):
to take place. And then everyday people also have an opportunity,
so are allies who really should be co conspirators for
justice alongside us. They have opportunities to donate, to have
courageous conversations with their family members, to understand what the
power and the privilege they have within their jobs, and
to make demands of change within the spaces that they occupy.

(01:02:57):
I think everybody has an opportunity to use their power
and their privilege, and not even just an opportunity, but
an obligation. At this point, when you see this level
of injustice taking place, there becomes a point where it's
like no, no no, no, you don't have a you have
you don't have a choice now. You the only choice
you really have is to be a part of justice

(01:03:20):
or know that you're impeding justice. And what I'm hoping
is that people will want to know that they are
found on the right side of history and that they'll
be with us in this pursuit for justice. Amen. Yes, Amen, Amen,
and amen, Thank you both. You know, this was such

(01:03:41):
a such an moving and important conversation, and I'm so
grateful to just be on the receiving end. And I
just want to jump to what Bose was saying about
people feeling nervous about being part of the conversation, and
to that end, I realized that sometimes words can be

(01:04:02):
insensitive and triggering. And I had a situation not too
long ago when I was discussing an interview I had
done with Denzel Washington, who I said, I deeply admired
and but he um we had an awkward, kind of
uncomfortable interview, and I mentioned how I felt a little.

(01:04:23):
I felt a little shaken by that interview, and I
understand that the way I used language was, as I said,
triggering for some people. That received was received in a
way that I did not intend it to to sound
and I'm curious for your perspective on the importance of

(01:04:45):
language as we navigate this trauma that people have endured,
and to be respectful of that, but also forgiving for
people who are unintentionally hurtful. I think it all begins

(01:05:07):
with with mutual respect and real relationships. Relationships that are
only done in public are always a deficient you. You
can't use a black or white or brown person as
a prop. You have to have real relationships and eat
with us and talk with us, and eat with you

(01:05:27):
and laugh and talk with you. We have a saying
in the church, the Kingdom of God advances amongst friends,
and I think that's where the conversations begins, when you
actually befriend somebody whose perspective or racial hue is different
from yours, because friends are forgiving and friends are confrontational,

(01:05:49):
and and friends will kind of prep you for the
larger conversations with people who don't get you, because friends
understand your heart even when your mouth goes self and
a beautiful way to put it, you know. So, I
think if there's one takeaway that I would challenge everybody

(01:06:10):
that's listening at us today is to go beyond being
polite and actually develop a friendship with somebody that's different
from you, and go eat and have lunch and talk
and laugh and play and take the risk of being
reprimanded because your friendship should be strong enough to handle it.

(01:06:30):
And then go mainstream. Don't hide behind Twitter and say
things that that and become a bully. Take the risk.
The kingdom advances amongst friends, and we are we are
family on this planet. COVID nineteen teaches us that we

(01:06:52):
are family. The whole family got infected, the whole world
got shut down. Nine eleven of us. What Americans were, black, Republican, white, Muslims, Jews, gay, straight,
Everybody died together, burned up together. Let's stop allowing our

(01:07:13):
enemies to be smarter than us. If our enemies know
we are one, then we should know we're one. And
let's broach the conversation by building a relationship strong enough
to accommodate a mistake. I love all of that, and

(01:07:33):
I love that question that you asked. UM. I'll say
this that words do matter, right, UM, And obviously I
know that from personal experience, knowing that these three simple
words that we put out into the world made such

(01:07:54):
impact and resonated so deeply with people from all walks
of life or on the world. And so we know
that words have meaning. And you know, I'm here with
the bishop, and so I want to get a little
bit into my my own my own faith. My dad's
a pastor, and I grew up around a lot of ministers,

(01:08:15):
and I can't help but think of the Scripture when
they say that that life and death is in the tongue, right.
So there's a lot of power in our words. And
we have to be mindful of what we are sharing,
what we're saying. We have to be not mindful to

(01:08:35):
name when there's an injustice going on in the land.
We have to be mindful because we need to bring
life to the situation. And quite literally, Black Lives Matter
was a love note for Black people to remind ourselves

(01:08:56):
that we matter, even if the society or the systems
are say negative things or doing negative things to us.
We used it as a message to remind ourselves of
our own power, of our own beauty, of our agency,
of our worthiness, whether we have money or we don't,
whether we're from one country or another. We use it

(01:09:18):
as a reminder of all of that, and it was
quite you know, simple, quite literally, both a message of
love but also a demand on our society. And so
I'll say that, you know, words matter, and while we're
engaged in this longer journey to justice, there will be

(01:09:39):
mistakes and no one's going to get it perfect. But
what is so powerful about the age that we're living
in is that we have all sorts of resources and
tools to educate ourselves, you know, to do the deep work.
There are all sorts of programs and anti racists, you know,
books and work in clue groups and clubs, and you

(01:10:02):
know even you know, different departments and companies and governments.
And so I think there's a lot of opportunities to
engage in the practice of justice, right, both theory and
the actual live practice, which is not always pretty. Right,
it's not always pretty. But because we're committed to building

(01:10:23):
a world where all of us have a chance to
to thrive, a world where we're all respected and given
the opportunity to tap into who we are and the
best of ourselves, and we want to live up to that.
So we have a duty to engage in those tough conversations,
to to hear the hard truths to name it, to

(01:10:45):
own it, and to show up and keep on showing up,
because that's what it is. This is life, and just
like everything else, we live, we learn, we grow, we
keep on. You're still part of this community, You're still
part of this world. Making a mistake doesn't um negate
your presence or your contribution. We need people to learn,

(01:11:07):
and we need people to model their learnings and continue.
And I think it's, you know, a powerful example when
I see you folks own it and and just continue
going and continue going. I love that, love all of that.
I know you guys are so awesome. Really, um, I

(01:11:29):
think that's I mean, gosh, this this is great. And
I hope people will really really learn as much as
I did from just listening to what you all have
to say and give your giving me a lot to
think about. And Bose, I think probably they're giving you
a lot to think about too, right well, Listen, I
came into this very tired, I am leaving very motivated,

(01:11:53):
so I certainly appreciate the words of the bishop and
of course, my sister opel Um, I can't thank you
enough for this very honest conversation. Um. And I think
that a lot of people are going to really take
a lot out of it. I mean, we certainly are
at a place where my hope is that this is

(01:12:14):
a turning point in that we will find new ways
of being that will evolve our culture and our communities,
and that people will find inspiration in what you have said,
whether they are black or white or brown. Uh, that
we will all find ways to make our society is better.
So thank you again so much for the conversation. Let

(01:12:34):
me just close with one thing to both of my
Nubian sisters. What a privilege and and honor it is
Uh to hear your wisdom and see your smiles, and
and hear your perspectives and and learn and grow. And
I have been inspired. Uh Indicatie Curi, who is is
absolutely a journalistic legend. Thank you for propelling our voice

(01:12:59):
beyond the board or so for anyone else amongst us
could carry it. Uh. Your influence, your background, your massive
journalistic career enables our thoughts to be propelled onto platforms
that none of us could reach without you. And when
you ask what can you do, you're doing it right now.

(01:13:21):
Thank you so much. Bishop. You're making me cry. I
wish I could go go through this computer screen and
give you a hug, but I know I'm not allowed
to do that anyway, so I'll send you a virtual
hug and Opal. Such a such a privilege to meet you. Likewise,

(01:13:42):
this is great. Thank you all so much. This was
such an important conversation, truly, truly, thank you, Wow, Bows,
those two really delivered. I am so moved and inspired
from that conversation. I cannot thank you enough for inviting
both of them to the podcast. I think it's been

(01:14:03):
such an important conversation and I'm really proud of the
way that you even asked questions that perhaps made you
feel uncomfortable. And I hope that you are more comfortable now.
And for anyone who's interested in reading or understanding more,
we've put together a detailed list of anti racist resources,
which you can find in the podcast description and on

(01:14:25):
our social media channels too. Until next time, I'm Katie
Couric and I'm Bozma st. John and this is Back
to Biz with Katie and Bows. Thank you so much
for listening everyone, and Bows, thank you for being here.
Thank you so much. I love you, Katie, I love
you too. Back to Biz with Katie and Bows is

(01:14:49):
a production of I Heart Radio and Katie Currk Media.
The executive producers are Katie Currk, Bozma St John, and
Courtney Litz. The supervising producer is Lauren Hansen. The associate
producers are Derek Clements, Eliza Costas, and Emily Pinto. Editing
by Derrek Clements and Lauren Hansen, Mixing by Derrek Clements.
Special thanks to Adriana Fasio. For more information about today's episode,

(01:15:14):
go to Katie Kirk dot com. You can also follow
Katie Kuric and Bosmas st John on Twitter and Instagram.
For more podcasts from my Heart Radio, visit the I
Heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to
your favorite shows,