Stepping In to Change Rape Culture with Dr. Taylor Waits

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Oh, welcome to another episode of The Unwanted Sorority. I'm

(00:08):
your host, Doctor Leetretat. As a reminder, this is a
space created for and by black women, fem's, and gender
expansive folks who've experienced sexual violence. So whether you've lived it,
left someone who has, or simply want to hold space,
you're welcome here for this week's Flowers for the Founder segment,
I'm kicking it back to a group who got a
special mention in episode one, but I didn't really give

(00:30):
you much detail on if you missed it, I'm going
to link that episode in the show notes, so make
sure you go back and listen. But the Comby he
River Collective is a group of black feminists lesbian socialists
who were intentional about how they showed up in the
gap of the contemporary movements at the time. They weren't
shy at all about creating the spaces they wanted and

(00:51):
they needed to see, even if they didn't quite exist yet.
And that's kind of the same ethos of today's role
called guests Doctor Taylor Waite. She'll share with us her
process of establishing the organization hashtag Change Rape Culture, which
she founded in twenty nineteen with co constructor Kamaya Factory.

(01:11):
In this episode, Taylor really speaks truth to power with
thoughts like.

Speaker 2 (01:15):
This, trying to attack this systemic problem with your two
hands is just going to leave you so exhausted.

Speaker 1 (01:24):
The Inlandon Sorority is a space for community connection and care,
but it's not a substitute for professional mental health, medical
or legal support. If anything you hear today resonates in
a way that feels heavy, I encourage you to reach
out to someone you trust or a licensed clinician. You
deserve to feel whole and you deserve to be supported.

(01:56):
For founding members Tomta Frasier and sisters Barbara and Beverly Smith,
creating the spaces they needed to see meant forming the
Combahee River Collective in nineteen seventy four after the frustrations
from the limitations of the existing movements in the black
liberation groups and the feminist groups kind of came to
a head at the same time for them. They chose

(02:17):
the name Cumbahee River to honor Harriet Tubman's eighteen sixty
three raid along South Carolina's Cumbahee River. It was the
first United States military operation that was planned and led
by a woman. During that time, Harriet Tubman led one
hundred and fifty black soldiers to free over seven hundred

(02:39):
enslaved people. And so, as Demita noted in a twenty
twenty four interview where she was celebrating fifty years of
the Cumbahee River Collectives founding with author Madeline Call of
the Boston Globe, quote, black feminism had to be created
because there were too many smart, capable, unruly Black women

(03:00):
who were not willing to simply be set aside or
to spend all of our time arguing about why we
deserve a seat at the table end quote. Domitia goes
on to say, quote we.

Speaker 3 (03:11):
Were not going to do that.

Speaker 1 (03:12):
We were building tables end quote. And truly, at the
heart of it all, that's what the Collective was all about,
not just waiting or fighting for inclusion and other movements.
They were building their own platforms, and by nineteen seventy seven,
the Collective brought about a revolutionary vision of black feminism
that was inclusive, intentional, and that ultimately challenged the dominant

(03:36):
narratives that didn't account for the intersecting nature of oppression.
And we've talked about how that is marked by racism, sexism, classism,
and homophobia that many of the black women who were
part of the collective were experiencing at the time. Their
defining text, the Combahee River Collective Statement, states quote, we

(03:56):
believe that sexual politics under patriarchy is a pervasive in
black women's lives, as are the politics of class and race.
And they wrote noting that their lives were shaped by
racial sexual oppression, so for example, the long history of
the rape of black women by white men as it
was used as a weapon of political repression. And it's

(04:18):
also important to note that the term quote identity politics
was actually coined by them in that same statement, the
term was born out of a need to express that
their politics grew out of their identities and their lived
experiences as black women. Quote, our politics evolved from a
healthy love for ourselves, our sisters, and our community, they wrote,

(04:42):
rejecting any concept of black women's issues being secondary in
anybody's movement, and this analysis insisted that freedom had to
be holistic. They were committed to fighting not only for
racial justice or gender equality and isolation, but for a
world free of all forms of oppression that blacklack women
and by extension.

Speaker 3 (05:02):
All people based.

Speaker 1 (05:04):
And one of the sort of defining markers of their
work was the collectives work and fight against sexual violence
targeting black women. In their own words, quote, black feminists
have all experienced sexual oppression as a constant factor in
our day to day existence. And they go on to

(05:26):
say that from girlhood quote they became aware of the
threat of physical and sexual abuse by men end quote,
but they had no language or support to make sense
of it until they found each other. The collective didn't
just write about these issues, though, I want to be
very clear about that, They took action. So many of

(05:47):
the Combyhee River Collective members were active in projects that
address sexual assault, domestic abuse, and reproductive justice. So remember
Jill Little, who I mentioned briefly in the last episode.
The collective was very active in their defense. In nineteen eighty,
the collective was very active in their defense, and even

(06:08):
in nineteen eighty some members participated in a march in
Boston where they held a banner that read Third World Women,
we cannot live without our lives. The collective organized to
demand attention go towards violence against Black women and emphasize
the need for community action. One of the most prominent
instances came in the form of their activist actions. In

(06:30):
nineteen seventy nine, according to doctor Marianna Brandman, author of
the coma hebri of a collective pioneers of intersectional feminism, an
article from Massachusetts Women's History Center, Boston was shaken by
a series of murders where eleven black women and one
white woman were killed within a span of five months.

(06:51):
The crimes received relatively little public attention at first, and
there was a general sense that the police and media
didn't really value the lives of black women enough to
highlight how horrifying the crime spree actually was. And you know,
this is just kind of an aside from me, but
if you tune into any big name true crime podcasts

(07:13):
these days, you'll hear countless stories of individual, mostly white
women who are murdered. And yet, as the Kombahee River
Collective noted in their response pamphlet entitled quote eleven Black women,
why did they die?

Speaker 3 (07:28):
They said? Quote?

Speaker 1 (07:30):
In the black community, the murders have often been talked
about as solely racial or racist crimes. It's true that
the police and media response has been typically racist. It's
true that the victims were all black, and that black
people have always been targets of racist violence in the society,
but they were also all women. Our sisters died because

(07:55):
they were women, just as surely as they died because
they were black. The collective refused to let these women's
deaths go unnoticed. The pamphlet didn't stop at just this
analysis either. It also offered practical guidance on self protection
and listed community resources for women facing violence. Further, they demanded,

(08:18):
in writing in all caps in their pamphlet, quote, we
have to learn to protect ourselves, demanding that we move
beyond the concept of it being a man's job to
protect women and understanding and recognizing the loaded assumptions in
that idea that women are weak, helpless, and dependent victims

(08:40):
that need protection from other men.

Speaker 3 (08:42):
End quote.

Speaker 1 (08:44):
They sprang into action, mobilizing the community and demanding the
authorities and new outlets confront the racial and gender dimensions
of these murders. And on April twenty eighth, nineteen seventy nine,
the Combahee River Collective and their allies turned outrage into
organized protests, and they led a five hundred person march
against racial violence and sexual violence on the Boston Common.

(09:07):
The image of the collective members at that march carrying
a banner declaring we cannot live without our lives. Someblies
exactly what they were fighting for, that basic right of
black women to live free from violence. The action helped
force the issue of black women's safety into public consciousness
in Boston. It also demonstrated a model of how to

(09:30):
address sexual violence in an intersectional way, considering race, class,
and gender altogether at the same time. And although the
Kumba Here River Collective is an organization was relatively short lived,
they were only active for about six or seven years,
their influence on subsequent generations has been profound. I had
the great privilege of seeing some of the founding members,

(09:52):
including Barbara and Demita, alongside other prominent scholar activists such
as Beverly Guy, Chef Doll, and Charlene Brothers in twenty
seventeen at the National Women's Studies Association's annual conference, which
they titled forty Years After Company, Feminist scholars and Activists
Engage the Movement for Black Lives, and there the members

(10:15):
recounted what the experience was like of creating and living
and building in the movement and what that looked like
for them. I also, not to brag, walked by Angela
Davis in the hallway on my way to a plenary
session after presenting, and it was just me and her
plus everybody else in her team who just kind of

(10:37):
walked past each other in the hallway, and she looked
over at me and she smiled, and that just felt
like a very important point for y'all to know about me.
So as we wrap up this little mini session on
social movements related to Black women and anti sexual violence,
I had to make sure the ogs the comba He
River Collective received their flowers. Their work paved the way

(11:00):
for so much of what we're seeing in terms of
organizing in this space today, and you'll hear a lot
of similarities between that collective and what our role called
guest doctor Taylor Waits has built with her organization hashtag
change rape Culture.

Speaker 3 (11:17):
So I can't wait for.

Speaker 1 (11:17):
Y'all to hear what she has to say. Let's get
into it, all right, So welcome, Welcome. I'm so excited
to have this conversation with you. Before I kind of
jump into anything else, I just want to give you
a chance to introduce yourself. So who are you?

Speaker 3 (11:40):
Hello? Hello, Hello friends. I am Taylor Waits.

Speaker 2 (11:43):
I am a advocate and educator for the Change Rape
Culture movement. It was a move that I started with
my co founder Cama Factory in twenty nineteen and right
now in twenty twenty three, we're working with three employees
working in four states, and we're working with over one
hundred and fifty I think events that we've done in

(12:04):
these four years in different places and spaces. We created
Change Rape Culture to act as the middle point between survivors,
specifically queer and of color survivors and their institutions that
they work at, that they go to school.

Speaker 3 (12:18):
At, or that they just function within.

Speaker 2 (12:20):
So whether you work at a bank or a business
that has really misogynistic and patriarchal laws that refuse or
that promote gender based discrimination or sexual base violence, we
are here to help advocate for you, to talk about
the things that happen with these two subsets of survivors,
queer and of color and sometimes of course queer people

(12:42):
of color as well.

Speaker 3 (12:43):
And we're also here to just spread our own stories.

Speaker 2 (12:45):
We're both survivors, so we wanted to create something that
was by survivors and specifically for survivors, and specifically for
survivors of color and queer survivors.

Speaker 3 (12:52):
So that's who we are. That's who I am.

Speaker 2 (12:55):
I am a fifth year graduate student at the University
of Pittsburgh getting my English.

Speaker 3 (13:01):
I finished next semester, thank Jesus. And then I am married.
I am gay married.

Speaker 2 (13:07):
I have a wife and they are amazing and they
had their degree in psychology. And I have two children,
a pitbull terrier and a black cat who Coakilla's who
I am. So that's them, that's me. Thank you so
much for this opportunity, of course.

Speaker 1 (13:22):
So I appreciate you kind of sharing a little bit
of background on how change rape culture developed and what
that space has meant to you, what that space has
meant to survivors that you've worked with, kind of the
full scope of like the events and stuff that y'all
have put together. So I'm curious if you're comfortable or

(13:43):
have anything else to share on what the foundation is, Like,
how did you all come together? Is there anything that
kind of has rooted you in the foundation of the work.

Speaker 2 (13:56):
It was through talking shit, it was through gossip, believe
in black feminisms, and that idea of just speaking out,
and that idea of testimony, that idea of sharing her story,
and that idea of not containing your anger, of letting
everyone have to do with it. Camie and I were

(14:16):
young scholars, you know, at ETSA, eyes wide open and
reading a lot of the Kambahi River Collective, and so
we had both been really involved on campus.

Speaker 3 (14:29):
I was the third of her black homecoming queen at
my university.

Speaker 2 (14:32):
I was involved in a organizations and I had a
full time job on top of that, so everyone knew me.

Speaker 3 (14:38):
I felt very visible. I felt like people asked me
for things all the time, and they.

Speaker 2 (14:42):
Would always also scope or skate on the Hey, can
I tell you something like those conversations that often happened
with survivors where they're like, you just seem like a
nice person. I really want to share this with you.
And so at first it was me and her kind
of talking about boundary setting in my dorm. Right, these
people just come up to you. Tell you, Harry, when
I was a child, these really traumatic things happened to me,

(15:05):
and we defined. I don't know why, I just kept saying,
I guess I had that face. What is it about
me that makes people feel these comfortable and like they
can tell me these very intimate stories that I at
the time was as a survivor unwilling to talk about
my own so I felt very uncomfortable by this. I
was like, I don't think this is my business. At
change of culture or grade, culture will have us believe
you know, your community's business, isn't your business. I'm an

(15:28):
individual and I don't need to get involved in what's
happening on the school. Also, I'm black, and I'm a woman,
and I'm gay, and I live in Texas. This does
not feel like our fight or this. This just feels
whey fucked that this doesn a feel like something I need.

Speaker 3 (15:39):
To get involved with. Though if I got involved with everything,
I was fucked that I'd be really busy.

Speaker 2 (15:45):
And Camille, I was in the dorm room, like, yeah,
we were talking about feminism, how it is that black
women are martyred, how it does we often die early,
how we take on these causes and people don't give
a fuck about us, and we live alone. And we'll
talking about all of these black feminists who alone, and
the statistic that is still going around that black women
are the number one demographic to dial old, that's for

(16:06):
a lot of reasons, but just.

Speaker 3 (16:07):
Talking about it.

Speaker 2 (16:08):
And then I was like, oh, and my bisexual boyfriend
broke up with me because he said this is the
full out of lesbian because he said that he needed
to work on himself and that he wasn't able to
do that in a relationship with me. And so of course,
as we're talking about all this, I'm like, Okay, and
there's this other dude I want to fuck.

Speaker 3 (16:25):
Have you heard of him? Do you know what? You know?

Speaker 2 (16:27):
What's the big game looking like? And Camille was like,
he's a full on rapist, Like he's definitely assaulted several
people on campus, and that was sort of the first
drop of the pin of being like, oh, I'm perpetuating
this too. I And the first thing I said is, Mitch,
why didn't you tell me? Why did no one tell me?
Why did no one tell me that I'm about to
literally have sex with the rapist? Y'all are putting me

(16:48):
in as much danger and when you were around this man,
and it's kind of fucked up that we're not telling
people that we're literally leading people to this man. And
this was one of many these are problems university in
Texas is a lot of like DL men, so a
lot of them were having sex with the gay boys.
The D gay boys are on campus or with each other,
spreading STIs and then having sex with the women to

(17:11):
like prove that they're men or whatever, and passing sexual
or transmitted diseases to all of these girls who aren't
telling anybody that these boys are really be giving them diseases.

Speaker 3 (17:20):
You know that they're and they're really.

Speaker 1 (17:22):
Kind of embarrassments and all this.

Speaker 2 (17:25):
Suffti stigma exactly and not wanting to be embarrassed. I
also became men obviously, like I'm not telling my AsSb,
which is exactly what would happen if they were to
walk around telling people that number one, they had sex
with these high profile men on campus, but that these
high profile men on campus are having sex with loads
of men and that they're all a part of these things.
So they're like, the life is fucked that, the word

(17:47):
is fucked up. Conversation kind of turned into like this
is fuck that, but we have to be able to
do something, And of course she was more so like Taylor,
you're the homecoming queen. There's something you can do. And
I realistically was getting really bien bordarted with the white
people's requests of me at the time, and then also
everybody that i'm that I answer to, all of my

(18:07):
higher ups are all white people, so they whenever we
bring up in our black population at the school is
less than three percent, so whenever we brought up things
that specifically partook in the black community, they would always say, well,
that's like a y'all problem.

Speaker 3 (18:20):
Would you ever do anything to help y'all with that?

Speaker 2 (18:22):
So I was very hesitant, and it just didn't seem
like the time, you know, it never seems like the
time to talk about rape and abuse and sexual violence.

Speaker 3 (18:31):
And I just remember telling Camilla like, can we wait?
Can we wait? Why now?

Speaker 2 (18:36):
And Camia really wentsn't taking them for an answer, you know,
she's in Lis, So she was just like, you're one
of the most radical people I know. The conversation you
just had, I feel like people need to hear. And
I don't know what you're afraid of, Like, I don't
know why would you even want to continue going to
school knowing that this is happening without saying anything about it.

Speaker 3 (18:54):
And that was where she got me where it was like,
ye're right, you know being.

Speaker 2 (18:57):
Silent is just as bad, or you know, not having
a stance is just as bad as taking the other stance. Right,
especially when we talk about sexual violence, people are so
that's in their house, that's their business. This isn't something
that involves me. This has this stems from psychological issues,
whatever it is. So people who come up with their
excuse as to why they don't get involved, and in

(19:17):
child cases, that's a lot of the times what happens.
There's like piles of adults who see something really fucked
up happening and they just let it happen and they
don't say anything, and they say, that's that kid in
their parent I'm not going to do anything. And I
lived an entire life of that, of just adults seeing
the beers on my arm, or seeing that I'm mentally
out of it, or seeing that I've been gone for
a few days, and just not really investigating that because

(19:39):
I put up the facade that everything is okay. My
family puts up the facade that we live in this
nice household. So I chose at that point, I said, okay,
well what are we going to do?

Speaker 3 (19:49):
Then?

Speaker 2 (19:49):
If you want me to do something, what are we
going to do, and so we went on Snapchat and
we sent out flyers to like everybody we knew about it.
It was called let's talk about it. It happens all
the time. And while we didn't blatantly say rape or abuse,
anyone knew what that meant. And so we had it

(20:09):
off campus, and I remember like sixty five people showing up,
which was really big at the time, like for a
student event, sure for most student events, hy for most
other events, because it was like six people like barely that.
And so the fact that sixty five came and of
course once again whether I'm like, we're here to talk shit,
we need the tea I want. Some of us wanted
to leave there with a list of names, just in community,

(20:33):
so that, like I said, we can stop not saying
anything and leading people literally to their doom, and that
could be within community.

Speaker 3 (20:40):
We don't have to post that anywhere or do anything
about that.

Speaker 2 (20:43):
So we talked mainly about like the people we've encountered
or people we've heard of, and a lot of.

Speaker 3 (20:47):
Like oh or I knew it, We're in there, lots
of like oh my god. But there wasn't a lot
of vigo. There was no victim blaming actually in that space,
which was great. Everyone just believed each other.

Speaker 2 (20:58):
We were just like, oh, period, another name question asked right,
So then.

Speaker 3 (21:02):
Camia was like, so what do y'all want to do
about it?

Speaker 2 (21:05):
And then that's when people start throwing out answers. One
person was like, we should take we should take pictures
of our faces and put them around the campus and
put like cover their eyes and put like a word
on it. We're very moosquiat, very offb out guard. We
were like, we're gonna make us stats. We want see
and indico and then you know they gorilla art exactly.

(21:26):
Then like a lot of the gay and the black
people are like, to be honest.

Speaker 3 (21:29):
I got to get this degree.

Speaker 2 (21:30):
So ready, let's let's back it out. Let's back to that,
like how can we be active? How can we really
make us stand without putting ourselves in danger? Which is
how changed reculture also started like the abuser should be
the one suffering. We are not going to do over
hears and edergrees and having people give us the tenth degree.

Speaker 3 (21:46):
We're not doing that.

Speaker 2 (21:47):
Me and Camilla will just be the face of this thing.
But y'all don't have to like put your bodies on.

Speaker 3 (21:52):
The line or do any of this other stuff.

Speaker 2 (21:53):
You can just support us, or by supporting us, you
are thus supporting yourself. And so we were like, well,
what if Cami and I stop our largest event on
campus because it was coming up, so we all strategize
what we're going to do.

Speaker 3 (22:06):
We had the protest. It was very oppositional.

Speaker 2 (22:09):
There were so many people, I think me and Kimia
that was almost notable things. We really didn't expect people
to be that mad, Like even to this day when
we still get death threats or there themselves up. We
don't have to say any names. We never said any names.
Until our fourth protests. We never said any names.

Speaker 3 (22:28):
But we had people emailing as being like, if you
say this or if.

Speaker 2 (22:30):
You talk to this person because they see the survivor
protesting with us, so they're like, if you tell anybody
one dude.

Speaker 3 (22:38):
The dude I was interested in.

Speaker 2 (22:39):
His aunt was a lawyer, and so she emailed Tamia's
personal email and then the change repquature one and was like,
if I hear you talking more liable about my nephew,
I'm gonna press charges against you.

Speaker 3 (22:52):
Like people were really serious, you.

Speaker 2 (22:53):
Know, behind their kids, behind this person that could never
a lot of grave cultures.

Speaker 3 (23:00):
You know, they've never done.

Speaker 2 (23:01):
That to me, or they only like boys, so they
only like girls, or you know, but they're lesbian or whatever.
They're really excuses to allow it to happen. And after
that first protest.

Speaker 1 (23:11):
Yeah, it sounds like they were all so scared, like
scared of the accountability, scared of the ramifications of their actions,
just a lot of stuff that they had never faced before,
because you know, they're the entire name of your organization,
this movement at the time, because rape culture has protected

(23:33):
them for so long.

Speaker 2 (23:34):
Yeah, and they expected it, right, they expected this immediate, like, yes,
I'm gonna believe them.

Speaker 3 (23:39):
The entvitenment.

Speaker 2 (23:41):
We're going to come from this point of view. Were like, yeah,
we're gonna hear you out. And Camie and I are
the opposite of that. I think I did a training
yesterday and it was with of course, college students, and
they're it's called safe that pitt At the University of Pittsburgh,
seven out of ten incoming black students have been sexually
abused at that school, which is crazy.

Speaker 3 (24:02):
That is seventy percent of your black population.

Speaker 2 (24:04):
And I think it's even higher for the queer black
population at that school, and it's mainly perpetuated through fraternity
and sorority life. At our home institution, it was a
lot of fraternity and sorority life, right, but it was
also a lot of the stuff having sex with the students.
So there's a lot of them also creating these really
murky power and balances, lots of like girls marrying their

(24:27):
committee chairs, like stuff like that. After that first protest,
we're like, well, what are we asking for?

Speaker 3 (24:32):
What's the point? And Camie and I was like.

Speaker 2 (24:34):
Well, we should ask for the Title nine office to
change entirely, which you're asked for them to like fire
those people, to be honest, and if that problem is
federal laws with how Title nine handles these cases, we
need to have a conversation about that because these protocols
are so discriminatory to so many people. We know, we
just there has to be something else or an extra

(24:55):
level or you know, we didn't know necessarily know where
that we wanted the conversation to build with Title nine,
but we know that it needed to a conversation and
that that office specifically isn't doing it its job. Then
we also have the cultural problem which is rape jokes,
like you said, stigma against people based on their gender
we live in Texas, which highly criticizes anybody who identifies
as anything other than the gender that they were assigned as.

(25:17):
And there was also during a time when they were
trying or they ended up finally repealing talking.

Speaker 3 (25:21):
About critical waste they in class.

Speaker 2 (25:23):
So we had a lot of you know, things going on, obstacles,
lots of activism going on on campus, and they had
just started opening carry on our campus after there was
a huge mass shooting I think at the University of Texas,
So we had a lot of stuff that all the
students were really hyped up for. Anyway, it was like
a very big dis protesting time. It's look very similar
to twenty twenty when everybody sort of felt this need

(25:44):
to get up and get out, and with change of culture,
it just sort of like caught like fire. That was
really like the best thing or the best way I
could explain it. I think everybody in our generation agreed
that abusers fucking suck and that we don't need to
allow them to dictate how we feel. And the survivor,
I think at the base of it, even when you
ask more conservative right leaning people, but most people agree

(26:09):
with the fact that in that situation, the survivor should
not be the one that gets the brunt of the
media coverage or and the scrutiny. That's how we've always
seen this story. And so me and Camie are like,
we just want to flip that narrative. You can talk
to me, you can talk to me, we can talk
about whatever we can talk about. I'm not going to
tell you the survivor's name. I'm just gonna publish what

(26:30):
they've asked me to publish.

Speaker 3 (26:31):
And doing that, we get you was hard.

Speaker 2 (26:35):
So Camilla is going to law school and knows a
lot of lawyers and was in debate, and so we
would have where lawyers come with us to news interviews
or when we're talking to the newspaper and kind of
like correct what we're saying while we're saying it. Because
sexual abuse, rape and assault are some of the hardest
things to prove in court, like notoriously hard. Less than

(26:56):
three percent of the convictions for sexual assault that are
made to police are actually like met with punishment. So
most of the time, as I tell my survivors, and
nothing's going to happen, and that's just how the law
is set up. The law is set up in a misogynistic,
patriarchal way to protect abusers from accountability, like you were saying,
or if it's a mental they were relegated to this

(27:17):
is a mental health issue, and so this is a
community problem, and they'll basically pat this person on the
wrist and say, well, it's up to these already over
exhausted mental health advocates who are else already dealing with
piles of things going on, and their survivors are now
offering resources to set abuser to just as they often
do refftuate the violent crime. It's very rare that somebody

(27:39):
who and abuse as a pattern, right, It's very rare
that someone who's abused one person has only abused one
person and that's all they've abused, and it was this
one time thing.

Speaker 3 (27:49):
It's very rare that that happened.

Speaker 2 (27:53):
So it's just it has continued to just grow expeditiously
because people really believe in that idea that like, at
the end of this, we know that these people are
dout the reds who need to really take the large
part of it. So we started getting into like doing
social events with survivors like doing things that don't center
around our trauma. We were talking about mantras in the gang,
so we would do things like i am not what

(28:14):
happened to me, I'm at my experience, like just off
from basic mental health resources to young you know, privileged
students who go to college at school, and it was
a really revelatory experience. We helped a lot of people
our age, and we were able to see the influence
of just like having a mini you know, domestic violence
line basically on campus and what that did and having

(28:37):
space to just talk about it.

Speaker 3 (28:38):
We can't do anything about it. A lot of y'all
don't fuck with the cops anyway.

Speaker 2 (28:41):
So it's not anything's gonna happen from here, which nine
times out of ten, and if you go to the
cops anyway, that's what's going to happen.

Speaker 3 (28:46):
So how can we really move through life with our trauma?

Speaker 2 (28:51):
You know? How can we work with not in opposition
of our trauma and become at minimum Because we all
go to school here, students, how can we all graduate
a minimum of at baseline?

Speaker 3 (29:04):
How can we get out of here? And how can
we get out of here together? So, yeah, we just now.

Speaker 2 (29:16):
We do a lot of social events, We have support groups,
We do a lot of trainings, lots of preventative work,
but we also do a lot of work like on
the ground.

Speaker 3 (29:25):
We do a lot of raising money for people, just specifically.
We don't take any money.

Speaker 2 (29:30):
We just highlight somebodies go fund me for like twenty
five thousand dollars doing that. We've thrown drag shows, like
it's been very jewelryful being in change grape culture, and
I think a lot of people don't expect that when
you deal with sexual assault survivors. But it's like, yeah,
we don't believe in martyrs, we don't believe in trophies,
and we definitely don't believe in perfect victims. Everybody's out
over here wanting to be you know. I always say

(29:53):
that the law is going to call you a victim.
There is a victim and a perpetuator in legal jargon, right,
But for us, you get to choose where.

Speaker 3 (30:01):
You want to be in your survivorship.

Speaker 2 (30:02):
A lot of us, you know, some of us, our
parents are our abusers, and we don't necessarily want to
let them go. We don't want to not have a
relationship to them. Some of us are not in a
position to cut our parents off, to not talk to
our parents. Some of us are married to our abusers.
Some of us have kids with our abusers. Some people
have a really complex relationships to said abuser, and we

(30:23):
wanted services that allotted for that to be highlighted in
some sort of work because in a lot of the
federal rape crisis centers domestic violence centers, they center a
lot around women and children, mainly women and children, or
reparative work.

Speaker 1 (30:41):
Very narrow definitions, and who's.

Speaker 2 (30:44):
Allowed to sleep here, who's allowed to take a part
of these resources, who are these resources pointed towards right,
And then the other portion of it being like wape
still being a white women thing and men perpetuate this
against white women when we know that statistically that's not
the majority of people who are getting abused, and abusers

(31:07):
come in all shapes and sizes and genders, and they're
all weird though, So it gets so complex when you
deal with power, when you deal with abused, when you
deal with violation, when you deal with non consensual sex,
Me and community just sort of ride the wave, and
you know, when you work specifically with people of color,
when you're specifically of core people, you're going to get

(31:28):
a vibrance of stampas you know. We've had bisexual men
who are being abused by their CIS ribbed partners. A
lot of times it's like in relationships, especially in air
personal relationships, the abuser will have the survivor at this
point where they feel like they're being stocked or like
their every.

Speaker 3 (31:47):
Move is being watched.

Speaker 2 (31:49):
We've had people who just if you say, want mutual
aid or trying to escape an abuser and just need
like people who just need people to talk like. We
offer services similar to any other rape crisis center, but
we don't judge all criteria and that really all has
to do with funding.

Speaker 3 (32:05):
We're working on our five ONC three this year, but
that's mainly for.

Speaker 2 (32:09):
Us to get started into like lobbying work and for
us to get setted into like research, because it's really
hard to get money to do stuff for poor people
of color, black people in general unless it's something so specific,
and we're trying to combat that one case at a
time because it is just so vibrant and wild and
really nuanced and complex. When you're dealing with number one

(32:33):
rapes in America, that's a whole jar of things. And
then we have, especially in Texas, undocumented people who are
way more likely to deal with sexual abuse than any
other type of person in America because their citizenship is
always in the air. And so we have a lot
of people who've experienced it, you know, in school or
I've had it put against them.

Speaker 3 (32:54):
And they need specific rights.

Speaker 2 (32:56):
So yeah, it's just been really rewarding to work with
such a vibrance of audience because as a teacher, I
always like doing that too. I obviously had with a niche
and as sub set for teaching black children. Just for
me personally, I love teaching black children. And it's very like,
we don't have a lot of research about black children
unless it's at a deficit like these kids, these kids

(33:19):
and verb can't read.

Speaker 3 (33:20):
Like something like that.

Speaker 2 (33:22):
And I really wanted to start research about the joys
of black children in the classroom, the joys that black
people have had to do since we haven't been accepted
in the public school system for like, you know, hundreds
of years, and things that work with regardless of you know,
white normativity, patriarchy, but that's those things being influenced in
the space. So that's the work that I look at it,
that's the work that things be joy and so I'm

(33:44):
able to bring those artist things that I do, those
mental health things that I do to change rape culture.

Speaker 3 (33:50):
To offer to our audience. Like I said, I just
had a training yesterday with some woman, fired up young
people who are.

Speaker 2 (33:56):
Already really feeling the effects of rape culture. And so yes,
you're One of the things that we do called love
something for the body. And one of the things that
you can do as an active love, as an active
radical love towards yourself is to create a boundary. And
so before we leave the space, we want to start
working on those boundaries. That was how Change your Culture started.
It was a conversation, however, is all of you my

(34:17):
fucking faith and I feel like I'm exhausted to go
out our energy and this isn't going anywhere, you know,
Because that's that was really the key that we had
to learn in college, is that trying to attack this
systemic problem with your two hands is just going to
leave you so exhausted.

Speaker 3 (34:34):
It's going to leave you so resentful and so mad.

Speaker 2 (34:38):
And that's how the system is also built to leave
you out a deficit to leave you with nothing, And
what if we build a world where everyone.

Speaker 3 (34:45):
Left with something.

Speaker 2 (34:46):
You know, we all left with a piece of something,
we all sacrifice something, we all cared about one another.

Speaker 3 (34:51):
And wherever we have a change for recuature event. I
feel like it's the number one thing people say.

Speaker 2 (34:55):
They're like, this was say welcoming and fun and made
me feel op and like people believe me about my
story and like I can move in these spaces, and
like I can do these things, and I'm like, I hope,
so I hope you are inspired to live your life
to the fullest. As someone who is a survivor of
child abuse but also a survivor of sex trafficking, it's

(35:17):
really hard to justify why you even want to wake
up in the morning a lot of the times. But
as I tell my survivors, sometimes you gotta take it
a second end of time, a minute at a time,
you know, a day at a time, a second at
a time, to continue to relate to yourself that you
are worth it, that people believe you, that you have
people that love you and that want to see you

(35:39):
do the best for yourself. I never hate coming to
my job at TAKEE for your culture and that's that's
the kicker. I wish it was my full time career.
I wish it was something I could do all the time.
But like I said, there are so may barriers policy
wise to why black people people of color are you don't.

Speaker 3 (35:56):
See them in these spaces, and.

Speaker 2 (35:57):
It's going to take decades, literally decades to get any
sort of reform. Yeah, and then non you know, the
nonprofit is an industrial complex. It definitely is something that
perpetuates these policies, these very narrow minded ways of thinking.

Speaker 3 (36:14):
Of sexual abuse and rape.

Speaker 2 (36:17):
And so I'm really, really, really really just hoping that
we can break a lot of laws, you know, and
not in the ways that nonprofits already break laws, which
is like stealing so much money, So much money is
embezzled through so much of the nonprofit industrial complex.

Speaker 3 (36:36):
And Canie and I have gone broke many many.

Speaker 2 (36:40):
Times over change your culture, and I feel those there
are very few founders or CEOs who are still involved
who are able to say those things. These people drive
nice cars, these people live in nice neighborhoods.

Speaker 3 (36:50):
These people do not fuck with the people who are
their audience of people.

Speaker 2 (36:54):
It's really what I see in avaritionist work, or people
who have been in prison where you can see that
they're like, no, I'm just one of y'all, Like I'm
trying my best. And these are feminist activists, averoitionists that
we follow, people who work in community, people who did
I hold wealth, and people who were just you know,
people of the people. So Kamie and I have just

(37:16):
had such a terrible time as of yet, being poor
and black and young finding that balance because there is
no mental health resources, there is no people like we
just finished this textbook and it's basically like a bunch
of us.

Speaker 3 (37:29):
Trauma dumping for half of it.

Speaker 2 (37:32):
But we wanted to have these real world experiences like
I've been talking to you about in the book, because
college students can really relate to like, oh, that's a
weird I should And our editor was like, doll, was
there aftercare after any of these things? And I'm like,
I'm literally black and living in America. There is never
after care. You just go through these really racist, crazy
things that happened to you and you need one to

(37:54):
the next day. So, you know, we're still trying to
process the things that have happened to us and undergraduate
now it's lolone women trying to have our own families
and try and move on with our lives. Chang redcature
doesn't often come to you when you're like all put
together and like life is where it's supposed to be.
Sometimes and oftentimes it's the worst moment in your life
when you choose to be an advocate for someone else

(38:15):
or to say, I'm never going to allow this to
happen to somebody else, So I'm not gonna allow this
side to me again.

Speaker 1 (38:19):
You've said a word I am. So I'm excited to
get back into some of what you were saying around
your work and centering Black joy and centering and uplifting
a lot of this context that we don't see in
K through twelve schools, that we don't see in higher education,
that we don't see in our community colleges, around the

(38:39):
black experience and how just at the root of it,
like it is, it's rooted in joy, it's rooted in resilience,
but as a Black community, the Black diaspora, like that
is just rooted in how we show up in general.
And so you spoke to something earlier that I wanted
to highlight. I wrote it actually wrote it down, so

(39:00):
I made sure we come back to it. You talked
about how the sort of systems in place want you
to feel individualized as you're going through these experiences. A
major part of that is because when you feel like
you're the only one, when you feel like this couldn't
have possibly happened to anyone else, or this is probably
their first time having done something like this, so you know,

(39:22):
let's just move on, and you know, I'm sure it
won't happen again. All of that is just perpetuating that
rape culture. All of that is just perpetuating the system
in which people are able to escape without accountability and
get around having to take ownership over the harm that
they are committing to other people. But when we move

(39:44):
out of that kind of cone or spectrum of silence
that gets created when you don't see yourself as an individual,
and you're able to find community around that, and you're
able to come together and talk about what happened to you,
because more often than not, it happened to numerous other
people similar to you or different from different backgrounds, And

(40:06):
that's where we're able to kind of get into the
healing of that. So I wonder if you can kind
of talk a little bit more. I wrote down when
you were talking about like putting the flyers out there.
I forget what you said, we're on the flyers, but
you said everybody knew what it meant, and it's probably
because everybody has a personal experience like that. Like, so,

(40:29):
what had that looked like kind of coming to that
realization when you were in Camia, like got these sixty
five people together to show up to this event. What
was that moment like for you as an organizer putting
that together?

Speaker 3 (40:44):
It was really one and right because or the best
relations gens. We tried shit.

Speaker 2 (40:49):
But it's also long scale planning and thinking about how
will this affect the audience of people that were actually
working with right, Like you were saying, one of the
major tenets of white supremacy is individualism, and it's like
a colonialism tactic as well. Make these people believe that
the only people that matter aren't them and they need families,

(41:11):
and that they should not care about their neighbors or
their coworkers, or the people at the grocery store or
the people that they go through. Because if we get
them to think that these people are at opposition of them,
people who are on different class levels, are different than you,
or are as good as you, or don't care about
your problems.

Speaker 3 (41:28):
You'll keep them to your fucking self.

Speaker 2 (41:29):
You're not going to unionize, You're not going to talk
to your employers, You're not going to talk and advocate
through the rights if you're continuously like in this bubble
of this only happens to me.

Speaker 3 (41:39):
So me and Kmie just had the strong stance.

Speaker 2 (41:42):
After reading the Combined River Collective Black feminist statement of
all the problems they were going through, and it just
had illuminated all the problems we were going through. You know,
there's turfs in the queer community that are transphobic, that
think that certain people shouldn't be in the form of revolution,
or that we are not in revolution with these people
white people coming in and literally just being white and

(42:05):
fucking a lot of shit up. Hence why we work
mainly with survivors of color, because there's a lot of
a lot of ladorado past history with like black people
specifically doing work for and in service of white people,
and that's also of white people just hoggy resources and
centering themselves in a conversation that has long been about
the invasion of people of color's bodies due to the

(42:28):
hands of white people.

Speaker 3 (42:29):
So we have that problem too. And then and that
really came to a head at UTSA.

Speaker 2 (42:35):
There was like a lot of waste problems because the
white people were so focused on their own issues and
not actually being an ally and standing up for people
of cars issues.

Speaker 3 (42:46):
It was a lot of us what.

Speaker 2 (42:47):
We're seeing now where black people have long since had
to stand with Palestine and like we've talked about those
things for like forty fifty, sixty, seventy eighty years now,
and now that white people are in this forefront of
the Ukraine and things that they give a fuck about,
you know, Israel and all these other sorts of Western
colonialist ideas that have nothing to do with Judaism or

(43:07):
anything else. Now they have to come up to these
hard points of what do I feel about this when
it's like marginalized people, colonize people have already known this
about y'all, Like y'all are predisposed to violence.

Speaker 3 (43:19):
Look at the research like don't do that? Yeah, Like
where have you been? Where have you been? Like we
have to focus on us for a little bit, okay,
And y'all need to focus on y'all.

Speaker 2 (43:28):
I always used to tell the white people in Texas,
like white people going into these small towns and doing
like really intense race work would be amazing.

Speaker 3 (43:38):
The white studies like y'all could really go up with.

Speaker 2 (43:40):
That and appalleccha, y'all can go back home, get in
these trailer parks and start teaching these anti racism courses.
But they don't want to get out and actually get
into their community and build community. And so with change,
rape culture is very important for us, like you said,
to start up that base point of everyone needs to
feel the same way about this, and that starts with
you as an individual right at your community meeting individually,

(44:02):
like where you come from and your experiences, your lived experiences, right.
I grew up in a very Christian household, so and
I was Black American, so I'm very used to like
the idea of those in community or needing to stick together.
And I'm from the South and both of my parents
are from the South. So you can't really go to
the government agencies to get whatever you've got to get done.
You got to know somebody kooky will just come do it.

(44:22):
You can't always just go somewhere you don't have the
money all the time other things come up. We got
to make some shake and say a change for culture.
It started very small.

Speaker 3 (44:32):
With like what can we do? And we had you know,
Camea was on the one of the.

Speaker 2 (44:37):
Editors for our school newspaper, which is sponsored by an
off campus thing, and at this point it was COVID
and specifically dealing with racial trauma from the medical system,
and so we did dot and that was all digital
because of COVID, and we were like, Okay, this is
really nice. We really are enjoying bringing joint survive us

(44:58):
happy or telling us things like I really need it
this or I really thanks for the runey.

Speaker 3 (45:02):
I just needed to let this out.

Speaker 2 (45:04):
I've been sitting on this piece of work, you know,
just kind of helping our friends out and them growing
into survivors, being like, hey, I'm like sure, am I
when is.

Speaker 3 (45:12):
There anything that changed where a culture can offer? And
I'm like, I mean I ran away.

Speaker 2 (45:15):
But we got an Instagram page and so we started
posting Mutual Raid there and we started hosting things on
behalf of people.

Speaker 3 (45:22):
Then venue started offering us things for free.

Speaker 2 (45:24):
So it just sort of like the community sees the
need and they want it to so we don't really
have to do much work.

Speaker 3 (45:30):
And like you said, I would hope and wish that
for most people who work with the community that the
community also loves them.

Speaker 2 (45:36):
But like I said, that starts with with I thought,
like me and Kemmia, we are community people, we're community women.
This is what we were bored to do in our
heads and our mindsets, in our paths. When we talk
to our ancestors, this is what we're meant to do.
And so when you have a passion full of work,
it doesn't always feel like work. It just falls in
mind with what you're doing. So I also like to
tell people like the students I told yesterday, you.

Speaker 3 (45:57):
Know, joining an organization with something as stakes as like
we are advocates for.

Speaker 2 (46:02):
Students so axual assaulted on campus, it's gonna take a
lot out of you, you know what I mean, especially.

Speaker 3 (46:06):
At this university specifically. Yeah, no, nobody keeps their heads
to themselves here.

Speaker 2 (46:10):
And they were already talking about like going in lunch
and having people like reveal these very traumatic things to them,
and a lot of them not having you know, the
student Health Services is at the door already and they
don't have access to.

Speaker 3 (46:21):
These things, and I'm like, yeah, y'all, that's the way.

Speaker 2 (46:24):
That's like what happens as your guero as an adult,
the services do not get easier to access, They're not
easier to find. You're, in fact in a harder position,
and you're making less money and you do have less
people around you who are understanding of said.

Speaker 3 (46:36):
Situation, who actually want to be there to help you.

Speaker 2 (46:38):
So they're like, it gets worse, and I'm like, yeah, yes,
you no, right, like you said, like, my friends are
the only way that I can really make it through
the health gate that is being black and queer in America.

Speaker 3 (46:50):
You know, that's I have to make a lot of
boundaries with people.

Speaker 2 (46:53):
I have to do things outside of what moment people
would do for their work or what typical differently traumatized people.
As I say, you know, I have to do what
works for me. And you, as a survivor, you have
to know yourself. You really have to know your own body.
You have to know your limits, and we have to
feel strong enough to communicate them right when someone violates it.

(47:16):
After we've communicated, then we can send it on another
boundary and continue leaving in that way, But it starts
with us. It really does start with you. I was
telling them yesterday a really easy boundary for me in college.
It was like I started calling people weirdos for making
rape jokes, and I feel like people don't call enough
people ward us for their hero of jokes. It's not
enough to just like get up and walk away from
the conversation, like we need confrontational that shit's fucking weird.

Speaker 3 (47:37):
Don't say that shit, but that's so weird.

Speaker 2 (47:49):
I remember when the whole archareic thing was happening, this
thing that has been building for literally decades that people
just chose to outwardly ignore as a culture chose to
outwardly ignore. And now all these people coming over with
all these stink pieces and they're talking about them openly
in class, and I'm never raising my hand and telling
the professor, like, when are you going to be a
professor and control and facilitate this conversation because at this
point it's just something that's not going to be productive,

(48:12):
nor is this something that we should be promoting as
a society, Like laughing at the expense of people who
are putting their sexual assault literally these people who are
being trafficked actively, and we're here making.

Speaker 3 (48:24):
Fun of it or putting white, putting white on our carrier,
or doing whatever. All of this is bullshit and.

Speaker 2 (48:29):
We don't need to be doing and getting into full
screaming matches with professors who think they're on the right
side of history.

Speaker 3 (48:34):
We're poking fun at or thinking this is very trivial,
trivial to talk about.

Speaker 2 (48:39):
I've had a professor sir that like, gay people can
get sexually assaulted because they're watching I'm brazy about the
military in Iraq somewhere terrorizing somebody and there's like these
gay soldiers and they one rape the other one. Because
that happens all the time in the military. Same sex
abuse and violence happens literally all the fucking time.

Speaker 3 (48:59):
And so crazy. How the something that people don't talk about.

Speaker 2 (49:01):
But a robin than survivors we work with are definitely
veterans and they deal with, like I said, say saying
gender based violence, and it takes more than just me
going to the dean and saying, hey, this deep said,
this is really quazy shit.

Speaker 3 (49:14):
And I need at least two or three y'all, And.

Speaker 2 (49:16):
If we all, ma'am, mom, if four or five of
us come here to at least take him off of
this section. We at least get into teacher for the semester.
Is it gonna keep walking around here saying quazy ass shit? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (49:26):
Is it gonna catch up to them? Eventually?

Speaker 2 (49:28):
You know, within the next five or ten years, they'll
stop saying wildly racist shit, or they'll just keep saying it.
While the misogynistic stuff. We'd have professors say quazy things
in class, and you know, I always tell them it
starts with you. You know, not everybody we call ourselves
Kerrie Jury's people who often you know, bring to light.

Speaker 3 (49:48):
These really fucked up issues that people don't ever want
to talk about.

Speaker 2 (49:50):
Where the people at Thanksgiving that everybody in the family
and know the black sheet, the one who's like, oh
yours got to bring that shit up or yeah, yours
gotta cardabez at the party, and it's like that shit's
not funny, where we'd never thinking that shit is funny.
Laughing at children's its expenses is fucking weird, doing all
that weird shit.

Speaker 3 (50:07):
You're during this fucking weird. And I always tell them,
you know you older people will tell you, you know,
those where you get the rest you start giving a fuck.
But you've got to start that.

Speaker 2 (50:14):
Now, like, especially as young people in this very polluted
place like a college campus, where everyone's coming from their
fuck that passhold and then they're all living together and
then they're all like perpetuating all their little fuck that
passhold things, and it really takes community to hold you through.
You know. There's this excerpt in the book that we
talk about where my coat where one of my co facilitators,

(50:38):
and it's happened to me too, where you have sex
in a room where somebody else is in the room,
which in college happens basically all the time because we're
shoved into these rooms where the beds are like this. Anyway,
we'rely treading murky waters. The person there room who was
in the room, who they thought was sleep there was
wide away, as a lot of us is that my
wife has had an experience with like that, where they

(50:59):
all it was a four person a huge room, but
they like had little cut off, little curtain areas, and
this couple was having sex while everyone was sleeping for
like four hours, like and.

Speaker 3 (51:10):
Everyone was so nervous to say anything get in same thing.

Speaker 4 (51:12):
They just let it out sex on top of them
the phones and my wife's bed in courage and you'll
hear crazy stories like that all the time, and it's
really hard while you're at a party and people are
like making me out and taking their clothes off to be.

Speaker 3 (51:26):
Like hey, carry stop like this is really weird, or
to just get up and leave. You know, you kind
of you're carrying the vibe, you know, like I said,
you're a buzzkill.

Speaker 2 (51:36):
But it's important to be a really active by standard
and not assigned by standard, because then you're just gonna,
you know, like I said, not having a stance at all.

Speaker 3 (51:43):
It's just as bad as doing the act.

Speaker 2 (51:46):
In my opinion, if you see someone being sexual assaulted
and your idea is like, Okay, I'm gonna just walk
out of here or knack like I didn't see that,
you know, you're just as bad as the person you
know committing the assault.

Speaker 3 (51:57):
We all have to take a stance to one of
whoop some ass, to stand up for.

Speaker 2 (52:01):
Somebody, to call to spot outside, to throw a work
through a window. Something I'm always telling my students, like
something to get to the attention to us as a society.
Something needs to happen here, and even in a room
full of people who are like, I'm not going to
mess with that.

Speaker 3 (52:16):
I don't care. You know, I could be riven societies.
I'm going to be perpetuate rip all the time.

Speaker 2 (52:22):
What are you going to do?

Speaker 3 (52:23):
What are you going to be able to say when
that person looks back around this experienced ten years from now,
did you get at them, say something? Did you help them?

Speaker 2 (52:30):
Or when they're recollecting this act that they'll never forget?
Are you just one of the other people in the
you know, in the background. So I try and sell
tell out to people. I wish I had that in
my life as a child. I also was as silent
by standard, a lot of really murky and really fucked
up just blatant abuse situations in courage as well as
sexual violence, and I regret every single one of them.

(52:52):
So I'm happy to have change with Quichro my life
to remind me every day to stand up to say something,
at minimum for myself, obviously following that tenet of like
not allowing yourself to hoard your anger, but having everyone
else feel that anger, having everyone else see that frustration,
but also on top of that, also allowing yourself that
space to you know, experience, unexperienced, learn, heal, joy and

(53:19):
making them for all of that, not just talking about
your trauma all the time, or not just being in
that space where you don't see a future. I tell
all my survivors that we have a future. It's with
that trauma. Like I said, so no one's cap getad
from all abusers. So it's all in the space.

Speaker 3 (53:36):
Where we want to.

Speaker 2 (53:39):
And a very slim slim slim slim slim sm slim
chance people change, which is crazy.

Speaker 3 (53:45):
I've seen wired stories of like.

Speaker 2 (53:49):
People really putting in the effort to change obviously on
behalf of their children, on behalf of it. So often
somebody else or somebody who's going through who has share interviews,
through drug abuse, through having you know, a mental health issue,
seeing people like totally do complete one eighties when they
really feel what they've done to someone else. We'll always

(54:13):
see that data persion system though, see that they perpetuate
it again. But yeah, in these very small community spaces,
you can actually see the work working and happening.

Speaker 3 (54:23):
And I also like that will change the word culture.

Speaker 2 (54:25):
It is not too big at this point where it's
kind of like you hear about these things or people
submit surveys about how they feel. You still get to
like see the people and like I said, a lot
of these people are close to me or are there
artists that I really look up to. So yeah, it's
been a very rewarding and fun, enlightening, great jerryful, also

(54:45):
traumatizing and scary and really like eye opening experience. But
I wouldn't change it for anything, And I think Ima
feels the same exact way. You know.

Speaker 3 (54:54):
We continue to do. We continue to sacrifice a lot of.

Speaker 2 (54:57):
Our mind and body and energy chasing its dream, chasing
its vision that people are going to care about survivors
as much as we do.

Speaker 3 (55:05):
And I mean, so far we've been able to create
the world we want to see. There's lots of people
who care about survivors.

Speaker 2 (55:10):
It's just that a lot of us don't have the
resources to dedicate a lot of time and energy to it.
We have when moving in very slim days where you
can exert energy on those and especially something as intimate
and traumatizing as sexual violence, a lot of people choose
to save their energy for other things, which is totally

(55:30):
the progative, and we love that.

Speaker 1 (55:32):
I appreciate that you kind of talk about it as
like this space that people can enter and kind of
maybe take a step back as they see fit in it.
Sounds like you and Kamia have really created that created
a space in which that is like the death has
been normalized, because I think when it comes to protection

(55:57):
and healing that it is not a linear process. And
feeling protected at all points in which you are able
to give yourself space to heal, that's gonna change what
your needs are. And so having that space where people
can kind of vacillate between all right, I'm ready to
be in it, like I'm ready to do the work.
I'm ready to kind of, you know, dig into maybe

(56:20):
some of the things that I need to unlearn or
relearn or things that I need to work on in
myself in terms of practicing and behaviors and things that
have been normalized for me, or oh hold on, like nope,
I need to retreat and I need to kind of
just focus fully inward and just take care of myself.
And that might look different at a number of times.

(56:41):
So I really appreciate that you and Camia have provided
a space that I think is counter to what we
see in like the dominant nonprofit structure. You know, because
people want you to show up weekly to talk to
a therapist, or they want you to show up weekly
to talk to a mental health clinician. And you know
that level of scheduling and scriptedness to it doesn't work

(57:04):
for everybody. And that's not how you know everybody is
going to find the space that they need. But the
one thing that I also really appreciated you talking about
was like the bystander, the active bystander piece. I think
we underestimate the impact that social isolation will have on

(57:25):
a perpetrator. Isolating them is seeing them out of the
social group, calling them a weirdo, saying this behavior, saying
this comment, saying you know what somebody is seeing as
okay is just not making making The perpetrator has to
sit in that space of social isolation as opposed to
the survivor. I think is a really powerful tool, because

(57:49):
often the survivor is the one that has to sit
in that space of social isolation. They like you, like
you were saying earlier, like that individualized perspective of oh,
this is a me thing. This happened to me, but
this is a me thing that I have to I
have to work through. Mession on this when no, it's
a perpetrator who needs to work on their ship and

(58:09):
they're the one who should be isolized, and that's not
often how that plays out. So I think that's a
really powerful thing to think about, like how we show
up as active bystanders is using social isolation to make
perpetrators and people who are committing harm verbally physically sit

(58:31):
in that. So I really appreciated you bringing that into
the space. Another thing that you mentioned earlier was with
regard to title nine, So I am curious to hear
a little bit about like what that looked like with

(58:52):
change Rape Culture as it was kind of starting out.
I know you mentioned that that was something that came
up in terms of one of the demands that the
movement was making at your particular institution of getting rid
of the people who were in the office at the
time and kind of revamping that. But if you could
kind of talk about what title nine is, what it

(59:12):
looked like for y'all as you were building your movement
and maybe how that fits into like the institutional aspect
of what you how you a chain trape culture or
kind of envisioning the future as well.

Speaker 2 (59:28):
Wow, like erder like you said, to kind of a
vision the future, we needed to understand the beast that
is Titananine, Like, what is the point of it?

Speaker 3 (59:34):
Why was it created?

Speaker 2 (59:36):
And in our text work the first chapter we kind
of just do a deep die that's to the history
of it and why it came to be. And it
was really a way of pacifying the feminists of the
time of the seventies who were like, what about everybody
who's like.

Speaker 3 (59:51):
Being sexually assaulted? Like women had been integrated and white
women had been.

Speaker 2 (59:55):
Integrated into schools for a little bit at this point,
maybe you know, thirty years by the time the seventies
had hit, So they're with the integration of black people starting,
you know in nineteen sixty five, and like, well into
the seventies. Now we have like an onset and like
an uptick in sexual assault, specifically within the student athletes.

(01:00:19):
So at first women's leads, even now rimmons leads are
just now sort of getting the same cloud or even
getting paid similar to mayor athletes, right, And that's been
the whole thing is where do you play as a
transperson anyway?

Speaker 3 (01:00:37):
What do you play, who do you play with? On
what team?

Speaker 2 (01:00:40):
What are you allowed to do at locker room where
you in like that whole thing of the binariness of
being a student athlete was the biggest problem, and they
had to create something on Title nine because of it.
So in the seventies, how and I was created, And
in the beginning it was obviously a way for schools
who say that they our public institution or that accept

(01:01:02):
funds from the government, they had to allocate certain funds
towards having to settlement office.

Speaker 3 (01:01:08):
Now, first they just had to have the office. They
wouldn't necessarily have to allocate funds to the office.

Speaker 2 (01:01:13):
So as we see with a lot of other colleges,
they don't have a women's team, but they don't have
as much money that goes towards the women's team. They
don't have enough influence, they don't have the same uniforms.
As time has gone on, obviously people have.

Speaker 3 (01:01:26):
Become more privy to that and they're like, why don't
they have.

Speaker 2 (01:01:29):
The same uniforms, Why don't they have the same amount
of money, Why don't why aren't they give them the
same amount of visibility or influence.

Speaker 3 (01:01:35):
There are things that the institution could be doing to
it needs.

Speaker 2 (01:01:37):
To make sure everybody's at the same plane, if society
decides to frequent the men's games more, that doesn't mean
that the women have a smaller locker room, you know,
you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (01:01:46):
That doesn't dictate it.

Speaker 2 (01:01:47):
That doesn't mean that they're And just now student athletes,
regardless of gender, can now get paid. So you know,
it's this unpaid thing that people need to have these
rules for rules so that the school can make money
off of the sponsorships of these athletes.

Speaker 3 (01:02:01):
And when you have these huge.

Speaker 2 (01:02:02):
Sponsors pairing for their favorite football team and their alumni,
they wanted to look, feel and reflect their ideals. Right,
So Tyrone over time began to reflect the larger conversations
that were happening basically decade wise. Right, there was so
few women in the Senate that even just getting the

(01:02:23):
law to pass was a huge deal. Then once the
law has passed, now we have to talk about not
just athletes who experience sexual assault. What about students that
experience sexual assault, you know, from an athlete. What about
students that experience sexual assault from another student. What about
students that experience sexual assault from another student but not
on campus. What about students who grow through a different
country or on travel and experience sexual assault. Like, all

(01:02:44):
these questions started to hop up and hop up from
hop up, and the government began to start coming up
with these protocols within TITA.

Speaker 3 (01:02:51):
Nine to keep people in check quote unquote.

Speaker 2 (01:02:55):
Now, obviously the title NYE office has to be ran
by a person who takes you know, titleline classes, by
someone who certified as someone who says, I am here
to keep the university safe. I'm here to keep those
who come to report in this office safe. I am
not going to do things that are we are going.

Speaker 3 (01:03:15):
To tarnish that reputation in the university.

Speaker 2 (01:03:18):
Is like, yeah, we're all gonna also take these classes,
and we're going to force our students to take these classes.

Speaker 3 (01:03:23):
And if something bad happens, you got to terrast and
when you do tennis, we'll keep you safe and everything
will be okay.

Speaker 2 (01:03:29):
And then sounds so sound nice, you know, so to
see it, you know, to mold into where it is now,
where it's dictating whether or not trans dudentes can like,
you know, be a part of athletic teams, which turns
people have been a part of athletics for since the
dawn of time, but officially in like Division one, the

(01:03:51):
first transman to be out of an out transman.

Speaker 3 (01:03:55):
I think that's the best way to put it.

Speaker 2 (01:03:56):
People that put their own up, you know, personality and
life on the line by being like, no, I'm an
out trans person was in twenty ten. So since twenty ten,
we've had lots of outturns athletes, lots of debates about
where it is that they can compete, lots of what is.

Speaker 3 (01:04:13):
It that the school is doing, what is it that
the community is doing, what is who's being protected?

Speaker 2 (01:04:17):
I remind people that like we had to get the
National Guard to get seven black kids to a school,
like it was a huge doo at the time, and
that's exactly how our society is. You know, where you're
seeing Tide of Mind is like this space where we
can dictate what these trans bee.

Speaker 3 (01:04:31):
From Karen and can do. I don't want one on
my kids. I don't want them in my locker room.

Speaker 2 (01:04:35):
You know, shit, really bullshit that has them to do
with education or sports, you know, just happening all the time,
and it happens in all in all sports, it happens
in fencing and you know Olympics, it happens everywhere. So
now every institution, if it's an institution that serves this
large amount of people, corporation HR, you have the Tyro

(01:04:55):
nine office, and people who have experienced abuse, who have
experienced sexual irons, who have experienced discrimination, will go to
the Title Line Office and now say I have experienced discrimination.
My boss is touching my knee, my x Y and
Z was doing X Y and Z. I have this
experience with the student. It happened off campus, and the
Title Line office will take this experience. They will do
their own investigation and then they will come up with

(01:05:19):
ways that they can protect the survivor.

Speaker 3 (01:05:21):
But they also have to keep the best interest of
the perpetuator, because the only way you can prove that this.

Speaker 2 (01:05:27):
Abuse happened is by going to the police, getting a
police report, and convicting said person of this thing. I
have a friend who was sexual assaulted as a child,
and it took up until she was twenty.

Speaker 3 (01:05:41):
Six for her rapist to get three years. So you know,
it's not like you're.

Speaker 2 (01:05:49):
Going and that was like her whole life, you know,
from a child all thereay twenty six, you're rating on
something to happen. This person is walking around, like you said,
they're not facing social isonization because because it's very rare
for people to like even google people before they.

Speaker 3 (01:06:03):
Go hang out with them, if they even have to be.

Speaker 2 (01:06:05):
Put on the registry, which this person was not mandated
to be put on the registry after this assault had happened.

Speaker 3 (01:06:11):
It was the bulletet proof was on the survivor to
prove that they were assaulted in the first place.

Speaker 2 (01:06:16):
So Tita mind perpetuates that by saying, well, Knaw that
you've come and told us the story.

Speaker 3 (01:06:21):
Thanks, here's a tissue.

Speaker 2 (01:06:23):
Now you've got to go tell the police, and the
police need to believe you, and then they need to
convict that person that you're telling all this too before
we even like think of what we're going to do
about it.

Speaker 3 (01:06:32):
In the meantime, though, we can like switch up your class.

Speaker 2 (01:06:36):
We can like, you know, give you like a bodyguard
that follows you around, even in stalking cases. That's like
really the most that they can do. It's like silly,
they'll do something for you, but we don't actually really
do anything. They more so bring more attention to the
fact that you were assaulted. So now more people know
that you were assaulted because you have this dude following

(01:06:57):
you around everywhere, and then of course the assaiant they're
alleged then start their campaign if this person's crazy or
shoes drunk, or this person is our gay so you
shouldn't believe there, or you know, the younger than me,
so they don't.

Speaker 3 (01:07:16):
Know what they're doing, you know, then they start their campaign.

Speaker 2 (01:07:18):
And that just gives more time to whittle down the
survivor's community to it around the survivor's self confidence and
are expecting to still go to school or all of
us happening right, you know, there's.

Speaker 1 (01:07:29):
Such if they do their academic issues and sanctions that follow.

Speaker 3 (01:07:35):
Yeah, and then you have to deal with your parents.

Speaker 2 (01:07:36):
Maybe you don't want to tell your parents that you
were actually assaulted, but now you're really going to have
a conversation with them. If you're like me, you know,
when you have a relationship to your parents, you're kind
of experiencing this all alone and you don't have mental
health resources to really talk to anybody about it, so
you're just processing these things and just like pushing food
with your day. So that's the main thing with individualism,
Number one is that thinking that you're stuck in this box.

(01:07:58):
But that's the other thing will change culture is like
us pushing the community to have the same burdens that
we do, like we need to carry these burdens alone.

Speaker 3 (01:08:06):
Definitely not. And it's more fun.

Speaker 2 (01:08:08):
Actually, it's joyful when we all can grieve together, when
we all can protest together, when we all can be
angry together, when we all can.

Speaker 3 (01:08:16):
Feel joy together, when we all can protect one another.
Like it's like super fun that way and super rewarding
that way.

Speaker 2 (01:08:23):
And people, obviously because we're also I think you have
to just get fed up with being fed up.

Speaker 3 (01:08:30):
And be willing to like rather.

Speaker 2 (01:08:32):
Sacrifice my mental well being having this argument, you know,
or standing on this moral then to go by like.

Speaker 3 (01:08:42):
I shouldn't have done something, or like something shouldn't have
been that, you know. Yeah, it comes down to that.

Speaker 1 (01:08:49):
I appreciate that. I think Title nine is one one
of those institutions that well, so it's within the Institution
of higher Education, but in and of itself, I feel
like we should one hundred percent consider its own institution
at this point just because of the level of complexity of.

Speaker 3 (01:09:10):
How it operates.

Speaker 1 (01:09:13):
And I think the historical piece is like so critical
for people to understand because it really is it's a
matter of providing accommodations for students as that investigation is
playing out, but oftentimes it significantly misses and underrepresents what
a survivor may need during that time. So again, like

(01:09:36):
super important that y'all are out here doing that work
would change grape culture because it's filling a very specific
gap that just exists in what we're supposed to see
as these support institutions and support structures in the in
the society, in our society, and then in the community.

Speaker 3 (01:09:56):
That's just.

Speaker 1 (01:09:58):
It creates creates really significant issues for people when they
don't have those gaps meant so one other like kind
of couple the last couple questions that I have for you,
what has been like one of the most illuminating experiences
that have really just kind of showed you, like, this
work is significant, This work is important, This work we are,

(01:10:22):
what we're doing in this movement matters so much.

Speaker 3 (01:10:25):
I remember one time we were throwing a ball.

Speaker 2 (01:10:27):
It's called Camilla's Balts, named after Camia because it's about
black women. It's about celebrating black women, and it's about
getting in their flyers before they die. And in Pittsburgh,
Pittsburgh is one of those places that has the highest
number of deaths for Black women and the highest number

(01:10:48):
of displacements and the highest number of Black women moving
from the area because it's just so an ethical in
the way that black women aren't receive treatment the dating pool,
like a lot of reasons that black women don't thrive
or die early in Pittsburgh. And so we were like,
we need something to disrupt this very negative space towards
black women in Pittsburgh. And I want to invite a

(01:11:09):
bunch of black women, sish, trans and gender not conforming
to come together and celebrate one another, but also to
celebrate ourselves, like to give ourselves our flowers. And somebody
who's there was like, being here has taught me number
one that I was assaulted and number two that like
there's life beyond it. It's really crazy to come to
a realization like that in this really positive space, because

(01:11:33):
I'm not like in this need to like cry or
like process it. It just seems like everyone here is
in a space of like I'm going to process it
when I'm ready and as it comes, and it doesn't
need to be right now.

Speaker 3 (01:11:46):
For someone like me, like I've been at the bar
DJing and people are like, I told my therapist about you,
and I'm like, oh, thank you, Oh my.

Speaker 2 (01:11:53):
Gosh, should manage ring time offa to takira shots to
tell me this and I'm at a gig so to
finish my job, but like, don't make me quiet.

Speaker 3 (01:12:02):
Thank you so much.

Speaker 2 (01:12:03):
And it's been really hard for Camie and I to
kind of come to this realization that we're advocates and
that people rely on us, and that we have a
responsibility to our community, and that the things that we do,
you know, there's consequences to their actions. It's like we
just have a special place in our heart for other survivors,
and a lot of us do work with survivors, so
it's similar with like, you know, people who work with

(01:12:24):
recovering addicts, Like a lot of them are recovering addicts.
It's it's just like you have a soft space for
people who have been through similar experiences to you. And
so that's just sort of been where we've lived. Like
a lot of the work we do is.

Speaker 3 (01:12:34):
For survivors by survivors.

Speaker 2 (01:12:35):
We have a zene call FSBS where it's like for
survivors curated by survivors, survivor artists who have shipp they
want to say, and it's by survivors, and we're giving
it to other survivors mainly ninety nine percent of the time,
or somebody who you know is.

Speaker 3 (01:12:51):
A closeted survivor as I call them, people.

Speaker 2 (01:12:53):
Who have an inkling that what happened to him, to
them is not a good thing, but they don't really
know or have this space or the language or the
jargon to express what's going on. We just see, like
us always needed to be there, and if there's end
to it, I mean, I'd love to see that day,
but we don't nessary envision the end. We envision joy

(01:13:14):
throughout it.

Speaker 3 (01:13:15):
Oh yeah, Oh I love.

Speaker 1 (01:13:17):
That so much. I love that so much. I think
one of the things that has like been so evident
in like the events that you talk about and just
kind of like the impact that you all have made
has been art and the way, like the varying ways
in which art shows up. There's just so much cultural

(01:13:37):
richness and how we express ourselves and it is it
is just art. Our living is art, and so like
a lot of that has like you know, popped through
and stuck out to me. And what you're like art,
Like it's just art. Is there anything that you can
speak to like how that came about?

Speaker 2 (01:13:56):
It?

Speaker 1 (01:13:56):
Was that just like a natural occurrence or did you
find that like the people who are more open to
like coming forward, we're just naturally artists.

Speaker 3 (01:14:08):
Yeah, I feel like there is August in all of us.
Kamie and I really believe that.

Speaker 2 (01:14:12):
But Kamie and I are personally are writers, so our
form takes the form and writing.

Speaker 3 (01:14:18):
Camia does a lot of poetry. We're big readers.

Speaker 2 (01:14:21):
And so Krim and I, as I said, were already
involved in She was a journalist and I had a
personal blog that I talked about my personal experiences on
and I.

Speaker 3 (01:14:30):
Was doing a lot of like revelatory.

Speaker 2 (01:14:35):
Work, the revlatory mental health, like these are things that
happened to me in high school.

Speaker 3 (01:14:39):
And I'll get a lot of abuse on these blogs.

Speaker 2 (01:14:42):
I think, I says have deleted my Facebook, and so
I think looking back on it, it was just people
being messy. People just hearing a story, juicy story about
abuse and wanting to read the it. But it's me
reprocessing like my sex trafficking experience. And we found other
people who really resonated with our art form, So people

(01:15:03):
who lodged Camilla's writing, Camia would do like these op
eds or these advice columns about like dating and misogyny
and patriarchy and kind of developed the following through that.
And then I she had read a lot of my
blogs and through our work on campus, you know, just
coming up with events we did before we did them

(01:15:24):
for Gangraad Culture, we did them for you know, our
student organizations, you know, going to open mic nights, going
to our galleries with these very talented and amazing Chicana
and Chicano artists, and hanging out with Witches and the
Blue Haas and Sugan, just like having friends who like.

Speaker 3 (01:15:46):
Who like really expressed themselves through photography and the way
they dressed it.

Speaker 2 (01:15:50):
Just like you said, all sort of fell online because
we all, regardless of our art form, really had a
passion for sharing other people's stories and giving a platform
to other people's stories. So our first artist who did
our first logo was like a local artist, Emmanuel who
is puppy bird friend on Instagram, but three did our

(01:16:10):
first logo for us, and we used that on T shirts.
Like we had like a local person who was doing
like presses, and we just like bought a bunch of
shirts from Walgreens and did some presses. And then Camilla
had some ties with a couple of people who had
like just free galleries that we could use. So that's
when she started partnering with local artists of having like

(01:16:31):
a little table for change Rood culture or having like
a journalist come in and write a story about the
artist in exchange for us just like talking about change Rood.

Speaker 3 (01:16:39):
Culture and putting it out there. And then on top
of that, we started hosting, like I said, social events.

Speaker 2 (01:16:45):
So we started hosting and I'm a DJ, sos DJ
said social events, so we'd be turning that and we'll
have vendors there, people making their own shirts, or people
who want to donate money to us.

Speaker 3 (01:16:57):
And like I said, all of our friends were all autists.
They all We're like, I have no money, bro, but
I can definitely make you this print. And I'm like period.

Speaker 2 (01:17:05):
And even now we have Trinita Fenny who just did
our most latest print, which was from Connie's Ball, and
she offered to do that too.

Speaker 3 (01:17:13):
She was like, I really want to draw this, like
this is a beautiful space, this is a beautiful thing.
It makes me feel so happy. I just want to
draw and I'm.

Speaker 2 (01:17:20):
Like, oh, I love that, Like we are just doing
this out of the card of art and we are
broken tired, so we'd love it something too.

Speaker 1 (01:17:31):
Again, I think, just another testament to like the space
that y'all are creating and have created and the need
for it. And how you when you sent her folks
who are often marginalized in all of these other support
structures and you know, the dominant support structures that we're

(01:17:53):
made to see as a place where we're supposed to
land and seek out help if we, you know, as
we're going through our healing. When you center those who
are marginalized and don't see themselves reflected or in decision
making positions within those other structures, you get people to
show up, and you get people to feel connected, and

(01:18:14):
you get people who you know are able to find
a safe place for them to land and to co.

Speaker 3 (01:18:21):
Create with you.

Speaker 1 (01:18:22):
And that's just a beautiful thing.

Speaker 3 (01:18:24):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:18:25):
See, And I'm just humble to you or to have
that experience. Obviously a lot of people who work with
heory do not have really positive experiences, and those people
that do, like more on the groundwork working with sex
with in person sex workers.

Speaker 3 (01:18:37):
Working with children, working with their different subsets of.

Speaker 2 (01:18:42):
Survivors, you know, and whatever environments that they're in that
I think have to do because they work through a
federal government or I mean through a federal agency or
through an organization, have a little bit more like the
strict wards as to how they do things. So that's
why I'm happy to be in Chagual culture at the
time I am, because one hundred years from now, it's
going to be those whole thing. I like have this
vision that we're gonna have like a secret sect of

(01:19:03):
assassins that like are the change with culture assassins and
they like kill people across the.

Speaker 3 (01:19:08):
World following period, you see it. And then there's like
the corporation on the top that does like the fake
shit that we say.

Speaker 2 (01:19:16):
That we do, but we're really just giving money to
people like under the table, because that's what nonpublits do anyway.
So you know, I kind of wanted to be there reunionized,
so I wanted to be there in the formative of
parts of change with culture to be like, yeah, these
things have to happen, but care culture is not mine.
It is not commias I always tell people it is
not up to me. There's nothing I feel really like

(01:19:36):
poining it or resonant to to say like this is
my thing, because it's not.

Speaker 3 (01:19:39):
It's our thing to care.

Speaker 2 (01:19:41):
Culture has taken a mind of its own, and that's
like where I wanted it to be by the time
I was ready to transition to do something else, because
like I said, I'm not a corporate baddy. But once
we get this paperwork followed and we get this funding
and we're able to find people who, really, like I said,
have been doing this work for so long, there's just
so many people who are the kids for survivors, child survivors,

(01:20:02):
court survivors who have just been silenced in who don't
care who who's going to keep doing it and keep
making the problem and keep bothering people and keep working
on around And those are the people we work with.

Speaker 1 (01:20:13):
So I'm curious to now just kind of as we
wrap things up, what does it mean to you to
be considered a part of this sorority as we use
the term here on the show of other black women
and friends who have experienced sexual violence.

Speaker 3 (01:20:29):
Yes, it's like.

Speaker 2 (01:20:32):
It means a lot, right, because I really love and
stand up for survivors because, like I said, they're not
perfect people, and these circumstances and things that happen to
us do not define us.

Speaker 3 (01:20:45):
And are often some of the least interesting things about us.

Speaker 2 (01:20:49):
It's just so much other things that happen in our
lives that are actually significant, that aren't as a consequence
of some terrible things that have happened to me. One
of my really cloar writer and survivor friends, Lexiban, talks
a lot about how people will say that, well, you
trans before you were assaulted, are you terrestre because we're assaulted,
or how close are those.

Speaker 3 (01:21:10):
Within your identity?

Speaker 2 (01:21:11):
And as I put it, as a black core woman,
obviously my experiences.

Speaker 3 (01:21:17):
Of being assaulted and form.

Speaker 2 (01:21:20):
A lot of how I think about the world right
and a lot of that also comes from being black.
A lot of that also comes from being gay. A
lot of that also comes from Jordan non conforming. A
lot of that also comes from like just living in America.
You know, you have your own lived experience and way
that you see the world, but it's how you can
connect with those other people that it may have a

(01:21:41):
similar experience to you.

Speaker 3 (01:21:42):
As I say, the other.

Speaker 2 (01:21:43):
Survivors like, yeah, we have that we had that in common,
that's definitely, but we also have so many things about
us that are in common that are just so beautiful
and that brings so much joy to others, and that
that that has really been the main set point for

(01:22:03):
all of us at Tangeree culture is like, yeah, the
shit was really fucked up and it happened, or it
continues to happen, or I'm working on making it not happen,
or I mentally am still in this place where it
feels like it's.

Speaker 3 (01:22:16):
Happening all the time. But are at minimum have a
phone and barking call.

Speaker 2 (01:22:21):
I have some people that I can text, I have
you know, an event I can go to in two weeks,
and you know, as I said, sometimes that's really how
you need. I always tell people, you know, especially doing
with suicide prevention, like I like to have the thing
to look forward to. Everyone's got to have something to
look forward to.

Speaker 5 (01:22:38):
And sometimes if you like the only thing you have
to look forward to is like that support group or
going to get drinks on Thursday, or seeing a friend
or a phone call or a text, like you know, life,
really you really shorten what becomes important to you as
life goes on, and yeah, keeping survivors safe, being.

Speaker 2 (01:22:58):
A part of this unwonted authority. You know, it's not
something that I think is like bestowed upon people or
sometimes people like to justify, like abuse or death or
grief and like give it a reason. And I never
give it a reason or a justification. I just say
it's something else that we all have, that we have

(01:23:18):
in common, that we can use as a as a
starting point to build a relationship, any interpersonal relationship, but
also just a platonic one where I just want the
best for.

Speaker 3 (01:23:31):
Other survivors. I just want the best for them, and
I want them to have what they want, whatever that
might look like.

Speaker 2 (01:23:37):
I want to see survivors exercising their body, automate, autonomy, whatever.

Speaker 3 (01:23:42):
That looks like.

Speaker 2 (01:23:44):
And I think we're happy to be an organization that
represents people who have that juxtaposition.

Speaker 3 (01:23:50):
You know, especial redos dealing a lot with.

Speaker 2 (01:23:55):
Black queer folks, black gender not conforming folks, as well
as black trans people of all gender presentations, thumb and
masculine and everything in between. It has just been so
eye opening to see the depths of evil but also
see the depths of joy and how as you said Rezerot,

(01:24:17):
black people really are and real me, how we just
take a stance to just not give a fuck, to
just continue to really push this ritic that like, no
matter what happens to me, I'm gonna be good. We'll
all be good at the end of the We're gonna
be good. And I think that's such the matter that

(01:24:38):
we have really a change your culture. We believe you
and everything will be okay. You know, not everything will
be fine, not everything will be nice and everything will
be good, but we'll get through it.

Speaker 3 (01:24:46):
We will at the end of it.

Speaker 1 (01:24:50):
Yeah, And I again just love it. What is so
like essential to your work is just seeing the full
of of oneself and letting that be enough. And that
is inherently enough for you to get whatever it is
that you want in this world and.

Speaker 3 (01:25:09):
In this way. And I love that.

Speaker 2 (01:25:11):
So that is it.

Speaker 3 (01:25:12):
That's enough. We're all above and there, keep it there
for the pay of it. That's good enough.

Speaker 1 (01:25:18):
Anything else you want to say that we didn't get
a chance to talk about.

Speaker 2 (01:25:24):
Shout out to my co founders or shout out to
do ever our community call it our community at I
change through culture shout out to Korean shout out to Camia.
We have our textbook coming out. If you go to
a website too three culture dot org you can reserve it.
It's actually an open access textbook though it's the first

(01:25:44):
open access textbook through the places published. And yes, because
I was like beautiful, I would to write this it
for free, you know, with the point if it's not free,
so it's going to be a variable open access online.
But you can purchase the actual textbook with the physical
copy if you wanted to. And yeah, just keep up
with us on our Instagram on our website.

Speaker 3 (01:26:04):
At c h n g E R p E c
L C L t U r E.

Speaker 2 (01:26:11):
We had to like take some of their words out
because you know, Instagram be shy a banning people both.
You've even sure if you live in Pittsburgh c r
C pg h is how you can get across to us.
And if you live in Texas, c r C Texas.
If you live in New Orleans cr C noah, get
us on any of those chapters, get involved, hang out.

(01:26:32):
You know we are here for you have every step
of the way through the cycle of violence, whether you're
still in it or whether you're working on.

Speaker 3 (01:26:38):
Getting out of it or whether you're like I'm just
working through a ribbon every day. We're here to support you.

Speaker 2 (01:26:43):
So I will say thank you to you for doing
this amazing work, both like professionally but also with this
amazing podcast that really really what do you mins of them?
We need so many more and I just really am
wishing you safety, like I'm just wishing you safety and
enjoy and like I hope you have an amazing listing.

Speaker 3 (01:27:02):
Oh I hope you.

Speaker 1 (01:27:05):
Likewise, I mean, what a better but what there's no
better way to have kicked off the week and starting
it on the right note is just with this conversation.

Speaker 3 (01:27:14):
So so grateful for you.

Speaker 1 (01:27:16):
Appreciate, appreciate you. The website links directly to all of
the chapter Instagram pages, so like if anybody's trying to,
you know, get exactly to the Instagram pages to follow
up in your content, it's all there. Again, thank you
so much for this. I appreciate you so much and

(01:27:38):
I can't wait to continue to collaborate in whatever ways
that might come up.

Speaker 3 (01:27:42):
Know, please hit us up, always will hit you up.
We have to continue the community. It's just and our
dogs like are very.

Speaker 1 (01:27:53):
Uh, selective dogs exactly.

Speaker 3 (01:27:57):
Maybe they will.

Speaker 1 (01:27:58):
Find community with one another, because lord knows it's not
coming with several others in the neighborhood.

Speaker 3 (01:28:04):
Exactly what they need do sok.

Speaker 2 (01:28:08):
You so much.

Speaker 1 (01:28:20):
As you heard from Doctor Waits, There's a lot to
pay attention to when it comes to Title nine, especially
as we think about it in the context of our
show and what it may mean for an individual survivor's
ability to advocate themselves if they don't feel supported by
their school. In this week's Unpacking the Ritual segment, I
want to slow it down and take you back to

(01:28:40):
sort of the root of Title nine and what it means,
because Taylor gave us a lot of information and what
it looked like for her and how it showed up
for both her and Camaya and the organization they were building.
But you know what's the root of Title nine. So
let's rewind to nineteen seventy two, when Congress past the
law that would change American education in just thirty seven words.

(01:29:05):
These words, better known as the Title nine of the
American Amendments of nineteen seventy two, declare that quote, no
person in the United States shall on the basis of sex,
be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of,
or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or

(01:29:27):
activity receiving federal financial assistance. End quote signed by President Nixon,
Title nine was designed to ensure that women and girls
can learn and thrive as equals in school. At the time,
many colleges had strict limits on women's students and opportunities
for women in athletics, academics, and beyond, which was very unequal.

(01:29:51):
Title nine blew those doors wide open, and over the
past fifty years actually Title nine's impact specifically has been dramatic.
In nineteen seventy two, only about forty two percent of
college students were female. But according to an NPR article
which as an aside, fund your local public media station,

(01:30:11):
which was written in June twenty twenty four by John Marcus,
he stated that the majority on college campuses around twenty
ten had almost flipped and a record breaking almost sixty
percent had become women in athletics. The growth was even
more astonishing since Tataline informed in nineteen seventy two, there's

(01:30:35):
been a five hundred and forty five percent increase in
women playing college sports. According to the Women's Sports Foundation.
The first president of Women's Sports Foundation, Donna Dave Verona,
attributed that to the effects of Title nine on women's sports,
and she actually credits increased funding and institutional opportunities with

(01:30:59):
its growth. And another kind of astonishing fact is that
high schools are seeing a nine hundred and ninety percent
increase in the percentage of girls playing high school sports.
So amazing things happen when you give girls and women opportunities, resources,
and equitable support. I'm just saying. However, it's very important

(01:31:23):
to note that Title nine isn't just about sports or admissions.
It spans all facets of education, from science labs to
dormitories to what we talk about on this show sexual
violence and specifically sexual violence prevention these days, Title nine
protects students from sexual harassment and violence as forms of

(01:31:44):
sexual discrimination. Over time, courts and policymakers clarified that schools
must address sex based harassment, sexual violence, and even stalking
under Title nine. And the Department of Education has put
their mon money where their mouth is when it comes
to protecting students. I guess technically they put your money

(01:32:06):
as the student where their mouth is or something like that.

Speaker 3 (01:32:09):
But essentially they linked a.

Speaker 1 (01:32:12):
College or university's ability to continue receiving federal funding to
their willingness and efforts to comply with mandatory training and
appropriate follow up when it comes to Title nine, reporting
in students coming forward about issues at their institutions, so
that means colleges have a legal duty to respond when

(01:32:32):
a student is sexually assaulted or harassed, and to ensure
that pregnant or LGBTQ plus students aren't discriminated against. Basically,
over the years, Title nine has become embedded as a
cornerstone of campus safety and equity. As the anti Sexual

(01:32:52):
violence organization RAIN puts it, quote, Title nine's role in
protecting the safety of students and their right to an
education is vital in the fight to end sexual violence
end quote. And it's really hard, honestly, actually, to overstate
how embedded these protections are in campus life today. Many

(01:33:13):
of us kind of take it for granted that our
schools must respond to these issues until we're in moments
like we are now, where its future is in question
despite its track record of progress. So recently, if you
haven't heard or seen in the news, an executive order

(01:33:34):
was issued by the Trump administration calling for the dismantling
of the United States Department of Education, the very agency
that oversees and enforces Title NINN in our schools. This
has huge implications for students and campuses across our country.
The Department of Education actually houses the Office for Civil Rights,

(01:33:56):
which is responsible for investigating thousands of discrimination complaints, and
in twenty twenty four alone, that included almost twenty three
thousand investigations of discrimination that the Office for Civil Rights
was investigating. And they're also responsible for holding those schools accountable,

(01:34:18):
as I mentioned before, So if the Department of Education
is gutted, who will enforce Title nine? And that's one
of the biggest issues that we just don't have an
answer for right now. According to the American Association of
University Women or the AAUW, which I'll reference them as

(01:34:39):
going forward quote, eliminating the Department of Education would decimate
federal civil rights enforcement, it would slash protections against gender
based discrimination, and it would roll back decades of promise.
In other words, the laws like Title nine might technically
remain on the books, but the muscle to enforce them

(01:35:01):
with atrophy, colleges would feel free to ignore Title nine standards.
If no federal agency is watching, survivors of campus sexual
harassment and assault could see more Title nine cases dismissed,
with pathways to justice drastically weakened.

Speaker 3 (01:35:18):
End quote.

Speaker 1 (01:35:19):
The loss of such a strong federal agency means that
marginalized groups will be left defend for themselves when facing
instances of discrimination on their campuses. And again, it's not
just Title nine. The Violence Against Women Act is another
pillar of campus safety that would be undermined with the

(01:35:42):
dismantling of.

Speaker 3 (01:35:42):
The Department of Education.

Speaker 1 (01:35:44):
The Violence Against Women Act or VAWA VAWA you may
have seen or heard of, passed in nineteen ninety four,
and it came with bipartisan support. That's bipartisan support was
as recent as twenty twenty two, and it complements Title
nine by expanding rights for survivors of sexual violence, dating violence,

(01:36:05):
domestic violence, and stocking on campuses. Amendments have come about
throughout the years, specifically with the Cleary Act, which requires
colleges to publish and be transparent about crime statistics that
have happened on their campus. So it offers survivors support
services and protective accommodations and implements prevention programs to stop

(01:36:28):
violence before it happens. So Title nine and Clary and EVAWA,
they all have rules that create a safer, more transparent
environment for students. And all of this has been, like
I said, supported by and enforced by the Department of
Educations guidance and enforcement policies. So again, if dismantled, the

(01:36:54):
enforcement of Cleary and VAWA's campus provisions would likely be
transferred elsewhere or probably more likely left in limbo. As
a former government employee, I can tell you there's a
lot of stuff that is just questionable because things get
lost in the shuffle between different administrations. So while a

(01:37:14):
symbolic executive order has been signed, actually dismantling the department
requires an Act of Congress, and there's a lot of
legal hurdles that will have to get over before the
full dismantling can be put into effect. But the threat
is still very real. There's even a bill proposed in

(01:37:35):
Congress to eliminate the department as soon as twenty twenty six.
And even without full elimination of the Department of Education,
substantial cuts or streamlining quote unquote the processes of the
Department of Education are still threats that can do actual,
real damage to the effectiveness on our college campuses. We're

(01:38:00):
seeing a lot of those quote unquote streamlining and cuts
coming from Project twenty twenty five that have this vision
of ending federal enforcement of civil rights and education as
a whole, and they see that as part of a
total government overhaul. And I'm certain you've heard of Project
twenty twenty five in many different instances, but I just

(01:38:22):
want to make sure that you're clear on how robust
this sort of web is in terms of its impact
on gutting some of these support systems for students on campuses,
because it's very real. So just imagine for a second
the students who may already feel marginalized with Title nine
and Cleary and Volua policies already in place, what kind

(01:38:48):
of damage this stripping of the Department of Education could
do to a student sense of belonging and connection to
that campus. If there are not feeling supported, that's going
to become even more prominent with this dismantling plan. So
these plans treat oversight of discrimination as red tape to cut,

(01:39:11):
but for students on campus, these civil rights protections are
their only lifelines. They're the reason a survivor can demand
an investigation when assaulted, or a pregnant student can get accommodations,
or a woman athlete can get equal facilities. So rolling
back Title nine enforcement now would be turning back the

(01:39:33):
clock on generations of progress.

Speaker 3 (01:39:36):
The good news is that.

Speaker 1 (01:39:37):
Title nine is still the law and we are not
powerless as it stands right now. Students, faculty, and alumni
have a history of activism on campuses, and now is
the moment to rise to the occasion. So I want
to leave you with a few quick tips on how
you can stay engaged in this work if you're interested,

(01:39:58):
and how you can make a difference, because sometimes it
feels like we can't, but we really can't, especially on
our campuses today. So Number one, stay informed and educate others.
Followed trusted organizations that monitor these issues like the AAUW
as I mentioned before, the National Women's Law Center, the
Cleary Center, and survivor led groups like No You're Nine.

(01:40:21):
They provide real, tangible updates on what's happening in the
legal space, and they also provide you with tips on
how to support yourself and support other survivors on your campus.
Number two, mobilize on campus and in alumni networks. As
I mentioned, no You're nine, they kind of have like

(01:40:42):
a toolkit that you can go into and if you're
not sure where to start, they have a step by
step breakdown on what that looks like, what it looks
like for you to take that first step. You can organize,
just like doctor weights and commiaded on their campuses. You
can form Title nine defense coalitions with other clubs on

(01:41:03):
your campus. You can partner with the Women's Center, student athletes,
survivor advocacy groups, and even faculty allies. As a faculty
member at a college myself right now, these are the
types of initiatives that we would love to support hosting
a campus forum or a town hall where you're talking
with administrators about these kinds of issues and letting them

(01:41:25):
know that these are things that you care about. These
are all tangible ways that you can make your voice heard.
Number three, Document, report and persist. Even if the Department
of Educations role changes, your rights under Title nine still exists.

Speaker 3 (01:41:42):
So again it's.

Speaker 1 (01:41:43):
Tricky to guess what that will look like in the future,
but use the resources while you have them. If you
feel like your college or university, and this also applies
because I haven't talked about it much because higher education
is kind of my space, but this also applies Title
nine law to ke through twelve. So if you are

(01:42:05):
feeling like your schools are not supporting you in the
ways that you see fit and you deem appropriate, you
can use these reporting processes on your own independently. Go
to the Department of Education's website, go to the Office
for Civil Rights, and find the reporting policies that are
still in place today, at least for now. Other organizations

(01:42:29):
like the Legal Network for Gender Equity and I already
mentioned a National Women's Law Center there who runs the
Legal Network for Gender Equity. They can help you find
attorneys if your school is violating your rights, and they
can help you get connected to appropriate legal representation if
you need it, and finally, advocate at the state and
local levels. Just because we're seeing these pretty scary, potentially

(01:42:53):
detrimental changes at the federal level doesn't mean that the
state and local level are just going to leave you hanging,
because those are going to honestly be your best paths
forward in terms of getting the support that you need.
And the NAACP Legal Defense Fund actually suggests pressing schools

(01:43:13):
to keep collecting data on discrimination and harassment even if
those federal requirements become looser over time. So don't underestimate
the power of storytelling and solidarity. Sharing your experiences in
spaces like this with your unwanted sorority, sharing your story
and your experiences in building collectives and community like Taylor

(01:43:37):
and Kamaya did with hashtag change rape culture. All of
this is how you are going to prove to your
schools that you mean business, that you're serious about the
protections that are due to you. And it also helps
to put human faces and names on what otherwise may
just sound like policy changes, and you know, legalies help

(01:44:00):
to humanize this experience if you are in a position
to do so. So I already mentioned a number of
different resources that are available for your support, but I
just want to highlight another, you know, just kind of
take it back away from the policy conversation really quickly,
just to you know, talk survivor a survivor, or person

(01:44:21):
to person because remember that these survivors support hotlines are
always available for you when it all just becomes a
little too much, because it certainly can. So Number one,
I already talked about rain but RAIN operates the National
Sexual Assault Hotline. Their contact information is LinkedIn almost all

(01:44:44):
the show notes I believe, but just you know, so
you have it at the ready if you need it.
Their phone number it's twenty four to seven. You can
call them anytime. It's one eight hundred sixty five six Hope.
And they also have a online chat where you can
go and message someone if you don't want to talk
on the phone, because sometimes you some of be wanting

(01:45:05):
to talk on the phone. And then there's also UJIMA,
which is the National Center on Violence against Women in
the Black community, and their twenty four hour hotline is
one eight hundred seventy nine nine Safe. So make sure
you reaching out as you need to, because it's important
that you feel supported and that you have those opportunities

(01:45:27):
for support at the ready. As we wrap up this episode,
it's important for me to leave all of you students
with us. When students and their allies speak out, people listen.
In the nineteen seventies, it was student activists and advocates
like Patsy Nick who insisted on change in giving us

(01:45:47):
what we know and experience now. As title nine. In
the nineteen nineties, survivors and women's rights groups push Congress
to pass EVALLA, and now in this current place in time,
we might be called to defend those hard fought gains
in survivor support. So that might mean calling Congress, it

(01:46:08):
might mean marching on your campus, and it might just
mean refusing to let your campus administrators shrug off their
responsibilities because compliance is becoming difficult with this current administration.
And it also could mean mentoring younger students about their
rights or voting in the next election with education equity
in your mind. So I'm challenging everyone listening to this

(01:46:31):
to stay vigilant, to stay informed, and to stay loud.
Talk about Title nine, talk about vow with friends and colleagues,
especially those who might not know what's at stake. We
truly and really have no time to waste when it
comes to this, and so per usual, I want to
hear how you all are interpreting understanding this stuff. You

(01:46:55):
know what sticks out to you about what your campuses
are doing when it comes to title nine? Are there
many conversations happening? Is there anything that you're doing specifically
to raise awareness about this? Aht U s up on
Instagram at the Unwanted Sorority. You can also send in
an email and a voice note, you know, if you
want to just give a shout out to some of
the stuff that you see being done at your school

(01:47:17):
or your campus. And I'm interested to see what you'
all share. So until next time, take care of yourself,
take care of one another, and release whatever shame or
guilt you may be feeling about the harm that's been
done to you. You're not alone, all right. I'll see
you all next time. The Unwanted Aulorty is hosted in

(01:47:43):
executive produced Emmy Leader Tate Or. Executive producer is Joel Money,
our producer is Carmen Lorenz, and original cover art is
created by Savannah Yuler. I would also like to be
a special thanks to the I Heard Podcast Next Up
program for helping bring the show to life. Also all
of the guests who have taken a step in sharing
their store, sorry with you all on these episodes. And
finally to all the members of the Sorority who will

(01:48:04):
never tell their story, we see you and your story matters.

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