Focus Group: White Men [part one]

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

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

Are any stereotypes or tropes outdated?

What are we getting right?

What are we getting wrong?

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

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

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

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

61.8% of the US prison population

51.7% of all mass shootings since 1966

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

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

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

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

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

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

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Like, because that's been so frequent,I'm wondering like what, what or how
that lands if we like play the entirefocus group and don't stop it when
there's something that we want tosay, or like, want to analyze in that
moment or like talk through, um, justbecause that's how I'm seeing it show
up in other spaces one, but then two,um, I am terrified that someone's

(00:24):
going to take this episode of context.

Jenny (00:27):
I mean, they're going to anyway
and I have to start believing that they'renot, we now have safety mechanisms in
place at the top of the episode, that'sasking them to go back to the beginning
if they don't that's their problem.
And then there's, did youhear the whole disclaimer?
So there's that disclaimer, thenthere's the second disclaimer, when we
do the, like the introduction piece.
So if they're still taking it out ofcontext, I don't I'm, I'm not holding

(00:51):
myself accountable to that anymore.
They're doing
that
anyway, because they wanted to havepeople like receive it however they can.
And so now that there's like twopieces in there, if they're still
coming in and scooping thingsout, up out of context, right.
That's where I'm at now.
It was more of like a fool meonce, shame on me, fool me twice.

(01:12):
Now, what shame I kind of like whereI'm at with the, with the piece.
And so in holding this, I just feellike we're going to be able to talk
a lot more about what the individualsaid, as they're saying it, versus this
kind of like larger reflect of whatwere the main takeaways kind of deal.

(01:35):
What are your thoughts,feelings, and reactions.
Um,
I'm here for whatever you need.
Um, I think, no matter again, we, Ijust said this, I think no matter, or
you said, you said this, I think nomatter what we do, somebody can take a
sound bite from anywhere and just likefucking make it whatever they want.
Right.
So regardless of how many disclaimerswe have, um, I think if we're gonna

(02:01):
interject into the, the conversation,like that's what you're thinking of.
Right?
Like somebody says something and then wego, oh, that's problematic or whatever
the fuck we say, and then unpack it.
Is that what you're thinking?
So I think that's a great idea.
Um, I do think that that's goingto make it really long, even longer
than when we just did the intro.

(02:25):
Unless you have specificthings that we're saying.
Um, no.
Um, so we can do it and thenyou can cut it down if you want.
But I don't know.
I imagine this is a two part episode, so,
okay.
So, so then yeah, whateveryou want to do, I'm here
for okay.

(02:47):
Um, I
just don't know how are we going to do this?
Hurry up.
Do we have hand signals?
Like, are we going to listen toit and then in real time, and then
we'll listen to it in real time.
Um, how about for the intros atleast, um, we'll that each person
kind of introduced themselves.
And then in between each of them, we'lldo like a pause, stop, pause, stop.

(03:11):
If we just say at the top, wewe've already recorded this.
We've already like we've already come upwith a way to talk about the focus group.
And we're revising that as we areexperiencing, we have this like really
literal reminder of the violence.
Of white nationalism,white and male nationalism.

(03:33):
And so trying to be more thoughtfuland intentional about how we put
this forward means that we're goingto use the thing that we've already
created, and then cut that up intosmall, more digestible bites so that
we can have more fuller conversationsto make this more relational.
That sounds good.

(04:10):
a whole, whole lot of datais about to come your way.
And upon listening to this episode a fewtimes in the post-production process,
I just want to name that it might beeasier for folks to look at the show
notes or the spillways website, whichhas all of this data written out.
The focus group starts at around the13 minute mark for folks who just want

(04:31):
to skip ahead or you can try it out.
And if you get lost, just knowthat 13 minute mark is your anchor
back into the swing of the episode.
It really just not that it was reallyimportant to have this data collected
and put into one place to kind ofencapsulate what we know as a base
about white men before talking andlistening to white men's experiences,

(04:53):
white men, what do we know about them?
What don't we know, it seems likeeveryone has an opinion about white men,
but what do the cold hard facts say?
And user be aware a lot, a lotof data is about to come your way
and I'm going to try to go slowly.
If it's helpful.

(05:13):
All of this data with links may befound on our [e-mail].
But before we begin, I just want to saythat I'm painting a picture with this.
One of my favorite classes and Mandergraduate was a statistics course
where among many things we spokeat length about the human bias,
which creates and presents data.

(05:35):
I can tell you that 44.3% of white menhave college degrees, which is more than
any other race and gender, except forwhite women and Asian men and women.
I can also tell you that 55.7% of whitemen don't even have college degrees.
A majority of white menhave never been to college.

(05:59):
Both of these statements areaccurate 44.3% and 55.7%.
But they both evoke different emotions.
Don't they?
One says, oh, you're fine.
You have it better than other people.
The other says, whoa, that'smore than I would've thought
one says, let's compare people.

(06:21):
The other says let's build.
And this isn't about either or thinkingthis is about holding both simultaneously.
So this is going to feel jarring.
I mean, it's been a doozy puttingit all together, but I think it's
worth it so that we can hold thecomplexities of the human condition
within like the white male experience.

(06:44):
So let's just start here.
How many white men are there?
The us census bureau reports that whitemen make up 30% of the us population, 30%.
And this number is going to be important.
A lot of it because we're going towork in percentages for the most part.
But does this number surprise you?
Is it lower?

(07:04):
Is it higher than you imagined?
30%?
You select 10 us citizens at random.
Three of them will be white mountain.
Let's go deeper, according to thebipartisan reflective democracy campaign.
And this is just a group, which kindof recaps elections as of the 2020
elections, white men make up 58%of the us house of representatives.

(07:28):
60% of statewide officials, 63% ofcounty officials, 67% of us senators,
72% of elected prosecutors, 76%of governors and 91% of sheriffs.
I told you bought a beta.
We just started, but what does thissay when we're talking about social

(07:48):
power or electability and white men,despite making up 30% of the U S
population white men also make up61.8% of the U S prison population.
51.7% of all mass shootings since 1966have happened at the hands of white men,

(08:11):
more than any other race and gender.
What does this say about our criminaljustice system and white men?
According to the CDC, white men aremore likely to have heart disease
than any other by race or gender.
And this is nearly 8% of all white men.
The American foundation for suicideprevention finds that middle

(08:33):
aged white men have the highestsuicide rates of any race or gender
suicidality increases even further.
If a white man is unmarried and even more.
So if the white man has ahigh school diploma or that.
The life expectancy of weightmountain, according to the CDC
is 75.5 years old, and that'slower than Asian and Hispanic men.

(08:57):
And women's life expectancies aswell as black and white women's life
expectancy is all of which are inthe upper seventies, lower eighties.
What does this collection of data sayabout the life of white men of business
owners in the us more than any other byrace and gender are white men at 41%.
And that's according to Forbes thecenter for employment equity out of

(09:22):
the university of Massachusetts Amherstfinds that white men's advantages
are weaker and sometimes absent inoccupations that require educational
certification, educational requirements,paper women's employment, and for
working class jobs, white men faceconsiderable employment competition
from minority men in these samestates with large minority workforces.

(09:47):
Lastly, they find that white menhave advantage access to high
paying white and blue collar jobs.
In most states, PBS reports that 319of the nearly 400 people arrested at,
or in connection to the insurrectionat the us Capitol are white men, 79.9%.
Hold this figure.

(10:08):
When you hear that the odds of sendingan insurrectionist was six times
higher in counties where the percentof non-Hispanic whites declined in the
population that among Americans whobelieve that blacks and Hispanics are
overtaking whites, it increases the oddsof being in the insurrectionist movement,
threefold that among conservativeAmericans, the fear that black and

(10:34):
Hispanic people will have more rightsthan white people increases the odds of
being in the insurrectionist movement.
Twofold.
All of that data comes from the Chicagoproject on security and the threats
out of the university of Chicago.
Speaking of universities, 55.7% ofwhite men do not have a college degree.

(10:59):
Let's revisit the figure that white menaccount for 30% of the us population.
When you hear these figuresfrom the FBI, it's their
uniform crime reporting program.
And it's showing that white men aredisproportionately arrested in nearly
every single category that they controlfor 71% of all arrests made for arson

(11:22):
are by white men, 72% of all sex offensesfrom white Madden, 68% of rape white men.
78.4% of liquor law violations, 81%of DUIs, 61.9% of aggravated assaults.

(11:44):
68.1% of burglaries.
65% of fraud.
62% of embezzlement, 67.6% of vandalism,54.4% of illegally carrying or possessing
a weapon 70.6% of drug abuse, 67.4% ofoffenses against family and children.

(12:06):
63.7% of disorderly conduct.
White men hold these numbers.
When you hear that more white men than anyother race in gender except white women
receive food stamps or the supplementalnutritional assistance program benefits.
Snap enough.
That's we call them at 15.5%.

(12:28):
Of those who wrote edited, drafted, voted,debated, and passed the U S constitution.
First 15 amendments out of the 27that we currently have in 2022,
the governing document by which allother laws are evaluated on their
legality, 100% were done by white men.
This is a lot of data and this dataisn't just numbers, it's people's

(12:51):
lives and hearts and bodies.
Let's just take a moment toappreciate that we have this data.
Maybe appreciate it feelslike the wrong word.
Maybe it's about appreciating howwe very rarely put these numbers
together in the same conversation.
The good, the bad, the concerning,the scary, the sad, the in-between,

(13:16):
the fuller picture of white man old.
These figures hold this dataas we go into this Congress.
So do you want to tee all this up?
I would love to.
It was, um, coordinating.
Let's see.

(13:36):
Let's count.
Um, there was me, there was you,there was J there was T there
was teach and there was Sam.
So what does that?
Six, six people's schedules.
That was one thing.
Um, we're all in differentparts of the us, I believe.

(13:57):
Um, So I had to be wrapped inand out because of the thing.
So, but I, I was therefor, for the questions.
And so what we did was we had themall come in and we said, hello.
And I think you toldthem what we were doing.
And they were all really nice and, and,and here for it, which I wasn't expecting.

(14:19):
And so then they all went away and weinvited one person at a time into like
the room, you know, the zoom room.
Um, and we, I asked them a seriesof questions, you know, name will,
you know, fake name, um, dateof birth or age and all that.
Um, and they answered them some in moredetail than others, um, which is fine.

(14:43):
And it was, it was interesting.
Um, and then.
Then then the F after that, we didthat with everybody individually.
And then the focus group was we invitedeveryone back into the main zoom room.
And you started outwith the COVID question.
I think the only thing that I wantto add, that's a really great tee

(15:04):
up to us is we did all of thisas confidentially as possible.
Oh yeah, absolutely.
So I met with one person and thatone person then created this kind
of like a really beautiful bouquetof like experiences and demographics

(15:24):
within white manhood to cometogether and have this conversation.
Um, and so Jenny and I reallydon't know any of these humans
outside of this conversation.
One of them.
I met previously once before to talkabout this, and then we emailed a couple
of times to try to get this together.

(15:44):
Um, but a lot of that was sothat they could speak openly and
freely about their experiences.
And then when we share it, itcannot be traced back to anybody
which is important, given cancel culture,
right.
Or anything too.
There's this other piece of they arebigger and larger than themselves.
They, they represent their cultureand their community has weight Madden

(16:08):
right.
In this podcast, in this podcast
episode.
Right?
So they, uh, you're hearing one voice,but that one voice is representative
of whiteness and white culture,which helped you raise and socialize
and educate these white men aboutwhat's coming out of their mouths.

(16:29):
And so like, one of the things thatwe love to do and with culture is
individualize everything, oh, hold on.
That's your experience?
That's your experience?
That's your experience, butwe're completely missing that.
So many other people share our experience.
Right?
I just want to make sure that whenwe're talking about these men, we're
understanding and experiencing them asa reflection of white culture and white

(16:50):
men, not as an individual experience.
I think that's what I'm tryingto like, put the point home on.
And why is that important?
Because I think a lot of people are goingto listen to this and go, oh, well then
that's just that one person's experience.
Oh.
That doesn't like equate to all white men,but that's just that one person's thing.
And yeah, it's not going to be everysingle white man on the face of the

(17:13):
earth or within the United States,but it will be a sizable portion.
Does that make more sense?
It does.
I just know.
Yeah, that was perfect.
Um, so you know, me, I have a hard timewhen people are like, you know, fuck
individual experience, like bothers me.

(17:36):
I'm not saying that we don't havecollective experiences or there
aren't through lines to experience.
So I just that's, that'smy, my thing, I guess.
So that's why I'm kind of like,Ooh, I'm a little uncomfortable
with that, but it's fine.
So we don't need to worry
about that.
No, but again, if you're having thatexperience much, like you're having

(17:57):
an experience, other people are goingto have that exact same experience.
Uh, no, this is their individualexperience and we have to honor
their, I think there's needs to be space for both.
Right.
But I think what, what you're saying,and I think what you're saying
right now is that the most importantpiece of this is that these folks
are coming together in a sharedexperience of male whiteness in the.

(18:21):
And I think that that's important.
So, so absolutely.
I think that's important.
I probably just needed to say it out loud
and I appreciate that because it is,again, for me, the tick, the tic-tac
experience, the tic-tac phenomenon, youthink you're so isolated and insular
in your individual experience, andthen suddenly you see thousands of

(18:42):
other people going, oh my God, I havethis exact same thought experience
behavior, and you go, oh fuck.
Wow.
I thought it was so uniqueand special and I'm not,
but you are, and you're not right.
Both and both and
all
those multitude, somebody call out.
And then, um,

(19:02):
well I think this larger thingthat also has to be part of this
conversation is we are not clinicians.
We don't have that language.
Like that's just not part of our.
Um, personhood or educationor training in any capacity?
I think they know that with me,
these are just two white people alltalking about why people miss without

(19:23):
dependency or shame privacy or shame.
And we're just kind of going, whoa, wejust heard from four way people who don't
really have any understanding of our kindof framework and they're putting them
through that framework with their consent.
Right.
And also, I think it's somethingto be said that they showed up

(19:46):
because we weren't just like, wedidn't just throw them in blind.
Like they knew what they were.
They knew what the topic was
real quick.
Also, we're going to have this likelittle noise that way, you know, that
we are dropping out of the focus groupand into a kind of reflective space.
And then we will acknowledge whenwe're going back to the focus group.
Just so everyone's clear,you're going to hear this noise

(20:11):
when we're about to start holdingspace for what they've just said and
unpacking it a little bit further.
All right.
All right.
Let's start this recording.
First step we have Jay he's 36 years old,but lives in a predominantly suburban
slash urban leaning area and is a socialwork professor with a private practice

(20:32):
and works in community, organizing
political party, if any,
yeah, affiliate liberal.
Um, but I wouldn't say I'm anextreme liberal by any means
religious affiliation.
Um,
agnostic leaning, atheist
partnership status, if any,
currently, uh, engagedto be married in three

(20:54):
months.
Who did you vote for in the 2016 election?
2016.
I voted for Hillary
Clinton, 2020,
uh, but
ethnicity, Swedish, Finnish, Scottish.
Do you have a kilt?
I do.
I have a family crest,actually not a killed.

(21:15):
I don't want to kill it withmy family crest on it, which
is kind of golden.
Super cool.
I love it.
Really great.
It looks like a newsy hat, you know,like I should still leave papers.
Um, and I have the world's tiniesthead, so I look whole Arius in it
and I'm so glad I snuck that question in there.
Can you pinpoint around when yourfamily immigrated to the U S.

(21:40):
My maternal side, came to Ellis islandin the late 18 hundreds, 1880s, 1890s.
I don't know about my maternal side.
That's a lot more
chaotic.
Okay.
So are you familiar with the Kinseyscale of sexuality or zero to six?

(22:01):
One to six?
Yep.
Okay.
So no six is completely attracted
to same-sex and zeroscompletely attracted to opposite
sex.
Okay.
Zero to six.
Zero is exclusively heterosexual.
Six is exclusively homosexualand three is bisexual.
Like the general thing,you know, um, stereotypical

(22:22):
knowledge of what a bisexual is.
Then we've got one which is heterosexual,incidental, homosexual tendencies.
Then we've got two, which isheterosexual, more than incidental,
homosexual tendencies threes.
The bisexual force homosexualmore than incidental, heterosexual
tendencies, and five as homosexualincidental heterosexual tendencies.

(22:48):
Uh, given that scale, what I'm hearingis I'm probably more like a two, I've had
some physical intimacy with men limited,not super interested in it, but open
to it.
Okay.
In your family growing up, were you raisedto be racist and the sec is a two-parter.
And how were you taughtor how were you taught?

(23:09):
Not to be racist?
Um,
I grew up in the rural Midwest in Ohio.
My family is not overtly racist,nor did they teach any specifically
over racialized behaviors, butI was told not to see color.
So colorblindness was built into myupbringing and a disregard and a lack

(23:32):
of understanding of systemic racialissues was absolutely a part of the
world that I grew up in a very, very
white world.
Which of these three ideas ormovements do you most closely
align with all lives matter?
Black lives matter, bluelives matter and why
black lives matter because the historyof racism in our country is really

(23:57):
the foundation of the narrativeof who we are as a S as a society.
And I do believe maybe it's a platitudethat until black lives matter,
um, there won't be liberation for
any others on a scale from one to 10, 10 being a lot or frequently.
How often do you think, just thinknot talk about race or racism?

(24:19):
Uh,
daily, almost in my profession, I teachcourses on advanced social justice.
I teach classes in narrativetherapy where we're consistently
analyzing the intersections ofidentity in therapeutic processes.
I teach substance abuse classeswhere we talk about systems that.
Create, uh, addiction withinmarginalized communities,

(24:41):
predominantly black and brown.
And I run anti-racist trainings.
How often do you talk about race with people of color?
Probably in some way, maybe likeevery other day or at least the
bare minimum once a week at amaximum four or five times a week.
Also my fiance is a personof color, so we're, you know,

(25:03):
engaged in that at the home.
You know, I don't, I don't comehome to a purely white family, so.
Gotcha.
Okay.
How often do you talk aboutrace with other white people?
Um, quite regularly, probablya couple of times a week.
Um, as part of my job at the universityand part of my teaching, if I didn't
have the teaching and the classesto do it, and I only had sort of

(25:26):
university meetings, it might be oncea week, twice a week at the most,
but pretty frequently.
How often do you talk about race?
In
like message boards or like in zoom?
I don't know.
Lauren what?
Social
media.
Oh
yeah.
Um,
yeah, actually I really, youknow, as a millennial, I don't

(25:48):
care much for social media.
I don't know why I say millennial, butI don't care a ton for social media.
I don't do a lot of postings, but Ihave found if I look historically, I
don't post photos of me at concertsor food or you, my latest workout.
I tend to post racial and social justicethings if I post and that's maybe once

(26:09):
every two months, it's pretty rare.
Gotcha.
I don't want to, I'm carefulof, um, what's the term.
Oh my gosh.
Um, when you just want to present animage of who you are, that's anti racist.
Um, I'm drawing a blank
on the term.
That's okay.
That works.
How comfortable are you talkingabout race and racism in general?

(26:32):
At this point in
my life, I'm extremely.
Um, five years ago, less, 10 years ago.
Not much at all.
What's your most recent level of educationworking on a doctorate as we speak.
Oh, wow.
Okay.
You don't like to play small dude.
You're like getting married,working on a doctorate, like

(26:52):
I got one life to live.
I'm going to, I'm going toit to the wheels fall off.
Um, I don't have any favorite parts at thevery ending was like, do you talk about
race online and hosts and message boards?
And I was like, oh my God.

(27:14):
And then he like goes on later tosay like, as a millennial, I was
like, buddy, you don't need the RD.
Call yourself a millennial afteryou thought that the only thing
online was a message board.
We know, we know where's
your AOL handle, your aim message.

(27:34):
I know, you know, what's crazy to me too is, and we've
talked about this before.
I feel like.
So, um, social media is such a huge partof social justice at this current time in
the world, or at least, you know, talkingabout it or making it more visible.
Um, a lot of the white folks thatwe've spoken to don't do social media.

(27:58):
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's like across theboard, I'm a sudden that.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And you'll, I think we hearthat later from some of the
other folks on this episode.
Right.
And that's just
right.
I'm like, who's, I mean, I know people of color doing a lot of social

(28:18):
justice work, social media, and thenthere's you doing the white people need
to get their shit together version, butI don't know of anyone else that's doing
what's for sure.
If you want to burn in between,
right.
I mean, you might have more of yourfinger on the pulse of foods doing that.

(28:38):
I mean collectively there's maybe aneye, like this goes for like Instagram,
Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
I can maybe think of like 15 people.
I always forget about LinkedIn.
Yeah.
Yeah.
The other thing that was reallyinteresting too, and I've

(28:58):
noticed that I do this too,
is in naming our ancestry.
We can like name very eloquently, likeone side of the family tree, but when
it comes to the other side, that's um, Ithink Jayden's of like a bit more chaotic.
Oh my God.
We just like, don't even go intoit, but we like hold onto the one

(29:18):
of like, oh no, I know that wecame here after slavery and bed.
Um,
But the, like the one that's a littlebit more chaotic and maybe that's just
what I do, but like, no, sorry, go ahead.
I just think that it is because it canbe messy, more messy and more chaotic.

(29:40):
We can have like more routes thatlike deeply tie into the American
enslavement system and genocide system.
And so I think sometimeswe like glaze over that.
Like, I think in much the sameway, like Jay was like, oh no, it
wasn't overt racism, but right.
But I was taught X, Y, and Z, but evenwith, but even within that, uh, but

(30:05):
even within that change, the implicitracism isn't even named as racism.
It was, I wasn't out of overt racism,but I was taught color blind, like
ideology is, but not using it as racist.
See,
when I heard his, when I heard him say that it's a little bit chaotic,
I was like, oh, I get you not on the,uh, like connection to racism level.

(30:32):
But the like, my, my family history isthat the, the matriarch of my father's
side told a lot of really special storiesthat may or may not have been true.
So nobody really knows, like, we'resure that they came from Italy, but we

(30:52):
have no idea when, um, so like when hesaid that that's where my mind went.
I was like, oh, did you have a sketchyrelative that made up Fibbers too.
Yeah, I guess it could be that too.
Right.
There is lost to
history.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

(31:13):
I think it is.
I just brought it up cause I waslike, hadn't thought of your, your
thoughts before, but it's, it's true.
Like who wants to bring up that
stuff?
I think it has, because they've beenin a lot of shared spaces recently with
other white folks who are very quickto not make their American ancestry.

(31:38):
I like us ancestry.
Um, but then once you get into likesmall breakout rooms, they're like, oh,
Hey, I actually want to talk about this.
And like, we're totallyhere to hold space for it.
But it's like, oh, like within ashared larger communal space, you
don't feel comfortable talkingabout like, oh wow, you are a
direct descendant of slave owners.
Uh, and so sometimes that's sometimesnow like messy or it's complicated.

(32:02):
Just kind of like, justperks me up a little bit.
Where are your line?
10?
I go up near like, oh, let me probe that.
Um, the other thing I wanted to mentionwas it was interesting to hear about
like, thinking about racism and likenot talking about racism, like by

(32:22):
himself and then with folks of colorand then with other white people.
And so for Jay thinking about racismwas a lot because it happens daily.
Um, but then it was interestingwhen he talks with other white
people, which he said happensabout one to two times a week.

(32:44):
He says it's more frequent.
Yeah.
I didn't catch thatfirst, but you're right.
Yeah.
And then talking with folks of color,I think he said one to four times
a week, one minimum, four maximum.
And so that would actually be more thanthe more frequently of one to two times.
And so there's this weird kindof inconsistent story happening

(33:07):
around how, what, like, whatis frequency that the, um, the
numerical understanding of frequencychanges throughout those questions?
I also wonder.
When, when I asked thequestion, um, do you feel did,

(33:28):
what did I ask this question?
Like, did we get an answer if hefeels more comfortable speaking with
white people or people of color?
Or did I just ask the like generic,how comfortable do you feel?
Okay.
So I wonder what theanswer to that would be.
Yeah.
I was also really surprised.

(33:49):
He was like, oh yes, very comfortable.
And I was like, oh, Iwonder what that feels like.
Yeah.
Do you not feel bad for yourself?
I mean, at home and with you, right.
And like, you know, but, and that's truefor white people and people of color.
Like for me, like I don't, when people,you know, I'm, I'm actively working

(34:15):
on addressing things when people saythem, but it makes me really sweaty.
And so, but I was like, wow.
I wonder how it feels to not like rain,sweat from your pits when you start
talking about it to somebody, let me
think.
Maybe that's because he's also a teacher.
Oh, that's true.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And so there is also, I think that kindof, that advantage of it being in your

(34:39):
curricula or a textbook and saying, oh,here, we're talking about it because
it's part of our, just like our syllabus.
And so we're talking about it, but like,without that civil by, would we still be
talking about it in the same frequency or
capacity?
That's true.
Also, I don't speak to a lot of peopleevery day because of the work that I do.

(34:59):
So even just regularconversations are hard for me.
Cause I like forget how totalk in a normal tone of voice.
Yeah.
Anyway.
All right.
What's going on?
Okay.
Next week we have Sam he's 29 yearsold, that lives in the suburbs and is
training to go into computer coding,

(35:21):
political party, if any, if any, you know, none.
Okay.
Sure.
Um, religious affiliation, ifany Jewish partnership status, if
any, in relationship, who did youvote for in the 2016 election?
Nobody.

(35:42):
Um, what about 2020 Trump?
What's your ethnicity?
Uh, middle Eastern.
Can you pinpoint around whenyour family immigrated to the
U S decade and point of origin?
My grandmother
is 81 and she came herewhen she was three.
So 79 years ago putsus, do we meet roughly,

(36:05):
roughly like this totally fine.
We don't need
to get peas on my mother's side.
And then on my father's side, think it waslike the hundred and something years ago.
Okay.
And they both came frommiddle east, the middle east.
Um,
my father's side came from like, uh,Spain, Turkey, Israel kind of situation.

(36:26):
It's not certain where my mother's side
came from Syria.
Okay.
Now this one, um, are you familiarwith the Kinsey scale sexuality?
I
am.
I've heard of it.
I've experienced people talk aboutit, but I don't know much about it.
Jenny explains the Kinseyscale to Sam in much the same

(36:47):
way that she did for J you'd.
Like, I'll just give you a sum up ofhow I conduct my sexuality and you
can sound great.
Um, I'm generally, uh, onlyinterested in women, um, but I'm
also generally only interestedin men who are kind of feminine.

(37:08):
Right.
But also not too feminine.
Um, the way that it goes is like, whenI'm perfectly sober, I'm exclusively
involved with women when I am not.
So.
Um, if someone really catchesmy fancy, they catch my fans
in your family growing up.
Were you raised to be racists,be racist or, you know, if you

(37:33):
weren't, how were you taught?
Not to be racist?
Um, I was taught by my mother's parents,I think is more accurate than saying
I was taught by my mother to, um, toreally, to see people as, as people.
And if you look at someoneas if like they're white or a
minority, Your own because they'rethere they're a person, right?

(37:56):
The things that they are, are moreimportant and you'll learn from them.
That's like a Jewish proverb thatsays like, you should drink in
the dust of someone's feet, right?
Like no matter who they are, evenif you think that they're an idiot.
And then on my father's side,my father doesn't believe he's
racist, but he is so racist.
So, uh, I'll go with a stickwith like my mother's side for

(38:19):
the moment.
Which of these three ideas ormovements do you most closely
align with all lives matter?
Black lives matter, bluelives matter and why?
Um, I'm going to have to go with that.
I, I can't choose any of them becauseI know they all have political meanings
and I don't know them all like in depthenough, but as far as I'm concerned,

(38:43):
I just want people to do whatever theywant so that I can do whatever I want.
And we can all just kind of like supporteach other and also like leave each
other about how often do you think about race and racism?
So not talk about it, but actuallythink about it in your head?
Probably more often than not, becauseI think that we're going about it.

(39:05):
Oh, gotcha.
What'd you say like at least once aday, maybe more sounds about right.
Okay.
How often do you talk aboutrace with people of color?
Uh, I talked to people of color a lot.
But I don't think we ever talk aboutracism because I think that just
sitting in and chatting as likepeople with people means a whole lot

(39:29):
more than talking about like, andmy issue is, is X, Y, or Z, unless
I feel oppressed in this way or not.
Um, how often do you talk about race with other white people?
So much
more than black people?
So much more likely?
It seems like white people just like,they want to talk about it all the time.

(39:49):
And it's like, they, because everybody hasan issue with looking in the mirror and
not being able to say I'm a good person.
Right.
So like, For years, people weresitting around saying like,
oh, like I'm a good person.
Cause I'd go with the morality oflike my religion or my country.
And it says do this.
And then all of a sudden socialmedia is a big thing eight years ago.

(40:13):
And then all of a sudden, um, race iseverywhere you look and suddenly you're
going and telling these people that theyfollowed, what they were told was good.
And then all of a sudden, nowthey're being told, oh, but like,
you're a man and you're white.
So you are the problem.
But what do you mean?
I had, I had two children.

(40:35):
I supported my wife.
I've supported my kids.
I followed, geared at my church.
I did all this good stuff.
And all of a sudden you're tellingme that like, I'm the problem?
Like, like you feel let downby everyone in anything and
you feel isolated and alone.
I'm sorry, I can't go past that one.

(40:55):
It's so loaded.
It's
muted.
Sorry.
There's a lot.
And I was making notes what Iwas doing, cause I was like,
oh man, I got to remember that
one.
No I can't.
We get to the end of this one
the first.
Oh no, go ahead then.
So one thing I was thinking that peoplemight say a certain maybe group of folks

(41:19):
might say is, um, well he's not white.
He's middle Eastern.
Okay.
Okay.
So what's the, like, I can just see that coming up.
You know what I mean?
Okay.
What's the answer to that
ethnicity is different than race.
So with ethnicity is yourculture fits like, happens on

(41:40):
top of a racialized culture.
So, and I've actually been like a reallystrong proponent of adding middle Eastern
north African into a racial demographiccategory for like the U S census.
Because right now the U S census onlyallow us, or like accepts Hispanic
as an ethnicity in the United States.

(42:01):
I know, and it really is.
It's like Hispanic or other, and theyjust recently added two or more races.
And so it's becoming moreand more complicated.
And so, like not only is it middleEastern that Sam was talking about,
but also the Jewish identity too.
And there's a very long history ofJewish people not being identified

(42:25):
within whiteness and white people, notallowing Jewish people into whiteness.
And so that is, and itshould be its own episode.
Um, and, um, in the spaces that I've beenin, there is more and more conversation
about where is Jewishness now in terms ofits, um, identification or assimilation

(42:51):
or amalgamation into the larger bucketof white culture, uh, and white people.
And so, yeah, there's this like historicalappreciation and analysis and the
current reality to a Jewish that a lotof Jewish people identify as white.
And then a lot of white people identifyother Jewish people as white, a lot

(43:12):
of stuff.
Um, one thing you did say was theyadded two other races to the sentence.
Did you mean ethnicities?
I am I confused?
You know, it's two, two or more races.
That's the category two or more.
It's not that, I don'tknow what those two are.
It's that it's, it'sliterally, that's what it says.
Two or more races so thatyou could be biracial try.

(43:36):
Okay.
I'm sorry.
I was like, oh no, I'mlost in a sea of verbiage.
Welcome.
Here's an order buoys.
Now I get it.
Okay.
Two or more, right?
The
den.
What does that mean?
Yeah.
What does that mean?
And what are these pieces?

(43:58):
Um, but there are a lot of Jewishpeople who identify as way and
there's some Jewish people who don't.
Right.
Um, and there are some peoplewith a middle Eastern identity
that identify as white.
And there are some that don't right.
This very particular person.
When we put out all of the feelersand readers for this focus group,
we said, you have to identify it as.

(44:18):
Gotcha.
Okay, good.
Cool.
Yeah, I do.
Oh, okay.
Wonderful.
Sorry.
I was just thinking about that.
Um, I already have the same amountof notes that I had for Jay.
Um, let me stop.
Okay, so go
ahead and you go
start here.
Um, There was some, so there's thislike interesting through line from

(44:41):
you right now about the scripts, the,like the predetermined scripts that
he felt that he had to internalizein order to be a good person.
Um, and you were told that you, theseare the things you have to do to be
good, that you have a wife that youhave children that you're married,

(45:01):
that you volunteer, you go to church,either all of these things, and
then suddenly you're the problem.
There's that like script that you haveto follow, which I think is really
fucking fascinating because we talka lot about how within this larger
fabric of destiny, white people areimpacted by race and racism as well.
And in much the same exact breathand capacity thing, Sam is pointing

(45:24):
on the ways that patriarchy andheteronormativity also impact him too.
But this idea that, oh, youhave to have a way from them.
You're a good person.
If that script's driven into havingtwo kids has to be driven into you.
And I, just, to me, it makes, it makeshis answer to his sexuality so much more

(45:45):
enlightening because he's like, I don'tknow, I want to do this thing, but I have
to make sure that I am in neighborhood ed
in order to say, oh, I was in bridge,
right.
To cross through that script andsay, I could finally not have
to memorize that script anymore.
Right.
And they can do what my, mybody or my heart wants to do.

(46:07):
I thought that was sofreaking fascinating,
how I also thought it was really interesting how open he is.
Like I was sort of expecting, like nowthat I've listened to Jay's answers
and I've listened to Sam's, I wassort of expecting Jay to be more open
about his answers, but he was sortof like, you know, like, oh, well,

(46:31):
my, my fiance is a person of color.
And then, but not that didn't expoundon that, whereas, and he was like,
and these are the things that I am,uh, you know, my ancestry is, um, you
know, but that side's a little squiffy.
And then, you know, with Sam, he'sjust like, well, my dad's racist,
so we're going to go with my mom's.

(46:53):
So I, you know, I just, and thenhe was like, oh, I voted for Trump.
And then also was like, Mydad's so racist, so I don't
want to be associated with him.
So it's just like, oh my gosh,you do contain multitudes.
I think you also run up this other piecethat I was thinking about with Jay,

(47:13):
that I wasn't able to fully articulate.
And it was when he was talkingabout how often he talks with
folks of color about race.
And he said, oh, maybeone, four times max.
But when I come home, I'm not cominghome to like this all white space either.
But like that space wasn't included in hisone to four estimate, which I thought was
really interesting as if he's not talkingabout race and racism at home and maybe he

(47:35):
is, but it wasn't part of his like initialgut response of like, oh yeah, no, this
is like, when I wake up and go to sleep.
Um, but back to Sam, how can you be like,oh, no, but like, not my dad's side.
Like, can I, like, I'm trying tothink about like a person's ability to
compartmentalize your parents teach right.

(47:57):
And they'd be like, oh no, no, no.
Like that was stupid.
I'm not going to do that, butI'm going to do this other one
and like on a conscious level.
Sure.
But there's so much unconscious shitwhere I'm like, oh God, my dad does this.
Or, oh God.
Oh, my mom does that.
I realized that after she died,I was like, oh God, where do it?
My mom does this.
And I only know that because nowthat she's not here, it shows

(48:18):
up in different ways of like,oh God, this reminds me of her.
And I didn't, wasn't doing it consciously.
Well, no.
Sam has an incredible level ofawareness though, at least so far.
What were those
self-awareness social awareness?
No, I would, I would say not social.
I would say self and, and.

(48:41):
I think whether his awareness is, isskewed one way or another by something
else is a different thing altogether.
But he seems to have, you know, I dunnohe takes up space in a way that I,
with a confidence that I'm not used to.
I think
interesting like a white man confidence.
No, it's just like an anybody confidence.

(49:02):
Oh yeah.
Like I've never, yeah.
I was like,
That's how I experienced it.
Like Sam was a varied, charismatic human.
Like, I feel like you could drop Sam intojust about any situation or scenario.
And Sam would immediatelybe the cruise director,

(49:25):
the tour guide with the umbrella.
Yeah.
Know where the conversation is going.
Nowhere.
The next event was, or at least rallythe troops to go to the next thing.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Two other things that I was thinkingabout how much do you think about it?
More often than not.

(49:46):
So that, to me, that numerical valueis I'm having more thoughts about
race and racism that I'm not thinkingabout race and racism, but then when
you like forced an answer of like howmany times a day it was once a day.
So again, this like disconnectand frequency, but then.

(50:09):
How often are you talkingabout race with folks of color?
And his answer was not about his feelings,but rather he didn't want to hear folks of
colors, feelings, because he said, I thinkit was, um, oh, my issue is X, Y, and Z.
This is the way that I am oppressed.
I thought that thatwas really interesting.

(50:29):
I don't want to talk to them becauseI don't want to hear their problems
with race and racism, because Ithink there's more value in talking
about like what we have similar, likewhat we have together, like what we
have together and what unifies us.
But like not wanting to hearsomeone else as hurt or harm.

(50:51):
Right.
And he didn't want to hearthat with white people either.
He's like white people.
I know he was like, why peoplewant to talk about it all the time?
And that was a reallyred impression of Sam.
Um, but yeah.
Yeah.
So yeah, his, his, his like, uh, Idon't want to talk to anyone about race
or racism, like the negative impacts.
Let's just like, not even talk about it.

(51:13):
Right.
So there's just so much with him evenlike, just from the word, like, oh
yeah.
We're not even done with him yet.
We're not
even done with him yet.
Let's play the rest.
How often do you talk about raceonline, specific to like, like social
media, how comfortable are you talkingabout race and racism in general?

(51:35):
Very comfortable.
And what's your mostrecent level of education?
I had
a.
Yeah.
He said, he's very comfortable talking about race and racism.
And he also said before that henever talks about it with people of

(51:57):
color and he hates talking about it.
Well, he didn't say hate that's wrong.
Implication of not wanting to talkabout with white people either.
Right.
So that's
good
catch.
Yeah.
So how are you?
Thank you.
A little stuff and plus, um, no, butno it's because you brought that up.

(52:19):
Cause I was like, I didn't even realizethat he was like being weird about it.
Right.
Um, and then I was like, oh, shoo.
So there's that it's like withJay's unconscious disparate.
Is that disparity theright word between when he.
You know how much he talks aboutit and how comfortable he is.
Right.
Is that same thing I wonder is that'sgoing to be a through line with everybody.

(52:42):
I wonder if it, well, I mean, we'retwo out of four people right now.
Let's see if it continues.
It seems like it would before,already like 50% of participants.
I mean, we have a sample size of four,so this isn't like the largest or
most thoughtful qualitative researchon the planet got to start somewhere.
All right.
Well, yeah, let's go to this next year.

(53:04):
And there's T he's 44 years old livesin the suburbs is a current master's
of social work student after a careerin the high-end jewelry market,
political party, if any,
um, definitely not a party.
Now I find it a little bit suspect.
Um, religious affiliation, if any,

(53:25):
um, decidedly anti organized religion.
If anything, I had saidBuddhist, um, when I purchased.
Yeah, mindfulness.
That's my spirituality
partnership status, if any single.
Okay.
Who did you vote for in the 2016 election
who was in the 2016 election?

(53:47):
Um, it was Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.
Um,
I would've voted for Hillary if I votedand I'll admit I've voted a limited
amount of times in my life, but I'vespent in the past decade overseas.
So that's part of the reason why,
um, what about 20, 20, 20,
20?
Um, I didn't vote
ethnicity.

(54:09):
Can you pinpoint around whenyour family immigrated to the
U S decade or point of origin?
Sure.
We can do the U S uh,when I was 10 years old.
So that would have been 87
from.
And you lived here since then?
Um, well, yes, with theexception of the past decade,

(54:31):
you said that.
Okay.
Are you familiar with the Kinsey scale?
Yes.
I think I'm always ready to say my friendof mine has a rated me alternatively as
a Kinsey one and a Kinsey negative 40.
So take that as you like.

(54:53):
Okay.
Let me
again, Jenny startsexplaining the Kinsey scale.
Yeah, actually you don't need to.
I sort of recall.
Yeah, no, he writes me asa zero, generally speaking.
I think if I rated myself, I wouldsay somewhere around zero to one,
zero to one.
Okay.
In your family growing up, were youraised to be racist or if not, how

(55:15):
are you taught to not be racist?
I was taught not to be racist,but there were decidedly.
Um, Racist things sort of within theculture of my upbringing in the sense
that, uh, actually in recent studies, uh,social justice class, there were things

(55:35):
that were raised that, that allowed meto have some interesting conversations
with family pointing out the thingsthat were decidedly racist and having
discussions about them, which was a
good, which of these three ideas or movements do you most
closely aligned with all lives matter?
Black lives matter, bluelives matter and why

(55:57):
black lives matter?
Because I mean, well, I supposethat or all lives matter, but I
feel that all lives matter is, orblue lives matter is decidedly.
Those are responses toblack lives matters.
So for me, black lives matteris what is the important thing?
Um, if anything, just, uh, reducing.

(56:19):
Any person's suffering.
Um, but, uh, yeah.
How often do you think about race or racism?
So not necessarily talking aboutit, but just, you know, do to
do, and you're thinking about it.
Um, I think I'm probably, actually sincemy recent class, I actually quite a time
before that I'm cognizant of it daily.

(56:40):
Um, I'd say I'm aware of daily,the sort of impact I'm sort of in a
different way now than perhaps I was.
How often do you talk about race with people of color?
Not that often.
Unfortunately.
Yeah.
Um, I would say outside of the socialjustice class, I took, I've engaged

(57:03):
in a few conversations, but yeah.
Opportunities have not been many.
Um,
um, how often do you talk about.
No.
Sorry.
How often do you talk?
No.
What is wrong with my face?
Hang on.
How often do you talk aboutrace with other white people?
Um, more frequently than,uh, with people of color.

(57:27):
I mean, I'd say it sort of, itwill come up in a conversation
at least once a month.
Hmm.
Okay.
How often do you talk about race online?
So we're asking this question.
Not at all.
I'm just not an online person.
Oh, okay.
So no social media or anything?
Doctor, how comfortable are you talkingabout race and racism in general?

(57:50):
Comfortable.
Yeah.
Okay.
What's your most recent level of education, which you kind
of already answered, but currently
my master's.
So prior to that, mybachelor's, but um, yeah,
fucking T
T.

(58:11):
Okay.
With the two tier with the T pinkies up.
Um,
I still can't for the life ofme, and this is just me in my own
bias, being a queer person, beingnon binary, being HIV positive.
I am so deeply connected and investedin what is going on politically because.

(58:38):
Some very large parts of my bodyrequire a deep understanding of
what's happening politically.
Right?
Well that's yeah.
I was thinking that I was like,oh, that's your privilege?
Not to vote
to like, really think through like,wait, who was in the 2016 election.
Right, right.

(59:01):
That is seared into my memory.
That is so indelible to 2016.
If someone were to just say thewords, 2016 would go, oh right.
Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, like.
Right.
He was also out of the country though at that point.
And even though it was huge news,sometimes I think, you know, living

(59:21):
here, it felt bigger, big, huge.
Yeah.
But maybe in other parts of the world,they don't have their, their finger
on the pulse of American politics,you know, like, I don't know.
Right.
I mean, that creates a really lovelyand generously large excuse for
him that likes to if he wants to,but also like democracy, I think.

(59:45):
Yeah.
Just like my love letter todemocracy, again, like it's for
those who show up and those whoare allowed to show up can show up.
Right.
Um, but then to like completely be like,oh, I'm not even going to show up at all.
Right.
Because Sam did the same thingof like, oh, I didn't vote.
Yeah.
Well they can't, they, you know, I don't want to say they, I mean, it gets

(01:00:09):
get, I understand what you're saying.
Yeah, yeah.
I mean, yeah.
I feel the same, same way as, uh,a bisexual person with a uterus,
you know, who identifies as female.
Um, so elections matter to me a lot.
Um, also, you know, and also it's like,well, you get this, that's your right.

(01:00:34):
Not to vote, I guess.
It's yeah.
It's like, my eye is twitching.
Cause I don't really know.
Yeah.
It's also right.
Like fine whatever individually.
Yes.
But it, it definitely comes from aplace of, uh, thinking like, well,
I'm not going to vote because Idon't believe for either of them.

(01:00:57):
It's like that individualistic, thatprocess that you were talking about
earlier, instead of being like, it'simportant that I vote because I have
friends that are non-binary and black andnative American and you know, or whatever.
I have a partner with a uterus or.
You know, healthcare.

(01:01:18):
Yeah.
I don't want my food stamps cut off.
Yeah.
Right.
Or, yeah,
yeah.
Yeah.
I believe in centering thespecific type of education
within my child's public school.
And I'm sure that wasn't even a thought through any of their head, like,
oh, I need to vote for others also.
Like not, I'm not, and I'm notmaking a moral judgment on them.

(01:01:40):
I'm just saying like, that'swhat we're talking about.
Right, right, right.
We'll also just, and the malewhite male privilege, right?
Yeah.
Like they've, haven't been taughtto think like, oh, let's vote
based on other people's needs too.
It's not just about you.

(01:02:01):
Well, and I think that, that goesback into the, it's not about
an individualized experience.
This is about the collective experience.
That's true.
Yeah.
I think I am dipping, dipping in a different way upon.
No, no, no.
Well, I think that it's important topoint that out because I think at the
top of the episode, you were like noindividualized experiences so important,
but we also so deeply tied to these likelarger and broader themes of, oh, well

(01:02:25):
this is just like a general stereotypeor cliche of the white male experience.
And here we're seeing it likefed to us in this very explicit
way and we're going, oh, wow.
Yeah, that's actually kind of accurate.
Yeah.
It's sort of, yeah.
Yeah.
And I mean, I.
I'm trying to hold space for thefact that they are, they live, they,

(01:02:48):
you know, have that right to chooseif they're going to vote or not.
I always think about that when Ithink about privilege and advantage,
it's not that we don't want otherpeople to have privilege or advantage
it's that we want to, everyone,everyone should have privilege with
everyone should have that advantage.
Everyone should have the ability togo like, oh, I don't want about it.
Doesn't matter.
Everyone should have
that privilege.

(01:03:08):
Yeah.
Right.
Like when, you know, it was Bidenand Trump, and there was a lot of.
White folks that I saw on social mediathat were like, you know, black voters
need to show up and black voters.
And I was like, at the time, at the time,I was like, yeah, you know, let's all

(01:03:31):
go to, you know, because I'm an idiot.
And I was like, yo, and then, uh,now I'm like, but why is it there?
Why did they have to show up?
Why aren't we fucking showing
up?
Yeah.
And also a lot of our statesmake it so they can't.
Right,
right.
Get a Johnny.
Get it.

(01:03:51):
I know.
I hate how anyway, we're,we're not here about me.
Um, I just hate, I just hate how blind.
That's all.
Yeah.
Welcome.
Welcome.
A thousand times.
Welcome.
I appreciate that.
There's a few more things about teeththat I would love to talk about.
Oh, go, go,
go.
I also have another thing, but

(01:04:12):
what is the Kinsey scaleone to negative 40 ma
also.
Why did I laugh so hard about that?
I was like,
so funny
looking back on it.
I'm wondering what,
oh yeah, yeah.
That's right.
You did.
Why were you laughing?
Why is that funny?
Why is that fucking funny?
There's nothing funny about that.

(01:04:33):
I am so exclusively heterosexualthat I'm willing to break this scale.
Yeah.
I am like anti whatever.
Like w like, I don'teven know what it means.
I don't either.
And either I don't either
meaning like hate gay people.
Like, what did this person believewhen they were talking to, to you

(01:04:54):
that you're a negative four day?
Like, I just read that or receivethat as like a queer person is like,
oh, you could be like more thana zero, or like, less than that.
Like how, how does that figure?
I
mean, this scale is just, it's an imperfect measure of like
something that's hard to measure.
Right.
So,

(01:05:15):
So that friend took it to, Ilove that they've had a specific
conversation about the scale too.
Like what, who does that?
Um,
so this also to me connectsto, so like you're talking that
you're having conversationsabout sexuality, which is great.
We don't know when that's happeninglike that hasn't been identified for us.

(01:05:36):
But then as soon as we're talkingabout racism or talking about it with
folks of color, this 44 year old saysthat a class he took recently has
seen him have these conversations.
So that means within, he did not starthaving these conversations, at least like
in communicating that to us, he did notstart having conversations of race and

(01:05:56):
racism until he was in his mid forties.
Right.
And then he's very comfortable abouthaving these conversations there.
That is again, very comfortable.
And I don't know about you.
But I'm not very comfortable doinganything until I've done it a lot.
That's just me.

(01:06:18):
Right.
But to be able to take oneclass and be like, oh, this one
class has changed my experience.
I can definitely empathize withthat, but I don't feel like it.
Um, and I don't think that thisis what T was saying, either that
it's made him this expert or nowhe's this like kind of sewer of,
oh, no, sorry.
That wasn't what I was doing
playing that's it.
I didn't, I didn't receive it thatway, but I feel like there's this other

(01:06:40):
piece of, oh, well, I'm immediatelycomfortable doing this thing when we all,
I think within this, like whiteness orso many of us within whiteness are so
uncomfortable talking about whiteness,that one 14 week class that met once
a week for like two hours, three hoursmaximum is going to do that for you.

(01:07:01):
But to me it turns into this.
Oh, if you, and like I experienced thisa lot, I think within these answers
of, if you talk about it even just alittle bit, that makes you comfortable,
but it's actually not in depth.
It's not thorough.
It's not cross racially.
It's not, uh, like intra racially,like with other white people, or

(01:07:26):
like, just thinking about it enoughor taking that one class is enough.
That's all you need.
You don't need any more.
And we become these like pseudoexperts in race or racism.
Right.
And he did also say, you know, not enough, I don't have
these conversations enough, butthen again, he said that he was very
comfortable.

(01:07:48):
Yeah.
Yeah.
How often do you talk with folks of color?
Not often, unfortunately, whitepeople about once a month,
once a month.
I wonder where that.
Probably like maybe newssent, who knows, I guess.
Um,
there's also, so this is thethird time that it's happened
saying this other pattern.
Have you asked, how were you taught?

(01:08:10):
Not to be racist?
No, one's answering that question.
No one has answered that question.
People are only answering the, uh,where you taught to be racist or if
not, how are you tend not to be racist.
And so I think like that implies one,that everyone was taught to be racist,
which I think they're all articulatingand in some varied capacity from implicit.

(01:08:37):
Um, but that we're notusing that language.
And how interesting that is that we'relike dancing or skirting around that,
you know, with tea also, there was like this and this happens.
I feel like a lot with, I mean, hedidn't specifically live in England.
The whole time, um, that he wasout of the country for sure.

(01:09:00):
But I feel like this happens with Britishfolks sometimes where they're like that
like British folks that have, you know,either be bopped in and out of the U S or
like live in the U S ex-pats, whatever.
Um, they're like, well, I wasn't herethen anyway, because there's a lot of
England likes to pretend that it was.

(01:09:20):
You know, they're like,yeah, the U S is awful.
They're super racist.
My mom talks about this all the time.
Like how went in schools?
They were taught like, oh yeah, they,the United States is they're bad.
They own slaves task task, but it's like,

(01:09:44):
yeah.
Also where did, where did all those folks come from?
Also, if you look at thetrajectory of slavery, it starts
with England, but it's fine.
But it was not to, you know, Imean, that's where I come from,
so, you know, that's my ancestry.
Um, so I guess I should probablytake responsibility for that.

(01:10:09):
Um, but I just noticed that that verylike, you know, my British folks that I
know are like, well, I wasn't here anyway,so I didn't vote cause I wasn't here.
Hmm.
That's a really good.
I never thought of it that way.
Yeah.
I mean, it does feel good to beable to be like, well, I wasn't
a part of that awful thing.

(01:10:30):
Right, right.
Why do you think that this brings up areally important point that we're like
talking about how, you know, a majorityof white people, when we immigrated
to the U S we were fleeing some typeof harm in Europe, but that doesn't
because that's kind of like whereancestry kind of stops, um, through

(01:10:50):
our family lineages, we never thinkabout the ways that we perpetrated harm
within our ancestral lines before that.
Um, because when we talk aboutintergenerational harm and how it goes
back 300 years, if your family camehere, like Sam's like, T's within the
past hundred years, you still have 200years of intergenerational trauma that

(01:11:16):
you're holding in your body right nowthat is located in house within your.
Right.
Or like within Sam's case, like within themiddle east Syria and Turkey and Israel.
Yep.
And so that's being played out here too.
Yeah, for sure.
Yeah, for sure.
Yeah.

(01:11:36):
Let's listen to this last,last lovely human human.
Lastly, there's teach he's 34 yearsold, urban leaning, suburban and works
as a janitor and an education setting,
political party.
If any Democrat religiousaffiliation, if any.

(01:11:57):
Um, with the organization,I'd say I'm agnostic
partnership status.
If any, I'm
in a domestic partnership, not married.
Um, who did you vote for in the 2016 presidential election?
The 20 16 1 was HillaryClinton and Donald Trump
in that one, but I votedin the more recent one.

(01:12:18):
Okay.
Who'd you vote for?
Not Trump.
And what's your ethnicity?
Can you pinpoint around when yourfamily immigrated to the U S like
what decade or point of origin?
On my mom's side, my mom'smom's side is Italian.
So they were here in the early 19thcentury, maybe the thirties or forties,

(01:12:43):
uh, before that, on my dad's side andmy mom's dad's side, they, as far as I
know, I've been here since the Mayflower.
Soon after Jenny explainsthe Kinsey scale for teach.
Probably a zero to a
one, zero to a one in your family growing up.
Were you raised to be racistor if you weren't, how are

(01:13:04):
you taught to be not racist?
And my immediate family, I was taughtto be not racist, but I have a lot of
extended family that swings the other way.
Um, uh, was they touched me not raised.
That's a tricky one.
Cause I, I came from a very white area.

(01:13:26):
So there really wasn't anydiversity, at least when I was
up until about the age of 12.
So as far as like inclusion andthat sort of thing, I don't think
there's anything really put intopractice that helps me with that.
It was just kind of average.
I just remember my mom, youknow, preaching inclusivity,
whatever in a hypothetical medic.

(01:13:48):
Which of these three ideas or movements do you most closely
align with all lives matter?
Black lives matter, bluelives matter and why black
lives matter because that movementalready understands that all
lives and blue lives matter.
It's just, they're trying to remindpeople that black lives matter too.

(01:14:08):
When a lot of times people forget
that.
How often do you thinkabout race or racism?
So not necessarily talking aboutit, but just in your everyday
go on about your business.
And you're thinking about it a lot.
I think about it a lot.
My son, I have a sonwho's nine he's biracial.
So his mom is black, I'm white.
So a lot of times the, you know, racerelations in the country and in the

(01:14:33):
world, will I take them personallybecause of that, you know, there's just.
A topic of interest for that reason,you know, I worry a lot about him.
And just about those things thatsomeone of, uh, you know, anyone with
minority children would worry about.
How often do you talk about race with people of color?

(01:14:54):
Really not often.
I mean, I don't really have a lotof friends of color these days.
Um, I do talk about an option withwhite people, but, um, I mean, as
far as minorities, you know, peoplewho are in my life, it's really just
my son's mother and her parents.
And we don't really speakabout race too often.

(01:15:15):
How often you said, ha um, how often would you say you talk
about race with white people?
Um,
I was talking about itwith my partner a lot.
She's white, and so it'sa pretty frequently.
Um, a lot of times has to do with issuesin the news or, you know, day to day
things that pop up, um, probably daily.

(01:15:38):
How often do you talk about race or engage with, um, about
race online, like social media
nowadays?
I don't really, but I used to,I used to, I used to try to call
out my family members a lot.
Like I was speaking about earlier,the some extended family who has have
racist tendencies, I feel like I wouldoften push back every time I could.

(01:16:02):
Um, if they posted something racist or,you know, questionable anyway, um, I
stopped doing that because it didn't,I don't think any minds were changed.
Um, I just, I don't know if that'swhere my energy is best to use.
How comfortable are you talking about race and racism in general?

(01:16:23):
Comfortable, um, as comfortable asI can be with getting uncomfortable.
I mean, I, I think it's important to talkabout and I feel like as white people,
we don't really talk about it as much.
We're kind of just ontop of the food chain.
I mean, even those of us who want tosee a more inclusive world, I feel like

(01:16:46):
it's, it's easy to just kind of blendin and not really fight the good fight.
So I can't remember what the
question I, oh, that's okay.
I said, how comfortable are youtalking about race or racism?
Pretty comfortable.
And I'd say, I try to do it.
I try to make an activeeffort to speak about
it.
What's your most recentlevel of education?

(01:17:07):
Uh,
do the year of college,
his answers are a little different and my assumption would be
that that has a lot to do with his.
Like his involvement in his sometime,but that may not be completely accurate.

(01:17:28):
Um,
We can speculate for sure.
Sure.
Right, right.
I just want to make sure thatI'm not like, and this is why.
Um, cause I don't know, but I, yeah.
Yeah.
You said something that'slike really beautiful ways.
I think about it all the time.
All the time, becauseI worry about my kid.

(01:17:53):
Yeah.
And so he's like deeply, deeplyconnected through his child into this
broader conversation of racial justice.
Only through his child though.
He was very clear about that.
Right.
He's not talking about with anybody else.
No.
Uh, oh, well let me rephrase that.

(01:18:13):
He's not talking aboutit with folks of color.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But as with this partneron a daily basis, he
was white, but they have those conversations.
Yeah.
Right.
Anything.
So yeah.
There's that otherinteresting part too, where.
Um, there's this, I think, largernarrative around, um, people with

(01:18:34):
college degrees, um, who are moreconnected to social justice spaces.
Um, and so here is this person whodoesn't have a college degree, but
was even reiterating some talkingpoints of the left by saying, um, I'm
comfortable with, but however much youcan be uncomfortable with that, right?

(01:18:59):
That like this human is doing workoutside of an academic setting or
circle about race and racism, whichI think sits in really stark contrast
to someone like T who is like a decadeolder than, uh, and is entering the
conversation for the first time.

(01:19:19):
So yeah, like something'sdifferent for sure.
Yeah.
Yep.
And he also didn't vote in the2016, which was fucking crazy to me.
Yeah.
Well, and, but, okay.
So it was fucking crazy to me.
And then also I remember talking to whitefolks during that election and like us

(01:19:43):
talking about who we're going to vote forand me being like, oh, Hillary, for sure.
And having people say either they weren'tgoing to vote or they were voting for
Trump because they hated Hillary somuch, which is a different conversation.
I'm sure.
But I just that's, that's what I hearda lot from, from white folks that I

(01:20:06):
was, I mean, I didn't sit down and doa census or anything, but you know, the
people that I knew that would be werewilling to talk to me about it, it wasn't
because they liked to Trump necessarilyfrom the folks that I talked to.
It was that they hatedHillary that much more.
Yeah.
I think too geographically,it's important to point out.

(01:20:27):
Your in New York.
Stateness again now.
Yeah.
Oh yeah.
No, that's very different.
Yeah.
I'm one of those wonderfully forgottenindustrial towns of New York state.
Yeah.
There's a few states where youcan totally vote ideologically

(01:20:53):
rather than practically.
And if you like New York stateand California are two such states
because they are so heavily democraticand lean democratic for so long.
And so I understand that there'll besome people will be like, no, like even
though Hillary is going to take thestate that kind of ideological push.

(01:21:13):
I guess I just didn't make any sense to
me.
Right.
Well, I think that, that againgoes to that like privilege of, oh
no, no, no, no, no, no, I don't.
It doesn't really matter.
I'm going to come in up here onideological means rather than right.
And also I sh I shouldn't paint myself as like some, some Superman
of social justice at the time.
I wasn't even that, wasn'twhy I was voting for Hillary.

(01:21:36):
Just to be clear, I cannot sit in aseat that says, oh, I voted for Hillary
because of, you know, social justice.
No.
Interestingly teach also saidthat his ethnicity is white.
I know.
I heard that.
I was like, Lauren's gonna say nothing.

(01:22:00):
I don't know either.
I was just like, okay.
You know, I think a lot ofpeople don't know the difference
between ethnicity and race.
Uh, okay.
I'll say me like a really ridiculouscontroversial moment here.
Official.
I experience sex and genderin very similar ways.

(01:22:23):
As I do race and ethnicity,sex is something that you were
assigned, something that's justlike coming with your body and your
ethnicity and your gender are theseculturally socially defined things.
And so they are, they can be incomplete odds with your race, with

(01:22:47):
your sex, and they can be the exactsame as your race or your sex.
Um, and so when I hear someone saywhite, though, it just like takes
it, like it comes a little jarring.
Um, but it can also be true.

(01:23:08):
Like when I think about like the whiteAmerican experience like that, I think
isn't that tenacity like the whole, um,when you think about like an American
moment, like a white American moment, likethe, like a 4th of July Lee Greenwood,
proud to be an American barbecue.

(01:23:30):
Uh, yeah.
Like anything that's like,middle-class fancy on Instagram.
Like that.
It's just like, so hardcore whiteculture to say that, oh yeah, I'm white.
It's like, oh, I can likefilter you into that schema of
like, that's where you belong.
Like bald Eagles wear sunglasses ona shirt that you bought from Walmart

(01:23:52):
that says don't mess with this.
Well, I can't say that's not who Tesia is.
Cause I don't know teach, but that'snot the answers he gave to the rest
of the questions did not paint him.
Yeah.
As that kind of human.
I'm also a very awkward Laffer.

(01:24:12):
I realize people say stuff that's weird.
And I'm like, I don't know how tolike contextualize it in my body.
I think.
Um, yeah.
Wow.
With that one littleword, we were like, Ooh.
Yeah, we were really kind of sound done.
I think there's just some stuffthat we haven't been able to

(01:24:33):
articulate yet in this series.
Right.
Wow.
That's a lot
top of the food chain.
Yeah.
He, I feel like he probablyheard that somewhere
and like in a, like in, in a sarcasm.

(01:24:54):
Whey and the way he delivered it,maybe although I'm making conjecture,
he said what he said, I don't know.
But like,
yeah, there was something in me that itfelt like a scratch on that chalkboard.
It was like, oh, like, I don't likethe way that the sounds and also,
but like historically, is he wrong?

(01:25:15):
Right.
Yeah.
And I think that, that to me is mylike white shame coming up of like,
I don't know, we're not talking aboutwhite people, power and privilege.
It makes me feel gross and uncomfortable.
It makes me feel bad about my as well.
Right.
Yeah.
So I don't want you to talk about it.
I think that that's wherethat scratch comes from.
I see what you're saying,
but then I think there's this other partof like, oh, wow, this is this historical

(01:25:38):
trope that is slowly going away.
And so we need to start honoringthe present truth as well.
Yeah.
In a lot of ways, white people don'texperience themselves ourselves
as being the top of the food chainanymore in every single space.
And that's okay.

(01:25:59):
That's good.
And that's also a neutral,
yeah.
Neutrality is a new concept for mepersonally, in terms of everything.
Well, I don't think everythingcan be neutral and only everything
should be neutral, but there is,we can also just like, not have an
emotional experience around that.
Yeah.
Which is not how I live.

(01:26:22):
That's what I'm saying.
It's like, I can't not have an emotionalexperience about everything that happened.
Right.
Yeah, I've got two more things, atleast 2016, not voting again, 2020.
Who did you vote for?
Not Trump

(01:26:42):
calculated, right?
That thing is likewhoever isn't Trump right.
Would have been anybody,
right.
Could have been any,but just not that human.
Um, but then also we had someonenamed they're like us root.
Which is great with the familygoing back to the Mayflower.
Oh yeah.

(01:27:02):
So that was really lovely.
Oh yeah.
That like really beautiful momentthat Tish was talking about with
trying to engage his problematic
family.
Yes.
And the way he wasdoing it, wasn't helping
the amount.
See that to me is self-actualizationlike that to me is self-reflection

(01:27:22):
for sharing or self aware, like whenyou were talking about that with Sam.
Yeah.
That's not what I'm at.
I probably used the wrong words
and it may be the same, or it'sjust different because it shows up
differently in different people.
But that could be like, ohyeah, this isn't working.
I don't know.
Yeah.
By self-aware with Sam, I met like awareof himself in space, but it doesn't.

(01:27:46):
Yeah.
It doesn't translate the way thatit did with Tesia in that, in that
moment where he talked about thatmaybe self-focused is more with Sam.
Yeah.
Anyway.
All right.
You want to keep, fortunately, I thinkat this point, we'll end up as third one.
Yes

(01:28:32):
Should we do like a little thing where I'm like, Hey
friends, thanks for listening.
Just a little reminder rate review,subscribe, share with your friends.
Helps us out there.
It just did it.