S3E01: Joy as Resistance and Bias Reduction

For this Halloween episode, Will is dressed as Dracula and Amber is the Bride of Frankenstein! This is the first episode of season 3, and Amber’s joy is all the great reactions the podcast has received, including “Diverse Joy” being officially ranked in the top 5% of all podcasts globally! Will’s joy is that his book, "Overcoming Bias Habits", is now available for preorder! (Details below.) This episode’s discussion topic is how joy can be used as a scientifically validated tool against bias. Some of this concept is reflected in historical and contemporary notions of “joy as resistance,” using joy in many forms—community, song, fellowship—to fight injustice and oppression. They also discuss the distinction between genuine joy and performative or toxic positivity. Many scientists say that the primary driving force behind bias is having more pleasant (i.e., joyful) memories with similar folks and fewer with those who are different from you. In that way, cultivating diverse joy, in terms of building more, and more joyful, memories with diverse people, directly helps combat and push back against bias in your mind and behavior. The discussion brings into focus two primary goals that Will and Amber want everyone to keep in mind: doing the work to 1) cultivate diverse joy, and 2) disrupt bias habits. Working on each goal can help you with the other, and together they will help us all build a better world, bit by bit.  Our answers to this episode’s question explains that we don’t talk about current events because every episode is meant to be an evergreen educational resource, and discussing current events would date the episodes in an unhelpful way. During story time, the more negative story this episode involves how one of Amber’s colleagues had traumatic negative experiences with Black folks, which fueled them to have stronger unintentional race bias towards her. This episode’s positive story comes from a listener who shared that they actively use the notion of bias being a habit whenever they notice a biased thought. Our bias habit-breaking skill continues that theme, encouraging us all to Approach Biases as Habits to be Broken. We further emphasize that all the habit-breaking skills are actionable (they involve you doing something), self-sustainable (you can maintain them over time), customizable (you can adapt them to different contexts), and generalizable (you use them to work on biases related to race, gender, LGBTQ+ statuses, age, disability, or any other group status you can think of).  Will’s joyful recommendation is the movie “Sinners.” It includes themes of “joy as resistance” with the Black community combating racism through a horror allegory. It is a fun, not-too-scary vampire romp to help you cultivate diverse joy and disrupt bias habits! Dr. Cox’s book becomes available for preorder the day this episode releases! Preorder through our website BiasHabit.com, on Amazon or Barnes & Noble. The publisher is University of California Press, and the full title is Overcoming Bias Habits: An Evidence-Based Guide to Creating a Joyfully Inclusive World.

Preorder Overcoming Bias Habits

From Amazon: https://a.co/d/iwnakbM

From Barnes and Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/overcoming-bias-habits-william-t-l-cox-phd/1148276458?ean=9780520410428

We now have merch! Buy some to support the show at https://www.biashabit.com/store

Follow Diverse Joy on social media, including Facebook, Instagram,
Season three!
Isn’t that amazing?- It’s so great.
Oh my gosh.
So getting into it.
Amber, what's bringing you joy?
Yeah.
As we go into season three,
you know,
I've had just a lot of feedbackabout the podcast, which is amazing.

(01:29):
And getting to hear people just come up
and tell me about it and tell methat their listening has been such a joy.
I had a colleaguewho is doing some research,
and I don't even rememberwhat the research was about, but
essentially one of the questions was,“Where are they learning about diversity?
Where are they continuingto expose themselves?”

(01:51):
And our podcast came up and she wasso excited to come tell me she's like,
“So somebody mentioned itin my research study! Said
‘Diverse Joy’ podcast is a place in whichthey continue to learn about diversity.”
And a friend and colleague of mine,Doctor Amy,
who does relational healthresearch and trainings,

(02:13):
she posts about it all the time
and she constantly is advertisingand telling people to come
and listen as another placewhere they can continue to learn.
And, it's just really coolto see other professionals
and hear about professionalsdoing it, and enjoying and,
getting a lot out of our showand our conversations.

(02:36):
But also I havemy little niecey,
her name is Christiana.
Hi, Christiana.- Hi, Christiana!
She is ten years old,and I've known her since she was,
like four, I think.
I go to church with her as well,
and every week, at least once a month,she comes up and she's like,

(02:57):
“Amber, I listened to the podcast!I listen to the podcast.”
So she is one of our most devotedlisteners,
Youngest, probably.- Probably our youngest listener and most devoted.
She gets so excitedand she like, tells her friends about it
and she just gets so --it just it brings me joy
to see how much joy it bringsmy little ten year old niece.

(03:20):
So. Yeah. It’s amazing.
Well, glomming on to yours a little bit.
I also have some “Diverse Joy” joy.
Yes, yes.
So speaking of kids, I have,
a friend with a daughter who's about 13,I believe.
And they said that she was at someone'shouse, like, for a birthday party

(03:40):
and that the kid’s parent hada “Diverse Joy” magnet on their fridge.
And she was like,“I know the people who make that.”
That sounds so sweet.
Awe! That’s so great.
Yeah. Also in “Diverse Joy” joy,
you were mentioningwe came up in that research study,
we are now officiallyranked as being in the
top 5% of all podcasts in the world.

(04:00):
I mean, that's amazing.
So that is very exciting.
It's so exciting.
And it's thanks to allof you listening
and watching because that'swhat the statistics are based on.
So thank you so much for sticking with usand helping us do that.
One last tiny “Diverse Joy” joy,
- Yes, yes!
I learned how to say “Diverse Joy” insign language, which the people listening
won’t able to see me do it,but the people watching:

(04:24):
So this is how you say “Diverse Joy”.
- Yeah!
Yeah. So.
So it's kind of like moving the hand,both hands on the like,
moving outwardskind of up and down and then,
moving them,
forward and backwardstowards your self.
Kind of like you’re wafting somethingat your face, that’s the “Joy”.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I love it.

(04:45):
That’s great.
Yeah. And Will,
what is your joycoming into this third season?
Well, some people might remember in
one or two episodes last season,I talked about a book I was writing.
- Right.
And I am pleased to announce that
that book is available for preorder today.

(05:05):
Today?- Yes!
Not today when we're filming,but today when this episode comes out.
- All right, all right.- On October 1st.
So cool.
So all have you listeningif you want to pull up your Amazon
or wherever you buy books,you can order my book;
it’s full title is “Overcoming Bias Habits:
An Evidence-Based Guide toCreating a Joyfully Inclusive World”

(05:28):
by Dr. William T. L. Cox.
Woo! Not “T. L. Cox”
like I said earlier?
No, there's a “W” also.- Yes, yes.
(Both laughing)
Yeah.
And, so, we'll also have a linkon the website BiasHabit.com
our nonprofit's websitewhere you can find places to order it.
But my publisher was saying Amazon'sespecially good for us because for

(05:51):
every one someone buys on Amazon,Amazon actually purchases ten of them.
Wow. That's amazing.
So check it out there.- Yeah.
And so, yeah,that's been a long process.
A year of writing the book and 20 years ofdoing the research that led up to it.
Yeah.
And that brings usa little into our topic.
So just, I'm not going to talkabout my book the whole time, I promise.

(06:13):
But, the basis of the book,
is from something that my colleaguesand I worked on for many years
that longtime listeners will have heard metalk about before,
called the bias habit-breaking training.
And one thing that weactually talked about
in our very first episode back in the day,is that there are a lot of diversity
and bias trainings that aren't evidence-based,that don't get tested in randomized

(06:35):
controlled experiments to show what kind of effects they're having.
And our group, me andmy many great colleagues
who have done this research,have tried to provide an antidote to that.
Our bias habit-breaking training,
we've tested it in over a dozenrandomized, controlled experiments.
We've had some really amazingfindings, including in one of our huge studies

(06:57):
a 43% increase in hiring members
of underrepresented groups as faculty.
In a study we did withmiddle and high school teachers
if teachers got our training, achievement gaps or their students of color
went away, completely disappeared.
And many other things.
You can read about my researchalso through our website
if you're very interested.
But actually an editor at my publisher,

(07:20):
University of California Press,sought me out to write the book.
I had the idea for the book.
Like, I had an idea that I wantedto write up our training as a book.
But before I could kind ofget to that phase of actually starting
to write itand figuring out how to publish it,
she actually reached out to meand was like, “I've heard about your work.”
She’d read some of my papers.
And she was like, “Would you be willingto write this up as a book?”

(07:41):
And I was like, “Well, dang,I want to do that anyway.”
“Well, actually!” (Laughing)
So so that's exciting.
My joy for this episode.We're going to talk a little bit more
at the very end of the episode.
We'll give the official descriptionof the book for folks.
It relates to our main topic.
So the first episode of every seasonwe kind of revisit,
the concepts of diverse joy,

(08:04):
that was kind of the basis of the podcast,but in a different way,
bringing in different thingsto talk about.
And that's what we'regoing to do a bit today.
Talk about why we focus on joyand specifically how,
scientific evidence pointsto, what we call
diverse joy as a validated wayto help people reduce bias.
Absolutely.
So when we first started way back, firstepisode years ago…

(08:27):
- I know!- … it’s been years!
You know, it's been years now,isn’t that wild?
We came up with this idea of diverse joy,in part because I was just excited
that Amber was coming here.
Like, Amber was flying to Madison,Wisconsin, where we record,
and I just kept feeling so much joy
that my friend was comingand we were going to do this.
And somehow it combined in my head,I was like, we could call it “Diverse Joy”.

(08:48):
- Yeah.
And at the time,
something that was happening at the timeand unfortunately is still happening,
was that there many examples ofdiverse people's joy
getting policed or criminalized.
So drag queens, for instance,
some states trying to make drag illegal.
Black folks having a picnic and getting the copscalled on them, things like that.

(09:11):
And so we kind of talked about that,a bit in that first episode.
And we won't rehash it.
But in very recent times,
it's kind of come back as this idea ofjoy being resistance.
So, members of stigmatizedcommunities are saying, you know,
there are bad thingshappening in the world.
In the United States specifically,
there's a lot of stuffthat is not treating diverse folks well,

(09:34):
but that one of the waysto fight back against it is joy.
Because if we get exhaustedby all the awful things going on,
we end up burning out.
And that's what

some forces want to happen: they want to overwhelm and burn us out. (09:45):
undefined
And so we really needthat kind of community, that sort of joy,
to help us persevere, for many causes.
- 100%. Yeah.
I think that there are two pieces
that I think about. One is, personaland community ways
in which we performand do joy as resistance.

(10:09):
And then, of course, is the historicaland cultural pieces of joy as resistance,
that you’re talking about, right?
When you think about Black liberation movements,
when you think about queer joy,when we think about
indigenous traditions andleaning into those pieces
as means of reclaiming joyeven in the midst of oppression.

(10:31):
That those are waysthose are antidotes to
a system that is trying tostrip us of our dignity,
trying to strip us and keep us, oppressed
and dismayed and tired and exhausted.
Right?
That joy is the antidoteto all of those things.
There's this quote, and I wrote it down --hopefully I can read my handwriting,

(10:55):
because my handwriting is not great.
But it's by Rebecca Walker,
who is a third wave feminist.
She actually is the person that coinedthe term third wave feminism.
And she's the author.
I first came to know about her from
one of her books called“Black, White, and Jewish”.

(11:15):
And talking about kind of thatintersectionality growing up as interracial.
And so anyway,

the quote is (11:22):
“Joy is an act of resistance against the machine of oppression
that wants us broken, quiet, and erased.”
And I love that, because that's exactlywhat we're talking about, right?
Joy is a resistanceagainst this machine,
this culture, the systemthat tries to pull those things from us.

(11:44):
It reminds you of something that youtalked about last season: decolonization.
And also kind of capitalism mixed inwith that, because, you know,
capitalism focuses on productivity and profitand centers those things, not joy.
- Right.
And being kind of capitalistin colonized societies, that is often
what's emphasized and leads to thingslike burnout and so on.

(12:06):
And so centering joy is also, I guess
would be called maybe potentially a decolonizing practice?
-100%.
Yeah, 100%.
I think it's a decolonialway of thinking about,
resistance.
Right.
And even thinking aboutjoy as a form of resistance,
just like last season --one of the previous episodes,

(12:28):
I’m sure I talked about Audre Lorde’squotes around self preservation and self-care
as as a means of of resistance.
But there's this other piece
that’s like it's alsocommunity oriented.
It's pulling -- it's moving us awayfrom these ideas of what traditional ways
in which we resist thingsthat are coming against us.

(12:49):
- Awesome.
Another thing that I wasthinking about with this
is that I want us todistinguish between
joy as resistance
versus like, the idea of toxic positivity.
- Oh, absolutely.
Because it can be really easy to do
performative joy, right?

(13:10):
Or just be toxically positive.
And this is not that.
This is not just dismissing hardship.
This is not saying, “Just think positively,
just do this!”And dismissing the things that are hard.
Doing joy as resistance
is rooted in authenticity and survival.

(13:33):
It is rooted in …
it's rooted in
a cultural understanding,a personal understanding.
It's rooted in something that is much morethan just saying, “Just be positive.”
It's saying, “I'm finding joy in the midstof hardship, in the midst of oppression.”
We see this throughout our history, right?

(13:55):
Absolutely.
And one thing that I'm going to talk aboutas my joy in a later episode,
we've - Eric Roman and I - especiallyhave been going to pride events
and things promoting the podcast,
and that's something I always bring upbecause I'm worried
people are going to thinkit's a toxic positivity.
- Right, right!
And the way I say it is, we don't shy awayfrom difficult topics.
- Right, exactly!

(14:15):
We address them, but we always havea focus on how to make them better.
And we bring it back to a place of joy.- Right.
So yeah, so that's kind ofone of the ways that we talk about
this kind of concept of diverse joy,
but it can mean multiple things;so that’s joy in diverse communities.
But also which we're going to talka little more about now is,
kind of diverse joy in terms of,“thinkiabout the joy you’ve had

(14:37):
in your life and how much of ithas been with diverse people.”
- Mmhmm.
And, there are a lot ofresearchers in my field -
and for any new listeners,my background is in social psychology,
I'm a PhD scientist
who studied bias and how to help peopleovercome bias for almost 20 years now -
there are many researchers who actuallydefine bias as having less pleasantness,

(15:00):
less pleasant memories,less pleasant associations
with people who are different from usrather than people who are similar to us.
- Right.
One of the scientific terms forthis is in-group favoritism.
So if you think of, for instance,your family and growing up,
for most people, you're going to grow upwith people who are the same race as you,
have other kinds of similarities to you.
And so you end up having just more joywith people who are similar to you.

(15:24):
And then when someone is different,
you just don't have those same happy,positive associations.
And so the difference between the happy,joyful memories you have,
the pleasant memories,and lack of that ends up making,
what we what we measureas bias in research.
But also it means
you don't behave as favorably, maybe,to someone who's different from you.

(15:44):
- Right.
And my colleagues
Tony Greenwald and Mahzarin Banajihave done a lot of work on this, even,
fMRI studies looking at the brainwhere they really say,
“It's actually us having more joywith our own groups
that is the primarydriving force and bias.”
And so
thinking of that and then also tying itto research that has shown this,

(16:07):
if we can increase the diversityin our joyful memories,
have more joy with peoplewho are different from us,
make friendships with peopleoutside our own social groups,
media - which we talk about every episodeat the end - telling more stories.
Getting those
positive associations in your mindis directly a way to work against that.
The more you can cultivate diverse joy.

(16:27):
Using that term a little differentlythan the other way we were using it.
Cultivating diverse joycan directly be scientifically validated
effective weapon to reduce bias.
- Absolutely.
I mean, that's huge, right?
And we've talked about it from,like you said,
the broadening your input perspective,but really thinking about it from

(16:50):
that lens of,“If I only have joyful experiences
with folks that look or experiencelife similar to me,
then I'm by kind of default.
I have this bias against other people
because I don't have that immediate,joyful interaction.

(17:11):
I don't have the immediatejoyful association
with folks that that lookor have different experiences than me.”
And, you know, we're drawn to things -just thinking, we're going to talk
more about this next episode, actually,
we have it on the plan -
but we tend to be drawn to thingsthat we've had pleasurable experiences
with in the past.
Our brains are really focused on,

(17:31):
“Oh, this is something
that's going to bring me more joy.”Your brain's reward system,
which is what we're talking aboutnext month.
But if you think about that in workplacecontext, you're gonna be gravitating
more towards people who are similar to youbecause of this past experience,
not because you're fundamentally racistor hateful or anti-gay or whatever,
but just this kind of gravitationthat your brain's going to have.
And so a lot of what we dowith this podcast

(17:54):
and with this broader research that we'vedone, is focus on counteracting that.
- Right.
And so I like to think about whatwe're going to do,
what we do all the time with the podcast.
But, in this season, in my book,in the training that we do,
is kind of having two goals that we wantto work with and they're reciprocal.
So the idea of cultivating diverse joy,which both means the community

(18:15):
sort of stuff we started offtalking about joy as resistance
and within an individual person's life,making their joy more diverse.
And those are thingsthat work against bias.
So those workto disrupt bias habits.
And we're going to talk more about thisnotion of habits being related to bias,
later in this episode, for anyonewho's just starting with us and doesn't

(18:37):
know what I mean by that yet.
But basically, as we cultivatediverse joy, it works against bias,
but also as we do
other things to work against bias,it helps us cultivate more diverse joy.
Because if my bias is saying,“Oh, I'm not going to have anything in common
with this person because of their skincolor, because of their culture.
You know, you have that bias that stopsyou from having those interactions

(18:58):
and finding that you have a lot in commonand cultivating that joy
with someone else.
So as we work to reduce bias,we are better able to cultivate diverse joy.
As we cultivate diverse joy,we're better able
to disrupt our bias habits.
And for the people watching on video,Roman can put this
symbol I made him create where it'skind of like a little cycle of disrupting,

(19:21):
you know, habits,
feeds into more joy and and so on.
I love that, too.
(Stammering)
Our “Diverse Joy” bingo, right?(Both laughing)
“Both/and.”
Phrases that we like to say a lot.
Phrases that we say often.
Both/and.
Right? It's not just the disruption.

(19:41):
It is the disruption,and it is cultivation.
- Yes.
And so there's an active piece of this.
There’s the kind of stopping of a biasand cultivating a counter narrative.
Right? And cultivatingadditional positive experiences
and putting yourself in positionswhere you can cultivate those things.

(20:02):
- Absolutely.
And that also brings it back to somethingI said at the beginning about,
bias and diversity trainings or
what people often called “DEI trainings”that sometimes fall short.
One of the reasons we know many of them
fall short and sometimes actually createmore problems rather than helping them,
is a negativity focus where it'sonly talking about the problems,

(20:25):
talking about the problems,and then people get demotivated.
They're just like,
“I don't want bias to happen,but I don't know what to do about it.”
But by having the positive side of things,that was part of the design
of the podcast years ago, we were like,we need to have that positive,
that positivity, that thing to approach,not just something to avoid.
- Absolutely.
So, so, yeah.

(20:46):
Some of that's new, some of that's a refreshfor people who’ve listened all along.
But that's kind of the backgroundof what we try to do with this podcast.
And then the rest of itis bringing in kind of the science of how
we can actually makemeaningful change.
In more detailed ways,teaching people skills, and so on.
So, I think we're going to go on breakright now, and then we will come back

(21:09):
with some more great stuff.
So see you in a moment.
[ “Diverse Joy” interstitial music plays ]
Okay.
Welcome back from the break.
We're just going to startwith our question.
And this is actually a questionthat's come up quite a bit.
But the question really iswhy don't we talk about current events.

(21:33):
- Yeah.
So lots of people - like peopleI know who listen to the podcast =
and 1 or 2 people who sentquestions through the website,
have asked this, and I have a Dolly Partonquote, to help me start my answer.
One of my favorite Dolly Parton quotes, is
“It takes a lot of money to look this cheap.”
And the way that actually answersthe question is,

(21:54):
it takes a lot of time and effortto produce the podcast.
So, the earliest you could be listening tothis is October 1st.
We're recording it on August 31st.- Right.
Because our producer, Eric Roman,has to pull all the video together.
So we're being recorded by one,
two,
three,
four,
- FIVE! - …five cameras
recording the video.

(22:15):
He has to mix the audio.
If we cough or sputter or something,
he has to take all that out.
And then, you know, we need to -
Amber and I watched the videos and listento everything for quality assurance.
And usually there's always a secondround of editing where
maybe we said a fact slightly wrong.
We need to cut that out or somethingand fact checking everything.

(22:35):
So it just takes a lot of work.
So from the time we recordan episode to it coming out,
the current events would bewould be old or have changed.
- Yeah.
And just before we move on,I just want to take a moment to thank
our producer, Eric Roman,and how amazing he is

(22:56):
and how amazing our episodeshave come out.
And the sound qualityand the video quality and the photos.
Like he is the magician behindthe scenes and we're so thankful for him.
(Producer Eric Roman) You’re welcome. Thank you!
I could I could literally talk about howamazing and talented this man is all day.
I will spare you all, but I will probablysay it again because he's amazing.

(23:19):
Absolutely.
So so that's one of the big things.
The other is that we really designand work on
every episode's topics to bean evergreen educational resource,
and we are just so thrilledthat there are actually people using this.
So I know there are at least a coupleof professors who use one of our episodes
in their classroomsas a lecture on a topic.

(23:43):
One of the big ones
is the intersectionality episodefrom episode one -- or season one.
Excuse me.- Season one.
And so,
if we start talking about current events,then these can't serve as evergreen,
educational resources like that.
And so that's why. One last tiny biton a slightly related note,
we are a nonprofit, which limits whatwe can talk about with regard to politics.

(24:07):
We can talk about events happeningand so on.
But anything that could be construedas speaking in favor
of or against a particular politician,
would violate our nonprofit status,
which we need to be ableto keep operating at all.
So so there'sa little bit of that as well.
And I think, again, us wantingto be really intentional

(24:30):
about these being evergreen,this allows this
for you to take these topicsand to expand them
and generalize them to current events,right? To allow the topic to come up
and whatever is going oncurrently to then apply it
and say, “How does this fit withwhat's going on right now?
What pieces can we take from this?

(24:52):
How can we take this skill and apply it towhat's going on in our country?
In your neighborhood? Nationally?
How do we take this and use this in thein these specific instances?”
- Absolutely.
When we get to our skillin a little bit
I'm going to talk aboutthe skills that we teach every episode.
One of their core featuresis them being customizable,
which is exactly whatAmber just described

(25:14):
that I'm not just telling you
how to grade students betterif I use an example for grading students,
it's that that is a skillthat if you are a lawyer,
if you are a medical doctor,if you are a retail worker,
there's something that you can customizeto your situation.
the place you are,
with all of the core skills that we teachin all the episodes.

(25:36):
- Aboslutely.- So yeah. Yeah, yeah.
All right.
So with that as the question,
our next segment today is story time.
And as always,
we have a kind of more negative story,maybe a time that bias happened.
And then a more positive story.
We're going to start off,Amber’s got the more negative story,
although it turns a bit positiveby the end.
So what's your story, Amber?

(25:57):
Yeah.
So, I mentioned actually,I think the last episode
about an experiencewhere I had feedback as a student
that kind of categorized meas arrogant and a bully.
And that was something that hasreally stayed - that really stayed with me.
Continues to and 15 plus years later.

(26:19):
But this person,
is somebody that I came backand started working with
as a faculty member and,
you know,I think at the time I didn't necessarily
specifically tie it to racialized -
however, after having conversations,I was like,
“Oh, I wonder if there's a cultural differenceor a cultural misunderstanding here.”

(26:43):
When I talked to themabout that experience,
and that feedback,and they were like, “Oh, yeah, maybe.”
(Both chuckling)
And again, as much as it impacted me then,
I tried to come back to like, okay,there's a cultural misunderstanding here.
There's a misinterpretation of me.
And as I came backand started to work with this person,

(27:03):
I learned more about their ownpersonal experiences with Black folks
throughout their life.
And they've had some really negative,
personal experienceswhere they were attacked.
They were held at gunpoint.
They had several - or at least 2or 3 major instances in their life.

(27:26):
So, so not just the lack of joywe were talking.
- Not just lack of joy!
But this personliterally had some really scary, really,
traumatic experiences with folksthat embodied Black bodies.
And so I do believe --I actually love this person.
And, and I think they did a lot of workaround it and still maintained

(27:47):
this underlying fear and bias against,folks that inhabit Black bodies.
And I think those things were learnedand reinforced through media
and reinforcedthrough cultural perceptions.
And this is an older person.
And so at the time, too,
there weren't necessarily positive
portrayals of Black folksin the media and in culture.

(28:13):
And that's part of what feeds intothe notion of bias being like a habit.
So it's not necessarily borne outof animus, out of hating, out of prejudice.
It’s, It becomes the kind of defaultway our brains
maybe think aboutmembers of different groups.
And so this is part of what we talk about
bias being like a habit or ushaving bias habits that we try to work on.

(28:33):
And I think this person, too,really came out of a family
that worked to try to have - at the time,you know - a colorblind approach to interacting,
which was theDEI of the time.
You know, of the ‘60s and ’70s.
Which we know now doesn’t work,according to the evidence.
Doesn’t work, right.
But it was the DEI of the time, I think.
And then had thesereally negative experiences

(28:56):
and that completely,
gave a 180 on their perceptionof Black folks.
So that being that, again,that learned experience and habit
that they built over time, that thenany experience that they had with,
particularly, Black embodied folksthat was confident

(29:17):
or outspokenwas then perceived as aggressive …
- Aggressive, yeah.
… and attacking.
And again, I think thatmost people that know me
would never categorize me as a bully.
- Definitely.
I would continue to hopethat that is the case.
But me being,you know…

(29:38):
- Assertive.
… assertive and even embodied
in the way that I embody myselfwas too triggering for them.
- Right?
- And then kind of conclusionof that story, though,
is that after I came back and startedworking with them as a colleague,
this was in the midst of 2020, 2021.

(30:00):
We've got George Floyd,we've got the pandemic.
There's a lot of racial reckoninghappening in our country.
And, I was doing a lot of DEI workin my department
and having lots of conversationsand pulling things to the forefront
and holding space for what was going on,how that was --

(30:20):
how I was personally experiencing it,but also holding that space
for our diverse students at the time.
And I remember at one point in the year,
I invited
everybody to a protest,or a demonstration, I should say.
And they cameand it was in this conversation
that they had with me that said,

(30:43):
“You know, Amber, it’s inmy relationship with you,
it is in these conversationswith you and hearing these experiences
and seeing the impact,being able to see how you've impacted me,
how you're impacting our students, thathas shifted and changed my perception.”
- Awe!
And that, you know, again,that's so meaningful.

(31:04):
But it goes back to the conversationwe're talking about earlier, right?
That cultivating experiences,having those personal relationships,
having those experiencesand conversations with me
and not that I'm somebody that's so magical and perfect,
but just having thosepositive experiences with me,
having those frank and goodpositive conversations

(31:27):
with me is one of the antidotesand one of the things that helped shift
this person's perception.
That’s wonderful. That's what we hope for.- Right, right!
And what we hope for
with these conversationson the podcast for other folks.
- Absolutely.- That's so wonderful.
So that had some of the negativeand some of the positive.
But then I also have a briefer,positive story I wanted to share.
But, in terms of getting everyoneon the same page -

(31:49):
because we anticipatehaving many new listeners,
we do so far every seasonat the beginning of the season -
so this through line ofbias being like a habit:
So similar to your colleague.
We know that people learn biases
throughout their lifetimesthrough the media, and so on.

(32:09):
In fact, there was some AI researchthat came out a few years ago.
And as people know, AI learns
based on the internet, on the media,like they feed that sort of stuff to AI.
And then, some researchers were seeingthat AI was showing race bias.
- (Sarcastically) Shocking.
Exactly.Researchers, like bias researchers,

(32:31):
were like, “Duh.”
“Of course it is.”
People are fed on the media from culture,and that's where they learned biases.
So of course your AI is going to.
Bias kind of becomes the default, habitualway of thinking about others.
And then we have to kind of actively workagainst it, as we've been talking about
already and will continueto throughout the season.

(32:51):
But one friend of mine,
who listens to the podcast,and has been
through the bias habit-breaking training,
we were at a social gathering together,a little while ago, and
she said to me,“I love listening to your podcast
and every time,
if I ever have a biased thought,I just remember, ‘bias is like a habit.’
I have to keep working onbreaking that habit.”

(33:14):
Because that kind of helpsher kind of redouble her efforts.
Rewire her brain, yeah.- Yeah.
And so I want to thank that friendfor kind of mentioning that,
that's my little positive storythat, you know,
even just the notion ofbias being like a habit
can be a powerful wayto work against these things.
And so, shout out to Sarah.
Yay, Sarah, keep it up!
And I guess I should also should out myPhD advisor, Doctor Patricia Devine,

(33:39):
she started the whole idea of thinkingabout bias as being like a habit.
So that's my mini positive storyto add on, you know,
just thinking about bias as a habit being,useful for folks.
- Yeah, absolutely.Excellent.
All right.
So our skill! - Skill for today?
This next segment.
So every episodewe're going to have a skill segment.

(33:59):
And one of thebias habit-breaking skills
from our training - our longtime listeners already know.
And today, the skill is kind of whatwe've already been talking about.
It’s a good through-theme today.
Yeah! Approach biases as habits to be broken.
Something we'vealready talked about a lot,
so I'm not going to go in-depth on it,
is kind of the modelfor breaking a habit.

(34:21):
If you want to break a habit,you need to be motivated.
You have to care about it, work at it.
You need awareness of how bias happens.
You need tools to help you work againstthe bias and work against the habits.
And you have to put in effort over time.
If you ever hear ustalk about the MATE
motivation, awareness, tools, effort,That’s the acronym.
The acronym was actually an accident.

(34:42):
Like it was it was built onthe kind of scientific models
that we were working with.
And I was like,
“It also spells something.”
So that's what's involved.
You approach biases as habitsto be broken and work at it.
The skills that we teachthroughout this training,
throughout the podcast,throughout my book also.

(35:02):
Keep plugging myself!
(Amber giggling)
Out for preorder!
- Yes. Preorder now.
They have a number of features,these skills.
And so throughout allof our skill segments,
I want you to think abouthow the skill is actionable.
That's the first important thing.
In order for it to be a skill,you actually have to be doing something.
It can't just be us
saying, “Oh, this kind of bias happensall the time,” or something without you

(35:25):
actually having somethingto do to make it different.
Again, that's that “both/and.” Right?
You it's not just the passive pieces.
There's an active piece.- Yes.
You have to be doing something about it.
The closest to itbeing inactive would be
you have to startwatching out for this thing.
But we're always goingto have that component
of here's the action that you're taking.
Also, for these skills that we're goingto be talking about every month,

(35:49):
they're self-sustainable.
So it's not somethingthat you need us to keep doing it.
I hope you will continue tuning into be reminded of these things,
but it's all stuff that people can kind oftake on and keep working on themselves.
- Right.
And that's important becausethere are a lot of DEI companies,
for profit companiesthat, they're like,

(36:11):
“Oh, we have a solution andyou have to keep paying us for the solution.
Presumably you already know,this is a podcast.
It's free.- Right.
We put out lots of otherfree resources on our website
because we're tryingto make the world a better place.
That's why we're a nonprofit.
So everything that we teach you, youshould be able to keep it going yourself.
And we have free resources

(36:32):
to keep reminding you of these thingsand helping you out with it.
Nothing requires you to giveour nonprofit money.
Although hey, please donate if you’re able.
Always welcome to give, if you’d like.- And that'll help us keep doing this stuff.
The goal is always for you to be ableto carry the work forward,
whether or not you continueusing our services, our products.
Then the other two features, onewe've very talked about customizable.

(36:53):
These skills are customizable,which Amber already talked about a lot.
It's not somethingthat's just about educational systems,
which we might talk about a lotbecause we have more experience there.
But everything we're talking aboutcan be customized to
whatever your work is, whatever your life is,your own specific examples.
And so for for Amber’s colleaguewho had these specific kind of negative

(37:15):
and traumatic experiences, that might bean area where her colleague looks out like,
“Okay, I know I havefear responses to Black folks.”
- Right.
And so she might customizesome of the skills to fighting
against that kind offear reaction specifically.
I mentioned in past episodes,you know, for me,
I kind of have a negative knee jerkreaction to Christian folks

(37:36):
being a gay person whohas faced prejudice and
seeing prejudice that Christian folks
or Christian identifyingfolks have put against gay folks.
So I know that I have thatknee jerk reaction and bring to mind
people in my lifewho are Christian, like Amber,
to make sure that I don't express biasagainst someone because of their religion,
because that's not who I am

(37:57):
and not what I want.So customizable.
And then the last featureof these skills: Generalizable.
So all the bias habit-breaking skills,
they're not just about race,they're not just about gender.
They're not just about LGBT, religion.
They're all thingsthat we can use across
the various types of biasthat we might encounter.

(38:17):
Bias against straight White meneven could be one of them.
100%, absolutely.
If you assume that all straight White menare haters and not, you know, whatever,
like some people in cultureact like some of the time.
That's a biasyou can work against as well.
Although, systemic oppressiongenerally operates directionally:
From more powerful groupsto less powerful groups.

(38:40):
Cognitive biases, which is a lot of whatwe talk about, can be in any direction.
It can be towards thepowerful groups as well.
Absolutely.
I think maybe we we’re talking about thatin the later episode.
But yeah, so approach biasas a habit to be broken.
Think of it like a habit that, you're goingto slip up from time to time.
- 100%.- That's another component of that.
But if you come back to these skills

(39:01):
and keep working at it over time,you can get better at the habit.
So that was our skill for today.
Woo. Treating bias as a habit.
love it.
[ “Diverse Joy” interstitial music plays ]
All right. Welcome back from the break.
Just a quick one this time.
As we close out,we always like to end on

(39:23):
a joyful recommendation.
So, Joy (clicks tongue). Joy?
Gosh today I'm telling you!- You don't know my name.
- You think my name is Joy.- Well, apparently.
You apparently I don't knowyour name today.
Will, what is our joyful recommendationfor today?
All right, so this is one that came outearlier this year,
as of when this episode's coming out,it's called “Sinners”

(39:46):
and it matches my costume.
Sort of.I'm not the right kind of vampire.
It's a vampire movie.- Yeah.
It is set in theMississippi Delta in 1932.
And it is, fun, smart, intriguing,
you know, vampire story that you can,
watch just because you like horror,you like vampire stuff.

(40:08):
But also it's really good for
new listeners to kind of talkabout how we do these recommendations.
So in diversity discussions, typically
if someone talks about using the mediato work against bias,
work against lack of inclusion,that sort of thing,
they tend to focus on
strictly educational things,biopics, stories about

(40:30):
Martin Luther Kingor slavery or Jim Crow
or those sorts of things.Which are valuable!
Which are great.
Absolutely engage with that.
But, because so manyother people do that,
we don't repeatthe same kind of thing
everyone else does.
We focus on things that startwith the kind of joyful entertainment.

(40:51):
And then also will give you a bit ofexposure and maybe learning.
And “Sinners” actually kind ofcrosses that barrier a bit.
So it's the fun vampire stuffthat I was talking about.
I think it's exciting.I think it's dynamic.
The tropes of vampires like,
“Oh, they can't come in unless you invite them,”and sun and stuff

(41:13):
they actually do it in a fresh way
that I haven't seen in a vampire moviein a while, because they've been done.
Really good on all those kinds of --
And of course, great actors,great music, everything.
But also,it touches on racism in the Old South
or just the old United States,not even just the South.
It has some things that if you're payingattention there's segregation:

(41:36):
there’s a Chinese, or Chinese American, couplethat has a grocery store,
and on one side of the streetis where the colored folks -
as they would have called them backthen - can shop,
and then on the other sidefor the White folks.
And so you get exposed to some of thesehistorical things, while it is still
just overall a great, enjoyable movie

(41:57):
without, you know, feeling educational.
- Right. Yeah.
It --, I mean, I could talkabout this movie all day.
And I was shocked whenAmber had seen it
because she does not like horror.- Yes.
I was just going to say:
So, it took a lot for me to go and see this.
But it's a Ryan Coogler film.
And I love Ryan Coogler.So he does “Creed” and “Black Panther”

(42:20):
and “Wakanda Forever” and, also“Fruitvale Station”, which I have not seen
but is really well regarded.
And so I just love Ryan's filmsand how genius he is.
And so it was like.
“Okay, I'm really go, but there isa monster movie, like, can I handle it?
I don't know, I don't know.”

(42:40):
And so I kept like watchingall these reviews on --
like non-spoiler rave reviews, like,“Can I handle this movie?
I don't know if I can,but I'm going to try it anyway.”
And man, I'm so,so glad that I went and saw it.
It’s beautiful.
- Was the blood too much for you?- It was tolerable.
And no, the blood was not too much.
And I think just the storyand how he tells

(43:03):
the story just overcame everything else.
There was only a couple of jump scares
and it wasn't, like, too intense,so I could handle it, which was --
So any of you scaredy cat is out therelike it's not too, too bad.
So I would second.
So I love horror movies,so I'm not exactly the person to ask.
But so there is bloodit’s vampires.
There is blood, yeah.
So if you're squeamishabout blood,

(43:25):
you might skip itbecause there is some of that.
But it's not.It doesn't like going on any gore.
- Yeah, it's not super gory.
Yeah. And it's not.
Yeah.
It's not traditionalin any sense of the term.
And so anyway, there's just so muchI could talk about it, but, --
- One -- sorry!
Go ahead, go ahead.
One other thing with the kind of racerelations stuff and this isn't a spoiler.

(43:49):
Like, as it starts, it's very clear
that it's a White guy or White peoplewho are the vampires.
- Right.
And it's really set up as like, “Oh, Whitepeople are going to be the awful vampires
trying to kill the Black people.”
And then it has interesting twistson that by the end.
- Yeah.
And that's what I'll say about it, where as a bias researcher
I'm like, “Oh, it's kind of coolhow they they connected things.”

(44:10):
- Yeah. Yeah.
There's bits and pieces of like,
kind of tying in the idea of like,culture vultures and like,
and vampires kind of trying to stripand pull culture away.
But one of the things that I really --
And there's, again, a million thingsI could talk about what this movie.
Lots of cultural pieces,that are just incredible in this film.

(44:32):
But, in line with whatwe're talking about today,
as joy as resistance, I think that's sucha huge theme, actually, in this movie.
And the juke joint that they create,first of all,
is like Black ownedand created for the community
as a space to come in and

(44:53):
resist the oppression of Jim Crow era.
And a placewhere they get to enjoy
and have unabashed joy with each other,which is so, huge!
It’s beautifully and characterized.
Incredibly shot.
And then one of the maincharacter’s pursuit of his joy,

(45:16):
which is music is --
there are these amazing scenes
where you can see thisspiritual connection that connects him
to culture throughout space and time,both current and past and future.
And it is his pursuit of joythat is ultimately his freedom.

(45:36):
He's pursuing a career in music,and his father
doesn't want him to,but it's the thing that brings him joy,
that he’s meant to do on this planet.
And it shows that,
again, shows that spiritualconnectedness in that authenticity,
that authentic joy of this pursuit,
in music is just - it's incredible.

(45:57):
So I couldn't say enough.
I can say so much more,but so many amazing things about this.
And just repeating, really, the kind ofjoy as resistance sort of thing.
You know, what happens is he'splaying music and you start to see
kind of the connectionto people's ancestors, for instance.
It's just really beautiful.
This kind of music connecting ourselves,which Amber already said.

(46:18):
I'm just saying it again.I can't emphasize it enough.
It was just so cool and beautiful,and I teared up.
For sure. - Yeah. Oh, yeah.
In the middle of a horror movie!
It was just … Yeah!
And as somebody who,you know, in the worlds of scary
I tend to lean towardsthe Mickey's Not So Scary Halloweens.

(46:41):
(Both laughing)
Like not so scary-scary.
And even - you know,we're dressed as monsters today -
my favorite quote unquote monstermovie is “Young Frankenstein”.
So, like, the mostcomedic levity in it.
I can handle that.
But, the fact that this is, like,
become one of my favorite movies,monster movies is just,

(47:04):
testament to how beautiful and
how much depth is in the film as well.
So, that is our --- Oh, wait.
Eric Roman has something to add.
(Producer Eric Roman) Also, if you're a fanof Michael B. Jordan, he plays
identical twins in this movie.
- I was trying to
not to just also emphasizeMichael B. Jordan,

(47:25):
but he is beautiful and also incredible.
He does in such an incredible job,like inhabiting two different characters as twins.
(Producer Eric Roman) Really seemedto like two different people!
Two different people!
And they talk about -- peoplethat interviewed folks on set,
they talk about:
you could feel the shift in energywhen he was each of his character.

(47:47):
So yeah. Beautiful. Amazing.
That's our official recommendation.
All right.
So for just a couple episodes
I'm going to kind of plug my book.
Plug away, plug away.
So we're just kind of a tiny little thing
at the endthat Amber is going to help me with.
So preorder now,if you're listening to this, you're able

(48:09):
to order the book,the release date is March 17th (2026).
And so just at the endof this episode, Amber
is going to read the official thingthat people wrote that describes the book.
So I didn't write this, I approved it.
- Yeah.
So this is kind of like the thingthat goes on the back of the book
I think is what it'sgoing to end up being.
And in the future episodes I have

(48:31):
professionals who have endorsed the book,read it and gave a little blurb
that we’ll read one of those in eachepisode leading up to the book coming out.
But, so my book's title is

“Overcoming Bias Habits (48:40):
An Evidence-Based Guide to Creating a Joyfully Inclusive World”
you got to get that joy in there.
This podcast in the book,I even say that “Diverse Joy”
is a companion to the book,if you want to use it that way.
- Yeah.
Listening to the podcast,you don't need to read the book.
Reading the book,you don't need to listen to the podcast.
But they do enhance one another.

(49:02):
And Amber is going to read the littledescription and my author description.
They they came up with it, as well.
Yes. Yeah.
Again, they're standalonebut they're companions, right.
They enhance the overallexperience of “both/and”
and honestly, I really wantedto read this out loud.
I think that this really encapsulatesthe book really well and encapsulates,

(49:25):
Will and this work.
So the book description is
“An action oriented, scientifically tested guideto confronting and overcoming bias.
Most anti-bias trainings offer empty wordsrather than effective,
practical solutions.
In this hopeful and accessibleguide, scientist-practitioner
William T. L. Cox breaks down the sciencebehind stereotypes, bias,

(49:49):
and the habits we form that perpetuatethese cognitive traps in daily life.
He highlights lessons from his empiricallybacked anti-bias training and provides
actionable tools for preventing biasand speaking out in favor of diversity.
‘Overcoming Bias Habits’ inspires us to beagents of change by making meaningful
transformations in our behaviorsand maintaining them over time.

(50:13):
Focusing on individualsand our habits, however, does not mean
ignoring the systems and institutionsthat perpetuate discrimination.
Doing the work for ourselvesempowers us to also build
institutions accountableand to effect
genuine, lasting change in our schools,workplaces, and communities.
Dr. William T. L. Cox is an award-winningscientist-practitioner

(50:37):
with more than 20 yearsexperience testing bias reduction methods.
He is the founder and CEO of nonprofit Inequity Agents of Change
and the co-host of ‘Diverse Joy’ podcast.”
How Beautiful and lovely is that?
I was so happy when theymentioned the podcast, I was like, “Oh!”
It's so good.
And again, I think it’s such abeautiful picture of the work that you do

(51:02):
and the work of - obviously the podcast -but your training and
what you inhabitand hope to pass on into the world.
And so I am just so excited for you
for this book and proud of your work and,
and excited that other people getto, like, have it as a resource

(51:23):
that they can continue on this workand their own personal journey.
So!
Yeah, having it as a resource brings upsomething that I was trying to figure out,
“How do we mentionthis on the podcast today?”
But that's a perfect segue,
because as people probably know, if you'vebeen keeping up with current events,
funding for kind of diversitytype of research,

(51:45):
research on how to help people overcome
bias has been completely strippedfrom federal funding,
which was what funded most of what we do.All of the years of research
that we've done developingthis training and testing it,
we can't really do anymore,because it was all federally funded
by grants from the NIH.
And right nowwe can't even apply for those grants

(52:05):
because there are lists of wordsthat if you have one of those words,
your grant gets kicked out.So I can't even say the word “bias.”
And so,
I was writing the book anyway, but also,you know, with organizations
not having funding to have DEI trainingsand stuff, having that out there where
even if someone can't affordto bring me out to give the training,

(52:25):
they can still have accessto the information
just so meaningful to meto be able to do that.
So anyone can have these things.
I mean, the book does -you have to pay for it.
But you can get the free podcast!
So even that, you can get some of it free.
And again, I think that that speaksto your heart of
getting this this information out,like the whole purpose of this

(52:49):
being a nonprofit withgoing about it in this way
is to get the information out thereand not it being like,
“The only way you can accessthis is by hiring me to come in
and do the consultationand do the training.”
Like, that's a great way to go in depth,to have a different kind of conversation.
But the heart is like we want people toto have conversations.

(53:12):
We want people toto have access to this information -
in an accessible way - and not only being through a paywall.
Exactly.
Yes, absolutely. Thank you.
I couldn't agree more. That is the idea.
We want everyone to have these skillsbecause that's how we make the world
a better place, is through everyoneworking on these things together. So.

(53:34):
All right, so, that is our first episode
of season three.- Our show, woo!
Keep following us and subscribingand all of that.
Sooo…
I'm Dr. William Cox.
And I'm Dr. Amber Nelson.
“Diverse Joy” is producedby Eric Roman Beining
with music by Jay Arner.
Follow us @DiverseJoy on mostsocial media platforms for extra content.

(53:59):
If you enjoy the show, help us reachmore people
by leaving five star reviewsor by recommending it personally.
Word of mouth accounts for 70%.
That's 7-0 percentof how people find new podcasts.
New episodes released thefirst Wednesday of every month.
Watch us on YouTube,listen in any podcasting app

(54:20):
or check us out at DiverseJoy.com
where you can also findadditional diversity education resources,
buy some incredible merchandise -also made by our producer Eric Roman Beining -
or donate to support the show.
“Diverse Joy” is the official podcastof Inequity Agents of Change,
a nonprofit devoted to evidence-basedapproaches to reduce bias,

(54:41):
create inclusion, and promote equity.
All that good(both) JEDI work!
For new people,
JEDI stands for justice, equity,diversity, and inclusion.
Learn more at BiasHabit.com.
Thank you for joining us.
Now,
(Both) go find your joy!
- Bye.- Byeeee!
(Amber laughing)

(55:03):
I realized what wasthrowing me off at first:
There's no music and I'm so used towatching and listening to it.
And I'm like, it's supposed to be like,
(mimics the “Diverse Joy” theme music by Jay Arner)