Episode 36: Fighting Intimate Partner Violence with PerSister LY Marlow, Founder of "Saving Promise"
December 18, 2018 • 57 mins
In our last episode before Christmas (and our last episode in 2018!), Bea sits down to talk with acclaimed author, compelling storyteller and inspiring advocate LY Marlow about her organization "Saving Promise", whose goal it is to “disrupt the cycle of intimate partner violence in at-risk adolescence and young adults and create safer communities for generations to come.”
https://www.savingpromise.org/
for their new campaign "Don't Just Give a Damn" go to:
https://www.savingpromise.org/dont-just-give-a-damn/
Our listeners get 15% off FUR products: visit www.furyou.com and enter the code “PERSIST15” at check-out.
Check our homepage for further shownotes, sources and resources: www.shewhopersisted.com
Check our Instagram for pics: https://www.instagram.com/shewhopersisted/
Please support SWP on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/shewhopersisted
https://www.savingpromise.org/
for their new campaign "Don't Just Give a Damn" go to:
https://www.savingpromise.org/dont-just-give-a-damn/
Our listeners get 15% off FUR products: visit www.furyou.com and enter the code “PERSIST15” at check-out.
Check our homepage for further shownotes, sources and resources: www.shewhopersisted.com
Check our Instagram for pics: https://www.instagram.com/shewhopersisted/
Please support SWP on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/shewhopersisted
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
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Hello, and welcome to the Persistence. This is she who persisted the
Nasty podcast. My name is Beatrice, and today I'm not here with Elizabeth.
However, I'm not the only personthat's going to talk to you today,
because what you're going to hear isan interview with the wonderful, amazing,
arts and Fantastic l Y. Marlowel Y is an award winning author,
(01:33):
a distinguished speaker, spokeswoman, anempowerment advocate. Her first book,
Color Me Butterfly, one ten awards, amongst those, one of the highest
literary awards, the prestigious National BestBooks Award. In the interview, you'll
hear that she's a very compelling storyteller. She made my job as an interviewer
so so easy. L Y isalso the founder of Saving Promise, an
(01:57):
organization whose goal is to quote disruptthe cycle of intimate partner violence in at
risk adolescence and young adults and createsafer communities for generations to come Unquote.
Now, you might wonder why wechose the topic of intimate partner violence and
sexualized violence for our Christmas episode,and the reason for that is, unfortunately,
(02:19):
around the holidays, we tend tosee your rise in intimate partner violence,
and being a feminist sometimes implies talkingabout uncomfortable topics at uncomfortable times,
even at Christmas. Now, ifyou're not ready for that kind of subject
and if you want to listen tosomething that's say, less heavy to listen
to, then you can listen tolast year's Christmas episode titled Feminismus. Please
(02:43):
consider that this episode will deal withsubjects such as intimate partner violence sexualized violence,
and it's therefore not suitable for allaudiences. If you feel like these
subjects might trigger you. Maybe don'tlisten to this and listen to our FEMINISMUS
episodes instead for linked to it inthe show notes. All right, onto
the interview. Hello, l Y. We're so glad to have you on
(03:07):
the show because we care deeply aboutthe topic you're working on, and we're
both not experts, so it's alwaysgreat to have experts on the show.
So you are the CEO and founderof Saving Promise. Yes I am,
And you also launched a campaign nowthat is called Don't just give a damn
right? Yes, desk correct,Yes, So can you tell a listeners
(03:30):
a bit about why you started yourorganization, what your organization is about.
I'm happy too, and you knowI anytime I come into a conversation around
this topic, I cannot help butstart with my own personal family story,
which is I come from a familyof five generations of mothers and daughters,
(03:52):
my grandmother, my mother, myself, my daughter, And it would be
the story of my daughter's little girlnamed Promise that became the fifth generation when
my daughter was almost killed for thesecond time by Promises father by Promise on
a bed next to her as hestrangled her. And it would be that
(04:15):
story would that would not only inspireme, but move me literally to walk
away from a twenty plus year corporatecareer to dedicate my life to literally saving
promise. I mean, I knowthat sounds like a great name, but
literally that name came up because thenext morning, after I discovered that my
(04:41):
daughter was almost killed for the secondtime, I wrote a letter to the
only person in the world at thatpoint in my mind and in my heart
that I thought could help me becauseI had been I had gone everywhere to
try to get help for my daughter. We filed restraining orders, I've moved
her three different times to three Okay, this is the second time he almost
(05:02):
killed her, And I felt likeBeatrice, somebody that had the public ear,
mind and heart could probably bring attentionto this terrible issue that I know
could not only be affecting my family. So that letter, it was August
twenty fifth, two thousand and seven. I will never forget that date because
(05:27):
that letter started with their Oprah,and I wrote this two page letter,
and I often Beatrice go back tothat letter for a couple of reasons.
One is because I opened the letterup with their open and I tell her
the story last night my daughter wasalmost killed for the second time, and
I go through the story about youknow, the four generations, and now
(05:47):
here was my daughter, and nowhere was little Promise, who was only
six months old at the time.And I said something that letter that ultimately
became the name for the organization,but more importantly, over time, the
mission, which is I said,in so many words, Oprah, if
you cannot help me save my daughter, please help me save Promise. And
(06:11):
that's how that name came. Itdidn't come out of you know, oh,
I want to create name that it'sgoing to be catchy. It came
out from a mother who comes fromfour generations. And now here was this
six month old little girl literally namedPromise that I wanted to save. And
that's how ultimately, right after Isent that letter August twenty fifth, two
(06:33):
thousand and seven, I would eventuallywalk away from my career to dedicate my
life literally to saving Promise. Andwhat was the reaction to the let's say
road, Well, here's the reaction. And I will say this, and
I mean this from the deepest partsof my every bid and my heart,
(06:55):
that though another personally heard back fromOprah in the way I feel like Oprah
did respond by not responding, Andthe reason she responded by not responding is
because she gave me a voice togo forward and do what I do now.
Because I look at the opposite.Most people think, well, we
(07:17):
want other people to help us orsave us. But I think that if
Oprah had responded, I would haveprobably gone on her show. I would
have told my family story, andthat might have become my legacy. I
was on an Oprah show and Ishared my family story, and Oprah probably
would have even help in some kindof way, but the legacy would have
been more about oprah show and Oprahhelp versus me wanting to do something to
(07:43):
not only say promise, but tobreak the cycle in my family. Because
now this is five generations. Sothis wasn't even in that moment. I
was just a mother heartbroken and desperateto save her daughter and her daughter's daughter,
right. But what I didn't understandin that moment was that it was
bigger than that. It was.It was bigger than just reaching out to
(08:07):
Oprah. It was literally about savingpromise. So it was actually the silence
around going to topic that made youspeak up and that made you do something
about ten. Yeah, Beatrice,because here's why. And I say this
now because it's you know that Soto two thousand and seven, it's been
over ten years since I started theorganization, and most people think that I
(08:30):
suddenly had this epiphany to tell myfamily story, because prior to Promise,
I had just finished writing my bookCalling Me Butterfly, which told the story
about the four generations. And whenthat book was published, that book came
out the same year that Promise wasborn. So when I wrote that book,
Promise wasn't even you know, aseed in my daughter's wound, you
(08:52):
know, and so and so whenthat book was published, I had just
finished gone through the terrible atrocis tragediesof my grandmother, my mother, reliving
my story, having even you know, stories like a gun pointed to my
head and kicked in my eight motherpregnant belly whom I was pregnant with at
(09:15):
the time, with my daughter,and then my daughter struggles of you know,
sexual violence and other issues that weregoing on in our family as well
as a little girl. And soI had just finished writing that book,
and now you know, here waspromised, that book being published the same
year that she was born, andI, you know, I one of
(09:37):
the things that I would later tellwas that my grandmother didn't talk to my
mother about it. My mother quitehonestly didn't really talk to me about it.
And I am not ashamed to saythat I did not talk to my
daughter about it, not in theway that it needed to be talked about.
And it was a silence. Itwas sort of one of those things.
(09:58):
What goes into families stays in thefamily. And so with that whole
notion around what goes on the familystays in the family, mentality that I
grew up with, that that mymother grew up with, that her mother
grew up with, there was thatsilence that perpetuated that kept us as women
silent about the atrocities that were happeningto us in our family at the hands
(10:20):
of you know, domestic violence andeven to some extent, sexual violence.
And now we needed to break thecycle. And how do we raise a
wellness about this problem because everyone knowsit's happening, but nobody wants to talk
about it. What do we do? You know, I think, you
know, at the risk of soundsso cliche, but I really believe it
(10:46):
really is about breaking the silence andtalking about it, and not only when
there's a tragedy, a controversy,or a travesty, right because like,
for example, Oh, I amso so so grateful for movements like me
too. Um, I'm so gratefulfor those courageous women who step up and
(11:11):
who share their stories. I'm sograteful for those women and men because it's
not only women that are abused.Men are abused in many ways as well.
Um. But I'm so you know, I applaud the courage it takes
to come forward and and and andexpress your story as a survivor um around
(11:33):
anything that's happened with domestic or sexualviolence. I applaud you know, the
the the um the stories that comeout when their silence broken, like what
we heard unfold earlier in the yearat the White House with uh different um,
different figures at the White House.UM. I so recognize and appreciate
(11:56):
those stories. But why do theyhave to come out? Why do we
own have to talk about it?And why do we only have to raise
awareness about it and it get thevisibility that it gets when there is a
controversy, a travesty, and atragedy that comes first before people talk about
(12:18):
it. So I believe that theway to really get ahead of this problem
is around prevention. And the wayto get prevention is to break the silence
and begin really talking about it,but not being reactive, but more proactive.
And I suppose that also implies talkingto children about it and educating them
about it from a very young age. My question would be how early it's
(12:41):
too early to start the conversation aboutintimate partner violence a sexual violence. So
here's the thing that I you know, even now, ten years plus into
saving Promise, we recently this yearre thought our mission and because our whole
(13:03):
focus over the last several years hasbeen around greater public education and prevention,
we want to be more proactive.We want to prevent it from happening instead
of trying to fix it after ithappens. You know, there's a lot
of wonderful organizations and groups and advocatesand you know, different communities, support
stakeholders, etc. That are doingtremendous work around this area, but much
(13:26):
of it is being done in thevein of less built shelters after the fact.
Let's get more counseling, less painfulprograms after the fact, right,
My attitude is that we need toget on the front end of that problem
and start preventing and creating awareness beforeit happens. So one of the things
(13:50):
that Saving Promise just went through thisyear is a reassessment of our mission and
we said, where is prevention thebest effective and the most impactful? It
really is most impactful impactful? Whenwhen? When? When? When when
you when you can raise awareness andeducate and prevent younger generations UM And so
(14:16):
we just redefined our mission to focuson children, adolescents and young adults to
put forth a very progressive prevention UMstrategy around really preventing young adults, adolescents
and children from becoming victims of domesticviolence. So with that mission to answer
(14:39):
your question when is it what isthe earliest age or when is it too
young? I personally believe that weneed to start educating kids in age appropriately
as early as great in middle schoolUM. And in fact, one of
the things that we're trying to doright now is launch a number of programs
(15:01):
focused on that middle age school tohigh school and beyond to help educate and
provide you know, curriculums in schooland youth organizations and communities that serve that
population to create creative public awareness andeducation and guide us on what's the difference
(15:22):
between healthy and unhealthy relationships and behaviorsand attitudes. Because if we don't stunt
it at that age, then it'sgoing to continue to perpetuate in to the
adulthood lifespans. So as part ofyour organization, Saving Promise, you,
I think in October, because it'sDomestic Violence Awarness month, right, you
(15:46):
started that, don't just give adamn campaign or initiative? What is that
about specifically? So don't just givea damn And you know I love I'm
a storyteller by trade, and termsof my work isn't all perfect. It's
perfect for an interview and you tellstories, right, Because with that really
(16:07):
mean And so that came about.I was literally I live in DC,
and Saving Promises is headquartered in DC, and I was having coffee one day
with a digital media strategist he developedthe digital media videos, film, etc.
And I asked him to this meetingbecause I wanted to find a way
(16:30):
to tell the story about domestic violencein a compelling, engaging way. And
so his name is James Williamson.So we're sitting in Starbucks, I believe,
second in Pennsylvania Avenue, and andI said to him, you know,
James, I it's pretty much whatI just said to you at the
top of it is called Beatrice.I said, you know, I am
(16:51):
in awe of the different visible meatmovements and things out there like me Too,
and all the different times up andall the different campaigns that have come
over the last few years and priorto that. And I'm in all of
all the you know, media coverageand everything that's happening right now that you
(17:11):
know, we just had come outof around of you know, controversy of
media stories coming out of White House. And you know, obviously we had
UM the Me Too movement, mediaand everything pertaining to that, and we
had media about all of these differentcelebrities that now being you know, um
um held accountable for their behaviors.And and I said, and I think
(17:36):
that's well and good, and peopleare finally paying attention. And then this
is the most that we've ever seenUM the this this level of discussion around
domestic and sexual violence. But youknow what, I'm tired of people just
talking about it. I want tosee us do something because we don't want
this to fade. We don't wantme to to fade in a year or
(17:56):
two. We don't want the controversythat's I mean, from all of these
different things to fade. We needto do something about to take actions.
What's the point of talking about itbut not doing something, so James says
to me first, to me,he goes, so ly, what you're
saying is you don't want people tojust don't just give a damn, but
(18:17):
do something. So I said,that's it, that is exactly it,
and I am going to launch acampaign using those exact words. Don't just
give a damp do something, becausewe all give a damp, right,
We all care or want to care. We all express our opinions. We
all express me too. We allexpress you know, outrage at some of
(18:44):
the stories that we're hearing coming out. We all feel sad when we hear
about some poor woman who was beatento death by her partner. We all
feel sorry when we see a childlike Promise laying on a bed as her
mother lay next to her being strangled. You know, we all see,
you know here stories like my ownwith a gun to my head. You
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know, but it's time we justdon't just give a damn that we do
something, that we actually take action, and so to don't just give a
damn campaign, it's just that we'reasking people to not only first say that
they don't just give a damn,but to show us that they don't by
(19:26):
taking action. And we ask themto do three things. One is to
share with us by taking a writingdown on a postal or a piece of
paper or whatever. You know yourpledge. I don't just give a damn.
I X. What is your exYour X could be. You know,
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I'm going to teach my students becauseI'm a teacher about healthy relationships.
I'm going to talk to my daughter. Or I don't just give a damn.
I'm going to talk to my son. Why don't just give a damn.
I'm a has to at a church. I'm going to talk to my
congregation. Or I don't just givedamn. I'm an employer. I'm going
to educate my employees. So wewant them to share that pledge. Write
(20:11):
it down, take a quick selfie. We all got cell phones now with
with with cameras, and take aselfie and just send it to us so
that we could post it on Instagramand build people a community of people.
It's not about sending it to us. It's about becoming a part of this
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community of people that are taken thepledge to do something. And then once
you send it, actually act onthat pledge and um and and and go
out and and it you know,be it. Just what I say to
people is that it's those small,small actions that people can take that will
(20:52):
make the world of a difference.Because if you got let's say, uh,
you don't just give a damn.Is I'm going to get ten of
my girlfriends together and we're going tohave tea at my home on Saturday,
and we're all going to talk aboutit. Even if it doesn't happen to
us, We're just gonna talk aboutwhat we feel about it or be educate
each other about it. So ifit does happen to us, or it
happens to our somebody in our familyor our community, we know what to
(21:15):
do and we're just going to gettogether for an hour. So my I
don't just give a damns. Idon't just give a damn. I'm going
to get ten of my girlfriends together. Now, if you get ten of
those women and let's say other womendo that or other men do that,
and say, I'm gon get tenof my buddies together and talk about it,
or five of my buddies, orI'm going to talk to my son.
Imagine how we can change this terriblepublic health pandemic because people took small
(21:41):
actions. It is not organizations likeSaving Promise or the national other organizations out
there, or even to Me Toomovement that is going to change this issue.
It is people taking small actions intheir families and communities. Yes,
absolutely, absolutely, that is sotrue. And I think, um,
you know, in times like these, we sometimes rely on just social media,
(22:07):
uh you know, activism and andthink that we did something just because
we made a post, you know, But I think it's really doing something
in our communities and those small actionsthat add up. Yeah, you know
that you got ten people that showup at that tea, ten girlfriends or
five girlfriends or two girlfriends. Ifif if if even half of them went
(22:33):
now and took action, and thenthey took action, and then and it's
it's snowballs from there. We canchange this crisis. Where can people send
those things to do? You havean email address where they can send it
to yes, and so they cansend it to Don't Just Give a Damn
at Saving Promise dot org um,or they could just visit our website at
(22:59):
Saving Promise dot org. On ourhomepage. The first thing they're going to
see is the UM the video,and we kicked it off with for the
first time ever, Beatrice I chair, I revealed the five generations of mothers
and daughters in my family. I'venever done that UM in this way UM.
And so we kicked it off byme not just giving a damn,
(23:22):
but Sharon breaking the silence that nowI want you to meet these women that
were in my family. I wantyou to see my grandmother and my mother
and my daughter and myself and Promiseand it's actually narrated by Promise M.
She's now eleven. In fact,she lives with me. I have custody
of hers, so I get tosee her UM and how she responds to
something like this UM and so,so I would encourage people to visit Saving
(23:47):
Promise dot org on and go tothe Don't Just Give a Damn link and
there there there's instructions around how tosubmit their pledge. And the second thing
we're asking people to do is tois to kind of share it with their
friends and family, and also ifthey can give a dollar so that we
(24:11):
can continue to raise funds to keepthis campaign going and keep other programs and
take those programs into the schools,into youth organizations, into our communities to
help us to continue to prevent domesticviolence and sexual violence. Now, I
have one more question concerning intersectionality,because we all know that women are affected
(24:33):
more by intimate partner violence than men. We know that trans women are affected
more than six women. We knowthat black women are affected more than white
women. So I mean, ofcourse, some of this might be related
to increasing reporting in these populations.But what I want to know is does
your project look at the specifics ofspecific communities and then also the outreach that
(24:55):
can be done to help these individuals. You raise a very good point,
um, Beatrice, for two reasons. One is that domestic and sexual violence
is colorless um uh raceless um,economic um uh um status lists um,
(25:22):
educational lists, because it it affectsus all. And however, to your
point, um, there is evidencethat it often happens more often in some
communities and certain races and ethnicities andcultures than others and and and one of
them that you name for example thatfor example, in an LGBTQ community,
(25:47):
there's a lot of uh, intimatepartner and sexual violence that happens um And
then when you take a community likethat that is already depressed from you know,
being who they are and standing intheir truth, now they're in addition
to having to deal with those typeof biases, they're now having to come
(26:08):
forward and express the shame of anintimate partner or sexual violence incident. And
so so I think it's important thatwe as a community kind to understand that
these issues domestic and sexual violence arecolorless, and that it affects every gender,
(26:30):
every race, every every socio economicstatus, every education, every religious
preference, every sexual preference, everygender is no longer and one thing I
am trying to really build in mymessaging around Saving Promise and what I speak
is it's no longer just a woman'sissue. It is a public health issue.
(26:55):
Yes, more women are abused thanmen, clearly so, and especially
you know in areas like physical violence. But we also have to acknowledge that
until we begin to treat this asa major global public health issue, we're
going to continue to try to addressthis from only one angle, and it's
(27:18):
not and we're not going to beable to break the vicious cycle. Yeah.
Yeah, you said something that Ifind very interesting. You talked about
shame. And maybe that's a questionthat it's impossible to answer, but I
always find it so shocking and justoutrageous that we live in a culture where
(27:45):
being victimized is something that people feelshame about. It I have to or
told that they have to feel shameabout. Why do you think is that?
Why do we feel ashamed when weare victimized because of one word dgment,
you know, judgment. We're we'reashamed oftentimes because of the way we
(28:07):
might be judged and what I andI used judge very loosely, because judge
isn't that word. Judgment comes forexample, UM, a woman who might
be an abusive relationship with her partneror spouse, she has children, you
know, she has a career,she's ashamed to tell somebody because she doesn't
(28:27):
want to be judged or you know, UM accosted because she decided to stay.
You know, there was that afew years ago, UM, when
the whole Rave Rice thing came outand his his his then fiance and now
wife decided to stay. There wasa whole hashtag around why women stay.
(28:48):
Yeah, and below the that hashtagwas the real answers to why women stay.
Women oftentimes stay not only just becausethey are shamed, but because they
don't want to break up their families. They might be financially independent on the
dependent on their their spouse. Theyyou know, oftentimes you know when when
(29:11):
women go to court and I've beenthere on the other side of the court
with my daughter, and I've beenthere on that other side of the court
with with with my daughter's father wherejudge was ready to turn her over.
He had just gotten out of prison. I'd been raising my daughter for twelve
years. He comes out of prisonand the judge was about to turn over
(29:33):
full custody to him. Um andmaybe for whatever reason, and maybe he
had his own gripe about the system, right, maybe he was in it.
But and so so the shame alsocomes in that that they don't want
to break up their families or havetheir children stripped from them. Not of
women don't go into shelters because manyshelters can't afford to house or don't have
(29:57):
the space to house. Their children, um and so they have to they
have to be you know, presentedwith the shame of leaving their children and
trying to get to safety. Right. Um. So, so there's that
that whole judgment and the judgment,I mean judging the whole system, that
(30:18):
being tried and persecuted many times inmany different ways, and being revictimized in
that in that in that bloated wordof judgment and shame. Yeah, And
I think that's you know, oneof the great things that um Also,
even if it's just social media activism, but also like hashtags like me too
and campaigns like yours, I thinkone of the great things that those initiatives
(30:41):
do is they make us less ashamed, you know, of what happened to
us. And I think that's justso important. Oh absolutely, Beatrice.
It's you know, that is whyI applaud movements like me Too, because
if it does nothing more then togive others a voice, you know,
(31:04):
because sometimes and that's what the wholeconcept is about me too, you know,
this has happened to me too,and it and it and it relegates
a voice for women particularly who didwho was who remained voiceless because they were
ashamed of being judged. You know, even when some of the initial survivors
(31:26):
came forward right after the me too, because me too been around, I
understand it for a decade now.I think it just sort of found its
legs with his latest controversy, UMthat came out with some of the controversial
stories that came out earlier in theyear, UM and UM. And even
(31:48):
when some of the women came forward, and particularly some of the celebrity women,
they were being judged. They werebeings you know in question, well
why did you wait till now?You were protecting your career. You just
thought about the money. You justthought even why did you wait ten years
now? And that is why,because they were being judged, And that
was That was a perfect example ofwhat I met by linking Shane to judgment.
(32:12):
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the code persist fifteen. Now,one thing I think that everyone listening now
wants to know is what i've warningsigns for intimate partner violence, so curse
of control or stalking. Are thereany stories that come up over and over
again that you now know are redflags in the beginning of a relationship.
(33:16):
For example, one that is oftenvery prevalent as a as as an early
sign, and I'll use my ownpersonal experience. The story was that this
person was very charming and engaging andknew how to reel me in that by
(33:40):
the time I was in it,I didn't even realize I was stalk right,
and so, but what I alsohave noticed, and what it's also
very common in the stories that Ihear, is that that whole honeymoon phase
of when the first time we sawsomething, I mean, the first sign
(34:07):
doesn't happen when that first strike ofyou know, a fist, or the
first strike of a name calling,or the first attempt at stalking. That
first sign happened when in the smallpit of your gut, the way that
person looked at you or says somethingthat just didn't feel right, and you're
(34:31):
like, wait a minute, didI hear that? Right? I know
I heard it, but did Ireally listen to it? Did I listen
to the words the meaning beneath thewords? And oftentimes, especially we as
women, we listen to the wordsand don't dig deeper for the meaning.
(34:54):
And so so many people want tosay, oh, the first sign came
when he hit me, or whenhe called me to be word, or
when you know he stoked me.No, the first sign came when we
first saw or heard those words,or that moment where we felt like something
(35:15):
just isn't right in this. Iknow it, I believe it, I
feel it. But I'm going toallow myself to be think in about this
in a way that I'm in anew relationship or I'm back in it again
(35:36):
or whatever, and I want togive it the benefit of the doubt.
And it's that doubt that ultimately couldlead, unfortunately to the minimum of three
women that are murdered every single day, or the countless number of women that's
are sexually violated, you know,in an intimate partner situation. I know,
sexual crimes come unexpectedly, but itusually is in those early warning signs.
(36:01):
So you say, it's a lotabout trusting your own good. It's
about trusting your own God. Itis so about trusting your own good.
And I when I speak, Idon't speak from a place of judgment.
I speak from my own personal experience. Yeah, I speak from generations,
you know, and I speak fromyou know, the times where my daughter,
you know, when I first metthe boyfriend and she bring brought him
(36:24):
home, and I looked at himand I'm looking at her, and I'm
like, do you not see whatI see? Oh? Yes, I
know that feeling so well from likefriends of mine, and yeah, like
why am I seeing this but you'renot seeing it? Yeah? Yeah,
because she's looking through eyes of love, looking through eyes of shame, might
(36:46):
be looking through eyes of you know, where she is that in that journey
that she's not ready to see youknow. Um, The average number of
times, for example, Beatrice,that a woman returns to her abusive partner
is minimally seven to nine times.M Well, you asked yourself, well,
(37:07):
why does it take seven to ninetimes because and I remember, you
know, I had um come tothe realization with my own daughter that I
you know, and when I mentionedat the top of the discussion, I
said, you know, I hadto move her three different times to three
different states. It was after thatthird time, and he kept showing up
(37:29):
wherever I moved her. To JesusChrist, Yes, I come to realize
that, Wait a minute, how'she finding her? Well, he's finding
her because she's reaching out to himas well. Yeah, And so I
said to myself, until she isready. She's not ready yet, So
she's still in that journey, andI don't want to I don't want to
(37:50):
judge her, even though as amother I did because as a mother,
you're you're you know, all thoseall those motherly and maternal instincts kicked in,
and even I didn't want her to, you know, feel judged or
shame her. At some point,I finally had to say, until she
is ready, until she is readyto move on, then I can move
(38:15):
her to all fifty states. Yeah. But but this also means that a
lot of times perpetrators of violence arevery very good manipulators, right, Yes,
And that's That's what I was talkingabout earlier when I spoke about you
know, when I'm looking at mydaughter and she's bringing him home, and
(38:37):
I'm like, do you not seewhat I'm seeing. I'm seeing manipulation,
I'm seeing control, I'm seeing jealousy. I'm seeing scars on your face.
Right, And they might not bephysical scars. It's just in the way
she looked at him at that point, right, fear and so um,
(39:02):
so yes, um. And Iwould go on to say, and I
don't by any way mean to minimizephysical violence, but I would go on
to say that it is that emotionaland psychological violence that is even more damaging
sometimes than physical violence, because thosescars never heal. Physical scars may heal.
(39:30):
All of it is terrible. Butand that is because the manipulation,
the the the humiliation, the makeit that. There's a term called gaslighting,
yeah, you know, which meansfor your audience, when somebody try
to make you think you're the crazyone, you're the one that's causing us
(39:52):
me to do this to you,You're the problem and not me, or
it never happens. Yeah, yeah, And is that um stuff that is
part of manipulation. Now, onewoman that I really really admire is Laura
Richards. I don't know if youknow her. She also has a podcast
and she talks a lot about she'sa criminal behavioral analyst for Scotland Yard and
(40:15):
she also has a podcast and shetalks a lot about coercive control, and
she says the same thing that youjust said, which is a lot of
time the violence is not physical butpsychological, and it's just as bad.
And a lot of times physical violence, you know, comes after a lot
of psychological violence. So a lotof times the curassi of control comes before
(40:39):
the physical violence. Yes, andthere's there's a there's, there's a there's
there's there's a chart, there's andI might get the term wrong, but
it's like escalation chart that shows howviolence escalates. And first it starts very
subtly, and it starts with thecontrol and you know, not wanting you
(41:02):
to be around your friends or yourfamily or it didn't the jealousy. Then
it goes into the manipulation and thehumiliation, and then the verbal abuse and
by the time it got to physicalbecause I've yet to hear a story where
someone got involved in the relationship.And then on the first time that she
(41:29):
or he noticed, you know,that it was an abusive situation was when
they struck him. Right, thestriking comes much later. And what I
mean by much later, I meanall of these does. That doesn't mean
in terms of a timeline, muchlater. It could mean that there were
so many other things that were goingon, you know, with the verbal
(41:51):
abuse, the psychological abuse, thehumiliation, the manipulation, the control,
the jealousy, that by the timethe physical violence has come on, they
could be in a week span.I'm not saying it's less or longer time.
I'm just saying that by the timethe physical calms, there's been a
whole other number of things that havebeen going on. And that is why
(42:17):
I think we need to start withgreater public education and prevention and break into
silence because and quite frankly, manymany women in particular don't even realize that
they're in an abusive situation, especiallylike in my family. That was our
(42:38):
norm. Yeah, that was ournorm. I didn't know any different.
That was you know, my grandmother, my mother sold of my grandmother.
That's what my you know, Isaw to some extent of my mother.
But I was very young when mymy biological father passed away when I was
only five years old, and soI got to see two sides I got
(43:01):
to see, you know, andI wrote a blood I wrote a blog
about this um about the two sidesof my mother's story that I saw in
the relationship with my father, mybiological father, who was murdered when I
was five years old. But inthat story, I remember the scars,
(43:22):
I remember the blood, I remember, you know, the atrocities of what
a little girl would never forget certainthings that happened with my biological and mother,
and my biological father and mother.Then my mother, after my father
was killed, would later marry mystepfather, who was the complete opposite,
(43:47):
and in the nearly forty years thatthey were married, if I until she
passed away, I don't recall thenumber of times, if any, that
I ever even heard or seeing himraise his voice to her let along his
head. So I saw what ahealthy and unhealthy relationship looked like. But
(44:08):
by the time it got to mygeneration, it was more about me wanting
to be with the popular boy okayright, and keeping it quiet and silence
because of the shame of telling myfriends and my family and my mother in
particular, who you know. Iremember the first time I came home with
(44:30):
a black eye, was only sixteenyears old, and I was very active
in sports and stuff. And somy mother said to me in her southern
dialect, that was even more shame, you know, fearful of me than
of him. I was more fearfulof her than of him. And she
said that boy ain't putting his handson you, Izzie. Now, how
(44:52):
do you respond to that at sixteen? I mean, if I say yes,
I'm not going to be able tohave a boyfriend anymore, You're gonna
be disappointed in me. I waspreparing to be the first of my family
to go to college. I've notonly shamed her but disappointed her. So
how do you respond to that?And I said, no, the ball
(45:12):
hit me. Yeah, but Iwill tell you that even by the time
I came home with that black eye, all that other stuff had been happening
for months. Yeah, of course. Yeah. So you talked about how
women don't realize that they're in anabusive relationship because all they know are abusive
(45:32):
relationships. And I feel like alot of times people don't notice that they're
in an abusive relationship because they keepmaking excuses. A lot of times it's
like, oh, yeah, hejust hit me once, or maybe I
provoked him, or so, thisis what I noticed that. It's also
a lot of, as you said, not trusting your own gutten also a
(45:53):
lot of making excuses for an abusivepartner. That is so true. And
I think until we get real aboutthat. You know, the the the
the social conscious and political correct politicalway to address this or say it is
to say, oh, well,no, you know that. You know,
(46:14):
we don't want to re victimize thevictims. And you're absolutely right,
I would never do that. However, um, we also have to come
to terms that many times, toyour point, Beatrice, some women don't
even realize they're being abused. Yeah, you know, not because that's their
norm. But they just don't evenrealize it. They don't even they don't
(46:35):
even recognize it, or they might. Most people think abuse is just physical,
yeah, you know, and especiallyin a day and age in the
culture we're living in now where wejust turn on the music or whatever,
and we hear women being called allkinds of names, and you know,
uh, this and that and slutsand this and all that. You know,
that's that's that's cultural norm. Youknow, that's our cultural morais now.
(47:00):
And so so when it when ithappens to us in a in a
in a in a personal or romanticrelationship and the first time he says,
you know, something to us thatdoesn't feel right. It's not that it
doesn't feel right, because I hearit all the time. I see it
(47:20):
right. Um. But then aswe allow it to continue to perpetuate and
we start not owning it and listeningto that small still voice in our gut,
that is when we start to potentiallybe stuck in a situation that we
don't even realize we're in. Yeah, so what are some I mean,
(47:44):
you answer some of it already,So, but what are some concrete things
that we all all of our listenerscan do now about the situation? How
can we show that we do morethan just give a dam I think some
concrete ways that we can do morethan just give a damn. And I'll
talk about it from whether or notyou are being affected by it, and
(48:06):
what you can do as a survivoror victim, and then what you can
do as a community member that wantto make sure it doesn't happen to you,
your family, your community, orit might be happening and you want
to. You want to, youwant to do something, you want to
take action. So, as someonethat's in it, what I would say
is, first and foremost, findsomeone that you can trust, that you
(48:30):
trust, that you can talk to, because the ft. The first step
towards healing is first come into termswith yourself that you deserve better. And
I know that's cliche, as youdeserve better, No, it's true,
you do deserve better. Right,and find someone, whether or not is
(48:52):
a family member, a friend,a confidant. Do you know there are
hotlines out there, like the NationalDomestic Violence Outline one eight hundred seven nine
nine Safe Safe that people can reachout to and have a confidential conversation.
(49:14):
You don't even have to reveal yourname. You can just call and say,
hey, I think I think evenif you're not sure, I think
this is something. I'm not surewhat it is, but here's what's happening
to me. Can you help mework through it? Right? So that
small step of just talking to someonecan be that first step that can lead
(49:34):
you onto a path of healing andultimately trying to honor yourself to get out
of a situation that does not honoryou. If you are in a community
and you are someone whether or notyou want to prevent yourself or family or
friends, or just want to dosomething. It doesn't have to be that
(49:58):
you are connected to this in anykind of personal way, but you just
want to don't just give a damnUM. One of the things that we've
done is on our website, wehave also outlined a list of things that
people can do to take action,because that was something that people said,
you know, well, okay,I want to do something, but but
(50:19):
how do I do that? Sothere is on our website a link that
once you go to the Don't Justgive a damn Um website, UM is
called you know how you can UMHow you can UM take action and UM
and you click on that and thereare different ways that you could do something.
(50:42):
Like I said earlier, I nameda few. You might just want
to, you know, host it. If you're if you're you know,
a woman, you might want tojust have a meeting with your few friends
and say hey, let's come togetherand talk about this. If you're a
teacher, you can say, youknow what, I want to educate my
students about it. If you're inthe workplace, you might want to.
You know, they have brown baglunches that employees put on. Maybe invite
(51:07):
a few people to a brown baglunch. Reach out to me. I'll
come speak right, yeah, andyou you can you know, um,
you can just go home and talkto your daughter about it. You know
you were asking earlier, is whatis the appropriate age to start? I
would say start as early as youthink is that child can handle right,
(51:29):
age appropriate. If you're talking toa child that's eight years old, just
use age appropriate language. You'll besurprised with these little eight nine year olds.
No, Now, I think we'renot giving them credit. I think
they know more than we think.You know, I'm you know, promises
with me right now, and Iam constantly having to check her iPad and
(51:49):
I do find stuff and I'm like, I am like flabbergasted. I'm like,
oh my god, what are youdoing looking at this? Because it's
out there. So if we don'tteach them at home at an appropriate age,
at a younger age, trust me, society and social media will.
Yeah. Yeah, they're gonna teachthem who they should be calm, right,
and so doing something can just assimple as at the dinner table tonight
(52:15):
when I'm sitting there with my family, when I sit with my child,
I'm like, over dinner, I'mjust gonna say, you know, with
spaghetti. You know, hey,Joey, what what do you know about
boys and girls and the way thatthey talk to each other? Because you
don't have to say your use wordslike domestic or sexual violence. Yeah,
you just say, what do youknow about boys and girls and the way
(52:36):
they talk to each other? Orwhat what what happens when so and so?
Did you ever see so and sohit a girl? Or did you
ever see a girl hit a boy? What did you think about that?
You'll be surprised how that little conversation. In fact, we had a we
launched, for example, UM andour closalness Beatrice, we launched um UM.
(52:59):
We launched it Don't just then formallyin October and recognition of Domestic Ballence
Awareness MOM that but we had apre launch of an event that we hosted
here in DC, and we invitedsome friends and family and community members,
and one of them attendees was ayoung mother who brought her five year old
son. And in fact, onour Instagram you could see a picture of
(53:23):
Helm and her together, and shesaid when he came, he wanted to
know where they were going, andso she told him we're going to an
event and real talk saving promise.And he was like, well, what
is that? Why is what asaving promise? And she told him what
saving promise was, and and hestarted asking questions. He was engaging her
(53:44):
because he wanted to know what thiswas about. And by the end of
that event, and she came upto me and she said, you know,
l Y, my five year oldson who was sitting off in the
corner because he was at the eventwith his iPad and the playing games or
whatever. She said, he hada lot of questions and I felt good
to answer them. So you invitedme here tonight, gave me the first
(54:07):
step towards talking to my five yearold about it. That's awesome. So
there are many things we can do, and I encourage Meach and every one
of your audience members to please dothat. It only takes a minute to
it. Don't have to not wedon't have to solve world hunger. We
could just take one small step beingthat mother who talked to it at five
(54:29):
year old. Talking to your childover dinner tonight talking, you know,
get together with some of your employeesat work and go out to lunch together
and talk about it. And thenthe three all of you can write a
poster and say we don't just givea damn. We talked about it over
lunch. It's those small steps thatwe all can take. So just one
more time, where do people findyou on the internet? So they can
(54:52):
go to Saving Promise Saving Promise dotorg and write at our website, they'll
see the campaign called Don't just Givea Damn and we are really encouraging people
to take the pledge and send itto us. It takes a minute to
snap a picture of yourself, andeven if you don't want to show your
face, you could just snap thepicture of you holding a sign right and
(55:14):
send it to us. And yousend it to don't just Give a Damn
at Saving Promise dot org. Buton our website there's a link that you
just upload it. And so youcould just go to the link on our
website on that page on don't justGive a Damn. It'd be a simple
link for you to upload your photo, very simple, and then we ask
you to just take the action.That's it and then of course share with
(55:36):
your friends and family. Awesome.Thank you so much. L Y,
you were an amazing guest. Thankyou for your honesty and how frank you
talks about your experiences. It wasamazing. Thank you so much. It
was an honor. Likewise, Beatrice, always feel free to reach out.
I really enjoyed talking to you today. Thank you so much. Thanks bye
bye bye. Thank you a wifefor the interview, and thank you d
(56:00):
Nasties for listening to it for theshow. Notes to this episode in all
the links we talked about, pleasego to her homepage She Who Persisted dot
com. If you want to contactus, you can do that via She
Who Persisted Podcasts at gmail dot com. But there is also a Facebook group
which is called Persists that She WhoPersisted group, and that group tends to
(56:23):
be a very good way of gettingin contact with us. Also, there
are other listeners of the show onthere, so we can discuss the topics
that we talk about in the show. We also have a Facebook page.
We are on Instagram where you canfind the picks that we talk about in
the episodes, and we're on Twitterat She Persisted pod. You can also
(56:44):
support us on patreonatreon dot com slashshe who persisted. Please note that we
will take a break until the beginningof March. We won't publish new episodes
until then. However, that doesnot mean that we will be lazy,
because we will be researching and preparingand recording a bunch of episodes in the
meantime. Because as promised in thelast episode, there will be a few
(57:07):
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off with code Persist fifteen. Shewas warm, She was given an explanation.
(01:10):
Hello, and welcome to the Persistence. This is she who persisted the
Nasty podcast. My name is Beatrice, and today I'm not here with Elizabeth.
However, I'm not the only personthat's going to talk to you today,
because what you're going to hear isan interview with the wonderful, amazing,
arts and Fantastic l Y. Marlowel Y is an award winning author,
(01:33):
a distinguished speaker, spokeswoman, anempowerment advocate. Her first book,
Color Me Butterfly, one ten awards, amongst those, one of the highest
literary awards, the prestigious National BestBooks Award. In the interview, you'll
hear that she's a very compelling storyteller. She made my job as an interviewer
so so easy. L Y isalso the founder of Saving Promise, an
(01:57):
organization whose goal is to quote disruptthe cycle of intimate partner violence in at
risk adolescence and young adults and createsafer communities for generations to come Unquote.
Now, you might wonder why wechose the topic of intimate partner violence and
sexualized violence for our Christmas episode,and the reason for that is, unfortunately,
(02:19):
around the holidays, we tend tosee your rise in intimate partner violence,
and being a feminist sometimes implies talkingabout uncomfortable topics at uncomfortable times,
even at Christmas. Now, ifyou're not ready for that kind of subject
and if you want to listen tosomething that's say, less heavy to listen
to, then you can listen tolast year's Christmas episode titled Feminismus. Please
(02:43):
consider that this episode will deal withsubjects such as intimate partner violence sexualized violence,
and it's therefore not suitable for allaudiences. If you feel like these
subjects might trigger you. Maybe don'tlisten to this and listen to our FEMINISMUS
episodes instead for linked to it inthe show notes. All right, onto
the interview. Hello, l Y. We're so glad to have you on
(03:07):
the show because we care deeply aboutthe topic you're working on, and we're
both not experts, so it's alwaysgreat to have experts on the show.
So you are the CEO and founderof Saving Promise. Yes I am,
And you also launched a campaign nowthat is called Don't just give a damn
right? Yes, desk correct,Yes, So can you tell a listeners
(03:30):
a bit about why you started yourorganization, what your organization is about.
I'm happy too, and you knowI anytime I come into a conversation around
this topic, I cannot help butstart with my own personal family story,
which is I come from a familyof five generations of mothers and daughters,
(03:52):
my grandmother, my mother, myself, my daughter, And it would be
the story of my daughter's little girlnamed Promise that became the fifth generation when
my daughter was almost killed for thesecond time by Promises father by Promise on
a bed next to her as hestrangled her. And it would be that
(04:15):
story would that would not only inspireme, but move me literally to walk
away from a twenty plus year corporatecareer to dedicate my life to literally saving
promise. I mean, I knowthat sounds like a great name, but
literally that name came up because thenext morning, after I discovered that my
(04:41):
daughter was almost killed for the secondtime, I wrote a letter to the
only person in the world at thatpoint in my mind and in my heart
that I thought could help me becauseI had been I had gone everywhere to
try to get help for my daughter. We filed restraining orders, I've moved
her three different times to three Okay, this is the second time he almost
(05:02):
killed her, And I felt likeBeatrice, somebody that had the public ear,
mind and heart could probably bring attentionto this terrible issue that I know
could not only be affecting my family. So that letter, it was August
twenty fifth, two thousand and seven. I will never forget that date because
(05:27):
that letter started with their Oprah,and I wrote this two page letter,
and I often Beatrice go back tothat letter for a couple of reasons.
One is because I opened the letterup with their open and I tell her
the story last night my daughter wasalmost killed for the second time, and
I go through the story about youknow, the four generations, and now
(05:47):
here was my daughter, and nowhere was little Promise, who was only
six months old at the time.And I said something that letter that ultimately
became the name for the organization,but more importantly, over time, the
mission, which is I said,in so many words, Oprah, if
you cannot help me save my daughter, please help me save Promise. And
(06:11):
that's how that name came. Itdidn't come out of you know, oh,
I want to create name that it'sgoing to be catchy. It came
out from a mother who comes fromfour generations. And now here was this
six month old little girl literally namedPromise that I wanted to save. And
that's how ultimately, right after Isent that letter August twenty fifth, two
(06:33):
thousand and seven, I would eventuallywalk away from my career to dedicate my
life literally to saving Promise. Andwhat was the reaction to the let's say
road, Well, here's the reaction. And I will say this, and
I mean this from the deepest partsof my every bid and my heart,
(06:55):
that though another personally heard back fromOprah in the way I feel like Oprah
did respond by not responding, Andthe reason she responded by not responding is
because she gave me a voice togo forward and do what I do now.
Because I look at the opposite.Most people think, well, we
(07:17):
want other people to help us orsave us. But I think that if
Oprah had responded, I would haveprobably gone on her show. I would
have told my family story, andthat might have become my legacy. I
was on an Oprah show and Ishared my family story, and Oprah probably
would have even help in some kindof way, but the legacy would have
been more about oprah show and Oprahhelp versus me wanting to do something to
(07:43):
not only say promise, but tobreak the cycle in my family. Because
now this is five generations. Sothis wasn't even in that moment. I
was just a mother heartbroken and desperateto save her daughter and her daughter's daughter,
right. But what I didn't understandin that moment was that it was
bigger than that. It was.It was bigger than just reaching out to
(08:07):
Oprah. It was literally about savingpromise. So it was actually the silence
around going to topic that made youspeak up and that made you do something
about ten. Yeah, Beatrice,because here's why. And I say this
now because it's you know that Soto two thousand and seven, it's been
over ten years since I started theorganization, and most people think that I
(08:30):
suddenly had this epiphany to tell myfamily story, because prior to Promise,
I had just finished writing my bookCalling Me Butterfly, which told the story
about the four generations. And whenthat book was published, that book came
out the same year that Promise wasborn. So when I wrote that book,
Promise wasn't even you know, aseed in my daughter's wound, you
(08:52):
know, and so and so whenthat book was published, I had just
finished gone through the terrible atrocis tragediesof my grandmother, my mother, reliving
my story, having even you know, stories like a gun pointed to my
head and kicked in my eight motherpregnant belly whom I was pregnant with at
(09:15):
the time, with my daughter,and then my daughter struggles of you know,
sexual violence and other issues that weregoing on in our family as well
as a little girl. And soI had just finished writing that book,
and now you know, here waspromised, that book being published the same
year that she was born, andI, you know, I one of
(09:37):
the things that I would later tellwas that my grandmother didn't talk to my
mother about it. My mother quitehonestly didn't really talk to me about it.
And I am not ashamed to saythat I did not talk to my
daughter about it, not in theway that it needed to be talked about.
And it was a silence. Itwas sort of one of those things.
(09:58):
What goes into families stays in thefamily. And so with that whole
notion around what goes on the familystays in the family, mentality that I
grew up with, that that mymother grew up with, that her mother
grew up with, there was thatsilence that perpetuated that kept us as women
silent about the atrocities that were happeningto us in our family at the hands
(10:20):
of you know, domestic violence andeven to some extent, sexual violence.
And now we needed to break thecycle. And how do we raise a
wellness about this problem because everyone knowsit's happening, but nobody wants to talk
about it. What do we do? You know, I think, you
know, at the risk of soundsso cliche, but I really believe it
(10:46):
really is about breaking the silence andtalking about it, and not only when
there's a tragedy, a controversy,or a travesty, right because like,
for example, Oh, I amso so so grateful for movements like me
too. Um, I'm so gratefulfor those courageous women who step up and
(11:11):
who share their stories. I'm sograteful for those women and men because it's
not only women that are abused.Men are abused in many ways as well.
Um. But I'm so you know, I applaud the courage it takes
to come forward and and and andexpress your story as a survivor um around
(11:33):
anything that's happened with domestic or sexualviolence. I applaud you know, the
the the um the stories that comeout when their silence broken, like what
we heard unfold earlier in the yearat the White House with uh different um,
different figures at the White House.UM. I so recognize and appreciate
(11:56):
those stories. But why do theyhave to come out? Why do we
own have to talk about it?And why do we only have to raise
awareness about it and it get thevisibility that it gets when there is a
controversy, a travesty, and atragedy that comes first before people talk about
(12:18):
it. So I believe that theway to really get ahead of this problem
is around prevention. And the wayto get prevention is to break the silence
and begin really talking about it,but not being reactive, but more proactive.
And I suppose that also implies talkingto children about it and educating them
about it from a very young age. My question would be how early it's
(12:41):
too early to start the conversation aboutintimate partner violence a sexual violence. So
here's the thing that I you know, even now, ten years plus into
saving Promise, we recently this yearre thought our mission and because our whole
(13:03):
focus over the last several years hasbeen around greater public education and prevention,
we want to be more proactive.We want to prevent it from happening instead
of trying to fix it after ithappens. You know, there's a lot
of wonderful organizations and groups and advocatesand you know, different communities, support
stakeholders, etc. That are doingtremendous work around this area, but much
(13:26):
of it is being done in thevein of less built shelters after the fact.
Let's get more counseling, less painfulprograms after the fact, right,
My attitude is that we need toget on the front end of that problem
and start preventing and creating awareness beforeit happens. So one of the things
(13:50):
that Saving Promise just went through thisyear is a reassessment of our mission and
we said, where is prevention thebest effective and the most impactful? It
really is most impactful impactful? Whenwhen? When? When? When when
you when you can raise awareness andeducate and prevent younger generations UM And so
(14:16):
we just redefined our mission to focuson children, adolescents and young adults to
put forth a very progressive prevention UMstrategy around really preventing young adults, adolescents
and children from becoming victims of domesticviolence. So with that mission to answer
(14:39):
your question when is it what isthe earliest age or when is it too
young? I personally believe that weneed to start educating kids in age appropriately
as early as great in middle schoolUM. And in fact, one of
the things that we're trying to doright now is launch a number of programs
(15:01):
focused on that middle age school tohigh school and beyond to help educate and
provide you know, curriculums in schooland youth organizations and communities that serve that
population to create creative public awareness andeducation and guide us on what's the difference
(15:22):
between healthy and unhealthy relationships and behaviorsand attitudes. Because if we don't stunt
it at that age, then it'sgoing to continue to perpetuate in to the
adulthood lifespans. So as part ofyour organization, Saving Promise, you,
I think in October, because it'sDomestic Violence Awarness month, right, you
(15:46):
started that, don't just give adamn campaign or initiative? What is that
about specifically? So don't just givea damn And you know I love I'm
a storyteller by trade, and termsof my work isn't all perfect. It's
perfect for an interview and you tellstories, right, Because with that really
(16:07):
mean And so that came about.I was literally I live in DC,
and Saving Promises is headquartered in DC, and I was having coffee one day
with a digital media strategist he developedthe digital media videos, film, etc.
And I asked him to this meetingbecause I wanted to find a way
(16:30):
to tell the story about domestic violencein a compelling, engaging way. And
so his name is James Williamson.So we're sitting in Starbucks, I believe,
second in Pennsylvania Avenue, and andI said to him, you know,
James, I it's pretty much whatI just said to you at the
top of it is called Beatrice.I said, you know, I am
(16:51):
in awe of the different visible meatmovements and things out there like me Too,
and all the different times up andall the different campaigns that have come
over the last few years and priorto that. And I'm in all of
all the you know, media coverageand everything that's happening right now that you
(17:11):
know, we just had come outof around of you know, controversy of
media stories coming out of White House. And you know, obviously we had
UM the Me Too movement, mediaand everything pertaining to that, and we
had media about all of these differentcelebrities that now being you know, um
um held accountable for their behaviors.And and I said, and I think
(17:36):
that's well and good, and peopleare finally paying attention. And then this
is the most that we've ever seenUM the this this level of discussion around
domestic and sexual violence. But youknow what, I'm tired of people just
talking about it. I want tosee us do something because we don't want
this to fade. We don't wantme to to fade in a year or
(17:56):
two. We don't want the controversythat's I mean, from all of these
different things to fade. We needto do something about to take actions.
What's the point of talking about itbut not doing something, so James says
to me first, to me,he goes, so ly, what you're
saying is you don't want people tojust don't just give a damn, but
(18:17):
do something. So I said,that's it, that is exactly it,
and I am going to launch acampaign using those exact words. Don't just
give a damp do something, becausewe all give a damp, right,
We all care or want to care. We all express our opinions. We
all express me too. We allexpress you know, outrage at some of
(18:44):
the stories that we're hearing coming out. We all feel sad when we hear
about some poor woman who was beatento death by her partner. We all
feel sorry when we see a childlike Promise laying on a bed as her
mother lay next to her being strangled. You know, we all see,
you know here stories like my ownwith a gun to my head. You
(19:06):
know, but it's time we justdon't just give a damn that we do
something, that we actually take action, and so to don't just give a
damn campaign, it's just that we'reasking people to not only first say that
they don't just give a damn,but to show us that they don't by
(19:26):
taking action. And we ask themto do three things. One is to
share with us by taking a writingdown on a postal or a piece of
paper or whatever. You know yourpledge. I don't just give a damn.
I X. What is your exYour X could be. You know,
(19:47):
I'm going to teach my students becauseI'm a teacher about healthy relationships.
I'm going to talk to my daughter. Or I don't just give a damn.
I'm going to talk to my son. Why don't just give a damn.
I'm a has to at a church. I'm going to talk to my
congregation. Or I don't just givedamn. I'm an employer. I'm going
to educate my employees. So wewant them to share that pledge. Write
(20:11):
it down, take a quick selfie. We all got cell phones now with
with with cameras, and take aselfie and just send it to us so
that we could post it on Instagramand build people a community of people.
It's not about sending it to us. It's about becoming a part of this
(20:32):
community of people that are taken thepledge to do something. And then once
you send it, actually act onthat pledge and um and and and go
out and and it you know,be it. Just what I say to
people is that it's those small,small actions that people can take that will
(20:52):
make the world of a difference.Because if you got let's say, uh,
you don't just give a damn.Is I'm going to get ten of
my girlfriends together and we're going tohave tea at my home on Saturday,
and we're all going to talk aboutit. Even if it doesn't happen to
us, We're just gonna talk aboutwhat we feel about it or be educate
each other about it. So ifit does happen to us, or it
happens to our somebody in our familyor our community, we know what to
(21:15):
do and we're just going to gettogether for an hour. So my I
don't just give a damns. Idon't just give a damn. I'm going
to get ten of my girlfriends together. Now, if you get ten of
those women and let's say other womendo that or other men do that,
and say, I'm gon get tenof my buddies together and talk about it,
or five of my buddies, orI'm going to talk to my son.
Imagine how we can change this terriblepublic health pandemic because people took small
(21:41):
actions. It is not organizations likeSaving Promise or the national other organizations out
there, or even to Me Toomovement that is going to change this issue.
It is people taking small actions intheir families and communities. Yes,
absolutely, absolutely, that is sotrue. And I think, um,
you know, in times like these, we sometimes rely on just social media,
(22:07):
uh you know, activism and andthink that we did something just because
we made a post, you know, But I think it's really doing something
in our communities and those small actionsthat add up. Yeah, you know
that you got ten people that showup at that tea, ten girlfriends or
five girlfriends or two girlfriends. Ifif if if even half of them went
(22:33):
now and took action, and thenthey took action, and then and it's
it's snowballs from there. We canchange this crisis. Where can people send
those things to do? You havean email address where they can send it
to yes, and so they cansend it to Don't Just Give a Damn
at Saving Promise dot org um,or they could just visit our website at
(22:59):
Saving Promise dot org. On ourhomepage. The first thing they're going to
see is the UM the video,and we kicked it off with for the
first time ever, Beatrice I chair, I revealed the five generations of mothers
and daughters in my family. I'venever done that UM in this way UM.
And so we kicked it off byme not just giving a damn,
(23:22):
but Sharon breaking the silence that nowI want you to meet these women that
were in my family. I wantyou to see my grandmother and my mother
and my daughter and myself and Promiseand it's actually narrated by Promise M.
She's now eleven. In fact,she lives with me. I have custody
of hers, so I get tosee her UM and how she responds to
something like this UM and so,so I would encourage people to visit Saving
(23:47):
Promise dot org on and go tothe Don't Just Give a Damn link and
there there there's instructions around how tosubmit their pledge. And the second thing
we're asking people to do is tois to kind of share it with their
friends and family, and also ifthey can give a dollar so that we
(24:11):
can continue to raise funds to keepthis campaign going and keep other programs and
take those programs into the schools,into youth organizations, into our communities to
help us to continue to prevent domesticviolence and sexual violence. Now, I
have one more question concerning intersectionality,because we all know that women are affected
(24:33):
more by intimate partner violence than men. We know that trans women are affected
more than six women. We knowthat black women are affected more than white
women. So I mean, ofcourse, some of this might be related
to increasing reporting in these populations.But what I want to know is does
your project look at the specifics ofspecific communities and then also the outreach that
(24:55):
can be done to help these individuals. You raise a very good point,
um, Beatrice, for two reasons. One is that domestic and sexual violence
is colorless um uh raceless um,economic um uh um status lists um,
(25:22):
educational lists, because it it affectsus all. And however, to your
point, um, there is evidencethat it often happens more often in some
communities and certain races and ethnicities andcultures than others and and and one of
them that you name for example thatfor example, in an LGBTQ community,
(25:47):
there's a lot of uh, intimatepartner and sexual violence that happens um And
then when you take a community likethat that is already depressed from you know,
being who they are and standing intheir truth, now they're in addition
to having to deal with those typeof biases, they're now having to come
(26:08):
forward and express the shame of anintimate partner or sexual violence incident. And
so so I think it's important thatwe as a community kind to understand that
these issues domestic and sexual violence arecolorless, and that it affects every gender,
(26:30):
every race, every every socio economicstatus, every education, every religious
preference, every sexual preference, everygender is no longer and one thing I
am trying to really build in mymessaging around Saving Promise and what I speak
is it's no longer just a woman'sissue. It is a public health issue.
(26:55):
Yes, more women are abused thanmen, clearly so, and especially
you know in areas like physical violence. But we also have to acknowledge that
until we begin to treat this asa major global public health issue, we're
going to continue to try to addressthis from only one angle, and it's
(27:18):
not and we're not going to beable to break the vicious cycle. Yeah.
Yeah, you said something that Ifind very interesting. You talked about
shame. And maybe that's a questionthat it's impossible to answer, but I
always find it so shocking and justoutrageous that we live in a culture where
(27:45):
being victimized is something that people feelshame about. It I have to or
told that they have to feel shameabout. Why do you think is that?
Why do we feel ashamed when weare victimized because of one word dgment,
you know, judgment. We're we'reashamed oftentimes because of the way we
(28:07):
might be judged and what I andI used judge very loosely, because judge
isn't that word. Judgment comes forexample, UM, a woman who might
be an abusive relationship with her partneror spouse, she has children, you
know, she has a career,she's ashamed to tell somebody because she doesn't
(28:27):
want to be judged or you know, UM accosted because she decided to stay.
You know, there was that afew years ago, UM, when
the whole Rave Rice thing came outand his his his then fiance and now
wife decided to stay. There wasa whole hashtag around why women stay.
(28:48):
Yeah, and below the that hashtagwas the real answers to why women stay.
Women oftentimes stay not only just becausethey are shamed, but because they
don't want to break up their families. They might be financially independent on the
dependent on their their spouse. Theyyou know, oftentimes you know when when
(29:11):
women go to court and I've beenthere on the other side of the court
with my daughter, and I've beenthere on that other side of the court
with with with my daughter's father wherejudge was ready to turn her over.
He had just gotten out of prison. I'd been raising my daughter for twelve
years. He comes out of prisonand the judge was about to turn over
(29:33):
full custody to him. Um andmaybe for whatever reason, and maybe he
had his own gripe about the system, right, maybe he was in it.
But and so so the shame alsocomes in that that they don't want
to break up their families or havetheir children stripped from them. Not of
women don't go into shelters because manyshelters can't afford to house or don't have
(29:57):
the space to house. Their children, um and so they have to they
have to be you know, presentedwith the shame of leaving their children and
trying to get to safety. Right. Um. So, so there's that
that whole judgment and the judgment,I mean judging the whole system, that
(30:18):
being tried and persecuted many times inmany different ways, and being revictimized in
that in that in that bloated wordof judgment and shame. Yeah, And
I think that's you know, oneof the great things that um Also,
even if it's just social media activism, but also like hashtags like me too
and campaigns like yours, I thinkone of the great things that those initiatives
(30:41):
do is they make us less ashamed, you know, of what happened to
us. And I think that's justso important. Oh absolutely, Beatrice.
It's you know, that is whyI applaud movements like me Too, because
if it does nothing more then togive others a voice, you know,
(31:04):
because sometimes and that's what the wholeconcept is about me too, you know,
this has happened to me too,and it and it and it relegates
a voice for women particularly who didwho was who remained voiceless because they were
ashamed of being judged. You know, even when some of the initial survivors
(31:26):
came forward right after the me too, because me too been around, I
understand it for a decade now.I think it just sort of found its
legs with his latest controversy, UMthat came out with some of the controversial
stories that came out earlier in theyear, UM and UM. And even
(31:48):
when some of the women came forward, and particularly some of the celebrity women,
they were being judged. They werebeings you know in question, well
why did you wait till now?You were protecting your career. You just
thought about the money. You justthought even why did you wait ten years
now? And that is why,because they were being judged, And that
was That was a perfect example ofwhat I met by linking Shane to judgment.
(32:12):
Mhm, and we will be rightback after a word from our sponsor.
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the code persist fifteen. Now,one thing I think that everyone listening now
wants to know is what i've warningsigns for intimate partner violence, so curse
of control or stalking. Are thereany stories that come up over and over
again that you now know are redflags in the beginning of a relationship.
(33:16):
For example, one that is oftenvery prevalent as a as as an early
sign, and I'll use my ownpersonal experience. The story was that this
person was very charming and engaging andknew how to reel me in that by
(33:40):
the time I was in it,I didn't even realize I was stalk right,
and so, but what I alsohave noticed, and what it's also
very common in the stories that Ihear, is that that whole honeymoon phase
of when the first time we sawsomething, I mean, the first sign
(34:07):
doesn't happen when that first strike ofyou know, a fist, or the
first strike of a name calling,or the first attempt at stalking. That
first sign happened when in the smallpit of your gut, the way that
person looked at you or says somethingthat just didn't feel right, and you're
(34:31):
like, wait a minute, didI hear that? Right? I know
I heard it, but did Ireally listen to it? Did I listen
to the words the meaning beneath thewords? And oftentimes, especially we as
women, we listen to the wordsand don't dig deeper for the meaning.
(34:54):
And so so many people want tosay, oh, the first sign came
when he hit me, or whenhe called me to be word, or
when you know he stoked me.No, the first sign came when we
first saw or heard those words,or that moment where we felt like something
(35:15):
just isn't right in this. Iknow it, I believe it, I
feel it. But I'm going toallow myself to be think in about this
in a way that I'm in anew relationship or I'm back in it again
(35:36):
or whatever, and I want togive it the benefit of the doubt.
And it's that doubt that ultimately couldlead, unfortunately to the minimum of three
women that are murdered every single day, or the countless number of women that's
are sexually violated, you know,in an intimate partner situation. I know,
sexual crimes come unexpectedly, but itusually is in those early warning signs.
(36:01):
So you say, it's a lotabout trusting your own good. It's
about trusting your own God. Itis so about trusting your own good.
And I when I speak, Idon't speak from a place of judgment.
I speak from my own personal experience. Yeah, I speak from generations,
you know, and I speak fromyou know, the times where my daughter,
you know, when I first metthe boyfriend and she bring brought him
(36:24):
home, and I looked at himand I'm looking at her, and I'm
like, do you not see whatI see? Oh? Yes, I
know that feeling so well from likefriends of mine, and yeah, like
why am I seeing this but you'renot seeing it? Yeah? Yeah,
because she's looking through eyes of love, looking through eyes of shame, might
(36:46):
be looking through eyes of you know, where she is that in that journey
that she's not ready to see youknow. Um, The average number of
times, for example, Beatrice,that a woman returns to her abusive partner
is minimally seven to nine times.M Well, you asked yourself, well,
(37:07):
why does it take seven to ninetimes because and I remember, you
know, I had um come tothe realization with my own daughter that I
you know, and when I mentionedat the top of the discussion, I
said, you know, I hadto move her three different times to three
different states. It was after thatthird time, and he kept showing up
(37:29):
wherever I moved her. To JesusChrist, Yes, I come to realize
that, Wait a minute, how'she finding her? Well, he's finding
her because she's reaching out to himas well. Yeah, And so I
said to myself, until she isready. She's not ready yet, So
she's still in that journey, andI don't want to I don't want to
(37:50):
judge her, even though as amother I did because as a mother,
you're you're you know, all thoseall those motherly and maternal instincts kicked in,
and even I didn't want her to, you know, feel judged or
shame her. At some point,I finally had to say, until she
is ready, until she is readyto move on, then I can move
(38:15):
her to all fifty states. Yeah. But but this also means that a
lot of times perpetrators of violence arevery very good manipulators, right, Yes,
And that's That's what I was talkingabout earlier when I spoke about you
know, when I'm looking at mydaughter and she's bringing him home, and
(38:37):
I'm like, do you not seewhat I'm seeing. I'm seeing manipulation,
I'm seeing control, I'm seeing jealousy. I'm seeing scars on your face.
Right, And they might not bephysical scars. It's just in the way
she looked at him at that point, right, fear and so um,
(39:02):
so yes, um. And Iwould go on to say, and I
don't by any way mean to minimizephysical violence, but I would go on
to say that it is that emotionaland psychological violence that is even more damaging
sometimes than physical violence, because thosescars never heal. Physical scars may heal.
(39:30):
All of it is terrible. Butand that is because the manipulation,
the the the humiliation, the makeit that. There's a term called gaslighting,
yeah, you know, which meansfor your audience, when somebody try
to make you think you're the crazyone, you're the one that's causing us
(39:52):
me to do this to you,You're the problem and not me, or
it never happens. Yeah, yeah, And is that um stuff that is
part of manipulation. Now, onewoman that I really really admire is Laura
Richards. I don't know if youknow her. She also has a podcast
and she talks a lot about she'sa criminal behavioral analyst for Scotland Yard and
(40:15):
she also has a podcast and shetalks a lot about coercive control, and
she says the same thing that youjust said, which is a lot of
time the violence is not physical butpsychological, and it's just as bad.
And a lot of times physical violence, you know, comes after a lot
of psychological violence. So a lotof times the curassi of control comes before
(40:39):
the physical violence. Yes, andthere's there's a there's, there's a there's
there's there's a chart, there's andI might get the term wrong, but
it's like escalation chart that shows howviolence escalates. And first it starts very
subtly, and it starts with thecontrol and you know, not wanting you
(41:02):
to be around your friends or yourfamily or it didn't the jealousy. Then
it goes into the manipulation and thehumiliation, and then the verbal abuse and
by the time it got to physicalbecause I've yet to hear a story where
someone got involved in the relationship.And then on the first time that she
(41:29):
or he noticed, you know,that it was an abusive situation was when
they struck him. Right, thestriking comes much later. And what I
mean by much later, I meanall of these does. That doesn't mean
in terms of a timeline, muchlater. It could mean that there were
so many other things that were goingon, you know, with the verbal
(41:51):
abuse, the psychological abuse, thehumiliation, the manipulation, the control,
the jealousy, that by the timethe physical violence has come on, they
could be in a week span.I'm not saying it's less or longer time.
I'm just saying that by the timethe physical calms, there's been a
whole other number of things that havebeen going on. And that is why
(42:17):
I think we need to start withgreater public education and prevention and break into
silence because and quite frankly, manymany women in particular don't even realize that
they're in an abusive situation, especiallylike in my family. That was our
(42:38):
norm. Yeah, that was ournorm. I didn't know any different.
That was you know, my grandmother, my mother sold of my grandmother.
That's what my you know, Isaw to some extent of my mother.
But I was very young when mymy biological father passed away when I was
only five years old, and soI got to see two sides I got
(43:01):
to see, you know, andI wrote a blood I wrote a blog
about this um about the two sidesof my mother's story that I saw in
the relationship with my father, mybiological father, who was murdered when I
was five years old. But inthat story, I remember the scars,
(43:22):
I remember the blood, I remember, you know, the atrocities of what
a little girl would never forget certainthings that happened with my biological and mother,
and my biological father and mother.Then my mother, after my father
was killed, would later marry mystepfather, who was the complete opposite,
(43:47):
and in the nearly forty years thatthey were married, if I until she
passed away, I don't recall thenumber of times, if any, that
I ever even heard or seeing himraise his voice to her let along his
head. So I saw what ahealthy and unhealthy relationship looked like. But
(44:08):
by the time it got to mygeneration, it was more about me wanting
to be with the popular boy okayright, and keeping it quiet and silence
because of the shame of telling myfriends and my family and my mother in
particular, who you know. Iremember the first time I came home with
(44:30):
a black eye, was only sixteenyears old, and I was very active
in sports and stuff. And somy mother said to me in her southern
dialect, that was even more shame, you know, fearful of me than
of him. I was more fearfulof her than of him. And she
said that boy ain't putting his handson you, Izzie. Now, how
(44:52):
do you respond to that at sixteen? I mean, if I say yes,
I'm not going to be able tohave a boyfriend anymore, You're gonna
be disappointed in me. I waspreparing to be the first of my family
to go to college. I've notonly shamed her but disappointed her. So
how do you respond to that?And I said, no, the ball
(45:12):
hit me. Yeah, but Iwill tell you that even by the time
I came home with that black eye, all that other stuff had been happening
for months. Yeah, of course. Yeah. So you talked about how
women don't realize that they're in anabusive relationship because all they know are abusive
(45:32):
relationships. And I feel like alot of times people don't notice that they're
in an abusive relationship because they keepmaking excuses. A lot of times it's
like, oh, yeah, hejust hit me once, or maybe I
provoked him, or so, thisis what I noticed that. It's also
a lot of, as you said, not trusting your own gutten also a
(45:53):
lot of making excuses for an abusivepartner. That is so true. And
I think until we get real aboutthat. You know, the the the
the social conscious and political correct politicalway to address this or say it is
to say, oh, well,no, you know that. You know,
(46:14):
we don't want to re victimize thevictims. And you're absolutely right,
I would never do that. However, um, we also have to come
to terms that many times, toyour point, Beatrice, some women don't
even realize they're being abused. Yeah, you know, not because that's their
norm. But they just don't evenrealize it. They don't even they don't
(46:35):
even recognize it, or they might. Most people think abuse is just physical,
yeah, you know, and especiallyin a day and age in the
culture we're living in now where wejust turn on the music or whatever,
and we hear women being called allkinds of names, and you know,
uh, this and that and slutsand this and all that. You know,
that's that's that's cultural norm. Youknow, that's our cultural morais now.
(47:00):
And so so when it when ithappens to us in a in a
in a in a personal or romanticrelationship and the first time he says,
you know, something to us thatdoesn't feel right. It's not that it
doesn't feel right, because I hearit all the time. I see it
(47:20):
right. Um. But then aswe allow it to continue to perpetuate and
we start not owning it and listeningto that small still voice in our gut,
that is when we start to potentiallybe stuck in a situation that we
don't even realize we're in. Yeah, so what are some I mean,
(47:44):
you answer some of it already,So, but what are some concrete things
that we all all of our listenerscan do now about the situation? How
can we show that we do morethan just give a dam I think some
concrete ways that we can do morethan just give a damn. And I'll
talk about it from whether or notyou are being affected by it, and
(48:06):
what you can do as a survivoror victim, and then what you can
do as a community member that wantto make sure it doesn't happen to you,
your family, your community, orit might be happening and you want
to. You want to, youwant to do something, you want to
take action. So, as someonethat's in it, what I would say
is, first and foremost, findsomeone that you can trust, that you
(48:30):
trust, that you can talk to, because the ft. The first step
towards healing is first come into termswith yourself that you deserve better. And
I know that's cliche, as youdeserve better, No, it's true,
you do deserve better. Right,and find someone, whether or not is
(48:52):
a family member, a friend,a confidant. Do you know there are
hotlines out there, like the NationalDomestic Violence Outline one eight hundred seven nine
nine Safe Safe that people can reachout to and have a confidential conversation.
(49:14):
You don't even have to reveal yourname. You can just call and say,
hey, I think I think evenif you're not sure, I think
this is something. I'm not surewhat it is, but here's what's happening
to me. Can you help mework through it? Right? So that
small step of just talking to someonecan be that first step that can lead
(49:34):
you onto a path of healing andultimately trying to honor yourself to get out
of a situation that does not honoryou. If you are in a community
and you are someone whether or notyou want to prevent yourself or family or
friends, or just want to dosomething. It doesn't have to be that
(49:58):
you are connected to this in anykind of personal way, but you just
want to don't just give a damnUM. One of the things that we've
done is on our website, wehave also outlined a list of things that
people can do to take action,because that was something that people said,
you know, well, okay,I want to do something, but but
(50:19):
how do I do that? Sothere is on our website a link that
once you go to the Don't Justgive a damn Um website, UM is
called you know how you can UMHow you can UM take action and UM
and you click on that and thereare different ways that you could do something.
(50:42):
Like I said earlier, I nameda few. You might just want
to, you know, host it. If you're if you're you know,
a woman, you might want tojust have a meeting with your few friends
and say hey, let's come togetherand talk about this. If you're a
teacher, you can say, youknow what, I want to educate my
students about it. If you're inthe workplace, you might want to.
You know, they have brown baglunches that employees put on. Maybe invite
(51:07):
a few people to a brown baglunch. Reach out to me. I'll
come speak right, yeah, andyou you can you know, um,
you can just go home and talkto your daughter about it. You know
you were asking earlier, is whatis the appropriate age to start? I
would say start as early as youthink is that child can handle right,
(51:29):
age appropriate. If you're talking toa child that's eight years old, just
use age appropriate language. You'll besurprised with these little eight nine year olds.
No, Now, I think we'renot giving them credit. I think
they know more than we think.You know, I'm you know, promises
with me right now, and Iam constantly having to check her iPad and
(51:49):
I do find stuff and I'm like, I am like flabbergasted. I'm like,
oh my god, what are youdoing looking at this? Because it's
out there. So if we don'tteach them at home at an appropriate age,
at a younger age, trust me, society and social media will.
Yeah. Yeah, they're gonna teachthem who they should be calm, right,
and so doing something can just assimple as at the dinner table tonight
(52:15):
when I'm sitting there with my family, when I sit with my child,
I'm like, over dinner, I'mjust gonna say, you know, with
spaghetti. You know, hey,Joey, what what do you know about
boys and girls and the way thatthey talk to each other? Because you
don't have to say your use wordslike domestic or sexual violence. Yeah,
you just say, what do youknow about boys and girls and the way
(52:36):
they talk to each other? Orwhat what what happens when so and so?
Did you ever see so and sohit a girl? Or did you
ever see a girl hit a boy? What did you think about that?
You'll be surprised how that little conversation. In fact, we had a we
launched, for example, UM andour closalness Beatrice, we launched um UM.
(52:59):
We launched it Don't just then formallyin October and recognition of Domestic Ballence
Awareness MOM that but we had apre launch of an event that we hosted
here in DC, and we invitedsome friends and family and community members,
and one of them attendees was ayoung mother who brought her five year old
son. And in fact, onour Instagram you could see a picture of
(53:23):
Helm and her together, and shesaid when he came, he wanted to
know where they were going, andso she told him we're going to an
event and real talk saving promise.And he was like, well, what
is that? Why is what asaving promise? And she told him what
saving promise was, and and hestarted asking questions. He was engaging her
(53:44):
because he wanted to know what thiswas about. And by the end of
that event, and she came upto me and she said, you know,
l Y, my five year oldson who was sitting off in the
corner because he was at the eventwith his iPad and the playing games or
whatever. She said, he hada lot of questions and I felt good
to answer them. So you invitedme here tonight, gave me the first
(54:07):
step towards talking to my five yearold about it. That's awesome. So
there are many things we can do, and I encourage Meach and every one
of your audience members to please dothat. It only takes a minute to
it. Don't have to not wedon't have to solve world hunger. We
could just take one small step beingthat mother who talked to it at five
(54:29):
year old. Talking to your childover dinner tonight talking, you know,
get together with some of your employeesat work and go out to lunch together
and talk about it. And thenthe three all of you can write a
poster and say we don't just givea damn. We talked about it over
lunch. It's those small steps thatwe all can take. So just one
more time, where do people findyou on the internet? So they can
(54:52):
go to Saving Promise Saving Promise dotorg and write at our website, they'll
see the campaign called Don't just Givea Damn and we are really encouraging people
to take the pledge and send itto us. It takes a minute to
snap a picture of yourself, andeven if you don't want to show your
face, you could just snap thepicture of you holding a sign right and
(55:14):
send it to us. And yousend it to don't just Give a Damn
at Saving Promise dot org. Buton our website there's a link that you
just upload it. And so youcould just go to the link on our
website on that page on don't justGive a Damn. It'd be a simple
link for you to upload your photo, very simple, and then we ask
you to just take the action.That's it and then of course share with
(55:36):
your friends and family. Awesome.Thank you so much. L Y,
you were an amazing guest. Thankyou for your honesty and how frank you
talks about your experiences. It wasamazing. Thank you so much. It
was an honor. Likewise, Beatrice, always feel free to reach out.
I really enjoyed talking to you today. Thank you so much. Thanks bye
bye bye. Thank you a wifefor the interview, and thank you d
(56:00):
Nasties for listening to it for theshow. Notes to this episode in all
the links we talked about, pleasego to her homepage She Who Persisted dot
com. If you want to contactus, you can do that via She
Who Persisted Podcasts at gmail dot com. But there is also a Facebook group
which is called Persists that She WhoPersisted group, and that group tends to
(56:23):
be a very good way of gettingin contact with us. Also, there
are other listeners of the show onthere, so we can discuss the topics
that we talk about in the show. We also have a Facebook page.
We are on Instagram where you canfind the picks that we talk about in
the episodes, and we're on Twitterat She Persisted pod. You can also
(56:44):
support us on patreonatreon dot com slashshe who persisted. Please note that we
will take a break until the beginningof March. We won't publish new episodes
until then. However, that doesnot mean that we will be lazy,
because we will be researching and preparingand recording a bunch of episodes in the
meantime. Because as promised in thelast episode, there will be a few
(57:07):
changes to the podcast until then.Stay Nasty wherever you fall on the hair
spectrum from bare to fall, Furprovides natural care to hydrate skin, softened
hair, and eradicate ingroans from headto toe. Fur works with dermatologists and
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it, whether you choose to keepit all wax, shave, trim,
buzz or laser. And if you'reinterested in purchasing any Fair products, you
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get fifty percent off with the codepersist fifteen.
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