Blair Imani

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Speaker 1: Hey everyone, it's Sophia. Welcome back to Work in Progress. Today's guest is a historian and an author, but she is most well known for the power and scope of her activism. Blair Imani is a speaker and a writer, working hard to uplift voices, stories, and histories that have been systemically underrepresented or intentionally blocked. Perhaps her best known pushed and that is her viral video series Smarter in Seconds and If Shorts Aren't Your thing. Her ted X talk Queer and Muslim Nothing to Reconcile also reached viral status. Blair has been present on the front lines of Black Lives Matter, published two books and most recently her third, that give historical context and credit to the people are textbooks most often leave out. She's been profiled by The New y Times, invited to speak all over the world, and has even been arrested for peacefully protesting police violence in Louisiana. From stages to the front lines, Blair shows up. She is an absolutely admirable force for good and acceptance in the world, and I am so honored to have her on the show today. Those of you who have heard of her or followed her work know what to treat this episode will be and for those of you who don't yet, well, I could not pick a better person to get to introduce you to enjoy. Well Blair, I'm so excited to have you here today. I know that before we jumped into the interview, we were just talking about how much fun it is when people who have you know, shown up to support one another and causes and uh, you know, who witness each other working in the world. Actually you know, get to get off of Instagram and chat for real. So I'm just so excited that you're here. And I think for me as like my star has been rising, it's been really cool to be on the podcast that I'm listening to often, and it's like, so it's so cool and like weird also to like be able to like see you while also hearing your voice because I'm so used to just like this disembodied voice. It's a great combo. I'm so excited. That means a lot. Thank you for for loving the show and we're really excited to have you on today. So I really like to go back and and find out where guests have sort of started their journeys because I think so often, as you said, when your your star is rising, when you become a public speaker and author, people meet you where you are. They're learning in real time with you. And I'm always very curious about how the incredible folks I said across from we're shaped before they became go to teachers, online or household names. And so I know that you grew up in Los Angeles as well, which always makes me excited to meet fellow Angelina's. What part of l A did you grow up in? What what made this place feel like home to you as a kid. I'm also from the Rose City. I'm from Pasadena, yes, And so it's been like so cool because you're also from Pasadena. I mean I was born in Cedar Sinai in l A. But then I grew up in Pasadena. I went to St. Mark's and I ended up going to school in San Reno. And I mean, first of all, it smells amazing here, like living in different areas. I think that like having a hometown that is, you know, the home of the Rose Bowl and all of these beautiful, very like highly esthetic things, and then it being so close to like the acting world and the whole movie film industry and being able to step back from it and be in a place where there's like cal Tech right here in JPL, not far away. It's a really unique place that feels like a small town but of course, like you're right outside of Los Angeles um having so many museums like the Huntington's. I mean, like, is this an ad for Pasadena or my own life story? Like you know, like to say, I'm into it. I feel everything you do. And it's so it's so wonderful and it's been cool, like as I've gotten older instead of being like where are you from Pasadena? Where is that to people being like, oh my god, I love Pasadena. And so it's just a really unique place. There's such a wonderful, like family oriented environment here and there's so many things to do, Like there's so many ways to be exposed to perspectives and lives and backgrounds that aren't your own that it really makes you kind of like this global citizen, just you know, like straight from being born, because I remember having friends who didn't speak the same language as me and going to school with them, and not everybody has that experience of being able to like create your own self understanding and identity while also seeing so much difference and being comfortable in that. I think a lot of folks, you know, moved to New York and moved to l A and they're like, Wow, I don't know anybody who is from my hometown, or I don't know anybody who looks like me. But I've always grown up with that, and it's been that place of comfort, and I think it's definitely grounded my understanding with just anti racism, anti oppression work because that's been my upbringing. I love that. Yeah, I'm always so interested in getting into you know, we're we're having conversations about privilege and what that looks like and who has it and who has it in what ways? And I think there is, actually there is a positive type of privilege that I think you're speaking about and that I know I experienced as a kid, which I call the privilege of exposure. Yes, Yes, the incredible good fortune of growing up around so many people who come from different places, different cultures, different foods, different traditions, different ideas. And and I think about how you're right in this town that we both grew up in that really does in many ways feel like a small town, even though it's just outside of Los Angeles. I grew up around so many people who didn't look any like me, and who spoke different languages and whose traditions I had the privilege of being exposed to and learning about. And I I wish that for more people, and certainly for more kids, because it does give you a much more potential filled arena in which to develop yourself. That is so actually said like I think, especially as it relates to disability. That was something that was very much kind of the groundwork of my growing up process. My younger sister is autistic and bipolar, and she was my parents fought really hard to have her experience everything that every other kid would have, but also to understand things like if Chelsea needs more accommodations, that's not something that's extra, it's what she needs, that's her baseline. And so the schools that we went to, like we ended up moving from Pasadena schools to San Marino and we had speech therapy and I went to speech therapy too, And growing up and doing early childhood development gives you kind of an understanding of early childhood development. And so it's totally like the more work that I do educating people about things like consent or you know, different months of celebration, pride, lgbtq um, you know, identity and experience, the more I'm recognizing that it came from growing up here and just having to learn about different people, not as a matter of it being a burden, but it really being like an exciting thing. Like I wasn't raised Muslim. I was raised Christian, and I converted to Islam in college. But I remember the solution to the kind of growing Islamophobia after nine eleven was to have somebody whose family was Muslim come and talk to us about Islam, and we learned about the five Pillars of Islam, and it was like every chance to open people up to your experience or to somebody else's background was something that was jumped towards. Like I gave many presentations during Black History Month growing up, which is very much apt because that's what I do for a living, is give, you know, public speeches and stuff. We had Chinese New Year celebrations. We just it was just this perfect, very sheltered sheltered from bias and sheltered from these instances of oppression, which I'm sure we're still there, but we're in the forefront, and then I like went to school in Louisiana where people had never met a Jewish person, for example, or a Muslim person for that matter, and this concept of otherness being super duper pronounced. And I felt like I went from this utopia of especially at that time because Barack Obama was running for office when I was an adolescent, and this idea of like a post racial America. So I went from that to like very stark named biases and racist biases that people had in Louisiana, not that it was unique from anywhere else in the country. I definitely don't believe that like the South is more racist than other places. I just think that the way that it is expressed is definitely different. And that's the kind of the culture culture shock, but kind of being like socialized to believe, but no, everyone's inherently good, and I still believe that to it kind of being like don't sit with us, you're black. Like going from those different polls really activated me in a way that I felt was very difficult. But I'm happy that I grew from it. Like I don't want to say I'm happy it happened, because I'm definitely not, but I think that it made me aware that not everywhere is like Pasadena, and that, like you said, I do wish that for everybody. And it made me figure out how do I reconcile these things where I'm not shaming people for their lack of exposure, but figuring out what steps we can take to make everybody more smart and compassionate about our fellow experiences, even if it's not the path that we walked ourselves. M I think that's so beautiful, especially because and I know you probably have these moments where you know, I'm rolling my eyes even thinking about it, and I don't want to project that you also roll your eyes when this gets said. But I think so many of us who are from these quote coastal places get frustrated by the way that we're painted as being out of touch. Um because as you said, there are things about where we grew up that really do feel like small towns in so many places across the country. UM. And I've I've experienced that living all over the country for work, you know, going and making TV shows and movies, and you know, big towns and small towns in the Midwest and in the South, and um, and one of the things that really strikes me is that we get told that we just don't know something, when in fact, we know so much because we're exposed to so much. The privilege of exposure, of growing up in a place that is culturally diverse, linguistically diverse, experientially diverse, is that you're not afraid of difference. You're curious about it. And when you go to places that because of economic oppression or because of you know, generational segregation or whatever it is, when you go into these communities that are deeply homogeneous, the fear of what is different, of people who appear to be other creates a bias. And in my experience, it's because of what people don't know that they lean into those biases, and when they get to know even just one person, they go, oh, none of that stuff I was told or taught is true. That's so often and it's like, I think that what also happens. And I talk about this in my book Read This to Get Smarter. I talk about all of these kind of interpersonally racist things that might be said, and sometimes people instead of going, oh, all of my preconceived notions are wrong, sometimes they'll say, oh, all my preconceived notions are correct. But here's an exception to the rule, and that's when we hear things like, oh, but you don't really seem black to me, or you're like cool for a woman, especially like very bro circles, you're not like the other girls exactly, or maybe your conception of girls is incorrect. It's rarely those things, And so I talk about how sometimes it's those biases that we have to let go of, and I think what I will say about these, like, you know, we get called coastal elites, which is so hilarious to me. And in Louisiana, you know we're the South coast, you know, we're right on the Gulf. There's definitely, I think a level of privilege that comes with people being able to kind of like feel like they knew how you grew up. Like my school was definitely like high school musical very much because flash mobs were still a thing in the likes, like it was very much like high school musical. Like we didn't have a sports like we had sports teams about if you weren't going to the plays, if you weren't part of the drama department, then what were you doing? And like finding out who was coming out was such like the popular thing when you grow up, seeing how you grow up on TV because all of the writers are from where you're from, it's very different. And so I think that what I want folks to do is just be patient with one another. That's what I needed. Like moving to Louisiana, I definitely had to like eat some humble pie and figure out like, Okay, I've been led to believe that everything was better in my hometown, but no, there was anti Asian racism, there was anti black racism. The girl's softball team was not funded the same way that the baseball team was funded. And looking at how just because I had this kind of like rosy glasses of like naivete, doesn't mean there weren't problems. And it's not a matter of which problems are worse, but a matter of we all have a level of privilege over somebody else, and we all have a level of being more oppressed or farther away from power than other people, And so how do we use our unique experiences be patient with ourselves and be transparent with ourselves, and you know, come together in a way that makes everything better for everybody, even if that betterment doesn't necessarily serve us first, but we'll be what serves just humanity in a long term. And it's very much like a Mr. Rogers way of looking at life. But I feel like it works, and I do sometimes roll my eyes when people feel like, oh, well, based on how you grew up, you must not understand this, like you must not understand fishing like I love to fish, and I love to fish way before I went to L s U. And it definitely makes me help me make more friends. But you know, we can't really base each other's upbringing on a script or an assumption that doesn't necessarily fet our own story. Oh it's so important and it's something that I really look at. A good sort of example in my mind is the systematic issue of social media, because it gives you this you know, too D screen and you're comparing your three D life to it. We're encouraged to compare our insides to other people's outsides via our phones, and I think it's so important to remember that everywhere you look there is an inside. And to your point, which you made so beautifully, that the reality is every place has issues. You know, those issues that you brought up um that existed beneath the sort of high school musical you know, diverse casting. I remember a friend of mine UM who works at a studio, saying, yeah, you know, everyone wants to be the modern Benetton, you know, the United Colors of Benetton ads and be like, no, look, we did a good job. And it's like, well, okay, but what's happening behind the scene. So you know, you may have grown up in a diverse and multi linguistic community, but what what was happening underneath? You know, what prejudices um and systems of harm? Can you identify where you're from? Can that make you more empathetic two systems elsewhere? And can we each say oh, we have work to do rather than say you're worse, You're worse, this is bad, we have work to do. We could do better. And and something that I've been so inspired by, and we've had some audience members right into us about this. Some listeners. Dr Ibramax Kendy came on the show and he was saying that if you will paraphrase, because he's much more eloquent than I than I am, but he was essentially saying, you have to take the emotional connection to what racism is out and look at racism as a simple fact. And I was like, you know how because it's so the systems and the abuse in ther and he was just like, you know, I get it. But if if you just let it be a thing rather than a judgment, you can then look at how to dismantle a racist system because you're working on data and experience, and it's not about minds worse minds, whereas yours is the word. You know, people can take the emotion app And I'm fascinated by the potential if we could simply look whether you're at school in Louisiana or school in Pasadena and say, these are the problems these are these are the the damage in the system here is based on this kind of racism, this kind of gender depression, this kind of ablest ideology. What if we just aimed to fix the problems. If everyone could show up and say, teach me what I don't know, how can I help? How might I change? Then it might lead us to say, oh, my preconceived notions were wrong, rather than you're the exception exactly. So that's interesting because I like, I think the way that I was raised, especially because my parents are both in mental health, and it was very much the thoughts and feelings the way of growing up. And I think there's a gender dynamic to where sometimes women are more socialized, like lead into the feelings is I want people to step into the emotions of it not necessarily being a bad thing, or we can look at it just passionately. I think that's what Dr. Kendy is is grasping at there is like doing it this kind of like internal review and being really transparent, honest with yourself. But when we have things like preconceived notions, biases, you know, assumption stereotypes, reflecting on what we feel in those moments, that kind of fear like even you know, the microaggression that often happens when there's a man who walks past and you speed up. And sometimes it's because of valid fears because the patriarchy is out here and ripe culture is real. But looking at that feeling and what that connects to, because I think sometimes we end up gaslighting ourselves into thinking that these feelings we have are our fault, and it's not necessarily a matter of fault. To me, it's a matter of responsibility. A lot of us were socialized with a lot of nonsense. I mean, can I cuss on the show like it was just like total bullshit, and like the fact is that we have all this racist bullshit. And I think the conversation has become recently whose fault is this bullshit? Instead of it being whose responsibility is this bullshit? And so if we get to a matter of responsibility, I really think the whole conversation of discomfort when it comes to interrogating privilege, those things are important because it makes us better understand what the reluctance is. I really don't feel that the reluctance it comes from people being like, well, I don't give a ship what other people are going through. I'm fine. I think there are some people like that, but I think there are more people who are like I am so immobilized by apprehension and this fear of not wanting to do the wrong thing that I don't even know where to start. And so what I want people to do is to tap into that and to look at themselves first and to say, Okay, who am I? And not only who am I? But who do I understand myself to be? And who do others understand myself to be and one of those things not match up. Because when those things don't match up, it is sometimes because of where we came from or because of what we look like, and those things aren't our fault or our responsibility. But what is our responsibility is when we look at other people and we say, I don't understand that person's gender identity. That's not that person's responsibility. That's our responsibility to work through, so it doesn't negatively affect how we interact with them or others. Yes, yes, And I think for me, the finding this kind of balance that you're talking about has been such work for me because I am all emotion, all feeling. If you're in pain, I'm in pain. What's happening in your community might as well be happening to mine. It's it's hard for me to disentangle sometimes, and I've learned that what is so clearly unjust that I can see some people, based on where they come from, what they've experienced, what they haven't experienced, don't have the same reaction. And it's been really helpful for me to learn to pressure test my emotional response to something by leaning into the data and saying Okay, if I just make it math, if I take the feeling out of it, what might I see that I could then explain differently from my unique experience. And we each have those, and it's I don't know. It's just been so fascinating to me to begin learning how other people do it and and gleaning some of those tools, because to your point, we don't all have the same instinctual ways of communicating or seeing or feeling. And I think that for me, being able to pull in more scientific information to meet my feelings has given me an assist in how to meet and communicate with people. And I find it helpful as a deeply sensitive person. And yeah, I just I think I think that it can sometimes be the key to unlocking that thing you speak of, which is the difference between saying I don't understand something and I need help versus, oh, I'm carrying a prejudice or a level of confusion. And it's no one else's responsibility to do that emotional labor for me. I have to do it myself. And it's so empowering too, because once you usually an active step in it, that's not something that is very easy to turn off, like when you start watching TV shows. It's real. I really don't recommend move people let go back and watch their favorite movie or TV show from childhood, because as soon as they do, look like this is problematic. I don't know why children are allowed to watch this. What the heck is going on with that? But it starts with so many kids movies are terrifying. Oh yeah, and like you don't want to step back into that. But once you see it, you can't un see it. And once you make it an active process, it's a lot more activating where you can start going, Okay, what is the work that we have to do, like you're just saying and looking at it not as a matter of fault and burden, but responsibility and activation so that we can't take on this work and then become really excited. But I mean, the point you're getting to is well about how we all do it differently and process things differently. It's just the essential key point. How did you remember mitosis for your biology tests? When it comes down to that, I made up like a song for it. Some other people just get it immediately. So when it comes to something like that that we don't often interact with unless you're like a scientist, which is cool when it comes to something that we interact with on a daily basis, which are the systems of oppression. The way that you understand it might be totally different from how I understand it, but whatever it takes to get in the door, I'm happy that we're here. Maybe we should have gotten here a little bit sooner, but the fact is that we're here. Now what do we do about it? And that's that activation in And I also remind people that it's not a matter of doing this work because it's trendy or popular, but because it is a better it's a better way to live. I truly feel because I think that a lot of folks reflect on who they were prior to June when there was this you know, quote unquote racial awakening, and they look at themselves now and they kind of cringe at things they may have said in the past. And of course now we have like Instagram reminding us who we were two years ago, so we can really step into that cringe, but being happy that they have grown, not because of what sparked that growth, because tragedies shouldn't have to happen for growth to occur. But what do we do with the facts of a situation, and how do we come out of it, how do we cope, how do we grow, how do we change? And I think even with something like a global pandemic, there have been a lot of people who had to sit down and figure out what do I do with myself? And these moments of quiet, A lot of people decided to go to therapy. It's okay that I'm crying. I'm going to deal with this trauma. I'm going to improve these things. And what her circumstance got us into that place, That's not what we need to focus on. It's what we do with those circumstances. And I just get really excited about all of it because I have friends who grew up extremely privileged or believed that being color blind to racism was a solution, which it's not. You can't really ignore something and hope it gets better unless it's like a tiny pimple on your face, like systems of oppression don't work that way. But I see those folks sending me videos of their kids being excited to go to Black Lives Matter rallies or have tough conversations or be like mommy, why are all your friends white like, it's so exciting to me that process even happening, and that parents are in a position to be like, honey, that is a question that mommy needs to ask yourself. What do we do about it? Versus getting something to run away from? And I just think that it's a betterment that a lot of folks are realizing there's so much I don't know. I'm not afraid of that, but I am excited by it because I have more work to do. Yeah, And that if we can, if we can encourage people to take the sort of of you know, never enough feelings of failing that come from living in a deeply you know, hierarchical and capitalist society, and and take those out of personal identity and say it's okay that I don't know everything. It's okay that I haven't had every experience. How am I going to show up differently today? How am I going to ask those questions today? Um? Yes, we should have gotten here sooner, obviously, but here we are, So what are we going to do from today forward? And And it's interesting because I think about some of the things you are talking about, you know, in these moments and happening inside of families and and what is opening up because of the Internet, because of the transparency we all have and the capabilities we have to talk to each other and see each other and and really see systems that nobody wanted to put on the news, but now Instagram is the news. Um, I'm very curious. It doesn't seem accidental to me that so many things lined up to put you in the world to do all of this work. You know, you speak about your family, you speak about the community you were raised in, what you experienced with your sister. I think about the fact that you were born only a year after the acquittal of the police officers involved in the Rodney King assault and riots. And when you speak on advocacy for your sister, when you speak on advocacy for community, when you talk about teaching young people as a black, queer Muslim woman, do you see from this moment of leadership in your life? Do you see through lines to understanding these systems were referring to to understanding systems of harm and police brutality and things as you were growing up or was that something that moving to Louisiana and being in a completely different experience for the first time in your young life. Where do you where do you think it clicked on for you looking back? I think that when I look back and I tell like stories about how I grew up to my friends, it's so linear, like I am exactly, I'm doing exactly what I was meant to be doing, the fact that I would often volunteer myself to give a presentation on the Tuskegee Airmen or like the civil Rights movement, or the fact that there's actually a video me on my YouTube channel from like I think it's like two thousand and six where I'm a little wee baby and I have my little headband on, and I'm giving my interview in my living room with my friend Katie, and we're interviewing Dr Terrence Roberts, who was one of the nine students that volunteered to integrate schools in Little Rock, Arkansas. And he came over, you know, in his sweat pants, like getting ready to for us to interview him. And I see moments in that interview and I love showing it to the young people I'm working with because they are around that same age that I was. And there's this point where I remember having these no cards but there's one question I asked him that was a follow up, and that's like, that's great journalistic skills. And I'm like, you know, twelve or something. Those are the things where I'm like really excited about it. But I also think about what I do today, which is connect with so many diverse people to explain things in these really tangible ways. Like I did a lesson on how to apologize. I don't think that a lot of us might raise our hands and go, I need to learn how to apologize better. But once we see that lesson, we might go, oh, those are some tips and tricks that I actually need to incorporate in my life. It's kind of this life I've had figuring out how to get people to a place where I know they can be, but maybe they're not in a place of self understanding that they need to get there, And how do I cross that bridge in a way that isn't shaming people or judging people, but just really kind of activating and exciting people. And there's other aspects, like I was definitely a little bit tokenized growing up as one of the few black students in the school district period, and I remember that there were points when it was very clear that Obama was going to become president. Obama at least become the candidate, you know, and then eventually president. And I would be waiting for my mom at school and I remember one of the parents, one of the white parents, came out of the car and was like, Hey, Blair, I have a question for you. So what does young black America think about Canada? Obama and I had answers because I anticipated I would be asked because I grew up with such a belief in like being prepared. I mean my dad, the way that he would teach us about preparedness. He has this story about when he went to Kenya. He did operations Crossroads Africa in the seventies. He was a conscientious objector to the war in Vietnam, and he talks about how everybody wanted to like have fun the first day of the trip, and my dad was like, no, I'm gonna go get some wood and I'm going to build myself a bed that slightly off the ground because there are weevils in the dirt and I want to protect myself. And everybody was like, oh, do Walt, You're so boring, And he was like, I don't care about being boring. I care about being prepared. And he would tell the story like if you forgot your homework at home and didn't bring into school. But it really imprinted on me that, no, you sometimes have to do the unpopular thing or the lonely thing in order to be prepared and equip yourself. Of course, for a twelve year old Blair, super stressful way to grow up, and I definitely have generalized anxiety to storder like and it's interesting to look at all the pieces and just know that sometimes I was put in the position of being the spokesperson for all black people, and that's really unfair and I don't want my kids to have to go through that. Simultaneously, I have been so well equipped to do exactly what I'm doing today. And I think that the difference between being in Pastina and then going to Louisiana was that I had this tool kit from growing up. I had a vision of what things could be. When I came out to my parents and my brother came out to my parents, it wasn't like, oh, we need to go to therapy about this. It was like, amazing, I'm so glad you've realized this. About yourself. Thank you so much for letling us in. And it was a vision of how life could be. But then I went to school in Louisiana and I had friends who were telling me that their parents put them in conversion therapist who as it came out, and I saw what life could be and should be growing up, and then I was transported by choice. I went to Louisiana State University and saw how life is for a lot of people, and it made me realize, I have been so blessed, and it's not that I have been blessed or that I'm fortunate, it's that I've grown up how it should be, and so how do I create systems for other people? And in that moment, my response was to put my classes on Tuesday and Thursday, so that Monday, Wednesday, Friday I could be doing trainings. I could do advocacy. I could go to the Capitol building, which was right in the city of Bouton Rouge and start doing trainings on you know, civil disobedience and consent. And I think that it was like I had all the skills and it was going to Louisiana that activated me and also gave me a sense that it's not as rosie everywhere else, but it could be. And I'm glad that I had that that growth and understanding growing up that no, you should be able to come out and be accepted period. But a lot of people don't experience that, And so how do we use education to cross that bridge? I am endlessly excited when people talk about not just envisioning, but actually experiencing the world as it could be at its best, and then committing to assisting in the creation of that world, of that kind of a future. And I know it strikes me, and I'm sure strikes plenty of people who are listening to us have this conversation. You talking about being a college student and saying, I'm gonna reserve three days a week to run trainings on sevil disobedience to to teach to gather people. How does a young woman do that? How? How does how do you? As your college self? I feel confident enough to say, oh, I know how to do this? Where does that begin? Where you were? You? Nervous? I have anxiety just thinking about it. I think a big part of it is that I grew up idolizing the civil rights movement and definitely was doing a little bit of self fulfilling prophecy when it came to that idolization. I expected college to be the place where you went and had protests where there were sit ins where you were changing yourself to the dean's office so that things changed, which we never did. Um, but I was always prepared to do it. You were ready. Yeah. It was also an environment where, like my parents paid for my school and we were able to get loans and stuff. So I wasn't constantly in this position that a lot of my peers were of needing to not upset school administration, whether that was in a material sense or like a belief sense and lose their scholarship or get sent home, or didn't have parents who would fly down to Louisiana and get you a lawyer and speak to the double A c. P. If you got into any type of racially based trouble, because that was my parents all the time. Like my parents were like if anybody says, especially because we were the only black kids in many cases growing up, my parents were so present and ready to go, Like if we weren't getting all the things that we needed, my parents were like, let's speak to the manager immediately that very much that energy. So I came with that. I also came with the understanding of seeing what had been done growing up down the street from Dr Roberts, from Little Rock nine definitely gave me this perception. I remember he told me he was fifteen when he did that. I interviewed him when I was like twelve or thirteen, and I was like, Wow, that's only a couple of years from now. What am I doing to be in the history book. So it was kind of like this, not competitiveness in like a toxic way, but very much like this where my contributions coming in. So when I got to college and I was like, Okay, the activism arena here, it exists. I knew that in Baton News there with the bus boycotts there that had preceded the ones with Dr King in Alabama, and I knew that we could make this difference. But there was also a lack of understanding I had about all the trauma people had gone with policing. Growing up in Louisiana, I had friends who who had a cousin who disappeared, and I also had that in Los Angeles. But I also grew up in San Marino, where my mom went to high school with one of the police office. There's who was the only black woman police officer at the p D. And so when you hung up the phone in San Marino, the police are already there and they were happy to help. Like it was a very different dynamic than constantly being harassed on your way to school. And so I had that disconnect. And so when it came time to organize a vigil, we did a vigil um. When we found out that the police officer that killed Mike Brown wouldn't be, you know, indicted, or that he had been acquitted, I don't I don't recall the had taken place, but we wanted to do a vigil to give people a place to mourn, and my friends were afraid to do that, and I was like, there's definitely so much that I'm not aware of that my friends feel afraid to have to come together with a permit on campus with candles to mourn and do a spoken word poetry night. I need to take so many steps back. I need to let go that dream of chaining ourselves to the dean's office and figure out how I cannot do that thing that people think that folks from the West Coast and the East Coast do, which is think that we know everything and we come in and try to solve problems that we aren't even familiar with all the way. And I think I did that well. I of course I would like to think I did it well, but I think I had a lot to learn in terms of what's the status quo here, and not only feeling like, oh, I could fix everything, but that I'm going to do my damnedest to fix it, but that also I need to be collaborative. And I so got burnt out, like I would always have talked with my mom should be like, don't get burnt out, blare, and I didn't. It was so abstract to me. I was like, what is burnout? But for me, it looked like sleeping through the protest that I organized because I was so exhausted, or not taking care of myself or eating and drinking enough water because I was feeling like, if I go to this party or if I do anything nice for myself, I'm taking money away from something I could donate, something I could do better. And it wasn't sustainable whatsoever. And so it was kind of like such an urgency within my heart and soul. If I don't do this, it won't happen. And that's a terrible way to organize, in a great way to get burnt out. And what I had to instead do, which I feel like I was starting to accomplish as I left Louisiana UM in my last year of school, which was figure out who I could build in coalition with. But there were some things that I definitely tried to burden or shoulder myself, like I tried to protect people from things like instead of being in community when we basically were doing these meetups on campus and we would have blackout Wednesday. It was co organized by my friend Kristin White and myself and some other folks, and we would have press sometimes coming. We had a lot of accomplishments, but I was the one whose name was on paperwork, so I was the one getting threats, but I wasn't sharing that that was happening. I was just trying to insulate people. And so not only was I burnt out and feeling like I had to be the superwoman, but I was also kind of trying to shelter other folks cause I knew that they were afraid of these things, and I felt like if I had shared that was the reality, then all the progress we made would fall back, and so we ended up not doing those anymore. And there was a time where it kind of coincided with these two militiamen, self appointed militiamen who came to campus with guns, and it was kind of like a very diffused situation, but in my heart, I was like, those could have been the people who were giving me threats. And so it definitely affected me further on in my organizing career to the point where I'm a retired organizer. Now I can't do that anymore because it's just not good for my mental health. And so it was kind of like a candle that burns quickly but burns out. And fortunately my new candles to be like a writer and educator and historian. But I went in with such a sense of this has to be done that I didn't even have time to look at what might happen. And I wasn't listening to people in my family, like my uncle Vernon, who was a black panther who was constantly telling me be careful, watch your back. I was like, whatever, Uncle Vernon things need to change. But he had gone through something that I hadn't even believed was a possibility. So if I could do it all again, I would be more patient, I would listen more. And that's really what I tried to talk to young people who are doing this work now, is to take your time until really heed the warnings and the environment that people are going into. But the biggest part of it was that I was trying to actualize a civil rights movement moment, and it was a self fulfilling prophecy. But I didn't even think about how many activists don't talk about their work anymore because they're so exhausted. But I definitely understand it now. The candle that burns out quickly really resonates with me. I think, especially in a deeply motivated youth, we think we're going to be the ones to change it. You know, talking to my parents about attending civil rights protests and Vietnam protests, and and you know, similarly, my dad talking about immigrating to the US, and and in a way, because he knew he was safe from the draft, he could go and step up and say things that other friends who were from here fell like they couldn't. So. Hearing you talk about understanding ways in which you felt protected and privileged by your own circumstance um and also put your foot so hard on the gas, I'm like, yep, I've talked to my parents about that. I definitely did that, you know, as a young as a young woman really jumping into the fray. It was like, I'm going to use the privilege of this platform or everything at my disposal, and yeah, when the threats start coming, nobody really prepares you for that. And like my the way my parents have reacted to me getting threats every single time is probably the healthiest way, but not the most helpful way, where they're like, well, that's how you know you're doing something right when people are trying to get you, and it's like, okay, yes, yes, but also I am fearing for my life or I think, especially because there's this massive lore within the black community around all these martyrs of the civil rights movement, that if you're doing that, you're on the right path. Not necessarily what is that doing to your heart and your soul? And it really wasn't until I was being to other activists who had also gotten threats that I was able to heal from it because they had been in that same situation, which is like so beyond. And I tell people now, like when I speak on campuses, I'm like, please remember that this is college and definitely push the envelope and do as much as you can because it is the real world, but you definitely are sometimes more insulated. But also remember that you don't have to double major and then organize all the protests, Like you can literally just be a person and at a time exactly, and you can trust that you have a coalition of people who also care about what you care about and want to make the world better, and you don't have to fight this war by yourself. And I just try to be the person that I needed in that moment. But I was also bottling so much up, like it was just interpersonal drama plus my papers do and it was definitely like trial by fire. And the funniest thing about all of it was that I was so done with Louisiana. Afterwards, I was like, I'm not going back to Louisiana. I'm moving away. So I moved to d C. I finished we Will in like three years in a summer school because I was getting threats. Of course, my grandparents who migrated out of Louisiana were like, why did you think we left Blair? Like connect the dots, you know, uh. And they were so afraid for me when I decided to move. But they were like, she's stubborn, She'll have to learn on her own. But the job I ended up getting, like my first big girl job was at Planned Parenthood and my job was to be the press officer in the Southern States. So it was like, Awesome, I'm in the North. And then they're like, and you're going back, and so my job going back and you're going to be on the receiving end of more threats, Yeah, like very specific ones. And so from twenty six seventeen, I was a press officer for like a lot of the Southern plant parenthead affiliates. And I'm so grateful that all those things aligned because it gave me the opportunity to heal and being a different mindset. But it also was really cathartic and I was able to use those skills that I had where it was like, how can we come together and have these tough conversations. A big part of my job was teaching people how to talk about abortion from a religious standpoint, and there's a big belief in the South that no got f mint off my property, like this is ours. And then also we're not judging my neighbor, even though you probably will judge your neighbor. You'll just say bless their heart afterward. But yeah, it was like, how do we use that for the pursuit of justice? And I saw so much progress. So I had felt so burnt out and so kind of like defeated, where I know we had wins at l s U, but I felt like there was more I could do. And so that was kind of like the conclusion of my organizing career. Plus the first month that I was there, I got arrested at the protests um around Alton Sterling. I remember reading about that. But that's something I think is so interesting. I think that that desire and I guess I I highlighted, you know, my own version of it, which I know is proximal, Like I know the threats many of us are on the receiving end of as women who are publicly advocating for change, and I know that you, as a black woman publicly advocating for change, get a whole other set and then you layer on that you are a black, Muslim queer woman advocating for change, and I'm just like, dude, I have months where I'm scared to leave my house? How are you? And I guess that it feels important to acknowledge that there is that burnout that you know your family talked to you about, your grandparents and your uncle, and that my parents warned me about. And I, similarly to you, was like, we're going to be the ones where the generation we're going to change it all. And and my humble pie, as a public advocate and activist, came with, oh, people have been working on this for literal hundreds of years. So if I think in my little brain that it's going to be me and you and all our friends who are the ones that push it over the edge, of course we're going to burn ourselves out. What are we gonna do in these you know, ten year blocks of our lives that's gonna change the last four hundred, six hundred years of what we've been trying to alter for the better, for the greater good. And in a way it made me get really practical about leaning into the reality of we might move the needle say, say the last generation moved at five clicks, let's hope we can move it six. Let's hope. And and we're going to try our best. And we have to stay in it for a long time because it doesn't refresh like our phone. It isn't a quick turnover, It isn't sexy. It's a long haul job. And and if I think about it in that way, how do I better take care of myself so I don't completely burn out? How do I encourage the women in my life, in our larger circles, my friends, my co workers, how do we give ourselves a little release on that pressure valve? And how do we do it as a team rather than saying if I don't do it, it's not going to get done. What does a decentralized system of power look like an advocacy that we might and model in our society. That that was a reckoning for me starting to think about those things, And I think I have like just a quick story about what that looks like materially, because I think sometimes we think it's like a big, grandiose overture of something that's really big, big to do, and sometimes it's small acts of compassion where we might inconvenience ourselves in the moment, but it's in the pursuit of helping somebody else. And I think about my coworker Danielle, and I actually called her and talked to her about this. It was years after the fact, but it was my first time going to Birmingham and as a black person, like as you're saying all the identities I embody and then going back to a place where when I would drive down to Florida for spring break, I was definitely trying to skip Mississippi and Alabama and just hold it till we got to the other side because there's so much trauma there. And I remember freaking out, like we're in a meeting and I'm pretty sure I just like dissociated completely. They're like, Okay, then Blair will go down and then train folks in Birmingham and then we'll do that, and I'm just sitting there like no, no, no, no no, and just freaking out. And I had to think that Danielle saw me in that moment and she was just like, Okay, and I'm gonna go with Blair. It's her first time training this affiliate. I'll just want to be there and it was a moment where she looked into her humanity and was like, I don't want Blair to go by one. Blair's the only visible Muslim person here, She's one of the black folks that's on this communications team. Let's make sure that we're supporting her. And it was just her being present. And I have tried, I've exploited expressed her in that moment, but then of course I think it was like last year I called her about it, how grateful I was because it was such a scary experience that she didn't have to accompany me with. She didn't have to use her privilege as a white woman to come with me, as somebody who was more targeted by different systems of oppression, to be there for me. I'm sure she had things that she was also doing, deadlines that she had to push back, but she also had the seniority and the power in that, you know, at planned parenthood, to be able to say, hey, actually this needs I need to go with Blair um. And it's those things where she made herself in convenience to an immeasurable degree of benefit to me. And I really felt seen in that moment and it's those things. It's not necessarily that we need to raise a million dollars for a given organization. Sometimes it's having a tough conversation with your friend that keeps miss gendering somebody, or having a tough conversation with casting if you're able to have seniority on a set and say we actually need to have more black folks in front of and behind the scenes. And it's those small acts that ladder up to big change. And that's like the most concrete example I can possibly think of because it meant so much. And for her it was just kind of like a squid Blair looks super uncomfortable. I don't want her going by herself. I'm just gonna step up. And for me it was like, oh my goodness, thank thank God for this person seeing me and using their privilege so that I could just do my best at my job, but then also acknowledge the fact that I was terrified. And so it's those acts of humanity and sharing our humanity. But it also is about emotion, right, It's using our emotional intelligence to look at other people's experiences and maybe sometimes asking out loud, can I help you? Can I support you? And being okay with no, and other times making the judgment call that maybe I can be of use here, maybe I can be of service. Yeah, that's been such a a great clicking up, if you will, for me in my awareness in communities like our extended community of people who are really out trying to do the work when things happen years ago, you know I would I would reach out and just say, hey, I saw this. Are you okay? What's going on? You know? Do you need anything? And just the learning of being in a in a community and and learning the types of lessons you're referring to has made a change for me where when anything's going on in the life of a woman you know, or a friend, anyone who's kind of out there writing for the future, if you will, I don't reach out and say hey, do you need anything anymore? I always say I saw this. How can I support you right now? Just tell me, like literally, if you need a delivery of groceries, or if you need somebody to hop on a phone call or show up to a meeting or be on a zoom, just how can I support you right now? And it gives people the permission two ask differently and I think about how even you sharing that story of what you experienced with your coworker might make someone who's listening that's in a position similar to yours, or perhaps in a position similar to hers, be able to say, oh, I need this kind of support, or I can lend this kind of support right now. And the thing is I didn't even know her that well, And it's like, we don't have to be best beds with folks to extend that. I have another example, it's like all the women who'd like to help my career. A woman named Julia who worked at the Center for Disability Advocacy. I worked at Heineken before I worked at Planning Parenthood, and on the floor there was it was. It was in government relations. People like, you're a musclem that worked in beer, and I'm like yeah. In fact, when I did my TED talk, I mentioned that I used to work in the beer industry as kind of a litmus test, because if you're really like an Orthodox person and you're not homophobic and like scare quotes, then you would be upset that I worked in beer and that I was gay. But there's a lot of people who are just more upset about the fact that I'm bisexual than anything else. But anyway, So I was in Pine Niken and government relations. We shared a floor and Julia worked at the Center for Disability Advocacy, which was on that shared floor, so the shared bathroom, and I was in the bathroom. Absolutely just try you've had moments like this, like if you ever worked, like any circumstance where just under a lot of pressure kind of like okay, well I have to step right out, I'll be right back. It used in the bathroom and I was trying to ask my boss for a raise, and I was so freaked out about it, and she was just like, al right, girl, how could what are we how can we support? She just was like, I'll be right back. She brought me a cup of water. We talked through some steps, and it's those moments where you're just acknowledging somebody else's human be and now we're friends, we still keep in touch, and it's those things that make a true difference, because she easily could have been like, oh, that's drama I'm not stepping into And sometimes we make that call. But other times, and I think more valuable and compassionate times, we go this person might need a cup of water, this person might need some assistance, and I'm just going to make myself of service so that way and then give them the you know, the option to to to decline that, but definitely just to be present. And it's those steps that I think really dictate how we're remembered and what our legacy is on this earth, because it is those ten year intervals. But it's not sometimes the fact that we did one grandiose gesture, but all the little things together that make a difference when you think about that kind of showing up, you know, whether it's in a one on one moment or or at as you said, organizing a protest. You know, you mentioned that you got arrested at the Aults and Sterling protest. Can you kind of walk us through what that's like. You know, lots of people feel more permission now, I think to speak up about elections and politics and each other and community advocacy, but really being on the ground protesting things like police violence and then being subject to police violence in this community in the South where you knew you were more at risk. Can you can you share just a little bit about that maybe for people who want to advocate, but also might be afraid to show up on a front line like that. I will definitely say that a lot of it was just bold, reckless naivety, where I was just kind of like, I can do it, and not necessarily what's the fallout. I think that sometimes it's the consequence of being so ready to go to like shatter a glass ceiling, that we don't really think about where the glass is going to fall, and I don't recommend at I think sometimes we can't help it. I also accidentally came out on the Chucker Carlson Tonight show. I was thinking, Wow, I've spent the past year talking about abortion in the South. I can do anything. I'm not thinking about how volatile is this man's audience and will like what will the consequences be? And in one breath I'm glad that I wasn't afraid of those things, And in the other breath, I'm like, oh girl, you in danger, Like really take a step back and consider those things. And so what I tell people to do now is to consider their sphere of influence about the things that they can take action for. Like, say you live near dl Rio and you're seeing what's happening to Haitian immigrants, people who are trying to seek refuge in asylum. If you're in that vicinity and you don't have a warrant for your rest, and you know that you exist in a body that won't be impacted by police and that you are a citizen, sometimes showing up and bringing water are the best things that you can do. I also think about all of the people who just brought handwarmers and boxes of pizza, two people at JFK when there was the whole conversation around the muscle van, Like I still have a picture on my phone about this woman who just brought ten boxes of pizza and was like, I lived nearby. I just thought i'd bring something, and I was just like correct, like yes, that's what you're supposed to do. And so I think it's like what can I do? But then also really taking stock of things, I think that sometimes we can let our passions lead us in the not wisest or more strategic direction. Like sometimes we'll go, oh, I'm going to show up, but like oh snap, there's a warrant for me, or oh snap, like I can't do this because I will lose my job and I won't be able to pay rent. We have to live in the reality that we exist in while also trying to fight for a better future. So it means being really practical and really strategic. And the example I use is thinking about activism like a pot luck and say that you want to be the be the person that brings like the rock star mac and cheese, but you've never made mac and cheese before, you have a dairy and gluten allergy, and you're not really good at substitutes. And meanwhile, your best friend Becky just brought you like this fresh caught tuna, and you have our chosen a mayonnaise and you have fresh gill and celery. Sounds like you should be bringing the tuna salad and not bringing the mac and cheese, especially because Dolores across the street brings the best mac and cheese every year. So maybe you go over to Dolores's house and after the pandemic right and you figure out how you can learn to make that mac and cheese. But at the same time, you bring what your best equipped to bring, which is that tuna salad. And nobody really wants to bring the tuna salad, but it's what you need to bring. To this pot luck of justice to effect change, and so it's looking at your tool set that way. So for me, like my Mac and cheese is being a frontline activist, but I can't do that anymore. It's not good for my mental health. It's not where I'm most effective. I went to a protest in San Marino and all of my racial trauma just well to the surface, and I was just sobbing the whole time, and it was the most safe space you could imagine where it was just like a bunch of people and Grandma's holding signs that said black lives matter. Meanwhile, I'm reacting to this like I'm getting arrested again, which just reminds me that I'm traumatized and I don't need to put myself in those situations. So I Tuna Salad is me being an educator and talking to people about how they can affect change, teaching folks how will apologize that they could be more compassionate and understanding and have better interpersonal relationships. And I'm thriving at this. It might not be what I envisioned for myself, but it's what I'm good at and it's how I can best serve people, and I think those are the steps that we have to take. So we have to figure out what's in our fridge and what we need to bring, and it might not be what we want to bring, but it might be what we're called upon to do. I really love that, and I think it's also really important to remember that if we're lucky, we're all going to live long lives. You might start off being the mac and cheese person and become the tuna salad person. You will have stages of what your gifts are. And I am certainly aware that I am in a stage where I am having to give myself some gifts. Because I've spent most of my career giving everything I can to other people. I am having to bring some of those resources back in and create some new space. And I know that what's on the other side of what I'm learning experience and seeing, meditating on sort of recalibrating. I know there's going to be a next dish. And I think it's really important, whether it's in the ways we show up that you're talking about, or even in the things where you know quote unquote meant to do, like in our careers, um in our family structures, It's really important to give yourself permission to do a new thing, to change your mind about what you're good at. You know. That's that's where we can I love the metaphor. I'm just going to really lean into it. That's how we throw the best potluck. That's how we have the most variety at the table. And I I'm so excited as a person who is truly just a fan and an admirer of yours, um you know who loves when we like leave each other messages on photos and things. I'm excited to see what new things you've been cooking up. Your first book, Modern History, your micro video series Smarter and Seconds. Like you sit on the board of the Tegan and Sarah Foundation, there are all these things that you have made are making ways you are serving. Can you tell the folks at home a little bit about those things before we get into the new book. I want to. I want to get through what what's been cooking and what's on the on the stove now, Well, like Smarter and Seconds definitely was a smash hit in ways that I couldn't even anticipate. Where even now, like when I'm on board meetings at the Tegan and Sarah Foundation, like we just had one recently. They had a video of me doing the lesson on rainbow washing, and I'm like, wow, my worlds are really colliding. Or when I was at fashion Week and all of my friends who are well established in different entertainment fields are like singing my Smarter and Seconds jingle back to me. I feel like this is a really great example. But I was just talking about where Reels was coming out. I've always wanted to be like a Vine star, but Vine doesn't exist anymore. And I know I have these skills and I have like a stage presence, but when it's a short video format, I'm not going to do songs and dances. I'm not going to do makeup looks. I'm not going to do clothing transitions, not because I don't want to, but just because I don't want to embarrass my so but what I can do is talk really fast. I can talk really fast, and I can educate people about things in a short, snappy way. And I reached out to one of my friends who's a genius at branding, Courtney Quinn, who's at color Me Courtney, and she was like Smarter and Seconds like she was throwing out in different names, and she ended up naming it Smarter and Seconds. And I mean the first videos were just getting millions of views. Now I have like fifty million views under my belt. So we're actually going to be doing another vertical soon called Science and Seconds because there's a lack of understanding about science, and it will be teaching people about the ring cycle pollution, d n A m r n A to get lesson about vaccines in there. You know, vaccines don't change your DNA exactly. So many different basic materials that I can get across in thirty seconds or less. And so if Bill Nye is a listener, I'd love for him to reach out to us or my people will be in touch with your people, Bill Nye, if you happen to listen to Sophia Bush's podcast, Bill Nye and Icon And so I want to do these more comprehensive things even as I'm leading into this new book, but I'm also on the board of the Muslims for Progressive Values. I just really try to make sure that I am maximizing my time on Earth and then also resting. So like yesterday, I went to bed at like three pm because I did a thirty six hour trip to New York, and I never doing that again, but I had to do it for the specific work task. So I do try to rest as well, but I try to do things that make me joyful. And I really love teaching people, and I really love interacting with my smarties, and it's so great that I get to do that for a living. I love it. I love that we have communities of smarties. I literally call the listeners of this show whip smarties. Yes, you know I It's the only thing I want is for us to get smarter and more empathetic and to respect science and understand data and feel empowered by all of it. And and I think that's so much of the work that you do feels to me again, as you know, if you were like you have a very similar goal. And the book, the new book is called Read This to Get Smarter. So can you tell people a little bit about it? And and what led you to this being your next project? Okay, so this being my new project. What happened basically was I made this kind of jump the Shark video for Smarter and seconds where I think only happy days and millennials are going to get that. So it's basically like when you do something where it's like, Okay, this is kind of over the top, is this going to ruin the flow? And I did like a singing video where I was talking about how you may have heard that cowboys were white, but that just ain't the whole truth, and I like totally saying it. I'm not going to do it here, um, but I talked about how like cowboys were also black and indigenous and of Mexican nationality and like other backgrounds too. And the editor for my last two books, like hey, where we're all really loving Smarter and Seconds, would you have a conversation with us about potentially and doing another book? And at this time, I have to tell you, I was like, I'm never writing a book again. I hate the process, Like it's so stressful, never in life. Um. But I also wanted to be open to different possibilities and opportunities. So we had a few conversations and it was basically like how do I use this format of an accessible, easy to understand lesson then extended into a book forum. And my last two books are about history, and I really actually wanted to write a book about puberty, but I had to put that mac and cheese on the shelf and figure out, Okay, what can I actually do with this? And there were chapters in this book that I didn't want to write, Like I didn't want to write a chapter about relationships. I didn't want to write a chapter about class and classism, but I needed to for it to get the point across. And you're supposed to be as a writer. There's these sayings about, right the things that scare you, and that was definitely the thing that I did. I had to figure out, Okay, what are the things that I can talk about that might be not what I want to talk about, or might not be the forefront of what I am called to do or I feel that I'm called to do, but that need to happen. And a massive part was reaching out and asking for help and working with folks like Dr sha Kill McLane and Dr Chary Spurt and Stelly and feeling in these gaps, and then of course compensating folks. Do you have to compensate people when they're consulting for you. You can't be picking brains And then also talk about that conversation too in the book. And so it's been really a joy. And I just recorded the audio book myself, which was terrifying because I really struggle a reading out loud, and I'm like, this is good, Like I did a good job, and so I'm really proud of myself and excited for it to be in the world. I'm so excited for you when you are bringing people into this conversation about learning in this way about our identities are experiences showing up in the world, the ways to apologize, the ways that things like relationships and so on and so forth affect how we live, and the potential for showing up. It's not lost on me that a lot of that centers around identity and integrity. And there's a lot of people who push back on leaders and people who are advocating for change, and they like to kind of designate everything as identity politics. And you you mentioned this um earlier. You you mentioned the day that you went on Tucker Carlson, and I remember that and I was like, what is she doing? What is happening? Is she going to be okay? And I've obviously watched that interview, as so many people have, and I know you reference it in your Ted talk and he tried to do that to you. He was so dismissive, and he said, oh, you know, identity politics, and he was talking over you, but I still caught your response. You said, it's not identity politics when it's your life. And so I'm really curious how you think through learning, through getting smarter, we can dismantle that very dismissive card that gets flung around and and encourage people to look beneath two people's actual experiences, because it is the experiences and the seeing each other that allows us to be more progressive in everything from our own behavior to policy. Definitely, I think one of the biggest things is I start with identity right at the top of the book. I talk about ourselves and the way that we understand ourselves in the ways that others understand us, in that way we understand others, and all these different dynamics, and it basically coming down to a matter of we have assumptions, and those assumptions matter not because they're true, but because it affects how we treat people, how we understand ourselves, and how we understand each other. And the conversation about identity politics is a necessary one to have when it's when it happens correctly, just like critical race theory is super important to discuss if you understand critical race theory, otherwise it gets into this kind of like mushy mess. But the fact is that our experiences are lived experiences also adders up to expertise, and we have to sometimes put really actually sometimes foreground those things like when somebody says, well, I don't actually need to know this person's race, well, why are you saying that? Is it because it actually doesn't matter? Or is it because if you acknowledge it you might lean into your biases. When somebody says, oh, I don't really care about this person's gender identity or I couldn't care less what your sexual orientation is, is it a genuine message of I'm going to treat you the same regardless, or is it I'm afraid that I'm going to treat you differently if I know this about you. And so it's looking at intention every step of the way, and also just understanding that often the most privileged of identities are the ones that go unnamed and un acknowledged, where we'll say somebody is half black, but we won't say the other half because we already know that other half is white, or somebody who's a white American just gets to be an American, whereas I have to be an African American. And Tony Morrison said that in the United States, American means white and everybody else has to hyphenate. And so it's understanding that when identities aren't named, it's because those are the dominant identities, and because systems of oppression allow those identities to go unnamed and unacknowledged, and that's the system of power and the system of oppression that has to be dismantled. So in the book, I talk about racialized people and white people because as while white is also racialized identity, it's important for us to specifically named white because that comes with a degree of power and privilege in a system of white supremacy. So it's undoing the things that we claim to be uncomfortable with, Like I'm sure that folks like Tucker Carlson would be very uncomfortable being known as a straight cis white man. But those are facts. So basically, the whole core of it is that over the past six hundred years, race has been invented very gradually, and a massive part of that has been this unacknowledged fact that oftentimes when we say human being, we mean white person. We don't necessarily mean other aspects. And that's evidenced by the fact that we say people and then we say people of color when we're talking about different racialized people, or we say l g B t Q plus, but we're not necessarily talking about the straight and sis gender community. And we force people to come out instead of acknowledging the fact that we assume that everybody is straight and sis gender unless they say otherwise, and then we put the responsibility on them to do that, instead of putting the responsibility on us not to assume those things. And those are the conversations around identity that have to happen that I go into great detail in when in my book. So that way, we have to understand ourselves. We can't think of ourselves as blank slates just because we're closer to privilege or closer to a system of dominance. We have to understand that we also have identities, that we also have connections not only to systems of oppression, but of power and of privilege. And while that might be uncomfortable to acknowledge, it's necessary for us to get absolutely anywhere. M H. And I think to be willing to interrogate what we haven't known, what we're learning, and also what we might assume about ourselves. Something that I thought was so powerful years ago, um, when we were looking at you know, Donald Trump running for president and going, there's no way that this can't happen, right, Something that I found to be one of the more impactful statements anybody made that year. Brittany pack Nick Ningham was talking about proximity to white supremacy and she specifically called out white women and was like, ladies, white supremacy doesn't have anything for you either, and and it has been, uh, such a drumbeat. It was such a concise way to just state the ultimate truth. And I am a long winded person, so when someone who I respect does something in a short form, I'm like, there it is. I have to talk about this forever. And I really I have never stopped thinking about that, about how, whether it's conscious or unconscious, any of us who might be close to any system that makes us feel safe, because that's what power it's about. It's about, Oh, if you have this, you'll be safe. And what does our deep desire, our our evolutionary reality, you know, from back when we were all foragers, our deep desire for safety. In what ways will that allow us to conte or unconsciously ignore or turn away from the lack of safety other people are experiencing. How how can we really look at each other and say, if it's happening to you, it could happen to me, and vice versa. So let's show up to solve this together. And also, I think what's necessary is that it might never happen to me, and I should still care. I think that a good litmus test is is my feminism that I want to own half the plantation or that I want the plantation to not exist, and I want to free the enslaved people that should never been in bondage. And I think that's the crux of white feminism is that for a lot of people, they're concerned about owning half of plantation, owning halfy enslaved people, owning half of the tools of oppression. For other people, it's what are we gonna do when we replace the Mount Rushmore heads with suffragettes instead of it being let's not deface indigenous land and give land back instead? And so I think it's sometimes us looking at what must I give up and what am I willing to give up so that other people can thrive. I mean, you have the example I was just talking about this with my friends that for the second Matrix movie to happen, that KIANU Reeves gave up a huge bit of his paycheck. That's socialism, and also how the film was able to get made, Like you know, we all love good guy Kiana Reeves, but it's those things that must take place. And I think that sometimes it's this need for safety, right, but also acknowledging that sometimes that safety is an illusion. I think about folks like my friends in Brooklyn who live really close to a police station, and how they realize, actually, I don't feel safe being in this close proximity to such an impressive institution, even though when we moved here two years ago we did feel very comfortable with this and just evaluating what safety means. I think about the women who uh and pardon me, like I shouldn't just say women, I should say people with you know, who need access to abortion, which is across gender, because, as Erica Hart says, abortion has no gender, and people of any gender can get an abortion, who have never had access to the promises in ro Versus Wade, my friends who have had to drive to Florida to get an abortion, that reality which has existed with Row in place, who are now having that eroded even further. And I think about folks who will always have access to health care because they're wealthy, feeling the sense of alarm, and sometimes we need to step into those emotions, like we were saying before, in order to have that compassion. But we also need to understand that it's not a matter of whether or not a threat as on our doorstep, for us to acknowledge that it's a threat and for us to make a difference. But when Trump became president that was so bewildering. The other part that was bewildering was that it went from don't talk about this toward marginalized people, and then the next day it was why haven't you warned us? And I felt similarly with this racial awakening, where it was like, don't talk about this, Oh snap, why didn't you warn us? And then again January six, don't talk about this? Why didn't you warn us? And then again with the Haitian immigrants and the move that the United States decides to make, which is that no, we weren't using whips and we'll just stop using horses, instead of it being why are you removing people who are refugees and asylum seekers and we're doing these policies from the Trump era that you campaigned against Joe Biden when you need to be overturning them, don't talk about this? Why didn't you warn us about him? And it's this perpetual gas letting that I think marginalized people experience where every I say, like every eight ten weeks, White America is upset that we haven't warned them about something that we've been screaming our heads off about. And so I have to just stay committed to hoping that I'm activating the people who care and making those resources available, even things like folks having an increased concern about missing and murdered Indigenous women, where I had one of my followers reached out and say, Blair, why haven't you spoke about this? And I'm like, actually, here's the six times I've spoken about this this year. But making those resources available so that whatever point people decide that they need to be activated, that there's a ladder for that, but also being patient with myself and encouraging others to be patient that it is immensely frustrating to feel like you're only called upon in moments of crisis to acknowledge that, to name it, but also to you really like hold together. Another thing that Britney told me, which was that you had a purpose before anybody had an opinion. And sometimes whether that opinion is to listen to you or not, or whether you have something to say that's worthy or not, or that you matter or not, you have a purpose regardless of what another person's opinion is. Yeah, and I think everyone deserves to claim that and know that. And to your point, wherever people are on their journey of awakening to community, whether it's oh my god, if this could happen to me and it could happen to you, we have to solve this or you're further along where you say, regardless of what my personal experience of safety is, this happening anywhere is unacceptable. That should always be the goal, you know. I think about it in terms of it's funny because I get asked when I advocate for changes in our budget, because to me, listen a national budget is just a spelling out of priorities. And when you look at how much this country invests in a war machine and how little we invest in keeping people healthy, that to me signals that we have a priority that's very out of balance. And when people say to me, well, you don't know anything about it and this, that and the other, I say, no, No, I know a lot about budgets. The reason that so many people in my industry are such staunch advocates of unions, of universal health care, and of fair distribution and investment of resources is because that's what we do. I invest fifty percent of my personal resources back into the people on my team, and another back into workers who work part time for me all year, you know, the artists and the stylists and the teams. And then I invest another back into our country in my taxes. And but to me this feels important because people will say, yo, well you can pay out all that money because because you make money. No. No, this is about participating in the profit you create, and so many workers are denied that ability. So I'm fine living on of my entertainment companies gross income because it means everybody eats when I do well, everybody I work with, and everybody on my team does well, and it's possible for our country because let me tell you what, as much as I would love to be one of the icons who we look up to, like a queen of entertainment like Jail or Beyonce who just is like breaking it in, I'm not, but the United States government is. And when I look at how much available money we have, I'm like, no, we have the money, we just don't want to invest it in each other for whatever ridiculous reason and whatever folks like Mitch McConnell or in power and just want to, you know, get kickbacks from corporations. We have the ability, we have the resources, and we do have the mental acuity to envision and financially create a better future for all of us, but we don't have the conscience. But you're helping us get that conscience. You're helping so many people see the truth of things and and get smarter about what's possible. And I'm just I know that you and I are in our own ways like beating the same drum, But I am just so grateful that you ay have taken this time today be are using your gifts. You know that that you're constantly filling the pot luck with what only you can bring, and that you are welcoming people to these conversations to be thoughtful about language and behavior and also to give them steps to grow into deeper and deeper understanding, because we have to give people permission to do that, to say, it's okay if you don't know everything, nobody really does. I might know a little more about this than you. Here's another thing to think about. Here's another place for you to to come and meet and be held and be seen and and show up. Thank you so much. And I was just so excited and you're just talking about it because I talk about this in my book. I talk about jama which is the African ideology about shared resources. Before we were talking about relationships. That's UBUNTU, which is mutual respect and humanity towards others. Then we have Jamaa, which is about acknowledging that we can't thrive together unless we are sharing resources. That some people have way too much and other people's can't even live because they don't have enough. And it's just so cool to see it, like beating that drum in different ways, and it's just such an honor and such an exciting, like privilege to be able to do it every single day. And I think that the ultimate goal of read this to get smarter isn't to provide solutions, but hopefully give people the vocabulary, the historical context in the language to be able to move that needle those six ticks forward instead of those five that our previous generation did. So my very favorite question to ask every single person who comes on this show, and I'm really so excited to hear your answer, is, Blair, what feels like a work in progress in your life right now? Who? I think that my work in progress is my mental health and really trying to get into a great place. I think that as somebody who's like kind of in the business of trying to help other folks improve themselves, I can sometimes neglect myself and so I'm trying to pour back into my cup so that way I have more to give. But if you're empty, you have nothing to give. So that's an ongoing process and it's a very vulnerable process. But as I go through it, I just know that it's an investment that I'm making in myself, that that I deserve and that I need, and that it's okay for me to need things from myself, and that's the work in progress that I'm going through right now. Thank you, un