Host Erik Fleming sits down with three community-focused leaders—Dr. Nancy Pearson, Tania Anderson, and Hannah Bonecutter—to explore civic engagement, local government, and public service. The episode highlights practical steps for getting involved in local politics, the power of curiosity and contribution, and the lived experiences of leaders navigating activism, representation, and public life.
Listeners will hear candid reflections on running for office, protecting vulnerable communities, and the role of media and policy in shaping public health and equity. The conversation emphasizes staying engaged, holding officials accountable, and celebrating small victories in the ongoing work of community change.
00:00:00 --> 00:00:06 Welcome. I'm Erik Fleming, host of A Moment with Erik Fleming, the podcast of our time.
00:00:06 --> 00:00:08 I want to personally thank you for listening to the podcast.
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00:01:12 --> 00:01:17 The following program is hosted by the NBG Podcast Network.
00:01:57 --> 00:02:02 Hello, and welcome to another Moment with Erik Fleming. I am your host, Erik Fleming.
00:02:03 --> 00:02:09 And today, the theme of our show is going to be evangelize, reflect, and embrace.
00:02:10 --> 00:02:16 And I have three guests that are going to epitomize those three words in the title.
00:02:17 --> 00:02:25 As I am recording right now, this is my father's 84th birthday,
00:02:25 --> 00:02:29 and I hope that he's doing well.
00:02:29 --> 00:02:36 And we're also in a government shutdown. Two very significant things in my life.
00:02:36 --> 00:02:41 Although I do not work for the federal government, those of us who are American
00:02:41 --> 00:02:44 citizens understand that this is serious.
00:02:44 --> 00:02:49 Now, you know, we've been through this before here in this country,
00:02:50 --> 00:02:53 and we've been through this before with a Trump presidency.
00:02:53 --> 00:03:01 Last time he was in office, I think we were in a shutdown mode for about a month, maybe a little more.
00:03:02 --> 00:03:08 So, you know, it is what it is on that. Hopefully, folks can reach some kind of agreement.
00:03:09 --> 00:03:18 You know, the Democrats are trying to make sure that millions of Americans can
00:03:18 --> 00:03:20 still afford their health insurance,
00:03:20 --> 00:03:27 be able to get the subsidies that the Affordable Care Act provided,
00:03:27 --> 00:03:31 that those subsidies are supposed to expire in December.
00:03:32 --> 00:03:39 And, you know, just trying to make sure that folks still are able to get the
00:03:39 --> 00:03:45 cheapest possible health care if they are not employed or if they're not employed
00:03:45 --> 00:03:47 with an employer that provides health,
00:03:47 --> 00:03:53 if they are employed with an employer that does not provide health care insurance.
00:03:53 --> 00:04:01 So that's that. And, you know, we're still in this concept of budget resolutions
00:04:01 --> 00:04:06 instead of just normal budget procedures.
00:04:07 --> 00:04:12 Again, It's mind-blowing to me and to anybody that's ever served in a state
00:04:12 --> 00:04:19 legislature because we were under rules where we couldn't adjourn unless the budget was balanced,
00:04:20 --> 00:04:27 let alone trying to do emergency resolutions in the middle of the year or beginning
00:04:27 --> 00:04:28 of a fiscal year or whatever.
00:04:28 --> 00:04:34 So those of us who served at the state level in the legislative process,
00:04:34 --> 00:04:37 this is truly foreign to us.
00:04:37 --> 00:04:41 For those of our friends who have graduated to the congressional level,
00:04:41 --> 00:04:47 unfortunately, over the last couple of decades, it's business as usual.
00:04:48 --> 00:04:52 But nonetheless, but we'll, we'll, you know, I'm not going to talk about that.
00:04:52 --> 00:04:57 And this is all I'm going to say about it on the show, because we've got a jam-packed
00:04:57 --> 00:05:02 show and I want to get to the interviews, get y'all to the interviews and all that.
00:05:02 --> 00:05:07 I do have some stuff to say, though, about some other stuff that happened.
00:05:08 --> 00:05:14 But and I promise I won't keep you long. But again, I appreciate y'all listening,
00:05:14 --> 00:05:18 and I would love to get y'all's continued support.
00:05:18 --> 00:05:23 You can go to patreon.com slash amomentwitherikfleming and do that,
00:05:23 --> 00:05:32 or just go to momenterik.com and check out the website and support the podcast, as well as, you know,
00:05:32 --> 00:05:37 find out a little bit about me, find out a little bit about the show and anything
00:05:37 --> 00:05:41 else that you want to find. And it'll link you to all that stuff.
00:05:42 --> 00:05:48 And, you know, I think that'll be good for those who are first-time listeners, right?
00:05:49 --> 00:05:55 Yeah, so this show is really, really special to me because the three guests that I have,
00:05:56 --> 00:06:00 you know, just like, you know, one of the things, again, and I'll say this a
00:06:00 --> 00:06:07 lot, there are some really, really impressive people here in this nation.
00:06:08 --> 00:06:12 And one of the cool things about this podcast is I get to talk to them.
00:06:13 --> 00:06:18 And I know lately I've been jamming a lot of people in.
00:06:19 --> 00:06:22 Circumstances, scheduling has kind of dictated that.
00:06:23 --> 00:06:29 And so far, I'm going to have a lot of, I'm going to have some guests all the
00:06:29 --> 00:06:31 way through into next year that have committed.
00:06:32 --> 00:06:36 So I'm really, really thankful for that. And I'm just thankful for everybody
00:06:36 --> 00:06:41 that has been a guest on this show over these last few years.
00:06:41 --> 00:06:48 And it's hard to believe, you know, this all started in 2019 and we've gotten to this point.
00:06:48 --> 00:06:54 So, again, that's a credit to you all that are listening and credit to all those
00:06:54 --> 00:07:02 people who have supported the podcast, either by listening or being guests or, you know,
00:07:02 --> 00:07:05 just embracing the show in whichever way they can.
00:07:05 --> 00:07:09 Shout out to Leonard Young with the NBG Podcast Network.
00:07:10 --> 00:07:15 And the Black Podcasters Association. And I still want y'all to pay attention
00:07:15 --> 00:07:18 to the Black Podcasting Awards. Please go to their website.
00:07:18 --> 00:07:25 Please support the work that they're doing and support the other Black podcasters
00:07:25 --> 00:07:29 that not only have been recognized in nominations, but are out here doing the
00:07:29 --> 00:07:31 same kind of work that I'm doing.
00:07:31 --> 00:07:35 It's vitally important that we maintain this independence.
00:07:37 --> 00:07:41 You know, there's some people out there that wouldn't have gone on any other
00:07:41 --> 00:07:45 shows if it wasn't for the independents, right?
00:07:47 --> 00:07:52 And, you know, I'm not trying to answer to anybody's corporation. This is my show.
00:07:54 --> 00:07:59 And for as long as God allows me, we're going to keep this thing going.
00:08:00 --> 00:08:03 All right, so speaking about keeping it going, let's go ahead and get this started.
00:08:03 --> 00:08:07 And as always, we started off with a moment of news with Grace G.
00:08:15 --> 00:08:20 Thanks, Erik. A U.S. government shutdown began after the Senate rejected a short-term
00:08:20 --> 00:08:24 spending measure, leading to the furlough of federal workers and disruption
00:08:24 --> 00:08:25 of government operations.
00:08:26 --> 00:08:31 U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and President Trump delivered a highly charged
00:08:31 --> 00:08:36 address to military commanders, slamming woke diversity initiatives and suggesting U.S.
00:08:36 --> 00:08:39 Cities be used as training grounds for the military.
00:08:39 --> 00:08:43 President Trump ordered the military to deploy to Portland, Oregon,
00:08:44 --> 00:08:47 to protect federal facilities against domestic terrorists.
00:08:47 --> 00:08:55 A second Mexican detainee, Miguel Ángel García, 31, died from injuries sustained
00:08:55 --> 00:08:57 at a recent sniper shooting at a U.S.
00:08:57 --> 00:09:00 Immigration and Customs Enforcement field office in Dallas.
00:09:01 --> 00:09:05 The U.S. Department of Justice has filed criminal charges against former FBI
00:09:05 --> 00:09:10 Director James Comey for making false statements and obstructing a congressional
00:09:10 --> 00:09:12 investigation. The U.S.
00:09:13 --> 00:09:16 Justice Department also subpoenaed travel records of Atlanta prosecutor Fannie
00:09:16 --> 00:09:20 Willis, who charged Donald Trump in an election interference case.
00:09:21 --> 00:09:26 The FBI has fired a group of agents who were photographed kneeling during a
00:09:26 --> 00:09:31 2020 racial justice protest, a gesture they say was meant to de-escalate tensions.
00:09:32 --> 00:09:38 Ian Roberts, a school superintendent in Des Moines, Iowa and native of Guyana, was arrested by U.S.
00:09:38 --> 00:09:41 Immigration officials due to a prior deportation order.
00:09:42 --> 00:09:47 At the U.N. General Assembly, several delegations walked out as Israeli Prime
00:09:47 --> 00:09:53 Minister Benjamin Netanyahu criticized Western countries for supporting Palestinian statehood.
00:09:53 --> 00:09:58 In California, Maurice Hastings was awarded a $25 million settlement,
00:09:58 --> 00:10:00 the largest in state history.
00:10:00 --> 00:10:06 After spending 38 years in prison for a 1983 murder and sexual assault he did not commit.
00:10:07 --> 00:10:12 And Asiata Shakur, a former Black Liberation Army activist who lived in Cuba
00:10:12 --> 00:10:16 as a fugitive for decades, died at the age of 78.
00:10:16 --> 00:10:20 I am Grace G., and this has been A Moment of News.
00:10:27 --> 00:10:31 All right. Thank you, Grace, for that moment of news.
00:10:31 --> 00:10:35 And now it is time for my guest, Dr. Nancy Pearson.
00:10:36 --> 00:10:42 Dr. Nancy Pearson is a local government evangelist on a mission to help people
00:10:42 --> 00:10:46 develop radical curiosity about where they live.
00:10:46 --> 00:10:51 She embraces the power of civic engagement by showing citizens how to influence
00:10:51 --> 00:10:54 local leaders and drive community change.
00:10:54 --> 00:11:02 Dr. Nancy is an educator, two-term elected leader, and holds an MPA and a PhD.
00:11:03 --> 00:11:07 Ladies and gentlemen, it is my distinct honor and privilege to have as a guest
00:11:07 --> 00:11:11 on this podcast, Dr. Nancy Pearson.
00:11:23 --> 00:11:27 Dr. Nancy Pearson. How are you doing, Doc? Are you doing okay?
00:11:27 --> 00:11:33 I'm doing okay today. Well, I'm glad that you are, and I'm glad that you are here.
00:11:34 --> 00:11:39 I came across your profile, and I was like, oh, yeah, I got to get her on the show,
00:11:40 --> 00:11:49 because not too many people put in evangelizing with politics in a positive way in this day and age.
00:11:50 --> 00:11:54 And so I definitely wanted to reach out to you, and I'm glad that you accepted the invitation.
00:11:56 --> 00:12:02 So we're going to get right into it. I do a couple of icebreakers before we get started.
00:12:02 --> 00:12:08 So the first icebreaker is a quote that I want you to comment on. And this is the quote.
00:12:09 --> 00:12:15 Truly marginalized people or the people that are really affected by the decisions
00:12:15 --> 00:12:18 that are made in these meetings aren't at these meetings.
00:12:18 --> 00:12:25 But the people that do come already have influence and power.
00:12:25 --> 00:12:29 What does that quote mean to you? What that quote means to me is how government
00:12:29 --> 00:12:34 is basically set up to, I would say,
00:12:34 --> 00:12:38 reinforce the existing hierarchy that is already there,
00:12:39 --> 00:12:44 meaning that the people at the top of the ladder continue to maintain their
00:12:44 --> 00:12:49 influence and the people at the bottom rungs trying to get on the ladder are
00:12:49 --> 00:12:54 going to continue to be ignored and or not have their voices heard. Yeah.
00:12:55 --> 00:12:59 All right. So now the next icebreaker is called 20 questions.
00:12:59 --> 00:13:03 So I need you to give me a number between one and 20.
00:13:04 --> 00:13:10 Okay. What is the one thing you hope the new, and in this case,
00:13:10 --> 00:13:14 current administration will do or not do during their term?
00:13:15 --> 00:13:18 Oh boy i hope they won't mess with
00:13:18 --> 00:13:22 the midterm elections yeah yeah
00:13:22 --> 00:13:26 i'm with you on that i think that that's kind
00:13:26 --> 00:13:31 of scary although he he did make the announcement i don't know if you caught
00:13:31 --> 00:13:37 it that he wants to have a convention yes i did see that for the so it sounds
00:13:37 --> 00:13:44 like he he at least wants the elections to happen so we'll we'll keep our finger crossed on all that but
00:13:44 --> 00:13:47 Yeah, he definitely wants to throw a party, I guess, sometime.
00:13:48 --> 00:13:51 I guess it'll be the same time as the regular conventions in August. So we'll see.
00:13:51 --> 00:13:54 We'll see if the Democrats follow suit on that.
00:13:54 --> 00:14:03 All right. So do you feel more empowered as a self-described local government
00:14:03 --> 00:14:08 evangelist than you did as a local elected official?
00:14:09 --> 00:14:15 That is such a good question. And I'm going to say I feel as empowered.
00:14:15 --> 00:14:20 I don't think I feel more empowered, but I don't feel less empowered than when
00:14:20 --> 00:14:22 I was an elected official.
00:14:22 --> 00:14:29 And the reason is because I know now how to influence those decision makers
00:14:29 --> 00:14:33 to make sure that my voice is heard.
00:14:33 --> 00:14:38 And that's all that I was doing as a decision maker. I was just making my voice
00:14:38 --> 00:14:40 heard in the votes and the decisions that I made.
00:14:40 --> 00:14:45 I know how to get to those decision makers and influence them.
00:14:45 --> 00:14:47 So that remains the same.
00:14:47 --> 00:14:51 But what I don't have to do anymore
00:14:51 --> 00:14:56 is be held to the same high level of standard as an elected official.
00:14:57 --> 00:15:02 I do not have to have a right to know law on every single one of my emails.
00:15:02 --> 00:15:09 I don't have to deliberate a topic in public in front of the press and the media.
00:15:09 --> 00:15:11 I don't have to be quoted.
00:15:11 --> 00:15:14 I don't have to be scrutinized.
00:15:14 --> 00:15:19 I can just say what I want to say and how I want to say it and nobody cares.
00:15:20 --> 00:15:26 And so I like that better. And I was not anticipating, or I guess I just was
00:15:26 --> 00:15:31 very naive about the fact that everything, if you're doing it right.
00:15:32 --> 00:15:36 Everything you do as a public official is done in public.
00:15:36 --> 00:15:41 And it's really challenging to work that way.
00:15:41 --> 00:15:46 You know, it's very, very challenging. It should be, and it's the right thing,
00:15:47 --> 00:15:51 but I feel better not, not operating that way.
00:15:51 --> 00:15:53 Yeah. Same here. You know, I,
00:15:53 --> 00:15:59 I did, I did, but you know, the state legislature I served for nine years.
00:16:00 --> 00:16:04 And in Mississippi. And so, excuse me, thank you.
00:16:04 --> 00:16:08 And it was just, you know, it was just a different kind of thing because I was
00:16:08 --> 00:16:11 like an activist before I got elected.
00:16:11 --> 00:16:17 And I tell people all the time, you as an activist have a lot more freedom than
00:16:17 --> 00:16:20 those of us who are elected. I'll tell you a quick story.
00:16:22 --> 00:16:26 And a lot of times I remember the fights, but I don't remember what we were fighting about, right?
00:16:26 --> 00:16:33 And I know that it was an issue that was concerning the black citizens of the state of Mississippi.
00:16:33 --> 00:16:38 So we were having a caucus meeting and one of the members was like,
00:16:38 --> 00:16:42 oh, we need to get up and we need to go and march and blah, blah,
00:16:43 --> 00:16:45 this, that other. And I said, knock yourself out.
00:16:45 --> 00:16:49 And I'll call the people in your district and tell them to elect somebody else
00:16:49 --> 00:16:56 to do the work in here because we were given responsibility to fight the battle in here.
00:16:56 --> 00:17:02 It is the activist's job to fight the battle on the outside.
00:17:02 --> 00:17:04 And there's got to be a correlation.
00:17:04 --> 00:17:08 It can't be we switching roles. You know what I'm saying?
00:17:08 --> 00:17:12 So, you know, it is, it is a, you know, a lot of people think,
00:17:12 --> 00:17:15 well, you've got all this power and all this stuff, but it's like, Like,
00:17:15 --> 00:17:20 yeah, but we got to follow rules, you know, we got to follow the Jefferson manual
00:17:20 --> 00:17:25 of parliamentary procedure and, you know, all the Roberts rules, whatever.
00:17:25 --> 00:17:29 And, you know, it's totally different than being able to just,
00:17:29 --> 00:17:35 you know, grab like 200 people and walk up to the city hall or the state capitol.
00:17:35 --> 00:17:41 Absolutely. And I also found that no matter what kind of ideas I brought forward,
00:17:41 --> 00:17:49 and most of my platform and agenda was around better civic engagement with the citizens.
00:17:49 --> 00:17:54 The quote that you used in the beginning, of course, was very important to me
00:17:54 --> 00:17:59 because we always saw the same people coming to City Hall, and I wanted to see
00:17:59 --> 00:18:02 a more wide representative representation of our community.
00:18:02 --> 00:18:06 And so every time I proposed something different,
00:18:06 --> 00:18:12 something new, something more inclusive, it was immediately politicized because
00:18:12 --> 00:18:19 I was a city councilor and people found ways to twist and turn what I was trying
00:18:19 --> 00:18:22 to do into something political.
00:18:22 --> 00:18:27 And I don't even mean partisan because we didn't run our city council where
00:18:27 --> 00:18:31 I live is not partisan, but it just politicized everything.
00:18:31 --> 00:18:37 And now I don't have that anymore. I can get people to City Hall for an issue
00:18:37 --> 00:18:41 and I'm not being politicized for it.
00:18:41 --> 00:18:44 So I appreciate that on the outside. That's right.
00:18:45 --> 00:18:48 All right. So I need you to define a couple of things for me.
00:18:48 --> 00:18:52 The first thing is to find the concept of radical curiosity.
00:18:53 --> 00:18:57 Yeah, I coined that term.
00:18:57 --> 00:19:01 Radical is a word that's been going around a lot in the last few years.
00:19:01 --> 00:19:06 And I wanted to jump on that bandwagon because I think it's an attention getter.
00:19:06 --> 00:19:12 And also because it defines me. I am the kind of person who always asks,
00:19:12 --> 00:19:16 why do we do it this way? Who says we have to do it this way?
00:19:16 --> 00:19:18 Who decided we're doing it this way?
00:19:18 --> 00:19:23 And always go and try and find out like, what's the what behind the why, you know?
00:19:23 --> 00:19:29 And I found that when I moved to the city that I live in, in 2011,
00:19:29 --> 00:19:36 and almost immediately, I joined a board that was very connected to City Hall.
00:19:37 --> 00:19:44 And so I was immediately like thrown in the fire of local government and things that were happening.
00:19:44 --> 00:19:49 And this was around arts and arts policies and public art.
00:19:49 --> 00:19:55 So the cultural community of my city was kind of the way that I came up through
00:19:55 --> 00:19:59 the city hall and understanding how things were done.
00:19:59 --> 00:20:03 My city in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, we don't have a sports team.
00:20:03 --> 00:20:05 We don't have a stadium. We don't have a university.
00:20:06 --> 00:20:09 We have arts and culture. That's what we have. And that's our identity.
00:20:10 --> 00:20:12 And so it's kind of a big deal here.
00:20:12 --> 00:20:21 And I was paying attention for the first time to decisions happening in City Hall by the leaders.
00:20:21 --> 00:20:25 And I really didn't understand why they were making the decisions they were
00:20:25 --> 00:20:29 making, why they were so against, for example,
00:20:29 --> 00:20:33 building a second parking garage so people could come to the city and go to
00:20:33 --> 00:20:42 all of our great arts venues, or why they were so reluctant to expand our wastewater treatment facility.
00:20:42 --> 00:20:48 It's not very sexy, but they put it off for a decade and we were polluting our river system.
00:20:48 --> 00:20:50 So why? Why? Why were they doing this?
00:20:50 --> 00:20:54 So I had to get curious about the place that I lived.
00:20:54 --> 00:21:01 And when I did, that compelled me to run for office because I learned that what
00:21:01 --> 00:21:04 I thought was happening at City Hall is that like the
00:21:05 --> 00:21:11 smartest, most well-qualified people in the city sat behind the dais at city
00:21:11 --> 00:21:18 council meetings in their very esteemed sort of personalities making these decisions.
00:21:18 --> 00:21:20 And what I learned was that was not true.
00:21:20 --> 00:21:26 For some, it was. For some, they were very esteemed and very intelligent and were doing a great job.
00:21:26 --> 00:21:30 But for many, it was just the people who cared and who showed up,
00:21:30 --> 00:21:36 and they didn't really actually have great skills. They didn't have great thinking minds.
00:21:36 --> 00:21:42 They didn't have any kind of public administration or legal or policy background.
00:21:42 --> 00:21:43 They were just regular people.
00:21:43 --> 00:21:49 And sometimes regular people make incredible decision makers and sometimes they don't.
00:21:49 --> 00:21:55 Sometimes they can get caught up in ideology and that's what was happening.
00:21:55 --> 00:22:02 So I had to get curious about my community to understand how it worked and how
00:22:02 --> 00:22:04 I needed to get involved.
00:22:04 --> 00:22:11 And I think that getting radically curious about where you live is a message
00:22:11 --> 00:22:14 to help other people understand, like, hey, wake up a little bit.
00:22:15 --> 00:22:19 There's stuff happening in your community, and it's not always great.
00:22:20 --> 00:22:26 Yeah, it hurt my heart when I got into legislature, when I finally got elected to something.
00:22:27 --> 00:22:30 And you know when you kind of admire people
00:22:30 --> 00:22:35 from afar because i got elected like in my like early 30s so i was relatively
00:22:35 --> 00:22:42 young and so i'm like you know these are the people i looked up to really yes
00:22:42 --> 00:22:47 i i know that was that's always a shock for folks when they get in yeah it's like,
00:22:48 --> 00:22:53 oh so you're not all that okay all right i am the i was i was telling somebody
00:22:53 --> 00:23:01 i said if you get on you'll be like the one-eyed man in the land of the blind, right?
00:23:01 --> 00:23:07 And because you're more qualified than the people that are sitting on that council right now.
00:23:07 --> 00:23:10 And they didn't believe me until they got on there. And, you know,
00:23:10 --> 00:23:14 they're pretty much in leadership now. So it's eye-opening.
00:23:14 --> 00:23:19 It really is. Once you understand and get to know what's going on,
00:23:19 --> 00:23:20 it can be eye-opening. Yeah.
00:23:21 --> 00:23:28 All right. So now the other definition is what is the difference between report talk and report talk?
00:23:29 --> 00:23:35 Oh, I love these terms. These terms were coined by a sociolinguist,
00:23:35 --> 00:23:39 Deborah Tannen, oh, I want to say maybe more than a decade ago.
00:23:40 --> 00:23:44 And so they're styles of speaking.
00:23:44 --> 00:23:54 So report, report talk is a style that preserves independence and kind of maintains
00:23:54 --> 00:23:58 one's status in a hierarchical social order.
00:23:58 --> 00:24:06 And it's a communication that focuses on providing or exchanging information
00:24:06 --> 00:24:10 really without the need for dialogue. It's just kind of like,
00:24:10 --> 00:24:12 here's what I have to say. I'm going to say it.
00:24:13 --> 00:24:15 This is the information I'm imparting.
00:24:16 --> 00:24:23 Rapport talk, on the other hand, is a speaking style about building relationships
00:24:23 --> 00:24:29 and finding common ground through conversation and communication.
00:24:29 --> 00:24:37 And it's a way of establishing connections and even like negotiating bonds with
00:24:37 --> 00:24:38 each other, that rapport.
00:24:39 --> 00:24:48 And Tannen asserts that generally speaking, more men engage in report talk while
00:24:48 --> 00:24:52 more women engage in rapport talk.
00:24:52 --> 00:24:58 And I think there's some evidence of that when you look at, if we keep it to
00:24:58 --> 00:25:00 politics and local government,
00:25:01 --> 00:25:07 when you look at public comment, at how more comfortable men are coming up to
00:25:07 --> 00:25:13 the podium to speak, which is a one-way monologue.
00:25:13 --> 00:25:14 It's not a dialogue.
00:25:14 --> 00:25:18 I'm not saying women can't do it and aren't good at it,
00:25:18 --> 00:25:25 but the data do show that more men speak at public meeting and women say they
00:25:25 --> 00:25:30 don't speak at public meeting because they're not as comfortable in that environment.
00:25:30 --> 00:25:37 So that's just some data that supports her observations between rapport and rapport. Yeah.
00:25:38 --> 00:25:44 But now in the difference between men and women, the data also shows that women
00:25:44 --> 00:25:47 tend to be more civically engaged than men.
00:25:47 --> 00:25:51 So why do you think that is? I, well...
00:25:52 --> 00:25:56 I think part of it goes down to this, just sort of the way that women build
00:25:56 --> 00:26:02 relationships through communication and women build community around them.
00:26:02 --> 00:26:06 I think those things go hand in hand.
00:26:07 --> 00:26:13 Before, in the middle of when I was on the city council, the job that I had
00:26:13 --> 00:26:19 at the time, I worked for an arm of the SBA, the Small Business Administration.
00:26:19 --> 00:26:26 And so I was doing business advising to entrepreneurs, mostly women entrepreneurs.
00:26:26 --> 00:26:29 I worked for the Women's Business Center of my state.
00:26:29 --> 00:26:33 I ran it. I worked with a lot of women entrepreneurs and I learned a lot about
00:26:33 --> 00:26:36 women entrepreneurs and entrepreneurs in general.
00:26:36 --> 00:26:44 And one thing that I learned was that for a business owner who's a male.
00:26:45 --> 00:26:54 Typically a man will keep about 70% of what he earns and then reinvest about
00:26:54 --> 00:26:57 30% back into his family and community.
00:26:57 --> 00:27:02 Whereas women entrepreneurs and business owners, on the other hand,
00:27:03 --> 00:27:10 they reinvest 90% of their earnings back into their families and their communities.
00:27:10 --> 00:27:16 So they are much more about community building and the collective we,
00:27:17 --> 00:27:23 and I believe that that is one of the reasons why they are more civically engaged,
00:27:23 --> 00:27:31 because when you're typically when you're engaging, it is to strengthen some
00:27:31 --> 00:27:33 piece of your community,
00:27:33 --> 00:27:39 whether that's better public transit or lower housing prices or more.
00:27:40 --> 00:27:45 You know, more services, that's generally the reason why people become engaged.
00:27:45 --> 00:27:47 They want to better their communities.
00:27:47 --> 00:27:55 And women just are wired more to be more community and communal focus. Yeah.
00:27:56 --> 00:28:00 In general, municipal elections have the lowest voter turnout,
00:28:00 --> 00:28:02 while presidential elections have the highest.
00:28:03 --> 00:28:07 Do you think that is because people don't understand that local government is
00:28:07 --> 00:28:10 the very seat of democracy, or are there other factors at play?
00:28:11 --> 00:28:14 Well, I think that people just don't really understand.
00:28:15 --> 00:28:20 I really do think that people don't really understand what their local government
00:28:20 --> 00:28:27 is, what it does, how it affects their daily lives. And it's so easy to get
00:28:27 --> 00:28:29 caught up in the national politics of it all.
00:28:30 --> 00:28:37 You know, it's pervasive, especially since 2016. I mean, you cannot escape national
00:28:37 --> 00:28:40 politics. It sucks up all the air in the room.
00:28:40 --> 00:28:46 But, you know, I think people forget that they get up in the morning and they
00:28:46 --> 00:28:49 turn on the water on their tap and whether it's clean or not,
00:28:50 --> 00:28:56 you know, or the roads that they drive their kids to school or they drive to
00:28:56 --> 00:28:58 work, the safety of the neighborhoods,
00:28:58 --> 00:29:05 whether there are simple amenities near their home, like a park or a pharmacy
00:29:05 --> 00:29:10 or a grocery store, all of this is decided at the local level.
00:29:10 --> 00:29:12 And I think people take it for granted.
00:29:13 --> 00:29:19 It's just there in the background. And I do think that people just don't consider
00:29:19 --> 00:29:24 it as important as it is in their daily lives.
00:29:25 --> 00:29:32 One thing that I always try to tell people in my evangelism is that if you do
00:29:32 --> 00:29:36 care about something that is getting national headlines,
00:29:36 --> 00:29:43 whether that's climate change or the housing crisis or even LBGTQ rights.
00:29:44 --> 00:29:48 I guarantee you somebody is working on that,
00:29:48 --> 00:29:53 not just maybe at your city hall, but if not, there's a civic group in your
00:29:53 --> 00:29:59 community that is working either in that community or on that issue.
00:29:59 --> 00:30:04 Like you don't have to just cross your fingers and hope that Congress does the
00:30:04 --> 00:30:06 right thing about the thing that you care about.
00:30:06 --> 00:30:13 Those big issues that you care about are happening in your community where you live.
00:30:13 --> 00:30:18 So I like to remind people about that. It's not just about the little things.
00:30:18 --> 00:30:21 There's big things happening at the local level too.
00:30:22 --> 00:30:29 Yeah. So part of your evangelism is not just directed toward the elected officials.
00:30:29 --> 00:30:35 It's like also guiding people to say, look, you know, there's a chapter of the
00:30:35 --> 00:30:39 Sierra Club or there's a chapter of the NAACP.
00:30:39 --> 00:30:43 If those are issues, you need to be involved in those things.
00:30:43 --> 00:30:48 That's right. Because most of those, even if it's a civic group,
00:30:48 --> 00:30:53 at some point, those civic groups will have to interface with the local officials
00:30:53 --> 00:30:56 at some point. So they're all connected.
00:30:56 --> 00:31:01 That's why it's radical curiosity about where you live, you know,
00:31:01 --> 00:31:08 because there's going to be crossover at some point with policymakers. makers.
00:31:09 --> 00:31:15 Yeah. All right. So you kind of, you kind of like on your sub stack,
00:31:15 --> 00:31:18 you kind of talk about and guide people.
00:31:19 --> 00:31:21 I should say you guide people through this process.
00:31:21 --> 00:31:28 So first let's break down the four simple steps of understanding how your local government works.
00:31:28 --> 00:31:35 Sure. So, and, and, you know, it's very common for people to not know how their
00:31:35 --> 00:31:38 local government works. Like I don't take that for granted.
00:31:38 --> 00:31:42 Like everybody knows whether they have a city council or a select board or an
00:31:42 --> 00:31:45 alderman, like not everybody is paying attention.
00:31:46 --> 00:31:51 I have to admit that when I lived in a different city about 20 years ago,
00:31:51 --> 00:31:54 I never knew who my mayor was. Never. I couldn't tell you their name.
00:31:55 --> 00:31:58 Couldn't tell you if it was a man or a woman. I mean, I was just raising my
00:31:58 --> 00:32:03 child, head down in my career, just was not paying attention.
00:32:03 --> 00:32:06 So, you know, it happens and it happened to me too.
00:32:07 --> 00:32:13 But so step number one is learning how your local government is set up. Do you live in a city?
00:32:14 --> 00:32:16 Do you live in a town? Are you in a village?
00:32:17 --> 00:32:23 You know, what is the setup? Is there a town council? Is there a select board? Is there three people?
00:32:23 --> 00:32:28 Is there five people? Or do you have a whole, you know, eight or nine or 10 person city council?
00:32:28 --> 00:32:30 So that's the first step. Learn how it's set up.
00:32:31 --> 00:32:34 And then the second step is find out who's in charge.
00:32:34 --> 00:32:39 Who are those elected people? Do you have a town manager or a city manager?
00:32:39 --> 00:32:45 Or is your mayor the one that is actually running the town? It's different everywhere.
00:32:46 --> 00:32:52 So, you know, who is in charge? Who are the people that are making decisions? Get to know their names.
00:32:52 --> 00:32:56 Find out if they're elected or if they're the professional people.
00:32:56 --> 00:33:00 A city manager and a town manager are typically hired professionals,
00:33:00 --> 00:33:03 whereas the others are elected.
00:33:03 --> 00:33:07 So, you know, figure out who's making the decisions and who's in charge.
00:33:07 --> 00:33:12 And then the third step is to start paying attention. And there's so many ways
00:33:12 --> 00:33:15 today that you can pay attention.
00:33:15 --> 00:33:21 Most cities and towns film their council or their select board meetings,
00:33:21 --> 00:33:25 and you can either watch or listen to them after the fact.
00:33:26 --> 00:33:31 Sometimes you can watch or listen to them live streamed right on the town website
00:33:31 --> 00:33:34 or on YouTube, or you can go to a meeting.
00:33:34 --> 00:33:40 Now, in my research, when I did my dissertation and I was talking to a lot of
00:33:40 --> 00:33:42 people in municipal government,
00:33:42 --> 00:33:48 it was a general consensus that physically having to go to a public meeting
00:33:48 --> 00:33:51 was a barrier for a lot of people,
00:33:51 --> 00:33:56 which is why having them live streamed, having them, you know,
00:33:56 --> 00:34:01 archived on a website is really the way to go because that way people can access
00:34:01 --> 00:34:04 them and watch them and catch up after.
00:34:04 --> 00:34:08 But you can usually, if you don't have the time to watch a meeting,
00:34:09 --> 00:34:12 you can always just look at the agenda and the minutes.
00:34:13 --> 00:34:17 You know, scanning meeting minutes is one way to find out what happened.
00:34:17 --> 00:34:21 But paying attention and seeing what's going on.
00:34:21 --> 00:34:28 You'll learn a lot about a city or a town's values by looking at the agenda
00:34:28 --> 00:34:29 on their public meetings.
00:34:29 --> 00:34:34 You'll also learn about a city or town's values by looking at their budget and
00:34:34 --> 00:34:36 what they're willing to spend money on.
00:34:36 --> 00:34:42 So that's just a little advanced tip, you know, about what cities and towns care about.
00:34:43 --> 00:34:49 So, yes, paying attention, figuring out what your elected officials are talking
00:34:49 --> 00:34:54 about, where their focus and their attention is, is important.
00:34:54 --> 00:34:59 And then the last step is getting involved, asking questions,
00:35:00 --> 00:35:08 showing up, whether that means at a meeting or at a sort of community event
00:35:08 --> 00:35:14 or by sending emails or for some people speaking during public comment.
00:35:14 --> 00:35:17 Because these people are there to represent
00:35:17 --> 00:35:21 you and you're on
00:35:21 --> 00:35:24 the on the org chart of your town you're
00:35:24 --> 00:35:31 at the very top the citizen is at the very top so those people in theory yes
00:35:31 --> 00:35:36 they are the leaders and the decision makers but they can't be in their seats
00:35:36 --> 00:35:41 without citizens getting them there So once those people win their elections.
00:35:42 --> 00:35:48 You got to hold them accountable and make sure that they're doing what they
00:35:48 --> 00:35:50 said they were going to do or what you expect them to do.
00:35:50 --> 00:35:55 So getting involved, paying attention, and of course, always,
00:35:55 --> 00:35:56 always, always, always vote.
00:35:57 --> 00:36:04 Right. Those are the four steps. Yeah. So the next step after gaining that understanding
00:36:04 --> 00:36:06 is to ascertain the power that you have.
00:36:06 --> 00:36:11 And that is where the civic empowerment pyramid comes into play.
00:36:11 --> 00:36:18 So explain that to listeners. So this is a engagement model that I created.
00:36:18 --> 00:36:26 It was after I did my dissertation and I was sort of in the habit of looking
00:36:26 --> 00:36:30 at patterns and analyzing behavior.
00:36:31 --> 00:36:37 I didn't use it in my dissertation, but I used it, I created it actually for
00:36:37 --> 00:36:38 a TED Talk afterward. word.
00:36:39 --> 00:36:46 I, my experience as a decision maker and a city counselor was that there were
00:36:46 --> 00:36:54 absolutely people in my community who were much better at influencing decision makers than others.
00:36:54 --> 00:37:01 And I wanted to understand why they were so effective.
00:37:02 --> 00:37:09 So I sort of, you know, again, And looking at patterns and behaviors, I...
00:37:10 --> 00:37:16 Looked at all the things that they did, all the behaviors that they had in common.
00:37:16 --> 00:37:24 And from that, I created this inverted pyramid called the Civic Empowerment Pyramid.
00:37:24 --> 00:37:30 And the higher you climb up the pyramid, the more power you have with the leaders
00:37:30 --> 00:37:32 and decision makers, which is why it's upside down.
00:37:32 --> 00:37:40 So there are five stages to this. And I actually went through these five stages myself.
00:37:40 --> 00:37:45 And so that's how I know that, you know, it's not just theoretical,
00:37:45 --> 00:37:47 it actually is something that works.
00:37:47 --> 00:37:50 So at the very, very bottom is when you notice.
00:37:50 --> 00:37:56 And that's what I did. I just started to notice what was happening in my community.
00:37:56 --> 00:38:01 And in some cases, what wasn't happening? Like I mentioned, like,
00:38:01 --> 00:38:05 why weren't these decision makers willing to build a second parking garage?
00:38:05 --> 00:38:10 Like, for me, it was I noticed something that wasn't happening in my community.
00:38:10 --> 00:38:15 And after you notice, you have this, you respond in some way, right?
00:38:15 --> 00:38:20 And for some people, responding is talking about it with their neighbors or
00:38:20 --> 00:38:28 bringing it up at a Little League game or writing a Facebook post in your town's community Facebook.
00:38:29 --> 00:38:33 Or maybe a letter to the editor. Like you notice something and you have this
00:38:33 --> 00:38:37 response and you want to sort of test the waters and see what other people think.
00:38:38 --> 00:38:43 And I like to stop here and say that noticing and responding are a really great
00:38:43 --> 00:38:47 start, but they do not get results.
00:38:48 --> 00:38:53 In and of themselves, because you're not really talking to the decision makers yet.
00:38:53 --> 00:39:02 So after you notice and respond and sort of get some kind of understanding among
00:39:02 --> 00:39:06 your peers and other people around you, it's time to engage.
00:39:06 --> 00:39:08 That's the third step up the pyramid.
00:39:09 --> 00:39:14 And engaging usually involves contacting one of the decision makers involved.
00:39:15 --> 00:39:19 That could be emailing your select board member, your city council member,
00:39:19 --> 00:39:21 maybe you call your town manager.
00:39:22 --> 00:39:27 Depending on the issue it is, maybe it's somebody in the school department that
00:39:27 --> 00:39:30 you're engaging with, but depending on what you're noticing,
00:39:30 --> 00:39:32 or somebody on the school board, I mean.
00:39:33 --> 00:39:40 So that engaging piece, that's when you really start to pull away from the pack,
00:39:41 --> 00:39:47 so to speak, because very few people in a community engage with their decision makers.
00:39:47 --> 00:39:56 It's less than 20%. It's like less than 10% of the community will actually reach out and engage.
00:39:56 --> 00:40:03 So when you do, their response, the person that you reached out to or their
00:40:03 --> 00:40:10 lack of response, it can speak volumes and it really can make or break what happens next.
00:40:10 --> 00:40:16 For some people, if they don't hear back, they sort of just let it go and say,
00:40:16 --> 00:40:18 well, nobody responded, oh well.
00:40:18 --> 00:40:23 That is not how you get results. So if you don't have a response,
00:40:23 --> 00:40:29 then you go to the next person and you keep reaching out until somebody responds to you.
00:40:29 --> 00:40:37 If they do respond, now you've got a dialogue going. And the best way to...
00:40:38 --> 00:40:46 Work your way up to get to that influential level is to let the people in power
00:40:46 --> 00:40:52 know that you are interested in solving problems and not creating problems.
00:40:52 --> 00:40:57 And so the next step up that pyramid is to contribute in some way.
00:40:57 --> 00:41:04 Maybe you have expertise in an area and you're willing to sit on a committee
00:41:04 --> 00:41:07 or a commission and volunteer your time.
00:41:07 --> 00:41:17 Maybe you are willing to put together a community event related around the issue that you care about.
00:41:17 --> 00:41:24 Maybe you're willing to bring in a speaker to the library to help educate other people,
00:41:24 --> 00:41:29 but you're doing something, You're contributing to your community in such a
00:41:29 --> 00:41:33 way that you're building social capital,
00:41:33 --> 00:41:37 you're building relationships in the community, you're letting people know you're
00:41:37 --> 00:41:39 a serious person, like I said,
00:41:39 --> 00:41:43 there to solve problems and not create problems.
00:41:43 --> 00:41:49 And that area on the pyramid, that contributing, you're really very,
00:41:49 --> 00:41:57 very close to the top and you start to understand your local government at this point.
00:41:57 --> 00:41:59 You know who the players are.
00:41:59 --> 00:42:02 You understand the decision-making process.
00:42:02 --> 00:42:08 You really start to see the way things work, how the sausage is made.
00:42:08 --> 00:42:13 And I like to say it's just a slippery slope to the top of the pyramid where
00:42:13 --> 00:42:15 you really have a lot of influence.
00:42:15 --> 00:42:17 This is where maybe...
00:42:19 --> 00:42:22 You start having one-on-one conversations with influential people,
00:42:22 --> 00:42:29 or you become the chair of a committee and start making recommendations to the
00:42:29 --> 00:42:33 decision makers that are holding public office and taking votes.
00:42:33 --> 00:42:38 Or maybe, maybe, maybe you decide like I did, well, heck, I'm a better decision
00:42:38 --> 00:42:42 maker and I have a master's in public administration. I'm going to run for office
00:42:42 --> 00:42:44 because those bozos don't know how to do it.
00:42:44 --> 00:42:48 You know, I mean, that's sort of what happened. And not everybody's going to
00:42:48 --> 00:42:54 have that kind of experience, but, you know, you never know what will happen
00:42:54 --> 00:42:59 as you gain more and more confidence going up the influential pyramid.
00:42:59 --> 00:43:07 So that's just sort of a quick and fast way of the everyday person getting to
00:43:07 --> 00:43:09 a point where they can become very influential.
00:43:09 --> 00:43:16 I will say that with the exception of one person that I created this pyramid
00:43:16 --> 00:43:21 by studying, none of them ran for public office except for one.
00:43:22 --> 00:43:28 All of them just sort of stayed at the contribute level, serving on commissions.
00:43:28 --> 00:43:33 Serving on committees, volunteering their time, but they didn't really pull
00:43:33 --> 00:43:35 the trigger to become an elected official.
00:43:35 --> 00:43:40 So you don't always have to, to have the most influence. Yeah, that's true.
00:43:40 --> 00:43:45 And, you know, I think, you know, for people that do run like you and me,
00:43:45 --> 00:43:50 you know, it's almost kind of intuitive that we do those things.
00:43:52 --> 00:43:56 There's some people that try to skip some steps, but for the most part,
00:43:57 --> 00:44:02 you know, the people that are successful kind of go through that process.
00:44:02 --> 00:44:06 And in the vernacular, people say that's paying your dues, right?
00:44:06 --> 00:44:15 Yes. Yes. So last question I want to ask you is at this stage of your evangelism,
00:44:15 --> 00:44:18 do you feel more challenged or inspired?
00:44:20 --> 00:44:24 So i have a
00:44:24 --> 00:44:27 lot of faith in people i really do
00:44:27 --> 00:44:30 i i think i think most of
00:44:30 --> 00:44:33 the time people make the right decisions but
00:44:33 --> 00:44:36 there's a there's a big caveat here and
00:44:36 --> 00:44:41 it really really scares me and i think puts me over into the challenged side
00:44:41 --> 00:44:50 and that is i am very challenged by the billionaire owners of social media right
00:44:50 --> 00:44:55 now and the way public discourse is happening online.
00:44:55 --> 00:45:01 And I think back to like the early days, you know, when we were all just learning
00:45:01 --> 00:45:06 about Facebook and Twitter and there was sort of this like wink, wink.
00:45:06 --> 00:45:12 Yeah, I know you're getting some of my data, but you know, I'm learning things.
00:45:12 --> 00:45:13 I'm connecting with people.
00:45:13 --> 00:45:16 I'm finding communities online. Like it was kind of worth it.
00:45:17 --> 00:45:21 It was sort of a cost-benefit analysis there that was pretty equal.
00:45:21 --> 00:45:26 But things have gotten really, really off the rails in the last few years.
00:45:27 --> 00:45:38 And the amount of power and control that the social media moguls have now over
00:45:38 --> 00:45:41 us, over our government.
00:45:41 --> 00:45:43 Over everything that we do.
00:45:43 --> 00:45:50 It is beyond, I think, what any normal person could call a fair trade-off.
00:45:50 --> 00:45:58 And the fact that their business model now relies on an algorithm intended to
00:45:58 --> 00:46:05 make us feel bad and divide us in order for their conflict entrepreneurship
00:46:05 --> 00:46:08 to continue to fill their coffers.
00:46:08 --> 00:46:11 I don't know how we overcome that I
00:46:11 --> 00:46:13 I really don't I don't I don't know how
00:46:13 --> 00:46:17 the average person can can
00:46:17 --> 00:46:26 overcome that and so I'm challenged because I I don't know that people can do
00:46:26 --> 00:46:34 the right thing if the right thing is so hard to see yeah I I feel you on that but you know.
00:46:36 --> 00:46:42 I think that the fact that you are out here doing the kind of work and that,
00:46:42 --> 00:46:50 you know, being able to to guide, I think it's going to triumph.
00:46:50 --> 00:46:54 Not necessarily triumph is like, oh, we're going to bother social media and
00:46:54 --> 00:46:58 all this stuff, but get it to a point because people felt the same way about
00:46:58 --> 00:46:59 television back in the day.
00:47:00 --> 00:47:04 They just felt that, oh, my God, you know, they got these images and they're
00:47:04 --> 00:47:06 going to see this stuff and all that.
00:47:06 --> 00:47:11 And then people figured out how to say, OK, so if this is how you're going to
00:47:11 --> 00:47:14 play the game, then we'll make those adjustments.
00:47:14 --> 00:47:20 And I always use sports analogies. And one of my favorite ones is is in basketball.
00:47:21 --> 00:47:25 When when people started first playing basketball, everybody was on the court.
00:47:25 --> 00:47:30 Everybody would set up for their shot and take it. then somebody decided,
00:47:30 --> 00:47:35 hmm, I can't move forward or backwards without dribbling the ball,
00:47:35 --> 00:47:38 but there's no rule that says I can't go vertical, right?
00:47:38 --> 00:47:43 And so when people realized that they could jump straight up and shoot the ball
00:47:43 --> 00:47:49 without somebody standing in their face, it was like, okay, you know,
00:47:49 --> 00:47:50 and that changed the game.
00:47:50 --> 00:47:54 And so I think, you know, you are a changemaker.
00:47:55 --> 00:47:59 And, you know, and people like me that are podcasting, we're changemakers.
00:47:59 --> 00:48:04 And so as long as there's changemakers out there, I think that we can overcome
00:48:04 --> 00:48:06 the challenges that we feel.
00:48:06 --> 00:48:12 But I do feel the overwhelming part that you expressed, and I appreciate you
00:48:12 --> 00:48:13 being transparent about that.
00:48:14 --> 00:48:19 So if people want to get involved with your evangelism, if people want to reach
00:48:19 --> 00:48:25 out to you and do some things because you have a substack and you've written
00:48:25 --> 00:48:26 a book for elementary kids.
00:48:26 --> 00:48:30 Tell people how they can get in touch with you and get access to all that.
00:48:30 --> 00:48:38 I'd say the best thing to do is just come to my website, drnancypearson.com, drnancypearson.com.
00:48:38 --> 00:48:43 But that's my handle on all the socials. I have my Coffee and Civics on TikTok.
00:48:44 --> 00:48:50 I'm not as active on Substack anymore. I'm on Instagram. I'm on all the places that I hate.
00:48:53 --> 00:48:57 So go to my website and all my information is there.
00:48:57 --> 00:49:03 You can email me, get in touch with me. I usually have links to where I'm going
00:49:03 --> 00:49:07 to be, but I just did a workshop last night.
00:49:07 --> 00:49:10 I don't have anything lined up for the next month or two, so I don't have any
00:49:10 --> 00:49:14 events lined up right now, but But that's usually where things are most up to
00:49:14 --> 00:49:16 date. Yeah. Dr. Nancy Pearson.
00:49:16 --> 00:49:22 Well, again, Dr. Nancy Pearson, I greatly appreciate you coming on the podcast.
00:49:22 --> 00:49:25 And I greatly appreciate the work that you do.
00:49:26 --> 00:49:31 And likewise, I did not I did not put any pressure on you prior to it,
00:49:31 --> 00:49:34 but there is some significance to your name.
00:49:34 --> 00:49:39 You are literally the third person named Pearson that has been a guest on the show.
00:49:39 --> 00:49:46 And the other two Pearsons have been have been dynamic so much that they both are attorneys.
00:49:46 --> 00:49:51 So I created a a segment for them to come on and do like some legal stuff.
00:49:51 --> 00:49:56 So, you know, when I saw another Pearson I could get on the show, I was like, yay.
00:49:57 --> 00:50:01 It seems like everybody named Pearson is, you know, doing some things in this
00:50:01 --> 00:50:05 country. So you have definitely lived up to that status.
00:50:05 --> 00:50:08 And so, again, I greatly appreciate you coming on.
00:50:09 --> 00:50:12 Thank you, Eric. It was my pleasure. Thank you so much for having me.
00:50:12 --> 00:50:17 I love your show. All right. All right, guys. And we're going to catch y'all on the other side.
00:50:37 --> 00:50:41 All right, and we are back. And so now it is time for next guest, Tania Anderson.
00:50:42 --> 00:50:45 Tania Fernandez Anderson was born in prior Cape Verde.
00:50:45 --> 00:50:49 At the age of 10, she immigrated from Cape Verde to Roxbury,
00:50:50 --> 00:50:55 two places, she says, formed the foundation of her unwavering commitment to the community.
00:50:56 --> 00:50:59 Tania was elected to the Boston City Council on November 2nd,
00:51:00 --> 00:51:06 2021, becoming the first African immigrant and Muslim American elected to the Boston City Council.
00:51:06 --> 00:51:11 She represented District 7, consisting of Roxbury, Dorchester,
00:51:11 --> 00:51:15 Fenway, and part of the South End until July 4th, 2025.
00:51:16 --> 00:51:22 Tania was executive director of Bodong Geneva Main Street and has been a parent
00:51:22 --> 00:51:27 advocate with the Boston Public Schools, a program manager for a homeless women's
00:51:27 --> 00:51:30 shelter, a business owner, and a child social worker.
00:51:30 --> 00:51:36 She has also been a foster mom to 17 kids while raising two biological children.
00:51:36 --> 00:51:40 The equitable distribution of mental health services has always been near to
00:51:40 --> 00:51:44 Tania’s heart, which is why she founded NOAA's Advocate.
00:51:45 --> 00:51:50 NOAA's Advocate is a trauma-informed mental health program that serves underrepresented communities.
00:51:52 --> 00:51:56 Underrepresented communities, I'm sorry. Tania is also the founder of a program
00:51:56 --> 00:52:00 that supports AtRift Youth through theater, fashion, and art.
00:52:00 --> 00:52:05 The shows and performances routinely sell out the historic Strand Theater in Dorchester.
00:52:06 --> 00:52:11 Tania attended the John D. O'Brien High School of Mathematics and Science in
00:52:11 --> 00:52:13 Roxbury and Springfield College.
00:52:14 --> 00:52:18 She is the proud mother of a U.S. Marine and a young emerging artist.
00:52:18 --> 00:52:23 In her spare time, Tania enjoys sewing gowns and playwriting.
00:52:23 --> 00:52:27 Ladies and gentlemen, it is my distinct honor and privilege to have as a guest
00:52:27 --> 00:52:31 on this podcast, Tania Anderson.
00:52:42 --> 00:52:48 All right, Tania Anderson, how you doing, sister? You hanging in there? You doing good?
00:52:49 --> 00:52:53 I'll praise you to God, and it's Tania. What did I say?
00:52:53 --> 00:52:58 Tania? Tania. Okay. You said Tania. Tania. Okay. All right. Thank you. How are you, Erik?
00:52:59 --> 00:53:02 I'm doing good, Tania. Thank you. Thank you for that.
00:53:02 --> 00:53:09 And, you know, I appreciate my guests when they correct me on the pronunciation of their names.
00:53:09 --> 00:53:15 And I've been saying Tania because I have a cousin that spells the name the same way.
00:53:15 --> 00:53:20 But for some reason, I try to be phonetic with that. So thank you.
00:53:21 --> 00:53:24 Anyway, I'm really, really glad that you decided to come on.
00:53:25 --> 00:53:31 I have seen you in action when you were on the Boston city council.
00:53:32 --> 00:53:38 And at that point I wanted to get you on and I was finally able to get you.
00:53:39 --> 00:53:48 And it is not the most ideal circumstance, but I I'm glad that you accepted the invitation.
00:53:48 --> 00:53:52 And so we're going to, we're going to conduct this interview the way that I
00:53:52 --> 00:53:55 do all everybody else. We're going to do an icebreaker first.
00:53:56 --> 00:54:00 And usually the icebreaker is the first
00:54:00 --> 00:54:02 thing is a quote so i want you to respond to
00:54:02 --> 00:54:05 this quote i am not a perfect servant i am
00:54:05 --> 00:54:09 a public servant doing my best against the odds as
00:54:09 --> 00:54:14 i develop and serve be patient god is not finished with me yet what does that
00:54:14 --> 00:54:20 quote mean to you you know that human beings as human beings were imperfect
00:54:20 --> 00:54:28 and the process of serving is a humble one and it's a one of, it's evolutionary.
00:54:28 --> 00:54:36 So that this person is still learning, be patient, mean, be compassionate with
00:54:36 --> 00:54:39 me when I make a mistake. Yeah.
00:54:39 --> 00:54:43 All right. So I'd normally do this thing called 20 questions,
00:54:43 --> 00:54:47 but because of some of the conversations we had prior to this,
00:54:47 --> 00:54:49 I'm not going to let you pick a number.
00:54:49 --> 00:54:54 I'm going to pick a number for you because if you pick a number,
00:54:54 --> 00:54:56 it might be a question that you can't answer.
00:54:56 --> 00:55:00 So I'm a, I'm a pick the number for you. And since nobody picks,
00:55:00 --> 00:55:02 make the best use of your time, let's go.
00:55:02 --> 00:55:06 So I'm a pick, I'm a pick, I'm a pick number one for you.
00:55:06 --> 00:55:08 Okay. Cause nobody ever picks one.
00:55:10 --> 00:55:14 So do you think voting is enough?
00:55:16 --> 00:55:25 Of course not. You know, when I first got elected, I quickly realized that it
00:55:25 --> 00:55:28 wasn't just about telling people to vote.
00:55:28 --> 00:55:30 It wasn't just about telling them why they should vote.
00:55:30 --> 00:55:36 It wasn't just about representation, but rather the education and access.
00:55:37 --> 00:55:43 So the education, so that when they have the access, they could actually understand
00:55:43 --> 00:55:46 how to maneuver, navigate the resources.
00:55:46 --> 00:55:51 So it's not enough to just vote, but understanding the resources and then understanding
00:55:51 --> 00:55:54 how to navigate them and then having access.
00:55:55 --> 00:55:58 Yeah. So let's, you know,
00:55:59 --> 00:56:08 one of the things that you have highlighted and I agree with is that most people
00:56:08 --> 00:56:13 don't really understand the people that serve, right?
00:56:14 --> 00:56:17 They don't, they don't, they, you know, somebody pops up and says,
00:56:18 --> 00:56:20 hey, I'm running for this office, vote for me.
00:56:21 --> 00:56:26 You know, some people have some traction in the community, but other people just kind of show up.
00:56:27 --> 00:56:30 And the black community, especially with white candidates, you know,
00:56:30 --> 00:56:35 on Sunday, we'll get to see a whole bunch of folks that we've never met before.
00:56:35 --> 00:56:37 And we got to make a decision.
00:56:38 --> 00:56:45 So talk to me about you. You came from Cape Verde, is that right?
00:56:46 --> 00:56:54 Yes. Yeah. And so you were like a teenager when you came to the United States or?
00:56:54 --> 00:56:59 I was 10. You were 10. All right. So talk to me about how did somebody from
00:56:59 --> 00:57:06 Cape Verde get involved in American politics? Talk about that journey.
00:57:07 --> 00:57:10 I would say that when you're
00:57:10 --> 00:57:13 10 and you immigrate you and i
00:57:13 --> 00:57:17 i mean i'm i'm going to be 47 so
00:57:17 --> 00:57:24 i think people forget that because whatever black don't crack and i don't but
00:57:24 --> 00:57:29 how does an african girl immigrate to america to a different continent and you
00:57:29 --> 00:57:32 know assimilate enough or to become interested in her civics.
00:57:32 --> 00:57:34 I mean, it's now my culture.
00:57:34 --> 00:57:41 I am literally, by definition, African-American because I'm African and American.
00:57:41 --> 00:57:46 And so what the culture, the people.
00:57:46 --> 00:57:55 My rhythm, my education, everything that I have learned and love and endure
00:57:55 --> 00:57:59 and nurture is African-American.
00:57:59 --> 00:58:07 That's my culture. That's who I am. So naturally, I grew up in academy homes, projects in Roxbury.
00:58:08 --> 00:58:16 And you see the issues. I think by default, I worked in public health for about 23 years.
00:58:16 --> 00:58:23 And you're serving the entire time. And then you don't know enough because I
00:58:23 --> 00:58:28 was one of those kids that was not given a green card early on.
00:58:29 --> 00:58:32 And so I got it as an adult by way of marriage.
00:58:32 --> 00:58:39 And so I don't, I didn't necessarily understand much of civics until I started
00:58:39 --> 00:58:45 working for a nonprofit that, you know, worked a lot on small businesses.
00:58:45 --> 00:58:49 There I became interested in, you know, how things were shaped,
00:58:49 --> 00:58:55 the protocols and the policies that shape the resources.
00:58:55 --> 00:59:03 And so when the opportunity opened up, I said, maybe this is a job that I could
00:59:03 --> 00:59:07 do and really, really help my people.
00:59:08 --> 00:59:15 Yeah. So did you, when you decided to say, okay, well, I'm going to run for
00:59:15 --> 00:59:19 the city council, what did you know about city government?
00:59:19 --> 00:59:24 What did you, and why did you think that was a vehicle beyond the work that
00:59:24 --> 00:59:28 you were doing with nonprofits to help the people in your area?
00:59:30 --> 00:59:35 Well, I had a family member who had ran for office, was already a rep and then
00:59:35 --> 00:59:41 ran for DA. So immediately, he asked me to help him on his campaign.
00:59:42 --> 00:59:47 And just by being on this campaign and helping, I learned a lot about,
00:59:47 --> 00:59:51 oh, this is what a public official is. You run for office.
00:59:51 --> 00:59:55 This is what the universe is. Or this is what cutting turf is.
00:59:55 --> 01:00:00 And I learned a lot about what that meant. And then I wasn't really interested in it.
01:00:00 --> 01:00:04 It wasn't until, again,
01:00:04 --> 01:00:07 when I really started looking at nonprofit and
01:00:07 --> 01:00:10 resources and the economy and how it impacted us
01:00:10 --> 01:00:14 that I became more interested because you would look
01:00:14 --> 01:00:20 at the lack of resources and how systemically things were already sort of threaded
01:00:20 --> 01:00:29 into the fabric of our communities and the different disparities between certain
01:00:29 --> 01:00:31 communities. and where I lived.
01:00:31 --> 01:00:35 And so, of course, you become interested because you start saying that's not fair.
01:00:35 --> 01:00:43 I think immediately, though, it's your ego because you think, I can help. I can serve.
01:00:44 --> 01:00:50 But that's not the case. You hopefully eventually have to have a come to Jesus
01:00:50 --> 01:00:54 moment where you realize, I need to discover more about the issues.
01:00:54 --> 01:00:57 I need to learn more about the people that I serve. and to
01:00:57 --> 01:01:00 be a servant is truly you think you're
01:01:00 --> 01:01:04 a leader but you are just a servant in disguise
01:01:04 --> 01:01:07 so it's humbling you start
01:01:07 --> 01:01:10 understanding that you need people you start understanding that there is no
01:01:10 --> 01:01:16 ego there can't be arrogance and there can't be any type of you know I want
01:01:16 --> 01:01:22 to reprofist because I can help no no no we as a collective need to do this
01:01:22 --> 01:01:26 together and it has to be that way to serve that's,
01:01:27 --> 01:01:28 Pretty much, I hope that answers your question.
01:01:28 --> 01:01:31 That's all I knew about it. It was about on the campaign side.
01:01:32 --> 01:01:37 And then I had to literally Google and research what is a city councilor?
01:01:38 --> 01:01:39 What does the council do?
01:01:40 --> 01:01:43 Branches of government. What is a policy? What are codes?
01:01:44 --> 01:01:49 I had to literally Google all that stuff while I'm on the forum and I'm knocking on doors.
01:01:49 --> 01:01:52 I knew that I could change rules, right?
01:01:52 --> 01:01:56 In my head, there were rules that I was changing as a legislator.
01:01:56 --> 01:02:00 And once I got the grasp of it then I really believed that.
01:02:01 --> 01:02:08 Needed to humble myself and ask God to help me and purify my heart to be a true
01:02:08 --> 01:02:10 servant and not make it about me.
01:02:11 --> 01:02:13 Yeah. And for those people who
01:02:13 --> 01:02:20 tend to be good at that job, that's the process you have to go through.
01:02:20 --> 01:02:25 I explain to people all the time, all people that run for office have an ego
01:02:25 --> 01:02:31 to the sense that they believe that they can convince people to put their trust
01:02:31 --> 01:02:33 in them to to serve in that position.
01:02:33 --> 01:02:38 And you, but what I say is most people look at ego in the negative sense of
01:02:38 --> 01:02:40 being arrogant, overconfident and all that stuff.
01:02:40 --> 01:02:45 But ego is you, you, you have to have a belief in yourself, one,
01:02:45 --> 01:02:47 that you can make that difference.
01:02:48 --> 01:02:53 And then two, to have the confidence to go before people that some,
01:02:53 --> 01:02:59 you may know, but the majority of them, you don't to convince them at least 51% of them,
01:02:59 --> 01:03:05 to say, yeah, that's the person we want in this position at this time, right?
01:03:05 --> 01:03:09 And I think that's important for people to know.
01:03:09 --> 01:03:14 So I don't, and I really appreciate you being transparent in the fact that you
01:03:14 --> 01:03:17 were, as you were running for the office, you were learning more about it.
01:03:18 --> 01:03:23 Because one of the things that I realized when I was running was that I had
01:03:23 --> 01:03:25 to educate people about the position.
01:03:25 --> 01:03:29 I literally had, when I was running for state rep, people were asking me,
01:03:29 --> 01:03:32 are you going to go to Washington and be up there with Congressman Benny Thompson?
01:03:32 --> 01:03:36 I said, no, no, I'm going to be right downtown in Jackson, that big building with the dome in it.
01:03:37 --> 01:03:41 That's why I'm going to be working, you know? And people appreciated that.
01:03:41 --> 01:03:50 It was like, okay, so you kind of have to give a civics lesson to your own constituents at times.
01:03:50 --> 01:03:53 So yeah, Yeah, I think, you know, I think that's cool.
01:03:53 --> 01:03:57 And I think that that's and then the other piece that you talked about was,
01:03:57 --> 01:04:02 you know, the people, because in order to have a servant's heart,
01:04:02 --> 01:04:04 you have to have a love for people.
01:04:05 --> 01:04:11 And we had a mayor in Jackson who who once said that and I'm paraphrasing.
01:04:11 --> 01:04:17 He said, you can't do this job, if you don't have a love for the people, do you agree with that?
01:04:18 --> 01:04:22 You can't do this job if you have a love for the people. Even if you don't like
01:04:22 --> 01:04:26 people like myself, you can certainly, you certainly have to love people.
01:04:27 --> 01:04:32 And I absolutely love the people that I represented and still do.
01:04:32 --> 01:04:36 You have to want, you know, the best for them.
01:04:36 --> 01:04:41 You have to believe that they deserve it and you have to have a level of respect
01:04:41 --> 01:04:43 for them. Absolutely. Yeah.
01:04:44 --> 01:04:49 And, you know, when for those of y'all listening, when she said,
01:04:50 --> 01:04:56 I don't like people, you know, an introvert will say that because I know that
01:04:56 --> 01:04:57 you you're an introvert.
01:04:57 --> 01:05:00 I'm an introvert, too. My dad was amazed.
01:05:00 --> 01:05:05 How do you know I'm an introvert? Oh, well, just you said that somewhere.
01:05:06 --> 01:05:08 You publicly said that. Oh, yeah.
01:05:08 --> 01:05:14 Yeah. Yeah. And but I am, too. And my dad was amazed because he was like,
01:05:14 --> 01:05:18 he said, I can't believe that you not only got into politics,
01:05:18 --> 01:05:23 but you were successful in it because one, you're a natural introvert.
01:05:23 --> 01:05:26 And then two, you have a, you're allergic to BS.
01:05:27 --> 01:05:33 And I said, so he was just amazed. How did you navigate through all that?
01:05:33 --> 01:05:37 So I guess I'll ask you that question. How did you, when you got on the council,
01:05:37 --> 01:05:39 how did you navigate to BS?
01:05:39 --> 01:05:44 I don't think I did a good job navigating through the BS.
01:05:44 --> 01:05:48 I think I came on too strong, too hard, too fast.
01:05:49 --> 01:05:52 And, you know, I wouldn't be me if I did otherwise.
01:05:53 --> 01:05:56 So a lot of people were saying, you know, if she had guidance,
01:05:56 --> 01:06:00 if she had a mentor, if she had, if she, you know, if she built a network,
01:06:00 --> 01:06:02 I did none of those things.
01:06:02 --> 01:06:07 The network that I built was with my constituent, and I actually have an advisory
01:06:07 --> 01:06:11 council I had, still volunteer with them on the weekends to do civic stuff.
01:06:12 --> 01:06:17 But, and they, you know, we worked on policy. It wasn't about me.
01:06:17 --> 01:06:19 It wasn't about them coaching me.
01:06:20 --> 01:06:25 At some point, it became about me, right? Like, obviously, they were supportive many times.
01:06:25 --> 01:06:32 But for the most part, yeah, the relationships that I had, I think,
01:06:32 --> 01:06:36 for example, people are often asking me about Meru.
01:06:38 --> 01:06:43 She like you? Do I like her? I don't have an opinion. I don't feel yes,
01:06:43 --> 01:06:50 dislike or like, even if she has done things that people say seem to be vindictive.
01:06:50 --> 01:06:56 I still don't have any emotional reaction to that because politics is a funny thing.
01:06:56 --> 01:07:01 And then you realize that she's no different from her predecessors in terms
01:07:01 --> 01:07:05 of, you know, moving politically, maneuvering this thing.
01:07:05 --> 01:07:10 And I am, I was not qualified. I wasn't ready. And I didn't have,
01:07:11 --> 01:07:15 you know, the politics part of me to maneuver all of that.
01:07:15 --> 01:07:20 So the relationship that I had with her was, if you, if you BS me,
01:07:20 --> 01:07:22 I'm going to take it to the people.
01:07:22 --> 01:07:28 And so it worked for a little bit. And, you know, it worked every time until it didn't.
01:07:29 --> 01:07:32 So that was my style.
01:07:32 --> 01:07:36 It wasn't speak the truth, like tell the truth, don't lie to the people,
01:07:37 --> 01:07:40 don't coddle systemically like racist practices.
01:07:41 --> 01:07:46 Just, you know, don't BS. Just do what you're supposed to do.
01:07:46 --> 01:07:50 And I did that with my colleagues. I did that with the mayor.
01:07:50 --> 01:07:52 I did that with everybody.
01:07:53 --> 01:07:56 It got me knocked upside the head several times, I would say.
01:07:57 --> 01:08:00 Well, I mean, but that's part of the journey.
01:08:01 --> 01:08:06 You're not the first and you're not going to be the last that experiences that.
01:08:06 --> 01:08:09 You know, I tell the story all the time. When I first got in office,
01:08:10 --> 01:08:14 my machine wasn't even working and I was already speaking against bills and stuff.
01:08:15 --> 01:08:19 You know so i mean that's that's this part of it when you come in and see,
01:08:20 --> 01:08:27 you know as another guest i just interviewed you know it was like when when
01:08:27 --> 01:08:32 she got on the council she she had been an activist and and and then she got
01:08:32 --> 01:08:34 on the council and then she realized,
01:08:35 --> 01:08:38 these people are not as smart as i thought they were you know what i'm saying
01:08:38 --> 01:08:44 you know so that's a realization when you look at people you see them on tv all the time or whatever,
01:08:45 --> 01:08:47 It's a dynamic thing.
01:08:47 --> 01:08:51 It's more than just, it's a dynamic construct. It's not just,
01:08:51 --> 01:08:53 you know, they're not as smart.
01:08:53 --> 01:08:55 They're moving too fast, so they didn't prepare.
01:08:56 --> 01:09:01 They haven't taken the time to learn Robert's Rules. This one has a lot of biases,
01:09:01 --> 01:09:04 but doesn't want to be racist and is working toward doing differently.
01:09:04 --> 01:09:08 This one has all the qualifications, but is scared. She wants to be the next
01:09:08 --> 01:09:11 big thing, so she's not going to vote the right way.
01:09:11 --> 01:09:16 This one is also, like, you know, there's all of these components to...
01:09:17 --> 01:09:22 And then, you know, what it sounds like is you get put on the spotlight,
01:09:22 --> 01:09:27 you get put under the camera, and people that are watching are like, oh, what a bonehead.
01:09:27 --> 01:09:29 What did she just say? Or what did he just say?
01:09:30 --> 01:09:34 And they don't realize that everything is a quick, you know, ad hoc.
01:09:34 --> 01:09:44 And the good legislator has sat down for hours every day if possible to do their homework and study.
01:09:44 --> 01:09:50 Because you, you know, again Back to the navigating resources In order for you
01:09:50 --> 01:09:55 to represent a body of people You have to understand the rules In order for
01:09:55 --> 01:09:58 you to maneuver that conversation If you don't know,
01:09:58 --> 01:10:00 say you don't know And then you research it,
01:10:01 --> 01:10:06 I've seen people do that in a real Like in a kind of like superfluous way And it's like.
01:10:07 --> 01:10:09 Yeah, whatever You're not going to read it You're not going to get back to them
01:10:09 --> 01:10:12 But there are people that,
01:10:12 --> 01:10:16 you know will pretend to know and then
01:10:16 --> 01:10:18 that sounds dumb in itself because then people know better
01:10:18 --> 01:10:21 these you know especially the new generation you know
01:10:21 --> 01:10:25 they're smart as hell they they have information at their fingertip and
01:10:25 --> 01:10:28 you can't fool them they understand more there
01:10:28 --> 01:10:32 may be a lot of you know like mentally like social like mental
01:10:32 --> 01:10:35 health stuff going on where they you know
01:10:35 --> 01:10:38 we they don't suppress it as we did right so
01:10:38 --> 01:10:41 it seems like their issues are more heightened but no these
01:10:41 --> 01:10:44 kids can navigate things at a quick rate and they're
01:10:44 --> 01:10:48 smarter i think socially politically and
01:10:48 --> 01:10:51 emotionally it's just that they don't hide it they're not
01:10:51 --> 01:10:56 as you know depraved as we were coming up where we're like you know we just
01:10:56 --> 01:11:01 work our way to toughness but anyway i i i'm uh going a little bit off track
01:11:01 --> 01:11:06 but the point is that it's not just what you see in the moment it's not like
01:11:06 --> 01:11:09 someone is dumb or whatever sometimes they're playing with you too right sometimes
01:11:09 --> 01:11:10 they're just telling you,
01:11:11 --> 01:11:15 that they don't know a thing, or they're pretending to not answer and they're
01:11:15 --> 01:11:19 scurrying around it, but they actually do know, and they're not dumb,
01:11:19 --> 01:11:22 they're playing dumb. So there's some of that too.
01:11:22 --> 01:11:33 Yeah. So being an African-American woman in that position, what was the biggest
01:11:33 --> 01:11:35 challenge you had to deal with?
01:11:36 --> 01:11:43 I think on many levels, like there's, there's the.
01:11:44 --> 01:11:48 Know in hiring even your own staff
01:11:48 --> 01:11:51 having to like not necessarily respect
01:11:51 --> 01:11:54 you because you're a black woman and your authority
01:11:54 --> 01:11:58 is not authority or you know you being questioned
01:11:58 --> 01:12:01 there's the part about walking in a building and
01:12:01 --> 01:12:04 everyone does the potential in boston they're very good at
01:12:04 --> 01:12:07 doing the nicey nice every you know
01:12:07 --> 01:12:10 in boston everybody's like counselor counselor counselor counselor
01:12:10 --> 01:12:13 and i just couldn't stand it i just wish people would just
01:12:13 --> 01:12:17 say hey t what up whatever
01:12:17 --> 01:12:21 because you it's
01:12:21 --> 01:12:24 good just when they think that you know you
01:12:24 --> 01:12:27 are how adjacent you are to the mayor and then
01:12:27 --> 01:12:30 when you disagree with the mayor they all work for the mayor then that
01:12:30 --> 01:12:33 becomes a thing and it's definitely because you know
01:12:33 --> 01:12:37 they definitely treat you as a black woman differently white counselors
01:12:37 --> 01:12:40 coming in have access immediately because
01:12:40 --> 01:12:43 the people that historically have been
01:12:43 --> 01:12:48 there for years that understand the resources and how to navigate or connect
01:12:48 --> 01:12:55 with stuff where everything is I saw public works and public facility immediately
01:12:55 --> 01:13:02 meet with the new white counselors in their office connecting them to stuff you're told one thing,
01:13:02 --> 01:13:07 you can do one thing but then you'll see your white colleagues get away with other things.
01:13:08 --> 01:13:10 The list goes on and on and on.
01:13:11 --> 01:13:17 When things happen in your neighborhood, you see the mayor responding one way
01:13:17 --> 01:13:19 to the white counselor's constituents
01:13:19 --> 01:13:23 than she does to your Black constituents in your neighborhood.
01:13:24 --> 01:13:27 And it doesn't matter if she's a woman of color. She knows that she is in the
01:13:27 --> 01:13:30 same system and that she has to play by the rules too.
01:13:30 --> 01:13:37 So the list goes on and on. I can't begin to tell you enough, But I never felt like...
01:13:38 --> 01:13:41 A black woman and this is so hard and
01:13:41 --> 01:13:44 i'm a victim i didn't feel that way i
01:13:44 --> 01:13:47 think it was the same not ego but the same belief
01:13:47 --> 01:13:50 that i can and i will
01:13:50 --> 01:13:53 by god i will if god allows me i
01:13:53 --> 01:13:56 will i can and god allows me i will
01:13:56 --> 01:13:58 and if i can't i will learn and if
01:13:58 --> 01:14:02 i don't learn fast enough that's okay and try
01:14:02 --> 01:14:05 to be kind to myself in that process but that
01:14:05 --> 01:14:09 that's that's that's every black every African-American woman
01:14:09 --> 01:14:13 in America that she has
01:14:13 --> 01:14:16 to train herself to be kind to herself to
01:14:16 --> 01:14:21 forgive herself along the way because the pressures are real the visceral trauma
01:14:21 --> 01:14:27 real and that every single day issues that we go through discriminatory like
01:14:27 --> 01:14:32 experiences that we go through adds on pressure we're literally walking with
01:14:32 --> 01:14:35 like you know induced stress every single day,
01:14:36 --> 01:14:38 but we, we get it done.
01:14:38 --> 01:14:43 We, we make it happen. And it's not fair that the load is so heavy,
01:14:43 --> 01:14:50 but you can only make it if you decide that God is in control and that's okay.
01:14:50 --> 01:14:56 That this journey may be tough and, but that's okay. It's all part of it and
01:14:56 --> 01:14:58 be grateful for all of it. Yeah.
01:14:59 --> 01:15:03 So you said the journey could be tough.
01:15:03 --> 01:15:10 And right now you are in what you self-described as your tough climate phase.
01:15:11 --> 01:15:14 And I'm kind of paraphrasing, but you did say something to that.
01:15:14 --> 01:15:18 No, that sounds great, but I never said that. But, okay, I get what you're saying.
01:15:18 --> 01:15:21 Yeah, when you said something about, somebody asked you a question,
01:15:21 --> 01:15:23 you said the climate is tough right now.
01:15:24 --> 01:15:27 And so that's why I was kind of paraphrasing that. Climate?
01:15:27 --> 01:15:38 Okay. Yeah, that was the word. yeah yeah on james on jimmy jimmy yeah um yeah
01:15:38 --> 01:15:41 yeah we're going i i you know so anyway.
01:15:42 --> 01:15:46 I think he said it and then I said it, but it didn't feel like something I would
01:15:46 --> 01:15:49 say. That's why I said that. But yeah, I remember. I got you.
01:15:49 --> 01:15:55 All right. So on September the 5th of this year, you said everything that happened
01:15:55 --> 01:15:57 is for a reason. Everything.
01:15:58 --> 01:16:01 Upon further reflection, what did you mean by that?
01:16:02 --> 01:16:06 Oh, yes. That was on the media. i everything
01:16:06 --> 01:16:10 that happens is for a reason meaning that
01:16:10 --> 01:16:13 when things are good most people i
01:16:13 --> 01:16:19 think we're like human beings we are inclined to be grateful for things when
01:16:19 --> 01:16:24 they feel good when they are easy when it's smooth sailing when the climate
01:16:24 --> 01:16:33 is you know easy sailing but when When things get tough, then we start questioning,
01:16:33 --> 01:16:35 and there's more to the story, right?
01:16:35 --> 01:16:40 And I was very transparent with you that I will not speak about the case until
01:16:40 --> 01:16:43 a postponed time, one day, maybe.
01:16:44 --> 01:16:47 But there that that you know you
01:16:47 --> 01:16:50 can ask yourself a thousand questions about you know how this
01:16:50 --> 01:16:52 happened where what you know where am i in the state of
01:16:52 --> 01:16:55 things but in order for you to be
01:16:55 --> 01:16:58 truly grateful for your journey
01:16:58 --> 01:17:02 you have to accept every bit
01:17:02 --> 01:17:05 of it the good the bad what you
01:17:05 --> 01:17:09 actually did what you didn't what others
01:17:09 --> 01:17:12 did but now is on you it doesn't matter
01:17:12 --> 01:17:18 that you take full you take a full account of all of it good bad and you are
01:17:18 --> 01:17:24 grateful for it and that's what i meant that i am grateful for every bit of
01:17:24 --> 01:17:30 it every moment and it's been truly cathartic to go through this experience.
01:17:30 --> 01:17:37 And I pray that I learn at the end of the journey that I understand the purpose
01:17:37 --> 01:17:40 and that I continue to always be grateful to God for everything.
01:17:41 --> 01:17:48 Yeah. So when you left the Boston City Council, you said, I leave this chamber
01:17:48 --> 01:17:51 the way I entered, with a big smile, grounded,
01:17:52 --> 01:17:56 God willing, humble, faithful, not in the system, but in the people.
01:17:57 --> 01:18:03 I will still be fighting, not from this chamber, but from the community, with you, with God.
01:18:04 --> 01:18:09 So my question to you is, how will the new chapter of Tania Anderson's public service start?
01:18:11 --> 01:18:17 I think I have to wait for God to guide me, for God to show me.
01:18:17 --> 01:18:25 I don't have that answer. I promise you, I have realized that I could be,
01:18:25 --> 01:18:27 potentially, people would tell me I am.
01:18:27 --> 01:18:34 I had a functioning individual, so I perform well at anything I start, God willing.
01:18:35 --> 01:18:41 But that's because I put God first. So in this moment, I would like to seek
01:18:41 --> 01:18:45 God's guidance and understanding exactly what my next step is.
01:18:45 --> 01:18:53 But I can never, I know deep inside that my truest self is to always be kind
01:18:53 --> 01:19:00 and serve and help and be a part of what God wants us to do as a community, as one human community.
01:19:01 --> 01:19:07 So I say I will fight, you know, not from the chambers, from the outside,
01:19:07 --> 01:19:10 with God, but I don't know what that looks like.
01:19:10 --> 01:19:15 Yeah. And that's understandable. So I want to close out. Well,
01:19:15 --> 01:19:17 first of all, let me make a qualification to you.
01:19:17 --> 01:19:21 Most of the people, well, I should say all the people that have been guests
01:19:21 --> 01:19:25 of my show are smarter than me. So if you've had any doubts that you're highly
01:19:25 --> 01:19:30 functional, I can testify that you are.
01:19:30 --> 01:19:34 I'm still discovering whether or not I'm going to put that on you.
01:19:35 --> 01:19:41 But to close out, what do you see as the future for District 7,
01:19:41 --> 01:19:42 the area that you represented?
01:19:43 --> 01:19:51 Even though you grew up in Roxbury, you're very protective of the district as
01:19:51 --> 01:19:53 a whole and not just focused in.
01:19:54 --> 01:19:58 Because a lot of times, you know, when those of us are elected,
01:19:58 --> 01:20:02 especially if those of my friends that were elected in areas that they grew
01:20:02 --> 01:20:06 up in, they were very, very protective about their particular subdivision,
01:20:06 --> 01:20:08 their particular community.
01:20:08 --> 01:20:11 And then everybody else just kind of got some of the benefits from that.
01:20:11 --> 01:20:16 But you, you know, in just the conversation I had with you, you wanted to make
01:20:16 --> 01:20:19 sure it was clear that it was all of District 7 that you represented.
01:20:19 --> 01:20:25 So what would you like to see happen? What do you see the future of District 7 going forward?
01:20:26 --> 01:20:32 Well, first of all, I'd like to say for you that it is a sign of intelligence
01:20:32 --> 01:20:35 to admit that you know nothing. So good for you.
01:20:38 --> 01:20:44 Contrary to what you were joking about as far as District 7 it's,
01:20:45 --> 01:20:49 It pains my heart when I hear constituents tell me that,
01:20:49 --> 01:20:56 you know, especially with what's happened and now with the finalists for the
01:20:56 --> 01:21:01 general election, that people don't have faith in, you know,
01:21:01 --> 01:21:03 the two that are finalists.
01:21:04 --> 01:21:08 One's supposed to be really terrible and supposed to be homophobic,
01:21:08 --> 01:21:15 and the other one is highly homophobic, and the other one is anti-African American.
01:21:15 --> 01:21:19 And so it's like all of these things that people are hearing and have been substantiated
01:21:19 --> 01:21:23 by like either past like social media posts and things that people did.
01:21:23 --> 01:21:27 They both they're both, you know, people are concerned about the both of them.
01:21:27 --> 01:21:31 And but we have to work with whomever gets elected.
01:21:32 --> 01:21:40 And that means that we have to be graceful and we have to teach them and,
01:21:40 --> 01:21:45 you know, pull them along the journey, just as they allowed me to learn and serve.
01:21:46 --> 01:21:50 We can't just lose hope. We have to keep going. We have to keep voting.
01:21:50 --> 01:21:54 We have to keep educating one another. We have to keep doing the work.
01:21:54 --> 01:22:02 District 7 is the center of Boston. So literally, Roxbury is in the middle of Boston.
01:22:02 --> 01:22:07 And so we say it's the heart of Boston. All roads lead to Roxbury.
01:22:08 --> 01:22:15 And we know that there's a lot of land based on, due to urban renewal,
01:22:16 --> 01:22:20 basically they took land from black people and and
01:22:20 --> 01:22:26 it was and and so now all of this land available the mayor came out and said
01:22:26 --> 01:22:31 that a few years ago that she was going to give them away for free to developers
01:22:31 --> 01:22:37 so that we can continue to develop in the city and that should happen but she's not,
01:22:37 --> 01:22:42 prioritizing small black and brown developers she is just whomever is going
01:22:42 --> 01:22:45 to develop housing because that checks off a list, right?
01:22:45 --> 01:22:47 And we can say we're doing good.
01:22:48 --> 01:22:52 When you do the math and I know we don't have the time to do it right now,
01:22:52 --> 01:22:56 you then see that it's not addressing the most vulnerable population.
01:22:56 --> 01:23:02 And so unfortunately district seven is at a very, very vulnerable state.
01:23:03 --> 01:23:09 And if the mayor continues on the path that she wants to with the developers
01:23:09 --> 01:23:13 that, as I see them, who is like, you know, funding her campaign.
01:23:13 --> 01:23:18 Then district seven is in trouble because you get a whole bunch of.
01:23:19 --> 01:23:24 Poverty, condensately populated in Roxbury and South End and Little Roxbury area,
01:23:25 --> 01:23:31 where as we know it, you know, it's not a good recipe for, you know,
01:23:31 --> 01:23:36 economic drivers that we need in urban settings such as District 7.
01:23:36 --> 01:23:42 And so I would say to the people that I'm hoping that we can all work with the
01:23:42 --> 01:23:46 elected coming in, that we can continue to try to hold them accountable.
01:23:46 --> 01:23:53 But there is a very vulnerable situation that could potentially go the wrong way.
01:23:53 --> 01:23:57 And everyone wants a piece of it. It's about 400 parcels.
01:23:58 --> 01:24:03 Maybe about an eighth of that has gone into acquisition.
01:24:03 --> 01:24:07 And so there's still a lot left. And so everybody's hungry.
01:24:07 --> 01:24:10 Everybody's trying to pull in every direction. And in Boston,
01:24:11 --> 01:24:18 I don't know if you know, only 13% of all eligible voters voted for the mayor, 66 people.
01:24:18 --> 01:24:23 That's 13% of half a million people that make decisions, basically,
01:24:23 --> 01:24:29 for the people. And I would say that we have to look at the data and see who those people are.
01:24:30 --> 01:24:35 Are those people people that work for the mayor, people that have contracts
01:24:35 --> 01:24:39 with the mayor, people that are endorsing because my family or my husband or
01:24:39 --> 01:24:44 my cousin got land from the mayor, people that have all of these grants from the mayor.
01:24:45 --> 01:24:50 So it's this ongoing, like, depraved, depraved cycle.
01:24:52 --> 01:24:56 Those who play by the book and play the game right will get the contract,
01:24:56 --> 01:25:01 will get the job, will keep their jobs, and government will continue,
01:25:01 --> 01:25:05 as per usual, to do business like they usually do.
01:25:05 --> 01:25:12 If you play by the book, you get bread. And unfortunately, that's Roxbury,
01:25:12 --> 01:25:18 particularly because it has the most land, is that a very precarious situation.
01:25:18 --> 01:25:22 So I'll be looking forward to, hopefully,
01:25:22 --> 01:25:27 I don't know, hopefully, again, I don't know what my position is,
01:25:27 --> 01:25:35 or if, again, if folks will allow me the space, and they want me to help, then sure.
01:25:35 --> 01:25:37 But I don't know what that looks like yet.
01:25:37 --> 01:25:40 And I pray for everyone in District 7.
01:25:40 --> 01:25:45 And I say everyone because Black, White, Asian, Haitian, immigrant,
01:25:46 --> 01:25:48 whatever, wherever you're from, Africa,
01:25:49 --> 01:25:55 Somali, the populations in District 7, every single bit of the population were
01:25:55 --> 01:25:59 kind to me, were supportive. They love this district.
01:26:00 --> 01:26:06 It's a great place to live. But again, everybody's after it.
01:26:06 --> 01:26:10 And so right now, people are feeling like they're defeated.
01:26:11 --> 01:26:14 Like the mayor is going to give up this land to the gullupers.
01:26:14 --> 01:26:20 It's going to be a whole bunch of bricks and quality of life will go down,
01:26:20 --> 01:26:25 as you saw with controversy with White Stadium, the Shattuck coming in.
01:26:26 --> 01:26:31 And all of these services, everything is halfway homes and services and nonprofits
01:26:31 --> 01:26:38 and big brick buildings with housing that doesn't actually address the housing need of District 7.
01:26:39 --> 01:26:45 Yeah. Yeah. Regentrification is something else. In Atlanta, we got this thing called the Beltline.
01:26:46 --> 01:26:50 And for years, they've been trying to figure out a plan.
01:26:50 --> 01:26:54 And it's never worked because whenever they build some new Black folks that
01:26:54 --> 01:26:56 had some money moved in there.
01:26:56 --> 01:27:00 Right. But now they came up with this Beltline thing, and that's been their
01:27:00 --> 01:27:03 most successful re-gentrification project.
01:27:03 --> 01:27:09 And the biggest concern is that the people that have been there for a long time
01:27:09 --> 01:27:11 that don't want to move or can't move,
01:27:11 --> 01:27:17 they're going to get higher taxes because their property is going to be assessed
01:27:17 --> 01:27:20 higher, and that's going to cause a problem for them.
01:27:20 --> 01:27:25 So, you know, there's some leadership because Atlanta's majority black,
01:27:25 --> 01:27:30 as far as the political leadership, they're trying to navigate that.
01:27:30 --> 01:27:35 But, you know, black, you have black leadership politically,
01:27:35 --> 01:27:38 but the economic leadership is white.
01:27:38 --> 01:27:44 And so that's always going to be an issue here until that dynamic changes,
01:27:44 --> 01:27:50 which I might not, you know, I know you said black don't crack. I'm 60.
01:27:51 --> 01:27:55 So I don't know if I'm going to make it to see when that change is going to
01:27:55 --> 01:27:58 come. But I think you're proving that case.
01:27:58 --> 01:28:00 You're good. Well, thank you.
01:28:01 --> 01:28:07 So at the end of the show, I usually ask people if people want to reach out to you and all that.
01:28:07 --> 01:28:10 I don't know if you're in a position to be receptive to that.
01:28:10 --> 01:28:14 But if you do want people to reach out to you or more importantly,
01:28:14 --> 01:28:23 if there's some organizations or causes that you want people to support or get behind,
01:28:23 --> 01:28:27 this is the time to, you know, tell people how they can do that.
01:28:29 --> 01:28:32 I think people can, you know, move to their own cause.
01:28:32 --> 01:28:39 I'm nobody to advise on that, but I will just remain just, you know,
01:28:39 --> 01:28:46 a little speck on a leaf somewhere in a forest in the universe.
01:28:47 --> 01:28:53 I don't think people need to reach out to me. And I'm sorry if you have kind
01:28:53 --> 01:28:57 words or support, or even, I don't care.
01:28:57 --> 01:29:01 I get people from Mississippi calling me, like some grand master somebody,
01:29:01 --> 01:29:05 I don't know, from the KKK, that kept calling me.
01:29:05 --> 01:29:09 And I would actually have conversations with them because, I don't know,
01:29:09 --> 01:29:11 because everybody deserves a conversation, I guess.
01:29:12 --> 01:29:16 And so it doesn't matter if you call and you're calling me the N-word or whatever.
01:29:16 --> 01:29:21 I just, either way, I just don't want to be contacted because I think,
01:29:21 --> 01:29:27 again, I'm just a regular person. and I would like to get back to normal life
01:29:27 --> 01:29:28 and just focus on my family.
01:29:29 --> 01:29:36 Yeah, well, that's fair. All right. Well, Tania Anderson, I thank you again for coming on.
01:29:37 --> 01:29:42 And I have been a fan from afar.
01:29:43 --> 01:29:50 And usually when I get people on that I like, I kind of sound like a fanboy
01:29:50 --> 01:29:55 for the most part where I'm trying to be objective and ask these popular questions,
01:29:56 --> 01:29:58 proper questions, I should say.
01:29:58 --> 01:30:04 But I think that you're going to be beyond okay.
01:30:05 --> 01:30:09 And I think that you're going to continue to do incredible things.
01:30:11 --> 01:30:19 And I'm saying that because there's a rule I have in that once you've been on
01:30:19 --> 01:30:22 the show, you have an open invitation to come back.
01:30:24 --> 01:30:29 So you don't have to wait on me to say, hey, Tania, I need you to come on or whatever.
01:30:29 --> 01:30:32 It's like you say, Erik, look, I need to talk about this.
01:30:33 --> 01:30:38 Just reach out to me and we'll make that happen. So again, just thank you for your time.
01:30:39 --> 01:30:45 And as my Arabic is not that great, so I'll just say peace be unto you.
01:30:46 --> 01:30:49 Well, my Arabic is not that great either. So, peace be on to you, brother.
01:30:52 --> 01:30:56 That's what I like to say. I speak English.
01:30:57 --> 01:31:01 Yes, ma'am. And we don't have to do it in Arabic. Thank you so much.
01:31:01 --> 01:31:03 And God willing, I thank you so much.
01:31:04 --> 01:31:06 All right. All right, guys. We're going to catch y'all on the other side.
01:31:26 --> 01:31:31 All right. And we are back. And so now it is time for my next guest, Hannah Bonecutter.
01:31:31 --> 01:31:35 Hannah Bonecutter is an accomplished young woman with high aspirations,
01:31:36 --> 01:31:39 immense dedication and allegiance to justice.
01:31:39 --> 01:31:43 Hannah is a public health professional, earning her master's of public health
01:31:43 --> 01:31:48 in the Division of Health Policy and Administration with a global health concentration
01:31:48 --> 01:31:51 and a health disparities research certificate.
01:31:52 --> 01:31:56 Hannah is a Class of 2022 U.S. Presidential Management Fellowship alumna.
01:31:56 --> 01:31:59 She completed her PMF at the U.S.
01:31:59 --> 01:32:04 Department of Veterans Affairs Office of Enterprise Integration as a management
01:32:04 --> 01:32:07 and program analyst located in Washington, D.C.
01:32:07 --> 01:32:12 As part of her PMF, she also worked for the Centers for Disease Control and
01:32:12 --> 01:32:15 Prevention, Global Health Center,
01:32:15 --> 01:32:21 Eastern Europe and Central Asia Regional Office in Tbilisi, Georgia,
01:32:21 --> 01:32:26 and other surrounding areas as a policy and communications analyst.
01:32:27 --> 01:32:33 Hannah has taught as a licensed educator here in the United States and abroad,
01:32:33 --> 01:32:37 while also playing the role of entrepreneur with her own professional organizing
01:32:37 --> 01:32:39 business called Bone Clutter.
01:32:39 --> 01:32:41 We organize to the bone.
01:32:42 --> 01:32:48 In the arts realm, Hannah is an award-winning filmmaker, spoken word poet, actress, and model.
01:32:48 --> 01:32:53 She remains a devoted, enthusiastic social activist serving on boards of multiple
01:32:53 --> 01:32:55 nonprofit organizations.
01:32:55 --> 01:33:00 Hannah operates as a public speaker as well, whether it be within an educational
01:33:00 --> 01:33:06 setting on an academic related topic or in an artistic space sharing about her personal journey.
01:33:07 --> 01:33:12 Hannah states that her mission in life is to be a light of exposure and inspiration.
01:33:13 --> 01:33:17 Through many diverse pathways, Hannah strives to greatly improve this world
01:33:17 --> 01:33:20 to become a much better place.
01:33:20 --> 01:33:25 Ladies and gentlemen, it is my distinct honor and privilege to have as a guest
01:33:25 --> 01:33:29 on this podcast, Hannah Bone Cutter.
01:33:41 --> 01:33:43 Hannah Bonecutter. How are you doing, sister? You doing good?
01:33:44 --> 01:33:46 I am. I'm blessed indeed.
01:33:47 --> 01:33:52 Doing well. Can't complain. Just living life and grateful.
01:33:52 --> 01:33:58 I definitely understand that. And, you know, it's really an honor to have you come on.
01:33:58 --> 01:34:03 And we're going to get into why it's an honor. Some people might be like,
01:34:03 --> 01:34:05 Hannah Bonecutter, do I know that name?
01:34:05 --> 01:34:08 But when we get through with this interview, Y'all gonna know this sister.
01:34:09 --> 01:34:14 She's very unique. So what I want to do is I do like I normally do.
01:34:14 --> 01:34:16 I start off with a couple of icebreakers.
01:34:16 --> 01:34:20 So the first icebreaker is a quote.
01:34:21 --> 01:34:26 All right. So I want you to respond to this quote. Even the smallest victory
01:34:26 --> 01:34:32 is never to be taken for granted. Each victory must be applauded because it
01:34:32 --> 01:34:34 is so easy not to battle at all.
01:34:34 --> 01:34:38 Just accept and call that acceptance inevitable.
01:34:39 --> 01:34:40 What does that quote mean to you?
01:34:42 --> 01:34:53 That quote to me embodies the essence of continuing each day and more so like
01:34:53 --> 01:34:57 in our daily experience.
01:34:57 --> 01:35:04 And when I say continuing, I mean just proceeding with as well as we're able
01:35:04 --> 01:35:07 to, putting the next foot in front of the other.
01:35:07 --> 01:35:14 It actually reminds me, and not just, excuse me, but not just,
01:35:14 --> 01:35:18 or I should say simultaneously while putting that foot in front of the other,
01:35:19 --> 01:35:22 giving yourself a quick pat on the back for doing it.
01:35:23 --> 01:35:33 Because in our very speed-driven and quote-unquote busy society that we live in.
01:35:35 --> 01:35:39 That those moments of kind of in that quote, again,
01:35:39 --> 01:35:45 celebrating that next step taken, whatever small leap,
01:35:45 --> 01:35:51 hop, skip of progress, even if that's just, hey, I took care of my hair today
01:35:51 --> 01:35:56 And I haven't done that in five months because that is the reality for so many people.
01:35:57 --> 01:36:03 That deserves a moment of celebration and recognition.
01:36:04 --> 01:36:10 And that does a lot for our mental health and spiritual health and overall just kind of demeanor.
01:36:10 --> 01:36:16 And that can really put a positive trajectory on the rest of one's day.
01:36:17 --> 01:36:21 I also want to say, so it's encouraging. And I think it's, again,
01:36:22 --> 01:36:24 something, that's a great quote that.
01:36:26 --> 01:36:32 A piece to think about each day because we should be practicing that.
01:36:32 --> 01:36:36 It also reminds me of this quote, and I want to say it's about a woman with
01:36:36 --> 01:36:37 her first name, Margaret.
01:36:38 --> 01:36:40 I forget the last name, but it's one of those famous ones.
01:36:41 --> 01:36:49 Remember, oftentimes change started with just a few people coming together and
01:36:49 --> 01:36:51 doing something that wasn't already done.
01:36:51 --> 01:36:54 It's to the likes of that. I'm not saying exactly, but I'm sure you know what I'm talking about.
01:36:55 --> 01:36:59 And where were those people, always historically, it seemed like they're like,
01:36:59 --> 01:37:00 we're not really doing nothing.
01:37:00 --> 01:37:05 We're just doing what we can, putting one step in front of the other the best we can.
01:37:05 --> 01:37:11 And then years, centuries, decades later, lo and behold, that was the precipice
01:37:11 --> 01:37:15 for huge progress and change society-wide.
01:37:16 --> 01:37:21 And when you can think about that as well, it's very encouraging in a deep level.
01:37:21 --> 01:37:22 So that's what that means for me.
01:37:23 --> 01:37:27 Yeah. All right. So now the next icebreaker is what I call 20 questions.
01:37:27 --> 01:37:32 So I need you to give me a number between one and 20. Three.
01:37:33 --> 01:37:38 How should we balance rights, freedoms, and responsibilities?
01:37:45 --> 01:37:50 So, and when you say we, just want to clarify, do you mean us as a human race,
01:37:50 --> 01:37:56 as a human species or do you mean just the nation of America or are you certain a specific week?
01:37:57 --> 01:38:06 Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Understood. You said freedom, rights, and what was the other one? Responsibility.
01:38:07 --> 01:38:15 So I think that not to not answer the question with a contemplation,
01:38:15 --> 01:38:23 but to be very honest about it, the answer very much depends on how we define those,
01:38:23 --> 01:38:26 particularly freedom.
01:38:27 --> 01:38:33 That is a very, I mean, so much in the world is subjective and can be subjective
01:38:33 --> 01:38:38 rather, but especially in times such as these,
01:38:38 --> 01:38:51 freedom as well as rights seems to have multiple definitions and multiple and different boundaries,
01:38:51 --> 01:38:56 depending on who is interpreting and or enforcing the term.
01:38:56 --> 01:39:03 So in that sense, I think very first, maybe ground zero,
01:39:04 --> 01:39:12 is for us to be unanimous in our understanding and agreement on what those are.
01:39:13 --> 01:39:18 For example, to give a concrete example, several
01:39:18 --> 01:39:21 black people have lost their lives in their
01:39:21 --> 01:39:24 own homes from police coming in
01:39:24 --> 01:39:27 to the police they had
01:39:27 --> 01:39:35 a right reason a proper enough legitimate enough reason to enter the home as
01:39:35 --> 01:39:40 well as do whatever action that they took that took the life of that person
01:39:40 --> 01:39:45 many of these people that have lost their lives and their family members,
01:39:45 --> 01:39:46 their community members,
01:39:46 --> 01:39:49 did not believe that these police officers had that right.
01:39:51 --> 01:39:59 There are misalignments of understanding of what the rights are of these different
01:39:59 --> 01:40:00 parties, these different civilians.
01:40:01 --> 01:40:06 And if we're not on the same page there, we're not going to get on the same
01:40:06 --> 01:40:07 page with anything further.
01:40:08 --> 01:40:11 Responsibilities around those, freedoms around those, et cetera.
01:40:11 --> 01:40:17 So I think it starts there. That's my best thought on that.
01:40:17 --> 01:40:20 I hope that makes sense, Erik. No, that's fine.
01:40:21 --> 01:40:28 So to the listeners, just those few, those two questions, I started Icebreaker off.
01:40:28 --> 01:40:32 You kind of see why I was attracted to bring Ms.
01:40:32 --> 01:40:37 Bonecutter on, because she's, she's what we call a deep thinker.
01:40:37 --> 01:40:44 And she's also a, a, the, the, the technical term is polymuth,
01:40:44 --> 01:40:48 or in the vernacular, renaissance woman.
01:40:49 --> 01:40:54 So, Hannah, when did you realize that you were this polymuth,
01:40:54 --> 01:41:00 that you were this renaissance woman that could just be well-versed and skilled
01:41:00 --> 01:41:03 in all these different venues that you've gotten into?
01:41:04 --> 01:41:08 Yes. Well, thank you, Erik, for your kind words.
01:41:08 --> 01:41:18 I think, you know, I started hearing that term when some people, namely a lot of my like.
01:41:21 --> 01:41:28 Parents, peers, and maybe some family members around their age as after college,
01:41:28 --> 01:41:34 like about three or four years after I got my bachelor's, people, and after that,
01:41:34 --> 01:41:39 like right when I got my bachelor's, came back to Chicago and really started
01:41:39 --> 01:41:45 getting into the arts and acting on a film scene and doing spoken word poetry,
01:41:45 --> 01:41:49 which was quite different from what I got my degree in,
01:41:49 --> 01:41:52 in some ways, which is elementary education.
01:41:52 --> 01:41:57 And so I was still teaching full-time, but doing that. And then I started Bone Clutter.
01:41:59 --> 01:42:03 We organized to the bone, professional organizing business. And so as people
01:42:03 --> 01:42:05 would kind of check in and say, What you doing?
01:42:05 --> 01:42:09 Wait a minute. What you doing this to? Well, you just a renaissance woman,
01:42:09 --> 01:42:13 aren't you? And that's when that term really...
01:42:14 --> 01:42:17 Marinated in my mind. I kind of did some research. I thought,
01:42:17 --> 01:42:22 oh, okay, well, yeah, I guess I am, by golly.
01:42:23 --> 01:42:27 And I definitely have embraced that. But it was natural.
01:42:27 --> 01:42:31 It was never a thing where I knew always what it was and wanted to be that.
01:42:31 --> 01:42:32 No, it was just very natural.
01:42:33 --> 01:42:37 So that was when I first learned that indeed I was a Renaissance woman.
01:42:38 --> 01:42:41 So I was telling my college roommate about
01:42:41 --> 01:42:44 you and he was looking up your bio and
01:42:44 --> 01:42:47 he said oh so she's like a modern day benjamin franklin
01:42:47 --> 01:42:50 and i said yeah that's it benjamin franklin
01:42:50 --> 01:42:53 paul robeson yeah just because you it was
01:42:53 --> 01:42:56 like because you were an athlete right you you were on the swim team in
01:42:56 --> 01:43:00 in high school i think or something i was so see paul Robeson
01:43:00 --> 01:43:03 he was an athlete and and this actor and this
01:43:03 --> 01:43:06 this activist and all this kind of stuff and so
01:43:06 --> 01:43:09 yeah it's like you yeah you fall right into
01:43:09 --> 01:43:12 that category and that's that's very very awesome
01:43:12 --> 01:43:16 because it's like politics is my thing you know
01:43:16 --> 01:43:19 i i dabbled in sports but and i
01:43:19 --> 01:43:22 love athletic competition but you
01:43:22 --> 01:43:27 know i you know i couldn't jump out and say okay i'm gonna do because you know
01:43:27 --> 01:43:32 the public health thing that's what my mom did she was a health okay board of
01:43:32 --> 01:43:36 health in chicago and she was a teacher before that and My dad was the math
01:43:36 --> 01:43:41 whiz in the family and all that stuff, but I couldn't do all that.
01:43:41 --> 01:43:46 I was just straight trained. So when I see people and I interact with people
01:43:46 --> 01:43:53 that can do multiple things and multiple things at a skilled level, it's fascinating to me.
01:43:53 --> 01:43:57 And I definitely wanted to pick your brain on a couple of things.
01:43:57 --> 01:44:02 Why does cultural representation in the media mean, what does it mean to you?
01:44:02 --> 01:44:06 And how can Black women in leadership shape that narrative?
01:44:08 --> 01:44:09 Uh-uh-uh.
01:44:12 --> 01:44:24 That's such an important question for right now in the world because so much
01:44:24 --> 01:44:31 of what we believe is the past,
01:44:31 --> 01:44:38 present, and could be future is shaped by what we consume mainly through media.
01:44:39 --> 01:44:50 And historically, the realm of media has just gotten bigger and bigger and bigger. Humongous, right?
01:44:50 --> 01:44:52 There was a time before there was anything digital.
01:44:52 --> 01:44:58 Now it's digital. And we walk around with these computers in our hands that
01:44:58 --> 01:44:59 have multiple media outlets.
01:44:59 --> 01:45:06 I mean, it's is endless. And so the role of media in shaping our culture.
01:45:07 --> 01:45:11 And was there something else to that, Eric? I want to make sure I'm touching on all pieces.
01:45:12 --> 01:45:14 There it is. How can Black women in leadership shape the narrative?
01:45:15 --> 01:45:20 So I think it's at minimum two folds and then there's creases within them.
01:45:20 --> 01:45:24 We can't get into all the creases right now. And this is like my strategic planning
01:45:24 --> 01:45:31 hat coming on, which I've done in, to your point, political or let's say government spaces.
01:45:31 --> 01:45:35 I worked on strategic planning with federal government, Department of Veterans Affairs.
01:45:36 --> 01:45:47 And I'll say that kind of, and I think many historical figures that have changed,
01:45:47 --> 01:45:51 made significant impact in the.
01:45:52 --> 01:46:00 Areas, particularly injustices within society, have done it from an inside and outside place.
01:46:01 --> 01:46:05 So, and maybe that's sometimes that is thought of as inside and kind of the
01:46:05 --> 01:46:09 rooms with the already powerful people, as well as maybe on the outside grassroots
01:46:09 --> 01:46:11 on the streets type thing.
01:46:11 --> 01:46:16 And both are very well needed. And then there's realms, kind of those creases within them.
01:46:16 --> 01:46:21 So from women in leadership positions.
01:46:21 --> 01:46:27 There are women in leadership positions that are within or very close to those
01:46:27 --> 01:46:34 rooms that have a lot of powerful players that shape media.
01:46:34 --> 01:46:37 And I think their role and
01:46:37 --> 01:46:48 responsibility is to bring evidence-based research and materials to these rooms
01:46:48 --> 01:46:57 in these spaces to these powerful people and show the deleterious effects that some of these.
01:46:58 --> 01:47:05 Stereotypical in ways, images and messaging is going out in the media about
01:47:05 --> 01:47:07 particular population groups,
01:47:07 --> 01:47:10 especially Black people, Black
01:47:10 --> 01:47:17 women, but also, also, because unfortunately, And this is the key part.
01:47:18 --> 01:47:20 Unfortunately, a lot of those people in those powerful rooms,
01:47:21 --> 01:47:24 probably one, don't care.
01:47:24 --> 01:47:27 And or two, one, think deleterious effects.
01:47:27 --> 01:47:35 Let's keep it above. So then also coming with it of saying how if we don't change
01:47:35 --> 01:47:39 it, it's going to harm one of their goals.
01:47:41 --> 01:47:47 Their goals may be profit, we can talk about how continuing a thing that's having
01:47:47 --> 01:47:52 a negative effect on a certain population group can actually harm the people
01:47:52 --> 01:47:54 that are condoning it and putting it out,
01:47:54 --> 01:47:57 stereotypical imaging, whatever, their pockets.
01:47:57 --> 01:47:59 Because unfortunately, that's a lot of times what they may care about most.
01:48:00 --> 01:48:08 That can be spun. I don't think Black women in leadership, nor nearly any leadership group,
01:48:09 --> 01:48:15 has been able to spin it the way it needs to be because of what we're continuing to see.
01:48:16 --> 01:48:20 But it can be. I have to have hope that it can be.
01:48:20 --> 01:48:24 But then also, in the meantime, and this is the second fold,
01:48:24 --> 01:48:29 or as I say, not but, and also, while they may be saying, well,
01:48:29 --> 01:48:31 you know, that's all good and great, but we're going to still keep doing it.
01:48:31 --> 01:48:36 We got the power, understand those evidence. Great, but we appreciate your time
01:48:36 --> 01:48:40 But you can leave On the outskirts, you got grassroots saying Look,
01:48:40 --> 01:48:44 we're not going to take it no more Right, and these top.
01:48:45 --> 01:48:50 Again, black women in leadership In the communities Are on the ground,
01:48:51 --> 01:48:55 Organizing and getting people And doing these things like Black Lives Matter
01:48:55 --> 01:48:59 movement, all these things To say, yo, this is it And if you ain't,
01:48:59 --> 01:49:03 go ahead, fine If you don't want to stop in your top But, you know,
01:49:04 --> 01:49:08 I will tell Oval Towers when we presented it to you for you to stop there,
01:49:09 --> 01:49:12 then you're going to just have to stop now because we're not going to consume it anymore.
01:49:12 --> 01:49:14 You're just not going to make a profit that way.
01:49:14 --> 01:49:18 You're not going to get your goals accomplished that way. So I think there's twofold.
01:49:18 --> 01:49:21 And, of course, like I said, there's creases within those that support it.
01:49:21 --> 01:49:26 But that's those are the ways I see it. And it's tough.
01:49:27 --> 01:49:29 All of it's tough, but must be done.
01:49:30 --> 01:49:37 So, OK. You once said that as a black woman, the greatest challenge I faced
01:49:37 --> 01:49:42 to fully embracing my black womanhood was others not accepting my intelligence.
01:49:43 --> 01:49:44 Do you still feel that way?
01:49:50 --> 01:50:01 Absolutely. I don't think, unfortunately, that's going to ever be something that goes away.
01:50:01 --> 01:50:07 I think it can ebb and flow or the level of it be increased or decreased depending
01:50:07 --> 01:50:10 on where you are, whom you're around, whom you may work with.
01:50:11 --> 01:50:16 For me, that's most felt in professional settings.
01:50:17 --> 01:50:23 I will say that I think for me in very recent past, it has decreased.
01:50:25 --> 01:50:31 However, there are certain things that confirm that that's still the case,
01:50:31 --> 01:50:41 such as, you know, it's intelligence as well as respect.
01:50:41 --> 01:50:47 But then sometimes I feel that it's one proceeds of the first where it's like,
01:50:47 --> 01:50:52 well, I don't respect her, but she's also not going to be smart enough to know
01:50:52 --> 01:50:57 that I'm doing this microaggression or I'm doing this rude thing against her.
01:51:00 --> 01:51:09 And boo-boo the fool is silly if you do that, especially if you leave a breadcrumb trail, let's say.
01:51:09 --> 01:51:16 So, and I'd actually, you know, now this is the public health research part of me, Eric.
01:51:16 --> 01:51:21 I would love to take a survey. And you know politics. Now, you know government.
01:51:21 --> 01:51:28 And I'm sure you know email etiquette. I learned the hard way in undergrad that
01:51:28 --> 01:51:32 typing all caps is synonymous to screaming at somebody.
01:51:33 --> 01:51:35 And you don't do that in a professional setting.
01:51:37 --> 01:51:43 Multiple people do that in my workplace, in recent past.
01:51:44 --> 01:51:48 They're not of color, right? They're not Black.
01:51:48 --> 01:51:55 And I can't help but think, again, I mean, one, you don't respect me,
01:51:55 --> 01:51:59 but I never maybe expected you to maybe. So, you know, you know.
01:51:59 --> 01:52:06 But then, too, my goodness, you probably also, again think I'm so dumb as to
01:52:06 --> 01:52:10 not know what that really means and maybe not and to think that,
01:52:11 --> 01:52:18 I'm not gonna keep tabs on it right so yeah definitely definitely still happens
01:52:18 --> 01:52:24 but to that quote keep keep making progress keep putting one step in front of the other so,
01:52:25 --> 01:52:28 looks like you have some deep thoughts on that Eric no I
01:52:28 --> 01:52:32 you know I was just listening it might have froze can you hear me yeah i can
01:52:32 --> 01:52:40 hear you yeah you know i'm not i i i agree with that i think black men do not
01:52:40 --> 01:52:45 experience it as much as black women i think and because.
01:52:47 --> 01:52:53 Well misogyny plays a lot of role in that but i think that you know men are
01:52:53 --> 01:52:58 men are men and And we confront things like that.
01:52:59 --> 01:53:03 Like, you sent me an email with all caps. I'm like, you know,
01:53:03 --> 01:53:05 you need to say that to my face.
01:53:05 --> 01:53:11 I'm not feeling the microaggression at this point. And I know in a corporate
01:53:11 --> 01:53:12 setting, you can't really do that.
01:53:12 --> 01:53:14 You really ain't supposed to do that in a political setting,
01:53:14 --> 01:53:21 but you have a little more leeway in the halls of a Capitol building or a city
01:53:21 --> 01:53:22 hall or something like that.
01:53:22 --> 01:53:35 But, you know, the intelligence part, I think, you know, people mistake privilege for intelligence.
01:53:36 --> 01:53:41 And I think they have, because they have access to things that we don't have,
01:53:41 --> 01:53:44 they think that's a reflection on our intelligence.
01:53:44 --> 01:53:49 When it's like, no, we may not know all the rules to the game,
01:53:49 --> 01:53:53 but we do know the essence and the foundation of the game.
01:53:54 --> 01:54:00 So I think that's kind of where it hits with with black men as opposed to black women.
01:54:03 --> 01:54:08 So let's try to pick your brain some more, more on some issues.
01:54:09 --> 01:54:12 And there's really one question I really want to ask you to kind of close it out.
01:54:12 --> 01:54:18 So putting on your public health hat, do you feel that the current administration
01:54:18 --> 01:54:24 will be a hindrance to future African-American health disparity interventions?
01:54:25 --> 01:54:32 Absolutely. I think it already is. Matter of fact, I know it already is.
01:54:34 --> 01:54:40 Based on anecdotal evidence I have. There's, I'm sure, some studies,
01:54:40 --> 01:54:48 as much as they can be done, gathering more evidence, but yes, absolutely.
01:54:50 --> 01:54:57 To expand a little bit on how I said I know, again, I was recently working in
01:54:57 --> 01:55:03 federal government for a couple years and through the Presidential Management
01:55:03 --> 01:55:04 Fellowship Program, actually.
01:55:05 --> 01:55:09 Do you want to touch on that? That is something that has now since been removed
01:55:09 --> 01:55:11 or attempted to be removed through an executive order.
01:55:11 --> 01:55:16 As we know, many of those are being fought in court and whatnot, etc.
01:55:16 --> 01:55:21 We shall see the outcome in the future, the full final outcome.
01:55:21 --> 01:55:34 But so many people in federal government work, which is a large employer for Black people,
01:55:34 --> 01:55:36 have been laid off,
01:55:37 --> 01:55:39 fired, however you want to put it.
01:55:40 --> 01:55:46 Right then and there. Employment is one of the social determinants of health.
01:55:46 --> 01:55:54 Without that, everything else with the health gets shaky and usually deleterious effects to it.
01:55:54 --> 01:55:59 Now that's on an individual level. And I do know some Black people that have been let go, right?
01:56:00 --> 01:56:07 Also, I know that there are employee affinity groups or employee resource groups
01:56:07 --> 01:56:12 for particular population groups such as Black federal government employees,
01:56:12 --> 01:56:19 which what these do, as we know, create safe spaces for these groups,
01:56:19 --> 01:56:24 have been essentially obliterated with the removal of DEIA.
01:56:25 --> 01:56:31 So now they can't even convene safely within their business,
01:56:31 --> 01:56:32 their workspaces or whatnot.
01:56:32 --> 01:56:36 This can instill
01:56:36 --> 01:56:39 let's say broadly
01:56:39 --> 01:56:44 a disruption to one's homeostasis within their within their their bodies and
01:56:44 --> 01:56:50 their souls and to get a little bit more specific probably increase anxiety
01:56:50 --> 01:56:55 in people which is not good for your health and probably increase stress and
01:56:55 --> 01:56:59 then and right and And that is for big groups of people.
01:56:59 --> 01:57:03 And let's then take it on an even broader scale.
01:57:05 --> 01:57:12 Going on is an attempt to incite chaos and mass fear.
01:57:13 --> 01:57:22 And depending on where someone is, they can very easily and fully be engulfed by that.
01:57:22 --> 01:57:30 And that is a very not safe and pro-health place to be.
01:57:31 --> 01:57:36 And so just that alone, like, and I don't know, Eric, if you were aware,
01:57:37 --> 01:57:41 but it has been proven in past studies that, like, I can't help but think of
01:57:41 --> 01:57:44 this when I think about what you just said in the current administration and
01:57:44 --> 01:57:45 with health disparities, right?
01:57:45 --> 01:57:49 There's already a huge health disparity in allostatic load between Black people
01:57:49 --> 01:57:51 in America and other populations. What is that?
01:57:52 --> 01:57:56 Allostatic load is how they kind of measure the key stress hormones in our bodies,
01:57:57 --> 01:57:58 one of which being cortisol.
01:57:58 --> 01:58:03 And they've tested Black people on longevity studies and whatnot.
01:58:03 --> 01:58:08 They've sorted by age, stratified by age groups, gender, and et cetera.
01:58:08 --> 01:58:14 And across the board, Black people have always a higher one than white counterparts
01:58:14 --> 01:58:19 and most of the other population groups when sorted by ethnicity and race.
01:58:19 --> 01:58:23 What's going on right now is, I'm sure,
01:58:23 --> 01:58:26 aim to continue to increase that disparity and for
01:58:26 --> 01:58:29 many already has whether it's on
01:58:29 --> 01:58:32 the individual level more bigger group or
01:58:32 --> 01:58:39 all over across the board and yeah and we and we we shall see what happens now
01:58:39 --> 01:58:46 you know what eric and i have to say this right now because i i love i'm here
01:58:46 --> 01:58:51 to to love people to spread love and positivity that's i believe we all are spread light.
01:58:52 --> 01:58:57 I encourage people to be very To be vigilant, but but,
01:58:58 --> 01:59:01 Boundary safe boundary vigilant in terms of as we kind of talked about media
01:59:01 --> 01:59:02 things can be coming at us all
01:59:02 --> 01:59:07 the time and to Consume all of it that is asking for I think mind chaos.
01:59:07 --> 01:59:12 We we should not be doing that with that said Keep aware of some of the key
01:59:12 --> 01:59:15 highlights especially the health things right because if you don't have your
01:59:15 --> 01:59:18 health You don't have anything You don't have a life,
01:59:19 --> 01:59:23 And what I see and what I've seen actually prior to,
01:59:23 --> 01:59:30 as I kind of read some of these summaries of Project 2025, before the new administration
01:59:30 --> 01:59:37 was in place, it is opening in several top public health experts have said this,
01:59:38 --> 01:59:41 that are much more versed in it than me and studied in it.
01:59:41 --> 01:59:48 But it is setting a storm for, if you will, maybe the perfect storm for further
01:59:48 --> 01:59:52 pandemics and epidemics to occur.
01:59:53 --> 01:59:58 Already being seen in some places across America, definitely across the globe.
01:59:58 --> 02:00:03 There's a newsletter called Global Health Now. Encourage people to read it for free.
02:00:04 --> 02:00:12 And as we saw with the COVID pandemic in America, what groups died the most?
02:00:13 --> 02:00:19 Already most vulnerable and marginalized ones. And so if this is setting up
02:00:19 --> 02:00:25 for things like that to occur again, then the disparities are setting up to
02:00:25 --> 02:00:27 be greatly increased and whatnot.
02:00:27 --> 02:00:31 And so I say that because I want people to do their best to,
02:00:31 --> 02:00:37 again, be aware and take whatever steps necessary to protect yourself,
02:00:37 --> 02:00:40 protect your health, as you should already be doing in life.
02:00:40 --> 02:00:46 But being aware of what's going on around in these times right now to do so.
02:00:47 --> 02:00:54 All right. Where in your hat now, working with Veterans Affairs in the state
02:00:54 --> 02:01:00 of Illinois, what is the greatest challenge facing America's veterans right now?
02:01:02 --> 02:01:07 Well, greatest has to be defined.
02:01:08 --> 02:01:14 This could be by numerically in various ways. This could be by maybe surveys
02:01:14 --> 02:01:17 taken from veterans and what they feel most passionate about.
02:01:17 --> 02:01:21 This could be measured in a lot of different ways. So I need to state that.
02:01:21 --> 02:01:26 And I also need to say I'm speaking as Hannah Bonecutter, not in my position
02:01:26 --> 02:01:27 with the state government.
02:01:27 --> 02:01:31 But in my humble opinion,
02:01:31 --> 02:01:38 I'll say the issue for veterans that I'm most passionate about and that I know
02:01:38 --> 02:01:42 several people who work for our veterans,
02:01:43 --> 02:01:46 whether that's through community organizations that have a veteran center mission,
02:01:47 --> 02:01:51 however it is, is homelessness.
02:01:51 --> 02:01:54 Homelessness and the very
02:01:54 --> 02:01:57 first film I ever did of my
02:01:57 --> 02:02:00 own documentary called Live is the Majority you could watch
02:02:00 --> 02:02:03 it now I was for free on YouTube and it's around
02:02:03 --> 02:02:10 homelessness in Chicago and there's a moment where I am speaking with a homeless
02:02:10 --> 02:02:17 person in Chicago who's a veteran a black male veteran and I don't think I'll
02:02:17 --> 02:02:20 ever get over the fact that like it's such a conundrum how,
02:02:21 --> 02:02:28 these are the people that fight to protect a home for us, a safe home for us, for all of us,
02:02:29 --> 02:02:31 and yet they're not guaranteed a safe home for themselves.
02:02:34 --> 02:02:38 That is, to me, the definition of backwards.
02:02:39 --> 02:02:44 And so, for me, that's what I'm most passionate about with our veterans.
02:02:44 --> 02:02:49 And I'm working towards fixing that as much as I can.
02:02:51 --> 02:02:56 So the most striking image, one of my most striking, the striking image in my
02:02:56 --> 02:03:00 memory, being involved in public service, one of the things I had to do,
02:03:01 --> 02:03:05 well, I didn't have to do it, but I ended up doing a lot was going to D.C.
02:03:05 --> 02:03:09 Mm-hmm. And there's a park right
02:03:09 --> 02:03:14 across the street from the Department of Veterans Affairs in D.C. Yep.
02:03:15 --> 02:03:19 Mm-hmm. It is filled with homeless veterans.
02:03:20 --> 02:03:25 And I just, that was, that image will never get out of my mind.
02:03:25 --> 02:03:33 It was like, if any president made the mistake and put me in that position, I was like,
02:03:33 --> 02:03:38 I am going to do everything I can so that park will look like a park and all
02:03:38 --> 02:03:40 those individuals will have a home to stay in.
02:03:40 --> 02:03:46 It does not make sense to me. And in previous administrations in the history
02:03:46 --> 02:03:50 of this country, it didn't make sense to them either. That's why we had the GI Bill and all that.
02:03:51 --> 02:03:53 Now, it wasn't fair to black folks, but that's a whole nother show.
02:03:54 --> 02:03:59 But, you know, it's like if you are going to defend a homeland,
02:03:59 --> 02:04:02 you need a home when you get back to the homeland.
02:04:03 --> 02:04:05 Right. It just makes sense.
02:04:06 --> 02:04:09 And you know the the president
02:04:09 --> 02:04:12 that figures out how to get that done will
02:04:12 --> 02:04:15 probably be in the pantheon of like let's see
02:04:15 --> 02:04:20 if we can carve another face in Mount Rushmore right I mean that's how that's
02:04:20 --> 02:04:24 how that's how crazy that and it shouldn't be that crazy but that's where we
02:04:24 --> 02:04:28 are so I feel you on that I feel you on that and but don't let me get on my
02:04:28 --> 02:04:33 soapbox because I gotta try to finish this interview with you as a Chicagoan.
02:04:33 --> 02:04:39 Tell me how you feel about President Trump sending federal troops to the city.
02:04:41 --> 02:04:53 Yeah, you know, I feel that definitely a showboating type effort on the administration's part.
02:04:56 --> 02:05:05 And from what I've heard in my city, if this happens, it's not going to be taken
02:05:05 --> 02:05:09 sitting down, so to speak. And you know our city.
02:05:10 --> 02:05:14 And you know what happened with recent riots and all of that. And so...
02:05:16 --> 02:05:21 To my knowledge, that hasn't happened yet, but I know it's still being talked about.
02:05:22 --> 02:05:28 I am prayerful and hopeful it does not because it's I mean, none of it,
02:05:28 --> 02:05:32 in my opinion, is necessary at all. Like I said, showboating.
02:05:33 --> 02:05:36 But yeah, I'm glad it has not happened to date.
02:05:37 --> 02:05:42 So, you know, I think he's pushing the button because he thinks it will happen.
02:05:42 --> 02:05:50 And i think it's part of his grand scheme to put us into some kind of crazy martial law whatever,
02:05:50 --> 02:05:57 but i but again and i've said this on my show and i've said this to guests america
02:05:57 --> 02:06:04 is too big for a strong man and i said i was going to dedicate something to
02:06:04 --> 02:06:08 really justify that because I've had experts on this on the show,
02:06:08 --> 02:06:12 but, you know, Chicago is an example of why that's too big.
02:06:13 --> 02:06:17 It's like, first of all, you've got this activist mayor.
02:06:17 --> 02:06:22 And regardless of how people may feel about, is he the smoothest brother on
02:06:22 --> 02:06:25 the job or, you know, giving press conference, all that.
02:06:25 --> 02:06:27 He's an activist by training.
02:06:28 --> 02:06:33 Absolutely. If you circle a raggons around him, he's going to circle the wagons
02:06:33 --> 02:06:36 that's circling him. That's just his mindset.
02:06:36 --> 02:06:41 And the people are, he's, he's used to fighting government, even though that
02:06:41 --> 02:06:43 is part of the government, he's used to fighting it.
02:06:43 --> 02:06:48 So you're playing into it. And then his ally is one of the richest politicians
02:06:48 --> 02:06:50 in America. Right. Right.
02:06:51 --> 02:06:56 Who is based out of Chicago, who made his family fortune in that city.
02:06:56 --> 02:07:00 Right. You know, and still has vested interests through his family business.
02:07:00 --> 02:07:03 So he from a money side of
02:07:03 --> 02:07:07 the point he's got motivation but from a political side he
02:07:07 --> 02:07:11 might want to be president one day so he's looking like oh no you're not going
02:07:11 --> 02:07:16 to do this here and then the nature of the people of chicago it's just exactly
02:07:16 --> 02:07:23 that's it yeah we we not going to talk i mean it's like they pushing it with
02:07:23 --> 02:07:25 the boats going down the chicago river they really pushing,
02:07:25 --> 02:07:28 walking down the street. Chicago.
02:07:30 --> 02:07:36 So, just a real quick Chicago history lesson. When the gangsters were in Chicago
02:07:36 --> 02:07:39 and Al Capone was doing his thing, this is not for you, Hannah,
02:07:39 --> 02:07:39 this is for the listeners.
02:07:41 --> 02:07:46 You know, the gangsters wanted to control and they didn't like...
02:07:47 --> 02:07:50 Tribune writing bad stories about them
02:07:50 --> 02:07:54 so they decided they were going to try to hijack the
02:07:54 --> 02:07:58 tribune trucks as they were delivering newspapers and what
02:07:58 --> 02:08:01 they did not know that robert mccormick was a
02:08:01 --> 02:08:04 former officer in world war one and so
02:08:04 --> 02:08:08 when those guys went to try to hijack
02:08:08 --> 02:08:11 the trucks they were met with guys with
02:08:11 --> 02:08:14 guns and they were gunfights at newsstands in
02:08:14 --> 02:08:16 chicago that's the history of this
02:08:16 --> 02:08:20 city and these are just the white folks now we ain't gonna get to us exactly
02:08:20 --> 02:08:23 that's the white folks so i'm like in
02:08:23 --> 02:08:26 in the history of this city if there's any city where
02:08:26 --> 02:08:30 it's like yeah we probably don't need to try that experiment chicago
02:08:30 --> 02:08:33 would be that city but again let me let
02:08:33 --> 02:08:35 me move on let me let me let me
02:08:35 --> 02:08:38 let me close this out yeah and eric can
02:08:38 --> 02:08:41 i can i add one one quick thing in same light
02:08:41 --> 02:08:45 in that I want to say I'm so proud
02:08:45 --> 02:08:48 of my city for that fact where it's
02:08:48 --> 02:08:51 like nah we're not the one we're not
02:08:51 --> 02:08:59 the one at all but further we are the one when it comes to setting a much higher
02:08:59 --> 02:09:09 standard and much more pointed focus on equity and inclusion and access. We truly are.
02:09:09 --> 02:09:13 And that is seen in our healthcare, that has been seen in our education reform,
02:09:13 --> 02:09:15 that is seen in so many places.
02:09:15 --> 02:09:23 And it ain't perfect, far from it in some ways, but by golly, Chicago has done a lot.
02:09:24 --> 02:09:28 And so I'm thankful to be part of it. And I'm proud of us.
02:09:28 --> 02:09:31 And we are, I mean, other cities are looking to us in America,
02:09:31 --> 02:09:34 other places in the world, to Chicago for guidance on that stuff.
02:09:34 --> 02:09:39 So, and I think that also is why we're a target by this administration,
02:09:39 --> 02:09:42 but we're not the target they want to put a trigger on.
02:09:43 --> 02:09:47 So. Amen, sister. Amen. All right. So let's close this out with this question.
02:09:47 --> 02:09:52 The opening stanza of Travis Green's song, Intentional, states that all things
02:09:52 --> 02:09:56 are working for my good because he's intentional.
02:09:56 --> 02:10:01 So one, are all things still working for your good? And two,
02:10:02 --> 02:10:06 how would you advise people to find that place of intentionality?
02:10:09 --> 02:10:21 Absolutely. Always. Number two, this is, this response, the answer to this is rooted in my faith.
02:10:21 --> 02:10:26 And I will say sidebar, so interesting, Erik.
02:10:26 --> 02:10:32 I almost feel like, did you get my iTunes a little bit? Because that is my favorite,
02:10:32 --> 02:10:36 one of my favorite praise songs. And I'm listening to that.
02:10:36 --> 02:10:38 People can tell you, I listen to that on a daily.
02:10:39 --> 02:10:45 So, and I'm usually on repeat. Shout out to Travis. So to respond is rooted in my faith.
02:10:45 --> 02:10:48 I definitely identify as a Christian.
02:10:48 --> 02:10:52 And when I say that, going back to the etymology of that word,
02:10:52 --> 02:10:57 breaking it down to Christ with Christian and then in like,
02:10:57 --> 02:11:02 so Christ-like doing my best to live my life as Jesus Christ lived his,
02:11:02 --> 02:11:05 which for me to
02:11:05 --> 02:11:08 say very summatively high level
02:11:08 --> 02:11:13 is injustice love and peace and
02:11:13 --> 02:11:16 so to walk and
02:11:16 --> 02:11:24 move and do and be with intentionality I believe needs to be founded at least
02:11:24 --> 02:11:34 for me it is founded in my faith and understanding what my faith says about that and how to do it.
02:11:34 --> 02:11:42 And for me, there's levels of intentional,
02:11:42 --> 02:11:46 I guess, or you can be intentional in, let's say, many different ways and things,
02:11:46 --> 02:11:52 with work, with family, with friends, with however, so many ways you can live an intentional life.
02:11:52 --> 02:12:02 But if it's rooted in faith, I think that that intentionality can never be separate
02:12:02 --> 02:12:06 from love and peace and justice.
02:12:07 --> 02:12:13 And so when you're being intentional and kind of more of these specific areas,
02:12:13 --> 02:12:20 those themes should be perceived and felt by others.
02:12:21 --> 02:12:26 That's when you know the intentionality is right
02:12:26 --> 02:12:29 I would say at least for myself yeah
02:12:29 --> 02:12:33 all right well Hannah Bonecutter it's
02:12:33 --> 02:12:39 it's been an honor and a privilege to talk to you as I knew that and I knew
02:12:39 --> 02:12:44 that it would be if people want to get in touch with you and you know check
02:12:44 --> 02:12:50 out your short films check out your poetry keep track of what you're doing with the Veterans Affair,
02:12:50 --> 02:12:54 just all the stuff that Hannah Bonecutter is doing. How can they do that?
02:12:55 --> 02:12:57 Absolutely. So I would say...
02:12:59 --> 02:13:02 Well, maybe three. One, I know a lot of people on Instagram.
02:13:02 --> 02:13:06 My Instagram is at the underscore bonecutter.
02:13:06 --> 02:13:11 Bonecutter spelled my last name, just how it sounds, bone, and then cutter, all one word.
02:13:12 --> 02:13:15 And then I have a link tree which the link tree
02:13:15 --> 02:13:17 is how my
02:13:17 --> 02:13:21 link tree is kind of like a very aesthetic engaging portfolio
02:13:21 --> 02:13:26 of kind of all my engagements and what I'm about artistic things I've done and
02:13:26 --> 02:13:32 that's I may probably the most entertaining maybe or secondly to the IG but
02:13:32 --> 02:13:35 pretty direct and so if you just were to search Hannah Bonecutter link tree
02:13:35 --> 02:13:39 it would pop up and then also LinkedIn LinkedIn is a great place as well.
02:13:40 --> 02:13:43 So yeah, those, those would be the main places, but my link tree also has all
02:13:43 --> 02:13:46 other links to different social media platforms I'm on at the bottom.
02:13:47 --> 02:13:51 Yeah. And then also your business, cause we didn't even get to dabble,
02:13:51 --> 02:13:53 but you did mention it. So that's good.
02:13:55 --> 02:13:59 Well, I know you got to go, but I, again, thank you for doing this.
02:14:00 --> 02:14:04 And one of the rules I have is that once
02:14:04 --> 02:14:06 you've accepted an invitation and you've actually come on you
02:14:06 --> 02:14:09 have an open invitation to come back you don't have to
02:14:09 --> 02:14:12 wait on me to ask you if you say Fleming
02:14:12 --> 02:14:17 look or Erik I something I need to talk about just you know we'll make that
02:14:17 --> 02:14:22 happen so thank you again for doing this thank thank you so much Erik for letting
02:14:22 --> 02:14:26 me know that I will not forget that and it's this this has been such a wonderful
02:14:26 --> 02:14:29 conversation for real I feel like I'm in some ways talking to talking to a family
02:14:29 --> 02:14:32 member about about just just some important things.
02:14:32 --> 02:14:35 So I so appreciate you, Erik. And thank you so much for finding me,
02:14:35 --> 02:14:37 reaching out and setting this up.
02:14:38 --> 02:14:41 I've had a great, great time talking with you. So thank you.
02:14:41 --> 02:14:43 All right, guys. And we're going to catch y'all on the other side.
02:14:44 --> 02:14:46 Yes. Catch you on the other side.
02:14:58 --> 02:15:04 All right. And we are back. And so I want to thank Dr. Nancy Pearson.
02:15:05 --> 02:15:09 Yes, there's another Pearson. If you didn't hear that interview,
02:15:10 --> 02:15:11 another Pearson in the mix.
02:15:11 --> 02:15:16 But don't worry, lady, she's not a lawyer. So it's still going to be Melba and
02:15:16 --> 02:15:18 Dr. Tracy doing the legal stuff.
02:15:18 --> 02:15:22 But, you know, Dr. Nancy is probably going to come back on at some point.
02:15:22 --> 02:15:26 Hannah Bonecutter what,
02:15:27 --> 02:15:35 a an incredible person you can you can you can hear,
02:15:36 --> 02:15:40 that you know there are sometimes that there are regrets that this is only audio
02:15:40 --> 02:15:46 but just being able to talk to her and all that and I hope that you heard how
02:15:46 --> 02:15:54 thoughtful she is and how inspiring she is this is a young Black woman who is really,
02:15:55 --> 02:16:00 really committed through various venues to make this country better.
02:16:01 --> 02:16:07 And in the interview, there was a comparison with Benjamin Franklin and Paul Robeson.
02:16:07 --> 02:16:11 Those gentlemen did that.
02:16:11 --> 02:16:18 They were people who used their talents to try to make America a better place.
02:16:18 --> 02:16:21 And this sister definitely falls in that category.
02:16:22 --> 02:16:27 And the more that she continues to do that, I think the more people are going
02:16:27 --> 02:16:30 to recognize what she's offering.
02:16:31 --> 02:16:42 And in Tania Anderson, going into that interview, knowing what she's been going through, It was tough.
02:16:42 --> 02:16:51 But first of all, I was honored that she even responded to my request and that she signed up for it.
02:16:51 --> 02:16:59 And I hope that those of you who are listening who may be familiar with her
02:16:59 --> 02:17:10 situation got to hear a side of her to understand why she was on my radar for a long time.
02:17:10 --> 02:17:18 She has been, and I believe will continue to be, an advocate for the people in her area in Boston.
02:17:20 --> 02:17:27 And, you know, that no matter what trials and tribulations we go through,
02:17:27 --> 02:17:30 that we're going to be greater on the other side.
02:17:32 --> 02:17:37 And I really believe that because I'm a testament, testimony on that.
02:17:39 --> 02:17:43 You know, and some days I don't know if I'm climbing a mountain or if I'm sliding
02:17:43 --> 02:17:45 down the mountain, but I'm still on it.
02:17:46 --> 02:17:56 Right. And, you know, we all have our crosses to bear and, like I said,
02:17:56 --> 02:17:58 our Garden of Gethsemane moments.
02:17:59 --> 02:18:02 But, you know, we just keep pressing on.
02:18:03 --> 02:18:13 And I hope that when all is said and done, that all of us, not just me,
02:18:13 --> 02:18:15 not just Tania or anybody else,
02:18:16 --> 02:18:21 that when it's all said and done, that people realize that those of us who are
02:18:21 --> 02:18:23 out here in the fight are doing it for the right reasons.
02:18:23 --> 02:18:30 No matter how, whatever shortcomings we may encounter, just know that there
02:18:30 --> 02:18:34 are some people in our community that's fighting for us in spite of that.
02:18:35 --> 02:18:43 So again, thank those ladies for coming on. Now, I want to get to, it's been a lot of stuff.
02:18:43 --> 02:18:51 And I want to talk about this, you know, There's been some talk about Assata
02:18:51 --> 02:18:57 Shakur, and I'm not here to deify any human being, right?
02:18:59 --> 02:19:06 But I think, you know, in light of the way this show is going or has gone,
02:19:06 --> 02:19:10 I think I wanted to touch on this thing for a moment.
02:19:10 --> 02:19:17 If you do not understand the magnitude of what was going on in the 1960s and
02:19:17 --> 02:19:28 the 70s in America as far as black people fighting for freedom and liberation and peace of mind,
02:19:29 --> 02:19:35 right, if you don't really comprehend that, you might want to talk to people before you go public.
02:19:35 --> 02:19:39 If you're an elected official, you might want to let that one ride.
02:19:40 --> 02:19:45 You might not want to say things like, oh, well, she didn't,
02:19:45 --> 02:19:50 you know, get her moment of accountability and all that. What are we talking about?
02:19:51 --> 02:19:54 Governor, what are we talking about? I'm talking about a governor of New Jersey,
02:19:55 --> 02:19:57 by the way. What are we talking about?
02:19:58 --> 02:20:03 Obviously, you don't understand, right? And if you want to hang out with the
02:20:03 --> 02:20:06 narratives like, oh, you know, she killed a police officer and blah, blah.
02:20:06 --> 02:20:12 Well, first of all, testimony was given that she couldn't have been one of the
02:20:12 --> 02:20:13 shooters because she got shot with her hands up.
02:20:15 --> 02:20:19 And then if Kash Patel is saying, oh, well, she's bad, it's like,
02:20:19 --> 02:20:23 bruh, look in the mirror first before you start judging anybody.
02:20:23 --> 02:20:29 I swear to God, there's no way that there can be mirrors in the household of
02:20:29 --> 02:20:31 anybody that's affiliated with the Trump administration.
02:20:32 --> 02:20:37 There's no way. I think mirrors are barred. When you look at these shots of
02:20:37 --> 02:20:39 the White House, do you see any mirrors in the White House?
02:20:40 --> 02:20:44 They've done all this decorating and all this stuff and readjusting paintings
02:20:44 --> 02:20:47 and all that. But are there any mirrors in the building?
02:20:48 --> 02:20:52 I don't think they are because this whole deflection,
02:20:53 --> 02:21:01 you know, I could disagree on policy stuff, but character, nobody in this administration
02:21:01 --> 02:21:05 should say anything about anybody's character. Nobody.
02:21:06 --> 02:21:15 You are in because 48, 49% of the population voted for your guy to get the job.
02:21:16 --> 02:21:20 And because of the way that the electoral college is set up,
02:21:20 --> 02:21:22 he got more electoral college votes.
02:21:22 --> 02:21:26 That's it. It wasn't a landslide. It wasn't a mandate.
02:21:26 --> 02:21:31 It was a close race. And he ended up on top.
02:21:32 --> 02:21:37 Period. End of discussion. So all of you that have rolled in on this coattails
02:21:37 --> 02:21:41 that have been part of the administration, either as interim people or acting
02:21:41 --> 02:21:47 people or permanent people, just do us a favor and do the job.
02:21:47 --> 02:21:55 Stop trying to be these immoral folks, especially if you're going after black
02:21:55 --> 02:21:57 folks that you have no history of whatsoever.
02:21:57 --> 02:22:04 You probably didn't even know Sada Shakur existed until somebody gave you a
02:22:04 --> 02:22:07 dossier about, oh, this is why she's famous.
02:22:08 --> 02:22:12 Or you pulled it up on Wikipedia. And if you actually pulled it up on Wikipedia,
02:22:12 --> 02:22:14 you probably wouldn't have said the things that you said.
02:22:15 --> 02:22:20 Nonetheless, rest in power, Sister Shakur. Yeah.
02:22:21 --> 02:22:24 Yeah, rest in power, Sister. You know,
02:22:24 --> 02:22:31 I just wish that there had been a situation where her name could have been cleared
02:22:31 --> 02:22:37 before she passed away, but it is what it is, and we'll move on.
02:22:39 --> 02:22:44 Character. This is what I really wanted to talk about. And I can't promise it's
02:22:44 --> 02:22:45 going to be short, but I'm going to try.
02:22:46 --> 02:22:53 I just got a real problem with all of this craziness.
02:22:54 --> 02:23:02 You get 800 generals to show up from all over the globe to show up and then
02:23:02 --> 02:23:05 tell them that I don't want anybody fat.
02:23:06 --> 02:23:11 I don't want to see any more black people or women getting promoted.
02:23:12 --> 02:23:17 I don't want to deal with any LGBTQ folks in the military.
02:23:18 --> 02:23:22 You could have done that in a Zoom call. You could have done that in the email.
02:23:23 --> 02:23:29 You could have recorded a message and shipped that out on the World Wide Web,
02:23:29 --> 02:23:34 you know, YouTube channel or any military provision,
02:23:35 --> 02:23:40 you know, where you could directly talk to these commanders instead of spending
02:23:40 --> 02:23:42 American taxpayer dollars.
02:23:42 --> 02:23:48 Right. It's so funny that they say, oh, well, you know, we're trying to save
02:23:48 --> 02:23:52 money and we're trying to cut the deficit and all that. And then you spend money
02:23:52 --> 02:23:56 to fly every major commander in the U.S.
02:23:56 --> 02:24:03 Military to one spot in Quantico, Virginia, to lecture them about fat generals.
02:24:05 --> 02:24:08 Fat soldiers, woke initiatives.
02:24:08 --> 02:24:09 For what?
02:24:10 --> 02:24:17 Hubris. Ego. That's what. lack of character, lack of moral standing,
02:24:17 --> 02:24:22 lack of comprehension of the task at hand.
02:24:23 --> 02:24:30 You know, this is not ideology that we are dealing with.
02:24:30 --> 02:24:35 Some people might argue that, you know, they'll say that white supremacy is an ideology.
02:24:35 --> 02:24:46 I say it is an idiot-ology, right? or idiotocracy, I think is the word that we've coined.
02:24:47 --> 02:24:52 But it's not about differences of political theorem or thought.
02:24:53 --> 02:24:59 This is about character, man. These people have no character.
02:25:01 --> 02:25:03 They don't have a high standard.
02:25:05 --> 02:25:09 People with high standards would not pull these kind of stunts.
02:25:10 --> 02:25:15 People with high standards wouldn't just blow up ships for no reason.
02:25:16 --> 02:25:19 Now, they're saying that, oh, these people are drug traffickers and all that stuff.
02:25:21 --> 02:25:28 You're playing battleship with boats. It's like, how about interdiction?
02:25:29 --> 02:25:35 These folks are doing something or they're being accused of doing something.
02:25:35 --> 02:25:40 I mean, you know, we saw this in like science fiction shows, you know, Judge Dredd.
02:25:41 --> 02:25:46 You know, we were going to, you committed a crime and we're going to execute you right there.
02:25:47 --> 02:25:54 Right? Now, I'm not saying the people that died in these boat explosions are going to be canonized.
02:25:54 --> 02:25:58 You know, they might not be good people at all.
02:25:58 --> 02:26:03 But there's a process in how we do things, and people with character understand that.
02:26:04 --> 02:26:10 People with character would not go against the Constitution each and every day that they exist.
02:26:10 --> 02:26:15 You take an oath to uphold the very document that you seek to destroy and defy
02:26:15 --> 02:26:17 every day. That's not character.
02:26:18 --> 02:26:24 How can we discuss finding solutions to the problems that Americans have to
02:26:24 --> 02:26:28 deal with if we're not dealing with high-character individuals?
02:26:30 --> 02:26:34 Right? Now, I guess you can make that argument in the United States over 249
02:26:34 --> 02:26:37 years that we've navigated around that.
02:26:37 --> 02:26:45 But my God, not at this level where nobody has the wearable male,
02:26:45 --> 02:26:50 female, dog, cat to look at the president of the United States and say, sir, that's a bad idea.
02:26:50 --> 02:26:53 In the first administration, they did, but not this one.
02:26:54 --> 02:26:59 And then it's like you let the folks that have crazy ideas do what they want
02:26:59 --> 02:27:02 to do. Oh, no, we're not going to have any vaccines.
02:27:03 --> 02:27:06 And all of a sudden, measles pops back up. What?
02:27:07 --> 02:27:16 I mean, you got the FBI director giving out challenge coins that look like a
02:27:16 --> 02:27:21 ripoff of the Punisher's logo from the Marvel comics. What are we doing?
02:27:22 --> 02:27:27 What are we doing? We have a Justice Department that thinks that they're not
02:27:27 --> 02:27:31 the Justice Department, they're the Trump Corporation Legal Department.
02:27:32 --> 02:27:35 We're going to sue everybody that's pissed off Donald Trump,
02:27:35 --> 02:27:39 and we're going to put in jail anybody that tried to put Donald Trump in jail
02:27:39 --> 02:27:43 for all the criminal acts that he's done. What are we doing?
02:27:43 --> 02:27:49 Right? I don't care what they try to tell you.
02:27:49 --> 02:27:52 Nobody voted for that. Right?
02:27:53 --> 02:27:57 There are people, well, let me take that back, because there are some people
02:27:57 --> 02:28:01 that read Project 2025 and were not alarmed.
02:28:02 --> 02:28:06 They actually said, eh, we'll see if this works. There's some people that are like that.
02:28:07 --> 02:28:13 But the majority of the voters were making a judgment call, who's going to lower
02:28:13 --> 02:28:15 the price of my groceries?
02:28:15 --> 02:28:19 Who's going to help the housing crisis? Who's going to make sure that there's
02:28:19 --> 02:28:21 jobs available for me or my children to get?
02:28:22 --> 02:28:27 And based on even recent polling, people are saying, well, we still think the
02:28:27 --> 02:28:29 Republicans would do a better job than the Democrats.
02:28:29 --> 02:28:31 It might actually have been worse if the Democrats were there.
02:28:31 --> 02:28:35 There's people that still think that. It's polling data that's showing that.
02:28:37 --> 02:28:41 So people were not voting for lack of character.
02:28:41 --> 02:28:47 They weren't voting for people to be in these offices that didn't have a backbone.
02:28:47 --> 02:28:49 They weren't voting for that.
02:28:49 --> 02:28:55 They weren't voting for people who were moral reprobates, except maybe the president.
02:28:56 --> 02:28:59 They weren't voting for that. That wasn't on their mind.
02:29:00 --> 02:29:05 I promise you that. I promise you the majority of Americans that voted for our
02:29:05 --> 02:29:07 current president didn't think that.
02:29:07 --> 02:29:10 They were thinking in selfish terms.
02:29:10 --> 02:29:18 I need some help with my household expenses. I need help living in America.
02:29:18 --> 02:29:23 And they felt this guy was saying he was going to do it. So they believed him
02:29:23 --> 02:29:25 over the vice president.
02:29:26 --> 02:29:27 Their attitude was, well, the vice
02:29:27 --> 02:29:31 president had four years along with the president to fix these things.
02:29:31 --> 02:29:34 What makes you think that she's going to do anything now that when she's in
02:29:34 --> 02:29:36 charge? That's what people were thinking.
02:29:37 --> 02:29:40 Now, I'm not counting the folks that didn't vote for her because she didn't
02:29:40 --> 02:29:46 take the position they wanted on any issue, whether it was God's or anything else.
02:29:47 --> 02:29:51 Just talking about the average ordinary American voter that showed up out of
02:29:51 --> 02:29:54 the 150 million people that did. Right.
02:29:55 --> 02:30:04 Now, there were 75, 6 million people that felt like, yeah, she's got to be good. Right.
02:30:04 --> 02:30:08 So, you know, it wasn't like.
02:30:09 --> 02:30:10 He fooled everybody.
02:30:11 --> 02:30:15 You know, and there's some people, they didn't even care about whether we have
02:30:15 --> 02:30:18 a democracy or not. I mean, that's just a term, right?
02:30:19 --> 02:30:22 I mean, we're still going to be able to vote. We're still going to be able to,
02:30:22 --> 02:30:26 you know, go to, kids go to school and go to the library.
02:30:27 --> 02:30:29 And surely he's not going to mess with any of that stuff. I mean,
02:30:29 --> 02:30:31 that's American values.
02:30:32 --> 02:30:33 He's not going to destroy that.
02:30:34 --> 02:30:39 But, you know, people that don't have any character, people don't have any real
02:30:39 --> 02:30:48 self-esteem. people that don't have any security in their own skin always have to flex. Right.
02:30:49 --> 02:30:54 Have to flex. They always got to show that they belong.
02:30:55 --> 02:31:00 And, you know, you deal with people like that at work. You deal with people like that in school.
02:31:00 --> 02:31:05 You deal with people like that, you know, if you're playing basketball at the gym.
02:31:06 --> 02:31:09 But you don't want those kind of people leading the country.
02:31:09 --> 02:31:14 You just don't. And this is evidence why.
02:31:15 --> 02:31:20 Would we have had a government shutdown? down, maybe, to Democrats,
02:31:20 --> 02:31:24 maybe, because I'm sure the Republicans and Democrats would have disagreed on
02:31:24 --> 02:31:27 something and would have held the budget resolution hostage.
02:31:27 --> 02:31:32 That's the way they politic now. I think that's stupid, but that's where we are.
02:31:32 --> 02:31:36 Because if they did their jobs, there'd be a budget.
02:31:36 --> 02:31:41 Every year, every fiscal year, we have a budget and keep it moving.
02:31:41 --> 02:31:43 If they had actually passed the
02:31:43 --> 02:31:47 balanced budget amendment, we would have a balanced budget. But I digress.
02:31:47 --> 02:31:54 Would we still have conflicts in the Middle East or in, you know,
02:31:54 --> 02:31:57 between Russia and Ukraine? Yeah, probably.
02:31:57 --> 02:32:06 Or in the Congo? Probably. But I'm sure that there would be more diplomacy involved
02:32:06 --> 02:32:10 other than trying to get the president the Nobel Peace Prize.
02:32:11 --> 02:32:16 I'm sure there would be something more substantive at stake like world peace
02:32:16 --> 02:32:19 or at least peace in the region.
02:32:20 --> 02:32:26 Right. You know, you wouldn't have a president. If Kamala Harris was president,
02:32:26 --> 02:32:33 I promise you she wouldn't be trying to outdo Barack Obama based on any insecurities she would have.
02:32:33 --> 02:32:38 If she was more progressive in policies and all that, so be it.
02:32:38 --> 02:32:39 History will dictate that.
02:32:40 --> 02:32:44 But it wouldn't be out of any insecurities she would have.
02:32:47 --> 02:32:50 At a joke that he told her, right?
02:32:51 --> 02:32:54 And, you know, let's just deal with the reality of the fact.
02:32:55 --> 02:32:58 This man ran for president of the United States because the president of the
02:32:58 --> 02:33:01 United States pissed him off by telling a joke.
02:33:02 --> 02:33:06 Now, never mind that president's feelings about you questioning where he was
02:33:06 --> 02:33:11 born for over a year, because he clapped back on you in a public setting.
02:33:11 --> 02:33:15 I'm going to run for president and I'm going to try to get rid of his legacy.
02:33:16 --> 02:33:19 You're going to act like Pharaoh in the Ten Commandments.
02:33:20 --> 02:33:26 So it be done, right? That's insanity, man. That's insecurity.
02:33:26 --> 02:33:29 That's not embracing who you are.
02:33:30 --> 02:33:37 That's not reflecting on anything. It's not even close to evangelizing anything
02:33:37 --> 02:33:42 other than stupidity, hubris, ego.
02:33:43 --> 02:33:49 I just, you know, you're getting mad at comedians for making fun of you and
02:33:49 --> 02:33:53 stuff, but then you sit there and tell 800 generals,
02:33:54 --> 02:33:59 yeah, I try to walk slow so I won't fall down the plane. What are we doing?
02:34:00 --> 02:34:05 What are we doing? When this man was campaigning, he was talking about electric
02:34:05 --> 02:34:09 boats, shocking sharks or whatever.
02:34:09 --> 02:34:14 He was claiming that immigrants were eating dogs and cats. And he still got the most votes.
02:34:16 --> 02:34:20 Y'all that voted for him. I'm not. There's some people that are.
02:34:20 --> 02:34:22 They wear t-shirts every day that says it.
02:34:22 --> 02:34:27 There was a whole parade of people that had flags telling you how they felt
02:34:27 --> 02:34:28 about you and the president.
02:34:29 --> 02:34:37 But I'm not mad. I just think that we need to pay attention and do better. That's all.
02:34:38 --> 02:34:41 It's just, you know, I guess that's just my sports mentality.
02:34:42 --> 02:34:50 You know, coaching, whatever. It's like, these are what we call teachable moments.
02:34:50 --> 02:34:54 Even if we win the game, you know, let's correct our mistakes.
02:34:55 --> 02:34:59 Now, Donald Trump won the election, but America lost the game.
02:35:00 --> 02:35:03 And that's evident by all of this foolishness and.
02:35:06 --> 02:35:11 Crazy, misguided stuff that's going on. And then the one black guy we got in
02:35:11 --> 02:35:18 the administration, the one black guy uses the HUD website to start being,
02:35:18 --> 02:35:22 oh, it's the Democrats' fault that the HUD is going to be shut down.
02:35:23 --> 02:35:26 Bruh, that's not what you do. You don't do that.
02:35:26 --> 02:35:30 Your boss can do that because your boss actually had to run for the position.
02:35:30 --> 02:35:33 You were appointed by people who were elected.
02:35:34 --> 02:35:38 Some of them were Democrats. There were some Democrats that voted for you to have that job.
02:35:39 --> 02:35:45 You don't do that. You handle it like the elected or the appointed professional
02:35:45 --> 02:35:47 that you're supposed to be.
02:35:48 --> 02:35:51 Due to unfortunate circumstances, due to the government shutdown,
02:35:53 --> 02:35:56 services are going to be limited for a time uncertain.
02:35:57 --> 02:36:03 If you just had to post something on the website, i mean we just i don't know
02:36:03 --> 02:36:05 i guess you gotta support your team but,
02:36:06 --> 02:36:13 you know is this donald trump's signature oh no that's not a signature bro look at the check he wrote you,
02:36:15 --> 02:36:20 look at the campaign check he wrote you and match that up yeah that's his signature.
02:36:22 --> 02:36:29 What are we doing? You know, I just, we just got to do better, man.
02:36:31 --> 02:36:37 And I think it's coming. And I hope that we've had our teachable moment and
02:36:37 --> 02:36:41 now that regardless of which political party that you support,
02:36:41 --> 02:36:46 that you elect people who understand the gravitas of those positions,
02:36:46 --> 02:36:51 that understand the importance of the duty of serving the public.
02:36:52 --> 02:36:58 And that you're not out to try to destroy other Americans, but you're trying
02:36:58 --> 02:37:01 to figure out a way where all of us can coexist.
02:37:02 --> 02:37:07 That's what I'm praying for. That's what I'm hoping for. Now,
02:37:07 --> 02:37:11 I'm hoping that it will be within my lifetime that this gets fixed.
02:37:11 --> 02:37:14 I'm actually hoping it will be the next couple of elections.
02:37:15 --> 02:37:22 But we got to get back to at least the illusion of being civil,
02:37:22 --> 02:37:28 at least the illusion of being competent, at least the illusion of being respectable,
02:37:29 --> 02:37:32 at least the illusion of having character.
02:37:33 --> 02:37:36 We got to get back to that. We got to get back to that.
02:37:36 --> 02:37:42 We can't continue down this road. We need to rebuke foolishness.
02:37:44 --> 02:37:52 We do. Those of us of the Christian faith that understand that Satan is here
02:37:52 --> 02:37:55 to try to create confusion and all that stuff,
02:37:55 --> 02:38:01 and that from Genesis throughout, we were given the charge of having dominion
02:38:01 --> 02:38:04 over the earth, which meant dominion over Satan.
02:38:04 --> 02:38:06 We got to stop playing his game.
02:38:07 --> 02:38:11 Even the preachers that say that the president is a God-fearing man,
02:38:11 --> 02:38:13 we got to stop playing the game.
02:38:14 --> 02:38:18 You know, the Spirit of God dwells in all of us. Just some people don't listen to it, right?
02:38:19 --> 02:38:22 Some people don't adhere to it. Some people don't connect with it.
02:38:23 --> 02:38:27 But by the very essence that you live, that Spirit dwells within you.
02:38:28 --> 02:38:33 That's the Christian in me talking, right? For those of you who don't ascribe
02:38:33 --> 02:38:35 to the Christian faith or faith
02:38:35 --> 02:38:40 at all, there's decency in every human being. That's what Plato said.
02:38:41 --> 02:38:48 I'm not a Hobbesian. And I believe Plato was right, that there's decency in
02:38:48 --> 02:38:53 every human being inherently, and that evil is interjected into our lives.
02:38:53 --> 02:39:00 And so what I'm asking, what I'm imploring, what I'm hoping will happen is that
02:39:00 --> 02:39:06 decency becomes the fashion trend in American politics and civil discourse.
02:39:06 --> 02:39:08 Just be decent.
02:39:10 --> 02:39:13 See a car wreck, but nobody actually wants to be in one, right?
02:39:14 --> 02:39:19 This is a battle for democracy. Let's not get that twisted, because the people
02:39:19 --> 02:39:22 that don't have any character don't care about the Constitution.
02:39:23 --> 02:39:27 But this is also a battle for decency, because we can win this war,
02:39:28 --> 02:39:35 we can win this fight by being decent, by being people who understand the importance
02:39:35 --> 02:39:39 of character and trust and service.
02:39:39 --> 02:39:46 We just got to elect them and we got to start holding people accountable,
02:39:46 --> 02:39:51 whether it's in public office or in your private office. We just got to get there.
02:39:53 --> 02:39:57 So I'm going to leave y'all with that. Y'all have indulged me enough.
02:39:57 --> 02:39:59 Thank y'all for listening. Until next time.