00:00:00 --> 00:00:06 Welcome. I'm Eric Fleming, host of A Moment with Eric 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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00:01:00 --> 00:01:04 Because it is time to make this moment a movement.
00:01:04 --> 00:01:10 Thanks in advance for supporting the podcast of our time. I hope you enjoy this episode as well.
00:01:11 --> 00:01:16 The following program is hosted by the NVG Podcast Network.
00:01:17 --> 00:01:57 Music.
00:01:57 --> 00:02:01 Hello, and welcome to another moment with Eric Fleming. I am your host, Eric Fleming.
00:02:02 --> 00:02:08 And if you didn't notice, at the very beginning of the podcast,
00:02:08 --> 00:02:10 something new has been added.
00:02:11 --> 00:02:20 So it is my privilege to announce that this episode is the first episode for
00:02:20 --> 00:02:25 a moment with Eric Fleming to be on the NBG Podcast Network.
00:02:27 --> 00:02:31 It has really been an honor and a privilege to be invited to join.
00:02:32 --> 00:02:34 And I want to thank Leonard Young for making that happen.
00:02:36 --> 00:02:41 MBG is a Black-owned, Black-operated podcast network.
00:02:42 --> 00:02:46 And so I look forward to a long relationship.
00:02:48 --> 00:02:54 And, you know, this podcast has come a long way from just me recording my Uber rants.
00:02:56 --> 00:03:03 And now to actually be on an actual podcast network was a major, major accomplishment.
00:03:04 --> 00:03:10 The other housekeeping note I wanted to mention is that we did not win this
00:03:10 --> 00:03:12 year for Best News and Political Podcast,
00:03:13 --> 00:03:19 but I want to thank the Black Podcasting Awards for nominating A Moment with
00:03:19 --> 00:03:23 Eric Fleming for the second time in our five-year journey.
00:03:23 --> 00:03:26 And I want to congratulate Rashad Ritchie.
00:03:27 --> 00:03:33 Who did win and you need to check his podcast out it's called indisputable,
00:03:35 --> 00:03:41 and rashad's got so many titles he's got a lot of grades a phd he's got all
00:03:41 --> 00:03:45 sorts of stuff going on so i just call him brother rashad and,
00:03:46 --> 00:03:53 and i have respected that brother from afar we met maybe once but congratulations
00:03:53 --> 00:04:00 to him and And congratulations to all the winners of the Black Pod Awards this year.
00:04:01 --> 00:04:06 Please check out their website to see who won. Please check out and see who was nominated.
00:04:08 --> 00:04:17 And make sure that you follow or listen to those podcasts that had the same
00:04:17 --> 00:04:22 distinction in me of being nominated because it's an honor to be recognized for the work that you do.
00:04:24 --> 00:04:30 And you know i'm going to continue to keep doing what i'm doing and i hope that
00:04:30 --> 00:04:37 the other content creators keep doing what they're doing and encourage y'all to always listen to us,
00:04:38 --> 00:04:43 so now that i got that out the way let me just say that this episode is going
00:04:43 --> 00:04:48 to be special because i'm going to be dealing with a couple of subjects one
00:04:48 --> 00:04:52 is going to be kind of heavy and one is not as heavy, but very important.
00:04:55 --> 00:05:01 And really was honored to have these ladies come on to talk about their particular subjects.
00:05:03 --> 00:05:07 And I can't wait for y'all to hear those interviews.
00:05:07 --> 00:05:13 So let's go ahead and kick this off with a moment of news with Grace G.
00:05:13 --> 00:05:21 Music.
00:05:20 --> 00:05:26 Thanks, Eric. Marcellus Williams was executed by lethal injection in Missouri
00:05:26 --> 00:05:31 after the U.S. Supreme Court denied his appeal, despite claims of new evidence
00:05:31 --> 00:05:34 regarding jury bias and the murder weapons contamination.
00:05:35 --> 00:05:39 The U.S. Congress passed a stopgap bill to prevent a government shutdown,
00:05:40 --> 00:05:42 ensuring funding through December 20th.
00:05:43 --> 00:05:48 New York City Mayor Eric Adams has been indicted in a federal corruption investigation.
00:05:49 --> 00:05:54 Donald Trump declined to take part in another debate with Vice President Kamala
00:05:54 --> 00:06:00 Harris, citing the late timing as voters have already begun casting ballots in three states.
00:06:01 --> 00:06:05 Georgia's election board voted for a hand count of ballots for the upcoming
00:06:05 --> 00:06:08 election, a decision criticized by voting rights advocates.
00:06:09 --> 00:06:15 A Republican proposal to switch Nebraska's electoral college votes to a winner-takes-all
00:06:15 --> 00:06:19 system, failed to receive the unanimous Republican support needed to pass.
00:06:20 --> 00:06:25 Several aides to North Carolina's Republican gubernatorial candidate Mark Robinson
00:06:25 --> 00:06:29 resigned, following controversial comments attributed to him.
00:06:30 --> 00:06:35 A judge upheld the acceptance of digital university IDs for voting in North
00:06:35 --> 00:06:39 Carolina, allowing college students to participate in the upcoming election.
00:06:40 --> 00:06:45 The U.S. Supreme Court upheld a ruling that keeps the Green Party off the Nevada ballot.
00:06:46 --> 00:06:51 U.S. Army Private Travis King was sentenced to one year of confinement for several
00:06:51 --> 00:06:55 offenses, including desertion after fleeing to North Korea.
00:06:55 --> 00:07:00 Families of six workers who died in the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse filed
00:07:00 --> 00:07:03 lawsuits against the cargo ship's owner and operator.
00:07:04 --> 00:07:10 The FBI reported a 3% decline in violent crime in the U.S. last year,
00:07:10 --> 00:07:12 alongside an increase in hate crimes.
00:07:13 --> 00:07:18 And a Joint Center report reveals that the U.S. public workforce system may
00:07:18 --> 00:07:25 be reinforcing racial disparities for Black Americans by channeling them into low-paying jobs.
00:07:25 --> 00:07:29 I am Grace G., and this has been a moment.
00:07:29 --> 00:07:36 Music.
00:07:37 --> 00:07:40 All right. Thank you, Grace, for that moment of news.
00:07:41 --> 00:07:46 And now it is time for my guest, Rachel Zimmerman.
00:07:47 --> 00:07:51 Rachel Zimmerman, an award-winning journalist, has written about health and
00:07:51 --> 00:07:53 medicine for more than two decades.
00:07:54 --> 00:07:59 She is a contributor to The Washington Post and previously worked as a staff
00:07:59 --> 00:08:04 writer for The Wall Street Journal and a health reporter for WBUR,
00:08:04 --> 00:08:06 Boston's public radio station.
00:08:06 --> 00:08:09 Where she co-founded a popular blog and podcast.
00:08:11 --> 00:08:13 Her essays and reporting have been published in the New York Times,
00:08:14 --> 00:08:19 Vogue.com, New York Magazine's The Cut, Old, The Oprah Magazine,
00:08:20 --> 00:08:24 The Atlantic, Slate, and The Huffington Post, among others.
00:08:25 --> 00:08:29 She received an M.S. from Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism
00:08:29 --> 00:08:31 and a B.A. from Sarah Lawrence College.
00:08:32 --> 00:08:37 She lives with her family in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and is the author of
00:08:37 --> 00:08:42 the book, the new book, Us After, A Memoir of Love and Suicide.
00:08:43 --> 00:08:48 And this is the book we're going to discuss in the interview.
00:08:48 --> 00:08:51 Now, the subject matter of this interview may be disturbing.
00:08:52 --> 00:08:55 If you are having thoughts of suicide, please reach out for help.
00:08:55 --> 00:09:06 Call or text 988 for the Suicide Crisis Lifeline or go to www.speakingofsuicide.com
00:09:06 --> 00:09:13 forward slash resources for any additional resources you may need.
00:09:14 --> 00:09:18 Ladies and gentlemen, it is my distinct honor and privilege to have as a guest
00:09:18 --> 00:09:21 on this podcast, Rachel Zimmerman.
00:09:22 --> 00:09:32 Music.
00:09:32 --> 00:09:36 All right. Rachel Zimmerman. How are you doing, ma'am? You doing good?
00:09:37 --> 00:09:39 I'm doing okay today. How are you doing, Eric?
00:09:40 --> 00:09:46 The same. I'm doing good. I'm doing okay. You know, I really appreciate you coming on.
00:09:47 --> 00:09:51 But even more so, I really appreciate this book that you've written called Us
00:09:51 --> 00:09:55 After, after a memoir of love and suicide.
00:09:57 --> 00:10:01 And in the questioning, I'll kind of get into the personal aspect of it, but.
00:10:03 --> 00:10:06 I'll just say this to editorialize a little bit.
00:10:06 --> 00:10:12 I'm really, really proud and honored that you summoned the courage to do this.
00:10:12 --> 00:10:18 I know this was like a 10-year effort from what I've read in the book. That's right.
00:10:18 --> 00:10:23 And so I greatly appreciate that you summoned the courage to do that.
00:10:23 --> 00:10:25 So let's go ahead and get started.
00:10:25 --> 00:10:30 What I normally do with guests is that I throw a quote at them and then have them respond. bond.
00:10:30 --> 00:10:35 So your quote is, at the end of my suffering, there was a door.
00:10:35 --> 00:10:37 What does that quote mean to you?
00:10:37 --> 00:10:43 Well, that's a quote I've included in the book, and it's the poet Louise Gluck
00:10:43 --> 00:10:45 from her poem, The Wild Iris.
00:10:45 --> 00:10:51 And to me, you know, what I've learned from doing all the reporting from this
00:10:51 --> 00:10:57 book and talking to other people doing book events is so many people have trauma
00:10:57 --> 00:11:00 and loss, Right. So many people have suffering.
00:11:00 --> 00:11:04 It's the human condition if you're an adult, basically.
00:11:04 --> 00:11:12 And so my feeling is when you're in the acute moment of grief and suffering,
00:11:12 --> 00:11:14 you feel like there's no way out.
00:11:14 --> 00:11:22 And yet, for many people, a door opens and you evolve and life goes on and you
00:11:22 --> 00:11:24 don't imagine that to happen.
00:11:25 --> 00:11:30 And I think that's, you know, that's what that quote means to me,
00:11:30 --> 00:11:33 that you are forced against your will.
00:11:34 --> 00:11:39 I mean, nobody asks for these kind of destructive, devastating life events, right?
00:11:39 --> 00:11:42 But they happen to most of us, if not all of us.
00:11:43 --> 00:11:46 And you have a choice to go on or not.
00:11:46 --> 00:11:51 And you most of the time have to pivot and take care of your kids and take care
00:11:51 --> 00:11:55 of your daily demands. And so that's the door that opens.
00:11:55 --> 00:12:00 And a lot of this book, we'll get into it, but sort of a motivating factor was
00:12:00 --> 00:12:02 sort of finding the good in what remains.
00:12:03 --> 00:12:05 And so that quote speaks to that concept.
00:12:07 --> 00:12:13 So I normally when I interview authors, I don't quote passages,
00:12:13 --> 00:12:16 total passages from the book.
00:12:16 --> 00:12:24 But for my first couple of questions, because the way the book starts, I want to read that.
00:12:25 --> 00:12:29 Because it really, really hit me, you know, it's like good literature is like
00:12:29 --> 00:12:31 the opening is what's supposed to be the hook. Right.
00:12:32 --> 00:12:39 And so. So let me read this. If I were writing a news story, I'd start like this.
00:12:39 --> 00:12:47 On July 1st, 2014, Seth Teller, MIT professor and father to Parkers Crimson
00:12:47 --> 00:12:49 Honda Insight on the Tobin Bridge,
00:12:50 --> 00:12:55 three miles from his home in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and jumped to his death. He was 50.
00:12:56 --> 00:13:01 But this is not that story. This is the story of what happened after.
00:13:02 --> 00:13:09 So my two questions. My first question is, you were married to Seth for 12 years.
00:13:09 --> 00:13:14 That's right. Right. And I guess you you dated for three years because a lot
00:13:14 --> 00:13:17 of times you refer to 15 years when you were talking.
00:13:17 --> 00:13:27 Talk to me about him. I know he was like a super smart individual and and he
00:13:27 --> 00:13:29 had these incredible projects that he's working on.
00:13:30 --> 00:13:32 But just talk to me about Seth, the husband.
00:13:32 --> 00:13:39 Right. Well, I appreciate you reading that opening, Eric. So Seth was a devoted
00:13:39 --> 00:13:44 father of our two daughters who were 8 and 11 years old when he died.
00:13:44 --> 00:13:49 As you mentioned, he was a tenured professor of robotics at MIT,
00:13:49 --> 00:13:52 deeply connected with his students.
00:13:53 --> 00:14:00 His parents were very close with him. Two brothers, again, very close. An extended family.
00:14:00 --> 00:14:04 So in other words, a very robust social network. work.
00:14:04 --> 00:14:08 He was involved in like the Neighborhood Association, you know,
00:14:08 --> 00:14:13 the turf fields where he played ultimate frisbee.
00:14:13 --> 00:14:20 And he was somebody who if you just saw him, you'd see this like cool,
00:14:20 --> 00:14:22 laid back, brilliant guy.
00:14:22 --> 00:14:26 He wore shorts all the time. He often taught classes in shorts.
00:14:27 --> 00:14:33 And, And, you know, he would carry, he actually had a bottle of bubble mix that
00:14:33 --> 00:14:35 he kept in the back of his car with a big wand.
00:14:35 --> 00:14:40 And so if he'd run into a group of kids, he'd just take the bubble mix out and
00:14:40 --> 00:14:41 start making bubbles for the kids.
00:14:41 --> 00:14:46 So he was just like this very fun-loving but brilliant, like he'd stay up all
00:14:46 --> 00:14:50 night looking at the stars and coming up with big ideas.
00:14:50 --> 00:14:57 But he also was very hard on himself in terms of his expectations of himself.
00:14:57 --> 00:15:02 And a friend of mine who recently read the book said it was almost like Seth
00:15:02 --> 00:15:03 had a Ph.D. in carnating.
00:15:04 --> 00:15:12 And I think he was a perfectionist and he operated on a very high level.
00:15:12 --> 00:15:18 And I think, you know, he never was diagnosed with any kind of severe mental illness.
00:15:19 --> 00:15:24 But in my investigation and reporting, you know, he either had,
00:15:24 --> 00:15:29 I mean, obviously had undiagnosed deep depression and he may have even had bipolar.
00:15:29 --> 00:15:32 Bipolar there was some bipolar in his family but again
00:15:32 --> 00:15:35 never diagnosed and I think
00:15:35 --> 00:15:38 what happened was there was
00:15:38 --> 00:15:41 a lot of stress in his life he was involved in a
00:15:41 --> 00:15:48 you know international robotics competition and he had just turned 50 so that
00:15:48 --> 00:15:53 was on his mind you know many men are kind of like what have I accomplished
00:15:53 --> 00:16:00 like the sort of midlife situation he had some chronic pain so he wasn't unable to exercise.
00:16:00 --> 00:16:05 His sleep had deteriorated near the end. And he had something called tinnitus,
00:16:05 --> 00:16:09 which is a ringing in the ear that is fairly common and usually low level.
00:16:10 --> 00:16:13 And it never bothered him, but it escalated. And none of those things on their
00:16:13 --> 00:16:15 own pointed to an emergency.
00:16:15 --> 00:16:25 But I think for him, these sort of maybe on their own minor intrusions coalesced
00:16:25 --> 00:16:26 at the same time and escalated.
00:16:26 --> 00:16:31 And because he'd never been in any kind of long-term therapy or ever really
00:16:31 --> 00:16:37 asked for help about any kind of mental health situation, he didn't have the tools to deal with that.
00:16:38 --> 00:16:45 And so, you know, what I tell my kids, he had an illness in his brain that was undiagnosed.
00:16:45 --> 00:16:53 And the consequence of that illness turned out to be self-harm and ultimately, sadly, his death.
00:16:54 --> 00:16:59 Yeah, because that leads to, well, that's another question I'm going to ask
00:16:59 --> 00:17:01 dealing with your daughters.
00:17:01 --> 00:17:09 But the other question based on the opening was, how did your background as
00:17:09 --> 00:17:14 being a journalist help you get through this moment?
00:17:15 --> 00:17:20 Right. Well, I would say it both helped and hindered me in these respects.
00:17:20 --> 00:17:26 So I had been a journalist, mostly a health care journalist for over 20 years,
00:17:26 --> 00:17:29 worked at the Wall Street Journal, worked in public radio.
00:17:29 --> 00:17:36 And so my belief system based on a lot of that, my work was that,
00:17:36 --> 00:17:39 you know, you dig deeply,
00:17:39 --> 00:17:43 you know, you talk to as many people as you can about a complicated topic and
00:17:43 --> 00:17:46 you you emerge with some clarity. Right.
00:17:46 --> 00:17:48 And you think you can have enough
00:17:48 --> 00:17:53 of an answer to write a story that leads readers to some kind of clarity.
00:17:53 --> 00:17:57 So I thought I could do that with Seth. Like, so I just started interviewing
00:17:57 --> 00:18:04 suicide researchers and doctors and people who knew him in different aspects of his life.
00:18:04 --> 00:18:10 Life and, you know, I found someone who actually jumped off the same bridge and survived.
00:18:10 --> 00:18:13 And I thought, okay, he'll give me some insight.
00:18:13 --> 00:18:18 And at the end of, I mean, I did this for years, this sort of obsessive digging.
00:18:18 --> 00:18:24 And honestly, it helped me focus. It was a good distraction.
00:18:25 --> 00:18:31 But at the end of the day, it didn't provide this aha moment about why,
00:18:31 --> 00:18:36 nor did it provide an aha moment about what had I missed.
00:18:36 --> 00:18:42 Like, of course as a survivor of someone, you know, you love who dies by suicide,
00:18:42 --> 00:18:46 you of course think, how could I have stopped this? What did I miss?
00:18:46 --> 00:18:49 That's sort of a human response to that sort of thing.
00:18:51 --> 00:18:55 And I came to the understanding that, again, an illness in his brain,
00:18:55 --> 00:19:01 when you are in that suicidal mindset, you are not thinking about anything else.
00:19:01 --> 00:19:04 You're not thinking about your kids, your marriage, your work.
00:19:04 --> 00:19:09 You're just thinking about the psychic pain you're in and how do you end it.
00:19:09 --> 00:19:11 And then there's a kind of tunnel vision.
00:19:12 --> 00:19:17 So, you know, I did come to some clarity in terms of an understanding a bit
00:19:17 --> 00:19:21 about what he was going through. But I think like unless you have been there,
00:19:21 --> 00:19:24 it's very hard to wrap your brain around suicide, right?
00:19:24 --> 00:19:30 It's like the very antithesis of everything that is a human impulse, which is to survive.
00:19:31 --> 00:19:37 And so there's still an unknowingness about, you know, how he died,
00:19:37 --> 00:19:39 which I think never goes away.
00:19:39 --> 00:19:44 But you kind of have to learn to live with the unknown and decide to pivot to
00:19:44 --> 00:19:47 like focus on what you can control and manage,
00:19:47 --> 00:19:53 which was, you know, reconnecting with some level of joy and pleasure and making
00:19:53 --> 00:19:55 sure my kids could do that as well.
00:19:56 --> 00:20:01 Yeah. So talking about your children, you mentioned them at the beginning.
00:20:01 --> 00:20:06 They're basically grown now, but they were eight and 11 when this happened.
00:20:06 --> 00:20:17 And there was one particular passage where you talked about his love for flying, right?
00:20:17 --> 00:20:20 That he always wanted to fly.
00:20:20 --> 00:20:24 And there was a moment when you were talking to your daughters.
00:20:24 --> 00:20:28 I don't know which one. Was it Julia or I forget the other one's name.
00:20:29 --> 00:20:33 Sophia. Sophia, yeah. Right. And it was like it was one of them where you were
00:20:33 --> 00:20:38 explaining that maybe at that moment he felt that he was flying.
00:20:38 --> 00:20:45 Kind of talk about how difficult that was, because it took it was it was if
00:20:45 --> 00:20:47 you read the book, it takes.
00:20:48 --> 00:20:53 It's almost like every year it's like you start another chapter and explaining
00:20:53 --> 00:20:55 to your children what happened.
00:20:55 --> 00:21:00 Yes, I really appreciate that you highlight that passage because,
00:21:00 --> 00:21:06 you know, I sort of at first treated my kids as one unit, like,
00:21:06 --> 00:21:08 what will I tell the kids?
00:21:08 --> 00:21:12 But because of their age difference and just their personality difference,
00:21:12 --> 00:21:16 I soon realized like each of them needed different things for me,
00:21:16 --> 00:21:19 you know, and developmentally they were different.
00:21:19 --> 00:21:23 And so my younger daughter was always the one who wanted all of the facts.
00:21:23 --> 00:21:28 Like she started asking exactly how did he die? I want to know all the details.
00:21:28 --> 00:21:30 You know, when she was nine.
00:21:31 --> 00:21:34 Not immediately right after he died, but very soon after.
00:21:34 --> 00:21:37 And my older daughter never asked for that.
00:21:37 --> 00:21:43 I mean, he kind of absorbed the details, but she was more the one who wanted
00:21:43 --> 00:21:49 to keep an image of him as she had known him on, you know, when he was alive and thriving.
00:21:49 --> 00:21:56 So the passage you refer to is, you know, finally, when I talk to Julia and
00:21:56 --> 00:21:58 she's like, how did daddy die? I have.
00:21:58 --> 00:22:06 So I explained, you know, he had this illness and he just, you know, and he jumped.
00:22:06 --> 00:22:10 I mean, that was pretty much one of, you know, there are several worst moments
00:22:10 --> 00:22:13 of my life. And this was one of them trying to tell my nine year old this.
00:22:13 --> 00:22:16 And, you know, I said it to her.
00:22:17 --> 00:22:21 And like almost that impulse that you have with your kids, when something bad
00:22:21 --> 00:22:26 happens, you want to make Like, all you want to do is not have them feel pain, right?
00:22:26 --> 00:22:36 So I said, you know, I imagine that for a moment, he felt like he was flying before he died.
00:22:37 --> 00:22:41 And, you know, he used to say stuff like that to them, like,
00:22:41 --> 00:22:43 would you rather be invisible?
00:22:43 --> 00:22:46 Or would you rather fly? Like, what superpower would you like?
00:22:47 --> 00:22:51 And he that's how he thought he thought like a kid on many levels.
00:22:51 --> 00:22:58 And so she responded to that like she went with the maybe he did have a moment
00:22:58 --> 00:23:06 of flight before the end and you know again there's this sort of you want to
00:23:06 --> 00:23:07 know you don't want to know and,
00:23:08 --> 00:23:15 the fact that she responded to to that flying statement made me feel like okay
00:23:15 --> 00:23:20 she also is is able to find some kind of good in this disaster.
00:23:21 --> 00:23:25 And, you know, he also used to do a thing with them where they'd make this huge
00:23:25 --> 00:23:29 pile of leaves in the fall in, you know, in Cambridge.
00:23:29 --> 00:23:33 There's always like, you know, the change to autumn is dramatic.
00:23:33 --> 00:23:35 And they do leaf jumping.
00:23:35 --> 00:23:40 And she said, when I said the thing about flying, she said, oh, I also imagined him.
00:23:40 --> 00:23:44 He felt like he was doing leaf jumping. something so it's
00:23:44 --> 00:23:47 like she wants to know the gory details
00:23:47 --> 00:23:51 but then she also wants to bring it back to the
00:23:51 --> 00:23:56 joy they had together and yeah it was an amazing moment it's like you don't
00:23:56 --> 00:24:02 think your kids can absorb this kind of stuff and they don't metabolize it in
00:24:02 --> 00:24:07 the same way that grown-ups do they they understand only what they can understand
00:24:07 --> 00:24:10 and in some ways that's a protective mechanism antagonism.
00:24:12 --> 00:24:17 Yeah. And my older daughter, I said, you know, I just told Julia exactly how dad died.
00:24:18 --> 00:24:21 Would you like me to tell you to? And she's like, that's okay. I've got it.
00:24:22 --> 00:24:26 And yet they always came together in the end to support each other,
00:24:26 --> 00:24:30 you know, and we became, I mean, part of how we survived was we've sort of became
00:24:30 --> 00:24:36 this unit, this like three girl unit that sort of moved through the world together.
00:24:37 --> 00:24:41 Yeah, so that was an extremely painful moment. Yeah.
00:24:43 --> 00:24:46 So that kind of leads me to the next question about support.
00:24:47 --> 00:24:53 So you had kind of developed this tribe within the household between you and the daughters.
00:24:54 --> 00:24:58 What other kind of, well, cause there was one part where you said you reached
00:24:58 --> 00:25:01 out to a friend of his who had gone through,
00:25:02 --> 00:25:06 losing their spouse. Right. And that person never responded to you,
00:25:07 --> 00:25:13 but you did have a mom's mom brigade, I think you called it or something like that. Yeah.
00:25:13 --> 00:25:19 So talk about talk about the different support groups that kind of got you through.
00:25:19 --> 00:25:25 Yeah. Well, I think this is critical to anyone going through this kind of loss.
00:25:25 --> 00:25:31 We had amazing, You know, in our very unluckiness, we were actually fairly lucky.
00:25:31 --> 00:25:33 First of all, he had left life insurance.
00:25:34 --> 00:25:40 And there was a period of time where I wasn't sure we were going to get it because
00:25:40 --> 00:25:42 he died by suicide and there's a suicide cause.
00:25:42 --> 00:25:48 But in the end, we did. so we were financially stable and we didn't have to
00:25:48 --> 00:25:53 move and the kids could stay in their school where they had been since they were four.
00:25:53 --> 00:25:55 So there was the school community, which was incredible.
00:25:56 --> 00:25:59 There was the neighborhood community, which we got to stay in.
00:25:59 --> 00:26:06 Like everything that kept things familiar and stable and consistent helped us go on.
00:26:06 --> 00:26:11 And then as you mentioned, the mom brigade, I mean, these women who are largely
00:26:11 --> 00:26:17 mothers of my kids' friends just gathered around and they, you know,
00:26:17 --> 00:26:19 left food on my doorstep.
00:26:19 --> 00:26:24 They took my phone calls in the middle of the night when I was anxious and freaking out.
00:26:24 --> 00:26:29 They drove the kids like to their gymnastics and to the birthday parties.
00:26:29 --> 00:26:34 And when my kids had to be in two places and I couldn't be both places,
00:26:34 --> 00:26:40 they would take them. And so that was just so huge.
00:26:40 --> 00:26:43 And, you know, I didn't have my kids till I was older.
00:26:43 --> 00:26:49 It was my late 30s. I was 38 when I had my first kid and 41 when Julia was born.
00:26:49 --> 00:26:51 So I, by that time, had my career.
00:26:51 --> 00:26:57 I sort of thought of myself as this, like, knowing older mom, right?
00:26:57 --> 00:27:01 And like, I didn't need help. But soon after Seth died, I realized,
00:27:01 --> 00:27:06 like, I cannot do this without help. And then Julia and I went to this grief
00:27:06 --> 00:27:10 group for children and families who had lost someone.
00:27:10 --> 00:27:16 And she went with the kids downstairs and they didn't talk about loss and pain and grief.
00:27:16 --> 00:27:21 They like jumped on a trampoline and did art projects and painted rocks and stuff.
00:27:22 --> 00:27:26 I went upstairs with the grownups and we talked and I could see,
00:27:26 --> 00:27:27 I talk about it in the book,
00:27:27 --> 00:27:35 like this kind of hierarchy of grief where I saw women who did not,
00:27:35 --> 00:27:40 you know, who lost their main source of income and who had to move to smaller
00:27:40 --> 00:27:46 places away from their support systems and the damage that can do to a kid and an adult.
00:27:46 --> 00:27:49 And then, you know, there are a couple of dads in the group,
00:27:49 --> 00:27:54 who apparently really were not part of child rearing.
00:27:54 --> 00:27:58 I mean, I remember one father saying, like, I've never made a sandwich for my kid.
00:27:58 --> 00:28:04 Or another who was like, I don't know how to talk to my daughter about her mother's death.
00:28:04 --> 00:28:11 Like, you know, and I was very lucky to have these people that I could lean on.
00:28:12 --> 00:28:15 And as you say, it's not always the people you think, right?
00:28:15 --> 00:28:21 I thought this guy who lost his spouse would really understand and he just, he couldn't deal.
00:28:21 --> 00:28:27 I had a work colleague I was very close to, I assumed she would be a support.
00:28:27 --> 00:28:31 And he basically said to me, you have too much pain in your life right now.
00:28:31 --> 00:28:33 I can't, I can't deal with that.
00:28:33 --> 00:28:36 Okay, sorry about that.
00:28:36 --> 00:28:40 But anyway, you know, and then there were other people who were just sort of
00:28:40 --> 00:28:43 peripheral in my life, and they came right to the center.
00:28:43 --> 00:28:48 So you just don't know how people are going to respond to this kind of thing.
00:28:49 --> 00:28:55 There's sometimes a sense that it's, you know, contagious, like I had this terrible thing happen.
00:28:55 --> 00:29:00 And some people are don't want to come in close to that for this irrational
00:29:00 --> 00:29:03 fear that it's like going to happen that things can happen to them,
00:29:03 --> 00:29:06 which obviously, that's not how it works.
00:29:07 --> 00:29:12 But yes, the support was, and even still, you know, through this book,
00:29:12 --> 00:29:14 I have people checking in on me, like, how's it going?
00:29:14 --> 00:29:17 How does it feel to have all this material out there?
00:29:17 --> 00:29:22 And honestly, one of the amazing things about putting this material out in the
00:29:22 --> 00:29:24 world, because you never know how it's going to land.
00:29:26 --> 00:29:31 But in these public events I've done, people just want to share their own stories
00:29:31 --> 00:29:35 and they want to connect and they want to say, you know, this thing happened
00:29:35 --> 00:29:39 to me and it was similar and we never talked about it.
00:29:39 --> 00:29:42 And I, you know, this gives me permission to talk.
00:29:42 --> 00:29:47 And I think, you know, from a macro perspective, I really think sharing these
00:29:47 --> 00:29:51 kind of stories with each other is makes us all more human.
00:29:52 --> 00:29:57 Yeah, and I'm going to put a pin on that because that kind of leads to a question I wanted to ask.
00:29:58 --> 00:30:07 But before we get to those, what was the toughest thing, trying to fulfill the
00:30:07 --> 00:30:12 role as a widow in society or finding love again?
00:30:12 --> 00:30:15 Well i'm glad
00:30:15 --> 00:30:18 you the widow thing is interesting because you know
00:30:18 --> 00:30:25 the popular conventional wisdom about like what a widow is is kind of this old
00:30:25 --> 00:30:32 woman in black turtleneck lace who's sort of long-suffering and you know just
00:30:32 --> 00:30:37 in a perpetual state of grief which you know i was not ready to embody that.
00:30:38 --> 00:30:43 However, that's, it's a powerful cultural stereotype, you know,
00:30:43 --> 00:30:49 and so when my friend about a year after Seth died said, do you want to meet a guy?
00:30:50 --> 00:30:52 I was kind of like, you know, is this allowed?
00:30:52 --> 00:30:56 Like, what is the norm here and what is acceptable?
00:30:56 --> 00:31:04 And, you know, I quickly decided not to care about that and went out for coffee with this guy.
00:31:04 --> 00:31:10 And, you know, Now, even he's another professor at MIT, actually,
00:31:10 --> 00:31:13 and we had chemistry. He's actually a chemistry professor.
00:31:15 --> 00:31:21 Yeah, but we went very slowly. And our first couple dates, our first more than
00:31:21 --> 00:31:25 a couple dates, I felt like I was doing something illicit.
00:31:25 --> 00:31:30 I just felt like I was violating my marriage vows with Seth.
00:31:30 --> 00:31:32 Like who was I what am I
00:31:32 --> 00:31:37 doing with another person like in some kind of romantic situation that's not
00:31:37 --> 00:31:42 allowed and at the beginning I would just kind of look around to see if anybody
00:31:42 --> 00:31:51 was watching us I mean I honestly felt like this there I was doing something wrong and mostly,
00:31:51 --> 00:31:58 after that I just didn't want my kids to feel like their father was in any way being replaced,
00:31:59 --> 00:32:02 So we just went very slowly.
00:32:02 --> 00:32:09 And, you know, I think it was like at least six or nine months after we were
00:32:09 --> 00:32:13 dating, we finally got he has a daughter six months older than my daughter.
00:32:13 --> 00:32:18 And we took all the girls to see Pitch Perfect 2. That was like our way of meeting.
00:32:20 --> 00:32:24 You know, they were really interested in her more than they were interested in him.
00:32:24 --> 00:32:29 And I think, you know, on some level, they were happy that I was dating someone
00:32:29 --> 00:32:33 because it took the pressure off them on taking care of me.
00:32:33 --> 00:32:38 You know, there's somebody else who could take care of me. And so five years
00:32:38 --> 00:32:40 after Seth died, we married.
00:32:40 --> 00:32:46 I remarried and, you know, blended family and kind of amazing.
00:32:46 --> 00:32:52 Like the girls are all doing their thing, but they call each other sisters and,
00:32:52 --> 00:32:55 you know, they're staring a bathroom.
00:32:55 --> 00:33:01 It's not always easy, but we, you know, put a lot of work into it and, and made it work.
00:33:01 --> 00:33:06 So again, you know, back to this idea, my daughter, the day her father died,
00:33:06 --> 00:33:08 said to me, are we ever going to be happy again?
00:33:09 --> 00:33:16 And I said to her, yes, But I completely didn't believe it. I really thought they were doomed.
00:33:16 --> 00:33:21 I didn't think children could recover from this kind of loss and especially
00:33:21 --> 00:33:27 the suicide part, which, again, remains so incomprehensible. But they did.
00:33:27 --> 00:33:31 And now they're both in college. They have fairly healthy relationships.
00:33:32 --> 00:33:36 They have passions. They, you know, fight for their causes.
00:33:36 --> 00:33:43 And again, the sort of miraculous phenomenon of life going on.
00:33:43 --> 00:33:47 Yeah, it's an incredibly personal book.
00:33:48 --> 00:33:59 So, did Finding Love Again help with, was that kind of a support and was writing
00:33:59 --> 00:34:02 the book kind of a support for you? Yeah.
00:34:02 --> 00:34:09 Well, you know, I didn't want to end the book with my second marriage to Moonji
00:34:09 --> 00:34:17 Bowendi because I really didn't want this sort of cliche of like, oh, I remarried.
00:34:17 --> 00:34:20 So problem solved, because obviously it doesn't work that way.
00:34:21 --> 00:34:26 Did it take the edge off to have a new partner who I could talk to and vent
00:34:26 --> 00:34:29 to and, you know, just share with?
00:34:29 --> 00:34:31 Yes, of course it helped.
00:34:33 --> 00:34:36 But there was so much more beyond that.
00:34:37 --> 00:34:41 And what really helped is like, you know, just because somebody dies,
00:34:41 --> 00:34:43 it doesn't mean your relationship with them ends, right?
00:34:43 --> 00:34:48 It just shifts dramatically. And so the last chapter of the book,
00:34:48 --> 00:34:55 which you'll if you get to the end, is about, you know, five years after he
00:34:55 --> 00:34:58 dies, I couldn't deal with getting rid of his clothes.
00:34:59 --> 00:35:04 So his all of his clothes were, you know, put in the basement in garbage bags.
00:35:04 --> 00:35:07 And so finally, I had to sell my house.
00:35:07 --> 00:35:12 And the kids went through his clothes in those garbage bags.
00:35:12 --> 00:35:16 And they just loved they were like, Oh, these are so cool.
00:35:16 --> 00:35:19 And like, I'm going to make crop tops out of these t shirts.
00:35:19 --> 00:35:21 And they took this whole bag of socks.
00:35:21 --> 00:35:26 And soon I found like all of Seth's clothes around the house,
00:35:26 --> 00:35:28 like part of the rotation.
00:35:28 --> 00:35:32 And there'd be, you know, there they are wearing them as pajamas.
00:35:32 --> 00:35:38 And, and so like, just this sort of metaphor of him, his presence being still
00:35:38 --> 00:35:41 around us is how the book ends.
00:35:42 --> 00:35:49 So, yeah, it's about my coming to terms with my relationship with him and how
00:35:49 --> 00:35:53 he's still, you know, how his presence remains. domains.
00:35:53 --> 00:35:58 And in terms of writing the book, I mean, people ask, was it like therapy writing the book?
00:35:58 --> 00:36:07 And, you know, I think all memoirists have to either struggle with it or just forced to think about,
00:36:07 --> 00:36:11 you know, what is the difference between, you know, dumping my feelings in a
00:36:11 --> 00:36:14 journal and writing a book that's a memoir.
00:36:14 --> 00:36:20 And there's a huge difference because in a memoir, in a book, you have after you.
00:36:20 --> 00:36:25 Create like a narrative arc. You have to make yourself a character and you have
00:36:25 --> 00:36:28 to make all of the people in your world characters.
00:36:28 --> 00:36:32 You have to decide what details to include and what not to include.
00:36:33 --> 00:36:40 And you have to make it into a compelling story. And so this book was not therapy for me.
00:36:40 --> 00:36:47 But on the other hand, I've come to think of the process over 10 years as like
00:36:47 --> 00:36:51 me developing a story I can live with.
00:36:51 --> 00:36:54 And I think of that really as
00:36:54 --> 00:37:00 a major part of grief. Like we have to come to a story we can live with.
00:37:00 --> 00:37:04 I mean, here's this person who your brain thinks you're going to wake up with
00:37:04 --> 00:37:09 again the next day because you've woken up with them for 15 years.
00:37:09 --> 00:37:14 And then suddenly they're not there. And how does your brain make sense of that?
00:37:14 --> 00:37:22 So I think more than therapy, the book is making sense of a story or a critical
00:37:22 --> 00:37:27 character in the story is no longer there. Yeah.
00:37:27 --> 00:37:33 So, Rachel, you know, this is a political show, so I got to ask you a political question.
00:37:33 --> 00:37:39 What should government do to increase support for individuals and families that
00:37:39 --> 00:37:44 are struggling with mental illness and or grief from losing a loved one?
00:37:44 --> 00:37:50 That's an excellent question. I mean, you know, we talk about parity in terms
00:37:50 --> 00:37:54 of mental and physical health, but we are so not there.
00:37:54 --> 00:38:02 I mean, there was a large increase in mental health issues, you know,
00:38:02 --> 00:38:07 before the pandemic, but the pandemic made things even worse, right? Right.
00:38:07 --> 00:38:14 And the wait time to find a therapist, the accessibility and affordability of
00:38:14 --> 00:38:18 mental health providers is terrible in this country.
00:38:19 --> 00:38:23 And, you know, you don't have to be suicidal to need a therapist.
00:38:23 --> 00:38:29 I mean, a friend of mine is like, we should all have we should all have someone we can talk to.
00:38:30 --> 00:38:36 You know, isn't necessarily a family member who could help us organize the complexity
00:38:36 --> 00:38:42 and unfairness and, you know, twists and turns of life.
00:38:42 --> 00:38:48 And so I think government can make mental health providers more accessible.
00:38:49 --> 00:38:51 They can reimburse them. I
00:38:51 --> 00:38:56 mean, try to find a therapist who takes your insurance, who has openings,
00:38:57 --> 00:39:02 and who you, you know, feel is professional enough to, you know,
00:39:02 --> 00:39:07 and skilled enough to deal with your particular issue. It is not easy.
00:39:07 --> 00:39:15 So anything government can do to subsidize and train and support more mental
00:39:15 --> 00:39:19 health providers so that that they are easily accessible,
00:39:19 --> 00:39:25 I think would go a long way in helping people get the support they need.
00:39:25 --> 00:39:32 And also, you know, education, I still think there is stigma in reaching out for help.
00:39:32 --> 00:39:36 As much as we talk about everything online, and we are all open books,
00:39:36 --> 00:39:42 because we're all over social media, there is still a sense of shame in reaching out for help.
00:39:42 --> 00:39:47 And, you know, as I've told to my kids, if there's one lesson out of all of
00:39:47 --> 00:39:51 this is it is not a sign of weakness to ask for help. It's a sign of strength.
00:39:52 --> 00:39:56 Right. And, you know, I'm not going to put you in the box. This is my editorial.
00:39:58 --> 00:40:05 We have a political figure that's out there that obviously does not get that
00:40:05 --> 00:40:12 memo that any kind of failure, any kind of weakness, any kind of failure is a sign of weakness.
00:40:12 --> 00:40:19 And And if nothing else, that's why I do not support that particular individual,
00:40:19 --> 00:40:23 let alone when we get into politics. Nor do I. For many, many reasons.
00:40:23 --> 00:40:29 You know, a lack of compassion and empathy and a sense of, you know,
00:40:29 --> 00:40:33 helping anybody but himself. Yes.
00:40:33 --> 00:40:37 I mean, let's not. I could do a whole nother series on that,
00:40:37 --> 00:40:38 but I am with you on that one.
00:40:39 --> 00:40:44 Yeah. So September is Suicide Prevention Month.
00:40:44 --> 00:40:49 How do you believe us after can be an asset to those efforts?
00:40:50 --> 00:40:55 Well, as I mentioned, I really hope that it is a point to start conversations
00:40:55 --> 00:40:57 among people and families.
00:40:57 --> 00:41:02 And one reason I included so many details about my personal situation was,
00:41:02 --> 00:41:07 you know, almost like an invitation that it's OK if you don't feel perfect.
00:41:07 --> 00:41:11 If your marriage isn't perfect, if you yell at your kids once in a while,
00:41:11 --> 00:41:13 like, it's not your fault.
00:41:13 --> 00:41:16 People suffer for all kinds of reasons.
00:41:17 --> 00:41:20 And, and we try to do the best we can, but,
00:41:21 --> 00:41:26 Life happens. And so I hope this can be, you know, part of the conversation
00:41:26 --> 00:41:32 on how we get help, how it's okay to ask for help, and how we support,
00:41:32 --> 00:41:35 you know, the people we love when they need help.
00:41:35 --> 00:41:42 And I will say, you know, obviously, the material in the book can be triggering to people.
00:41:42 --> 00:41:48 And, you know, for anybody who needs help, there is help available.
00:41:48 --> 00:41:53 You can call or text 988, which is the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.
00:41:54 --> 00:41:59 And they can provide all kinds of resources, free groups, free counseling,
00:41:59 --> 00:42:03 but you have to reach them and make the call. Yeah.
00:42:03 --> 00:42:08 And I'm glad you pointed that out. One of the things I want to say from a personal
00:42:08 --> 00:42:14 standpoint is I have been dealing with depression since 2009.
00:42:15 --> 00:42:23 And I know that I am different than I was prior to being diagnosed.
00:42:23 --> 00:42:25 And all the things I was going through.
00:42:26 --> 00:42:33 One of the things that your book reinforced in me is that if I ever thought
00:42:33 --> 00:42:38 about going down this path, there's going to be people impacted.
00:42:38 --> 00:42:45 I remember that movie, It's a Wonderful Life, and not all of us are going to
00:42:45 --> 00:42:49 have that friendly spirit that's going to take us around and show us what will happen.
00:42:49 --> 00:42:54 You know what I'm saying? So it's like your book, if nothing else,
00:42:54 --> 00:42:57 gives people a perspective.
00:42:57 --> 00:43:07 It's like, this is what happens with people or what could happen with people if you decide to do that.
00:43:08 --> 00:43:13 Or if you know somebody that's thinking about doing that, you can say, hey, look. Right.
00:43:13 --> 00:43:17 So if nothing else, go ahead. Yeah.
00:43:17 --> 00:43:24 No, I wanted just to add to that, which is, you know, some of the researchers I talked to it,
00:43:24 --> 00:43:30 this grip of single mindedness in which you feel, you know, like you're in a
00:43:30 --> 00:43:37 burning building and you have no other choice but to jump that moment could pass and can pass.
00:43:37 --> 00:43:44 And so if there's a way to sort of ride it out, in other words,
00:43:44 --> 00:43:50 if you do have coping skills and you can talk to yourself and say, it is bad now,
00:43:50 --> 00:43:53 but it's like weather, it will pass.
00:43:54 --> 00:43:59 Like if you can get yourself out of that crisis moment and, you know, some people can't.
00:43:59 --> 00:44:07 But if you have the tools and have practice, sometimes you can move out of that
00:44:07 --> 00:44:10 suicidal, you know, tunnel vision mindset.
00:44:12 --> 00:44:15 And get out of harm's way.
00:44:15 --> 00:44:19 And people who have survived suicide attempts talk about that.
00:44:20 --> 00:44:23 Like, in that moment, I thought there was no other choice, but for whatever
00:44:23 --> 00:44:26 reason, that moment passed, and I'm glad that it did.
00:44:26 --> 00:44:34 So, you know, just having perspective that that moments of pain pass,
00:44:34 --> 00:44:37 which is not I mean, it's much easier said than done.
00:44:37 --> 00:44:43 But it's a it's a good awareness to try to internalize. Yeah.
00:44:44 --> 00:44:49 So if people want to get the book, if people want to reach out to you, how can they do that?
00:44:49 --> 00:44:54 Well, you can totally find all my all the information on my website,
00:44:54 --> 00:44:56 which is Rachel Zimmerman dot net.
00:44:56 --> 00:45:00 The book is available on Amazon, from independent bookstores,
00:45:00 --> 00:45:05 Target, you know, wherever books are sold, Audible, Kindle, any form.
00:45:06 --> 00:45:11 But if you want to write to me, go through my website. And I would I I love
00:45:11 --> 00:45:17 to talk about this stuff with with anybody who's available to listen.
00:45:18 --> 00:45:22 Rachel Zimmerman, it has been an honor to have you to come on.
00:45:22 --> 00:45:25 And again, I appreciate you writing this book.
00:45:26 --> 00:45:30 More importantly, I appreciate the strength and the courage that it took for
00:45:30 --> 00:45:36 you to go on this journey and to do this and to use the skill set that you have
00:45:36 --> 00:45:39 been given to make that so.
00:45:39 --> 00:45:42 So I hope that people go out and get it,
00:45:42 --> 00:45:49 and I hope that your voice resonates throughout the community as far as helping
00:45:49 --> 00:45:54 people get through that personal grief that they're dealing with.
00:45:54 --> 00:45:57 So I appreciate the service that you've rendered in this book.
00:45:58 --> 00:46:03 Eric, thank you so much for having me on. I really appreciate the thoughtful
00:46:03 --> 00:46:05 questions. Thank you so much.
00:46:05 --> 00:46:24 Music.
00:46:27 --> 00:46:34 All right. And we are back. And so now it's time for my next guest, Michelle DeLeon.
00:46:34 --> 00:46:43 Michelle DeLeon is the founder and CEO of World Afro Day, the 15th of September,
00:46:43 --> 00:46:48 a global day of celebration and liberation of Afro hair and identity with an
00:46:48 --> 00:46:52 estimated reach of 1.5 billion people.
00:46:53 --> 00:47:00 Michelle successfully combines her broadcasting career of 20 years with leading World Afro Day CIC.
00:47:01 --> 00:47:07 She has overcome her own struggles with Afro hair and was inspired by her eight-year-old
00:47:07 --> 00:47:09 daughter to set up the day of celebration.
00:47:09 --> 00:47:16 Since 2017, her work has influenced the UN, UK government, global brands,
00:47:16 --> 00:47:19 international media, and major celebrities.
00:47:19 --> 00:47:23 Key highlights are the Workplace Hair Acceptance Report of 2023,
00:47:24 --> 00:47:32 contributing to the EHRC 2022 guidelines to prevent hair discrimination in schools,
00:47:32 --> 00:47:36 and a speech at the United Nations in Geneva in 2018.
00:47:37 --> 00:47:41 Ladies and gentlemen, it's my distinct honor and privilege to have as a guest
00:47:41 --> 00:47:44 on this podcast, Michelle DeLeon.
00:47:43 --> 00:47:53 Music.
00:47:55 --> 00:48:00 All right michelle de leon did i pronounce that right,
00:48:01 --> 00:48:08 de leon okay all right michelle de leon how you doing sister you doing good
00:48:08 --> 00:48:14 i am i'm really a kind of excited to be on your show well that's good,
00:48:15 --> 00:48:19 yeah first time i've had somebody say they're excited it's like you know most
00:48:19 --> 00:48:22 of the time They're like, oh, I'm honored to be on and all that.
00:48:23 --> 00:48:26 You're the first one to actually say excited. So that's good. That's good.
00:48:28 --> 00:48:34 So you caught my attention on LinkedIn with this, this activity,
00:48:34 --> 00:48:38 this celebration that you do called world Afro day.
00:48:38 --> 00:48:43 And I felt that it was kind of relevant because there's been a movement here
00:48:43 --> 00:48:47 in the United States to do that. So for the audience, I,
00:48:48 --> 00:48:53 Ms. DeLeon is a citizen of the United Kingdom.
00:48:54 --> 00:48:58 She is not a U.S. citizen. This is not the first time I've had somebody from
00:48:58 --> 00:48:59 the United Kingdom on the show.
00:49:00 --> 00:49:02 And I've actually been on some podcasts in the United Kingdom.
00:49:03 --> 00:49:09 But I want to clarify that this sister is across the water doing this kind of activism.
00:49:10 --> 00:49:13 So I'm really, really honored because I know it's a time difference.
00:49:14 --> 00:49:16 I'm really, really honored that you took the time to do this.
00:49:16 --> 00:49:22 So let me go ahead and get started. And how I like to start off an interview is with a quote.
00:49:23 --> 00:49:26 So this is your quote. Trust the process.
00:49:27 --> 00:49:35 Embrace the journey. Just like our natural hair, life unfolds in its own beautiful and unique way.
00:49:35 --> 00:49:41 The twist, turns, and growth are all part of the masterpiece that is you.
00:49:42 --> 00:49:43 What does that quote mean to you?
00:49:44 --> 00:49:48 Oh, that's a bit of a surprise. I'm like, oh, when did I say that? How did I say that?
00:49:48 --> 00:49:58 It just means that this journey of embracing our hair and expressing our hair
00:49:58 --> 00:50:03 in all of its forms, in all spheres of our life,
00:50:03 --> 00:50:09 takes on all these twists and turns because there's no straightforward path.
00:50:09 --> 00:50:12 Like since I've been doing World Aphrodite there
00:50:12 --> 00:50:18 is no master plan there's no one I can go to there's no mentor to say how do
00:50:18 --> 00:50:23 you change the world how do you make the world see the light there isn't a map
00:50:23 --> 00:50:30 so I've had to grow it organically figure it out organically.
00:50:31 --> 00:50:37 Yeah. So what is World Afro Day and what was the motivation behind the celebration?
00:50:38 --> 00:50:44 So World Afro Day is a global celebration and liberation of Afro hair and identity.
00:50:44 --> 00:50:48 It's not just about the way that our hair looks.
00:50:48 --> 00:50:54 It's about the freedom that goes with our hair. It's very much about celebration and liberation.
00:50:54 --> 00:50:57 They are linked. linked and the inspiration
00:50:57 --> 00:51:02 was my having a daughter myself and not
00:51:02 --> 00:51:05 wanting her to experience my similar hair
00:51:05 --> 00:51:08 journey to me wanting her to be free completely you
00:51:08 --> 00:51:14 know never go through the struggle never go through the chemicals never go through
00:51:14 --> 00:51:20 the inferiority complex and having a real I had a master plan for her very clear
00:51:20 --> 00:51:25 that I wanted her to love embrace grace and be free to express her hair.
00:51:26 --> 00:51:30 Now, unless she lives in a bubble, I'm going to have to address the outside world.
00:51:31 --> 00:51:39 I can put in her, infuse in her, raise her with all the love and care and attention
00:51:39 --> 00:51:44 that I possibly can, but she still needs to go out into the real world.
00:51:44 --> 00:51:50 And I was aware that the real world would not reflect that necessarily back
00:51:50 --> 00:51:58 to her so yeah i i really wanted the world to be different for her and for her
00:51:58 --> 00:52:03 whole generation yeah so from my research.
00:52:04 --> 00:52:10 It seemed like she was singing one day, and that's what kind of got you into
00:52:10 --> 00:52:18 the mold to say, yeah, we ought to do a celebration about our hair and what it means.
00:52:19 --> 00:52:23 Yeah, I mean, she reached a pinnacle at a young age.
00:52:23 --> 00:52:27 I think she was eight years old, and it was early morning.
00:52:27 --> 00:52:34 She was in the bathroom. She was actually praising God for having Afro hair.
00:52:34 --> 00:52:37 She was saying she was a princess and saying she was grateful.
00:52:38 --> 00:52:46 Those three things are so symbolic of what we've lost that she was actually
00:52:46 --> 00:52:53 expressing in such an exuberant, free way. I questioned what I was hearing.
00:52:53 --> 00:52:55 I couldn't. It was just so wonderful.
00:52:56 --> 00:52:59 I was like, wow, what is she singing?
00:53:00 --> 00:53:05 And I just felt so inspired by what she was singing.
00:53:05 --> 00:53:10 But also I had, it was like a, it was a God moment where I was like,
00:53:10 --> 00:53:11 she can't be the only one.
00:53:12 --> 00:53:16 She must be, I want millions.
00:53:16 --> 00:53:21 I want to hear what she was singing. in, I wanted to hear that echoed across the world.
00:53:21 --> 00:53:29 I suddenly went from being a mother of one child to feeling this motherly love
00:53:29 --> 00:53:34 for hundreds, because there's hundreds of millions of us. There's a billion of us.
00:53:34 --> 00:53:39 And I literally went from, I'm just living my life with my child,
00:53:39 --> 00:53:43 raising my child to, but what about all the other children on the planet?
00:53:43 --> 00:53:49 And it literally was like And then I went from what about all the other children to women,
00:53:49 --> 00:53:57 women my age, adult women who I knew were struggling, who I knew were saying
00:53:57 --> 00:53:59 the opposite things to what I was hearing.
00:53:59 --> 00:54:03 They were saying all the negative stuff. They were saying the struggle.
00:54:03 --> 00:54:06 They were saying, I don't want this hair. I don't like this hair.
00:54:06 --> 00:54:07 This hair is not the good hair.
00:54:07 --> 00:54:09 I want somebody else's hair.
00:54:10 --> 00:54:16 So I had the high of what my daughter was singing about. And then I had that contrast of both.
00:54:17 --> 00:54:21 There are so many people who don't feel like that. There are so many people who are struggling.
00:54:22 --> 00:54:25 How do I get the struggle into celebration?
00:54:25 --> 00:54:30 I often say World Afro Day was about turning struggle into celebration.
00:54:31 --> 00:54:35 So why do you commemorate September 15th?
00:54:36 --> 00:54:40 What is the significance of that day to make that World Afro Day?
00:54:40 --> 00:54:45 Yeah, so this is the core American connection, I think, with World Afro Day.
00:54:45 --> 00:54:57 That for many people, celebrating our hair seems fickle or frivolous or superficial or surface or cosmetic.
00:54:58 --> 00:55:04 But anyone who really knows our story knows that the hair story is as deep as
00:55:04 --> 00:55:06 it goes, really, in terms of loss,
00:55:07 --> 00:55:13 in terms of devastation, in terms of our own self-image and identity and worth.
00:55:14 --> 00:55:18 So I wanted the date because I knew it was a serious day.
00:55:19 --> 00:55:23 I knew I wanted to have serious impact. The date had to mean something.
00:55:23 --> 00:55:27 So someone couldn't just dismiss it. Oh, you're just having a bit of fun. It's another day.
00:55:28 --> 00:55:33 And then I searched for a while. What date?
00:55:33 --> 00:55:36 What date can I use for this momentum?
00:55:37 --> 00:55:40 What date can I use for this movement? What will have significance.
00:55:40 --> 00:55:45 And in America, September 15th, in 2016,
00:55:45 --> 00:55:51 the state of Alabama passed a law against AHA, against dreadlocks,
00:55:52 --> 00:55:57 against having dreadlocks in the workplace, against being promoted with dreadlocks.
00:55:57 --> 00:56:03 And I thought, this is the 21st century, 2016, and we are the only people on
00:56:03 --> 00:56:04 on the planet who have laws.
00:56:05 --> 00:56:10 People have decided to create laws to inhibit our.
00:56:11 --> 00:56:16 Economic progress and our well-being. And I was outraged.
00:56:16 --> 00:56:21 I was outraged that this could be put into law against our hair.
00:56:21 --> 00:56:27 The struggle was already there, but they've enshrined that in a law that you're
00:56:27 --> 00:56:34 going to make our hair a disadvantage, an allowable point of discrimination. What a step backwards.
00:56:34 --> 00:56:39 So I was outraged. And I thought that date is the date.
00:56:39 --> 00:56:43 That date, because i want to do something to
00:56:43 --> 00:56:46 turn this is again this turn in the history
00:56:46 --> 00:56:49 turn in the struggle into something positive
00:56:49 --> 00:56:55 so yes you've done that law but look what i'm gonna do with this date yeah and
00:56:55 --> 00:57:07 and there was also a court case where a young lady lost her job because Because she had dreadlocks,
00:57:07 --> 00:57:12 and the company said that she couldn't keep those if she wanted to stay.
00:57:12 --> 00:57:17 That's the court case. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, the civil people took that and lost.
00:57:18 --> 00:57:27 Yeah, yeah. And so that's been, and that kind of spurred a movement in the United
00:57:27 --> 00:57:33 States as far as laws go. But before I do that, I want to touch on a couple of things.
00:57:34 --> 00:57:39 The word texturism, can you define that for the audience?
00:57:39 --> 00:57:51 Texturism is a hierarchical system of looking at looser, mixed hair types.
00:57:41 --> 00:57:54 Music.
00:57:51 --> 00:57:59 Less coiled hair types as a better standard, a better quality,
00:57:59 --> 00:58:05 more beautiful, more aspirational than tighter, coiler hair.
00:58:07 --> 00:58:09 Yeah. And that kind of goes back to...
00:58:11 --> 00:58:15 This movie one of my favorite movies school days right
00:58:15 --> 00:58:17 where they had it
00:58:17 --> 00:58:22 was they had a musical part they had several musical parts in the show in the
00:58:22 --> 00:58:29 movie but one of them was this whole thing about good and bad hair and you had
00:58:29 --> 00:58:34 to had the sisters that were like in sororities and all this stuff you know
00:58:34 --> 00:58:37 talking about you know good hair and talking about the sisters that were more
00:58:37 --> 00:58:40 Afro centric and criticizing them.
00:58:40 --> 00:58:44 And it was a good back and forth. It was kind of funny and entertaining in a
00:58:44 --> 00:58:50 way, but the reason why it was put in the movie was to highlight the fact that
00:58:50 --> 00:58:52 that is a struggle within the African diaspora.
00:58:54 --> 00:58:59 Especially here in America about, you know, good and bad hair,
00:58:59 --> 00:59:02 you know, and I think, uh, what's his name?
00:59:03 --> 00:59:09 Chris rock, I think, did a whole documentary about the whole industry that's
00:59:09 --> 00:59:14 based off of people trying to get their hair a certain way so they'll fit in
00:59:14 --> 00:59:19 and avoid this texturism that we all experience.
00:59:21 --> 00:59:26 A historian once stated that the dominant race established societal norms.
00:59:27 --> 00:59:30 Any deviation from those norms were labeled as unacceptable.
00:59:30 --> 00:59:36 It's a historical legacy of oppression and policing black decisions.
00:59:37 --> 00:59:45 So you agree with that statement, right? Yeah, we're dealing with a historical
00:59:45 --> 00:59:50 system of categorizing hair that has never shifted.
00:59:50 --> 00:59:54 And I mean, we're only really starting to shift it now.
00:59:54 --> 01:00:00 I mean, because of our own conformity and our own...
01:00:02 --> 01:00:07 Our own conditioning to see our own hair type is less. We haven't even tried
01:00:07 --> 01:00:09 to change it. We didn't. Maybe we haven't tried to change it.
01:00:09 --> 01:00:17 I mean, the 60s and 70s was a moment, was a decade or 15 years.
01:00:18 --> 01:00:22 But what were we trying to do? I don't know how much change they were.
01:00:22 --> 01:00:28 We were expressing ourselves, but we weren't changing the systems that created
01:00:28 --> 01:00:31 that. We weren't actually changing systems.
01:00:32 --> 01:00:35 And then I often laugh because that's my dad's generation.
01:00:36 --> 01:00:40 I said, what happened to your generation? Because you then raised us and we
01:00:40 --> 01:00:43 all just, we all went to jerry curl and relaxes. What happened?
01:00:44 --> 01:00:49 You know, you were the parents that rocked the Afros. You were the parents that
01:00:49 --> 01:00:51 black is beautiful. You were those parents.
01:00:52 --> 01:00:56 And then you brought us up and we were in the jerry curl and the perm.
01:00:56 --> 01:01:00 So what happened? It didn't, I don't know why.
01:01:01 --> 01:01:04 It didn't have the the roots weren't deep enough
01:01:04 --> 01:01:08 yeah you know because it was
01:01:08 --> 01:01:11 like i i had i had an afro when
01:01:11 --> 01:01:14 i had hair uh and i even
01:01:14 --> 01:01:19 had a blowout you know because one of my favorite baseball players it was so
01:01:19 --> 01:01:24 cool he was cuban and he had this giant afro and he would stick that cap on
01:01:24 --> 01:01:27 and the afro would just pop out and then when he was running after the ball
01:01:27 --> 01:01:32 you know the cap Kappa fly off and you see this Afro waving in the wind as he's
01:01:32 --> 01:01:33 tracking down a fly ball and all that.
01:01:34 --> 01:01:37 And I just thought that was cool. And I said, well, let me get me a blowout, too.
01:01:37 --> 01:01:39 And then I played one game and that hair was blowing my eyes.
01:01:39 --> 01:01:43 I said, no, I'm not going to be able to do that. Not the blowout part.
01:01:43 --> 01:01:47 But, you know, I it was like that was that was a thing growing up.
01:01:47 --> 01:01:51 I'm of that age where, yeah, we were rocking Afros and all that.
01:01:51 --> 01:01:56 And, you know, the iconic images of Angela Davis, you know, and that was that
01:01:56 --> 01:01:58 was her symbol of defiance.
01:01:58 --> 01:02:02 To the system wearing that Afro is like, yeah, you know, that,
01:02:02 --> 01:02:05 and even, even now, right.
01:02:06 --> 01:02:14 When young brothers see a sister with an afro, they're attracted to her in a
01:02:14 --> 01:02:17 certain way because it exudes power, right?
01:02:19 --> 01:02:24 So, yeah, let's talk about that. Or not attracted to her because it exudes power.
01:02:25 --> 01:02:30 Well, yeah, now that's a thing too. But let's talk about the power of hair.
01:02:30 --> 01:02:39 How does that power impact our struggle or our quest for self-determination?
01:02:40 --> 01:02:44 The power of hair, it's just, it's a legacy.
01:02:45 --> 01:02:52 It's a generational thing. The power of hair has to be instilled in as early as possible.
01:02:52 --> 01:02:57 Because when you instill it in early, it can't be taken away. way.
01:02:57 --> 01:03:01 So when I've instilled it in my daughter, that is her roots.
01:03:01 --> 01:03:09 So as she navigates the system, her roots are already embedded in her hair, is a strength.
01:03:09 --> 01:03:14 So it doesn't matter what's coming at her externally, it can't shift that because
01:03:14 --> 01:03:18 that's a root, that a part of who she is, that my hair is a strength.
01:03:18 --> 01:03:22 So no matter what you're saying externally, you can't change that.
01:03:22 --> 01:03:27 So power first comes internally.
01:03:27 --> 01:03:32 The power of hair first comes internally before you see it.
01:03:32 --> 01:03:39 So if you can embed that internally, that relationship, and there's a spiritual
01:03:39 --> 01:03:46 part of it that as African people, we had a very strong spiritual connection with our hair.
01:03:46 --> 01:03:52 And we actually had a very sense of being blessed to have this hair type.
01:03:53 --> 01:03:59 And if you do not feel grateful and you do not feel blessed,
01:03:59 --> 01:04:01 you don't have any power.
01:04:02 --> 01:04:09 Yeah, one of the early Bible stories growing up that appealed to a lot of us,
01:04:10 --> 01:04:15 consciously and subconsciously, really was the story of Samson, right?
01:04:15 --> 01:04:20 Because his strength was connected with his hair, and when he was tricked to
01:04:20 --> 01:04:26 getting his hair cut, he lost his strength, he lost his powers, even his identity.
01:04:26 --> 01:04:30 And and so a lot
01:04:30 --> 01:04:33 of us related to that you
01:04:33 --> 01:04:40 know and with not even fully understanding the historical context of it and
01:04:40 --> 01:04:46 then we started learning about the slave trade and how the minute that the slaves
01:04:46 --> 01:04:52 are brought on american shores that they were all it didn't matter male or female young or old,
01:04:52 --> 01:04:59 they all got their hair shaven because the traitors knew that they knew enough
01:04:59 --> 01:05:04 where they knew that certain hairstyles identified certain groups.
01:05:04 --> 01:05:11 And if people saw somebody with a similar hairstyle, they might get together.
01:05:11 --> 01:05:14 They might collude to rebel or whatever the case may be.
01:05:14 --> 01:05:18 So they they made sure that they cut their hair so nobody could really identify
01:05:18 --> 01:05:20 who was who. You know what I'm saying?
01:05:21 --> 01:05:26 So, you know, I think it's really, really important for us to understand this
01:05:26 --> 01:05:29 and not try to trivialize it.
01:05:29 --> 01:05:35 And I'm going to get to that in this question coming up because I want to state some facts.
01:05:35 --> 01:05:42 So as of now in the United States, we've got 25 that have passed some version
01:05:42 --> 01:05:44 of what we call the Crown Act.
01:05:44 --> 01:05:50 And Crown stands for create a respectful and open workplace for natural hair.
01:05:51 --> 01:05:56 There's been two attempts say that again open world,
01:05:57 --> 01:06:02 oh okay open world okay because it's like the definition I pulled up it said
01:06:02 --> 01:06:07 workplace but you know Americans we're capitalistic people you know so it's all about jobs.
01:06:08 --> 01:06:16 It's all about jobs for us we're not dealing with this esoteric you know broad
01:06:16 --> 01:06:19 vision it's like you know It's the open workplace.
01:06:19 --> 01:06:23 It's a job. We're trying to make sure we get paid, right? Yeah.
01:06:27 --> 01:06:31 There's been a couple of attempts at the federal level to do it in our National
01:06:31 --> 01:06:35 Congress, and it's gotten out of the House, but it hasn't,
01:06:36 --> 01:06:42 made it through the Senate for whatever reason. And even though we have 25 states
01:06:42 --> 01:06:46 that have passed it, two significant things.
01:06:46 --> 01:06:54 One, 43% of black women still live in states where they are vulnerable to hair based discrimination.
01:06:56 --> 01:07:02 And we've had, we had a case that was very high profile right when we were trying
01:07:02 --> 01:07:06 to coordinate when you were going to come on this, This young man named Daryl George,
01:07:07 --> 01:07:15 I believe, he's been banned from his high school in Texas because he his his
01:07:15 --> 01:07:17 hair didn't conform to the school district.
01:07:18 --> 01:07:24 And Texas, ironically, which was kind of surprised me, had actually was one
01:07:24 --> 01:07:26 of the states that had passed a Crown Act law.
01:07:27 --> 01:07:32 But the school got around it because they said, well, no, we're not against the style.
01:07:33 --> 01:07:38 It's the length of the hair. Right. And so when they asked the state representative
01:07:38 --> 01:07:42 who wrote the bill, they said, well, did you consider length?
01:07:42 --> 01:07:45 And he said, well, if you understood the hairstyle, you understood that length
01:07:45 --> 01:07:50 was part of it, you know, so we didn't put that in the legislation.
01:07:51 --> 01:07:57 So that gave the judge the room to say, well, you know, the school district
01:07:57 --> 01:08:00 didn't violate the law because it was about length and not about style.
01:08:00 --> 01:08:03 And so this young man can't go to that school anymore.
01:08:04 --> 01:08:09 So what do you think? Huh? It's been a very sad case because we were,
01:08:09 --> 01:08:12 you know, we've been aware and watching it.
01:08:12 --> 01:08:17 And, you know, you always play in your mind. Well, how would that work in our
01:08:17 --> 01:08:19 country? What would be happening here?
01:08:20 --> 01:08:23 So you know and in both ways it's
01:08:23 --> 01:08:26 happened in our country where children have been.
01:08:24 --> 01:08:32 Music.
01:08:26 --> 01:08:30 Forced to leave a school because of length and style
01:08:30 --> 01:08:33 but you've also had judges backing
01:08:33 --> 01:08:37 um a black boy's right to wear cornrows
01:08:37 --> 01:08:39 to school so we had we've had both sides of it
01:08:39 --> 01:08:43 so you you you decided and
01:08:43 --> 01:08:46 And this was all leading up to you recently
01:08:46 --> 01:08:50 decided this year prior to the
01:08:50 --> 01:08:54 World Afro Day celebration to have
01:08:54 --> 01:09:01 some a member of parliament actually introduce legislation or actually amend
01:09:01 --> 01:09:10 the 2010 Equality Act to to make Afro hair protected characteristic. Characteristic.
01:09:11 --> 01:09:17 Talk about that camp because it was pretty cool how you did it. It was like a hundred.
01:09:18 --> 01:09:22 It was like, was it a hundred voices, a hundred words campaign kind of talk
01:09:22 --> 01:09:29 about the whole thing that that the campaign and what y'all were trying to do.
01:09:30 --> 01:09:35 Yeah. So we've been on the journey of World Afro Day for eight years.
01:09:35 --> 01:09:40 And it's not like the law was never in my eyeline.
01:09:40 --> 01:09:44 It was, but the timing had to be right.
01:09:44 --> 01:09:47 And I also, the evidence had to be there.
01:09:47 --> 01:09:53 So what's happened in eight years, there's been multiple reports,
01:09:53 --> 01:09:57 multiple sets of research, not just my own.
01:09:57 --> 01:10:02 So as my own organization, I make sure I commission report after report after
01:10:02 --> 01:10:08 report, but also other people were creating UK-based research because a lot
01:10:08 --> 01:10:11 of it has been previously American-based research.
01:10:11 --> 01:10:15 So we've had time to build up our own body of evidence and research.
01:10:15 --> 01:10:22 And then I was able to say, dealing with the workplace, this will not change without a law change.
01:10:23 --> 01:10:26 It's too embedded into society without a legal change.
01:10:27 --> 01:10:31 And also, if you look at it from an employer's point of view,
01:10:31 --> 01:10:36 they've never been told they should not discriminate against someone because
01:10:36 --> 01:10:38 of their hair. It doesn't exist anywhere.
01:10:38 --> 01:10:41 They haven't gone to school and heard that. They haven't gone to university
01:10:41 --> 01:10:45 and heard that. They've never heard an employment training about that.
01:10:45 --> 01:10:47 So is it really their fault when
01:10:47 --> 01:10:50 something is part of society and they've never been told not to do it.
01:10:51 --> 01:10:57 So actually, the onus is on for the values of the country, and that's our laws,
01:10:57 --> 01:10:59 to say, well, what is right and what is wrong?
01:10:59 --> 01:11:04 If skin discrimination is wrong, why would you say discriminating against another
01:11:04 --> 01:11:06 part of the body is not wrong as well?
01:11:06 --> 01:11:10 The logic follows. One part of the body, that's wrong.
01:11:11 --> 01:11:14 The another part of the body, it's wrong, but it's not written in law.
01:11:14 --> 01:11:22 So it became really just so evident that to actually get this to a level of
01:11:22 --> 01:11:25 understanding, you have to have a law change.
01:11:25 --> 01:11:30 So with that in mind, it's like, well, how are we going to get people to listen?
01:11:30 --> 01:11:34 Because you're dealing with the people in power who do not have this issue.
01:11:34 --> 01:11:38 They do not understand this issue. They have no lived experience of this issue.
01:11:39 --> 01:11:42 How do you get them to the point of understanding this issue?
01:11:43 --> 01:11:47 So I thought, well, you've got to make a noise and you've got to make a noise.
01:11:47 --> 01:11:50 Well, we've got the evidence. So I knew I had the evidence now.
01:11:50 --> 01:11:55 So I thought, right, I'm going to build an information pack for politicians,
01:11:56 --> 01:12:00 an information pack that's going to take them from point A to point Z.
01:12:00 --> 01:12:04 This is everything you need to know about this issue. So you cannot say it's
01:12:04 --> 01:12:06 not an issue anymore. Here's the evidence.
01:12:07 --> 01:12:12 But then you have to say it matters. So the 100 Voices, 100 Words campaign is
01:12:12 --> 01:12:14 saying, okay, it's not just my organization saying it.
01:12:15 --> 01:12:19 Let's have some high profile people who you do know.
01:12:20 --> 01:12:26 Say it in their own words. So that's where the hundred words and hundred voices came from.
01:12:26 --> 01:12:32 We wanted to amplify this matters to a lot of people. And these a hundred voices
01:12:32 --> 01:12:34 are going to represent all of us.
01:12:34 --> 01:12:41 What was good about it is, as we know, the currency of the world that we live
01:12:41 --> 01:12:44 in are celebrities and high profile people.
01:12:44 --> 01:12:51 And it was great that enough of them said, yeah, we want to give you our 100
01:12:51 --> 01:12:53 words. We want to see this change.
01:12:53 --> 01:12:59 So we were able to speak to a politician, an MP who could say,
01:12:59 --> 01:13:01 right, Michelle, yeah, I agree with that.
01:13:01 --> 01:13:05 I want to help you take this into parliament. Because as you know,
01:13:05 --> 01:13:08 politics is a whole different world.
01:13:08 --> 01:13:13 If you're not in that world, you will not understand the rules of how things work.
01:13:13 --> 01:13:18 So we're coming in as an outside organization and we had to connect with an
01:13:18 --> 01:13:24 MP on the inside and then make noise to say, this is something that's important
01:13:24 --> 01:13:26 and this is something that needs to change.
01:13:27 --> 01:13:34 So, and you know what? We had a lot of press coverage and we had a lot of positive press coverage.
01:13:34 --> 01:13:39 I haven't even seen anything negative about it. I didn't hear any negative,
01:13:39 --> 01:13:43 I didn't read a single negative article, a negative radio, negative piece.
01:13:44 --> 01:13:48 It was wholly saying, these people are campaigning for this change.
01:13:49 --> 01:13:53 That's what it was saying. And a lot of support kind of saying,
01:13:53 --> 01:13:56 well, actually, well, they've got something here, haven't they?
01:13:56 --> 01:13:59 This is what they're saying. Doesn't it matter?
01:13:59 --> 01:14:07 So, you know, we were really happy that we were able to start the process. Yeah.
01:14:07 --> 01:14:15 So kind of talk about what is the timeline as far as getting that done?
01:14:15 --> 01:14:21 I know the process has started because you did this like on the 10th of September.
01:14:23 --> 01:14:30 Where is the legislation now? How soon do you think that it'll be brought forward
01:14:30 --> 01:14:34 before House of Commons,
01:14:34 --> 01:14:40 I guess, for it to go for a vote?
01:14:41 --> 01:14:44 Yes. Do you know what? We're not even, we're not at that legislation stage.
01:14:45 --> 01:14:50 With this, it's very, I don't know. I suppose the UK, I don't know how different.
01:14:50 --> 01:14:54 Different everybody's political systems are very different there
01:14:54 --> 01:14:57 are different routes that you can take in the uk you could
01:14:57 --> 01:15:00 have an individual bill brought in by an
01:15:00 --> 01:15:07 individual mp or you can have the government do the bill so our first choice
01:15:07 --> 01:15:11 will be to make sure that the government recognizes that they should be making
01:15:11 --> 01:15:17 this change and we're still in that process you know we're literally still in that process of,
01:15:17 --> 01:15:23 I'm going to still be, I've got to send all the reports to different MPs, different ministers,
01:15:24 --> 01:15:29 different government ministers, and say, keep putting this in front of their
01:15:29 --> 01:15:34 face, so to speak, you know, keep putting this in front of their face.
01:15:34 --> 01:15:38 And I don't yet know how they're going to respond.
01:15:39 --> 01:15:47 So would you feel with this new leadership that's running the country now,
01:15:47 --> 01:15:53 do you feel that that's going to be a more receptive government for the idea
01:15:53 --> 01:15:56 as opposed to the previous?
01:15:57 --> 01:16:02 Because I guess it's the labor group, the labor party that's in charge now,
01:16:03 --> 01:16:05 and it's like prior to that, it was the conservatives.
01:16:05 --> 01:16:11 So do you think the labor movement is more sympathetic to what you're trying
01:16:11 --> 01:16:14 to do as opposed to the other party?
01:16:15 --> 01:16:17 On paper, that would be the case.
01:16:18 --> 01:16:21 On paper, that should be the case.
01:16:22 --> 01:16:28 But we have to see that in reality. Put it this way. I didn't know I was doing
01:16:28 --> 01:16:30 this anyway. I didn't know.
01:16:30 --> 01:16:34 Don't forget, they called a snap election in July.
01:16:34 --> 01:16:38 So I had World Effort Days in September. So I was always planning to do this.
01:16:38 --> 01:16:43 So I didn't know there was going to be a change of government. So...
01:16:44 --> 01:16:49 Like with World Afro Day, from the beginning, if I went by how things were received
01:16:49 --> 01:16:55 to be my motivation, then I wouldn't do anything because the whole world says this doesn't matter.
01:16:55 --> 01:16:59 So it doesn't really matter who's in office.
01:17:00 --> 01:17:05 I know that this matters and this is a lifelong commitment of change for me.
01:17:05 --> 01:17:09 So talk about that in a little more detail. Because,
01:17:09 --> 01:17:16 you know, in the United States, we'll, you know, we don't have any qualms here
01:17:16 --> 01:17:20 about folks expressing when they don't like something. Right. One way or the other.
01:17:21 --> 01:17:29 And, you know, when when the first Crown Act got passed in California and there
01:17:29 --> 01:17:36 was some momentum to start doing in other states and at the federal level, folks were like saying,
01:17:36 --> 01:17:39 well, you know, that's not important. It's like, why are y'all wasting time?
01:17:39 --> 01:17:42 We got to deal with inflation. We got to deal with unemployment.
01:17:42 --> 01:17:45 We got to deal with immigration. We got to deal with all these other issues.
01:17:45 --> 01:17:49 Why are y'all talking about hair? I mean, why is that important?
01:17:49 --> 01:17:56 So what would you say to your critics in the UK that say, yeah,
01:17:56 --> 01:17:59 this is not at the top of our list?
01:17:59 --> 01:18:05 Why should we focus any energy toward getting this done? Why is it important for hair?
01:18:07 --> 01:18:16 Rights of people as far as their hair is concerned for the UK and even for here. Yeah.
01:18:16 --> 01:18:24 I suppose you have to look at what is right and what is wrong and not just the individual thing.
01:18:24 --> 01:18:29 Is it right to discriminate against children,
01:18:29 --> 01:18:36 to discriminate against people in the workplace and to have people's health
01:18:36 --> 01:18:39 impacted because they have a different hair type? Right.
01:18:39 --> 01:18:45 If you say that's wrong for a skin color, why would you say that's okay for hair?
01:18:45 --> 01:18:51 It's never been okay. And we're saying it's not okay because it's wrong, actually.
01:18:51 --> 01:18:58 It's wrong to treat people, for people to experience a worse quality of life
01:18:58 --> 01:19:01 because they happen to have a different hair texture.
01:19:01 --> 01:19:06 It's morally wrong. And it's been morally wrong for hundreds of years.
01:19:06 --> 01:19:08 So why should we put up with it for any longer?
01:19:09 --> 01:19:15 You give me the reason why we should put up with it, as opposed to you should change.
01:19:15 --> 01:19:21 It's very clear the evidence is now there to say this is impacting the quality
01:19:21 --> 01:19:24 of people's lives. It always has done.
01:19:24 --> 01:19:27 It's just that we have never positioned it that way.
01:19:27 --> 01:19:35 If you just say, oh, I don't like something or I don't, it upsets me, it's not enough.
01:19:35 --> 01:19:38 Enough we're going beyond that we're saying morally
01:19:38 --> 01:19:41 it's wrong the same way skin discrimination is wrong
01:19:41 --> 01:19:44 and we're saying that it affects the quality of
01:19:44 --> 01:19:51 people's lives you know why should children feel like they're inferior 40 41
01:19:51 --> 01:19:58 percent of children with afro hair want straight hair why should they feel like
01:19:58 --> 01:20:01 they should become different in order to be accepted in society Do we think
01:20:01 --> 01:20:02 that's morally acceptable?
01:20:02 --> 01:20:06 No, we don't. So we do something about the things that are wrong.
01:20:06 --> 01:20:12 You know, I'm very much, I'm a woman of faith. I'm a woman of God.
01:20:12 --> 01:20:19 And I believe when something's wrong and unjust, you deal with it,
01:20:19 --> 01:20:22 whether you think it's important or not.
01:20:22 --> 01:20:25 Because actually, if it's unjust, it is unjust.
01:20:26 --> 01:20:31 You know, you don't say, you don't accept what's unjust. That's the point of justice.
01:20:31 --> 01:20:37 Yeah. Yeah. I totally agree with that. I mean, you know, that's that's that
01:20:37 --> 01:20:39 was my motivation when I was elected.
01:20:39 --> 01:20:46 And that's the motivation that those of us in different parts of the African
01:20:46 --> 01:20:48 diaspora have been trying to address.
01:20:49 --> 01:20:56 You know, regardless. There's another thing. Equality laws and the concept of
01:20:56 --> 01:21:00 equality doesn't really help us when it comes to hair.
01:21:00 --> 01:21:06 And I think I'm starting to get people to understand you have to get this.
01:21:06 --> 01:21:08 There's an empathy side of the story.
01:21:09 --> 01:21:15 Ask a white person, do you want to be forced to wear Afros, dreadlocks and cornrows
01:21:15 --> 01:21:18 in order to progress in life? Everyone would say no. No.
01:21:19 --> 01:21:23 So why then would we be forced to do the same?
01:21:23 --> 01:21:26 You have to treat others as you would want to be treated.
01:21:26 --> 01:21:32 If you in your political position do not want to be forced to wear my hairstyles,
01:21:32 --> 01:21:36 then why should I be forced to wear yours? Amen.
01:21:37 --> 01:21:41 We don't have equal hair. There's nothing equal about our hair.
01:21:41 --> 01:21:46 We have very different hair. There's nothing equal about straight hair and Afro hair.
01:21:46 --> 01:21:50 They're just diametrically opposite.
01:21:51 --> 01:21:54 How would you say they're similar? They're not even any bit similar.
01:21:55 --> 01:22:00 So would you like to be forced to look like us? Would you like to be forced
01:22:00 --> 01:22:02 to wear our hair? No, you wouldn't.
01:22:02 --> 01:22:07 So, you know, why should we be forced to change our hair to look like you? Right.
01:22:08 --> 01:22:16 So this is more than just a one day celebration, which is, from what I understand,
01:22:16 --> 01:22:19 it's recognized by the United Nations, is it not? It is.
01:22:21 --> 01:22:27 But you have you've you've developed like some organizations and you've got some scholarships.
01:22:27 --> 01:22:30 So kind of talk about that aspect.
01:22:31 --> 01:22:37 And then to kind of close out, talk, you know, talk to people about how they
01:22:37 --> 01:22:42 can get involved, you know, how people can reach you and all that kind of stuff.
01:22:42 --> 01:22:48 Yeah, I think I mean, I think the biggest, well, most well-known aspect of what
01:22:48 --> 01:22:51 we did is the hashtag, you know, hashtag World Afro Day.
01:22:51 --> 01:22:56 You can look it up and you'll see it's a delight because you see,
01:22:56 --> 01:23:02 you know, people from all over the planet doing wonderful things to express
01:23:02 --> 01:23:06 their love and acceptance of Afro hair.
01:23:06 --> 01:23:12 You'll see artwork, you'll see photography, you'll see music,
01:23:12 --> 01:23:17 you'll see all these different ways that people are using their creativity.
01:23:17 --> 01:23:22 So it's actually a real blessing to just be a part of it because it's such a
01:23:22 --> 01:23:28 love and a celebration, an outpouring, an outpouring of positivity towards our hair.
01:23:28 --> 01:23:34 But far deeper than that, it's structural change that we're looking at.
01:23:34 --> 01:23:40 It's the structural change going into nurseries, schools, providing schools
01:23:40 --> 01:23:45 with resources that teach teachers and empower children,
01:23:45 --> 01:23:51 going into workplaces that, again, give them resources to understand children.
01:23:52 --> 01:23:57 This actually stops you getting the best people.
01:23:58 --> 01:24:02 This stops the people that you currently have being their best.
01:24:03 --> 01:24:07 So you're not winning. You're losing out. You're losing.
01:24:08 --> 01:24:14 And then, again, the movement in America around relaxing, looking at,
01:24:14 --> 01:24:19 again, there's been a health cough and consequence.
01:24:19 --> 01:24:23 Consequence that's only still getting started
01:24:23 --> 01:24:26 you know the research is there but
01:24:26 --> 01:24:29 where's the where's the legislation where's
01:24:29 --> 01:24:33 the protection where's the health warnings around our
01:24:33 --> 01:24:39 hair products so there's so much structural work that needs to happen that but
01:24:39 --> 01:24:45 the law is the this the underpinning of all that because once you have the law
01:24:45 --> 01:24:49 saying this matters this is of value you, this is important,
01:24:50 --> 01:24:54 this is right, then everything else will flow from that.
01:24:54 --> 01:24:58 So now I feel that with World Effort Day,
01:24:58 --> 01:25:02 there's always this breadth of things that you can focus on and you want to
01:25:02 --> 01:25:10 focus on, but actually now I'm narrowing it down to law because once you have the momentum on,
01:25:10 --> 01:25:13 it's like I was saying to some of my colleagues, I was saying like,
01:25:13 --> 01:25:15 you've had the natural hair movement,
01:25:15 --> 01:25:17 now you need the legal hair movement.
01:25:18 --> 01:25:23 We as a people across the diaspora need to start saying we need legal rights for our hair.
01:25:23 --> 01:25:28 We need legal rights that says we are now all human being in society.
01:25:30 --> 01:25:34 And we can function as a whole human being. Without the law change,
01:25:34 --> 01:25:36 we're still not. We're at 80%.
01:25:36 --> 01:25:41 So how can people get involved? How can people reach out to you?
01:25:41 --> 01:25:45 Yeah. So worldafroday.com is our website.
01:25:45 --> 01:25:50 And we've got a campaign, which I believe can be for everybody across the diaspora.
01:25:50 --> 01:25:53 And it's called Fix the Law, Not Our Hair.
01:25:53 --> 01:25:59 So if you don't have legal, any kind of legal, what's the word? Protection.
01:26:00 --> 01:26:07 In your country, then go to our website and we're launching on October 15th.
01:26:07 --> 01:26:12 So there's a bit of time. Our Fix the Law, Not Our Hair t-shirts and start being a message.
01:26:12 --> 01:26:17 You know, wear that t-shirt, have those conversations. What law?
01:26:17 --> 01:26:18 Why does your hair need protecting?
01:26:19 --> 01:26:24 So Fix the Law, Not Our Hair is like a global message for us to get to the point
01:26:24 --> 01:26:29 where, you know what, we want to be a whole human being society and our hair
01:26:29 --> 01:26:30 is part of that wholeness.
01:26:30 --> 01:26:32 So we need these laws put in place.
01:26:33 --> 01:26:37 And also you can, we've got another thing on our website, things that you can do with schools.
01:26:38 --> 01:26:44 So again, you can get schools involved in writing letters to their legal representatives.
01:26:44 --> 01:26:49 You can get schools to write letters to whoever the leader is of your country.
01:26:49 --> 01:26:53 You can get schools to the kids to write poems, write posters,
01:26:54 --> 01:26:56 you know, start from a really young age.
01:26:56 --> 01:26:59 Because if you think about it, any law that comes into place,
01:26:59 --> 01:27:02 they're the generation that get to live it out.
01:27:02 --> 01:27:05 You know, that's a wonderful legacy for them.
01:27:05 --> 01:27:11 You train them up to create, to be part of that movement where they're going
01:27:11 --> 01:27:15 to be, their hair is going to be respected.
01:27:15 --> 01:27:21 It's going to be validated legally so yeah that's how everybody else i think
01:27:21 --> 01:27:28 can get involved just yeah be a part of it be a part of the change all right well michelle de leon.
01:27:29 --> 01:27:39 Thank you so much for coming on. I greatly appreciate your initiative and your
01:27:39 --> 01:27:41 commitment to see this through.
01:27:41 --> 01:27:44 And I wish you much success in the UK.
01:27:44 --> 01:27:57 And I hope that next time we talk, we'll have even more states engaged in protecting our young folks.
01:27:58 --> 01:28:03 And, you know, because again, I, you know, I'm a supporter. I'm a bystander.
01:28:03 --> 01:28:05 I don't have any hair to fight for.
01:28:05 --> 01:28:10 But but seriously, though, I really commend you for what you've done.
01:28:10 --> 01:28:13 And I wish you much success.
01:28:13 --> 01:28:15 And thank you for coming on the podcast.
01:28:15 --> 01:28:19 Thank you for having me. All right, guys, we're going to catch all on the other side.
01:28:18 --> 01:28:28 Music.
01:28:31 --> 01:28:39 All right. And we are back. So let me thank Rachel Zimmerman for coming on and
01:28:39 --> 01:28:42 talking about our book, Us After,
01:28:42 --> 01:28:48 and the delicate subject dealing with suicide.
01:28:48 --> 01:28:52 And again, as we mentioned in the interview, this is Suicide Prevention Month.
01:28:53 --> 01:29:01 Well, as this podcast ends, it'll be the end of it, but the awareness still needs to be there.
01:29:01 --> 01:29:08 And again, if you are feeling depressed or you're thinking about it,
01:29:08 --> 01:29:11 try to get some help first. Dial 988.
01:29:14 --> 01:29:22 Make sure that you reach out to somebody because how you feel doesn't just impact
01:29:22 --> 01:29:25 you impacts those people who care about you.
01:29:26 --> 01:29:31 So I thank Rachel again for the courage to, to write the book and to come on the podcast.
01:29:31 --> 01:29:37 And then also Michelle daily on, we're talking about world Afro day and the
01:29:37 --> 01:29:42 importance of another aspect of our self-determination, right?
01:29:43 --> 01:29:51 Because, as she stated, how can you discriminate against somebody for the way
01:29:51 --> 01:29:55 they wear their hair, but you can't discriminate against somebody for the way
01:29:55 --> 01:29:57 that they look or their skin tone or whatever.
01:29:58 --> 01:30:07 So I wish her much success in pursuing the political aspect of World Afro Day
01:30:07 --> 01:30:10 and trying to get laws passed in the UK.
01:30:10 --> 01:30:19 And I encourage other state legislatures to join in the other 25 states and
01:30:19 --> 01:30:22 get Crown Acts passed in their state.
01:30:23 --> 01:30:30 But I want to close out because I want to deal with a subject that,
01:30:30 --> 01:30:37 you know, has been in the news and is something that's really, really close to me.
01:30:37 --> 01:30:43 And I say close, not because I knew a particular individual,
01:30:43 --> 01:30:49 but the issue is something that has been very, very near to me,
01:30:49 --> 01:30:57 near and dear to me as I went through my journey as far as being a state legislator.
01:30:57 --> 01:31:03 A man named Marcellus Williams, who was 55 years old, was executed in the state of Missouri.
01:31:04 --> 01:31:07 And he went through all the appeals processes.
01:31:08 --> 01:31:14 He came down to the six justices of the United States Supreme Court to allow
01:31:14 --> 01:31:15 that execution of Ilter.
01:31:17 --> 01:31:20 Governor could have stopped it. This governor, I guess it's Parsons,
01:31:20 --> 01:31:22 I think his name was, or is.
01:31:23 --> 01:31:28 He could have stopped it. that attorney general could have stopped it.
01:31:30 --> 01:31:36 But they didn't. And there are questions about jury selection.
01:31:37 --> 01:31:42 There's questions about evidence tampering. There's questions about whether
01:31:42 --> 01:31:48 the brother was even present when the murder took place.
01:31:48 --> 01:31:56 Even the family of the victim wanted at least his sentence commuted to life,
01:31:56 --> 01:32:01 so that way, if he could prove that he wasn't the one to do it,
01:32:01 --> 01:32:05 then he'd still be alive to fight it.
01:32:06 --> 01:32:09 But nonetheless, he was executed.
01:32:10 --> 01:32:14 During my time in the state legislature, I've fought against the death penalty.
01:32:14 --> 01:32:24 I have made religious arguments, made economic arguments, and I've made moral conscience arguments.
01:32:25 --> 01:32:35 I don't think we should pass laws to adjudicate people who kill people if the
01:32:35 --> 01:32:37 state is going to kill people too.
01:32:38 --> 01:32:44 Especially if the way the decision is rendered, that an individual,
01:32:45 --> 01:32:48 more likely a judge, makes that call.
01:32:49 --> 01:32:55 Everybody always makes Pontius Pilate the villain in the Easter story,
01:32:55 --> 01:33:01 but we have a bunch of Pontius Pilates acting as governors of our our respective
01:33:01 --> 01:33:09 states, especially in states where they seem to be set on executing prisoners.
01:33:10 --> 01:33:17 Now, I'm not here to take away the pain of losing a loved one.
01:33:18 --> 01:33:22 I'm not here to defend somebody's guilt or innocence.
01:33:23 --> 01:33:29 My position is the death penalty should not be an option, period.
01:33:30 --> 01:33:35 And I've had family in other countries, living in other countries,
01:33:35 --> 01:33:40 and talk about the big ceremonies. And I've read through history about how people were executed.
01:33:40 --> 01:33:45 I've been to county courthouses where they used to have people either hanging
01:33:45 --> 01:33:47 or being electrocuted in public view.
01:33:48 --> 01:33:55 And I just think at some point in time that if we're going to be an evolved society,
01:33:56 --> 01:34:05 we're going to say that we stand on the rule of law, that barbarism should not be a part of the law.
01:34:05 --> 01:34:08 And that's all executing a person is.
01:34:09 --> 01:34:14 It's more of a form of retribution instead of.
01:34:16 --> 01:34:22 Former justice. And I was glad that I had a colleague, John Mayo,
01:34:22 --> 01:34:28 that fought that battle with me in the legislature, even forcing a committee
01:34:28 --> 01:34:31 to even deal with the legislation.
01:34:32 --> 01:34:38 We didn't prevail, of course, but it's a fight worth having.
01:34:39 --> 01:34:46 And as long as I am I'm able to have a platform as long as I'm able to think
01:34:46 --> 01:34:47 and express my opinions.
01:34:48 --> 01:34:53 One thing will always be certain is that I am against the death penalty,
01:34:53 --> 01:34:58 especially because of the fallibility.
01:34:58 --> 01:35:06 It will mean nothing 10 years from now if somebody enlightened in the Missouri
01:35:06 --> 01:35:12 Statehouse realizes that Marcellus Williams did not have to be executed.
01:35:13 --> 01:35:23 It may look good on the record, may provide a moment of satisfaction for the family of Mr.
01:35:23 --> 01:35:27 Williams, but it will cause additional pain.
01:35:28 --> 01:35:33 To the family of the young lady who was killed because now person who was adjudicated
01:35:33 --> 01:35:36 and executed turns out that wasn't the person.
01:35:37 --> 01:35:44 And I just think about what if Donald Trump had gotten his wish and Yusef Salam was executed?
01:35:46 --> 01:35:51 Never would have had a story with a happy ending concerning the exonerated five.
01:35:52 --> 01:35:56 Brother Salon would not be on the city council in New York.
01:35:57 --> 01:36:05 Who knows what this world would be like without Brother Yusef and those other four young men.
01:36:06 --> 01:36:11 So, you know, I'm not going to take up too much time, but I just wanted to be clear.
01:36:12 --> 01:36:17 America is supposed to be a place about freedom. them. It is also supposed to
01:36:17 --> 01:36:21 be a place about second chances, about redemption.
01:36:22 --> 01:36:26 Nobody can be redeemed if they're already dead. If you want to put somebody
01:36:26 --> 01:36:30 away in prison for life without parole, okay.
01:36:31 --> 01:36:38 But even in prison, a person who truly reforms can actually have an impact on
01:36:38 --> 01:36:43 people that are getting out of prison just by guiding them and telling them
01:36:43 --> 01:36:45 not to do what they They did. Right.
01:36:46 --> 01:36:48 But you can't do that if executed.
01:36:49 --> 01:36:55 And not everybody is going to be like Jesus. And after three days, show back up.
01:36:56 --> 01:36:58 That's not how this operates.
01:36:59 --> 01:37:03 Human beings. I give him a lot of freedom and a lot of power.
01:37:04 --> 01:37:10 Especially free will. But they should not have the power of life and death.
01:37:11 --> 01:37:14 And then some people say, well, what about abortion and all that?
01:37:14 --> 01:37:20 Look, it's already hypocrisy for people to say that they're pro-life and they're
01:37:20 --> 01:37:25 the main ones literally voting to execute another human being.
01:37:26 --> 01:37:29 And then there's some folks saying, well, why didn't Vice President Harris say
01:37:29 --> 01:37:33 anything? Well, why didn't Donald Trump say anything? You want to go there?
01:37:34 --> 01:37:41 The fact of the matter is everybody, everybody should be against the death penalty in the United States.
01:37:42 --> 01:37:47 There was a time in this country where the death penalty was outlawed.
01:37:49 --> 01:37:58 And some political leaders got scared and thought that a way to stem crime was to reinstitute it.
01:38:00 --> 01:38:06 Bloodlust should not be a part of our judicial system. Period. End of discussion.
01:38:07 --> 01:38:16 And until we abolish the death penalty for good, we will never be the nation that we need to be.
01:38:17 --> 01:38:25 Until we eliminate this discrimination for good. We will never be the nation that we need to be.
01:38:25 --> 01:38:32 When we stop rewarding people for lying to us, that's when we'll start ascending.
01:38:33 --> 01:38:37 There used to be a saying, clearest conscience a man could sleep on.
01:38:38 --> 01:38:41 The softest pill, I'm sorry, a man could sleep on was a clear conscience.
01:38:41 --> 01:38:47 And I've just come to the conclusion that people are comfortable sleeping on rocks now.
01:38:48 --> 01:38:51 We can tolerate mass shootings.
01:38:51 --> 01:39:00 We can tolerate genocide. We can tolerate abhorrent behavior in our political leaders.
01:39:01 --> 01:39:06 And we can tolerate the state executing other human beings.
01:39:06 --> 01:39:11 But we can't tolerate people being who God made them to be.
01:39:11 --> 01:39:16 We can't tolerate people making a decision about who they love.
01:39:16 --> 01:39:20 We can't tolerate how people want their health care to be.
01:39:21 --> 01:39:29 But we can tolerate barbarism. We can tolerate bad behavior. That has to end.
01:39:30 --> 01:39:39 And I hope in my lifetime that we can get back to a place where America says no more.
01:39:40 --> 01:40:17 Music.