Secret Shade with Alicia Garza
10/25/18 - In an excerpt from the first stop on The Shine Theory Tour, we discuss the Cheeto Administration's attempts to erase trans people, investing advice from Reddit, and San Francisco's debate over how to fund services for the homeless. Plus, we talk with Black Lives Matter co-founder Alicia Garza about how she stays motivated, how she handles the hard days, and her innovative approach for handling haters. We have a whole hour of treats that can only be seen on the road. There are still tickets available in Chicago, Minneapolis and Philadelphia: callyourgirlfriend.com/tour.
Transcript below.
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CREDITS
Producer: Gina Delvac
Hosts: Aminatou Sow & Ann Friedman
Theme song: Call Your Girlfriend by Robyn
Composer: Carolyn Pennypacker Riggs.
Associate Producer: Destry Maria Sibley
Visual Creative Director: Kenesha Sneed
Merch Director: Caroline Knowles
Editorial Assistant: Laura Bertocci
Ad sales: Midroll
LINKS
Trans people cannot be erased
Tips for allies of trans and non-binary people
San Francisco’s Prop C would tax large businesses to fund homeless services
TRANSCRIPT: Secret Shade with Alicia Garza
[Ads]
(1:38)
Aminatou: Welcome to Call Your Girlfriend.
Ann: A podcast for long-distance besties everywhere and in San Francisco, California.
[Cheering]
Aminatou: I'm Aminatou Sow.
Ann: And I'm Ann Friedman. On tonight's agenda: how the Trump administration is trying to erase trans people again. Yeah. Some hot investment advice. Ballot initiative talk, and last but definitely not least a conversation with activist and Black Lives Matter co-founder Alicia Garza.
[Cheering]
[Theme Song]
(2:35)
Aminatou: Thank you so much for being here. This is nuts.
Ann: we can't see you but we feel you. [Laughter]
Aminatou: I know. On a Sunday? Ugh. On a Sunday night? I would never.
Ann: I know. Shocking. [Laughter] We're also going to have some wine. It's our first show. I'm a little nervous. A little glass of wine helps.
Aminatou: Can you drop wine with beta blockers you think? [Laughter] Guess we're about to find out. Strap in, y'all.
Ann: I mean I was about to say "How you doing boo-boo?" but now I know.
Aminatou: Listen, I am doing great.
Ann: Mm-hmm. Should we talk about the news?
Aminatou: Sure. Let's do it.
Ann: Are you ready to talk about the news? Part is it's Sunday night. I don't even know what . . .
Aminatou: I know. You know, this is like -- Sunday morning is usually like it's the one paper I read is the Sunday morning paper and today was all trash fire. So . . . [Laughter]
Ann: Today? As in it was a special news where the news was all trash fire?
Aminatou: Today was especially bananas. So let me hit you with some things I've been reading about. Reading, it saves lives. So the Trump administration -- Trump, him who presidents here -- he . . .
Ann: Allegedly.
(3:48)
Aminatou: His administration and HHS is basically circulating a memo that says that sex is an immutable biological trait and it proposes definitions that basically eradicate federal protections for trans people by saying that they don't exist. So even like an eighth grader knows that genitals isn't the same thing as gender, but you know, the people in the White House don't know this. And it's the most evil way to use policy and to gaslight people who basically fight for basic recognition of their humanity every day, and Barack Obama barely gave us the bare minimum you can have and people are literally being written out of policy.
Ann: They're irate about the bare minimum.
Aminatou: Yeah, you know? And this made me really . . . I had to put the paper down I was so upset. It's really annoying because I -- we don't live in Trump's America; Trump lives in our America. [Cheering] And it really . . . it makes me really furious when I think about a lot of the protests that have been going on in the last two years and how whenever trans people or gender-nonconforming and non-binary siblings rights are under fire, the left never mobilizes for them. We're always like "Okay, we won't let trans people be soldiers. Fine, that doesn't affect me." All of these things have been creeping up for a long time and now we've reached crisis level. And it is a huge shame that we have organized for a lot of things and this one we always let slip by.
Ann: Also I mean this is at a level of definition which means not just policy and money but also just like legal protection. I mean that's a thing that I -- obviously words are one of the most important things in my life, and I'm just so angry also at this idea that they think they get to define gender. I'm like . . . anyway, it is really 1.4 million Americans who have chosen to recognize themselves as a gender other than the one they were assigned at birth who are going to lose as a result of this. And also it's just like they're not talking to them. That's the thing about this too, the idea of repercussions.
Aminatou: Yeah.
(6:08)
Ann: There are no level of personal repercussions for anyone who is in that room writing policy.
Aminatou: Right. And it's also really evil when you think about . . . because basically what the memo boils down to is they want to make a database of genitals. I was like first of all we can't even trust you people with our phone numbers. [Laughter] We are not trusting you with anything else. And, you know, it's so evil and it's so cruel and when I think about all the people that said two years ago "Hmm, this lady will be the same as this guy," it's like well, you know, that's not true. And now there are real consequences.
I just keep going back to the fact that, you know, there are people in this country who refuse to understand that trans men are men, trans women are women. Our non-binary and gender-nonconforming siblings are worthy of love. They're a gift to this world. And nothing can take that away. [Applause] So that's what's making me mad today.
Ann: Yeah. I mean and it's also one of those things where mad is the right word but I feel like the full cycle of grief, anger, despair, I mean in one . . . in the span it takes to read one article, like sentence-to-sentence.
Aminatou: I know you love words. [Laughter]
Ann: I'm not saying it's about me and my love of words. I'm saying it is like . . . I'm just agreeing with you that it is super upsetting. So I read a thing on the Internet that did not make me mad today so I'm going to talk about that. [Laughter] And it was a link that someone shared on Twitter. Actually a few different people, I saw it circulating. And it came from Reddit, a space I don't hang out in. So who knows? Maybe this is a thing that is often discussed in that space.
(8:05)
Aminatou: Ann, our relationship is so good.
Ann: I know you love our relationship.
Aminatou: You should invest. You should invest.
Ann: I know. Different segment. [Laughs] But, okay, so it was on this thread about investing tips and someone was like "What's the best investing tip that you ever got or gave?" And someone was like "Listen, for the biggest returns you could possibly imagine invest in things that basic white girls love." [Laughter] And then someone else like . . . I mean we can interrogate the word basic, let's do it as part of this, but I'm going to show you the list that they came up with. [Laughter] And . . .
Aminatou: This is my 401(K) come to life. I feel . . .
Ann: So we're going to critique the idea that this is the white girl index. I mean yeah.
Aminatou: I love white girls. [Laughs]
Ann: I mean also the way that this was defined or described was as "Companies with customers who have money and who set cultural trends." And I'm like I don't know at what point the investments would've had to be made in some of these companies for them to be a cultural trendsetter but I don't know that investing in these companies today is really shocking anyone. I will say that it made me think about whether there is an activist benefit to making money off of the consumer choices of a group, like let's just agree with the premise, a group of financially-stable, basic -- which I think is generally taken to mean like a cis, maybe femme-presenting white woman -- or whether we should be putting our money into companies that are maybe serving like other populations?
(10:05)
Aminatou: Listen, I'm about to buy some Target stock so . . . [Laughter] You know, the thing that this makes me think about all the time is how people are always so skeptical about -- we talk about this all the time. Any time women care about anything no matter what age you are people become skeptical of it.
Ann: Sure. No one is like invest there; everyone's like run.
Aminatou: Right. And the thing is, you know, I've worked in tech. If you work in tech you know if 13-year-old girls are using your product you're about to get rich. Everybody knows that's the market that you want. Those are the people who set trends. They tell the people at school or whatever.
Ann: Or whatever. [Laughter] I like the idea of tracing a trend to 13-year-old girls chatting at school. I know.
Aminatou: Always. Always. But I can understand how people would make fun of something like this on Reddit but the truth is this looks pretty . . . it looks pretty leverage. I'm like you can do worse than buying some Lululemon and some Nike and Starbucks, you know?
Ann: Lulu Lamon.
Aminatou: Lulu Lamon. They're doing great. So I don't know, shout-out to all the white girls. Thank you.
Ann: It's true. If anyone is looking to kind of make some shifts in their portfolio or get a portfolio. [Laughter] Some ideas for you.
Aminatou: Okay.
Ann: Yeah.
Aminatou: How many people in this room would say that you know about your local politics? Like just make some noise. [Applause]
Ann: We're not going to quiz you. Just how do you feel?
Aminatou: We're not going to quiz you. That's not enough of you but we're going to move on from that and we're going to . . . next time when we come the whole room will erupt. So I have been following very closely the Prop C measure that is on the ballot here.
Ann: You don't even live in the state.
(11:50)
Aminatou: Listen, but I live on Twitter so I care. [Laughter] But, you know, the . . . so for those of you who don't know, Prop C, if you vote yes on Proposition C you're basically authorizing the city and the county of San Francisco to fund housing and homelessness services by taxing certain businesses, businesses that make more than 50 million dollars a year. Like eat the rich. You are making 50 million dollars a year, you should give us everything you're making over, I don't know, a couple thousand. [Laughter]
And so I've been following this and I've been really confused about kind of what the agita about it is because now tech founders are fighting over it. Or really it's just like Marc Benioff, the one that lives in the tower, versus the rest of them.
Ann: But also it's not clear what the . . . everyone's not really being clear about what they think about it.
Aminatou: Right. Nobody is being clear about what's going on. So on one side you have the people who are like yes, tax the immoral tech companies who are making billions of dollars and stealing money from the city of San Francisco and driving the rent up and just bad people in general. Take a little bit of their money so we can fix homelessness.
Ann: The eat the rich campaign.
Aminatou: Right. And then on the other side, which I'm very confounded by, includes tech people but also the mayor and some state senators are all like "Well, the problem is that this proposition doesn't have enough safeguards so that the money's going to be spent effectively." I'm like so you're telling me that you're not taking money because you don't know how you're going to spend that money? [Laughter] That seems a little shady to me personally as a studier of shady things. So . . .
Ann: Professor of Shadynomics.
Aminatou: I generally like -- I generally like y'alls mayor. She looks cool. Her name is bomb. [Laughter] You know, women and government, hell yeah. But this particular thing is . . . like it's a policy that personally I can't abide by, the fact that when you think about the tax cuts tech companies get in this town are actually really awful. In 2012 San Francisco switched the tax code -- adjusted the tax code from a payroll tax to a gross receipts tax which basically means that companies that spend a lot of money to recruit people, a.k.a. tech companies -- man, I love those dinners. [Laughter] But basically it's like a scam where they get to save a lot of their money, and you have scams around where the shows go and they get all these subsidies.
(14:30)
Tech companies don't need subsidies. They're literal billionaires. They print money in the basements of those places. And the homelessness crisis in California honestly is very shameful and very immoral and wrong. And the fact that there are people who are getting so rich with money that they're not going to take with them when they go to Mars or die or whatever . . .
Ann: New Zealand, yeah. [Laughter]
Aminatou: New Zealand -- refuse to give it to other people. That is like . . . it doesn't sit right with me, but it also doesn't sit right with me when I can't trust that local government people are not in the pockets of those people. You know, and that they make policies based on what dummies who drive Teslas think. Like that's not cool. That's not cool with me. So I would say make up your own mind about Prop C for sure. [Laughter]
Ann: You don't live here, P.S.
Aminatou: I don't do electioneering. This is not my problem. I live on the east coast where we have other kinds of real problems. But I would say do your research around that and also put pressure on your local electeds to not be in the pockets of these people because they don't . . . San Francisco doesn't fucking need them. [Applause] Yeah, we're going to get arrested. [Laughter]
Ann: I mean . . .
Aminatou: I'm so on edge. It's a lot.
Ann: London Breed is not coming on the show anymore. [Laughter]
Aminatou: London Breed, call us!
Ann: Yeah, right? Give us a call. Come on the show.
Aminatou: Call your girlfriends.
(15:55)
Ann: Talk about snacks. No big deal. All right, you ready to move on?
Aminatou: Yeah, let's move on.
Ann: Okay. I mean not from these very trenchant issues but, you know, tonight in this moment.
[Music and Ads]
(18:55)
Aminatou: Okay, I'm very excited about our next segment. We are going to interview Alicia Garza. [Cheering]
Ann: We're really just thrilled to share space with her. Let's be honest.
Aminatou: Just wait until you see her outfit. Amazing. But first I'm going to read her bio. "Alicia Garza is a civil rights activist from Oakland, California. [Cheering] In 2013 she co-founded the Black Lives Matter movement," you might have heard of it. "She works in strategy and partnerships with the National Domestic Workers Alliance and she leads the Black Futures Lab which engages black voters year-round and uses political strength to stop corporate influences from creeping into progressive policies. It combines technology and traditional organizing methods to reach black people anywhere and everywhere. Her pronoun preferences are she, her, hers, diva." [Laughter]
(19:50)
Ann: Let's welcome her to the stage with us. [Cheering] You want some wine? Yeah? You're welcome.
Aminatou: Wow, you really are a rock star around here huh?
Alicia: The hometown squad, you know what I mean?
Aminatou: Love it.
Ann: I want to ask you about the -- this is probably unfair because I don't think people . . . this is a kind of set it and forget it thing, but the backdrop banner image on your Twitter account says "Exist on your own terms."
Alicia: Oh my gosh, yes.
Ann: And I just want to know, okay, first of all how do you do that every day? Is that like a wake up and how am I going to exist on my own terms today?
Alicia: I think I've just kind of always been like that to be honest. [Laughs]
Ann: You're like it's natural.
Alicia: Yeah, like with everything: fashion, my bad humor. [Laughs] My love of reality shows. Like I just feel like you've just got to do your own thing. I mean if you're trying to be somebody else you're not having that much fun are you?
Aminatou: I like that everybody's looking at me. [Laughter]
Alicia: Just saying.
Ann: We don't think you're trying to be somebody else.
Alicia: No.
Aminatou: Sometimes. You have a job that I think is one of the hardest things in the world in the sense that you have to draw new activists almost every day to fight for justice. That sounds exhausting to me. You also can't compromise on your core values and you can't water down the message. How do you do that?
Alicia: Not always well but . . .
Ann: No way, I don't believe it.
Aminatou: I don't believe it.
(21:44)
Alicia: No, it's true. It's true because -- little secret -- I am actually very much an introvert. I'm an extroverted introvert is what I say. So that whole drawing people in thing is great when we have a connection but you also have to do it with people you don't have a connection to and that can be challenging.
Ann: Are you saying we don't have a connection? [Laughs]
Alicia: No, we totally have a connection. But I will say this. I think for me personally it's actually the best work. I feel really blessed to be able to do it. So being able to inspire people to take action and not just be super bummed out about what's happening or kind of be observers and talk a bunch of crap about what other people are doing, it's pretty much what gets me up in the morning and what I feel accomplished about when I go to sleep at night. So as long as I can do that with folks who are down I'm with it, and then as long as I can get the trolls out of the way it's even better.
Ann: I think that this is something we struggle with a lot where we want to make a show that feels like it is accessible to people who are in a lot of places in talking and thinking about social justice, in interlocking oppressions, and things like that. But we also don't want to feel like we are always starting from zero or maybe even insulting people who have been there since birth for example. And I'm curious about that aspect of this. Not so much like, you know, the job and the day-to-day but almost philosophically how do you . . . do you have any advice for us is what I'm trying to say? [Laughs]
Alicia: Well here's my best advice which is that everybody has started from somewhere at some point and so having a lot of compassion for that I think is really important. And especially in this political context where I think, you know, being woke -- and I just really hate saying that because it just doesn't mean anything. It's like what does that mean? But being relatively conscious about what's going on around you is super important. And for a lot of people right now in this context politics is super-confusing and if you're not doing it every single day and not, you know, thinking about it and totally immersed in it it's easy to kind of feel stupid in this context. And that makes people not want to do stuff.
(24:15)
I hear a lot of people say like "I just turn it off. I can't understand what's going on so I just move on. I'd rather dive into my fantasy world," which I totally get. But we also need every hand on deck right now. And so it's really a process of like how do you have compassion for where people are while also trying to move them to the next step and realize we can't do this without you? It can't be like "Oh, you're my activist friend." Right? It's got to be like I want to get active too and I'm going to look to you as a resource to figure out how to do that.
Aminatou: I love that. [Applause] You know one of the things that we talk about a lot, and I think that I am particularly struggling with in this moment, is the house is on fire everywhere. It's just every day . . .
Ann: America.
Aminatou: Yeah, America. We're playing whack-a-mole with everything, right? You know, and I consider myself a fairly conscious person but I'm still learning a lot of things and I think I'm learning a lot about my own . . . I'm learning more about the issues that I have not mobilized about in the past. But I also know that there are days where I just feel like I don't have the capacity. And so I was wondering how . . . what is the calculus you make when you decide how you're going to spend your time and how you're going to spend your resources?
(25:45)
Alicia: Okay, this is a good one.
Ann: You have a spreadsheet or something? [Laughs]
Alicia: I don't have a spreadsheet but I thought about it.
Aminatou: Like 5% Black Lives Matter, 10% . . .
Alicia: Yeah. No, it's like I . . . I realize that I want to put my energy towards the things that make me passionate and I don't have to do everything. That's the whole point of building a movement is you get a lot of people to do a lot of things that they feel really passionate about, and hopefully we're all moving towards the same goal. And if we're not then we have to tinker with it. But I have had to learn you can't do everything and so there's things that I want to learn more about that I feel like taking the time to learn it is actually doing a thing. There's also things that I am super passionate about and I can't go to sleep at night unless I've done something and that's what I spend 85% of my energy doing. Then I weed out some of the kind of incoming requests that I get from people who there's something very important to them but it's not necessarily important to me. And by that I don't mean like your human rights or like your dignity. [Laughter]
Ann: That would be cold.
Alicia: Yeah, that would be coldblooded and wrong. But by that I mean a project that you're thinking about starting that you want to pick my brain about for 15 minutes that actually ends up being two hours. And then at the end of it it wasn't really an exchange; there was just an extraction that happened. And I can't do that anymore. I have finite time on this earth so I've become really good at being like I hear your request, I appreciate it, and let me move it right on over to this side.
Ann: Yeah, I have a filter for pick my brain.
Alicia: Yeah.
Aminatou: Same, trash.
Alicia: Exactly.
Ann: Trash.
Alicia: Junk. Spam.
Ann: Or sorry, pick your brain. Yeah. Yeah, like a whole oh, you didn't intend this to come to me, a real human? [Laughter]
Alicia: I need a hell nah folder.
Ann: Right, yeah. Get your Gmail setup. Yeah. So I'm curious about when you say, you know, that kind of 85% that you're like this is my core, did you have a moment where you were like actually very explicit? I've heard some people advise okay, I'm going to write down these are the issues where I'm really going to put my time and effort. Or is that something that's just kind of been baked in or intuitive?
(28:10)
Alicia: Well I've had to think about it a lot because there's a lot of incoming, and what I know is what I'm passionate about is making black people powerful in every aspect of our lives. [Cheering] That's what I care about. That's what just gets me all warm and fuzzy inside and so why not just live in that? That's what I do. And then other things I'm passionate about are movement building and sticking it to Donald Trump. You know, giving shade where it's got to be given. There's things you've got to replenish, right? But 85% of my time is spent figuring out how we make black people powerful in all aspects of our lives.
Aminatou: Oh man, I have a real question but now I want to ask you who are we shading? [Laughter]
Alicia: You want my list? Because I have a list. See, I was taught a trick because, you know, I can pop off sometimes. So instead of popping off, because now on social media it's like it lives forever, so instead of popping off the first thing I do is I put it in my notes section in my phone.
Aminatou: Wow.
Alicia: And I'll write whole, long things, you know? Like things that I'm not quite ready to put this out but try me, you know?
Ann: It's ready and waiting, yeah.
Alicia: Yeah, and if you try me, boom. You know what I mean? [Laughter] It's like missive sent. But if you know your lane, you know what I mean, then it'll just stay in the notes section. But ready for me to come back to at any point in time. So I have a list of shade too, so just let me know when you're ready to shade. We can shade, you know what I mean? [Laughter]
(29:50)
Aminatou: Stay ready, you won't have to get . . . earlier -- I'm just mentally thinking on my own list right now.
Ann: Isn't that what everyone is doing? Wait, so is it like first warning they get the notes app, second time they test you . . .
Aminatou: Gun shot.
Ann: Gun shot. [Laughter]
Alicia: Yeah. Like I often say like block hand strong, you know? But before I block I'm going to go in, you know what I mean?
Aminatou: Yeah.
Alicia: Like I'm just going . . .
Aminatou: I think about that, but then I'm like they're not going to see it.
Alicia: They'll see it.
Aminatou: They'll see it? Okay.
Alicia: They'll see it. They'll definitely see it. Trust. [Laughter]
Ann: See, this is why I like the mute.
Aminatou: No, mute is too gentle.
Ann: Oh, see, I think mute is void. Like they're still sending it into the void and you take up more of their time but it doesn't reach you.
Aminatou: Yeah, but they don't feel the pain.
Alicia: They don't feel it.
Ann: I don't think that . . .
Aminatou: When you mute somebody you're the only one that knows. I want them to know.
Alicia: It's true. [Laughter] You want them to know they've been canceled.
Aminatou: Yes!
Alicia: Yeah, exactly.
Aminatou: Cancelled yourself. Yes.
Ann: Different psychology of shade.
Aminatou: Mute is too, you know . . .
Alicia: It's too gentle and it's kind of passive aggressive, you know what I mean?
Aminatou: Mute is for gentle people. Block is for real people.
Ann: Also don't you think once you block them the hate spills elsewhere? Like the mute, they keep sending it into the void.
Aminatou: That's not my problem. That's not my problem.
Ann: I don't know.
Alicia: But if you had to get blocked, you know what I mean, you did something to get blocked. It wasn't like arbitrary, you know what I mean? So if you get it from somewhere else . . .
Aminatou: But who's like the most . . . who's the most famous person that's blocked you?
Ann: Ooh, good question.
Alicia: I don't know.
Aminatou: Okay, well I'll ask my real question. Back to activism. [Laughter]
Ann: Wait, who's the most famous person who's blocked you?
Aminatou: Listen, a lot of brands have blocked me. Listen. Who's the one who does the eraser with the bald head? You know, that brand? The Mr. Magic eraser, that guy?
Ann: Mr. Clean?
Aminatou: Blocked. [Laughter]
(31:50)
Alicia: Ha ha, really? That's amazing. How did that happen?
Aminatou: I don't even know why. Like one day I clicked on it and it's like you are blocked from seeing . . . I'm like this is wild.
Alicia: Impressed. I'm so impressed. That deserves an applause.
Aminatou: I was like maybe I did something.
Ann: Well there's also something so poetic about like shade and the Magic Eraser. I haven't quite worked it out.
Alicia: There's something in there. There's something in . . .
Aminatou: It's crazy. And then some people from Love and Hip Hop but I deserved that. [Laughter] Okay, so earlier . . .
Alicia: Please don't let Cardi B ever block me, please.
Aminatou: Never. Never.
Ann: She would never do that to you. She would never.
Alicia: I love her.
Aminatou: Love her. So earlier -- I'm such a mess. Earlier you talked about not wanting to be discouraged and everything is discouraging all the time. But, you know, I feel like sometimes as black people we're just like oh, we've been used to it for a long time so some of our less flavored friends are getting discouraged for the first time and we're watching them go through the motions.
Alicia: Totally. We're like "You're having a hard time right now? You okay?"
Aminatou: Yeah. You're like the government used to do things for you? Weird. [Laughter] So now it's almost like we're all equal in the despair.
Alicia: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Aminatou: But truly are there . . . when it gets really bleak and people -- like you are the head of a movement that people truly . . . like some people truly despise with all of their being, and there's so much state violence against black bodies. Like what . . . how do you deal with that deep despair and discouragement?
Alicia: Well, sometimes not well. Like I think it's important to say that. So we started an organization in 2013 that we did not intend to start and it blew up. And that brought a whole bunch of things along with it including being called terrorists, being in airports and seeing your face on Fox News and having them kind of talk about domestic terrorists. That's scary and not fun. And sometimes I don't deal with it well because there's no dealing with garbage well. It's like you just kind of figure out how deep in the hole you're going to go.
(34:18)
And for me I know that there's a well that's pretty deep and so I try to stay on the surface if I can but I also will drink a lot of wine if it's going really bad, you know? And just try again the next day. But I am scared about what's happening in this country, I'll be honest with you. It's not always easy to be optimistic but I do get optimistic when 500 domestic workers do the biggest canvas in the state of Georgia to make history. [Cheering] You know what I mean? That's amazing. And they're black domestic workers who speak eight different languages because they're from eight different countries and people don't think about black folks that way so that's really exciting. And in Georgia even more exciting.
I get excited by people like Andrew Gillum who killed it tonight in that debate. I get excited about like when I see the seeds of what's possible and I just want to keep fanning those flames. That's what keeps me out of the depths of it. But I guess sometimes you've just got to feel it and know that the sun is going to rise tomorrow.
Ann: Who are the people in your life who when you're tying to stay on the surface -- like we've been playing these voice mails between best friends. I feel like, you know, community is a really important part of that equation. I wonder if you want to shout-out any people in your life? And you don't have to name them but maybe tell a little story about someone who has been there for you.
(35:50)
Alicia: Okay, I have four people. I came prepped.
Ann: Oh my god, yes. [Laughter]
Alicia: Okay. Maybe five. So one is my mom who recently passed away. And -- it's okay, y'all. She is someone who was so cool because she was not about any fancy stuff. So I'd be like "Mom, I met so-and-so," and she'd be like "Great baby, who is that?" [Laughter] It's like shout-out to moms. Way to keep your head on straight. I'm going to shout out my partner Malachi who's pretty awesome and deals with all of my moods and my like "I can't deal with this," you know? And is always super excellent.
I'm going to shout out my bestie Obbs (?). 28 years we've been best friends since we met in geometry class that we were both failing miserably. [Laughter] It might have had to do with the fact that it was after lunch and we would always smoke weed at lunch but that's a whole other conversation.
Ann: Built to last.
Alicia: So she is Hawaiian-Japanese-Chinese and I am black American and we would just bond over food because we had a hippie-ass teacher who said "I don't care if you sit in circles and you can eat food." And we're like great, we're super high. [Laughter] I brought fried chicken from my mom and you brought kalua pig. This is dope. And we had a homie who worked in the cafeteria so he would bring the French fries so that was excellent.
And I'm going to shout out two more people, so maybe my list was six. I can't remember now. I want to shout out Latasha Brown who right now as we speak is driving a bus -- not herself but she's in a bus -- a Black Voters Matter bus all throughout the south kicking butt, taking names. She's on CNN in the Morning. [Cheering] And she's registering voters and taking seniors to vote. And, you know, the crazy racists are like "We don't like what you're doing," and she's like "Nobody cares." [Laughter] You've got to give it up, right? That's kind of amazing. And the last person I'm going to shout out is my home girl Ai-jen Poo.
Ann: Oh, yes!
(38:20)
Alicia: Who is also the director of the National Domestic Workers Alliance but my friend for like 20 years and she is super down and building the largest organization of women of color in the country. That's kind of amazing and I get to work there. It's like my dream job with my homie. Can't get better than that.
Ann: Ugh, the dream.
Aminatou: That's amazing. I'm going to ask you the hardest question in the entire CYG universe, so stretch. We need a very good answer to this.
Ann: Yeah, take a sip of wine.
Aminatou: Take a sip of wine. Okay. Many people have come here and disappointed us. [Laughter]
Alicia: Okay.
Aminatou: Just don't undo -- don't undo all the good works . . .
Alicia: Don't mess it up, okay. I'll see what I can do.
Aminatou: What are your go-to snacks? [Laughter]
Alicia: Gotcha. All right, so I love a chip. Any kind of chip, I love a chip.
Ann: Savory lady.
Alicia: I love a chip. Especially like a kettle chip, yes.
Ann: Any flavors in particular?
Alicia: You know what? I will go many ways but I'm big on jalapeno.
Ann: Hmm.
Alicia: I will do a honey Dijon but you know my favorite? Sweet Maui onion.
Ann: Oh wow.
Alicia: So I love a chip. I love nuts, especially a honey roasted peanut.
Aminatou: Look at you.
Ann: That's a classic, classic snacks.
Alicia: With a chip.
Aminatou: Wow.
Alicia: You know what I'm saying? It's wild. [Laughter] And then I also really love a little sandwich snack meaning a chip, a cheese, preferably spreadable, and a little salam. You know, a little salami.
Aminatou: Oh my god.
(40:10)
Ann: Wow.
Alicia: And maybe a little slice of avocado if I'm feeling real bold.
Ann: You're a snack artist.
Alicia: I am a snack aficionado.
Aminatou: Oh my god, nobody has aced this question. Like that's amazing. [Laughter]
Ann: Ten out of ten. Ten out of ten.
Aminatou: Ten out of ten.
Alicia: I love a snack.
Aminatou: You just made my day.
Ann: I know.
Alicia: Let's be friends.
Aminatou: I mean we're friends now. We talked about Drake.
Ann: Before we let we -- before we let we. Before we let you go . . . I'm just so flustered by the snack answer I can't even keep it together.
Aminatou: Multiple snacks, Ann.
Ann: Multiple snacks, and the snacks stack.
Aminatou: Like building things. Engineering snacks.
Ann: I know. This is what we usually do after the show but we're doing it in front of you right now. Yeah. Behind-the-scenes. Before we let you go where can all these people find your work? And if you want to point them to a URL where your energy is right now send them there.
Alicia: Yeah, okay. So Black Futures Lab is what I'm totally focused on. We're doing a black census right now trying to talk to as many black people across the country as we can about what we experience in our communities, democracy, our workplaces, places of worship. But also asking the all important question: what is it that you want to see for your future? And using that data to inform policy in cities and states. So 20,000 black people have taken this survey. It's the largest survey of black people done in 153 years.
Ann: Wow.
(41:45)
Alicia: Right. [Applause] So if you yourself want to take it you can go to blackcensus.org. If you want to send it to somebody that you know that you want to take it go to blackcensus.org. Share it with all your homies. And if you want to learn more about what we're up to you can go to blackfutureslab.org where we are doing a whole bunch of kick-butt work. And I also want to say, just to plug it, please vote.
Ann: Yes.
Alicia: I can't take another four years of this. [Applause]
Ann: I don't want you to go. [Laughs]
Aminatou: We have the rest of the show.
Alicia: What else can we talk about?
Ann: I know, do you want to just stay here? You could just stay here if you wanted to.
Aminatou: You could hang here. We're almost done, true story. [Cheering]
Ann: Your choice, no pressure.
Alicia: Yeah, totally. If there's more wine I'm in it.
Aminatou: There's more wine.
Ann: Yeah, you want to hang out?
Alicia: Let's kick it.
Ann: Okay, but no pressure. Also if you want to just get your phone out or something that's okay too.
Alicia: Oh, I've got it. I'm on this. [Laughter]
Aminatou: Notes app.
Ann: Yeah, I know right?
Alicia: Exactly.
Ann: Did I just make that awkward for you and you really want to leave?
Alicia: No.
Ann: Okay.
Alicia: I would tell you. I'd be like that was cute but I . . . [Laughter]
Ann: That's right. I'm like can I just pick your . . . okay.
Aminatou: So if you had a good time tonight and you have besties in Chicago, Minneapolis, Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, or Brooklyn please text them right now and tell them that it didn't suck and they should come. [Laughter] So you can send them the URL, callyourgirlfriend.com/tour.
Ann: And we'll see you at the polls on November 6th.
Aminatou: And we'll see you on the Internet.
Ann: Always we'll see you on the Internet. Thank you. [Cheering]
[Theme Song]