Ep 1: Join the Conversation from the Beginning

The week when it all started (sort of). April and Tracie introduce themselves, share more about how they connected, and their vision for sharing and modeling conversations about race for the Jewish community and our neighbors.

Find April and Tracie's full bios and submit topic suggestions for the show at www.JewsTalkRacialJustice.com

Learn more about April’s work at Joyous Justice
Learn about Tracie at TracieGuyDecker.com and read more of her thoughts at B’more Incremental

Walking Meditation (2006) by Thich Nhat Hanh and Nguyen Anh-Huong

Our theme song: Elliot Hammer -- Observing my Thoughts

Editing and production help from Sam Sittenfield

Transcript

- [April] This is Jews Talk Racial Justice with April and Tracie

- [Tracie] a weekly show hosted by April Baskin and Tracie Guy-Decker. 

- [April] In a complex world, change takes courage. 

- [Tracie] Wholehearted relationships can keep us accountable. 

- [April] We have a lot to talk about. Let's dive in. 

 - [April] Okay, Tracie. So, this is our pilot episode. [crosstalk] What do we want to let our new folks know about us? 

 - [Tracie] Well, I guess our full bios are available on the website, but... 

 - [crosstalk] that. 

 - ...maybe we should think about just a few things we want people to know. Why don't you start? 

 - Okay. So, I guess it might be helpful to say why, both why we're doing this and how you and I ended up doing it. And what I would say about the latter is that Tracie is someone I got to know, I had the pleasure of getting to know. I'll have to be honest. I was a little busy at the time, and I was working with a client of mine on a consulting contract. 

Oh, yeah, we should let y'all know a little bit about us too but... And through that process, I got to... Tracie got looped in, and I was sort of like, "Oh, another professional." But then Tracie is so incredibly thoughtful. And we both realized that we have a passion about continuing to strengthen our racial justice work and that we're both avid readers, and thinkers, and pontificators. 

And in our weekly meetings, when we were planning, we usually ended up, for some part of it or a chunk of it, talking about racial justice. And eventually, I got to a place where, and Tracie seemed to be in agreement, that we thought this was something that we could share with our friends and with the world. Because these are interesting conversations, and they're just not happening enough. 

- Yeah. I would second that. I think, I mean, in getting to know you, April, like, it started out as a work thing, but then it quickly became, our weekly calls quickly became, like, the highlight of my week. I mean... 

- [inaudible] did. 

- No, it really did. I mean, no kidding. There was just something so comfortable about the way that we were able to talk and have these conversations that honestly often aren't comfortable in our community or in any community. And so, to be able to just, kind of, get on and have the space to think and talk and... 

You know, I've said this to you before, or sometimes I would be talking about something that I've been thinking about, and you would then frame it for me with sociological, you know, a framework, and name things, name patterns that I had seen but had no words for. Sometimes, you know, you would share life experience that I'd thought about, but hearing it, hearing your life experience was able to really nuance my thought. 

But it was also, it was sort of reciprocal. Like, I love the way that you thanked me for giving you feedback in, you know, one of our early encounters that was really, you know, it was one of those moments for me where I was like, "What? Me? Really? Cool." 

- And I'm not used to it. I'm used to getting, oftentimes, thoughtful, but usually the same stock questions. And we should talk about that on a [inaudible], just even that subject could be a great subject for a future episode. So, stay tuned, folks. But yeah, I just, like, you blew my mind. I started out with a little defensive, and then I was like, "But you're actually completely right. And this is, sort of, a blind spot in the DEI field." 

So, speaking of DEI, DEI stands for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. And I have been a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion professional for going on 18 years now. Professionally, professionally for about 12 years. And then, also, or longer than that for 15 years. And then, in my college years, I was a national organizer of Jews of color and wrote a thesis about the experiences and identities of Jewish young adults of color in American Judaism. 

And throughout my career that I thought was going to be in public health, but ended up being in the Jewish communal field working around subjects of belonging, and inclusion, and social justice, I found that this childhood passion of mine of being sensitive to those who are marginalized in my community became my full-time work. 

And so, that's a little bit about my professional background is that I've been an inclusion, and diversity, and equity specialist, and I still am. And now I'm also currently running a consulting practice, and I work with clients and rolling out various opportunities in the months ahead, like this podcast. 

Tracie, do you want to talk a little bit about your background, and what brings you to our conversation besides our awesome meeting and working together over the past several months? 

- Yeah, sure. Just briefly, I also am a Jewish communal professional, though, my work is, in the past, has mostly, been in marketing actually. That's not precisely what I do now. But really what brought me to this work, that brought me to you, is a very intentional anti-racist path that I stepped onto as a result of the Uprising here in Baltimore, where I live. 

[crosstalk] It was five years ago, was 2015. Yeah, in April of 2015. And I was watching, like the rest of the world, you know, the unrest and then what turned violent here in Baltimore, with the rest of the country, watching that CVS burn which I have been to. And I started to cry. 

And it was like something clicked in my brain, and I experienced it as God speaking to me saying, like, "Now, you're crying, right? Like, a man is dead, and he's just the most recent person." And so, in that moment of, sort of, shame, and anguish, and everything else, I just, it refocused my path. 

And because I felt it as a call from the divine, which, you know, I'm not, I don't think God talks to me, you know, but it did feel like a moment that transcended ordinary thought. And because I did experience it as, sort of, a moment of divine revelation, I guess, I have pursued my anti-racist work with the Jewish lens explicitly. 

And so, that's what brought me specifically to you as another Jew who's on this path from slightly different directions and definitely different experiences. But it's really great to be able to, kind of, connect in that way. 

- Yeah. And so, in a nutshell, we wanted to bring this to a broader audience, and to our broader networks, and hopefully beyond because Tracie and I have continued to build a really meaningful friendship and professional partnership. And our conversations are so juicy because we have enough alignment around shared values, but also enough difference and some similar but also very different lived experiences, which we'll just, we'll talk about in a moment, that it creates for this really interesting combination that I think we both feel is affirming often, and also keeps us on our toes and continues to help both of our thinking evolve respectively. 

- I would just add, April, that I think, you know, when you said, like, "Hey, let's just start recording our conversations because they're so interesting, they're so juicy," I love that word. One of the reasons that I said yes, besides the fact that I just love talking to you, is that I'm hoping that we can model for people, like, having, sort of, open, comfortable conversations around a topic that, in general, Americans have been taught not to talk about. 

So, that's one of the things I just wanted to, kind of, add to that, that that's one of the reasons why this felt like an important project for us. Which, by the way, we've been planning for a while now. 

- For... I think I first mentioned it a few months back as, like, a "Wouldn't this be, kind of, fun?" And you were like, "Yeah." I was like, "Oh, okay." And then from there, you know, I don't even... Everything's a little bit of a blur now but it feels like a couple, this is now a couple months in the making. 

And so, this, along with another project I'm working on... And also, Tracie and I talked about this before starting to record that it feels very meaningful that we were planning on launching this podcast around recording and filming this video series and podcast before things started popping off in the aftermath of George Floyd's death and killing. 

And it could be just as righteous for us to launch this afterward, but it feels meaningful that we've been working and plotting on making this dream a reality before that happened. And it just so happens that our interest and commitment to this conversation is aligning with what's happening in the broader world around us, particularly in the United States. 

And so, I think it's worth naming because we are recording this on Zoom. So, I see us, but it occurs to me that we're predominantly also thinking of this as a podcast, although [inaudible] hoping that we can make the videos available too on various platforms, that we should talk a little bit about our backgrounds because people who maybe know one or both of us may know that, but it's not, it may not be readily apparent. 

So, I am, in addition to being a Jewish communal professional, a little bit about my background is that I am a Jewish woman of color. I am multiracial, and I identify with all of the following terms, both and/or yes and I am a Jew of color. I am multiracial. I am a black woman. 

And I come from a Jewish household that was initially interfaith, but over the course of my childhood, my family became Jewish, and I started Hebrew school in fourth grade, going to a reform congregation out in Northern California. And my mother is a white Ashkenazi Jew, and my father is black and native American and Jewish. 

And yeah. 

- Yeah, and... 

- And interesting that that's led to a variety of very specific experiences in my life. And it's interesting because as Tracie will say in a moment, her background, in a number of ways, is actually quite similar to mine, despite what people might think. 

- Yeah, yeah. Quite similar. So, my mom is a white Ashkenazi Jew. My dad is not Jewish. He's no longer with us, but he was not Jewish. He never became Jewish. But he had white skin. 

 In some ways, I had a much less religious upbringing than you did, April. I always knew I was Jewish, for sure. But we were pretty much, like, we had a Passover Seder, and we went to services on high holidays when I was a kid. And, you know, as I got older, I learned a lot more and observance became much more important always within the reform tradition. 

But one of the things that has struck me and it... You know, even when you and I were talking about it, like, it's this...the marker of whiteness is so hard to get away from that even when you and I were talking about how we would talk about ourselves for this podcast and I said something about wanting to name myself as an Ashkenazi Jew and you were like, "Yeah, but Tracie, I'm also Ashkenazi." 

 And it was like... 

 - Me too. Me too. 

- Right? Like, there was this moment where I was like, "Of course." Like, as if... But in my mind, Jew of color somehow, like, undid the Ashkenazi. Which I mean, now that I've said it out loud and when you pointed it out to me, of course. But it was evidence to me that, like, this journey is ongoing, that there's still so much more. 

And I was grateful to you to say that, and I'm acknowledging this here for our listeners to hear and our viewers to hear because I think that it is essential that we recognize that anti-racism is actually about seeing those moments of racism or white supremacy in ourselves and calling them out so that we can undo them. 

- In ourselves, in our language, and the ways we're thinking, you know. Yeah. And to your point, like, I think specifically the dynamic there is that people have mistaken or, you know, have confused Ashkenazi with exclusively white. [inaudible] European heritage. So, anyone who's mixed race with also the Ashkenazi heritage may also be Ashkenazi. 

 And yeah. Yeah. So, I think we should probably begin to wrap up this first episode. But before we do, I thought it would be good for us to share some of our hopes that we have for this series. 

- Yeah. I mean, for me, I think I've, sort of, said it, I really want to, well, I just love talking to you, and I want to keep talking to you. That's one of my goals. That's, like, my selfish goal is to keep you in my life. For our listeners, like, I really, I'm hoping that we can model having conversations like this and that we can provide some insight. 

Because I know I have gained a lot of insight just in our weekly conversations, and I'm hoping that as folks will listen in, they will also have those pieces of insight. What about you? 

- Yeah, I think there's probably, there's all kinds of big reasons, but what's coming up right now is, one, I am committed for myself and with you, in partnership with you, to get more of what's in our brains out into the world. Because there are a lot of people who have lots of questions about these things that are in, kind of, stuck places around being able to move forward when all they need is a little bit more information, or insight, or a funny story, or anecdote that helps them work their way around something that feels very hard, and helps them to see that, "Yes, that may have been legitimately scary, but that doesn't mean that we can't move through it, and get to the other side with greater insight." 

 So, that's a piece of it. And there was another thing I was going to say which I think I might have forgotten. This is going to be a thing that's going to happen from time to time also, just so you're aware. But there was... And... Right, is that, and so in some of my work, because I also work as a life coach, and with clients, and I also do trainings around racial and ethnic diversity and inclusion. 

 And one of the components that I talk about with people is the power of repetition and of incrementally learning something repeatedly over time as what a Buddhist zen monk, Thích Nhất Hạnh talks about as watering the seeds of the virtues or knowledge bases that we want to help flourish in our lives. 

And so, one of my additional hopes of this series is that it serves as a resource in a variety of ways, perhaps for Jewish or racial justice educators around sharing a particular episode we've done, or ideally for many of our broader community and fans. I need to figure out what we're going to say for that but... 

But for many in our community, it's probably the best way, that this can be one of those solid there every week for you things. And right now what we're thinking is going to generally be, like, 15 to 25 minutes or so that you have available to you, for free, that can help you advance in your racial justice and ideally is fun and pleasant most of the time, and also interesting. 

 - I love that. So, we're both planting seeds and/or watering seeds for folks. I really, like that. 

 - Thanks for tuning in. Our show's theme music was composed by Elliot Hammer. You can find this track and other beats on Instagram @elliothammer. If this episode resonated with you, please, Share it and Subscribe. To join the conversation, visit jewstalkracialjustice.com where you can send us a question or suggestion, access our show notes, and learn more about our team. 

Take care until next time, and stay humble and keep going.