TED Talks Daily - How to imagine a better future for democracy | adrienne maree brown and Baratunde Thurston

Episode Date: June 1, 2024

US democracy needs repair —  and care is the answer, says author adrienne maree brown in conversation with writer and activist Baratunde Thurston. In a sweeping discussion on what it means to be an active citizen, they unpack how to design a future for democracy where we all belong.

TED Audio Collective. You're listening to TED Talks Daily, where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity every day. I'm your host, Elise Hu. What does it mean to be a citizen? Today's conversation features two people who are deeply invested in how best to be a citizen. The writers Adrienne Marie Brown and Baratunde Thurston.

The two of them mix it up and unpack the ideas of democracy, citizenship, but more importantly, belonging, in their 2023 conversation at TED Democracy. After the break. Support for this show comes from Airbnb. If you know me, you know I love staying in Airbnbs when I travel. They make my family feel most at home when we're away from home. As we settled down at our Airbnb during a recent vacation to Palm Springs,

I pictured my own home sitting empty. Wouldn't it be smart and better put to use welcoming a family like mine by hosting it on Airbnb? It feels like the practical thing to do. And with the extra income, I could save up for renovations to make the space even more inviting for ourselves and for future guests. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at Airbnb.ca slash host. AI keeping you up at night? Wondering what it means for your business? Don't miss the latest Thank you. bold questions like, why is Canada lagging in AI adoption? And how to catch up? Don't get left behind. Listen to Disruptors, the innovation era, and stay ahead of the game in this fast-changing

world. Follow Disruptors on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast platform. And now, our TED Talk of the day. I want to start with this word, citizen. And we've both been doing work around tapping into the power of the people, the power within people. And context for me is that I've been co-creator and producer and partial voice of this media movement called How To Citizen, where we take citizen to be a verb. It's something you do. And there are four basic principles behind it. To citizen is to show up and assume you have a role to play. To citizen is to understand power and be literate in it, as Eric Liu would say. To citizen is to commit to the collective self, not just the individual self.

Yes. And thus we can still be selfish. We just have to expand the self circle. And finally, to citizen is to invest in relationships with yourself, with others, and with the planet around us, because there's no separation among all those things. And for us, and for me, this was born in part out of a lack of invitation to do more on the part of the people. Give me your money, vote for me.

They kind of stopped there. How do you think about this word citizen, what it means or what it can mean? First of all, I really like four pillars. I mean, I really like when there's like a clear lineup. I'm not going to give you that. I love it. That's why we have different people on the stage. That's why I love it. So for me, I think of the word fractal. You know, a few years ago,

I got deep into emergent science, complexity sciences, and because I wanted to understand how does everything in the world actually work and everything works. That's all changing. I just wanted to understand everything, everything. And I was like, change is constant. Change is inevitable. And so it means every species that survives on Earth gets in right relationship with change. And then inside of that, it's about being a fractal of something larger than yourself.

So fractal is the fact that things go to the very smallest scale and up to the largest scale, and you can see the repetition. You can see the self-same structure, broccoli, ferns, dandelions, you know, looking at a delta and looking at our lungs, right? You can see that these patterns repeat.

So to me, citizen is being a fractal of belonging to this species, right? And I don't think of it as nation. I think of myself as a post-nationalist because we have these larger concerns than just what's within a border. But so far, humans have said within each border, now we're going to try to operate a certain way. So for me, I'm like, how am I a fractal of belonging? How do I belong to the land, to myself, to community? How am I a fractal of justice inside of my community

or a fractal of the future that I really want to see come into being, right? And so that's how I live my life every day. I'm like, maybe we don't live in the world that I envision, the world that feels just to me yet, but I can be a fractal of that world now. That's to me what a citizen is. Be a fractal. The idea of change is a really important one and I think that change is inevitable and accelerating. And so we are living in this confluence of many changes at once.

The climate is changing, the economics are changing, the technology that allows us to relate or not is changing pretty constantly. So we've got to find something else to hold onto amidst that change. I propose each other as an answer to what we could rely on when everything else seems to be undergoing change. There's a series of questions that we could be asking ourselves

in this time about what are other ways we can process, talk about, think about citizening as a verb. What are some of the questions you're carrying? Well, I mean, we've got some problems. And I think one of the biggest ones for me is how frequently we see people wanting one thing and the government doing something else. And this is in places that are supposed to be democratic, evolved, we're representational governments, right? And it's not new, right? It seems to be like a very old problem.

And we've seen the cycle happen over and over again. So, you know, we can say it's a climate change. I call it a climate catastrophe. I'm like, we're past the time when we need to pay attention. Changes are now turning into something catastrophic. We're in a period of war. We're in a period of genocide. We're in a period of harmful pain.

We're in a period where apartheid still happens. Slavery still happens. And these are things that I've never met any people who were like, that's what I want. I want my government to go out and destroy the climate, harm people. That's not what I want. But people are like, I do want you to keep me safe. And I do want to have a place to be. How can we get there? So the big question I have is, if what we're doing is not working, how do we together change to something else? And how do we do it in a way that connects us? Because our problems are global.

Yeah. So how do we get into a sense of global community that is answering those problems? Do you have an answer? You know, I do. I mean, this is why, you know, I think that we are in this really magical moment of organizing and social media. Social media has a lot of drawbacks. But I think one of the things that we're seeing in this moment is it has the great benefit of allowing us to be in direct communication. And thus direct emotional responsibility for so much more than we ever had to be before. But that also shows us that we're in patterns that are larger than my town, my school, my community. I'm like, oh, I'm in a global pattern.

I'm not the only person who feels oppressed inside my nation. I'm in a pattern of people who feel that way. If we all connect, what can we practice that we're learning from other places, right? And for me, I really look, I remember this as things were arising in Ferguson and being like, oh, how do we handle what's happening in Ferguson? How do we handle the need for black life to matter? And I remember turning and looking at Palestinians and them sending us wisdom and being like, oh, we're facing some similar struggles.

And we're not the only ones. There's people all over the world who are facing these struggles. Right now, the climate crisis is impacting anyone who lives near the water already. So there's communities that are already figuring out how do we move? We're not going to be the first to figure that out. I come from a politic that we're never the first ones to try to face the problem. And we're never the first and we will not be the last. We're not the last. Our job is to move it along. And there's a humility. This is not the last. Our job is to move it along. And there's a humility. This is not the answer that anyone wants,

but there's a deep humility of being able to say, we don't know. And I think that as Americans, we almost never say that. Our internal empire is always so strong that we're like, we know what to do and we're going to tell everyone else what to do. I'm like, what if we don't? What if we are failing at democracy and we can't export that to anyone else? What if we have

to learn about it from others? I am holding space for what you just shared. Thank you. And on this question, the fractal comes back a lot. And I think this gap between what a government does and what people want in so many ways being so large is also this loop of an opportunity where sometimes what needs to change is us in order for the systems that we produce to change. But we also need the systems to change so that we can change. And it's a crisis. Yeah. So it's this Mobius strip of like parallel change is required. That's right. And it's not just demanding you be different. No.

And live by these values. It's expecting myself to do the same. That's right. To be and embody these values. That's right. And I think on the citizen front, I'm thinking a lot about what it means to be satisfied in the experience of citizening.

Yes. Like, how do we want to feel? That's right. I know how I don't want to feel. I don't want to feel frustrated and angry and unheard and tense. I want my shoulders to drop. Yeah. I want to feel heard.

Yeah. I want to feel belonging. Yes. I want to feel like other people see me and that I'm not afraid to see them I don't want to feel afraid at all. I want to feel trust And so if we can articulate that and give voice to that not just who do you want to be elected or what? Policy do you want to shift? But what's the experience of being together that you want to be a part of? And then design from that.

That's a good idea. I like that. I love that. And this satisfaction piece to me, too, I think we've gone through so many cycles of being dissatisfied and not being able to create the changes we wanted so that it becomes normal, right? It becomes like, oh, that's just what it is to be, that's just what it is. I'm like, that's what it has been.

And that's because we're living inside the imagination of people who did not benefit in any way from us changing things, right? So to me, part of the satisfaction is also saying, I get to imagine and you get to imagine and you get to imagine. It would be so satisfying to me to me, part of the satisfaction is also saying, I get to imagine and you get to imagine and you get to imagine. It would be so satisfying to me to say, I imagine a world in which the children that I love are safe and I can make that happen. That's so simple, but it's so what I want. There's an expansion possible here. And, you know, the practice of citizening and belonging and mutual care for

each other, I think our muscles have atrophied a bit. But it's never too late. I'm like, wait, practices. I wrote that down. How do we continue to practice? Okay. I have one main thought I'll come to. I like the countdown. So I think it's all

wrapped up in this ball of care and repair. I think really what it is is care and repair. If we are in a practice where when things go awry, we know we can repair them and we think about repair and we have mediation and we have facilitators who are like, oh, my job is to bring some repair into the circumstance. I think that then means we can believe it when people say they care and offer care to us.

So, you know, I think we're living on an open wound right now. You know, I'm critical of the United States because we were founded through a genocidal colonial act and we never actually repaired it. And then we kept building on top of it with more harm. I'm here because of harmful acts and we kept building and building on top of it

and we never repaired. And so without that repair, now it's normal to live in an extremely violent, extremely unjust world because that's what we created. That's what was founded, right? So I think we need deep repair.

And then I can believe, oh, this place actually cares about my existence. And then care is built into our society. Health care, educational care, like care for how people live and die, care for how people feel. I'm like, I don't want to feel like you're just manipulating me with acts of care. I want to feel like you really see me from birth to death as something that belongs to you and you belong to me. If things go awry, I will repair them and I can care for you and you can believe me because I show you in my actions, not just in my speeches every four years, but in everyday actions, you see my care.

So you're practicing care. You're practicing care. And I'm a facilitator. So to me, it's like facilitation is the way you care for a group. I would rather elect facilitators in chief. I would rather have facilitators running every town. I'm like, I'm tired of pontification. I want people who care and who know how to hold

people with care. I really feel that. And I think there's a mathematical obviousness to the fact that our problems are too big for one leader to solve. We need all of our talents, all of our experiences, all of our failures to be brought to bear on our problems and our opportunities. We need a facilitation, a facilitator, a way to bring all this together and coordinate it so that we can unlock this greater strength that we have only together. And the other path is predictably unsatisfactory. We're never going to get there. We're not going to get there.

We're not going to have, I think the orgasmic yes, right? Orgasmic yes. Orgasmic yes. I'm like, democracy, a democratic place should be an orgasmic yes. Where you're like, I can go out and say what I want

and we can co-create that. That to me is what, I think that's what the intention was once. I think that's what it needs to be now. I love the idea that we get to create it

through our practices now. I want to close this on the practice of imagination and some of the acknowledgement you have brought up. And one of the ways I categorize where we are is holding two truths at the same time. Yep. Democracy is dying. It is in crisis. The version we've inherited, some of it needs to die. It was not designed for all of us. It is not fit for the current circumstance as implemented. We can acknowledge that end. the new democracies that are being born, the new practices, the citizens assemblies, the new polling methodologies, the direct democracies, the deliberative democracies, the community

operated gardens that are giving us ways to see each other, care for each other, and practice citizening together. And so we have to have a funeral and a baby shower. That's right. At the same time. I really love this. And the only thing I would add to it, right, because I keep thinking about how there's not one way. And I think as humans, we're supposed to let go of the idea that there's one way. I think we need to have many funerals and many babies born, right? So there's a lot to grieve and only you know which part of the grief you're carrying, but everyone's got a part of it. And if you all get to lay it in the ground and then we all show up for each other, I'm going to show up for yours,

you show up for mine, and then we all get to doula the next world into being. I mean, it's a really great job. I don't know if you've ever been at a birth, but can you imagine birthing a world we wanted to live in and that wanted us there?

Yes. Let's go. Let's do that. Let's go and then let's tell that story so we can live that story. Let's do it. I'm in. I'm in with you. Adrienne. Support for this show comes from Airbnb. If you know me, you know I love staying in Airbnbs when I travel. They make my family feel most at home when we're away from home. As we settled down at

our Airbnb during a recent vacation to Palm Springs, I pictured my own home sitting empty. Wouldn't it be smart and better put to use welcoming a family like mine by hosting it on Airbnb? It feels like the practical thing to do, and with the extra income, I could save up for renovations to make the space even more inviting for ourselves and for future guests. Your home might be worth more than you think. Find out how much at airbnb.ca slash host. That was Adrienne Marie Brown and Baratunde Thurston at the TED Democracy event in 2023. If you're curious about TED's curation, find out more at TED.com slash curation guidelines. And that's it for today. TED Talks Daily is part of the TED Audio Collective. This episode was produced and edited by our team, Martha Estefanos, Oliver Friedman, Brian Green,

Autumn Thompson, and Alejandra Salazar. It was mixed by Christopher Faisy-Bogan. Additional support from Emma Taubner, Daniela Balarezo, and Will Hennessy. I'm Elise Hugh. I'll be back tomorrow with a fresh idea for your feed. Thanks for listening. Looking for a fun challenge to share with your friends and family? TED now has games designed to keep your mind sharp while having fun. Visit TED.com slash games to explore the joy and wonder of TED Games.