Unlocking Us with Brené Brown - Tarana Burke and Brené on Being Heard and Seen

Episode Date: March 23, 2020

Tarana is a good friend and one of my favorite people on earth. She has been working at the intersection of racial justice and gender equity for nearly three decades, and she started the ‘me too.’ Movement in 2006. In 2017, when the #metoo hashtag went viral, Tarana emerged as a global leader in the evolving conversation around sexual violence. In this episode, we talk about how her theory of “empowerment through empathy” is changing the way the world thinks and talks about sexual violence, consent, and social justice. AND we also talk/cry/laugh about falling in love, running as fast as we can from love, and the perils of sharing a bathroom with the guys we love. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Support for this show comes from Macy's. Fall is in full swing, and it's the perfect time to refresh your home and wardrobe for the sweater weather with new finds from Macy's. From October 9th to October 16th, get amazing deals on shoes and boots, on sale at 30-40% off. And you can shop new styles during the Macy's Fab Fall Sale, from October 9th to October 14th. Shop oversized knits, warm jackets, and trendy charm necklaces and get 25% to 60% off on top brands when you do. Plus, get great deals on cozy home accessories from October 18th to October 27th. Shop in-store or online at Macy's.com. About a year ago, two twin brothers in Wisconsin discovered kind of by accident that mini golf might be the perfect

spectator sport for the TikTok era. Meanwhile, a YouTuber in Brooklyn found himself less interested in tech YouTube and more interested in making coffee. This month on The Verge Cast, we're telling stories about these people who tried to find new ways to make content, new ways to build businesses around that content, and new ways to make content, new ways to build businesses around that content, and new ways to make content about those businesses. Our series is called How to Make It in the Future, and it's all this month on The Vergecast, wherever you get podcasts.

On this episode, we're talking to my dear friend, someone I just respect more than I can even say, Tarana Burke. Tarana has been working at the intersection of racial justice and gender equity for nearly three decades. Fueled by a commitment to interrupt sexual violence and other systemic issues that disproportionately impact marginalized people, particularly black women and girls, Tarana has created and led campaigns that have brought awareness to the harmful legacies surrounding communities of color. Specifically, her work in sexual violence has not only exposed the ugly truths of sexism and spoke truth to power, it's also increased access to resources and support for survivors and paved a way forward

for everyone to find their place in the movement. In 2006, Tarana founded the Me Too movement. Today, that hashtag, the changes we're seeing, the voices we're hearing, she started that movement and she started it in community centers and church basements and working one-on-one with young girls and women. I want to let you know that today's episode has some very candid and explicit conversation around sexual violence. So if this is a topic that is especially difficult for you, don't listen alone, listen with a friend, listen with some support. And if that's not something you can do, that's all right, too. Okay. Tarana Burke. Why? Why are you so far away today? It's so I wish I was it was really for Corona, but I actually don't even drink beer uh yeah this is

sad that we are all in four corners of the earth trying to connect to each other still it's tough the last time we were together I think this is the last time we were together we were in the back of a car singing oh yeah we were making videos of us singing I think earth wind, Wind & Fire. Yes. And you really brought it home with that. Do you remember? If I remember correctly, I think that you took the high notes there and it was very good. I don't know because I have the video. I might have to put it up on the Unlocking Us podcast page. Yeah, that would be very cool.

I just know that we were laughing so hard, you can barely make out the song. Yeah, well, there's that. But that always happens. That always happens. Good times. Well, we are responsibly socially distancing. And I wish you were here so I could give you a big old hug. Oh, no.

And kiss your cheek. But you are there. And I am loving on you from here in Houston. And I want to jump in with the big news first. Let's go. You're engaged. I am. I am engaged now for, what is this month?

About three or four months? Yeah. Tell me. Tell me. Funny story. It's a person I've known for 30 years yeah it's so interesting how life works I met him when I was 16 and he was older than me and um I didn't know he was older than me at the time he didn't know how old I was I didn't know how old he was and we sort of talked for a little bit and I'll never forget

the day we were we were like he lived in my comp in my project where I'm from in the Bronx and so um I'd never dated a guy in my neighborhood before and I walked into his building and he was talking to me about being a grown man and all this other stuff and I was like you're not a grown because I assumed he was like 19 you know because he was in college and he pulled out his ID and it said 65. And I was like, you are a grown man. I was born in 73. This can't work. Yeah. I was like, I'm sorry. You're too old for me. And so I stopped dating him, but we, we kind of stayed friends. And then from that point on, I dated him again a little bit in college. And then my, so I've had two stepdads and unfortunately both of them have passed away. And the first one died in 2001 and I hadn't seen him in a few years.

I was doing all the funeral arrangements for the, you know, I've never, it was the most grown up thing I'd ever done at in a few years. I was doing all the funeral arrangements. It was the most grown-up thing I'd ever done at that point in my life. Yeah, that's hard and grown-up. Oh, yeah. My mom just couldn't pull it together. And she's usually the person. She's the rock in the family. And she couldn't quite pull it together.

So I'm making arrangements for the funeral. And I literally physically bumped into him on the street. And it was like, ah he just he's a barber and he took off the rest of the afternoon and he literally just took me around to get through the flowers to buy the clothes he took me to lunch and I just was like thank you I don't know how I would have made it through this day that was 2001 but I lived in Alabama and he lived in New York so we dated a a little bit then. That didn't work out. So we've done this dance of like friend dating, friend dating forever. And a few years ago, I moved back to New York. He got in touch with me or he'll go to my mom's house because she's lived in the same apartment for like 35 years. So yeah, you know, he'll find me. Anyway, he found me a few years ago.

We started dating again. The timing was just off again. It was like I was trying to kind of pull my life together after Kai went to school. Long story short, we had a little bit of a tumultuous time between like 2015 and 2017 trying to trying to date. And right before Me Too went viral, I just was like, I don't want to see I don't think I want to see you anymore. Like he had done some things that just really just got on my nerves. I was like, I don't think I want to see you anymore. Like we've been trying so long.

I'm just done with it. And I stopped talking to him. And then last year, and I was serious. I was like, this is it. I'm done. You were seriously done. You were not like. Oh yeah. I was done. Now I have to tell you, this man has asked me to marry him twice before. And I said, no. I said no. And so, you know, that's unusual for men. Like mostly they kind of one time and then that's it. Yeah. I don't blame them.

I had said no. So anyway, and I think when I said in 2017 that I was done, he was kind of done too, because he's like, you can never make up your mind. I've been sure for you know 20 something years and you're never sure so we both we went our separate ways anyway last year unfortunately my other stepfather passed away and it was really hard because it was really sudden I don't know yeah he went into the hospital on April 11th with, no, he woke up like April 11th. He was fine. April 12th, he went into the hospital and they said he had sepsis. And it just went, it just got increasingly worse.

His cancer, it come to find out his cancer had come back and it was stage four metastatic. And within six weeks, he was, you know, we were talking about having to take him off life support. And it was in that moment that he comes back. Right. I get a text message randomly saying, I keep thinking about you. I can't stop thinking about you. I'm sorry for whatever I did. You know, and I get these messages every few months.

But this time I was just like, oh, God, I really miss him. Yeah. And so I answered it. And God, he's the kind of person, if you give him an inch, just, just, just, he's just relentless. He's going to take your heart. Oh, my gosh. But what was really, that's really so literal because this time, whatever happened in the 18 months that we were separated changed him. And he says this himself.

He's like, I didn't know how serious like when you left and we went our separate ways he's like the minute I walked out the door I was like this was I should have fought like this was a mistake and so all the things that were like driving me crazy he had started working on or at least acknowledging and I'll tell you the biggest lesson for me he came so he came right before my dad passed, like literally the day or two before. And then we talked on the phone and then the day after. So my dad was step, my stepdad was Muslim. So he was buried immediately. He passed away like 12, like right after midnight on Friday. And he was in the ground by Saturday night. Wow. Which was also, I've never had a Muslim funeral. I've never done, had that experience. And so it was jarring to have just seen, you know, been with a person.

There's a cadence. Yeah. Like, right. In our life, in our death, in our tradition, right? Where it's like, it's slow and people are coming into town and it's a week. Right, and you do all of these arrangements. This was like, get it done.

And he's literally in the ground on Saturday night. And yeah, you know, now that I've had the experience though, I kind of appreciate it. I kind of have an appreciation for how quickly that moved and it forces you to kind of just come to terms. And then, you know, it's not that you don't continue to grieve, but it situated the grieving process differently for me. Yeah.

But I was really hurt on Sunday and he came and got me and took me to the park and we sat in Central Park for like six hours. After he had worked like an eight you know, eight hour shift overnight. And I was just like, wow, I really miss him. And, you know, there was some things we had to untangle. Always. Always, you know, coming back into each other's lives. And, but then it was this moment where he said to me, are you ready to get married? We had been just talking maybe two or three weeks. And, and I thought, Oh God, here we go again with the marriage thing. You know, it always comes down to

this marriage thing with you. And he said, I'm not saying I want to get, we'd have to get married tomorrow, but I'm not going to proceed from here if you're not ready to get married. And I was indignant. I was like, are you giving me an ultimatum? I can see your face. I can see. I know your face well enough that I can see it right now. Like, uh-uh. I was like, wait, what is happening here? I thought you were supposed to be grateful to be back.

And he's like. Where's the gratitude? Let's just revel in that for a while. You know? And he's like he's like I do I love you I'm glad that we're back together but if you're I said if you are you saying to me if I don't marry you that you're gonna leave and he said not right away and I was like wow so I said okay I need a minute you know I just need to let me sit with it. And he was like, Tarana, it's been 30 years. You know, or you don't know. He was like, if it's not true, then just say it's not. You know, it's not going to happen.

But you know. And I just I was like, OK, I do know. I was just so scared. Like, it's just so scary to me. But you know what? The conclusion I came to, I'm going to wrap this long engagement story up. But the conclusion I came to was really not like I don't have anything to lose in a way that is dismissive of how much I love him. But like, I have done heartbreak already. You know, I've done it. I've done it. I've had,

he's broken my heart. I've had other men have broken my heart. I know what that looks like. I know what it feels like. I really don't know what the other side looks like. And like, if I walked into the situation and it didn't work, I know I've survived, right? Because I've done it. I've survived heartbreak. I've met much experience and coming back from that. But I don't have any experience in being loved fully and completely and having somebody who is dedicated to like being a better person, making you a better person, you a better person having a really good like you know wanting to love you um to life as opposed to loving you to death right I haven't had that experience and he's so committed to loving me and I just I was like dang I want to know what this

is like on the other side and you know if not I don't not that I think it's not gonna work out but again if it doesn't I'll be okay like I have evidence that I think it's not going to work out. But again, if it doesn't, I'll be okay. Like I have evidence that I can survive in heartbreak. So Christmas, he came with this ring and proposed in front of my whole family. Officially, I'd already agreed to do it. But this was like the official proposal. And now here we are. We're getting married this summer.

I'm really, really happy for you. I'm so excited, too. Yeah. He's a good person. It's funny because I don't think I've done anything in my life harder, more vulnerable, riskier than letting myself be loved. You said a whole word there. Oh, God. It's hard. Isn't it ridiculous there. Oh, God, it's hard. Isn't it ridiculous that it's so hard?

It's hard. No, it's, I don't know. It's right after Steve and I got married and we had a long off again, on again, seven years because we met too when we were young. And right after we got married, I was seeing a therapist because I was like, this is not going to work out. And I finally went into the therapist one day and I said, this is just not going to work. You know, I just can't do this.

And she said, yeah, I share your concerns. Oh, wow. And I said, exactly right. And she said, yeah, it's just he likes you so much more than you like you. Oh, no. I was like, what? That would hit me like than you like you. Oh, no. I was like, what? That would hit me like a ton of bricks. Oh, God.

That's bullshit. You're fired. I was like, yeah. I was like, what? And he goes, you know, she just said, you know, he really sees you and loves you. And God, is that terrifying for you? And it is. And it's so messy. It's like the only metaphor I can think

of for like how it feels for me is we have this bathroom where we have sinks that are kind of on different sides of the bathroom, like same bathroom, but you know, two different sink areas. And mine is a hundred, don't listen to this, Steve, a hundred times grosser and messier and like cluttered than his. But if one thing is out of place on his, I'm like, I can't live like this. Exactly. Oh my God. Yeah. And it's like, I can deal with my own shit, but now I have to untangle my shit from yours. Like, and then you're bringing your own mess into this, which is probably not even as messy as my mess, but it's hard, right? Brene, you have really, you've just explained our life.

Because I've also never lived with a man. I lived with my daughter's dad for maybe six months when I was first pregnant. We broke up a long time ago. And so I've never, as an adult, as a full grown functioning adult, I've never lived with a partner. So this cohabitation thing has also been interesting. Are y'all living together already? We're living together. And that's been, it's been six months that we've been living together. And, oh, it is so interesting sharing space. I'm a Virgo and I am, right, and I'm 46 and I've only raised a child. You know what I mean? So my living, my cohabitation is I've been in charge of everything.

I don't know what Virgo means, but I do know what 46 and in charge means. You know, like anytime I've shared space with another person, I could say, pick up your stuff. Excuse me. And, you know, I want this to go here and that to go there. And I don't want to hear anything about it. And he's like, you know, he is. It's interesting. He's clean.

He's a very clean person, but he's not an orderly person. I know what you mean. Oh, so he'll be like oh i don't want i hate to see dishes stacked up in the sink but then he'll get up and have cereal and leave the cereal box open on the counter with the bowl with half a bowl of cereal half a thing of milk in it and i'm looking at him like who raised you and it's so funny because like if you're in a good place and you're feeling like in love, you're like, oh, sweet guy, let me put the cereal box. And if you're not in a good place, I'm like, this clearly demonstrates the core difference, the differences between our values and what we believe about the world and each other. And this cereal box is everything.

This is a metaphor for our existence. No, it's been, we're going to couples counseling. And, you know, and it's been great because we get, he's, you know, he's a guy's guy and has never done anything like that. So having him there, you know, he sat there the first few sessions kind of looking like i don't know this lady you know and i've been in therapy for years so i'm just like blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah and he's like yeah i'm not interested in this but then he's found out that you know oh wait i can say the things that i can't say to you in here and you can't get mad

you can't let you, you have to listen. Now he's freedom. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it's good. It's been such a growth process for me. And I don't think I've done anything. Honestly, it sounds terrible to say, but I don't think I've done anything in a long time that really pushed me and made me grow. Do you know what I mean?

Like, oh, yeah. It's just I kind of feel like I've been coasting on what I know how I know how to live working on myself and trying to be better and maintain the betterness but not you know you think you know it all even some of the things that we've discovered in therapy or I've discovered about myself is like Toronto one you don't know it all at all you don't have all the answers you're not right all the time and this person is a human being who has some insight and who actually knows you and that really gets me he he calls me on things that that's just the worst it's the worst and it's the best i mean it's like to be seen and known and loved like it's why we're here right and then yeah why do you want to punch somebody

in the face sometimes i don't know the day it's like don't see me don't know me yeah i i just i know and don't know me just look away please yeah i'm being right about me go away yeah that vulnerability thing is is interesting and it's it's interesting to watch him find safety because I also know, you know, this is a he's a 54 year old black man who has been trained to like you work hard. You take care of your family. You love your woman. You take care of your kid. You know, like that's his. Yeah.

His thing. And I'm just like, you deserve a more robust life than that. You know, like you deserve to like joyous and happy and vulnerable like this is a place where you can do that and like cracking into that and watching him respond like he never smiled in pictures before like he's just always you can look back years and years in pictures unless he's with his kids he's barely smiling and I have this picture from his birthday I took him to Orlando I had to go to Orlando and he came with me, but we made it into a birthday trip

and went to like the race car thing, like the NASCAR. So he got to like race the cars and then he won a little trophy. And then we took this picture after and he has the biggest, he looks like a 12 year old boy. I put that picture up in our bedroom

because I'm like, this moment right here is just a reminder that you deserve to feel like this all the time or as much as possible, right? Like, it's okay. He felt like, I think so many men feel like they can't tap into that side of themselves because, you know, what does that mean about you? Yeah. So it's been great for both of us, I think. Well, I'm really happy for you. Yeah.

And I'm feeling all the bumps with you. And, you know, we just got to keep showing up with the people we love, right? Even when we have no idea what we're doing. Yes. Yes. That's a validating feeling. Even when we have no idea. Even when we know.

And, you know, that's like, you know, Steve and I had no, our parents are both, you know, we have eight now four sets and eight parents everyone's divorced and remarried and divorced and remarried and we didn't have a lot of models about what it meant to be with someone yeah you know in a way that we want to be with each other so we just try to you know we just try to commit to keep showing up like and figuring it out and sometimes it's so it's hard you've been married now it's been we've been together 30 years wow yeah and married 26 or something I think together 32 maybe or together 26 I mean married 26 that's amazing so I want to ask you something because you said something that I want to I want to talk about me too and I want to talk about me too. And I want to talk about something you just said about your fiance that reminds me of something, a quote that I read from you.

You said, love your wife, take care of your family, work hard, but there's more. And that more is joy. And that more is fully living and leaning into the vulnerability, including the, you know, the beautiful love moments and the joy moments and those things that are just so hard. You know, I read a quote by you and I'm going to try to grab it because I'm actually pulling it out of my head right now. But it said, I was talking about Me Too, Black Lives Matter. These are not anger movements. Oh, yes. These are declarations. We're not in these movements to live a life full of anger and rage. We're in these movements to declare that our lives matter, that you're not alone if you're a survivor of sexual harassment, sexual abuse, and that we are entitled to full lives of joy. Yeah.

Did I get that close? That's the close. I remember that. And I don't remember the interview, but I remember saying that. Yeah. Because I think people get that wrong so much that it's, you know, because we're interconnected as people, just humans, that I think there's, you know, this is just my thinking. I always feel like, well, I hope there's research to back this up. interconnected as people, as human beings, that when one group of human beings talk about the ways that their lives have, you know, the world has failed them, the way that these systems of oppression have failed them, whatever, other groups of people feel like it's an indictment of them or that they are somehow personally responsible for each individual life. There's accountability that has to happen,

you know, around oppression. We know about white supremacy, we know about all of these different things, but mostly we're talking about like, we need to, we need to have the ability to say, it's just like everything else. You have to be able to say it out loud and declare it so people understand it. One that you have to, if you can't hear me, I feel like you can't see me. That's right. I think that's right. Say it again. If you can't hear me, then I think you can't see me. It's just like if you're on a deserted island and I'm screaming and screaming and screaming and yelling, I'm not thinking that you can see me because you can't hear me. I'm like flapping my arms and yelling and waving and people just, it doesn't feel like you can be seen if you can't hear me. I'm like flapping my arms and yelling and waving and, you know, people just, it doesn't feel like you can be seen if you can't be heard. That's right. I think that's so,

wow. It's so, I just have to take a minute with that. Yeah. If, you know, to be seen and known and loved is the only reason we're here. And if you can't hear me, you can't see me. Yeah. It's an important distinction, I think, for people because it's you don't have to take an affront to me raising my voice to me, you know, to be feel like it's a personal affront. Right. I'm saying I have to say this happened to me, too. It does as much for me as it's doing for the world like I need it personally but the world needs to hear it too because we will erase groups of people if

they're silent we will just forget they exist because it's easy because who wants to look at the mess you know it's like yeah we were talking about our house earlier you know yeah there are two types of people I always think about the people who who sweep piles into all over their house but they don't actually pick them up and then there are people who like sweep it up put it in a dustpan and throw it away whatever but you know we will we don't like to those those of us who sweep it up and put it in the garbage we don't like to look at mess we don't want to look at that I want to just put it in the garbage. We don't like to look at mess. We don't want to look at that. I want to just put it away and make sure it's in the garbage, whatever. And you'll forget about things if you don't see them. We don't want, I would rather not look at the mess. I would, even as a black person, I would rather not think about racism and oppression. As a survivor,

I would rather not think about the things that I don't have and the things that happened to me. I don't even want to think about them. So I know the people who don't experience them don't want to think about them. But how do we live together if we're not privy to or have a whole space for everybody's experiences and reality? How do we coexist just in general? I don't think we can. And I think this idea that this idea about being heard, wrapping words around experiences, about movements like Me Too and Black Lives Matter, not being movements of anger, but expressions of our wholeness, the dignity, the love, the joy. Yeah. I just, I don't think anyone has led me more fiercely and lovingly through that understanding than you. Oh, thank you. For folks listening right now, so Tarana Burke founded the Me Too movement in 2006. And it wasn't a hashtag. It wasn't a

Hollywood movement. The way I understand it, and correct me if I'm wrong, Tarana, it was a movement that happened in community centers and classrooms and church basements and places where you needed young girls who were sexual assault survivors to know that they were not alone. Yeah. Is that right? That's absolutely right. I just feel like there was an awakening when I was looking around at these babies in our community, these young girls mostly who were in our program. I was my best friend at the time and I had had started this leadership program. It was a girls like empowerment and leadership program called Just Be. And my goal, because I came up through a leadership program that really changed my life, and I wanted to continue that experience more directly with black and brown girls.

I did not, I didn't think about this until I got into the work, even though I came from this sort of civil, I was in Salem, Alabama. So I was surrounded by people who had made civil rights history, who had been a part of the movement in one way or another, who were just really grounded in a social justice legacy. And I knew those people personally, and I knew the trauma that they had experienced, both from being directly in the movement and just from being, you know, in living in low wealth, underserved communities for decades. And I also know that when the movement left and all the hoopla died down, those people were left just to exist on their own. You know, Selma is one of the, is in Dallas County in Alabama. It's one of the poorest counties in Alabama. You know, people don't realize that this place that gave us democracy, you know, that reinvigorated democracy in this country

has been ignored. And so I went in with this goal of empowering these girls to make change in their community, creating, you know, doing leadership development with them so that they can go and affect change, you know, have the power to do that and also to be grounded in a sense of self-worth, like personally. So when they go into a world that says that they're not worthy, as it often tells Black girls, that they would be empowered to face that lie. But what I found were a bunch of girls who were very eager to do that work, but who were also carrying so much trauma and so much pain. And it started to feel, the reason why I compared it to the civil rights folks is because it started to feel unethical, if that's the right

word. I was like, to some degree, like unethical to ask these girls to go out and fix the community, to be empowered, to go in and go back and create change in your community without empowering them to create change in their own lives. Like without addressing the trauma that they were holding in their own lives. It just as if it were just normal. Yes. We can't just skip over that. Yeah. And, you know, and I think that's what we do for a lot of activists. We want them to be on the front lines. We want them to fight against social injustice, but we're not dealing with the traumas they're holding in their own communities, whether it's the trauma of, you know, poverty is traumatic or violence, you know, like all of these different things occur in our lives and we don't work on folks inside

the same way we work on the outside. And so it was was like I need to pull back and figure out one what does it look like to speak I don't want to sound like a pastor because it wasn't in the same way but to speak healing into these girls lives right to no yeah I mean I don't know if that's pastoral or not but it's just it's accurate yeah it's accurate. How do you speak healing? How do you speak healing? And it was at a time when I was doing, I was on this personal journey, you know, I was, it was the beginning of like the, the, like the secret and not, you know, I was reading all the Deepak Chopra, Yama Van Zandt, anybody. I was just, it was a self-help, self, yeah, mindfulness and self-awareness was kind of at a high at that moment and I was just voraciously

reading everything I could and those things this is probably too I don't I'm not disparaging anybody this is my personal experience but those things weren't helping me in what and I think it was because it wasn't speaking to what I was looking for, which is also why some years later when I found your stuff, I was like, thank you, God. The difference is the self-help stuff that I was reading at the time felt like it made me feel like I was doing something wrong. Yeah. Do you know what I mean? It made me feel like you're broken. You need to go outside of yourself to find joy. You don't, you have to go. I remember when I found the gift of imperfection and I just, oh, I know because of the TED talk. That's why I was like, how did I? Yeah. I have a friend named Nancy who, who I've, who I've been Facebook

friends with for like 15, 10, 10 years or whatever. And she's a psychologist and she posted your TED Talk. And I was like, oh my God, I have been talking about shame and not vulnerability necessarily, but the danger of shame and what it does to us, particularly as survivors of sexual violence. And generally like related to being Black people in America and how we, you know, just all this stuff around shame, unfounded. I didn't have any research or anything like that. And then I found it and I was like, see? The lady said it. The lady said it.

But, you know, the thing is that I just got, you had lived experience of working with thousands of people who have lived that. And my research is just, I think you have taught me, there's no way I could have told you more about shame than what you taught me. That's kind of where we met in this kind of like, we've got to name this thing. Yeah. And so. Yeah. to name this thing. And so, yeah. And what I realized when I was with the girls is that, oh, if we don't deal with the shame factor, we can't even get to the healing factor. They were wrapped in it. It was, it had become yet another layer. And I had it too, right? I was

walking with it, but it's, you know how children will do that. When a child mirrors some of your insecurities, you see it clear and you're like, no, no, baby, not you. And then you realize this is the thing I'm holding, right? And I'm looking at these little 11 and 12 year old girls who are the same age as I was when I was going through this thing, who have just adopted, their shame is like a coat of armor. You know, they had just adopted this thing. I'm not going there. I'm not dealing with that. I am definitely this type of person. And so I operate from this place because I'm this type of person. And that thing that they had taken on that this type of person was only because of shame. And their experiences were sexual assault. Yeah. And among other things. But, you know, I remember very clearly I'm writing right now. So I'm writing about a lot of this and a lot of this has come up. It's been really painful because I remember very, very clearly knowing and understanding at about.

Eleven, 12 years old that I was a particular kind of girl, that I had gone past the threshold of, you know, whatever a good girl was, you know, a clean, good, right girl was. I couldn't be that. This is because I had been molested and I had been sexually assaulted. And I did not ascribe anything to the perpetrators, to the people who caused me harm because I felt complicit in my own abuse. And my complicity caused me deep shame. And so I just decided, I'm just this type of girl. And these type of girls, these things happen to these type of girls. And the best that I can do to hide this shame is to pretend to the world, to at least make the

world think that I'm a better person. So I'm going to be perfect. I to pretend to the world, to at least make the world think that I'm a better person. So I'm going to be perfect. I'm going to have straight A's. I'm going to do great in sport. I'm going to do everything I can to create this veneer of perfection so nobody can see what's really underneath here, which is this horrible girl who can't even keep people from touching her. It's so complicated for a 12-year-old to carry that. But, and I was Catholic. It's impossible, right? Right. The load is impossible. Oh, yeah. Because part of the dynamic that no one understands is what you're naming right now, again, you know, you coming up with language for us, which is so much of sexual abuse is making sure that the victims and targets and survivors of it. I, that's part of the first key of unpacking how you start this journey to healing is I remember going through this group therapy thing around for survivors. And we went, we got to like, you know, week three or something like that. And they said, we're going to deal with anger, you know, and how you, it was, it was a religious, it was through a church. And it was like,

how do you release your anger towards the person who caused you harm? And I remember talking to the group facilitator after, cause I would help co-facilitate sometimes and said, I don't, I don't actually have anger toward the people who did this to me. Like, I'm not in the way that you're thinking. You know, people, I've talked to other survivors who are like, oh, I hate them. I want them to die. Or, you know, like those kind of, I didn't have that because I took all the blame on myself. So I was mostly angry at myself.

I didn't have the kind of anger. I had some, I was like, you know, like, why'd you pick me kind of anger? You know, like, I wish you would have just picked somebody else, which is terrible from a child's mind. But yeah, it took me a minute to, I had to dig in and get the anger against them. And that was actually therapeutic for me. And it was an opposite kind of thing. Like I had to become angry with them so I can displace some of the anger I had for myself that I had harbored for myself and put it where it belongs, which is why I always tell survivors, you got to put that burden where it belongs.

It's not our most complex, difficult part to me of shame is when we internalize, do you know what I mean? Like we internalize the responsibility, the blame. Yeah. Because sometimes I think externalizing it without the right support in place is maybe too much to bear. Yeah. No, I think it is. I think externalizing it and saying this, you know, you did this or this is you caused it.

It just, there's so much involved in that. There's so much understanding, particularly if it happened as a child. Right. There's so much understanding that we don't have yet, even about how the world works, that is required to do that, that you have to, for many people, and I don't think yet, even about how the world works, that is required to do that. That you have to, for many people, and I don't think we talk about it enough. There's these ways that we talk about healing and survival that are really dogmatic. Like you do this to get here.

This person feels like that. This person feels like that. And it's like you said, it's really messy and complex. It's not, we don't all experience it the same. We don't all feel the same. Even for shame, speaking about like the diversity of people who experience sexual violence, I have talked to people who are from Asian families, from Southeast Asian families, from African immigrant families, Black American families, Latinx families, universally shame is a factor

in what we experience. But why we have shame varies. That's right. Greatly by culture. Because shame is driven by messages and expectations that are absolutely socioculturally driven. Yep. Yep. It's the standards are so, I guess the expectations and messages that feel shame are so culturally bound. Yes, they are. And which is why we have to be careful about like how we, which is why I think a lot of people can't find themselves in the messaging that's out in the world around survival and around sexual violence. You know, I think a lot of survivors of color feel lost or left out or not seen because we're not speaking specifically about how, when I talk to folks who are from Asian families and they talk about the complete family shame, you know, and a lot of immigrant families have the same thing. Or you talk about people from Latinx communities who the reasons why we don't tell, like they don't tell not because, you know, they had different choices

they might tell. But, you know, we did a PSA where the woman is, I think, Colombian or Honduran. I can't remember. I'm sorry. But she's talking about why she didn't tell when her uncle molested her because she didn't want her family deported. She didn't want to risk bringing law enforcement into their lives and their family being deported. I didn't tell. And I probably could have said, as an adult, I know that if I had said what I needed to say

the night that it happened, that my mother and my stepfather would have absolutely responded well and believed me. But I, as a six-year-old child, Black girl being raised in an inner-city community with a lot of police activity and a lot of police violence, even at six years old, or I was six going to seven, I knew consequences. And so I put together inside of less than a minute, if I say this to my father, he's going to get his gun that I know he has, and he's going to go get this person. And then he's going to go to jail and it's going to be my fault. Like I made a very adult decision at like six, seven years old based on the world that I lived in and what I had seen and how I, you know, our cultural norms in the community that I was being raised in.

And so these things vary from person to person, community to community, culture to culture. And we have to be sensitive to that. And I think it's, there's no way, again, to go back to what you said earlier that I think is so, you know, for me, just life-giving and changing. We can't see people if we can't hear them. And so we have to hear the stories and hold everyone's story as their truth whether it whether it reflects our own experiences it doesn't doesn't matter we have to stop putting people's stories through our own experience and take people's stories as the truth yeah and and you bring you bring up something that I think that's also important in terms of this movement, right? As hard as that is for a lot of people and as difficult and big a task that is, it's also important because if the people don't understand what survival looks like, then they really won't be in a position to help survivors. Because I make this joke all the time about, you know, we've been watching Law & Order SVU for 20 years, and this is the lens that most, a lot of people see or have gotten their, the breadth of their knowledge around sexual violence. Thank God the show has shown

a great diversity of issues and things like that. But it is also a television, you know, show. It's a drama. It's a drama, right? And they get to dramatize things. They get to have a happy ending. They get to tie it up neatly in 45 minutes. That's not how life works. And I'm telling you, nothing made this more clear for me in the last two years than the Brett Kavanaugh hearings and the response to Dr. Blasey Ford and watching people, even folks who were supporters of the movement, liberal folks, whatever you want to call them, right, who were still questioning her, who still wanted her to be

a stronger, you know, to have a stronger testimony, who wanted her to remember more, who wanted her to be different. And then the naysayers, of course, were like, oh, she's clearly lying because she doesn't remember this. Because I watched people pick her apart and pick apart her story. And then I listened to those of us who have survived this thing. And we all thought the same thing like or similarly it's so amazing that all these years later that she has the level of memory that she has and the things that she remembered are very specific to the way it made her feel right when you listen to her testimony she's like absolutely i this is a i remember what's that word she said she said in

my because she's a scientist she said some she said something uh it left an indelible mark in her something and the and the laughing and the laughing and the smells like all the things that trigger us right that that that we remember and i I had this encounter. I tell this story often because it brings it home for people. I had this encounter in the bathroom because I was there at the, in the hearings, which was also life-changing. But I was in the bathroom during the break right after she testified. We were all just like emotional and people were trying to pull themselves together. And this woman who recognized me, you know, starts chatting and says, oh, you know, that was something, wasn't it? Oh, my goodness.

And I was like, yeah, blah, blah, blah. And then she said, I just wish, I wish that she was just, I just wish she had a little more detail. Like, I wish she was just a little bit stronger, right? She is, you know, for lack of a better way to put it we're on the same side here this woman right right and I was feeling some camaraderie with her for a moment like just to have somebody to unload on and and she said that and it was so jarring to me and I said they're not very really talk about my personal experience on purpose but I I turned to her and I said, you know what? I'm 40. I think I was 45 at the time. I said, I'm 45. And I was molested when I was, I was first molested when I was six years old.

And so that's me. That means for the last like 39 years, I've been carrying this and all of the people who know me, everybody who knows me closely, my close friends and family, they know that I have a terrible memory. Like I'm notorious. Everybody knows like write it down for Tarana. She's going to forget it. But, you know, that's just that's the that's the thing I'm trying to work on. But everybody knows it. And I said it took me years to figure out that the reason why I have this terrible memory is because I've spent every

day for the last 39 years trying to forget. We don't want to have these memories. We don't want to have every detail. Imagine having every single detail of everything that happened to you, the worst thing that ever happened to you, holding every last detail for 40 years. It's horrific. I'm glad that I don't remember the color of my coat or the pants that I was wearing. I'm glad that I don't have those memories. I don't want them. And so the fact that she could muster up

what she could in there is heroic. And I hope that she can forget all of it at some point because that's the only saving grace for some of us is to get this thing out of our bodies at some point. And that's the only saving grace for some of us is to get this thing out of our bodies at some point. And we never really can. So do not stand here and tell me that you wish she had more memory because should she suffer more, right? She's already doing this thing for us that's so heroic that she absolutely doesn't have to do. And we only say, give us more, give us more because we don't

understand survival. We don't understand what it looks like, what it feels like, what it costs. And because we don't have that information, other people who have control over our lives, whether they're jurors or, you know, lawyers or people who make decisions about the lives of survivors don't have enough information about what survival looks like. And so you, they double down on our trauma because you've made this decision based on something you saw on TV or some way that somebody else you know survived. And it's just not, it's not right. And it's not enough. I'm really just taking it saying, and I just keep thinking about the human need to separate ourselves from people who have experienced things that we fear and the need the need for me not to believe

things are true because if they are true it hurts too much or I'm too afraid or I have to reflect on my own experiences and that like give me you know, I've never thought about it to this moment where you're like, you know, give me more detail. Like, shit, man, I've spent my whole life trying to wake up and not remember every single detail. But we're not survivor-centered. We're first protective power systems in place centered. Then secondly, though, for those of us who really are trying to do the right thing, our self-awareness is not honed enough to think about what you're saying. And I just. Yeah, because she meant well, right? Like she was not.

Right. This woman definitely was not anti and she, you know, probably wished her well and thought highly of her. She didn't. It wasn't mean. It just was unaware, you know, and it was. And in a political context, it gets even worse. Yeah. I mean, we're so divided because then you've got the barricades. The barricades are built. Yes. And there's this deep polarization. I have people who support the president, his administration, whatever, who write into our social media pages, and particularly around this, when the Kavanaugh hearings were happening, saying things like, oh, goodness, I was sexually assaulted when I was a kid. It's not that big a deal.

She needs to get over it. I mean, tons of those letters. Or women saying, oh, she's lying. This happened to me when I was such and such. And I remember every single detail down to the letter. Like, you know, she's just trying to take down the president. And I'm like, y'all, listen, listen, we, how far gone are we? Really? Like the, the, the, we are almost depleted of compassion if this is the place that we are in that we can't even take a step back to see and hear you could want this man to take the place on the supreme court and acknowledge that this woman is telling the truth you just have to be honest with yourself and it's the kind of honesty that people don't want to face.

You are creating, I mean, that statement right there, Tarana, you are creating an internal tension within people that we are slowly but surely losing our capacity to hold. Do you know what I mean? Like that we cannot hold two competing ideas very well together. So we just have to just let one go. Trout the idea that gets in our way ideologically. in this moment, mostly inside of the Black community. I'm struggling with the rejection of the movement and people seeing it as an attack specifically on Black men. It's a growing narrative that is really, I think, dangerous. And I mean, it's dishonest, but it's also just really dangerous. We already have a very small amount of real estate on which to build this movement inside communities of color. And so when narratives like that pop up, they take up so much more real estate that we need. And that thing you said is the thing that

I try to drive home all the time about our ability to hold two truths at the same time, or more than one truth. What software do you use at work? The answer to that question is probably more complicated than you want it to be. The average U.S. company deploys more than 100 apps, and ideas about the work we do can be radically changed by the tools we use to do it. So what is enterprise software anyway? What is productivity software? How will AI affect both? And how are these tools changing the way we use our computers to make stuff, communicate, and plan for the future? In this three-part special series, Decoder is surveying the IT landscape presented by AWS. Check it out wherever you get your podcasts. Hello, I'm Esther Perel, psychotherapist and host of the podcast, Where Should We Begin?, which delves into the multiple layers of relationships, mostly romantic. But in this special series, I focus on our relationships with our colleagues,

business partners, and managers. Listen in as I talk to co-workers facing their own challenges with one another and get the real work done. Tune into Housework, a special series from Where Should We Begin, sponsored by Klaviyo. So for people listening that don't know, I mean, you and I are friends. I follow your work. I know about the tension and the attack on the Me Too movement within communities of color. Can you help people talk about what that, I mean, you see the narrative on Twitter and it's just, it's so not factual and it's so easy to just check it. Yeah, it's really. What's the narrative? Well, there's this growing narrative that Black men are the target of the Me Too movement, which has been started inside, you know, with this small groups of pockets of people on social media mostly. And it's based on the fact that it's complicated, but not complicated.

It's based on the fact that like R. Kelly, when the R. Kelly documentary came out on Lifetime, it was, you know, over three days. It was really sensational and it was huge. And it aired over and over again and it got a lot of attention. And for the first time, we had people outside of our community talking about this thing that we've been talking about inside of our community for 20 years. And it got a lot of attention. So R. Kelly, the musician. R. Kelly, the musician, right. Multiple charges. um and it got in a car kelly the musician kelly musician right multiple charges multiple charges

of sexual violence sexual assault sexual misconduct everything you can name who has been targeting um teenage black teenage girls for years in his community i mean from middle school right like girls as young as 13 for years and years and years. And Black women mostly have been railing against him as an artist, as a person, as a perpetrator, as a predator for years and to no avail. His music is still played. He still was touring. He was still very, you know, widely popular and accepted. Even like Lady Gaga did a show with him, did a song with him and performed with him at some big award show in this last decade. Right. So it's been really hurtful for a lot of black women that we could not get attention around this person.

And then the Harvey Weinstein case happens. Right. And all of a sudden the whole world stops because we had these different looking survivors. You had these, you know, rich, white, wealthy, glamorous, famous women who came forward, who again, I see as survivors first. Right. I'm not, this is not about them and them coming forward. They are survivors and they deserve to have that space to come forward and tell their truth. But I think what it brought up for a lot of people in the Black community is, well, for Black women, for sure, is that why is it that we can't get the same attention we've been

talking about a predator in our community in a similar way? Well, all of a sudden, when we do get that attention, now, if you know, those are people who follow the movement know that the most popular celebrity cases have mostly been white men. You know, have been, you know, Weinstein and Matt Lauer and Charlie Rose and Louis C.K. and on and on and on. Right. There were these there were these cases of white men even prior to Weinstein. We had Bill Cosby, but then there was also Roger Ailes and and the other guy from Fox News right so there's but to these pockets of black people who are

anti have said well Bill Cosby went to jail and now R. Kelly has been arrested because he was arrested and indicted for multiple charges after the documentary aired why aren't any white men going to jail and it's like it's not first of all it's not that simple

but secondly Harvey Weinstein it took a while but he was definitely you know arrested charged whatever blah blah blah anyway this narrative of like why do we keep talking about black men has been growing and growing and growing and some of it comes from a very real history that we have in America of Black men being falsely accused of sexual violence. Absolutely. Right. That's a very, I mean, from Emmett Till to the Central Park jogger case, we have seen Black men historically in this country be falsely accused or sexual violence be weaponized against them. And so that's a harmful and hurtful part of our history that you just can't erase. That it just is what it is. It's real and it's there.

But that we have not owned. People have not owned, that we don't talk about, but in our community, we know it, right? And so for many people, when a Black man is accused of sexual violence, we have it gives us pause first. Like, wait, who's the victim? What happened? Right. All the things that we that we do not encourage people to do when folks come forward have become standard in the black community because we've seen it so many times. We've seen the false accusation. So I get where the immediate, like the distrust comes from. I understand that very clearly. So that's a truth, right? But here's another truth that also doesn't get held up and that we don't talk about. That Black women have the second

highest rate of sexual violence in this country. We have the second highest rate, yeah, of sexual violence in this country behind indigenous women. That is a very real thing. And so that is another truth. And yet a third truth is in every single community, every community, there's no special depravity in the black community. There's nothing that makes our men, you know, have a predilection towards sexual violence, nothing like that. But in every single community, crimes are committed against the people who are in closest proximity. So that means that white people tend to kill, murder, rape, da-da-da, other white people. Asian people, Asian people, Latinx people, Latinx people, Latinx people, and Black people, other Black people, right? That's why we rail against this idea of Black on Black crime, because people commit crimes against the people who they live closest to, and we tend to live

in pockets together. But again, if we know that that is also true, now we have three truths. If we hold all of those truths, then we have to understand both the sensitivity around calling out black men around sexual violence and black women's need to guy in South Carolina. We've seen major cases erupt of white men who have or men who are not black who've actually committed crimes against black women. But by and large, just like in every other community, that's our reality. So if if we only hold the one reality of the history of black men being falsely accused and we operate from that place in this moment, what happens to the masses of Black women who have experienced sexual violence? We get erased again. We weren't seen when Me Too went viral, right? That was mostly not women of color at all who were put on the forefront. If we acknowledge that, that's true.

So now you have white women covered. If we only deal with the history of black men being falsely accused and come to their defense every single time a black man is accused and don't want to hear anything else, where does that leave black women? And that's all I've been saying, that my work has always centered Black women and girls for that reason, because somebody has to speak up for us. Somebody has to say that we matter. Somebody has to prioritize our pain. And my hope would be that the entire community could embrace that and say, these individuals who've been the

R. Kellys or the Bill Cosbys who have been called out, and mind you, there haven't been a ton of Black celebrity men who have, not to say they don't exist, but they haven't been called out and pointed out as perpetrators in this moment. A lot of that is because Black women do not want to be held responsible for being the one to call out these Black men. And in the last few months, we've seen the repercussions of that, right? Oprah Winfrey, Gayle King, Jada Pinkett Smith, Jamel Hill, myself, Black women who stand up and say anything, not accusatory, but anything that looks like we are trying to hold a Black man accountable for behavior. But even Black men like R. Kelly, there is this backlash and this vitriol

that says you hate Black men, as opposed to saying, you know what, these particular Black men do not represent Black manhood. R. Kelly is not indicative of the Black men I see in my life who raised me, who love me, who have been surrounded by for most of my life. He's not indicative of that. And so we want to make sure the world knows that when somebody is preying on our community, we want them held accountable. That's not the narrative that has taken shape, right? And so going all the way back to what you were saying before about the need to separate ourselves from the things that we fear, I think that is so much of what we're seeing is rooted in that. If we have to start looking internally and saying, we have to address the rate of sexual violence that is happening. Also,

not just the women and girls, right? In our community, period. Black boys, black men also are survivors. That's right. We have to, like every other community should do it. Right? Yeah, all of us. I mean, all of us collectively, but then also because of those cultural differences, we have to take a step back in our various cultures and ethnicities and talk about and think about the way it affects our groups of people. It's very important that we do that. And if our response to that is, why are you always talking about Black men? Why do you hate Black men? I'm like, come on, y'all. This response is coming from fear and shame and a lack of ability to be vulnerable, really, right? I know

vulnerability is hard for us. We can't all afford vulnerability, but we need a modicum of it in this moment in order for us and compassion to say, like, this is just a truth. Just, it's just a truth. And we have to just sit with this truth and like unpack it and figure it out and come up with some solutions. We have the ability to do that. I know that was really long, but it's just, it's sort of complicated and nuanced. So I just wanted to be clear that I got through the whole thing. I think it's complicated and nuanced. And I think that's why I want to have these conversations with people like you, because when we lose our capacity for complicated and nuanced, I think we lose our capacity for change. Yeah. And I guess what I'm struck by,

as you're talking, is that how complete oppression is as a tool that in white supremacy it's not just what you see it's all the ramifications are so bone piercing Bone piercing. You know, this idea that it's, you know, we see it in other communities. We see it, you know, with women who try to hold other women accountable. And how could you ever do that? You're setting us all back. Or, you know, it's oppression. Just every door you try to open, it has already set a trap there yep it feels impossible

i'm saying like absolutely i i was so struck with by of course you know what of course you know what i'm talking about because you built this your work on this it's just i sometimes think and i'm thinking on my feet right now so i don't know if it's going to make sense, but oppression almost seems to be completely predicated on not being able to hold multiple truths at one time. And assigning rank to truths so that what we're taught are smaller truths get crushed in the process. Yeah. Do you know what I mean? Like, it almost seems like the greatest weapon against oppression, white supremacy, is critical nuanced thinking.

Right. Because it is a ranking to truth. So if I am oppressing you through race, and then I have created this lie that I am a supreme being, right? And this truth is the highest truth. It is absolute and all consuming that this is true. And I have to proliferate everything that you believe, everything you see, everything you hear with that truth. You know, this is the thing I was saying about grounding our girls in the sense of self-worth, because that's a tool to fight back that lie. It's a tool against that lie. And we have to live our lives and build a literal arsenal to fight the lies that are created and put out in

the world as truth. You started the Me Too movement, what is that, 14 years ago? Yeah, what is this? Yeah, good grief. 14 years ago, by literally looking at young girls in this community that you were mentoring and teaching and modeling how to reclaim their own self-worth and value, you looked at them and said, Me Too. It's become a hashtag now, and whiteness has been centered on it a little. Would you agree? Oh, yeah.

The thing that I think about you when I think about Me Too and the history and just my friendship with you is, would you say it's true or not true that the Me Too movement that you created is a movement that is survivor, empathy, and love focused? Absolutely. Our tagline was empowerment through empathy. Oh, really? Yeah. That's the original tagline for Me Too on our t-shirts and everything. It's empowerment through empathy. Because what struck me about using, and that actually came to me before the idea to use the words Me Too.

When I was trying to figure out what was the thing that worked most for me in my healing journey. When I started trying to figure out how to feel better about myself. And it was the moments that I had deep empathy with other people. I had this, you know, I didn't have language. I didn't have, we weren't, you know, survivor healing. I just, I didn't have that language even in my own journey. And I remember meeting with this group of women in California, these activists, badass, radical women,

who we were doing a digital storytelling project and just kind of hanging out after and somehow or another turned to survival, like talking about sexual violence. And one of the, and I felt brave in that moment, even just saying something about being a victim, right? Because I just didn't even talk about it. I was on a journey, but it was very personal. And one of the women, I'll never forget this Indian woman, she stopped and she turned to me and she said, no, no, no, no, no, no. We don't use that language. You are not a victim.

You are a survivor. And although we use it widely now, it was not widely used then. Yeah, cutting edge then. Oh, yeah. And it just, it was, you know, those moments. Like, I was like, oh, my God. Just what it made me feel like was it feels so much better to feel like I have overcome something rather than succumb to it. You know, like, oh, this thing didn't kill me. I'm still here.

I survived. And so I took that nugget and these women allowed me, they just saw me, you know, we talked about a lot of what I do in our healing workshops comes from that experience because we didn't tell our stories. We didn't sit around talking about like all these gory details. We talked about things like being afraid of the dark, you know? We talked about like what our sex lives were like post these things. And I thought, I feel seen. I have a group of people who deeply empathize with my life as a survivor. And I needed that. I needed to feel like I wasn't just like, we all survive. Survival's very isolating. The violence is isolating isolating so even though you see the numbers

and the data and you know it's worldwide and intellectually you know it's widespread it feels it immediately feels like somebody is othering you and putting you in a corner and a lot of times I love obviously I love your explanation of like the difference between empathy and sympathy and I use it a lot and and one of the other things I tell people too is that for survivors sympathy sometimes can feel like othering so people will say to you yeah oh I'm so sorry that happened to you and that that little piece right there that happened to you feels like an arm I'm in the studio my arms, like putting arms distance. Because it's a separation between you over there that that thing happened to and me over here. And I know people mean well, obviously, when they do that.

They're trying to be there for you and support you. But it's such a different experience than somebody saying, gosh, that happened to me too. Right? And the minute you have that, how I explain to people sometimes is that you have created community even if it's just for five minutes. They're powerful words, aren't they? They're powerful words. We now, there's a thing I know about you and that I understand fundamentally about your life in just saying those words in this moment that so many other

people don't get. And that is what empathy between survivors can feel like and why. And like for me, Me Too originally was about empathy between survivors. Like I see you and I see you too, you know? Yeah. And so, yeah, definitely it was about love and empathy and healing and the power that is created. That empowerment was about the power that's created between two people when there's that exchange of empathy. How do we, I am a firm believer, and I get this question a lot. I believe empathy is possible

between two people who have not had the exact shared experience, but who are willing to hold people's stories up as truth and listen and learn? Do you believe that? Absolutely. I get that question a lot too. Like, what if I'm not a survivor? Can I empathize? And the reality is we've all felt pain. Most of us have experienced trauma. Most of us have experienced trauma most of us have experienced loss right these are the the things the things that people carry the residue that the trauma leaves is very similar to a lot of different things and so you know you can pull from that place and say like I get this if you can get past the this is why I try to get away from the details sometimes. Because if you can get away from the details to what it is that it left with you, then it's a better chance of people connecting to that.

Right? Because you don't have to have that. I ask people all the time when we're talking about empathy. And I said, you know, raise your hand if you know rage, powerlessness, pain, trauma. It's, you know, a lot of us have had the experiences that we need to share genuine empathy. Not all of us are willing to tap into them to make that connection. Right. And so what I think is impossible is to both self-protect and insulate and see and hear other people at the same time. Oh, yeah.

It's literally impossible. It's literally impossible. You won't, people at the same time. Oh, yeah. It's literally impossible. It's literally impossible. People won't go there. I mean, that's such a great way to approach that, to ask people. Because similarly, that's what I tell people. Like, there are things that I am holding, that I experience, that you have that have literally nothing to do. It could be a loss of your mom, you know? Right.

That brought you to this place. But at the end of the day, even with other survivors, there are so many survivors who I get this message all the time or this question. Such and such happened to me, but it wasn't that bad. Yeah. Comparative suffering is what we call it. What is it called? Comparative suffering. Oh, that's exactly.

That's it. Exactly. Thank you. I'm always learning. You know, it's hard. Let's rank it because I'm ashamed to take too much of the trauma and empathy space for my story because I know there are worse stories, which is just the most dangerous narrative of all. It is. And I'm always, this is what I tell people when I get there. And I get it from a lot of young girls when I go to college campuses.

And I say, what matters is what it left you with. The thing that happened. And it sometimes could be, you know, like you were not sexually assaulted. You were harassed. The thing that it left you with is what matters. This is what you're like. I don't, the details don't matter. I mean, they matter to you personally, but like in terms of what it did to you, because there are also people who have had very similar experiences who walk away feeling completely different. That's right. You know, I've met

survivors who have, when they say the thing and the experience, I'm like, yeah, that's, that was not consensual. You know, like that was, this would be date rape or this would be whatever. And they're just like, okay, they didn't take it that way. They didn't internalize that way. I don't want to give it to them. I don't want to, I don't want to like create that thing for them. If you walked away and you, it didn't leave you with a thing, then I'm grateful that you don't have to hold that burden. But a very similar experience could

happen to another person and it ruined them. And it just takes them down and makes them feel just awful. And they are left with this pain and or rage or shame or like all of these things. And it's okay. I'm like, you have the right to acknowledge what you feel. You don't have to rank it. You don't have to compare it to anybody else. It's yours. It's interesting because when we study empathy, what we have found is that the willingness to see and hear people and be with them in their pain, you know, is the big piece of empathy. And that sometimes people who've had the empathic failure happens for two equal reasons.

One, you invalidate, minimize or maximize an experience. You're not with someone where they are. Or equally, you've had the exact same experience and you attribute all of your, you know, what you would call what you were left with to them. So it is like there's no script for empathy. It's like, am I willing to be with you, hear you, and believe you? Yep. Like, and that's hard. Yeah.

I want to read something that you tweeted and then I want to read what some responses were. You sent out a tweet after the Weinstein verdict that said, For the record, I'm clear that this verdict and sentencing is squarely due to the survivors who stepped in out of the shadows and bravely told their stories. I am here to support them. In response, someone wrote, I know that I'm young and still in the process of becoming, but as a historian in training, I'm going to make sure the history books have your name on their pages. You have given a face to the brown, black, beige, and pink bodies who not only survive, but heal and thrive. Thank you. Another response. Another response.

At Tarana Burke, deserves all the praise and recognition in the world. You can't build anything without a strong foundation. Hashtag me too is that foundation. And Tarana Burke, you built it. Another response, thank you. Many women today got some justice because of you at Tarana Burke. You gave these women the help and support they needed to speak out. Hashtag me, is the foundation.

None of this would have happened without you. Huh. I don't think these responses, I sometimes tweet and it's kind of turned off the computer. And I get that, but I hope you know that. And I think you, you know, there is rage and I think rage and anger are important and they can be catalysts for great change. And I don't know there's been ever really massive change without some of them. I think they're really hard ways to live and too high of a price to pay to live with those. But you have built a movement that is so based in love and empathy and so survivor centered

that I hope it becomes the model that people use to build other great movements that tackle the shit that we're up against today in the world. Yes, indeed. Wouldn't that be nice? It would. And you did it. And I know that that's hard for you because I've read a lot of your, I read you and listen to you all the time. And I know that you hate, you always think the movement in Me Too is bigger than you or anyone else, and no one should be centered in the work but the survivors. But I just have to say to you that I think it's important for people to understand who you are, your intention behind the movement, and the work you tirelessly do to keep re-centering the right people? I mean, I appreciate that. I do. It is hard sometimes because I know, I very much feel like this current iteration of Me Too, what we're in now,

was built on the backs of survivors. And these folks who courageously came out and did not know what to expect, did not know what was going to happen, did not know how it was going to help or not help and posted and tweeted and hashtag me too all over the place. Part of, you know, I think when people like accuse me of courage, as my girlfriend says in a poem, people are like, you're so courageous and you're so heroic and and and I'm like I feel really dutiful part of what um coming up with this idea and this this you know the movement around me too made me feel like when it went viral was like oh god one I thought I would never get my arms around it. And then I thought I have to get in it, like insert myself in some way to try to at least keep it grounded on these people.

Like if we can't have as much courage, at least as the people who had the courage to say me to, then we don't deserve to be. You don't deserve to be a leader. You don't deserve to call yourself anything related to to shaping the movement so I feel like my job for the last two and a half years has been trying to like sometimes it feels like yelling into a well but to try to keep shaping and shaping and molding and shaping and and directing people away from the salaciousness and the headlines and you know the stuff that will move you away from these people who bent over backwards to make sure that we see them and we hear them and we have to keep seeing them and I feel like you know in a lot of ways we haven't given them anything in return for that

courage so as much as I can to try to like answer that that feels like the call like that's the work you got to keep remembering these people that's why I just keep bringing it back to them because if they aren't centered, then we just get lost in, you know, verdicts and headlines and who's next and all that kind of stuff. I hear you. I hear you loud and clear. Thank you. I appreciate it. Let me ask you a question. And this is where I can get really pummeled online.

And I just feel so sure in my answer. But I trust you on this. Okay. Can we use shame as a social justice tool? As a tool? What do you mean by that? So I've always believed that I'm thinking about the Audre Lorde quote that the master's tools will not dismantle the master's house and this idea that we can use empathy accountability and justice

as social justice tools but I don't know that we can use shame belittling and humiliation no absolutely okay I'm glad you cleared that up because I was like, where are you going? Were you worried that I had turned? I was like, this is, I'm just like, say more. I really, I was like, wow, she's gone into the

say more, because I know you all enough to know when you're like, uh-huh, say more. Help me understand that you're like, that's Tarana Burke for bullshit. I'm like, no, absolutely not. It actually makes me feel, you know, I get it. People are like, in this moment, it is easy to slip into what we're seeing, right? Into the same place. And in a lot of ways, fighting fire with fire feels good.

Because it feels, right? Like I'm getting you the way you got me, but we end up in the same exact, in the same exact place. And I just, if we're not aiming to be better, like sometimes you just slip. Sometimes you just, I don't know, something gets the best of you, whatever, but at least acknowledge your pain. Right. So acknowledge that this wasn't, this is not the best way to operate. I just did this because I just, I was in pain or whatever, but no shame is definitely not a social justice tool. It's just, it needs to be relegated to where to the same place all the time. And I feel like if we stop pulling in tools like that and using them as an excuse to fight for justice, like there's no place for it. And we will end up in the same exact places. It actually speaks to kind of the thing

I was saying about the issues we're having internally in the Black community, in that some of this is about people not wanting justice, but wanting to have the same privileges as the oppressor. And so they use the same tools as the oppressor internally in our community. And it's just not effective. We're going to end up in the same places. So no, no, no, no, absolutely not. It's helpful for me. I just think, especially when I think about sexual harassment, sexual assault, sexual violence, all violence, where humiliation, belittling, shame are the tools of silence. Oh, yeah. Well, you see now the jokes around Weinstein were awful.

People were talking about him getting raped in jail. Yeah. Like that's not helpful. It's just not helpful. It's not useful. And really what people who do that don't understand is that they're not allies for the movement because that is contributing to rape culture and rape culture creates the space for violence.

So we need to dismantle the culture that creates the space for violence if we're gonna ever see an end or an interruption of sexual violence. So it's just not, it doesn't, I think they think that they're making us feel better or maybe they're making themselves feel better. But you're not.

It's a disruption of the movement and it's really moving backwards, not forward. Don't become the thing we fear. Yeah. I mean, come on. Didn't Brene say that? And thank you for giving me a chance to explain myself with your tell me more. Hey, if you're listening right now and you ever find yourself in a conversation with Toronto Burke and she takes a deep breath long enough to like say a short prayer

and then says, tell me more, you better get your shit together. I think because we had stopped and I was thrown, I was like, wait, I don't know where you're going with this, but I'm going to listen. I want to listen.

Ten very fast questions. Are you ready? Uh-oh. Okay, let me take a sip of water. Hold on a second. All right, lightning round. Here we go. Lightning round. Vulnerability, fill in the blank for me. Vulnerability is? Hard. You're called on to be brave, but you're in some real fear. What's the first thing you do? Pray. Something that people often get wrong about you. That I'm not funny. Really? You're so funny. Yeah. People think I'm so serious. I'm like, no, no.

No, you're, yeah. You're, well, you know what? You are, you are dualistic. You are funny and you're serious. All right. Last show you binged and loved. Oh my gosh, this is so typical, but Unbelievable on Netflix. It's about sexual violence, I know, but it's so good. Okay, favorite movie? Color Purple. A concert you'll never forget? Oh, the reunion tour of Puffy and Bad Boys reunion tour a couple of years ago. One of the best concerts I've ever been to.

Favorite meal? Okay, quickly, quickly. Favorite meal? Cereal Frosted Flakes. That's the truth. Frosted Flakes in cold milk? In cold milk. It's my favorite.

Okay. What's on your nightstand right now? Gosh, junk. My iPad, my earrings, the box for my ring because I'm kind of obsessed. And like not losing it, not with the ring. Crystals, all kind of junk. Okay. A snapshot of an ordinary moment in your life that brings you great joy. Just one fleeting moment. Laying on the couch, cuddled up under this big

fluffy blanket with my love binge-watching TV. And last, what's one thing that you're deeply grateful for right now? For you. I'm so grateful for you. I really am. I'm not just saying that, but I just can't even express. And I think people who knew me before I knew you could tell you, I'm so grateful for you and this work that feels like it validated. You know, sometimes you have things in your head and they feel like they make sense. And then when I found you, you made the things in my head make sense and made me feel not like just this crazy person who was like, but shame and fear. And you had science and you had data and you made it so clear and plain for everyday people. So I'm like forever, always grateful for you.

I'm forever, always grateful for you, Tarana. Thank you for spending this time with us. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Next time I see you in person, I'm giving you the biggest kiss you've ever had.

I can't wait. Just be ready. I can't wait. Unlocking Us is produced by Brene Brown Education and Research Group. The music is by Keri Rodriguez and Gina Chavez. Get new episodes as soon as they're published by following Unlocking Us on your favorite podcast app. We are part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Discover more award-winning shows at podcast.voxmedia.com.

Support for this show is brought to you by Nissan Kicks. voxmedia.com. Support for this show is brought to you by Nissan Kicks. It's never too late to try new things, and it's never too late to reinvent yourself. The all-new Reimagine Nissan Kicks is the city-sized crossover vehicle that's been completely revamped for urban adventure. From the design and styling to the performance, all the way to features like the Bose Personal Plus sound system, you can get closer to everything you love about city life

in the all-new, reimagined Nissan Kicks. Learn more at www.nissanusa.com slash 2025 dash kicks. Available feature, Bose is a registered trademark of the Bose Corporation. cross AI powered email, SMS, and more. Making every moment count. Over 100,000 brands trust Klaviyo's unified data and marketing platform to build smarter digital relationships with their customers during Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and beyond. Make every moment count with Klaviyo. Learn more at klaviyo.com slash BFCM.