Have The Fight Featuring Kelly Cervantes and Dr. Monica McLemore

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Welcome. I'm Eric Fleming, host of A Moment with Erik Fleming, the podcast of our time.

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listen to it. That will help the podcast tremendously.

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Third, go to the website, momenterik.com. There you can subscribe to the podcast,

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make this moment a movement.

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Thanks in advance for supporting the podcast of our time. I hope you enjoy this episode as well.

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The following program is hosted by the NBG Podcast Network.

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Hello, and welcome to another moment with Erik Fleming. I am your host, Erik Fleming.

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So, it is Black History Month 2026, which is a special Black History Month as it is the,

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100th year of celebrating Black history in the United States of America.

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This was started by an organization, Carter G.

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Woodson and several others in Chicago, to commemorate 50 years, at that time,

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50 years of emancipation of African-Americans or black people from slavery.

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And that organization still exists and we still exist as black people.

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It started off as a week celebration and it is now a full month,

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and there are people that criticize that and I might get into that in my editorial

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at the end of the podcast, but I just wanted to acknowledge that and encourage you,

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especially if you're not black, to pay attention.

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And I'll leave it at that.

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I've got a couple of great guests, two young ladies who fit the theme of this

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podcast, of having the fight.

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One is an author who is an award-winning author who has written a book about

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her experiences in life, dealing with grief and tragedy and challenges.

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And it was a very, very compelling book. It brought me to tears,

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and I mentioned that in the interview to her directly.

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It's very rare. Well, I shouldn't say that anymore because the older I get,

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the more sensitive I get.

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So, you know, this book took me there, but in a good way, right?

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And then the other sister is a lifelong nurse and educator who has been fighting

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the good fight when it comes to reproductive justice and health equity.

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And both of these ladies have exhibited taking the charge of fighting for what

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they believe in and what they're passionate about.

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And I think you will feel that in those interviews.

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So without any further delay, let's go ahead and get this show started.

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As always, you can support this show by going to www.momenteric.com.

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You can subscribe to the podcast. You can listen to past episodes.

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You can learn a little bit about me.

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You know, a whole spiel you heard as the podcast got started, you know.

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But in times like these, whatever you can do to support independent podcasts

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like this one is greatly appreciated.

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All right. It's time to kick it off. And as always, we kick it off with a moment of news with Grace G.

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Thanks, Erik. The Justice Department confirmed that the massive release of over

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3 million pages concludes the administration's planned disclosures regarding the Epstein files.

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Bill and Hillary Clinton have agreed to testify in a congressional probe into

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Jeffrey Epstein. The U.S.

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Supreme Court has cleared California to use a new electoral map expected to

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grant Democrats five additional House seats.

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Democrat Christian Menifee won a special election in Texas, further narrowing

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the Republican Party's slim majority in the U.S. House of Representatives.

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President Trump has nominated Kevin Walsh to lead the Federal Reserve.

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A federal judge denied a request from Minnesota officials to halt federal immigration operations.

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Five-year-old Liam Ramos and his father were released from an ICE facility after

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a judge ordered their return to Minnesota.

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President Trump announced that DHS agents should only intervene in city protests

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if specifically requested by local leaders or federal properties under direct threat.

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DHS Secretary Kristi Noem ordered the immediate deployment of body cameras for

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federal officers in Minneapolis.

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Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson issued an executive order requiring city police

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to investigate and potentially refer federal immigration agents for prosecution

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regarding alleged illegal activities.

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Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard defended her presence at an

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FBI raid on a Georgia election facility, claiming she was acting under the president's authority.

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A federal judge has dismissed federal murder and weapons charges against Luigi

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Mangione, the accused killer of UnitedHealthcare's CEO.

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A federal appeals court has dismissed a misconduct complaint filed by the Justice

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Department against a federal judge who had clashed with the administration over deportation policies.

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President Trump plans to close the Kennedy Center on July 4th for two years of reconstruction.

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And South Carolina's measles outbreak has reached 876 cases.

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I am Grace Gee, and this has been a Moment of News.

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All right. Thank you, Grace, for that moment of news. And now it is time for

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my guest, Kelly Cervantes.

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Kelly Cervantes is an award-winning writer, speaker, and advocate best known

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for her blog, Inch Stones,

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and her USA Today bestselling book, Normal Broken, the grief companion for when

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it's time to heal, but you're not sure you want to.

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She has been published in the Chicago Tribune, Cosmopolitan,

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and Fortune, as well as featured by MSNBC, New York Times, and CNN.

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She sits on the boards of Cure Epilepsy and the Undiagnosed Diseases Network

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Foundation and hosts Cure Epilepsy's podcast, Seizing Life.

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Born and raised in the Midwest, Kelly now resides in Maplewood,

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New Jersey, with her family.

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Her new book is The Luckiest, a memoir of love, loss, and motherhood, and the pursuit of self.

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And we're going to be diving into that new book during the interview.

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So ladies and gentlemen, it is my distinct honor and privilege to have as a

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guest on this podcast, Kelly Cervantes.

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All right. Kelly Cervantes, how you doing, ma'am? You doing good?

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I am doing well, Eric. Thank you for having me. Well, I'm honored to have you.

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It's not often that I get an author to come on that makes me cry.

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And, you know, I told Lissa, shout out to Lissa Warren, who set this up.

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You know, she tries to get me people that deal with nonfiction,

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and she knows this is a political show.

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And, you know, it's just like the stories that I've been very fortunate to get

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from her and being able to read the books.

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It's really been an honor and a treat. But I never had a book that really hit

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a chord with me like your book did.

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And I have to say that, you know, because the book is called The Luckiest and

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it's been out for a while.

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But I wanted to talk about that. And since it's a political show,

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I'll dive into some political stuff.

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It won't be too heavy, but I think you'll have some input in that.

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But I really wanted you to come on to talk about your story.

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So how I normally do this thing is that I have a couple of icebreakers.

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The first one is a quote. And then the second one is a game,

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I guess, or a challenge called 20 questions.

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So let's do the quote first. You know shit is bad when people start telling you how strong you are.

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That quote means to me that, God, I live that on the daily.

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I think people—so funny, I was actually talking to a friend about this,

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that I think people, when they tell you, oh my goodness, you're so strong,

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or your kid is so strong, or they're like, they think it's a compliment—,

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But I think what the person hears is, wow, your life is really shitty or,

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you know, thanks for this compliment of being so strong, but I didn't choose this.

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I didn't, I didn't, I don't know that I had a choice in the matter.

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It's, it's a, it's one of those well-intentioned compliments that people give

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when they don't know what else to say.

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And it, I think over time, it, it doesn't mean what people think it means.

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I got you. All right. So now with the 20 questions, I need you to give me a

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number between one and 20.

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11. All right. Where do you go to check a fact that you see, hear, or read?

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Oh i go to npr

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i go to the new

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york times i go to google and

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but when i go to google i'm usually checking two or three websites two or three

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different pages to try and make sure that what i'm reading is accurate okay

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what led you to write this book um i think I think, like many authors,

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this book needed to be written.

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I don't know that I had a choice. I think it had to come out of me.

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And actually, there have been several versions. I have rewritten this book several times over.

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And the first version of this book was written, actually, I thought that it

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was written for public consumption, but it wasn't. That book was written for me.

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After my daughter Adelaide passed away, I was terrified of forgetting pieces of her.

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And I know that people will say that she's your daughter, you could never forget, but you do.

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No matter what, time is a memory, Thief, and memories fade.

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And I was so terrified that I sat down and I wrote essentially the story of

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her life through my eyes.

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And that was part

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of my healing journey because i believe

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that one of the best ways for us to heal through

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our losses is to remember them actually president joe biden regardless of how

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you feel about his politics is a man who knows loss he lost his infant daughter

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and a wife in a car accident and then a grown son right to breast cancer or

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to brain cancer and so he said the night before he was inaugurated,

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that he was giving a COVID-19 memorial, he was leading over it,

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and he said, to heal, we must remember.

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And those words struck me so much because up to that point, I had thought that

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healing meant that we had to let go and move on.

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And here was a man who had lost so much, and he was saying, no,

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to heal we must remember.

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We remember our loved ones. We remember everything about them,

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and then we learn how to move forward with their memory.

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And that, to me, was so pivotal.

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And so that was sort of the first iteration of the book. It was me healing through remembering.

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And then as time went on,

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I realized that instead of telling my daughter's story,

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I wanted to tell my story because I look at my life and I could break it down

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into so many different ways from the different places that I've lived to the Midwest,

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the East Coast, back to the Midwest, times and little blips in L.A.

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Or I could break it down to the different careers I've had.

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I am 43 years old and I am on my fourth career. And they are all vastly different.

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You wouldn't think that they overlap, but that's the interesting pieces that they all do.

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Or I could break it down to the different makeups of what my family has looked like.

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And I came across a quote from the poet Maggie Smith. And she said,

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we are all nesting dolls carrying the previous versions of ourselves inside of us.

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And that struck me as so poignant and so true as I looked at this different makeup of my life.

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And so I used that quote as the structure to look at my life and all of these

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different layers and whether they were.

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Gut-wrenching or joyous or whatever they added to me, whatever this layer added.

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I don't get to be the person that I am today without all of those layers before.

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And the fact of the matter is I'm pretty proud of the person that I am today.

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And the life that I have right now is actually really beautiful.

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And there's a hundred things I wish I could change, not least

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of which is that my daughter was still alive but i don't

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get this life i don't get to be who i am without experiencing

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all of that and i i

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wanted to get that point across to people that no matter what you have experienced

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in your life no matter where you are currently we are constantly growing we

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are constantly adding new layers and becoming this next beautifully painted

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doll in the series of our lives Yeah.

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And that's such a great answer because that was, you put the other two quotes

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I was debating about using in that answer.

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How has your early acceptance of being different shaped your life?

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Yeah. So I grew up in very conservative, white Midwest.

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And because my parents were not from, I grew up in Nebraska,

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my parents weren't from Nebraska, they had transferred there for my dad's job.

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So we would travel around the country to see family and, you know,

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getting in our, you know, 1992 Chevy minivan and driving across the country

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to Philadelphia and up to Maine and everything was road trips.

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And so we got to see so much of the country. And I realized standing in New

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York that like there were whole swaths of this country that weren't like where I was growing up.

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And I always, I never felt like I fit in and I, in, in Nebraska.

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And I think that a lot of kids feel that way.

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But I write in the book that it wasn't just that I felt different.

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I also felt like I needed to be different, like I needed to push back against

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these norms, that I didn't want to be a part of the status quo.

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And I think that part of that is because I knew there was this wider world out

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there, that there were all of these other cultures, that there was so much more

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than this tiny microcosm of a culture that I was experiencing.

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And I wanted to

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see that and I wanted to experience it and so I

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the first opportunity I had when I turned 18 and was looking at colleges I I

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looked at both coasts because I I wanted to go somewhere where everyone was

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different where I wasn't just the one that felt different in this whitewashed society,

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I wanted to be among a ton of people who were all different,

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who were, you know, come from different religions and different cultures and

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different racial backgrounds.

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And so that I could experience and learn from that. And we don't learn from

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people who are the same as us.

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We learn from people who are different from us.

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Yeah. So what does the book's title mean to you?

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Hmm, the luckiest. I think that it's certainly ironic, right?

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I don't think that many people would read the book and look at my life or look

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at anyone who has lost a child and be like, that person is the luckiest.

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And I don't think that I am.

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But I also don't believe that I'm the unluckiest.

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I, luck is a concept that I have battled and struggled and thought over for years because I,

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even as a child, I was very aware that my upbringing was safe,

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it was sheltered, my parents were married, they loved each other.

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I never went without, you know, many people would look at my childhood and think that it was lucky.

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And I acknowledge that and I own that.

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But then you look at a lot of my adulthood and it runs in contrast to that because

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of decisions that I made to go into places that were not as safe and to make

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decisions that aren't as safe,

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but that are more exciting and interesting and that I would learn from.

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We learn from challenge.

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We learn from not taking the safe road.

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And so when do we correlate lucky with safe, with not taking risk?

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And I really enjoyed writing about that and looking at the ways that luck shows

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up in my life or the perception of luck, right?

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Because luck is all about perception. It's what we show other people about our

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lives, be it through Instagram squares, or it is what people perceive of us.

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There's a scene in the book where my husband played Alexander Hamilton in the

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Chicago and Broadway productions for close to eight years, and he's like.

00:20:54.198 --> 00:20:57.558
Broadway has just reopened after the pandemic, and Miguel is on stage,

00:20:57.598 --> 00:21:02.518
and I'm sitting next to this young woman who is a musical theater student,

00:21:02.538 --> 00:21:05.798
and she's like, oh my goodness, she realizes that Miguel is my husband,

00:21:05.798 --> 00:21:08.418
and she's like, you are so lucky.

00:21:08.418 --> 00:21:12.778
I can't, you know, this light, this is, and she sees my life as lucky.

00:21:12.938 --> 00:21:16.978
And all I can think in my head is my daughter died a year and a half ago.

00:21:17.218 --> 00:21:20.478
There's nothing lucky about my life, but what she was seeing,

00:21:20.698 --> 00:21:23.858
the, the, what she was able to perceive was lucky.

00:21:25.138 --> 00:21:30.318
At the end of the day, I, I am not the luckiest,

00:21:30.578 --> 00:21:33.298
but I do, but there are certain aspects of my life where I do

00:21:33.298 --> 00:21:36.198
consider myself incredibly lucky and one of those

00:21:36.198 --> 00:21:39.918
is to have been the mother to all

00:21:39.918 --> 00:21:43.198
of my children but especially to Adelaide my daughter

00:21:43.198 --> 00:21:48.938
who passed away because I and and I know that that maybe sounds crazy because

00:21:48.938 --> 00:21:53.978
what we experienced and what we went through and all of the pain and all of

00:21:53.978 --> 00:21:57.358
the heartache but I learned more through the four years of being her mother

00:21:57.358 --> 00:22:01.998
than I have through the other year decades of my life.

00:22:02.158 --> 00:22:06.538
And I feel so fortunate that I got to know her and that I got to love her.

00:22:06.878 --> 00:22:11.738
And I feel sorry for people who didn't. And there is just something so,

00:22:12.098 --> 00:22:16.618
I will never have a job in my life that is more fulfilling than having been her mother.

00:22:17.038 --> 00:22:20.938
And for that, I absolutely feel like I'm the luckiest person in the world.

00:22:21.718 --> 00:22:27.598
Let's dig into that a little more. Explain the significance of the parable of

00:22:27.598 --> 00:22:30.278
the farmer and the horse. Yes.

00:22:31.398 --> 00:22:33.638
Funny. So I, I had sort of.

00:22:34.718 --> 00:22:38.978
I've loved this parable for a long time. And then anyone who has a young child

00:22:38.978 --> 00:22:45.298
that has watched Bluey will have also become familiar with this old Chinese parable.

00:22:45.438 --> 00:22:54.718
But it's this idea that, so a farmer purchases a horse and it runs off.

00:22:54.818 --> 00:22:58.558
And his neighbor says, oh my goodness, that is so unlucky that this horse ran

00:22:58.558 --> 00:23:03.158
off. And the farmer says, well, you know, maybe, let's see.

00:23:03.298 --> 00:23:06.418
And then the horse comes back and it brings with it another horse with it.

00:23:06.498 --> 00:23:08.338
And the neighbor is like, oh, my goodness, how lucky.

00:23:08.658 --> 00:23:14.018
And the farmer says, well, we'll see. And then his son gets on the horse that

00:23:14.018 --> 00:23:18.038
the other horse brought back and he breaks his leg on this horse.

00:23:18.038 --> 00:23:20.538
And the farmer is like, oh, my goodness, that's so unlucky.

00:23:21.078 --> 00:23:27.258
And then there's a draft for all of the young men to go fight in a war.

00:23:27.258 --> 00:23:32.178
And the farmer's son can't go because of his broken leg and the neighbor is

00:23:32.178 --> 00:23:33.598
like, oh my goodness, how lucky.

00:23:33.898 --> 00:23:39.158
And so this idea that you have no idea what's around the corner.

00:23:39.378 --> 00:23:47.598
So I see that in my careers. I was an actress for the first five years I was

00:23:47.598 --> 00:23:51.818
in New York City and it was grueling and it was hard and it was...

00:23:52.839 --> 00:23:56.959
It did so much damage to my mental health to the point where eventually,

00:23:57.279 --> 00:24:02.639
when I met my husband and we decided to start a family, I chose to walk away

00:24:02.639 --> 00:24:05.039
from that and had the opportunity to work in restaurants.

00:24:06.079 --> 00:24:11.499
And, you know, at the time, I thought, how unlucky that I didn't get to make

00:24:11.499 --> 00:24:14.899
it big, that I wasn't sitting across from David Letterman or Jay Leno being

00:24:14.899 --> 00:24:17.159
able to talk about my next movie.

00:24:17.719 --> 00:24:22.699
But then I go into restaurants and I realize that all of that experience of

00:24:22.699 --> 00:24:29.219
performing and listening as an actor translates very well to selling events

00:24:29.219 --> 00:24:31.259
for the event space in this restaurant.

00:24:31.619 --> 00:24:38.419
My father was like, oh, thank goodness, you're finally using your communications degree in restaurants.

00:24:38.419 --> 00:24:41.599
And I was like, no, dad, it's all of the acting classes I paid for that I'm

00:24:41.599 --> 00:24:46.259
actually using in sales to connect and to sell these events.

00:24:46.259 --> 00:24:55.279
And so when you hear that parable and you can look at your life and see how

00:24:55.279 --> 00:25:00.079
everything in that moment may seem unfortunate,

00:25:00.079 --> 00:25:02.479
but there's something else coming around the bend,

00:25:02.659 --> 00:25:06.559
you are going to need those skills, you are going to need that transition.

00:25:06.559 --> 00:25:11.979
And as I have just dove in headfirst into the world of grief,

00:25:12.239 --> 00:25:18.039
I've realized that so much of grief is actually resistance to change.

00:25:18.219 --> 00:25:23.359
We are resisting the change that our loss is inflicting upon our lives.

00:25:23.519 --> 00:25:28.539
And so in addition to this idea of to heal we must remember,

00:25:28.799 --> 00:25:31.839
we also have to learn how to accept our new normals how

00:25:31.839 --> 00:25:35.259
to accept the change that has happened

00:25:35.259 --> 00:25:39.939
in our lives and all of that is part of that healing process and the ability

00:25:39.939 --> 00:25:43.059
to move forward yeah what is

00:25:43.059 --> 00:25:52.039
the line asteroids i learned are not fairly rationed mean so in my naivety.

00:25:52.948 --> 00:25:57.408
My husband and I, after my son Jackson was born, we got pregnant again with another little boy.

00:25:57.588 --> 00:26:01.268
It was discovered at his 20-week ultrasound that he was not going to survive.

00:26:04.008 --> 00:26:09.768
Essentially, he had no heart. His heart was taking up his entire chest cavity, and he had no lungs.

00:26:09.988 --> 00:26:13.068
He was never going to survive outside of my womb. And...

00:26:14.499 --> 00:26:18.039
We made the excruciating choice to terminate.

00:26:18.519 --> 00:26:28.099
And I thought that that was my life's trauma, that this was the asteroid,

00:26:28.099 --> 00:26:31.339
and now everything else was going to be okay.

00:26:31.779 --> 00:26:35.979
I mean, looking back on that now and those thoughts going through my head,

00:26:36.139 --> 00:26:42.739
it's just like, it sounds crazy and so privileged and just so incredibly naive.

00:26:42.739 --> 00:26:44.699
But I really thought that.

00:26:44.839 --> 00:26:48.359
I thought that this was my life's moment, my life's tragedy.

00:26:48.639 --> 00:26:53.859
And because of that, when my daughter started to not meet milestones and started

00:26:53.859 --> 00:26:58.739
having trouble, I lived in denial because she had to be healthy.

00:26:58.739 --> 00:27:02.159
She had to be okay because our son Elvis wasn't.

00:27:02.159 --> 00:27:09.219
And as her health continued to deteriorate, I realized that those asteroids,

00:27:09.519 --> 00:27:14.759
these flaming rocks that crash into the landscape of our lives,

00:27:15.099 --> 00:27:19.919
that completely alter the way that it looks, and you have to now navigate this

00:27:19.919 --> 00:27:23.479
new terrain, that these asteroids are not fairly rationed.

00:27:23.479 --> 00:27:28.359
And there are certain people who are going to experience dozens of asteroids

00:27:28.359 --> 00:27:36.119
in their lifetime. And there are some people who may only have one or two, and maybe that's luck.

00:27:36.779 --> 00:27:41.839
Maybe that's the true luck is the less asteroids you have.

00:27:42.019 --> 00:27:47.459
But then again, I don't know, because I think you become a stronger,

00:27:47.679 --> 00:27:52.919
more interesting, more compassionate person the more asteroids that you survive. Yeah.

00:27:53.479 --> 00:27:57.639
So talk about the work that you're doing with Cure Epilepsy.

00:27:58.331 --> 00:28:06.291
Yes. So in terms of the political nature of your show, I truly believe that

00:28:06.291 --> 00:28:10.411
everything in life is politics. I don't think that we get to separate the two out.

00:28:10.631 --> 00:28:17.071
And I experienced that with my son Elvis and how fortunate I was that I was

00:28:17.071 --> 00:28:20.391
able to make the choice that I was in the state that I lived in.

00:28:20.391 --> 00:28:22.711
And I understand that's not the choice that everyone would make,

00:28:22.791 --> 00:28:25.451
but it's the choice that my husband and I made with our doctors.

00:28:25.651 --> 00:28:30.171
And I'm so grateful that that was a choice. And so I started advocating for

00:28:30.171 --> 00:28:32.011
a woman's right to choose after that.

00:28:32.251 --> 00:28:40.291
And then come to my daughter having her first seizure and being diagnosed with epilepsy. And,

00:28:41.164 --> 00:28:46.584
going to the doctor and having them just not be able to tell me why she was

00:28:46.584 --> 00:28:52.004
having seizures or what medication was going to control them or how they could stop them.

00:28:52.464 --> 00:28:57.284
And there was, I had always lived in this world where I thought that like modern

00:28:57.284 --> 00:29:00.364
medicine was so evolved that we had all of these answers.

00:29:00.624 --> 00:29:06.724
And now I was in, in the world of neurology, there are so few answers.

00:29:07.004 --> 00:29:09.284
There's so many more questions than there are answers.

00:29:09.584 --> 00:29:12.904
And it was excruciatingly frustrating.

00:29:15.784 --> 00:29:18.464
Around the same time that Adelaide was diagnosed with epilepsy,

00:29:18.864 --> 00:29:25.664
Miguel landed Hamilton and our family moved from New Jersey to Chicago for the show.

00:29:25.804 --> 00:29:30.764
And it just so happens that there was this organization in Chicago called Cure Epilepsy.

00:29:30.964 --> 00:29:37.944
It was started by another mom, Susan Axelrod, married to the political professional

00:29:37.944 --> 00:29:42.264
guru, David Axelrod of the Obama administration.

00:29:42.304 --> 00:29:49.424
And she was frustrated with everyone talking about how to live well with epilepsy.

00:29:49.424 --> 00:29:53.184
And she wanted the community to start thinking about how to cure epilepsy.

00:29:53.184 --> 00:30:01.804
And she started this organization that is now in its third decade and has raised

00:30:01.804 --> 00:30:10.184
so much money for epilepsy research and trying to find the whys behind it all,

00:30:10.304 --> 00:30:13.564
trying to find cures, trying to push science forward.

00:30:13.564 --> 00:30:18.624
And, you know, science didn't catch up to my daughter, but this is an organization.

00:30:18.804 --> 00:30:24.364
I am so incredibly passionate about the importance of research,

00:30:24.604 --> 00:30:27.584
medical research, especially, and as scientists.

00:30:28.039 --> 00:30:32.199
We look at the current administration and the cuts and the slashes to research

00:30:32.199 --> 00:30:39.439
both, you know, at the NIH and across the board with the university research as well.

00:30:39.639 --> 00:30:48.359
It's terrifying to me because this is going to have implications beyond just epilepsy research.

00:30:48.579 --> 00:30:53.219
We are actually witnessing a brain drain of professors and researchers leaving

00:30:53.219 --> 00:30:57.159
the United States to go overseas where their research can be funded.

00:30:57.159 --> 00:31:02.979
And so it's one of the reasons I'm incredibly proud to be a part of Cure Epilepsy.

00:31:03.119 --> 00:31:06.279
I sit on their board and I host a podcast for them called Seizing Life,

00:31:06.419 --> 00:31:10.579
because the organization is working right now actually through a campaign to

00:31:10.579 --> 00:31:14.859
raise money to try and help fill these holes in some of these researchers'

00:31:15.079 --> 00:31:21.879
labs so that we can keep them stateside, so that we can keep this research going.

00:31:21.879 --> 00:31:28.039
And I witnessed the difference in care firsthand last year.

00:31:28.339 --> 00:31:32.619
I was diagnosed with breast cancer, and I'm fine now. I am cancer-free.

00:31:33.019 --> 00:31:38.039
But what a miracle of medical research that is, because I was diagnosed in January

00:31:38.039 --> 00:31:43.459
of 2025, and I was cancer-free by September of 2025.

00:31:43.459 --> 00:31:50.799
And that is due to breast cancer being one of the most well-researched diseases in the world.

00:31:51.059 --> 00:31:56.819
That is because hundreds of thousands of women have walked and raised money

00:31:56.819 --> 00:32:01.159
and I got to go into a doctor's office and they said, this is the kind of cancer

00:32:01.159 --> 00:32:03.099
you have. This is how we're going to treat it.

00:32:03.199 --> 00:32:07.799
This is the prognosis and this is the timeline and that is because of medical research.

00:32:08.039 --> 00:32:13.159
And so I am grateful to be sitting here with my life cancer-free on the other

00:32:13.159 --> 00:32:15.219
side of this in less than one year.

00:32:15.379 --> 00:32:19.759
And that is my goal for, it should be the goal across the board.

00:32:20.639 --> 00:32:26.879
All right. Since you brought up politics, based on your experiences,

00:32:26.879 --> 00:32:33.099
what public policy changes would you like to see with adoption and health care?

00:32:33.159 --> 00:32:36.679
Because, you know, I'm trying to be sensitive on time.

00:32:36.839 --> 00:32:41.639
And I know that later on in the book, you become an adoptive parent.

00:32:42.039 --> 00:32:48.319
Yeah. And you talk about the, not so much the challenge,

00:32:48.559 --> 00:32:55.859
but the legal challenge, but the mental aspect and that scene where you got

00:32:55.859 --> 00:33:00.219
like the adults are at the top of the conference table discussing the terms

00:33:00.219 --> 00:33:02.159
and the kids are under the table playing.

00:33:02.359 --> 00:33:08.219
And I was like, wow, that sounds straight out of a movie, you know,

00:33:08.359 --> 00:33:11.499
but it's like, but that's a reality that people face.

00:33:11.499 --> 00:33:17.359
So, and I kind of have a soft spot with adoption because I served on a board

00:33:17.359 --> 00:33:21.279
dealing with adoption in Mississippi for almost a decade.

00:33:21.539 --> 00:33:26.139
I actually got to be chair for a minute. So that's an issue that's very, very sensitive to me.

00:33:26.319 --> 00:33:33.379
So if you, if, you know, what would you advocate for as far as policy changes

00:33:33.379 --> 00:33:34.879
with adoption and health care?

00:33:36.479 --> 00:33:40.179
I in regards to adoption I I

00:33:40.179 --> 00:33:45.479
think it's just so misunderstood I think that there needs to be a whole um,

00:33:46.755 --> 00:33:50.535
public awareness campaign almost to understand

00:33:50.535 --> 00:33:53.615
that adoption is like

00:33:53.615 --> 00:33:56.515
it is a beautiful thing there is no

00:33:56.515 --> 00:34:00.095
question about it that it can be this beautiful thing but that beautiful thing

00:34:00.095 --> 00:34:09.295
is born out of a family that has broken apart and i we have to understand that

00:34:09.295 --> 00:34:13.955
there is zero adoption that doesn't contain trauma.

00:34:14.435 --> 00:34:23.615
Even if it is from infancy, there is still trauma that is going to be associated with that.

00:34:23.795 --> 00:34:32.235
And I look at my daughter's case, and I am so grateful that I get to be her mother.

00:34:32.475 --> 00:34:35.815
I love her immensely, but

00:34:35.815 --> 00:34:39.055
it is impossible for me not to see

00:34:39.055 --> 00:34:42.335
that had her mother had the resources that

00:34:42.335 --> 00:34:46.295
she needed that she that

00:34:46.295 --> 00:34:50.495
that family couldn't have been kept together and and

00:34:50.495 --> 00:35:00.355
it is i think that so much of adoption policy exists far way before adoption

00:35:00.355 --> 00:35:04.695
or child protective services ever become a part of the conversation but far

00:35:04.695 --> 00:35:06.575
before foster care is involved,

00:35:06.755 --> 00:35:11.975
far before the courts are involved, if we can support young mothers.

00:35:12.355 --> 00:35:18.335
Mothers who are falling below the poverty line, if we can support these women

00:35:18.335 --> 00:35:21.635
in the way with child care,

00:35:21.915 --> 00:35:28.555
with proper health care, then there will be less need for foster care services for adoption.

00:35:28.555 --> 00:35:31.135
We can support those families and keep them together.

00:35:31.195 --> 00:35:39.915
And that is where I would love to see so much more energy be placed than in

00:35:39.915 --> 00:35:42.055
the family court systems.

00:35:42.375 --> 00:35:46.975
And, you know, not to say that children shouldn't be adopted,

00:35:47.335 --> 00:35:49.155
but the system is broken.

00:35:50.248 --> 00:35:53.888
Yeah. So talk a little bit about health care, because there's a scene.

00:35:57.368 --> 00:36:02.288
But there is this one particular moment where you're trying to get medication

00:36:02.288 --> 00:36:09.528
for Adelaide and you got to go through all of these hoops and all that, you know,

00:36:10.268 --> 00:36:15.368
and the way that you talk about it as far as like, you know,

00:36:15.588 --> 00:36:18.168
you were feeling guilty because you had some privilege.

00:36:18.168 --> 00:36:22.828
So you wanted to take advantage of it, but it's like you were cognizant of the fact.

00:36:23.128 --> 00:36:28.288
I don't know if it was afterthought or during when you talk about people don't

00:36:28.288 --> 00:36:31.448
have that privilege to even take this first step that I'm doing.

00:36:31.688 --> 00:36:33.748
And then you find out you've got another hope.

00:36:34.028 --> 00:36:38.148
So how would you deal with that at a health care standpoint?

00:36:38.568 --> 00:36:41.368
I mean, our entire health care system needs to be overhauled,

00:36:41.368 --> 00:36:46.428
in my opinion. I do not think that any aspect of our health care system should

00:36:46.428 --> 00:36:48.348
be a publicly traded commodity.

00:36:48.968 --> 00:36:54.208
Everything should, like that piece of it alone is like shocking to me that there

00:36:54.208 --> 00:37:01.768
are shareholders involved in people's health and like it is bonkers to me.

00:37:03.408 --> 00:37:09.428
In this particular scenario, and I think it, my daughter needed a medication,

00:37:10.148 --> 00:37:16.608
and the health insurance company decided that, who is not a doctor,

00:37:17.128 --> 00:37:20.208
her health insurance company decided that she did not need the medication.

00:37:20.968 --> 00:37:29.388
Her seizures had gotten so bad at this point i mean they were excruciating to watch,

00:37:29.848 --> 00:37:34.448
her life was in danger she would she had no quality of life they were terrible

00:37:34.448 --> 00:37:38.508
but the health insurance the one we had gone through all of these different

00:37:38.508 --> 00:37:42.408
medications and the health insurance company said no we're not going to pay

00:37:42.408 --> 00:37:45.648
for this medication why don't you try one of these other medications that we had already tried.

00:37:46.675 --> 00:37:49.515
The health insurance company didn't want to pay for that medication because

00:37:49.515 --> 00:37:54.475
it was, the treatment was going to be several hundred thousand dollars.

00:37:54.855 --> 00:37:58.955
I get why they didn't want to pay for it. It was ludicrously expensive for a

00:37:58.955 --> 00:38:03.995
medicine that has been around for nearly a hundred years. Like, it's stupid.

00:38:04.575 --> 00:38:07.075
But the pharmaceutical companies are allowed to charge that.

00:38:07.415 --> 00:38:12.315
And so, because they have, because they have shareholders that they have to

00:38:12.315 --> 00:38:17.195
report to. The health insurance companies have shareholders that they have to report to.

00:38:17.575 --> 00:38:24.875
And so we're in a battle between the health insurance company and the pharmaceutical

00:38:24.875 --> 00:38:28.575
company. And I happen to have a connection to the pharmaceutical company because

00:38:28.575 --> 00:38:30.115
of my work with Cure Epilepsy.

00:38:30.675 --> 00:38:33.975
Meanwhile, Adelaide's doctor is fighting with the health insurance company,

00:38:33.995 --> 00:38:36.975
and he has hundreds of other patients.

00:38:36.975 --> 00:38:44.035
Like, he doesn't have the time to be arguing as one of the top pediatric neurologists

00:38:44.035 --> 00:38:47.935
in the country, if not the world, with a health insurance company.

00:38:48.215 --> 00:38:56.315
And over and over again, I had to use our connections that we had through being

00:38:56.315 --> 00:38:59.015
advocates, which was only because my husband was Hamilton.

00:38:59.015 --> 00:39:04.455
Which, you know, we had, you know, in the end, I'm threatening the pharmaceutical

00:39:04.455 --> 00:39:07.955
company to take our story public if they don't give us this medication.

00:39:08.515 --> 00:39:13.055
And after we have already gone through all of these hoops, and it's been nearly

00:39:13.055 --> 00:39:16.495
a week now that we're fighting for this medication, she's been having these

00:39:16.495 --> 00:39:19.175
terrible seizures. And we're.

00:39:20.226 --> 00:39:27.446
It took everything, every piece of my consciousness and my soul, and I was aware,

00:39:27.666 --> 00:39:32.206
I was wildly aware through the whole thing, that not only were we at this distinct

00:39:32.206 --> 00:39:41.006
advantage because I had direct access to these people, but we had money.

00:39:41.286 --> 00:39:43.886
I spoke English as a first language.

00:39:44.426 --> 00:39:50.226
All of these things that allowed me an advantage. And it wasn't just getting

00:39:50.226 --> 00:39:52.226
medications. It was getting doctor's appointments.

00:39:52.486 --> 00:39:56.886
It wasn't even that. It was getting the respect from the doctors in the room

00:39:56.886 --> 00:40:04.506
because I didn't have to, because I knew English, because my skin is white.

00:40:04.866 --> 00:40:08.806
All of these things that just automatically, they're this cognitive bias that

00:40:08.806 --> 00:40:10.026
I'm going to be listened to.

00:40:10.026 --> 00:40:13.186
And then I learned quickly that if I spoke the doctor's language,

00:40:13.486 --> 00:40:16.546
if I said secretions instead of drool,

00:40:17.006 --> 00:40:23.586
these little changes in my vocabulary, if I talked the way that the doctors

00:40:23.586 --> 00:40:26.406
talked, then they respected me that much more and listened to me.

00:40:26.406 --> 00:40:31.766
And it just happened over and over and over again, these glaring,

00:40:31.966 --> 00:40:36.906
glaring signs of the privilege that I had.

00:40:37.086 --> 00:40:46.326
And it is, I feel and worry so much about all of these other families out there

00:40:46.326 --> 00:40:51.246
that can't get the appointment, who aren't listened to in the doctor's office.

00:40:51.246 --> 00:40:58.586
And I don't know how we fix that without a complete and total overhaul of our health care system.

00:40:59.186 --> 00:41:02.946
So a couple more questions I need to ask you.

00:41:03.878 --> 00:41:06.178
What does it mean to have the fight?

00:41:08.438 --> 00:41:13.178
So I'm incredibly lucky, I'll say it, to have a dear friend of mine from high school.

00:41:15.378 --> 00:41:19.098
She unfortunately has a rare disease, and her mother had it too,

00:41:19.158 --> 00:41:20.438
and her mother passed away from

00:41:20.438 --> 00:41:24.018
it the same week that Adelaide was hospitalized with her first seizure.

00:41:26.178 --> 00:41:28.158
And I was close with her mother.

00:41:31.098 --> 00:41:33.558
Courtney continues to be one of my best friends in the world.

00:41:33.878 --> 00:41:39.918
And I had no experience with the American health care system,

00:41:40.318 --> 00:41:43.978
really, outside of like giving birth and having to go to the doctor's office

00:41:43.978 --> 00:41:45.718
for flu shots or whatever.

00:41:46.378 --> 00:41:52.978
I was very inexperienced. And so when Adelaide is now in and out of the hospital,

00:41:52.978 --> 00:41:58.258
and I'm trying to navigate all of her different doctors with these different

00:41:58.258 --> 00:42:00.658
specialties, and I was so overwhelmed.

00:42:01.618 --> 00:42:06.658
And Courtney told me, that was actually her mother, in an email that she sent

00:42:06.658 --> 00:42:10.198
me, just days before she died. She was in the hospital. She was sick.

00:42:10.418 --> 00:42:14.658
Days before she died, Courtney's mother sent me an email. and she essentially

00:42:14.658 --> 00:42:20.698
said that you know your daughter best and if the doctors are saying something

00:42:20.698 --> 00:42:28.658
that you don't agree with have the fight and it means to me to trust your instinct,

00:42:29.438 --> 00:42:34.338
my aunt she told me she was like there's a reason that they say that doctors

00:42:34.338 --> 00:42:38.258
are practicing medicine medicine is a practice they are constantly learning

00:42:38.258 --> 00:42:40.758
they are constantly growing they do not know everything.

00:42:41.178 --> 00:42:48.078
And not to say that I know more than someone with an MD or a DO or a PhD, but.

00:42:49.781 --> 00:42:53.861
I know my body best. And out of anyone, I knew my daughter best.

00:42:54.141 --> 00:42:57.901
And so we have to have the fight. We have to advocate for them.

00:42:57.981 --> 00:43:02.441
And if something doesn't feel right, if it doesn't sit right, ask the questions.

00:43:03.281 --> 00:43:08.321
Stand up. And if that doctor isn't answering them, find another doctor.

00:43:08.461 --> 00:43:12.061
I am a huge proponent of second, third, fourth opinions.

00:43:12.821 --> 00:43:18.341
I am still friends with Adelaide's neurologist from Chicago.

00:43:18.761 --> 00:43:20.041
We're still dear friends.

00:43:20.501 --> 00:43:24.901
But even though I respected him and he was amazing, I still took her for second,

00:43:25.001 --> 00:43:28.881
third, fourth opinions to doctors across the country because maybe someone else

00:43:28.881 --> 00:43:31.141
had seen something that he hadn't.

00:43:31.261 --> 00:43:35.821
Maybe they had read something that he hadn't. And it wasn't out of disrespect for him.

00:43:35.961 --> 00:43:40.001
It was because I wanted what was best for my daughter.

00:43:40.461 --> 00:43:44.241
And the right doctors will understand that.

00:43:44.461 --> 00:43:50.921
And so have the fight means compile the best team. It means ask all of the questions.

00:43:51.341 --> 00:43:54.821
It means advocate for yourself and for others.

00:43:55.721 --> 00:44:00.701
Yeah, we don't have the time, but I went through a similar experience with my

00:44:00.701 --> 00:44:03.901
child where I grew up with asthma.

00:44:04.581 --> 00:44:08.861
And it was a weird kind of asthma, like a childhood asthma is like Once you

00:44:08.861 --> 00:44:10.681
get puberty, it's like it goes away.

00:44:11.621 --> 00:44:16.121
I still don't know much about that. My brother had the same.

00:44:17.041 --> 00:44:20.581
I have asthma and I'm still asthmatic, but my brothers went away.

00:44:21.101 --> 00:44:25.121
Yeah. And so, you know, my child was going through the same thing and the doctor

00:44:25.121 --> 00:44:29.561
kept trying to say, oh, well, it's just bronchitis and all that stuff.

00:44:29.681 --> 00:44:34.301
And I just, I guess I had to fight because I knew from the moment he was,

00:44:34.501 --> 00:44:37.341
you know, my child was born that it was like.

00:44:38.690 --> 00:44:43.730
I could hear the wheezing, right? Yeah. So I knew, and I just kept dealing with

00:44:43.730 --> 00:44:48.630
it, and finally I got a doctor, and, you know, the rest is history,

00:44:48.670 --> 00:44:52.070
and turned out to be an astounding young human being.

00:44:53.290 --> 00:44:58.510
So I can relate to that. But let me go ahead and close it out with these last two questions.

00:44:58.630 --> 00:45:04.530
What do you want readers to take away from this book? And I want them to take

00:45:04.530 --> 00:45:09.890
away that we are, that there is not one coming of age.

00:45:10.590 --> 00:45:16.050
That I think we so often we think of coming of age as like when we're teenagers

00:45:16.050 --> 00:45:19.950
and then we grow into our adult selves and then we are ourselves.

00:45:20.310 --> 00:45:23.630
And thank God I am not the same person that I was when I was 22. too.

00:45:23.890 --> 00:45:28.150
We are constantly growing. We are constantly coming of age.

00:45:28.290 --> 00:45:33.710
And how lucky are we to be able to do that, to continue to grow and change and

00:45:33.710 --> 00:45:37.290
acknowledge mistakes and to learn from them.

00:45:38.170 --> 00:45:43.010
Yeah. So this is a question I'm closing out with every guest this year.

00:45:43.330 --> 00:45:46.790
Finish this sentence, I have hope because.

00:45:48.430 --> 00:45:50.810
I have hope because.

00:45:51.528 --> 00:45:59.188
Because to not have hope is to admit defeat. To me, hope is an action.

00:45:59.828 --> 00:46:05.708
The act of having hope is in and of itself.

00:46:05.728 --> 00:46:08.728
It's so much more than wishing.

00:46:10.088 --> 00:46:15.108
We take the steps toward hope. We do the actions that create the hope.

00:46:15.588 --> 00:46:19.388
And even if whatever we are hoping for doesn't come to fruition,

00:46:19.808 --> 00:46:23.068
all of those steps along the way were part of it.

00:46:23.508 --> 00:46:25.508
And we can't give up. We can't give in.

00:46:26.068 --> 00:46:28.468
And that's hope. Hope is defiance.

00:46:29.508 --> 00:46:34.368
Yeah. All right. So Kelly Cervantes, how can people get this book, The Luckiest?

00:46:34.608 --> 00:46:38.308
The Luckiest is available everywhere. Books are sold.

00:46:38.748 --> 00:46:43.788
Bookshop.org, Barnes & Noble, Amazon, or you can go to your local bookstore

00:46:43.788 --> 00:46:48.168
and ask them to order it if they don't already have it. Support the local bookstores.

00:46:49.394 --> 00:46:56.554
So if people want to get more involved with Cure Epilepsy or just want to reach

00:46:56.554 --> 00:46:57.974
out to you, how can they do that?

00:46:58.294 --> 00:47:03.894
Yeah, cureepilepsy.org. And I am on Facebook and Instagram.

00:47:04.274 --> 00:47:10.454
You can just search up Kelly Cervantes and also my website, kellyservantes.com.

00:47:10.454 --> 00:47:20.134
And I am also on Substack where I do a weekly newsletter about all things grief, love, life, loss.

00:47:20.534 --> 00:47:25.174
And I delve into politics and current events currently on that theme,

00:47:25.214 --> 00:47:26.894
as I feel like many of us are.

00:47:29.114 --> 00:47:32.854
Well, Kelly, thank you so much for coming on. I greatly appreciate it.

00:47:33.514 --> 00:47:38.514
Like I said earlier, that the book moved me and it reassured me,

00:47:38.634 --> 00:47:45.294
you know, that no matter what challenges you face, you can fight through it.

00:47:45.414 --> 00:47:51.214
And that's why I really liked that email that your friend's mom sent you about having to fight.

00:47:51.294 --> 00:47:54.554
Cause I think now more than ever, we have to have that.

00:47:54.754 --> 00:48:00.594
So thank you for sharing and thank you again for coming on the podcast. Thank you.

00:48:01.294 --> 00:48:03.554
All right, guys. And we're going to catch y'all on the other side.

00:48:23.043 --> 00:48:30.183
All right, and we are back. And so now it is time for my next guest, Dr. Monica McLemore.

00:48:30.643 --> 00:48:36.563
Dr. Monica R. McLemore is a visiting professor at the Rory Myers College of

00:48:36.563 --> 00:48:38.463
Nursing at New York University.

00:48:38.803 --> 00:48:42.303
Prior to this, she was a tenured full professor in the Child,

00:48:42.483 --> 00:48:48.703
Family, and Population Health Department and the director for the Manning Price-Bratlin

00:48:48.703 --> 00:48:56.303
Center for Anti-Racism and Equity in Nursing at the University of Washington School of Nursing.

00:48:56.603 --> 00:49:01.403
She previously held the endowed professorship and lecture in health promotions.

00:49:01.803 --> 00:49:06.603
Throughout 2023, she served as the interim associate dean for equity,

00:49:07.263 --> 00:49:09.683
diversity, and inclusion in the School of Nursing.

00:49:09.683 --> 00:49:15.063
She retired from clinical practice as a public health and staff nurse after

00:49:15.063 --> 00:49:23.783
a 28-year clinical nursing career in 2019, however, continues to provide flu and COVID-19 vaccines.

00:49:24.603 --> 00:49:29.563
Her program of research is focused on understanding reproductive health and justice.

00:49:29.563 --> 00:49:35.803
To date, she has 145 peer-reviewed articles, op-eds, and commentaries,

00:49:35.843 --> 00:49:40.263
and her research has been cited in the Huffington Post, Lavender Health,

00:49:40.883 --> 00:49:44.503
eight amicus briefs to the Supreme Court of the United States,

00:49:44.643 --> 00:49:49.723
and four national academies of science, engineering, and medicine reports.

00:49:49.723 --> 00:49:56.023
And a data visualization project entitled How to Fix Maternal Mortality,

00:49:56.303 --> 00:50:01.963
the first step is to stop blaming women that was published in the 2019 Future

00:50:01.963 --> 00:50:04.643
Medicine edition of Scientific American.

00:50:05.652 --> 00:50:09.032
Her work has also appeared in publications such as Dane Magazine,

00:50:09.812 --> 00:50:19.092
Politico, ProPublica, NPR, and she's made a voice appearance in Terrence Nance's

00:50:19.092 --> 00:50:22.272
HBO series, Random Acts of Flyness.

00:50:22.572 --> 00:50:28.912
She is the recipient of numerous awards and is a past chair for sexual and reproductive

00:50:28.912 --> 00:50:32.112
health section of the American Public Health Association.

00:50:33.012 --> 00:50:38.212
She was inducted as a fellow of the American Academy of Nursing in 2019.

00:50:39.252 --> 00:50:44.972
She became the editor-in-chief of Health Equity Journal in 2022.

00:50:45.392 --> 00:50:49.952
Ladies and gentlemen, it is my distinct honor and privilege to have as a guest

00:50:49.952 --> 00:50:54.252
on this podcast, Dr. Monica McLemore.

00:51:05.228 --> 00:51:09.828
All right. Dr. Monica McLemore. McLemore.

00:51:10.308 --> 00:51:13.608
McLemore. I'm good. I'm good. How are you? I'm doing good.

00:51:14.128 --> 00:51:18.328
Glad to have you on. I'm really, really honored that you accepted my invitation.

00:51:19.188 --> 00:51:23.828
And I want to get into a subject that, you know, has been really,

00:51:24.008 --> 00:51:29.108
really important to me and my background.

00:51:29.608 --> 00:51:33.868
You know, I was a state legislator in Mississippi.

00:51:34.588 --> 00:51:41.728
And one of our big issues was maternal mortality and just health in general.

00:51:42.268 --> 00:51:46.908
And so since I have this platform, I've been trying to highlight that and we'll

00:51:46.908 --> 00:51:51.768
get into that into the discussion. As a matter of fact, let's go ahead and do the icebreakers.

00:51:51.968 --> 00:51:55.568
So the first icebreaker is a quote I want you to respond to.

00:51:55.568 --> 00:52:02.068
If we continue to have a maternal health crisis, we continue to have an infant

00:52:02.068 --> 00:52:07.108
mortality crisis, then we're going to potentially see a situation or circumstance

00:52:07.108 --> 00:52:09.988
where black people can be extinct in the future.

00:52:10.208 --> 00:52:14.068
And as long as I am around and a whole lot of other people are,

00:52:14.208 --> 00:52:16.048
we're not going to allow that.

00:52:16.208 --> 00:52:22.948
What does that quote mean to you? That quote is from me at the STAT meeting the year before last.

00:52:22.948 --> 00:52:29.288
I was on a panel with Harlan Krumholz, who is a public health researcher physician

00:52:29.288 --> 00:52:34.428
colleague from Yale, and he has done some of the most preeminent studies,

00:52:34.588 --> 00:52:37.008
one was highlighted in the New York Times,

00:52:37.588 --> 00:52:39.628
about premature Black deaths.

00:52:40.510 --> 00:52:46.870
And looking at life expectancy over time to be able to appreciate and understand

00:52:46.870 --> 00:52:52.270
that there is preventable premature Black death from, you know,

00:52:52.370 --> 00:52:54.290
everything from diabetes, hypertension,

00:52:54.850 --> 00:52:56.770
maternal morbidity, mortality, infant mortality.

00:52:57.650 --> 00:53:02.450
And we were talking about what could and should be done about it.

00:53:02.750 --> 00:53:06.270
I mean, I have to tell you, I was a preemie. I was born in preemie in 1969.

00:53:06.270 --> 00:53:11.890
And our statistics around maternal and infant mortality have not changed in 100 years.

00:53:12.370 --> 00:53:16.330
And these are preventable deaths.

00:53:16.650 --> 00:53:25.250
And so, in my opinion, you know, I worry that with the few number of people

00:53:25.250 --> 00:53:27.870
who are having children, period,

00:53:28.610 --> 00:53:35.170
to the, you know, number of moms and babies we lose every year,

00:53:35.170 --> 00:53:39.770
that, you know, we have to do something,

00:53:40.910 --> 00:53:44.350
if we want to continue to see Black people in the future.

00:53:44.590 --> 00:53:51.470
And we have to do things to ensure that we can be successful and be able to

00:53:51.470 --> 00:53:55.390
have the longevity, in my opinion, that we deserve.

00:53:57.029 --> 00:54:06.189
So, you know, for me, I take very seriously this notion of having a dignified

00:54:06.189 --> 00:54:08.449
life and a dignified death.

00:54:08.569 --> 00:54:11.989
And it's not just because I'm a registered nurse. I should not be here.

00:54:13.029 --> 00:54:18.449
Prematurity is the number one killer, the number one cause of infant mortality around the world.

00:54:18.989 --> 00:54:22.049
One in nine babies will be born prematurely.

00:54:22.609 --> 00:54:26.229
And we know that prematurity is preventable.

00:54:27.029 --> 00:54:32.029
But clearly, we are making decisions to live in a country and a world that does

00:54:32.029 --> 00:54:34.009
not want to prioritize prevention.

00:54:35.509 --> 00:54:39.269
So as long as our public health infrastructure, which has been gutted by the

00:54:39.269 --> 00:54:40.269
current administration,

00:54:40.749 --> 00:54:44.749
and as long as our clinical enterprise continues to be starved of the essential

00:54:44.749 --> 00:54:49.009
resources that they need in order to be able to provide comprehensive preventative

00:54:49.009 --> 00:54:52.509
health care, the Medicaid cuts are just one version of that.

00:54:52.509 --> 00:54:59.389
Then we will continue to see premature death from all cause of mortality,

00:54:59.389 --> 00:55:05.029
but it will be particularly exacerbated and Black and brown and Native indigenous people.

00:55:05.649 --> 00:55:11.769
And that's a decision we can make now to change because people seem to have

00:55:11.769 --> 00:55:17.349
forgotten that every decision you make in the now changes the future.

00:55:17.929 --> 00:55:19.349
So that's how I think about it.

00:55:19.989 --> 00:55:24.229
All right. So now the next icebreaker is what we call 20 questions.

00:55:25.149 --> 00:55:29.949
So I need you to give me a number between 1 and 20. 15.

00:55:30.809 --> 00:55:38.189
When you think about the challenges our country faces, what gives you hope? What gives me hope?

00:55:38.589 --> 00:55:42.849
That the dark times that we are currently experiencing are temporary.

00:55:43.469 --> 00:55:46.409
I tell my students this all the time, right?

00:55:46.689 --> 00:55:54.549
That night is not forever and that decisions can't be made out of fear.

00:55:55.643 --> 00:56:02.263
Because you will be ill-prepared when that temporary darkness is over.

00:56:03.383 --> 00:56:08.943
So the way that I think about our current country, right? I mean, what was it last night?

00:56:09.363 --> 00:56:16.043
We had a sitting president post one of the most racist memes I've ever seen

00:56:16.043 --> 00:56:21.703
in my life about our former and first black president and his family.

00:56:22.563 --> 00:56:25.703
And nobody said anything like that. just okay.

00:56:26.463 --> 00:56:31.343
And when I think about that, you know, I decided not to share it across my multiple

00:56:31.343 --> 00:56:37.443
social media platforms, because I feel very strongly that weathering is real.

00:56:37.923 --> 00:56:45.343
And weathering is a construct that Dr. Arlene Geronimus conceptualized in the early 80s and the 90s.

00:56:45.463 --> 00:56:49.943
And yes, she is still alive. And yes, she is a University of Michigan professor.

00:56:50.103 --> 00:56:57.183
And yes, she is a white woman, but she conceptualized this notion that constant

00:56:57.183 --> 00:57:03.923
assaults really trigger your nervous system, and it contributes to premature aging.

00:57:04.483 --> 00:57:10.803
And she has shown that, you know, premature disposition for illness and death.

00:57:11.023 --> 00:57:19.143
And she has shown in Black people That when your, you know, axis of your autonomic

00:57:19.143 --> 00:57:24.003
nervous system is constantly being assaulted, you don't recoil as quickly.

00:57:24.403 --> 00:57:29.843
And for black and brown people, that includes everything from interpersonal and structural racism.

00:57:31.121 --> 00:57:34.661
As a factor that contributes to

00:57:34.661 --> 00:57:40.121
your premature aging, even at a cellular level, not just at a social one.

00:57:40.921 --> 00:57:46.661
So for me, what gives me joy, the notion of knowing that I want to be with incredible

00:57:46.661 --> 00:57:51.521
people who are envisioning around what our future could look like.

00:57:51.741 --> 00:57:54.121
There are a lot of scientists, there are a lot of clinicians,

00:57:54.361 --> 00:58:00.901
there are a lot of people who want to rebuild and restore what has been lost by executive order.

00:58:01.141 --> 00:58:06.621
And that work is really important, but it's insufficient and it's not good enough

00:58:06.621 --> 00:58:09.781
because I don't think we should build back better.

00:58:10.261 --> 00:58:11.901
I think we should build back different.

00:58:13.224 --> 00:58:16.964
And so for me, I am working with a lot of the early career people,

00:58:17.224 --> 00:58:22.804
the young folks, who really are thinking about this in a really different way

00:58:22.804 --> 00:58:28.084
and trying to support and guide them to be able to have the resources that they

00:58:28.084 --> 00:58:31.004
need in order to remake all of this,

00:58:31.224 --> 00:58:35.384
where more people are supported and can win.

00:58:36.484 --> 00:58:42.964
So the temporariness of all of this is what gives me joy, not wallowing in the

00:58:42.964 --> 00:58:46.684
sadness that a lot of people feel about what's been lost.

00:58:46.944 --> 00:58:49.624
People ask me all the time, are you mad about the equity, diversity,

00:58:49.624 --> 00:58:53.364
inclusion and all this other stuff? I was like, we made that.

00:58:53.464 --> 00:58:54.544
We can remake something else.

00:58:55.184 --> 00:58:59.604
The one thing that I need people to remember is racism can be outsmarted,

00:58:59.604 --> 00:59:05.284
even though it morphs to its time. And over time, it's changed and it's been,

00:59:05.284 --> 00:59:09.184
you know, institutionalized and structuralized in different ways. And we're still here.

00:59:10.164 --> 00:59:17.044
So as far as I'm concerned, am I frustrated and upset and sad and grumpy because

00:59:17.044 --> 00:59:19.144
I know it didn't have to be like this? Sure.

00:59:19.884 --> 00:59:27.304
But is that stopping me from putting things into place that will allow for people

00:59:27.304 --> 00:59:29.564
to do good work in the future? Hell no.

00:59:30.204 --> 00:59:35.244
Because I don't see that kind of ground. That's not really how I think about it.

00:59:35.824 --> 00:59:42.504
I'm not an inherently optimistic person, but I'm also a realist.

00:59:42.684 --> 00:59:46.224
And I'm going to do everything in my power to support folks who are thinking

00:59:46.224 --> 00:59:52.444
about this differently and who will reject the false premise that this is the

00:59:52.444 --> 00:59:55.844
status quo from now on. Not true. That's a lie.

00:59:56.504 --> 00:59:58.204
So that's how I think about it.

00:59:59.764 --> 01:00:07.744
All right. So why are reproductive health and health equity among the most urgent

01:00:07.744 --> 01:00:09.424
issues in the U.S. today?

01:00:10.695 --> 01:00:14.695
This is the way I explain it to people. So I'm a reproductive justice informed scientist.

01:00:14.875 --> 01:00:19.075
And reproductive justice was conceptualized by Black women, I don't know, 32 years ago.

01:00:19.195 --> 01:00:22.975
We just had our anniversary of 30 years of reproductive justice at a big party

01:00:22.975 --> 01:00:25.615
in Washington, D.C., like two years ago.

01:00:26.115 --> 01:00:30.815
And reproductive justice states simply that you have a human right to have children,

01:00:30.955 --> 01:00:35.335
to not have children, and to parent the children that you have in safe and healthy environments.

01:00:35.335 --> 01:00:39.875
And I like to add in the fourth tenet, which is you also have a human right

01:00:39.875 --> 01:00:44.195
to disassociate sex from reproduction, because that allows us to have adult

01:00:44.195 --> 01:00:49.175
conversations about healthy sexuality and consent as being part of a whole human life.

01:00:49.795 --> 01:00:54.555
So in my mind, the reason that reproductive health rights and justice are fundamental

01:00:54.555 --> 01:01:01.315
to everything we do is because if you can't safely propagate the human species,

01:01:01.975 --> 01:01:03.475
then all of us will be extinct.

01:01:04.855 --> 01:01:09.515
Reproductive justice is not just about organs right

01:01:09.515 --> 01:01:12.315
it's not just about uteruses and penises and ovaries and

01:01:12.315 --> 01:01:17.955
also it's actually the reproductive justice of ideas and opportunities it's

01:01:17.955 --> 01:01:24.755
not just about propagating humans so in my mind the word reproduction it draws

01:01:24.755 --> 01:01:30.015
everybody to like you know pregnancy and childbirth and all the things but that's

01:01:30.015 --> 01:01:32.155
the end result isn't always It's human.

01:01:32.355 --> 01:01:34.795
Sometimes it's an idea. Sometimes it's an opportunity.

01:01:35.115 --> 01:01:42.615
So we need to widen our aperture in terms of how we think about what we want the future to look like.

01:01:43.661 --> 01:01:49.101
But the future is inextricably tied to the people that's going to be there or not.

01:01:49.821 --> 01:01:52.561
So I always say I'm a childless by choice cat lady, right?

01:01:52.761 --> 01:01:58.321
But the way that I think about it is somebody else's children is going to build the tech that I will use.

01:01:58.741 --> 01:02:01.921
Some of their people's children are going to be the physicians and the nurses

01:02:01.921 --> 01:02:05.241
and the social worker and all the people that's going to take care of me when I'm an old girl.

01:02:05.921 --> 01:02:10.201
Somebody else's tech is going to allow for us, or somebody else's children is

01:02:10.201 --> 01:02:15.081
going to allow for us to have beautiful art and movies and all these other things.

01:02:15.181 --> 01:02:22.361
So I don't get to abdicate my responsibility to shape the future because I have

01:02:22.361 --> 01:02:25.481
no personal stake in it. That's where everybody gets confused.

01:02:26.161 --> 01:02:30.561
So they make it very much about this sort of very individualized familial unit.

01:02:30.561 --> 01:02:34.741
And I try to get students to public the people that we serve that investments

01:02:34.741 --> 01:02:39.901
in the future actually should benefit everybody, whether you're going to be there or not.

01:02:40.601 --> 01:02:46.041
So you can't do that without thinking about what are we going to reproduce from

01:02:46.041 --> 01:02:49.121
this current era outside of humans?

01:02:49.581 --> 01:02:53.201
I mean, yeah, the human piece is important, but that shapes everything.

01:02:53.201 --> 01:03:00.381
If people existentially cannot govern and have bodily autonomy and community

01:03:00.381 --> 01:03:06.641
autonomy and data autonomy, then you're limiting what's possible in the future.

01:03:07.742 --> 01:03:09.922
And I don't want to live in a world that's like that. This is one of the reasons

01:03:09.922 --> 01:03:14.262
why I'm one of the biggest AI haters on the planet, even though I'm an early adopter to technology.

01:03:15.182 --> 01:03:19.102
I don't want to live in a perfect world. I've learned a lot from my mistakes.

01:03:19.802 --> 01:03:24.202
I don't want to live in a world where the reproduction of some people is more

01:03:24.202 --> 01:03:26.262
important than the reproduction of other people.

01:03:27.282 --> 01:03:30.742
So from where I sit, we're talking about this all wrong.

01:03:31.582 --> 01:03:35.282
It's not just about manipulating and controlling people's bodies.

01:03:35.282 --> 01:03:43.302
It's about who gets to be the holder of human history in the future.

01:03:43.722 --> 01:03:48.722
And I don't want that to just be one narrative or one experience or one existence.

01:03:49.402 --> 01:03:53.302
And that's the tie to reproductive justice, to also climate change,

01:03:53.482 --> 01:03:59.762
and to making sure that the animals, the fauna, and the flora of the planet are not extinct either.

01:04:00.142 --> 01:04:05.122
You're supposed to be caretakers of this planet, right? So some people just

01:04:05.122 --> 01:04:07.382
don't take that seriously. And I do.

01:04:08.182 --> 01:04:12.602
So when I think about why reproductive health and reproductive rights and reproductive

01:04:12.602 --> 01:04:16.702
justice all have to be the cornerstone,

01:04:16.942 --> 01:04:22.922
the touchpiece of how we set our society up, it's not because I believe in some

01:04:22.922 --> 01:04:27.942
weird grand replacement theory or some white supremacist notion that,

01:04:27.962 --> 01:04:31.522
you know, only some people should be alive in the future.

01:04:32.242 --> 01:04:35.202
It is more about if we are lucky enough

01:04:35.202 --> 01:04:41.742
to be living things and to share this planet with other other species then care

01:04:41.742 --> 01:04:48.122
and love should be a part of that and then i'm a nurse right i'm a healer i'm

01:04:48.122 --> 01:04:53.702
a teacher i'm a guide and i take that very seriously i took an oath to have a life of service.

01:04:55.167 --> 01:05:00.727
So I see the world very differently than I think a lot of people do because

01:05:00.727 --> 01:05:08.207
reproduction, in my mind, represents potential, regardless of whatever is being created.

01:05:09.107 --> 01:05:15.107
While the global maternal mortality rate has declined, the U.S.

01:05:15.247 --> 01:05:17.367
Rate has increased. Why is that?

01:05:18.127 --> 01:05:23.067
Well, first of all, I'm going to give a complicated answer to that because there's three parts to it.

01:05:23.787 --> 01:05:27.507
The reason the maternal health and morbidity mortality rates in the United States

01:05:27.507 --> 01:05:30.507
have increased while worldwide they have decreased.

01:05:30.647 --> 01:05:32.807
Number one, we got better at data collection.

01:05:33.207 --> 01:05:37.287
A lot of people don't understand that there are multiple ways to classify a

01:05:37.287 --> 01:05:40.747
pregnancy-related death. Let me give you listeners an example.

01:05:41.247 --> 01:05:46.887
If I am in a car and I get shot and I die and I'm pregnant, in some places that's

01:05:46.887 --> 01:05:50.227
considered a pregnancy-related death, even though it has nothing to do with the pregnancy.

01:05:50.767 --> 01:05:55.687
So we clean that up, right? Because how, I mean, how do you define a pregnancy-related death?

01:05:55.847 --> 01:05:59.227
If I fall down the stairs and I'm pregnant, is that a pregnancy-related death?

01:05:59.387 --> 01:06:02.107
Or are you just counting my death and my pregnancy, right?

01:06:02.307 --> 01:06:05.087
So we cleaned up a lot of that.

01:06:05.227 --> 01:06:10.467
Or the World Health Organization classified any deaths from a pregnant person out to a year.

01:06:10.607 --> 01:06:15.107
Whereas in the United States, we were only counting up to 42 days after the birth.

01:06:16.307 --> 01:06:22.847
So data clarity showed that we were underestimating the number of pregnancy-related

01:06:22.847 --> 01:06:24.407
mortality in the United States.

01:06:24.527 --> 01:06:27.507
So we corrected that, started correcting it in about 2016.

01:06:28.844 --> 01:06:33.064
The second reason why maternal deaths are increasing in the United States is

01:06:33.064 --> 01:06:35.464
because some people want to blame their patients.

01:06:35.764 --> 01:06:39.144
I wrote a paper about this. Oh, the patient's coming to pregnancy older and

01:06:39.144 --> 01:06:40.864
sicker and fatter and it's their fault.

01:06:41.584 --> 01:06:46.044
And I'm like, yeah, actually, no, that's really not the reason.

01:06:46.604 --> 01:06:51.084
The reason that we see Black women in the United States three to four times

01:06:51.084 --> 01:06:55.804
more likely to die from pregnancy-related complications than causes is because of structural racism.

01:06:56.724 --> 01:07:00.024
And when my students ask me, they're like, well, what do you mean? How does that show up?

01:07:00.104 --> 01:07:05.204
I said, well, first of all, we live in a country where the number one preventative

01:07:05.204 --> 01:07:14.664
health interventions that we can do is rate gatekept and rate limited by our capitalist system.

01:07:14.664 --> 01:07:20.064
A lot of people don't understand that having health insurance is the number

01:07:20.064 --> 01:07:25.184
one intervention to improve health outcomes because that gives you access to

01:07:25.184 --> 01:07:27.064
providers and it gives you access to care.

01:07:27.524 --> 01:07:32.144
And yet we tie our insurance to our employers.

01:07:32.644 --> 01:07:35.664
That's not true in other countries where they've been able to reduce maternal

01:07:35.664 --> 01:07:36.604
morbidity and mortality.

01:07:37.544 --> 01:07:41.984
They believe in this robust social safety net. So if you don't have access to

01:07:41.984 --> 01:07:46.024
insurance, at least in the United States, your health outcomes are going to be poor.

01:07:46.584 --> 01:07:52.544
The third reason, the other way that structural racism shows up is we have obstetrician deserts.

01:07:53.044 --> 01:07:57.524
People can't even access an obstetrician. I mean, you're from Mississippi, right?

01:07:57.624 --> 01:08:02.324
Eighty-eight percent of counties don't have an obstetrician or a birth worker

01:08:02.324 --> 01:08:03.564
or a birth care provider.

01:08:04.304 --> 01:08:08.424
I've been working with the midwives who have been trying to decriminalize midwifery

01:08:08.424 --> 01:08:11.824
in Mississippi. in Alabama, right?

01:08:12.024 --> 01:08:15.904
The fact that the grand midwives were discredited when they were caring for

01:08:15.904 --> 01:08:20.824
people on plantations and doing a relatively good job, not having access to

01:08:20.824 --> 01:08:24.404
midwifery care, not having access to doula care, that's a decision.

01:08:25.784 --> 01:08:29.184
Or when you go into a labor and delivery union, if you're lucky enough to get

01:08:29.184 --> 01:08:33.464
into one, structural racism shows up when the nurses don't listen to you,

01:08:33.564 --> 01:08:37.604
because then they miss the signs and symptoms of deterioration when they could

01:08:37.604 --> 01:08:39.784
have acted earlier or if they don't believe you.

01:08:40.524 --> 01:08:45.204
That's the Serena Williams telling Vogue in 2018 in January,

01:08:45.404 --> 01:08:48.904
telling her story, and then only to have Beyonce to turn around and tell her

01:08:48.904 --> 01:08:53.904
story in September around her toxemia pregnancy, or we call that pre-classion.

01:08:53.904 --> 01:09:00.524
But if you don't believe people, again, you're going to miss signs and symptoms of deterioration.

01:09:00.664 --> 01:09:04.784
And by the time you want to do something, pregnancy is a time-limited situation.

01:09:05.144 --> 01:09:09.504
And it goes from emergent to urgent very rapidly.

01:09:10.284 --> 01:09:14.224
So if you're missing all those potential touch points where you could have done

01:09:14.224 --> 01:09:19.804
something, and we learn this information from our maternal morbidity and mortality reviews.

01:09:19.804 --> 01:09:22.564
So every maternal death, well, not every, because some states,

01:09:22.784 --> 01:09:26.524
like Texas, canceled their maternal morbidity and mortality reviews.

01:09:27.184 --> 01:09:30.344
We have a committee that goes back and looks at all the medical records,

01:09:30.484 --> 01:09:36.184
all the cases, all the visits, all the labs, everything, to figure out what

01:09:36.184 --> 01:09:38.424
happened and what could have prevented it.

01:09:38.884 --> 01:09:43.544
And those are called MMRCs, Maternal Morbidity and Mortality Review Committees.

01:09:44.204 --> 01:09:46.964
That's how we know that maternal deaths are preventable or at

01:09:46.964 --> 01:09:49.864
least 80 to 90 percent of them are because we

01:09:49.864 --> 01:09:55.764
can look in hindsight at all the different places what was missed all the different

01:09:55.764 --> 01:09:59.004
visits all the different labs all the different increases in blood pressure

01:09:59.004 --> 01:10:06.104
all the signs and symptoms that could have saved that mom but in real time if

01:10:06.104 --> 01:10:09.164
you are afraid of black people and don't like them,

01:10:09.584 --> 01:10:14.784
and yet you're charged with our care, and you're not listening to me,

01:10:15.104 --> 01:10:16.284
you're going to miss something.

01:10:17.331 --> 01:10:24.331
So, in my mind, preventable maternal deaths would mean changes in nurse staffing ratios.

01:10:24.871 --> 01:10:32.011
It might mean changes in the racial, cultural concordance of the teens.

01:10:32.651 --> 01:10:37.391
It might mean having additional support. I think all pregnant people should

01:10:37.391 --> 01:10:41.951
have a doula just because it is a reverent act.

01:10:42.491 --> 01:10:47.091
And so we, as the village, should provide them with all the honor and the care

01:10:47.091 --> 01:10:48.651
and the love that they need.

01:10:49.411 --> 01:10:53.111
Not just because we want to prevent a harmful thing.

01:10:53.971 --> 01:10:57.691
So in my mind, we have over-medicalized pregnancy and childbirth.

01:10:57.851 --> 01:10:59.811
And for some people, there's too much intervention.

01:11:00.251 --> 01:11:04.391
I mean, the fact that the C-section, primary, first-time C-section rate in Black

01:11:04.391 --> 01:11:11.771
women is as high as it is, when that's associated with known morbidity and known mortality, right?

01:11:12.431 --> 01:11:18.091
So in my mind, our rates are so high because we've decided that we don't want

01:11:18.091 --> 01:11:22.451
to keep pregnant people alive or we only want to keep some pregnant people alive

01:11:22.451 --> 01:11:24.951
because otherwise we would make different decisions.

01:11:25.711 --> 01:11:30.391
Yeah. All right. So you kind of asked, I think you've kind of answered my next

01:11:30.391 --> 01:11:33.411
two questions, but I'm going to ask them anyway.

01:11:33.871 --> 01:11:36.831
Could you, could universal health care alleviate the problem?

01:11:37.901 --> 01:11:45.401
It depends. So I actually advocate for a single payer in terms of if we're going

01:11:45.401 --> 01:11:46.501
to maintain the shots, right?

01:11:46.621 --> 01:11:49.601
I actually don't think we should have insurance and have capitalism at all.

01:11:49.741 --> 01:11:54.621
I think health care is a public good and it should be offered as such and that

01:11:54.621 --> 01:11:55.781
people should have a living wage.

01:11:55.941 --> 01:12:01.941
Whatever language you want to use to state that, that's what I believe in.

01:12:01.941 --> 01:12:06.841
So if by universal healthcare, we mean people have universal access to a payer

01:12:06.841 --> 01:12:08.561
to be able to see a clinician.

01:12:09.841 --> 01:12:13.921
Yes, I think that that could really help. But again, if we don't change what

01:12:13.921 --> 01:12:18.321
the workforce looks like, because I mean, I say this all the time.

01:12:18.321 --> 01:12:23.001
When we did our Giving Voice to Mothers study, we saw that mistreatment was

01:12:23.001 --> 01:12:25.821
rampant in pregnancy-related care.

01:12:26.601 --> 01:12:29.861
We associated that. I didn't blame the clinicians.

01:12:30.921 --> 01:12:34.421
Our workplaces are inhumane. It don't work for the patients,

01:12:34.441 --> 01:12:36.721
and it don't work for us, right?

01:12:37.061 --> 01:12:42.081
Nobody should have to see 40, 50 patients a day in order to make ends meet,

01:12:42.281 --> 01:12:45.001
and it'd be spending five minutes with pregnant patients.

01:12:45.501 --> 01:12:47.721
That is inhumane.

01:12:48.461 --> 01:12:51.761
So in my mind, universal health care, if people had the time,

01:12:52.081 --> 01:12:57.081
the midwifery model of care where you can learn from each other and pregnant

01:12:57.081 --> 01:13:00.181
people, you could have your pregnancy-related care in groups.

01:13:00.841 --> 01:13:04.561
Everybody always asks me, why do people like centering and group prenatal care?

01:13:04.701 --> 01:13:08.701
I say, well, number one, you're never alone with a racist-ass clinician.

01:13:09.701 --> 01:13:13.741
Number two, you're learning from other pregnant people, which is how,

01:13:13.741 --> 01:13:17.221
in my mind, we want to shepherd new humans into the world.

01:13:18.321 --> 01:13:23.281
And number three, they're more eyes on you than just that one clinician.

01:13:23.641 --> 01:13:27.181
So that if they miss something, maybe the medical assistant,

01:13:27.301 --> 01:13:31.041
maybe the nurse, maybe the team will catch something.

01:13:32.599 --> 01:13:35.599
We have to think about the model of care, just not the payer of it.

01:13:36.019 --> 01:13:39.819
So if that's what you mean by universal health care, sure.

01:13:41.142 --> 01:13:44.522
How I think about it. Okay. So the next question,

01:13:44.722 --> 01:13:50.202
I have had as guests on this podcast, a doula here in the Atlanta area and a

01:13:50.202 --> 01:13:54.582
candidate running for the Georgia House of Representatives discuss the importance

01:13:54.582 --> 01:13:59.562
of addressing the maternal mortality crisis in America and Georgia specifically.

01:14:00.142 --> 01:14:03.382
So I have two questions.

01:14:03.962 --> 01:14:08.442
How important are doulas and midwives in preventing maternal mortality,

01:14:08.442 --> 01:14:14.522
and can you give some public policy examples to decrease maternal mortality rates?

01:14:14.942 --> 01:14:19.002
Absolutely. Well, number one, I don't think it's exclusively the responsibility

01:14:19.002 --> 01:14:22.002
of midwives and doulas to fix a problem they didn't create.

01:14:22.682 --> 01:14:27.522
So, maternal morbidity and mortality is a nurse physician. It's a healthcare problem.

01:14:27.922 --> 01:14:33.582
That said, one of the reasons why they are so vital if we want to improve health

01:14:33.582 --> 01:14:34.942
outcomes. It's twofold.

01:14:35.202 --> 01:14:41.422
My good friend, Dr. Karen Scott, who wrote the Secret Birth book and has created

01:14:41.422 --> 01:14:48.242
the only validated by Black women community patient reported experience measure

01:14:48.242 --> 01:14:50.542
to improve obstetric race syndrome,

01:14:51.082 --> 01:14:56.962
always says that doulas know how to move with people through time.

01:14:57.862 --> 01:15:05.382
Nurses and physicians and some Midwest to a certain extent, we try to manage time during a birth.

01:15:06.342 --> 01:15:12.282
So there is a unspoken clock that a lot of people don't know that starts the

01:15:12.282 --> 01:15:15.142
minute your water breaks if you're a pregnant person.

01:15:16.002 --> 01:15:20.762
And that clock is dictated by infection risk.

01:15:21.502 --> 01:15:25.082
Fetuses live in aqueous environments. They live in water. So the minute that

01:15:25.082 --> 01:15:29.782
water breaks, we got to get a baby out so they can take their first breath and be able to live on air.

01:15:30.082 --> 01:15:33.342
So that clock is about 12 to 24 hours.

01:15:34.436 --> 01:15:37.036
And so a lot of decisions, a lot of interventions, a lot of,

01:15:37.156 --> 01:15:46.436
so doulas know how to move with people through time to help the body do what it was designed to do.

01:15:47.436 --> 01:15:52.416
The rest of us on the team, we for a long time have been trying to manage time

01:15:52.416 --> 01:15:53.416
in Britain and Seamberg.

01:15:53.936 --> 01:15:57.796
The Mutual Free Model of Care, so the second full piece to your answer,

01:15:58.416 --> 01:16:03.956
they have a unique perspective. Number one, they have very long appointments.

01:16:04.596 --> 01:16:09.236
Their intake appointments can be two, three hours. I know midwives that go to

01:16:09.236 --> 01:16:14.436
people's houses to assess what their social needs are in addition to their clinical ones.

01:16:14.936 --> 01:16:21.856
I know midwives who, you know, don't even have a phone service because their

01:16:21.856 --> 01:16:24.216
patients have their cell phone numbers. They can text them.

01:16:24.896 --> 01:16:30.976
I know midwives who provide care in groups with all, it's a one-stop shop.

01:16:31.136 --> 01:16:32.596
The social workers are there.

01:16:32.796 --> 01:16:34.776
The psychologists are there.

01:16:35.036 --> 01:16:37.296
The nutritionists are there.

01:16:37.936 --> 01:16:41.236
When the people, they come in in a group, they can bring their other kids.

01:16:41.676 --> 01:16:43.156
They can bring their partners.

01:16:43.616 --> 01:16:49.556
They do their own vital signs. They are able to dip their own urines, right?

01:16:49.856 --> 01:16:54.996
They are curating a pregnancy experience, not an appointment.

01:16:55.676 --> 01:17:01.216
So it's a different model of being able to honor people who are brave enough

01:17:01.216 --> 01:17:05.596
to propagate our species and to revere them as such.

01:17:06.136 --> 01:17:10.216
So the reason that doulas and midwives are, and don't get me wrong,

01:17:10.476 --> 01:17:14.856
we need obstetricians who can do c-sections because sometimes they're really

01:17:14.856 --> 01:17:16.956
necessary to save a baby and a mom's life.

01:17:17.696 --> 01:17:25.236
But that should not be the first line of how we do pregnancy-related care.

01:17:25.716 --> 01:17:30.396
I also want to be very clear with your listeners, because I think this needs to be said as well.

01:17:31.591 --> 01:17:35.051
All pregnancies end, they all don't end in a birth.

01:17:35.831 --> 01:17:40.071
And I think we need to own that, right? All pregnancies end,

01:17:40.211 --> 01:17:44.071
but they all, and birth is not the only legitimate outcome of pregnancy.

01:17:45.211 --> 01:17:50.091
So we talk about the outcomes of pregnancy. We talk about miscarriage. We talk about abortion.

01:17:50.291 --> 01:17:53.431
We talk about infertility. We talk about birth. We talk about surgery.

01:17:53.591 --> 01:17:55.571
Those are outcomes of pregnancy.

01:17:56.971 --> 01:18:03.271
We don't talk about pregnancy. So to answer your second question,

01:18:03.691 --> 01:18:09.291
right, I mean, we don't understand normal parturition or normal pregnancy.

01:18:09.451 --> 01:18:13.491
What initiates labor? We have theories around that. But we spend a lot of time studying abnormal.

01:18:14.251 --> 01:18:18.611
Maybe we should study normal. I say this all the time, people get in their feelings,

01:18:18.691 --> 01:18:20.791
but I would love for us to go into

01:18:20.791 --> 01:18:26.091
affluent environments where pregnancy outcomes are really good, right?

01:18:26.151 --> 01:18:31.271
I'm a professor at New York University. And in New York, Black women are 12

01:18:31.271 --> 01:18:35.711
times more likely to die from pregnancy-related complications than everybody else.

01:18:35.931 --> 01:18:40.391
I would love to go into the wealthy affluent areas and figure out what's the

01:18:40.391 --> 01:18:45.151
minimum constellation of things that you need to have in order to ensure those good outcomes.

01:18:45.891 --> 01:18:50.291
And then make sure everybody has those things. Because I bet you it will be

01:18:50.291 --> 01:18:55.311
clean water, clear night sky. I bet you it will be things like having a community

01:18:55.311 --> 01:18:59.571
center that has cooking classes and pottery and art and all these.

01:18:59.651 --> 01:19:02.031
It won't be any clinical thing.

01:19:03.351 --> 01:19:08.851
So for me, we don't take seriously enough if people say they really have family

01:19:08.851 --> 01:19:10.631
values, and if that's true.

01:19:11.231 --> 01:19:15.611
Pregnant people don't exist in environments. They don't exist in a bubble.

01:19:16.091 --> 01:19:20.431
My colleagues and I did a research study in the Central Valley in California,

01:19:20.591 --> 01:19:26.911
Fresno, where we get between 30 and 50 days where the temperature is over 100 degrees.

01:19:27.771 --> 01:19:31.011
Heat exposure is associated with prematurity.

01:19:31.631 --> 01:19:34.751
It makes sense right so if you're a farm worker

01:19:34.751 --> 01:19:37.451
you don't get adequate hydration and you

01:19:37.451 --> 01:19:41.511
live in a place that doesn't have air conditioning heat exposure i mean we're

01:19:41.511 --> 01:19:45.951
all going to find this out on climate change there are things that impact clinical

01:19:45.951 --> 01:19:51.151
outcomes that are not clinical and we have to decide as a society how much of

01:19:51.151 --> 01:19:55.051
that do we want to tolerate whether it's dirty polluted water,

01:19:55.851 --> 01:19:57.611
or dirty, polluted air.

01:19:58.431 --> 01:20:01.451
Pregnant people exist in that milieu.

01:20:02.671 --> 01:20:09.611
So in my mind, if we wanted to change policy, we would make sure that pregnant

01:20:09.611 --> 01:20:10.951
people... Okay, here's another one.

01:20:11.451 --> 01:20:14.371
How many people, how many of your listeners know that regardless of how your

01:20:14.371 --> 01:20:18.231
pregnancy ends, if you don't go home with a baby, in most states,

01:20:18.311 --> 01:20:21.111
you got to go back to work because your disability don't kick in because you

01:20:21.111 --> 01:20:24.191
don't go home with a baby. So if your baby dies.

01:20:25.533 --> 01:20:28.813
Lose your disability. How many people know that? It's cruel.

01:20:29.913 --> 01:20:35.513
That's a simple policy change we could make. We decided that all NICUs,

01:20:35.713 --> 01:20:38.733
neonatal intensive care unit, like no parent would go bankrupt,

01:20:38.933 --> 01:20:42.193
that Medicaid would cover a NICU stay regardless of how long it is.

01:20:42.293 --> 01:20:46.013
We decided there is two groups in the country that have universal cover,

01:20:46.513 --> 01:20:51.113
children and the elderly under Medicare, that's if they don't gut it.

01:20:51.513 --> 01:20:55.753
We can make those decisions for other people. So as far as I'm concern,

01:20:55.973 --> 01:20:59.493
the easiest policy decision, if we wanted to really do something about maternal

01:20:59.493 --> 01:21:01.653
mortality, there's one bill,

01:21:02.193 --> 01:21:05.813
actually it's 12, you know, Lauren Underwood and Alma Adams and the Black Maternal

01:21:05.813 --> 01:21:08.553
Caucus and Black Mamas Matter Alliance introduced a momnibus.

01:21:08.673 --> 01:21:10.973
That was nine bills before COVID and then it became 12.

01:21:11.133 --> 01:21:16.633
But if we wanted to do one thing, one policy change to reduce maternal mortality

01:21:16.633 --> 01:21:22.453
in the United States, we would extend all postpartum insurance, Medicaid,

01:21:23.633 --> 01:21:26.753
Obamacare, on-exchange, employer-sponsored health insurance,

01:21:26.913 --> 01:21:32.573
we would extend that to a year because we know that 50 to 60 percent of maternal

01:21:32.573 --> 01:21:38.213
deaths happen in the postpartum period when people are not seeking care because

01:21:38.213 --> 01:21:39.213
their insurance runs out.

01:21:40.753 --> 01:21:44.873
So that'd be the one thing, extending, I wrote a piece about this in Scientific

01:21:44.873 --> 01:21:50.453
American, this open source, why we should extend postpartum Medicaid across the country.

01:21:52.504 --> 01:21:56.424
We're not that serious about this. I mean, in 2027, in H.R. 1,

01:21:56.744 --> 01:22:00.404
which some people, you know, sarcastically refer to as the big, beautiful bill.

01:22:00.664 --> 01:22:05.304
In 2027, we are looking at $800 million in cuts from the Medicaid program.

01:22:06.004 --> 01:22:10.644
Well, how many of your listeners know that almost over half the births in the

01:22:10.644 --> 01:22:12.224
United States are covered by Medicaid?

01:22:13.404 --> 01:22:17.504
So when I say that structural racism informs health outcomes in the United States,

01:22:17.704 --> 01:22:22.224
you are basically going to deprive half the births. we have 4 million births

01:22:22.224 --> 01:22:23.584
in the United States every year.

01:22:24.264 --> 01:22:27.564
You're going to say that those people don't deserve coverage,

01:22:28.304 --> 01:22:32.884
which we know is the number one intervention to improve health outcomes for

01:22:32.884 --> 01:22:34.824
people. That's what that means.

01:22:35.404 --> 01:22:38.664
So the language of entitlement and all this, that's like not a thing.

01:22:39.504 --> 01:22:43.464
So extending postpartum healthcare coverage for people.

01:22:43.664 --> 01:22:49.084
I know moms who have C-sections that eight days afterwards are driving for Lyft

01:22:49.084 --> 01:22:50.984
and Uber because they don't have health insurance.

01:22:51.604 --> 01:22:55.024
The last thing you should be doing after major abdominal surgery is sitting

01:22:55.024 --> 01:22:56.404
in a car driving for eight hours.

01:22:57.384 --> 01:23:01.244
That's the kind of language we need to be using when we're trying to shape public policy.

01:23:02.644 --> 01:23:08.284
About pregnancy-related care and healthcare and not buy into the false binary,

01:23:08.884 --> 01:23:12.424
of entitlement programs or other things that are just not true.

01:23:13.304 --> 01:23:17.004
That's how I think about it. All right, so I got a couple more questions.

01:23:17.924 --> 01:23:24.904
How much of a challenge is it for you to do your health care advocacy with the

01:23:24.904 --> 01:23:26.664
current leadership of the U.S.

01:23:27.084 --> 01:23:31.024
Department of Health and Human Services? I have dealt with active and credible

01:23:31.024 --> 01:23:36.644
death threats because I've only worked in reproductive health rights and justice my entire career.

01:23:37.104 --> 01:23:42.244
I have had to deal with active and credible death threats since 2010.

01:23:43.664 --> 01:23:49.604
We need to raise better humans. That said, I also help to support many of the

01:23:49.604 --> 01:23:55.424
law firms around the country who are suing the administration.

01:23:55.944 --> 01:24:00.444
And I'm very lucky that the Washington State Nurses Association,

01:24:00.884 --> 01:24:04.504
along with Academy Health and a whole lot of other professional organizations

01:24:04.504 --> 01:24:13.364
that I belong to, were willing to sue, summarize science, and be able to provide amicus briefs.

01:24:13.364 --> 01:24:16.984
In many of the cases I have been doing advocacy work my entire career,

01:24:17.364 --> 01:24:22.964
we were able to restore the 49 disappeared federal databases,

01:24:23.044 --> 01:24:25.884
many of which are pregnancy-related, right?

01:24:26.064 --> 01:24:29.964
PRAMS, the Pregnancy Risk Assessment Monitoring Surveillance Survey.

01:24:30.904 --> 01:24:34.084
BRIFIS, the Behavioral Risk Factor Survey.

01:24:34.224 --> 01:24:40.064
These are surveys that the taxpayers and Congress have fielded for over 50 years.

01:24:40.724 --> 01:24:44.424
Data that we collect that go to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

01:24:44.424 --> 01:24:47.304
so we can design interventions based on those data.

01:24:47.904 --> 01:24:50.764
Of course, we were going to sue to get those databases back.

01:24:51.264 --> 01:24:55.184
So my life has been disrupted by the current Department of Health and Human

01:24:55.184 --> 01:24:59.344
Services because not only do I have to do my job as a full-tenured professor

01:24:59.344 --> 01:25:05.804
and provide teaching for 300 undergrads every semester and all the service work that I do,

01:25:05.864 --> 01:25:09.784
I also have to do my full-time job of suing the administration,

01:25:10.264 --> 01:25:17.604
being deposed, writing up expert witness testimony, and being able to get data for my PhD students.

01:25:17.784 --> 01:25:22.224
I have 29 MPH, master's prepared, people working on master's in public health

01:25:22.224 --> 01:25:25.744
and or PhD students around the country who are expecting to use those databases

01:25:25.744 --> 01:25:27.084
to complete their degrees.

01:25:28.900 --> 01:25:33.540
I have one student, five, seven years of work, and they can't get the most recent

01:25:33.540 --> 01:25:36.820
data because those disappeared, those databases.

01:25:37.400 --> 01:25:41.260
So yeah, I've been doing two full-time jobs since January 20th of last year.

01:25:41.440 --> 01:25:43.640
So it's been very difficult for me to do my work.

01:25:44.260 --> 01:25:47.480
Also in the context of having to deal with active and credible death threats,

01:25:47.620 --> 01:25:49.860
because I believe in reproductive justice.

01:25:50.220 --> 01:25:53.500
And I think it's very, very important that we not lose sight of the fact that

01:25:53.500 --> 01:25:56.980
regardless of why Black people are seeking care. They deserve very good care.

01:25:57.880 --> 01:26:00.900
So it's been very difficult for me to do my work, and I'm doing it anyway.

01:26:01.080 --> 01:26:03.060
I come from a long line of badass Black people.

01:26:04.060 --> 01:26:08.140
Father's a Superior Court judge. Started the Black Law Student Association at

01:26:08.140 --> 01:26:10.360
Penn with his classmates. I'm good.

01:26:11.620 --> 01:26:18.080
All right. A year ago, you said DEI is the easy thing to blame everything on.

01:26:18.480 --> 01:26:23.300
Number one, you don't have to define it. Number two, it's a buzzword that means

01:26:23.300 --> 01:26:24.740
different things to different people.

01:26:25.340 --> 01:26:30.720
And three, some people don't want to do that work. So it's an easy scapegoat.

01:26:31.420 --> 01:26:36.060
How do institutions of higher learning, especially those with medical schools,

01:26:36.380 --> 01:26:39.520
avoid, as you put it, cowardly acquiescence?

01:26:40.060 --> 01:26:42.000
Yeah, I said that.

01:26:43.180 --> 01:26:50.260
I say it again. In fact, I said this to some students yesterday because the Super Bowl is Sunday.

01:26:51.040 --> 01:26:58.400
If every academic medical center for the Pac-12 football team decided last year

01:26:58.400 --> 01:27:03.440
that they were not going to be able to field any games, no Friday night lights

01:27:03.440 --> 01:27:05.960
for y'all, because we can't function.

01:27:08.024 --> 01:27:12.684
A sports entity without our sports medicine and academic medicine colleagues,

01:27:12.684 --> 01:27:16.144
we would be having a whole different conversation right now.

01:27:16.804 --> 01:27:19.844
But we don't have any collective solidarity amongst our institutions.

01:27:20.464 --> 01:27:22.504
You got some people that want to fly under the radar.

01:27:22.924 --> 01:27:25.124
You got some people that's going to go along to get along.

01:27:25.704 --> 01:27:29.624
If every university, academic, medical center, I mean, that's the reason we

01:27:29.624 --> 01:27:32.724
haven't heard from the American Hospital Association or the American Medical Association.

01:27:33.144 --> 01:27:37.524
I'm in a situation right now where my entire discipline might be deprofessionalized

01:27:37.524 --> 01:27:38.844
by the Department of Education.

01:27:39.144 --> 01:27:43.764
The open comment period around that goes until March 2nd.

01:27:44.384 --> 01:27:49.784
Social work, nursing, public health, there's 13 health professions on the list

01:27:49.784 --> 01:27:52.184
to be deprofessionalized by the Department of Education,

01:27:52.424 --> 01:27:57.784
meaning that they will cap our capacity to have student loans at $25,000,

01:27:57.784 --> 01:28:02.804
which will mean the nursing shortage will be exacerbated and or only rich people can become nurses.

01:28:04.072 --> 01:28:08.752
So would I say that people are being cowardly again? Yes, absolutely.

01:28:09.072 --> 01:28:11.372
I don't even use the acronym DEI.

01:28:11.712 --> 01:28:13.672
I make people say the words.

01:28:14.272 --> 01:28:18.372
I make people clarify. What do you mean when you say diversity,

01:28:18.572 --> 01:28:21.472
equity, inclusion, justice, belonging?

01:28:21.752 --> 01:28:27.732
What do you mean when you say that? Because clearly, right, DEI became a buzzword like woke.

01:28:27.952 --> 01:28:31.152
And it means different things to different people. And I was like,

01:28:31.292 --> 01:28:37.112
I need you to tell me what your action is going to be that's associated with

01:28:37.112 --> 01:28:39.432
executive orders and compliance.

01:28:40.032 --> 01:28:48.852
I have people who I went to events sponsored by offices of DE&I that I can't

01:28:48.852 --> 01:28:54.532
prove that they were there because people took down websites. They closed offices.

01:28:55.212 --> 01:29:01.372
I mean luckily I'm an obsessive scientist and I download pdfs for every invite

01:29:01.372 --> 01:29:08.492
I get I youtube everything and I ask the press to be at my events when people like oh Dr.

01:29:08.592 --> 01:29:11.272
Methamore can we record this hell yeah you got

01:29:11.272 --> 01:29:14.792
people who can't even prove their entire career happened because the

01:29:14.792 --> 01:29:22.652
website upon which their work lived no longer exists so as far as I'm concerned

01:29:22.652 --> 01:29:28.112
I try to use my platform to remind people that there are things that we can

01:29:28.112 --> 01:29:31.412
do to combat misinformation and disinformation,

01:29:31.912 --> 01:29:37.212
and particularly around our efforts to diversify the workforce,

01:29:37.212 --> 01:29:41.552
to include as many people as possible,

01:29:41.752 --> 01:29:47.312
and to really get to a point where perspectives matter.

01:29:49.273 --> 01:29:55.753
And so I knew people who were working on reparations and calling that DE&I work.

01:29:56.513 --> 01:30:03.473
I knew people who were working on retrofitting structures and calling that DE&I work.

01:30:03.873 --> 01:30:10.213
I had affinity groups and a whole variety of activities that,

01:30:10.353 --> 01:30:13.193
in my mind, a just society should be doing.

01:30:13.873 --> 01:30:19.513
But when you put something under an umbrella, it makes it easily neutralized and targeted.

01:30:20.353 --> 01:30:24.493
And a lot of people did not take Kimberly Crenshaw seriously when she did a

01:30:24.493 --> 01:30:31.073
whole redux at the Congressional Black Caucus annual legislative meeting on Project 2025.

01:30:32.033 --> 01:30:35.813
We knew this was coming. And as somebody who works in reproductive health rights

01:30:35.813 --> 01:30:39.153
and justice, they practice all of these activities on us.

01:30:39.553 --> 01:30:44.973
And the rest of health care stood by and watched. If you go back in timeline,

01:30:45.533 --> 01:30:50.093
anti-abortion rhetoric, when you go back in timeline, everything that's happening

01:30:50.093 --> 01:30:54.613
right now was practiced on those of us who work in abortion,

01:30:54.813 --> 01:30:56.273
family planning, and contraception.

01:30:56.753 --> 01:31:01.013
That's why Repro is grounded in everything that's happening right now.

01:31:01.233 --> 01:31:05.893
The intimidation tactics, the arm twisting of our institutions,

01:31:06.453 --> 01:31:10.293
the discrediting, the misinformation, the disinformation, getting people to

01:31:10.293 --> 01:31:14.513
buy into false binaries. That was all practice on repro, and that's been a 40-year plan.

01:31:15.875 --> 01:31:21.355
So when I think about the collective solidarity that's needed to get out of

01:31:21.355 --> 01:31:24.415
all of this, people are not learning the right lesson from what we're dealing

01:31:24.415 --> 01:31:29.835
with, which is why I stay so busy trying to get people to understand that.

01:31:30.355 --> 01:31:33.075
So, yeah, I said those words a year ago. I'd say them again now.

01:31:33.195 --> 01:31:37.855
And actually, I would probably say even more strong language in hindsight.

01:31:38.755 --> 01:31:42.335
Because being a coward in the now makes you irrelevant in the future.

01:31:42.335 --> 01:31:46.195
And therefore your opinion doesn't matter and I'm not listening to you.

01:31:46.995 --> 01:31:53.595
Yeah. Well, I normally close out the interviews with a question.

01:31:53.795 --> 01:31:58.875
This year I've been doing it, but you already, thanks to the 20 questions segment,

01:31:58.875 --> 01:32:02.915
you already answered that question. So I'm going to flip it a little bit and

01:32:02.915 --> 01:32:06.895
I want you to tell the listeners why they should have hope.

01:32:08.070 --> 01:32:14.890
Regardless of whatever spiritual, existential, philosophical orientation you

01:32:14.890 --> 01:32:22.250
have to life, most human beings want a dignified life and a dignified death.

01:32:22.930 --> 01:32:28.290
And so in order to have that be true, in order to have meaningful work,

01:32:28.470 --> 01:32:36.750
in order to have purposive existence, you don't live on an island by yourself.

01:32:37.670 --> 01:32:46.630
So the hope is that collectively, I think we can create the kind of world that we want to live in.

01:32:46.990 --> 01:32:52.490
It's going to be very difficult to do because there's some hard truths that we need to confront.

01:32:53.950 --> 01:33:01.610
So we should have hope because there's always been justice and joy in the midst

01:33:01.610 --> 01:33:06.410
of tragedy, even during enslavement. I've met, right?

01:33:06.550 --> 01:33:12.710
There has always been justice and joy and art and pleasure and things worth fighting for.

01:33:13.150 --> 01:33:16.310
So in my view, this is temporary.

01:33:16.810 --> 01:33:24.590
And so how are we going to put fundamentally things in place to make sure that

01:33:24.590 --> 01:33:32.150
future versions of ourselves will be proud but also dignified,

01:33:33.492 --> 01:33:38.512
where we find ourselves. That's the question I ask myself every morning when I'm at the gym.

01:33:38.972 --> 01:33:47.172
I spend a lot of time thinking about what action can I do now that will unburden some people.

01:33:47.612 --> 01:33:51.192
I mean, I'm lucky. I'm a teacher. I work with undergrads. I work with graduate

01:33:51.192 --> 01:33:53.312
students. I work with our future brain trust.

01:33:53.572 --> 01:33:59.392
What do they need to hear from me in this moment that will allow them to bring

01:33:59.392 --> 01:34:04.712
their gifts and talents forward to help us think very differently about how

01:34:04.712 --> 01:34:11.932
to restructure our society and how can I help them to do that work.

01:34:13.372 --> 01:34:21.492
Yeah. So, Dr. Monica McLemore, I really, really am honored that you came on.

01:34:21.852 --> 01:34:27.412
And if people want to reach out to you, how can they do that?

01:34:27.412 --> 01:34:32.512
Yeah, so I'm myself on all social media platforms except for Twitter because

01:34:32.512 --> 01:34:36.272
I left after I got a month of death threats because I wrote a piece on E.O.

01:34:36.352 --> 01:34:37.912
Wilson for Scientific American.

01:34:38.252 --> 01:34:45.792
My handle is MacklemoreMR and that's on Facebook, Instagram, Blue Sky, LinkedIn.

01:34:46.372 --> 01:34:50.992
I left TikTok because I don't really like their new surveillance situation and

01:34:50.992 --> 01:34:52.412
new terms and conditions.

01:34:52.792 --> 01:34:56.532
So I left there because I can't be bothered. But I'm myself everywhere.

01:34:56.892 --> 01:35:04.132
I also am a professor at New York University. I have a web page there where I can be contacted.

01:35:04.752 --> 01:35:08.232
And I very much appreciate, you know,

01:35:08.572 --> 01:35:12.852
podcasters and people like you who allow for us to be able to talk directly

01:35:12.852 --> 01:35:18.132
to the public and the people that we serve, to be able to remind folks that

01:35:18.132 --> 01:35:20.712
this does not have to be like this.

01:35:21.332 --> 01:35:26.412
We can all make a different decision to change our future, and I hope people decide to do that.

01:35:27.352 --> 01:35:33.032
Yeah, well, you know, I was trying to come up with a title for this episode,

01:35:33.032 --> 01:35:38.112
and so my previous guest kind of laid it out there for me,

01:35:38.212 --> 01:35:43.732
and you have solidified that, and that was to have the fight.

01:35:44.272 --> 01:35:48.912
In order for us to see the changes we need, we've got to fight for them.

01:35:49.252 --> 01:35:58.792
And it is clear to me, after talking to you, that you are a warrior of exemplar courage and dignity.

01:35:59.052 --> 01:36:01.612
And so again, it's been a honor to have you on.

01:36:02.597 --> 01:36:06.257
I'm grateful that you let me have this conversation.

01:36:06.757 --> 01:36:12.357
And I'm grateful for you and your listeners. And I'm grateful for people who

01:36:12.357 --> 01:36:19.197
are unapologetically willing to reject the hatefulness of this current moment

01:36:19.197 --> 01:36:25.157
and the false binary that we all have to be separated in the future. Because that's a lie.

01:36:25.617 --> 01:36:29.337
And as long as I'm alive, that's not going to be a thing.

01:36:31.597 --> 01:36:37.717
So that's how i think about it all right guys on that note and we're gonna catch y'all on the other.

01:36:50.291 --> 01:36:57.451
All right, we are back. So I want to thank Kelly Cervantes and Dr.

01:36:57.671 --> 01:37:00.071
Monica McLemore for coming on the podcast.

01:37:00.391 --> 01:37:02.511
Kelly's book is called The Luckiest.

01:37:03.231 --> 01:37:07.431
Please get that. It's been out for a minute, but it is really, really powerful.

01:37:08.351 --> 01:37:13.951
And you can tell even in the interview that she really put her heart into it.

01:37:15.051 --> 01:37:19.771
And I think it's a book that all of us can relate to.

01:37:20.291 --> 01:37:28.991
In dealing with triumphs and tragedies in our lives and how they juxtaposition each other, right?

01:37:29.131 --> 01:37:32.631
At one moment, you could be having the greatest moment in your life and then,

01:37:32.811 --> 01:37:36.791
bam, tragedy hits or vice versa, right?

01:37:37.631 --> 01:37:45.051
And, you know, Kelly really captures telling her story some feelings that a

01:37:45.051 --> 01:37:47.251
lot of us may have experienced.

01:37:47.251 --> 01:37:50.551
And it's very encouraging to

01:37:50.551 --> 01:37:57.451
press forward and understanding that that's how our life is going to go.

01:37:58.171 --> 01:38:07.891
Somebody posted on an interesting statistic said that the fact that we are here

01:38:07.891 --> 01:38:11.251
is that we have defied odds.

01:38:11.991 --> 01:38:14.091
And what she meant was that.

01:38:15.489 --> 01:38:23.049
There was a one in four trillion chance that we would be born.

01:38:23.769 --> 01:38:27.109
One in four trillion, right?

01:38:27.409 --> 01:38:36.049
So that's like, I think like eight zeros point 25% chance, right?

01:38:36.249 --> 01:38:41.549
I'm not good at math, but something like that, that we would even be born.

01:38:42.249 --> 01:38:48.809
And the point of her bringing that out was that we should look at life as a

01:38:48.809 --> 01:38:54.969
blessing as a whole because the fact that we exist, no matter how long we live,

01:38:55.549 --> 01:38:59.509
just the fact that we exist is a miracle in itself.

01:39:00.269 --> 01:39:03.469
And it's something that should be celebrated. Right.

01:39:04.789 --> 01:39:10.949
So I think Kelly conveys that very well. There was another commercial I saw

01:39:10.949 --> 01:39:18.749
that said something about we should measure our years on Earth by our life.

01:39:20.125 --> 01:39:24.485
It's something to the effect that we should measure the years that we're on

01:39:24.485 --> 01:39:27.385
Earth by the life that we live, right?

01:39:28.305 --> 01:39:32.865
And then there's the old classic thing that you hear a lot of funerals,

01:39:33.005 --> 01:39:38.365
especially black funerals, where on a tombstone, it'll have the year that you were born.

01:39:38.985 --> 01:39:43.625
And then they have the year that you died. And then in between, there's a dash.

01:39:44.225 --> 01:39:49.205
And the challenge is, what did you do in the dash, right?

01:39:50.565 --> 01:39:54.805
So go get that book, The Luckiest. And then Dr.

01:39:55.025 --> 01:40:00.265
Monica McLemore, what a joy it was to talk to that sister.

01:40:00.725 --> 01:40:07.865
The power and the confidence in fighting for what she believes in is amazing.

01:40:07.865 --> 01:40:11.565
And she's dealing with stuff. We didn't get into that in the interview.

01:40:11.725 --> 01:40:13.065
We kind of talked beforehand.

01:40:13.745 --> 01:40:19.225
But she's dealing with the same things that a lot of us are dealing with at a certain age.

01:40:20.525 --> 01:40:25.405
And, you know, some of the things she did mention in the interview was about

01:40:25.405 --> 01:40:33.165
doing the work that she's been doing. She's been getting death threats since for the last 16 years.

01:40:33.945 --> 01:40:39.565
Can you imagine getting death threats for the last 16 years just doing what you do for a living?

01:40:40.265 --> 01:40:44.325
Speaking out on things that you believe in, right?

01:40:44.985 --> 01:40:49.105
Doesn't seem to have deterred her in any way, shape or form.

01:40:49.225 --> 01:40:54.725
Which is the whole point of having the fight, right?

01:40:54.925 --> 01:41:05.305
And I got that theme from Kelly's book, but it applies to everything that we're dealing with, right?

01:41:05.785 --> 01:41:13.905
Especially during this time in our lives as Americans, the 250th year of our existence, right?

01:41:14.688 --> 01:41:17.548
Having the fight is more important than ever.

01:41:18.328 --> 01:41:23.948
And so I don't know how long I'm going to talk today, but I do want to read something.

01:41:24.668 --> 01:41:28.408
And this was mentioned during Dr. McLemore's interview, but,

01:41:28.688 --> 01:41:33.668
you know, we just kind of glossed over that because she was trying to paint

01:41:33.668 --> 01:41:35.048
a big picture where we were.

01:41:35.048 --> 01:41:42.488
But this lady named Claire Cook Collin, she is the executive director of a nonprofit

01:41:42.488 --> 01:41:45.408
in Missouri called Progress, Missouri.

01:41:46.368 --> 01:41:49.388
And she wrote an editorial column.

01:41:51.417 --> 01:41:56.977
And so when y'all listen to this, you know, it'll be out of the news cycle and all that.

01:41:57.197 --> 01:42:01.617
But I wanted to have a permanent record. She wrote this in the Kansas City Star.

01:42:02.337 --> 01:42:09.977
And I think it encapsulizes a lot of what normal human beings should feel.

01:42:11.277 --> 01:42:15.877
Normal Americans should feel at this particular point. Like I said,

01:42:15.997 --> 01:42:21.817
by the time that this airs, it'll be, you know, 72 hours old or whatever.

01:42:22.057 --> 01:42:30.457
But, you know, it is something that I think that we should be cognizant of.

01:42:31.717 --> 01:42:40.057
So let me see if I can do this without dealing with some other technical stuff.

01:42:40.177 --> 01:42:41.317
I'll just hold on for a second.

01:42:41.957 --> 01:42:44.257
All right, let's see if I can do it now.

01:42:44.957 --> 01:42:48.437
All right. So she said,

01:42:48.617 --> 01:42:53.317
in the first week of Black History Month, the president of the United States

01:42:53.317 --> 01:42:59.657
chose to amplify a post that inserted an apparently AI generated video depicting

01:42:59.657 --> 01:43:02.157
Barack Obama and Michelle Obama as apes.

01:43:02.157 --> 01:43:06.337
Let's call this what it is. It isn't edgy.

01:43:06.597 --> 01:43:12.497
It isn't political humor. And as White House Press Secretary Caroline Levitt

01:43:12.497 --> 01:43:16.677
confirmed, it wasn't an accident. It's racism.

01:43:17.217 --> 01:43:23.377
Blatant, dehumanizing textbook racism coming from the highest office in the country.

01:43:24.257 --> 01:43:29.597
While most Americans had no trouble recognizing that, every Republican member

01:43:29.597 --> 01:43:35.057
of Missouri's congressional delegation has had trouble saying a single word about it so far.

01:43:36.528 --> 01:43:41.588
Representatives, Missouri Representative Emanuel Cleaver immediately condemned

01:43:41.588 --> 01:43:48.468
the post as vile and urged Americans to refuse to be the worst version of themselves.

01:43:48.828 --> 01:43:53.668
His Republican colleagues, silent as of this writing.

01:43:53.928 --> 01:43:57.128
Let's be honest about what that means.

01:43:57.468 --> 01:44:02.048
Silence from elected officials isn't neutrality, it's a decision.

01:44:02.688 --> 01:44:08.908
And there are only two explanations. They either agree with it or they're too cowardly to speak.

01:44:09.308 --> 01:44:11.648
Neither one is leadership.

01:44:12.048 --> 01:44:16.488
This shouldn't be complicated. You shouldn't need a communication strategy or

01:44:16.488 --> 01:44:21.308
a pollster to decide whether comparing Black Americans to animals is wrong.

01:44:21.488 --> 01:44:25.288
You shouldn't need party permission to say racism is racism.

01:44:25.988 --> 01:44:30.648
In fact, other Republicans in the Senate are saying it out loud.

01:44:31.008 --> 01:44:35.308
Tim Scott, the only black Republican in the U.S. Senate, called this the most

01:44:35.308 --> 01:44:38.288
racist thing he has seen come out of the White House.

01:44:38.668 --> 01:44:44.168
If he can say it plainly, what exactly is stopping Missouri's delegation?

01:44:44.728 --> 01:44:48.948
What's stopping Josh Howley? What's stopping Eric Schmidt?

01:44:50.166 --> 01:44:54.386
Are politicians who rarely miss a chance to get on camera. They issue statements

01:44:54.386 --> 01:44:57.026
about just about everything.

01:44:57.406 --> 01:45:01.006
They can fire off outrage tweets in seconds.

01:45:01.206 --> 01:45:05.166
But when the president spreads racist propaganda about the Obamas,

01:45:05.526 --> 01:45:07.726
suddenly they have nothing to say.

01:45:08.066 --> 01:45:13.946
That is not restraint. That's cowardice. Or worse, complicity.

01:45:14.766 --> 01:45:19.986
Because silence from people in power sends a message. It tells black Missourians

01:45:19.986 --> 01:45:21.906
that their dignity isn't worth defending.

01:45:22.346 --> 01:45:25.966
It tells kids watching that this behavior is normal.

01:45:26.206 --> 01:45:30.106
It tells the country that Missouri's leaders will tolerate anything,

01:45:30.546 --> 01:45:35.326
anything, as long as it keeps them in good standing with their party.

01:45:35.686 --> 01:45:38.846
Public service is supposed to require a spine.

01:45:39.126 --> 01:45:43.806
If our elected officials can't muster the basic moral clarity to condemn open

01:45:43.806 --> 01:45:48.566
racism, what exactly are they fighting for on our behalf?

01:45:48.946 --> 01:45:53.606
You don't have to be a Democrat to draw this line. You just have to have a conscience.

01:45:54.786 --> 01:46:00.606
Missourians deserve leaders who will say this is wrong without checking first to see how it polls.

01:46:01.306 --> 01:46:06.726
Right now, too many of our representatives look less like leaders and more like careerists.

01:46:07.166 --> 01:46:13.266
People so focused on protecting their jobs, that they'll swallow their alleged values to do it.

01:46:13.846 --> 01:46:17.586
History is very clear about how this plays out.

01:46:17.926 --> 01:46:23.966
It rarely judges the loud racists kindly, and it judges the people who stayed

01:46:23.966 --> 01:46:26.126
silent right alongside them.

01:46:26.446 --> 01:46:28.606
This moment shouldn't be hard.

01:46:29.346 --> 01:46:34.526
Condemn the racism, say it's unacceptable. The fact that Missouri Republicans

01:46:34.526 --> 01:46:38.726
can't even do that tells us everything we need to know, Right?

01:46:39.246 --> 01:46:41.966
So that was...

01:46:43.820 --> 01:46:50.660
Again, that was Claire Cook-Collin, and she is the executive director of the

01:46:50.660 --> 01:46:53.100
nonprofit Progress Missouri.

01:46:54.200 --> 01:47:01.800
So basically what she said, you know, you can interchange Missouri for Mississippi.

01:47:04.180 --> 01:47:07.960
You can change Missouri to Georgia.

01:47:07.960 --> 01:47:13.820
You can change Missouri to any

01:47:13.820 --> 01:47:21.160
other state that has Republican members of Congress, Louisiana, Alabama,

01:47:22.120 --> 01:47:26.360
Florida, you know, just flip it around.

01:47:26.620 --> 01:47:34.840
Just insert here, right? Now, there have been reports that some members did

01:47:34.840 --> 01:47:38.300
not go public with their criticism, but they literally called the White House.

01:47:39.400 --> 01:47:45.320
And the spin from that was, you know, after they finally deleted it,

01:47:45.400 --> 01:47:48.260
I think it took them several hours to finally take it down.

01:47:50.184 --> 01:47:55.384
A staffer did it, right? It's, you know, like in a game of Clue,

01:47:56.104 --> 01:47:58.244
you know, the big joke is the butler did it, right?

01:47:58.704 --> 01:48:02.144
In Washington, when something goes down, the staffer did it.

01:48:02.344 --> 01:48:05.304
That's usually how that works, right?

01:48:06.844 --> 01:48:16.324
And, you know, but the time of day that it was released, it had an indication

01:48:16.324 --> 01:48:20.084
that the staffer was the president himself, right?

01:48:20.184 --> 01:48:26.324
Because the president has been known to stay up all night, get on his true social

01:48:26.324 --> 01:48:31.504
platform and message away. Right.

01:48:32.144 --> 01:48:39.784
So it is what it is. And this is not the first time that this administration,

01:48:40.344 --> 01:48:45.664
this individual has disrespected black people in February.

01:48:46.184 --> 01:48:54.584
It's almost like this is what he does, and I guess there is a base that he appeals to by doing that.

01:48:55.044 --> 01:48:58.904
I just, you know, I've gotten to the point now,

01:48:58.944 --> 01:49:07.344
and I get that there are people who identify as Republican, who believes in

01:49:07.344 --> 01:49:11.264
principles of the Republican Party pre-Trump.

01:49:11.264 --> 01:49:16.844
And they, you know, so when he does things or they support people other than

01:49:16.844 --> 01:49:22.564
him, you know, they feel justified in that because they, you know,

01:49:22.984 --> 01:49:24.784
they have those core beliefs.

01:49:25.724 --> 01:49:31.584
And, you know, we as Democrats, when Democrats grew up, we deal with the individual

01:49:31.584 --> 01:49:34.644
that screws up, but we still stay loyal to the party.

01:49:36.084 --> 01:49:38.364
So I get that. But.

01:49:39.517 --> 01:49:44.977
But the difference is, if this was a Democrat in this day and age,

01:49:45.137 --> 01:49:48.837
because there were a time when the Democrats were just as racist,

01:49:48.857 --> 01:49:52.117
if not more so, right? Woodrow Wilson was a Democrat.

01:49:52.657 --> 01:49:57.337
And he had the Birth of the Nation show. You thought Melania was something.

01:49:59.137 --> 01:50:02.537
He had the Birth of the Nation premiere at the White House.

01:50:03.137 --> 01:50:09.797
He filmed. He watched the film. And for those of y'all who don't know, of a certain time,

01:50:10.917 --> 01:50:15.597
The Birth of the Nation was the movie that basically made the Ku Klux Klan like

01:50:15.597 --> 01:50:18.697
heroes, American heroes, right?

01:50:19.317 --> 01:50:24.597
It was taken from a book called The Klansman, right?

01:50:25.417 --> 01:50:34.337
And so, you know, so I get it. If this was happening now, in our lifetime,

01:50:34.697 --> 01:50:37.177
we probably would have ran Woodrow Wilson out of office.

01:50:37.317 --> 01:50:42.097
He wouldn't have got a second term, at least not on the Democratic ticket, you know.

01:50:43.577 --> 01:50:47.537
But, you know, so I, and then the other thing is I'm not really surprised.

01:50:49.528 --> 01:50:54.028
It, but, you know, the point I'm trying to make with these folks,

01:50:54.188 --> 01:51:00.468
it's like, but just don't try to, I guess, don't try to defend it to me, right?

01:51:01.008 --> 01:51:05.688
Either you condemn it or you don't. And if you don't condemn it,

01:51:05.928 --> 01:51:09.848
then that tells me what side you're on.

01:51:10.248 --> 01:51:16.328
And we'll deal with that, you know? While you're in office, we'll still try

01:51:16.328 --> 01:51:21.708
to work around you or even try to convince you for certain issues to vote for,

01:51:22.148 --> 01:51:26.048
whether that's in Congress or the state legislature where you live, whatever.

01:51:26.768 --> 01:51:30.168
But come election time, we're going to vote you out.

01:51:30.888 --> 01:51:33.728
So just understand that that's part of the deal.

01:51:33.868 --> 01:51:38.828
When you decide that you don't want black people or you don't respect black

01:51:38.828 --> 01:51:43.328
people, then black people are going to vote that way.

01:51:43.888 --> 01:51:48.148
And people still say, well, why do black people just constantly vote for the

01:51:48.148 --> 01:51:54.268
Democrats, because apparently the Democrats haven't been as stupid as to be

01:51:54.268 --> 01:51:55.268
totally disrespectful.

01:51:55.728 --> 01:51:59.928
There are Black people that have been elected as Democrats, right?

01:52:00.448 --> 01:52:05.168
And, you know, I've had people on the show that have made the argument that we shouldn't.

01:52:06.108 --> 01:52:08.748
Doesn't matter if they're Republican, Independent, whatever,

01:52:09.388 --> 01:52:16.488
political scientists, or, you know, we shouldn't just vote for Democrats.

01:52:16.788 --> 01:52:20.688
But if the Democratic Party is the only party that gives a damn about us,

01:52:20.808 --> 01:52:25.648
or at least acts like they do, what choice do we have, right?

01:52:25.908 --> 01:52:29.768
Because the Republican Party, even though there are Republicans elected in the

01:52:29.768 --> 01:52:32.068
Republican Party at a federal level.

01:52:33.611 --> 01:52:39.931
Those representatives brag on the fact that they represent districts that aren't majority black.

01:52:40.451 --> 01:52:45.451
So they don't carry an agenda that helps black people. They carry an agenda

01:52:45.451 --> 01:52:47.751
that helps Donald Trump and the Republicans.

01:52:48.711 --> 01:52:53.251
Now, they'll try to make the argument that it will help black people.

01:52:53.491 --> 01:52:57.971
But even Tim Scott said, yeah, not so much.

01:52:59.466 --> 01:53:06.826
Switching parties, but at least his reflexes kicked in and said,

01:53:06.966 --> 01:53:08.586
that's racist. Stop that.

01:53:09.226 --> 01:53:16.306
Right? And if Byron Donalds or Wesley Hunt or I guess that brother out of California or whoever.

01:53:17.346 --> 01:53:21.646
Brother Jones out of Michigan, whatever, if y'all just said that's racist,

01:53:22.026 --> 01:53:24.546
okay, at least we know the reflexes are still there.

01:53:25.286 --> 01:53:29.346
Byron Donalds won't say that because he wants to be governor of Florida.

01:53:30.026 --> 01:53:36.046
And he thinks that'll turn off the Republicans, which is an indictment about

01:53:36.046 --> 01:53:40.446
the base that he's trying to court and him.

01:53:40.826 --> 01:53:44.246
But, you know, that's the game of politics.

01:53:44.466 --> 01:53:49.746
You're trying to build support. So if you say anything that alienates that support,

01:53:49.986 --> 01:53:51.826
well, that diminishes your chances of winning.

01:53:52.666 --> 01:53:56.826
Now, what that means down the road, what that means in the afterlife,

01:53:57.266 --> 01:53:58.366
a whole different discussion.

01:53:58.946 --> 01:54:03.446
But in his mindset, now Byron might have been one of the ones to call.

01:54:03.586 --> 01:54:06.886
They didn't say which Republicans called. They wouldn't reveal those names.

01:54:07.846 --> 01:54:11.506
Maybe he was one of the ones to call. He definitely has the right to,

01:54:11.766 --> 01:54:16.666
considering how much he put himself out there to get the president reelected.

01:54:17.466 --> 01:54:23.066
Wesley Hunt could make that call. But Wesley Hunt said he didn't have a problem

01:54:23.066 --> 01:54:24.286
sleeping in the Robert E.

01:54:24.366 --> 01:54:27.566
Lee barracks because he said, I'm at West Point.

01:54:27.666 --> 01:54:30.046
What am I going to do? All the freshmen have to stay there.

01:54:31.646 --> 01:54:35.646
But, you know, now that you're a member of Congress and you're an alumnus at

01:54:35.646 --> 01:54:39.886
West Point, you could probably say, change the name.

01:54:41.507 --> 01:54:46.167
Now with, you know, the historical, the sentimental historical value that P-Hex

01:54:46.167 --> 01:54:51.587
staff has toward these people, he would not honor it, I guess.

01:54:53.867 --> 01:54:58.987
Or maybe they couldn't find another person named Lee that went to West Point

01:54:58.987 --> 01:55:04.867
and did well and they could rename it for and just still keep it as the Lee barracks. I don't know.

01:55:05.347 --> 01:55:09.207
That's what he did with Fort Bragg. So, you know, I've been,

01:55:09.447 --> 01:55:13.227
I noticed that a lot of folks that I interacted with in Mississippi,

01:55:13.927 --> 01:55:21.767
former colleagues of mine who have been really getting on Facebook or anything

01:55:21.767 --> 01:55:27.907
else, trying to defend this current age of republicanism.

01:55:28.927 --> 01:55:36.267
And, you know, one went as far as to say a tone doesn't symbolize fascism.

01:55:37.427 --> 01:55:42.947
And, you know, they're trying to defend people getting shot in the face or shot

01:55:42.947 --> 01:55:45.307
in the back of the head in Minnesota. Right?

01:55:45.927 --> 01:55:50.407
You know. And then when they come at me, it's like, well, Eric,

01:55:50.507 --> 01:55:51.467
you don't know what you're talking about.

01:55:51.567 --> 01:55:57.527
I was like, so you went to the law enforcement academy at some time in your life? Because I did.

01:55:57.907 --> 01:56:02.107
Have you filled out a use of force report? I have.

01:56:02.647 --> 01:56:05.247
So what are we talking about?

01:56:05.947 --> 01:56:12.747
All right. But even off of that minutia, it's like just the whole concept that

01:56:12.747 --> 01:56:19.627
they want to make our argument against this administration more about our emotions.

01:56:19.627 --> 01:56:25.427
And I guess that's because their politics is based on emotion.

01:56:26.087 --> 01:56:31.207
There are people in this country that feel as though that they are being ignored.

01:56:33.531 --> 01:56:41.471
Neglected. Their feelings are hurt. And most of them have less melanin in their skin than I do.

01:56:42.311 --> 01:56:45.171
They have more recessive biological genes than I do.

01:56:45.511 --> 01:56:53.631
And so they think because America is becoming a country where African-Americans

01:56:53.631 --> 01:56:58.771
and Latino-Americans and Asian-Americans are becoming the majority collectively,

01:56:59.231 --> 01:57:02.591
that they're feeling some kind of way.

01:57:02.951 --> 01:57:09.731
And the reality is that all people want to do is live their life and not be

01:57:09.731 --> 01:57:15.611
restricted because of their ethnic background or their physical features.

01:57:16.131 --> 01:57:21.911
They want to be given the same opportunity to go to school, to go to church.

01:57:23.651 --> 01:57:27.851
To get a job, to live in a crime-free neighborhood.

01:57:28.491 --> 01:57:32.751
You know, those are just basic things that we want. We want to be able to go

01:57:32.751 --> 01:57:36.731
to the grocery store and be able to afford the groceries that we need.

01:57:37.231 --> 01:57:42.431
We want to be able to buy a house, be able to afford a house mortgage, right?

01:57:42.991 --> 01:57:44.811
Or a car even, right?

01:57:46.360 --> 01:57:51.840
Some of us would like to take vacations. You know, you shouldn't have to wait

01:57:51.840 --> 01:57:58.260
till you're old and gray like me to decide, yeah, I might want to use this passport that I got.

01:57:58.920 --> 01:58:06.140
You know, life is tricky that way. But, you know, and some people have, can do that.

01:58:06.640 --> 01:58:12.780
But the hustle that they have to do in order to achieve the lifestyle they want,

01:58:13.460 --> 01:58:14.960
it doesn't make any sense.

01:58:15.520 --> 01:58:19.720
That people have to have two or three jobs just to live a lifestyle that they

01:58:19.720 --> 01:58:24.340
want to live or to take care of basic necessities that they need.

01:58:25.000 --> 01:58:27.320
Eric, what does that have to do with racism? Everything.

01:58:28.240 --> 01:58:33.320
Because most of these folks, especially black folks, are the ones that have

01:58:33.320 --> 01:58:36.260
to do all this hustling, all this work.

01:58:36.920 --> 01:58:41.840
I wrote a terrible, terrible blog. It was probably the worst blog I ever wrote.

01:58:42.440 --> 01:58:45.080
And it was about hustling hard, right?

01:58:46.060 --> 01:58:52.540
And, you know, it was kind of like trying to encourage people to do what they

01:58:52.540 --> 01:58:57.960
need to do and at the same time, like critiquing the fact that we have to do that.

01:58:58.600 --> 01:59:03.680
But it was, I mean, when I looked at it after I put it out there, I said, this is awful.

01:59:03.840 --> 01:59:08.020
But it was a song I heard and it kind of prompted me to write it.

01:59:08.020 --> 01:59:16.400
But I guess it was terrible in the sense that I really didn't know what I wanted to say.

01:59:17.200 --> 01:59:22.080
Because on the one hand, you want people to do what they need to do.

01:59:22.520 --> 01:59:26.920
But as somebody that has been in public service, it's hard for me to see people

01:59:26.920 --> 01:59:31.740
going from one job to the next and barely having time for their family,

01:59:31.940 --> 01:59:33.840
barely having time for themselves.

01:59:35.280 --> 01:59:38.060
Just to make ends meet. Thank you.

01:59:39.158 --> 01:59:45.758
You know, people that defend the president, either verbally or silently,

01:59:46.678 --> 01:59:50.498
think that's okay for y'all, right?

01:59:50.678 --> 01:59:56.518
They think that's okay for us, especially black people, to do that.

01:59:57.098 --> 02:00:01.598
Now, they'll turn around and call us lazy on the flip side, right?

02:00:02.038 --> 02:00:07.318
They'll call Latinos lazy. or, but, and that's the other thing,

02:00:07.458 --> 02:00:09.998
the Latinos are lazy, but they're taking our jobs.

02:00:11.318 --> 02:00:15.318
So, you know, when you have to navigate through all this hypocrisy,

02:00:15.518 --> 02:00:20.418
you have to navigate through all of this, these feelings these people have,

02:00:20.438 --> 02:00:25.538
it makes it really, really unbearable for the rest of us to try to exist because

02:00:25.538 --> 02:00:30.178
everything they're doing is based off of their feelings and their pent-up anger.

02:00:30.578 --> 02:00:36.318
They're mad because Billie Eilish said at an awards show a historical fact.

02:00:37.138 --> 02:00:41.658
She expressed it in an opinion saying that nobody is illegal on stolen land,

02:00:41.658 --> 02:00:46.078
which is something that Native Americans have been saying forever, right?

02:00:46.338 --> 02:00:49.818
But there's nobody Native American that's in this administration.

02:00:50.978 --> 02:00:54.698
There's never been a Native American elected president of the United States.

02:00:55.258 --> 02:00:58.938
So you've never heard that on a national front.

02:00:59.598 --> 02:01:04.718
But if you have friends who are Native American or if you follow people like

02:01:04.718 --> 02:01:06.478
Billie Eilish, you will hear that.

02:01:06.958 --> 02:01:12.638
And then some goofball, I don't even know if he's from the United States, showed up at her house.

02:01:13.358 --> 02:01:17.298
And, you know, I've heard some people say her house is worth $12 million or whatever.

02:01:17.698 --> 02:01:24.998
If you've paid attention to this young woman, first of all, she lives with her brother. Thank you.

02:01:25.817 --> 02:01:30.357
The rest of her family, too. I don't know. I remember something at one point,

02:01:30.557 --> 02:01:32.117
all of her family was living together.

02:01:32.317 --> 02:01:34.857
And I think her and her brother finally got their own place.

02:01:35.897 --> 02:01:41.897
And all they do is just produce music, which is why she's one of the best out there.

02:01:42.517 --> 02:01:46.897
If you're into that kind of music she's in, she's one of the best to ever do

02:01:46.897 --> 02:01:50.037
it. And she's young. I mean, I don't think she's even 30.

02:01:50.657 --> 02:01:54.937
And she's one like, by the time her career is over, she'll probably have won

02:01:54.937 --> 02:01:57.977
more awards than any other artist in the history of the business.

02:01:58.537 --> 02:02:02.317
That's how good she is. And she's dedicated her life to doing it.

02:02:02.357 --> 02:02:07.857
But she's not naive to what's going on in the world. And if James Woods,

02:02:08.017 --> 02:02:10.617
the guy who played Byron Day-Lebeck with Finnegan, Mississippi,

02:02:10.877 --> 02:02:12.657
can have an opinion, then why can't she?

02:02:13.657 --> 02:02:19.637
Because based on what James Woods says and what Billie Eilish says, she's more informed.

02:02:21.017 --> 02:02:25.377
So I want to inform people. It doesn't matter if they are musicians or actors

02:02:25.377 --> 02:02:28.717
or athletes or bus drivers.

02:02:29.257 --> 02:02:35.277
Right. I don't care what profession you're in. If you have an informed opinion, let's hear it.

02:02:35.737 --> 02:02:38.997
Kind of that First Amendment thing, right? Yeah.

02:02:40.737 --> 02:02:48.217
So, but this guy shows up at her house and, you know, and he quotes it at $3 million and,

02:02:49.619 --> 02:02:53.939
more accurate than what Jesse Waters, anybody else on Fox says,

02:02:54.299 --> 02:02:58.479
because they're saying her house is like worth 12 million or whatever the case may be.

02:02:59.839 --> 02:03:04.339
What I know about this young lady, if her house was worth $12 million at this

02:03:04.339 --> 02:03:05.819
point, she'd probably sell it.

02:03:08.379 --> 02:03:13.639
Just easy money. If it went from three to 12, let's make that happen.

02:03:14.039 --> 02:03:18.639
Then she'll find another two, $3 million crib to crash it with her brother.

02:03:19.619 --> 02:03:24.339
But this guy shows up at her house and then he knocks on the door and,

02:03:24.619 --> 02:03:30.599
you know, which considering that she's a celebrity, that was a pretty impressive feat.

02:03:31.319 --> 02:03:34.419
You got that close to knock on the door. Right.

02:03:35.799 --> 02:03:39.639
And, you know, and then it's just kind of like, well, you know,

02:03:39.779 --> 02:03:44.299
if this is stolen land and why does she have a three million dollar house?

02:03:44.419 --> 02:03:49.059
So you want her to be homeless on historically stolen land.

02:03:49.619 --> 02:03:51.399
For your feelings.

02:03:54.419 --> 02:03:59.819
When you get caught up in your feelings, you lose logic.

02:04:00.759 --> 02:04:05.519
And that's why one minute you're saying everybody has a right to carry a gun,

02:04:05.579 --> 02:04:10.379
and then the next day you're saying, well, you can't carry a gun if you protest

02:04:10.379 --> 02:04:15.439
ICE or the police, or if you protest anything that we believe in,

02:04:15.759 --> 02:04:17.899
you can't carry a gun, right?

02:04:18.899 --> 02:04:24.979
Need I remind you that the NRA pushed for gun control in the 1960s,

02:04:25.139 --> 02:04:31.879
late 1960s, early 1970s in California because the Black Panthers were walking

02:04:31.879 --> 02:04:37.879
around with guns to protect people from police brutality, Black people.

02:04:39.519 --> 02:04:42.519
California was the first state to have gun control.

02:04:43.059 --> 02:04:49.119
And it was a Republican named Ronald Reagan that pushed it. And the NRA supported it.

02:04:51.251 --> 02:04:54.291
Because, you know, the Republicans always like to twist the history and say,

02:04:54.391 --> 02:04:59.711
oh, well, the Democrats were, you know, they were the slave owners, which is true.

02:05:00.191 --> 02:05:06.851
But what is also true is that the Republicans in California and the NRA got

02:05:06.851 --> 02:05:13.091
the first gun control passed in the United States in California because of the Black Panthers.

02:05:14.151 --> 02:05:22.311
So the hypocrisy has always been out there, always, especially with this particular group of people.

02:05:22.591 --> 02:05:29.371
And over these 60 years plus, you know, they've switched parties because all

02:05:29.371 --> 02:05:34.531
those people that the Republicans talk about being slave owners, their descendants,

02:05:34.871 --> 02:05:39.151
and those who wanted the South to rise again, they switched parties and became

02:05:39.151 --> 02:05:41.031
y'all, the Republicans.

02:05:41.791 --> 02:05:46.331
And this was all in my lifetime, right? 1968.

02:05:48.111 --> 02:05:53.091
So, you know, so we've been dealing with the hypocrisy for a long time. So none of this is new.

02:05:53.871 --> 02:06:00.151
The racism, the hypocrisy, the lies, we've been dealing with that.

02:06:00.511 --> 02:06:04.911
It just seems as though now, because we have all of this media,

02:06:05.251 --> 02:06:07.551
we're just more exposed to it.

02:06:07.551 --> 02:06:12.211
Whether it's on the internet, on your phone, social media feeds,

02:06:12.431 --> 02:06:18.531
or, you know, on your television, we got access to it all the time.

02:06:19.071 --> 02:06:26.131
And we've got more people feeling emboldened to express that, right?

02:06:26.931 --> 02:06:33.591
Because, you know, depicting the Obamas as apes, there's nothing new.

02:06:33.591 --> 02:06:41.471
I mean, they've accused Michelle Obama of being trans, right?

02:06:41.971 --> 02:06:48.711
Which offends a lot of trans people, by the way. Just so you understand, that terrible.

02:06:48.891 --> 02:06:51.391
They hold Michelle Obama up as a female icon.

02:06:53.139 --> 02:07:01.099
And, you know, that's totally disrespectful to their community as well as the Obamas, right?

02:07:01.719 --> 02:07:03.839
And that's the way you intended that to be.

02:07:04.459 --> 02:07:08.079
But, you know, they've said terrible things about it.

02:07:08.159 --> 02:07:15.459
I mean, a man built his political careers and his wife, the one that's got the movie out.

02:07:15.879 --> 02:07:19.799
They built their political career saying that Obama wasn't even a citizen.

02:07:20.499 --> 02:07:24.859
The audacity of somebody who is an immigrant to try to talk about somebody else's

02:07:24.859 --> 02:07:28.859
birthright who illegally got here, right?

02:07:29.519 --> 02:07:36.479
An Einstein visa, Elon Musk, undocumented immigrant, right?

02:07:36.739 --> 02:07:40.699
See, all these people that are trying to say all these bad things,

02:07:40.839 --> 02:07:46.399
because they're the classic human beings that once they get in the door, they shut it.

02:07:46.919 --> 02:07:51.379
Once they get on the other side of the gate, they close the gate and become

02:07:51.379 --> 02:07:53.819
the gatekeeper and say, you can't come in.

02:07:54.659 --> 02:07:58.539
They made it. They maneuvered their way through the system and got in.

02:07:58.719 --> 02:08:02.119
But don't let, don't let a Latino do it.

02:08:02.799 --> 02:08:04.679
Don't let a black Nigerian do it.

02:08:06.328 --> 02:08:08.768
Value from Haiti in at all, right?

02:08:11.108 --> 02:08:15.988
So this is all nothing new. And like I said, by the time you hear this,

02:08:16.148 --> 02:08:18.108
it'll be out of the main news cycle.

02:08:18.788 --> 02:08:23.908
But just because it's out of the news cycle doesn't mean that it's not still

02:08:23.908 --> 02:08:25.688
being dealt with, right?

02:08:26.328 --> 02:08:31.348
They just sentenced the guy to life that tried to take out President Trump at the golf course.

02:08:31.708 --> 02:08:36.048
I don't even think they, you know, still trying to figure out the Pennsylvania

02:08:36.048 --> 02:08:40.968
thing, but, you know, but they, they just send that guy to life.

02:08:41.468 --> 02:08:45.028
Things are going on. The Mangione case, a young man who was accused of killing

02:08:45.028 --> 02:08:49.208
the insurance executive, health insurance executive, you know,

02:08:49.368 --> 02:08:52.748
he's going through his legal proceedings, right?

02:08:53.428 --> 02:08:57.468
You know, Don Lemon and Georgia Fort and Nakema Armstrong and her friends,

02:08:58.148 --> 02:09:05.548
Chantel, I believe, and one other guy, Ted, I believe, they still have to deal with their court case.

02:09:05.668 --> 02:09:09.788
The congresswoman from New Jersey is still dealing with her court case, right?

02:09:11.810 --> 02:09:16.350
Department is still trying to put Letitia James in jail. None of this stuff

02:09:16.350 --> 02:09:19.210
has stopped just because the news is not covering it.

02:09:19.790 --> 02:09:26.210
These people are having the fight to challenge these things.

02:09:27.190 --> 02:09:34.350
So, you know, what we have to be disciplined in is even though it's not coming

02:09:34.350 --> 02:09:39.290
up on your news screen every day, your news feed doesn't mean it's not happening.

02:09:39.810 --> 02:09:42.690
We have to be disciplined to remember.

02:09:43.510 --> 02:09:46.690
We have to be disciplined never to forget.

02:09:47.530 --> 02:09:50.810
And we have to be disciplined to hold these people accountable.

02:09:51.490 --> 02:09:56.970
Those voting records in Georgia have not come back, despite the motions and

02:09:56.970 --> 02:09:58.310
whatever the judge says or not.

02:09:58.550 --> 02:10:01.590
They still haven't given those records back to the state of Georgia,

02:10:02.150 --> 02:10:03.190
primarily Fulton County.

02:10:03.930 --> 02:10:11.070
We still don't know if all of the documents that were stolen and at Mar-a-Lago were ever returned.

02:10:11.230 --> 02:10:13.830
We know a majority of them were because the FBI went and got them.

02:10:14.370 --> 02:10:15.770
But did they get all of them?

02:10:16.450 --> 02:10:22.550
See, all of this stuff, man, and he bombards you with all of this stuff, deliberately.

02:10:22.810 --> 02:10:25.630
That's what Steve Batten told them. That's what Ray Cohn told them,

02:10:25.710 --> 02:10:27.970
and Cohen and all these other folks.

02:10:29.550 --> 02:10:33.370
Just bombard them. Roger Stone, all these people. This is part of the strategy,

02:10:33.370 --> 02:10:35.150
just to hit you with all this stuff.

02:10:35.810 --> 02:10:44.750
Our job is to remember and to hold them accountable, whether that's personal

02:10:44.750 --> 02:10:49.790
boycotts on products, whether it's voting,

02:10:50.790 --> 02:10:55.490
writing letters to your members of Congress, to your state legislators.

02:10:55.930 --> 02:10:58.110
Got to hold these people accountable.

02:10:58.790 --> 02:11:00.850
Can't forget what they're doing.

02:11:01.930 --> 02:11:03.510
If you want to protest, protest.

02:11:05.689 --> 02:11:11.549
Remember who these people are and vote and act accordingly.

02:11:12.329 --> 02:11:16.289
All right, that's all I got. Thank y'all for listening. Until next time.