Ep. 74 How to Stand Up to Racism with Founders of Privilege to Progress

We’re going to sound incredibly ignorant to some of you - but we strongly believe in being fully transparent and honest. We have been ignorant. We have had rose colored glasses on - or maybe just no glasses on because we weren’t SEEING what we were hearing. Racism. The black communty has been screaming it still exists. We never really knew what side to believe so we just moved on with life.  UNTIL WE WATCHED THE VIDEO OF GEORGE FLOYD.  We have a lot to learn about racism in our country, and we WANT to do better. We want to educate ourselves as much as we can for the sake of our family, friends, and community as well as for our kiddos.  On the podcast today, we are ​honored​ to have with us two AMAZING ladies, Melissa DePino and Michele Saahene. They met in 2018 in a Philadelphia Starbucks after having witnessed and stood up to racism. Together they started From Privilege to Progress, a national movement to desegregate the public conversation about race. They lead the way for anti-racism by learning, speaking, and amplifying the voice of people of color on social media. Welcome, Melissa and Michele!  Show Notes:    02:34 - Jamie says thank you to frans for all of their support through this 4th trimester! 06:53 - Jamie shares that she has been trying to spend time educating herself in order that they can teach their kids how to speak out against racism. 08:10 - Jamie shares that she was searching online for how to speak out against racism and she came upon a Forbes article and liked the article so much she wanted to have the ladies on the podcast! 10:27 - Michele shares how she and Melissa first met at Starbucks and how they joined together against racism after witnessing racial discrimination against two black guys who would not buy coffee. 16:46 - Michele talks about confronting the Starbucks barista. 22:48 - Melissa shares that it is important to talk about the moment that you find out you are white - for Jamie and Doug it was when they saw the video of George Floyd; at that point now that their lens gets cleansed, now is the time to relearn everything you knew and try to understand others. 24:14 - We have to look within ourselves and make changes but also work towards systemic change. The ladies share that policing was based on white supremacy. They were originally slave patrol. That is still going on today!  25:24 - In order to understand, we have to LISTEN. 27:58 - Michele and Melissa talk about what we can do to stand up against racism. Even just interrupting conversations and ask people to reflect on what they are saying.  30:27 - Michele shares that she didn’t learn anything about her people growing up - education is the #1 thing to do to understand about the black communities! 32:58 - Jamie encourages listeners to start trying to make a stand! You can be a part of the change by checking yourself when you are with others.  34:20 - Jamie shares that she doesn’t believe all white people are bad, all cops are bad, all black people are bad, she just believes there can be a bad apple in the bunch and it takes the rest to help filter that bad apple out! 37:03 - Next week on the podcast, YouTube star and teen momma, Yasmyn Switzer!    Be the change! Educate yourselves so you can be GOOD apples! We love you guys!    From Privilege to Progress Instagram: @privtoprog Website: ​www.fromprivilegetoprogress.org Forbes Article: https://www.forbes.com/sites/janicegassam/2019/07/03/how-to-speak-up-when-you-witness-discriminatio n/#29dca4057c53 13th on Netflix - ​https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5895028/ Scene on Radio - Seen White - ​https://www.sceneonradio.org/seeing-white/  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices