00:00:23.080and I've spent my life exploring how other people survive what should have destroyed them.
00:00:28.600I'm Elizabeth Smart, and these are The Survivor Files.
00:00:32.200Every week, I'm with survivors who live through the unthinkable, abducted, stalked, controlled, and nearly silenced.
00:00:39.740These are stories about what it takes to make it out alive.
00:00:43.580Listen to The Survivor Files with Elizabeth Smart on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:00:51.200If your bookshelf and your For You page are equally important to your personality, welcome home.
00:00:56.920Pro Society is a weekly podcast that's part book club, part group chat for anyone who thinks Pride and Prejudice and Love Island deserve the same level of discourse.
00:01:05.580Each week, we're connecting the dots between books, the internet, and pop culture with your favorite writers, book talk creators, and plenty of overthought opinions.
00:02:41.380In 2015, she organized a vigil in honor of Tamir Rice
00:02:44.460at the Health Sciences Park in Memphis.
00:02:46.480If you've ever been there in the last few years, you know that it had a statue of Confederate General and Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard Nathan Bedford Forrest, the namesake for the movie Forrest Gump.
00:02:59.500In 2017, Tammy Sawyer organized the hashtag Take Em Down 901 movement, which led to the statue being removed.
00:03:07.620In 2018 of August, she was elected to Shelby County Commissioner for District 7 in Memphis.
00:03:12.360So she was this, like, visible figure in the movement for Black Lives, but that thing that elevated her to the public stage also made her a huge target for white supremacists.
00:03:23.380Things came to a head in June when she was doing a press conference at this park during the actual removal of the monument.
00:03:29.380So here's a little bit of, like, weird backstory.
00:03:31.800Through this, like, very weird compromise, the group Sons of Confederate Veterans were responsible for hiring and overseeing the construction project to remove this Confederate statue.
00:03:43.440It sounds like they never wanted this statue to be removed in the first place, and the team that they put together and hired to remove it seemed to reflect that, right?
00:03:51.820This team that they had was obviously not thrilled that these statues were coming down, to say the least.
00:03:56.400Yeah, that's an interesting contractor.
00:04:35.220That's how they were doing this for whatever reason.1.00
00:04:37.420I don't fully get, like, why or how this happened, but petty stunt shit.0.98
00:04:42.920So a member of that crew hired to remove the monument is a man named George K. Rack Johnson,0.98
00:04:47.800who is the founding member of a group called Confederate 901,
00:04:51.040who has a history of, like, showing up in places where Confederate monuments are being taken down.
00:04:56.540They were the group, if you remember, like, the group that was protesting a Confederate monument being taken down on Ole Miss, that was them.
00:05:05.260A piece in the Clarion Ledger says that the group is mostly white, shocker, but they do have a Black member who led one of their marches in Memphis.
00:08:36.280So that's really where things kind of come to a head.
00:08:39.680And honestly, it's hard to watch that because I really feel for Tammy in that video.0.77
00:08:45.620You know, she's just trying to do her job.0.86
00:08:47.820She obviously has to respond in this moment with, like, grace because it's happening in public.
00:08:54.040And you don't want to give these people any fodder to be like, oh, she deserved it.1.00
00:08:59.320You know, you can't really respond the way that you might want to because of all the negative stereotypes that women deal with that we talked about earlier.
00:09:07.480And, yeah, I just, I really feel for her.
00:09:10.320Like, I feel like it's palpable to see that she's dealing with this alone.
00:09:14.280and and like tammy tammy was actually on my podcast habituation room a while ago before this
00:09:20.860and she's the most lovely person like she's so wonderful and and just like warm and thoughtful
00:09:30.020and fierce and you can and clearly it comes across but it is just funny that like yeah the
00:09:37.220confederacy has been reduced to a sad man on a random tuesday with nothing to do with a tiny
00:10:36.440And so after this interaction, Sawyer filed charges against him
00:10:40.260and said that, you know, he threatened her.
00:10:41.760During the investigation, it is revealed that that same man, after she filed those charges, went on Facebook Live and read her address out loud.
00:10:51.040Here is a little bit about how she explains what went down after the incident we just heard.
00:10:56.800Because he went on Facebook Live with a friend and offered out my address and actually emailed out my address to people telling them to send me cotton and other gifts and show me who was in charge in this country and, you know, threatening that after January 24th after court that Memphis and me were going to face a reckoning.
00:11:21.160Because of those actions that came to light this weekend, the judge was forced to allow the case to continue.
00:11:29.320But the judge is also from Dyer County, and he did not want the case to continue.
00:11:36.160And he lectured Mr. Johnson and told him, you have a great lawyer.
00:11:40.300You know, why did you open your mouth?
00:12:55.600Right. Yeah. So she at that point, she was still an elected official. And this is how they were treating a pretty clear like like problem, you know, and also keep in mind, she was a county commissioner. Right. It's not like she had a well-funded security detail or like endless funds to dedicate to the kinds of like security that someone would need in a situation like this.
00:13:17.880You know, after this man made a show of having her address and a clear intent to cause her harm.
00:13:24.120And so Tammy had to fundraise for her own security.
00:13:26.540I should say, full disclosure, I do work for a organization that did help her fundraise for her security details.
00:14:30.720And they have generational wealth or they're independently wealthy, whatever the case may be.
00:14:35.740And they can afford a security detail.0.65
00:14:37.720But again, as you've discussed and laid out, mostly when you are a white man in office, you do not face those kinds of threats the way women and women of color do.0.61
00:14:48.060And it goes from, I mean, from Tammy to AOC on, you know, on a federal level, I guess, or in Congress, you know, AOC saying we need security.0.60
00:15:23.080And if we're saying we want to have a representative democracy where lots of different folks from lots of different backgrounds can be public servants, that should include people who, I'm sorry, can't afford a private security detail.
00:15:36.180It shouldn't just be for wealthy people.
00:15:37.360And I feel like we are creating a situation where the only people who can reasonably and safely hold public office are people who have independent wealth to pay the astronomical costs that are involved with security and online and offline security.
00:15:55.600And, you know, I should say, like, with the Tammy Sawyer situation, the charges were eventually dropped against the person who was harassing her.
00:16:02.900You know, it sounds like Tammy felt like this case was not handled seriously.
00:16:06.540She talks about how the judge was, like, really palling it up with the defendant who she says was harassing her.
00:16:13.340And when the judge was like, oh, you know, don't go on Facebook Live, it wasn't because he wanted Tammy to feel safe.
00:16:21.080It was because he didn't want that guy to make his case that much harder to have him be dismissed.
00:16:27.300And so when the charges were dismissed, Tammy wrote on Facebook, she said that even though the judge called his actions pathetic, he could not identify a reasonable level of fear on her part.0.99
00:16:38.320And so I would actually argue that that like weird—I know, it's so fucked up.0.76
00:16:44.020And like, I think that weird vibe, that tightrope of like, I have to show public grace kind of creates this impossible situation where it's like, oh, well, you can handle it.0.99
00:17:23.900He was just waiting for her to go off on him, and she didn't.
00:17:27.040She had to keep her cool, which is asked of marginalized people all the time because when you raise your voice, somehow that is – that's a threat.
00:17:36.660But, yeah, I think – the other thing I was going to say, and this is a terrible comparison, but when it comes to the justice system, it's just right there for the taking.
00:17:44.820Like, you know that rape victims are – their cases are not taken seriously often if they don't, quote, unquote, fight back.
00:17:52.640Right. So and in this case, oh, she wasn't afraid. She wasn't afraid because she didn't raise her voice or she didn't run. She wasn't physically running at the time. So therefore, there was no fear. Like, what are you talking about? This is all about surviving.
00:18:08.060And it just, I mean, you bring up such a good point about the ways that we've really just failed survivors and made survivors walk a really impossible tightrope in public.0.99
00:18:36.360I am so sure we're going to hear her name again, like, just because she's no longer in public office.
00:18:41.360I don't think this is, like, the end of her road by any margin.
00:18:45.260But I do think that we should acknowledge this, like, added burden that she was forced to carry because of her identity.
00:18:51.540You know, pursuing charges against somebody who gave out her address and encouraged people to harass her.
00:18:57.460And it's like, we, rather than taking the time to really reflect on that or acknowledge that, we just move on.
00:19:05.020We're just like, oh, yeah, like it just it just feels like a footnote as opposed to something that is a real marker of our democracy and how unwell our democratic system is right now.
00:19:15.840It's also it reminds me of like she was working with Black Voters Matter when I had her on.
00:19:20.640So she also has done incredible activism.
00:19:25.140It reminds me of like women in comedy, you know, where it's like a lot of male bookers will be like, well, look, I would put more women on my show, but like, well, they're not any good women.0.53
00:21:10.700run a business and not thinking about podcasting think again more americans listen to
00:21:18.260podcast than ad-supported streaming music from spotify and pandora and as the number one podcaster
00:21:23.520iheart's twice as large as the next two combined so whatever your customers listen to they'll hear
00:21:28.360your message plus only iheart can extend your message to audiences across broadcast radio
00:21:33.340think podcasting can help your business think iheart streaming radio and podcasting let us show
00:21:39.440you at iheartadvertising.com that's iheartadvertising.com when i was 14 years old i was
00:21:46.560kidnapped and held captive for nine months i survived and i've spent my life exploring how
00:21:52.700other people survive what should have destroyed them i'm elizabeth smart and these are the
00:21:58.520survivor files i just remember this low taunting voice next to my ear saying shut up don't say
00:22:06.720anything every week i'm with survivors who live through the unthinkable i knew if he woke up
00:22:14.200Without a doubt, he was going to hurt me.
00:22:16.940I started feeling that there was someone at the end of my bed, and I just started screaming.
00:22:24.560They are abducted, stalked, controlled, and nearly silenced.
00:22:28.460But these aren't stories about what's taken from them.
00:22:31.920They're stories about what it takes to make it out alive.
00:22:35.540Listen to The Survivor Files with Elizabeth Smart on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:22:43.300If your bookshelf and your For You page are equally important to your personality, welcome home.
00:22:50.200This is Prose Society, the weekly podcast that's part book club, part group chat for thought daughters,
00:22:56.340pop culture obsessives, and anyone who thinks Pride and Prejudice and Love Island deserve the same level of discourse.
00:23:02.380I'm Eli Rallo, and every week we're connecting the dots between books, the internet, and the conversations everyone can't stop having.
00:23:09.500I'm going to have to look up this story. I'm obsessed, so obsessed.
00:23:12.640From best-selling authors and your favorite book talk creators to the latest pop culture moments, nothing is off the table.
00:23:19.040It's like if you can hide some real messages inside compelling characters, then that is a Trojan horse.
00:23:26.940Whether you're looking for literary deep dives, smart pop culture conversations, or a community of readers who love to think a little too much, you're in the right place.
00:23:36.120Listen to Pro Society on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:23:47.860So I want to talk about one more elected official and her experience in public office, Kia Morris.0.91
00:23:54.300She made history in 2014 as Vermont's only black woman lawmaker.
00:23:58.420Her husband, James, grew up in Bennington, Vermont, and she went to college in Chicago but relocated back to Vermont to become a lawmaker.
00:24:04.700Her career was very short-lived because it was completely derailed by online harassment and violent threats by self-proclaimed white nationalist Max Misch.
00:24:14.660Misch was kind of known as like a violent—
00:24:17.160Wait, wait, wait. His name is Max Misch?
00:24:31.120i don't know i'm just like that is the stupid anyway sorry it's like a mickey mouse name1.00
00:24:37.600that's a made-up it's so stupid so he's kind of like no like a known violent asshole uh side note0.99
00:24:44.620he looks exactly like whatever you're thinking that he looks like based on the behavior i'm1.00
00:24:49.600about to describe i can tell you that you're right whatever you're thinking yes that's what
00:24:53.200he looks like very red faced super red face you got it you got it
00:24:58.500so mish he pled guilty to both first degree aggravated domestic assault and disorderly
00:25:07.540conduct as a hate crime so he has this like he doesn't have a great like he's like a known
00:25:12.860shithead i guess so he's been through a lot is what you're saying yes he's just a real victim
00:25:18.060You know, and so Kia, when she supports a gun safety bill, she starts to experience animosity from gun rights advocates in Vermont because of her support of this legislation.0.97
00:25:30.240Now, many legislators in the governor were targeted with like angry mail and messages over this this law.
00:25:36.940But the kind of content that she gets is very different because she's a black woman and the only black woman in the legislature.
00:25:43.160So, you know, she's not just getting like, oh, we didn't like that you support this bill.
00:25:47.320She's getting frightening, horrific, racist messages, particularly from Max Misch.
00:25:53.100Max starts sending her these, like, racist memes on Twitter and elsewhere about her support for the bill.
00:25:59.380Kia says that she gets an uptick in the intensity of this kind of harassment after a columnist for the white supremacist website, the InfoStormer, posts about her re-election and starts tagging, like, residents in it.
00:26:10.820The InfoStormer. Sorry, I had to give that a moment.
00:26:14.260I know. I feel like it's like we stormed the truth.
00:26:18.620They're like putting a bunch of words into like an A.I. generator or something.
00:26:23.200And it's like InfoStormer. That's going to be it.
00:26:25.460Like you mean DailyStormer? No, we're like a breakaway of the DailyStormer.
00:27:35.940Their governor is, I think it's Phil Scott, and he's, like, this is, like, his fourth time.
00:27:41.720Right. And it was the one issue that Sanders, like Clinton was to the left of Sanders on because there's so many gun enthusiasts in Vermont.
00:27:51.480Yeah. And Sanders was, I mean, I think now that's like, I mean, how many mass shootings has there been since 2016? Right.
00:27:56.760So even now, I don't think he can hold that line, but it's been the sort of one gray area where he was like, had to appease the gun folks in his state.
00:28:06.580Yeah, I get it. I mean, like, honestly, researching this episode, I get it.
00:28:10.480I was like, oh, I don't think I realized how fervent gun ideology is.
00:28:15.220Like, I live in D.C., so, like, there's gun crimes here, but, like, individuals don't have the same kind of connection to it.
00:28:23.920And when I was researching this episode, I was like, oh, wow, like, I forget how different it is in different states that, like, it's a real issue.
00:28:39.680So the kinds of messages that she's getting from Max Mish are just racist, garbage, you know, go back to Africa, it's the only place that you'll be safe, that kind of thing, right?0.64
00:28:49.680And so in August of 2016, she files a complaint with the FBI where she says that this guy and his associates are harassing her on Twitter.0.83
00:28:56.700But as online harassment often works, it doesn't just stay online, it bleeds from Twitter and Facebook into her offline life.
00:29:03.220On election day, she's doing a campaign event at a polling place, and she sees this guy, Max, there staring at her and weirding her out.
00:29:40.160Pete, I don't know if we should do the necktie thing. No, trust me. We're going to do the necktie thing. It'll be crazy. We just put a little necktie on every single gravestone.
00:29:50.080It's such a weird, specific way to fuck with somebody.1.00
00:37:50.460But that's why we were holding up our coats so that people of color don't have to see that hate and we're surrounding you and we don't like it. It's vile. It's vile. Yes, you have the right to put the shirt on, but I have the right to tell you that it's hateful, it's cruel, and it's vile.
00:38:11.460I see. I mean, you can cry about all you want. I'm not crying. I'm pissed.
00:38:18.460it's max are you intentionally being provocative that's what people are yes why why are you being
00:38:25.420provocative i like trolling people it's fun i'm so over that concept and look how much attention
00:38:31.520he's getting for doing it so he's clearly just someone who likes to like like this is a joke
00:38:38.520to him i don't think that he's any of this is serious to him i think it's just a joke
00:38:42.520oh my god if mommy issues pepe shirt i'm like oh just just like mom issues in a person you know
00:38:50.020like um it's because i want attention because i didn't get enough as a child and no one will
00:38:55.460play with me and one time they ditched me in the sandbox for like the volleyball court and i didn't
00:39:00.100know how to play volleyball and uh you know it's just like it's like oh my god go to therapy bro
00:39:05.940go to therapy people like again what is it what will it take and I think that's the woman who's
00:39:12.940like yes I have the right to also you know stand in front of you and call you hateful she was
00:39:17.880excellent and then she points out that the media is going to the provocateur and saying which is
00:39:24.820just a really funny statement I mean I don't know disrespect to local news but like or the free
00:39:30.140press but like it is very funny to be like are you being intentionally provocative like yeah0.74
00:39:37.400like what is the other answer to that no in my heart of hearts i do believe that white people
00:39:43.380are a superior race like huh interesting expound on that you know like what what's the other answer0.98
00:39:50.000yes he's being provocative on purpose does it has to do with his fucked up ideology doesn't even0.97
00:39:55.780matter yeah and asking him about that with a camera with a bunch of camera crews in his face0.98
00:40:01.760like sir are you intentionally being provocative are we like it's like you're providing the answer
00:40:05.960is clearly yes and you are providing him the exact thing that a provocateur wants a platform yeah
00:40:11.340and this is and i think it's important to remember 24 i believe 2014 or maybe 15 but kind of when
00:40:17.960the media was lending a platform to people like richard spencer people like these sort of you
00:40:25.540You know, Nazis in suits or sort of, you know, and and on on the cusp of the election of Donald Trump, effectively saying maybe we need to listen to Nazis a little bit more.
00:40:38.140And now that they've made their message a little more couth and digestible, you know, hey, they're not hateful.
00:40:43.500They just believe we should live in separate communities for people of color and white people.
00:41:08.060And I like the publication for the most part, but, like, there's a Mother Jones piece where it's like, oh, the dapper white supremacists walking through town.
00:41:17.660Like, I feel like it's, like, burned into my memory of, like, what are we doing?
00:41:26.260And the thing that fucks with me is I worry that we learned nothing.
00:41:31.440I worry that when I when I look at like how the media is covering somebody like Ron DeSantis, for instance, I worry that we have learned nothing.0.99
00:41:39.460The media has learned nothing about what kind of hateful bullshit ideology they will amplify and normalize despite the fact that he's like criminalizing trans youth and shit and like putting, you know, putting immigrants on buses and just like rewriting history books.0.99
00:41:58.680It infuriates me. The way that this kind of like horse race kind of political coverage is going, I see us poised to do the same thing again, where I see these memes about like, Ron DeSantis is tall or like things like that, where I'm like, yeah, he's also like a hate monger. Can we talk about that?0.99
00:42:15.180Right. They're just so desperate to move on from Trump, even though they're not. I think there's just this. I mean, that's like our political system is such, especially and the media is like following the political system is so reliant on the idea that there are two rational actors.
00:42:31.920Obviously, we have all of two parties in this country.
00:42:58.880And so as long as he's not openly saying he's a member of the KKK, it's all good.0.52
00:43:04.800And even though people held Hitler in his little, you know, like, hotel speech when Trump won, that's fine because he's in a suit and he's got a nice haircut.
00:44:47.080It's like if you can hide some real messages inside compelling characters, then that is a Trojan horse.
00:44:54.980Whether you're looking for literary deep dives, smart pop culture conversations, or a community of readers who love to think a little too much, you're in the right place.
00:45:04.140Listen to Pro Society on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:45:36.300Every week, I'm with survivors who live through the unthinkable.
00:45:40.740I knew if he woke up, without a doubt, he was going to hurt me.
00:45:45.280I started feeling that there was someone at the end of my bed, and I just started screaming.
00:45:52.740They are abducted, stalked, controlled, and nearly silenced.
00:45:56.700But these aren't stories about what's taken from them.
00:46:00.140They're stories about what it takes to make it out alive.
00:46:03.280Listen to The Survivor Files with Elizabeth Smart on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
00:46:16.340So while all of this was happening to Kia, her husband James was in very poor health and he had to have open heart surgery.
00:46:22.920So I know like this had to be stressful for her.
00:46:25.580And so perhaps not surprisingly, 10 days after she won the Democratic nomination for a third term as state representative, she announced that she was dropping her campaign and packed up and left town shortly thereafter for her family's safety.
00:46:41.500Like, she talks about how her son, who at the time was seven, saw the threats that she got, like, saw them and, like, understood them and had questions about them and was so scared that he tried to build a panic room in their home out of his closet.
00:50:00.200Or in leadership. Bye. Like, anyway, sorry. It's and I think it's also interesting because you see, again, there's like it's a white people problem. Like I'm reminded of W. Kamau Bell's like, you know, come get your boy when it comes to Trump. And it's in terms of what happened to Kia. It's like it's not a Kia problem. It's a everybody else problem. And you see like, you know, some of the white officials or police officers, folks around.
00:50:25.960And I think it's like, you know, you guys are the ones who have a lot of work to do. It's a you all problem. It's not a Kia problem. So how is this systemic? And yeah. And also, when are we going to get to the idea that once everyone is liberated, once there is equality, that will mean, or once the most marginalized are liberated, it will mean liberty and equality and freedom for everybody.0.51
00:51:04.280So these stories are obviously heartbreaking, but I also think they show the true cost to all of us of what happens when things like online harassment and abuse just go unchecked.
00:51:16.820This kind of harassment keeps marginalized people from running for office.0.99
00:51:19.920You know, I'm sad to say that I think a lot of people will hear about the experiences of women like this, and they'll be like, oh, well, that is just the cost of being a public figure. Deal with it. But we deserve a political landscape where, like, this is not just the cost of wanting to serve your community, especially when that cost is so much higher for the most marginalized among us.0.99
00:51:38.100absolutely i mean i think that i think with the latest midterms the fact that like young people
00:51:43.840came out in droves and that you had you know the squad growing with a lot of young folks and0.96
00:51:49.360specifically young people of color we will stop normalizing this kind of crap and because there0.99
00:51:56.260will be just more of it because there will be more women in office there will be more people1.00
00:52:00.260of color in office which is a good thing but then this is the crap that comes along with it and so0.99
00:52:04.520it's like not to mention the fact that younger generations are god i mean from middle school0.97
00:52:10.200dealing with online harassment from peers from randos like it's just gone are the days of random
00:52:17.340aol chats and uh me logging in being like i am blonde sexy lady hello sorry i'm just talking
00:52:26.220about how i was on the internet as a kid that's how i was too i was like yes that's how i was too
00:52:31.660Right, right. And you're like, now it's like, oh, no, there's consequences and everyone's using their real name and like people are stalking you and what? Not that that wasn't happening then. But so I feel like especially since young folks are also more Internet savvy and online harassment savvy and experience it, we will arrive at a point, Bridget, and you will be vindicated in all of your work in this show and everything that you've been sounding the alarm on.
00:53:00.100And I know we will be vindicated, but it's just going to take a while.
00:53:04.440It's going to give us like a decade, which is too long.0.98
00:53:08.200But I feel like we will arrive in another point where this shit is just not as normalized.0.99
00:53:15.400I think that like, you know, we've seen historic numbers of young folks, women, people of color running for office in this last cycle.0.62
00:53:22.820And I just think that we are different.0.55
00:53:25.760I don't I don't I don't think that we're going to tolerate this.
00:53:27.980And I think that we are going to hold people with power, whether it's legislators or policymakers or tech leaders, we're going to force them to, you know, do what they can to create a situation where this isn't the norm.
00:53:43.120Because this is not a functional democracy.
00:53:47.540This is not a healthy democracy when this is how the political landscape and the media landscape that people are trying to compete in.
00:55:25.900Yeah. It's a solid name when you're born in 1929.
00:55:31.580Yeah, when you're a white guy who watched the moon landing, yeah.
00:55:38.840And so, you know, when it comes to these kinds of attacks and harassment that we're seeing, something I think is really interesting and telling is that it seems like the goal of these attacks is to really destroy marginalized candidates, their resolve, and to get them to internalize this abuse that is directed at them.
00:55:55.800This is from the folks who did the study at the Center for Democracy and Technology that they wanted that these candidates felt very strongly that the point of this kind of harassment was to just get them to internalize and accept the oppression that they face as women and women of color and just drop out of politics.
00:56:13.400And so you see that that has an incredibly like silencing effect, you know, and unfortunately, and the research bears this out that these kinds of threats do keep women from running for office or just sort of engaging in public life in general or civic life because they're smart enough to see the way that other women are treated.0.78
00:56:31.140They see the way that law enforcement and media really do nothing or make it worse.0.98
00:56:35.280And they're like, no fucking thanks.0.97
00:56:38.020You know, just this afternoon, Nancy Pelosi announced that she's ending her career in politics on the heels of that horrific hammer attack against her husband, who not only was attacked after being attacked, elected officials and like political figures like and Elon Musk spread homophobic conspiracy theories about the attack, joked about it.
00:56:56.500And part of me is like, I can understand why she's just like, I'm out, you know, when a woman runs for office or is a public figure and she is attacked, it is never just her. It is her partner. It is her kids. It is her parents. It is her community. And I can understand why women are just like, you know, the cost is just too high. I don't want to put myself or my family at risk to run for public office. And so I'm not going to do it or I'm going to check out of it. I can understand that.
00:57:22.200And so I think if women can't run for public office safely, then we will never have a truly representative democracy or a functional democracy in general.0.50
00:57:32.480You know, the author of that report said a lack of representation means that we lose the important insights and solutions to public policy problems that women of color will bring.
00:57:41.360We will all suffer. We all suffer if everyone does not have a seat at the table.
00:57:45.740And I could not agree more. Like, it is not just about the women who are attacked and targeted.
00:57:50.720all of us lose out when we don't even have a shot at a landscape where people can safely
00:57:56.920serve their public through running for office. Absolutely. I mean, look, I'm not the biggest
00:58:01.920fan of Pelosi, but I do respect the hell out of her. And what I will say with people like her
00:58:06.480and also people like Clinton, I wish they would do what Monica Lewinsky has done. And I think
00:58:12.320that's part and parcel of the fact that Monica Lewinsky is a little younger, but like taking
00:58:15.680her the public um the scrutiny the harassment what she was put through and using it to actually0.92
00:58:23.540try and change the culture and i think that hillary and nancy pelosi come from more of a
00:58:29.420generation that's like you gotta like go you know basically shut up and get along and like um like
00:58:36.180whatever it is like get along to go along i'm really terrible with any kind of idioms today
00:58:40.340but you guys know what I mean like we right and and it's like it's like no I don't think I think
00:58:46.860we're done with that and I think that young women and all people are done with the like no you have
00:58:51.560to shut up in order to appease these systems and halls of power it's like no you don't and and so
00:58:57.660I hope that Nancy Pelosi in her because she's not going to rest this woman's never going to rest0.95
00:59:01.920until she's dead like she's going to keep on working and I hope she uses you know um her time0.98
00:59:08.400to try and not cut the ladder from out underneath her,0.98
00:59:11.720but help young women also accelerate and succeed in politics as well.1.00
00:59:16.480She hasn't got a great track record with that, going to be real.
00:59:20.020She jumped on a little bit of the anti-squad, anti-Ilhan Omar,
00:59:24.240you know, calling Ilhan Omar anti-Semitic when she totally was not being anti-Semitic.
00:59:29.800So, Nancy, you know, I hope you do better.
00:59:35.820Like, Monica Lewinsky, she's my white whale podcast guest because I think the way that she has turned something that was, like, meant to silence her and belittle her, she turned it into a platform.
00:59:49.500And she really changed the conversation about online shaming and online harassment and online bullying.
01:00:05.820And she has a really good – she's in a really good documentary called 15 Minutes of Shame on HBO Max, which everyone should watch, all about online shaming.
01:00:15.640I hope that this becomes the kind of situation where women are not expected to suffer in silence and have a kind of, like, poised face because, you know, it doesn't serve anybody.
01:00:28.740And it's funny because in an interview I listened to with Kia, she was asked, she said that so many people were like, you should just ignore this.
01:00:38.760And I'm so glad that she didn't ignore it because it started a conversation about what is and is not acceptable in discourse.
01:00:45.900And, you know, if you ignore it, it just festers and gets more empowered.
01:00:49.820And so the advice of just saying like, oh, rise above, you know, go high, don't go low, ignore it, you're too good to respond.
01:00:55.980I don't think that advice is really serving anybody, particularly if you're marginalized or you're like a young person who's coming up on this like online next generation.
01:01:05.420Yes, absolutely. And I think it's why a lot of people who are harassed incessantly often post those DMs or that harassment or the, you know, air the voicemails that, you know, people like AOC or Ilhan Omar get or Pramila Jayapal, who I believe was threatened as well.
01:01:23.440And it's like, yeah, more folks need to understand this is a daily occurrence before we actually, like, take it seriously. And whether or not Pepe Le Maximich understands it, I mean, he's not getting paid by anybody, but he's absolutely part and parcel of this system designed to, like, yeah, keep women and people of color out of any kind of decision making process over their lives.0.99
01:01:50.360Exactly. And I'm so glad that you put it that way because this was my whole intention behind this podcast is that it's so easy to think that when someone is being targeted in this way, it's individual and certainly it has individual impacts, of course, but it's also institutional. It's also systems. It's also, you know, power structures that enable it or, you know, amplify it or profit off of it. Right.
01:02:15.820And so we need to start picking apart and calling out all of the systems that make this kind of harassment a viable thing for people to do and break those systems and say, we're not going to tolerate this.
01:02:27.120If you want to engage in this kind of discourse, we're not going to amplify it.
01:03:13.040And it's like, I would say, I mean, like, I would argue that marginalized people, we are absorbing the hate to make tech leaders more money.
01:03:26.580What if Google was like, listen, Bridget, if you get trolled, I'll give you $200 every time, like every, like, hateful tweet.
01:03:35.140That I might, I'd be like, that's, that'd be a good solution.
01:03:38.960And it would certainly incentivize them to, you know, fix the problem, which is all we're asking for. And I guess this is my, like, overall point. You know, we, especially in the Democratic Party, we love our slogans like, support Black women. Yes, trust Black women. Like, I have a trust Black women shirt. And I am all on board for, like, championing the leadership of Black women.
01:03:59.620But we can't just say, you know, support black women without also being honest about the unfair racist, sexist attacks and harassment that they will they will probably face when they get into these leadership roles that we like are vocally supporting them for.0.94
01:04:12.520And so we need to be creating the conditions so that those women that we love to champion also have a chance at an equal playing field, that we're not just setting them up to be knocked down, to have to like, you know, abandon their office and leave town because of harassment and threats and garbage.0.97
01:04:29.620Amen. And we didn't even talk about Ketanji Brown-Jackson, but my mind went to her as well.
01:04:36.200Yes. Coming soon. Coming soon. Great example. Coming soon.
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01:05:55.620I survived nine months in captivity, and I've spent my life exploring how other people survive
01:06:03.220what should have destroyed them. I'm Elizabeth Smart, and these are The Survivor Files.
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