Learning Outside The Colorless Bubble (with Angie Thomas and Revida Rahman)

Today Jo Carducci is filling in for Rachel Vindman. In this episode, Jo, Jasmine, and Amanda chat about how right-wing extremists are trying to distract us and exhaust us. Whether it’s refusing to focus on anything but the trans identity of the recent school shooter in Nashville, or pretending that a children’s book about Rosa Parks is “pushing Critical Race Theory on kids,” we can’t let our focus waver from the things that really matter: standing up for equity in our schools and communities.

This week, we hear from Revida Rahman, a mom in Tennessee who co-founded OneWillCo, an organization that supports students of color. Revida shares some of the troubling racial incidents that led her and her friend Jen to found their organization, why book bans are so dangerous, and what white parents can do to stand up for racial equity in their school systems.

And after that, Jasmine gets the chance to talk to Angie Thomas, the award-winning author of books like “The Hate U Give” and “Concrete Rose.” Angie chats about writing a novel about Black Lives Matter from the perspective of a teenage girl, and how she wanted to approach writing the book not just from anger, but also from love. We’re very excited about her new book for middle-grade readers, “Nic Blake and the Remarkables: The Manifestor Prophecy.” It’s so important not for young girls of color and for everyone to see some Black Girl Magic.

Finally, Amanda, Jo and Jasmine raise a glass to awards, historic downtowns, and supportive co-workers in this episode’s “Toast to Joy.”

If you want to hear more from authors of banned books, you can check out our Banned Book Club events on Instagram Live. And if you aren’t able to join us live, you can always watch the interviews later on our YouTube channel. We also carry those banned books in our online bookshop, because one of the best ways you can support authors is to buy their books!

For a transcript of this episode, please email comms@redwine.blue.

You can learn more about us at www.redwine.blue or follow us on social media!

Twitter: @TheSWPpod and @RedWineBlueUSA

Instagram: @RedWineBlueUSA

Facebook: @RedWineBlueUSA

YouTube: @RedWineBlueUSA

Transcript

The Suburban Women Problem - Season 3, Episode 12

Jasmine Clark: Hi everyone. Thanks for joining us. I'm Jasmine Clark.  

Amanda Weinstein: I'm Amanda Weinstein. 

Jo Carducci: And I'm Joe Carducci, in for Rachel Vindman.

Jasmine: And you're listening to the Suburban Women Problem. So right wing extremists are trying to distract us and frankly, exhaust us. I think we all know that, but it's worth reminding ourselves. It happened last week after the horrible school shooting in Nashville. The right wing has been obsessed with the fact that in this one instance, the shooter was trans, as if that should keep us from talking about gun control. Or like how they built up critical race theory as a boogeyman to distract us from their book bands and bands on teaching Black history.

So today I'm so excited to share my interview with Angie Thomas. She's the author of the frequently banned book, The Hate U Give, which is also a really good movie. And before that, we'll be joined by Revida Rahman, a mom in Tennessee who founded OneWilLCo, an organization that supports students of color.

But before we get to all of that, how are y'all doing? 

Amanda: Ooh. What should we start with? There's always so much. 

Jasmine: I know. It's so much going on. 

Amanda: I know. Oh man. I mean, the Nashville shooting is so terrible. That's the one thing that they wanna point out. And even that, it's like, all right, fine. Maybe people who are trans who are really having a mental breakdown shouldn't have guns. So like, are you gonna join our side?

Jasmine: No, I know. I was like, that's what I was saying. I was like, okay. A gun was used to kill people. Can we focus for even a minute? And I'm like, you know what? It doesn't matter to me what the shooter has in their pants. What matters to me is that we have to do something. If the evidence that I read about this is true, the parents of the shooter did not want them to have access to a firearm, but Tennessee does not have red flag laws. These are the types of laws that might have saved lives, but we don't wanna have that conversation. We wanna talk about trans people because somehow that is just the only thing that they can fix their minds to even care about. 

Jo: So four shooters out of the last 300 mass shooters since 2009 had been transgender or non-binary, 1.3% of all shooters. And in every other case, they blame the doors, the pot, the porn, the video games…

Amanda: The video games! Yep.

Jo: They blame everything else, they'd never, ever talk about the guns. And we're not even talking about the victims. We're talking instead about how to lay blame on the entirety of the transgender community. Because that's a scapegoat and it accomplishes two things for them. It helps distract us from the issue of the fact that these are weapons of mass destruction and also it helps them vilify, to their ends, the transgender community. So they're accomplishing two things at once while ignoring the problem itself, which is that bans on assault rifles work. We have seen it throughout time. We've had a successful ban in our history. We can do it again. They don't wanna have that conversation. 

Amanda: That is an inconvenient truth. We do not want any inconvenient truth, and that is a huge inconvenient truth. 

So in Ohio, we have a new house bill, all about transgender sports. And in these committee hearings, they couldn't find even one parent, one coach, one athlete in the entire state that has had any issue whatsoever with a trans athlete in Ohio. But that is still what they're attacking, making out to be the issue that it's not. We know what the issue here is. The issue here is the guns, right? They wanna say it's not the guns, it's the people that are the problem. Then why are you giving the problem? 

Jasmine: Right. I always say that. I'm like, okay, fine. Let's go there. Let's, let's go down that road. If it is the people that are a problem. Do people without guns shoot people? No. No. There has to be a gun there.

Jo: And even their own representative, Representative Burchette, I think that's his name, the, the, the fellow who by the way, homeschools his kids.

Jasmine: Oh my gosh. And said it. Yes. He said it.

Jo: He's a representative from Tennessee. And what did he say? “There is nothing we can do about guns.” We congressional representatives can't do anything about guns. And by the way, then went one step further and compared those children being shot in their school to his father serving in the Pacific in World War II and said, “My daddy said to me, son, if someone wants to kill you and they're not afraid to die, there ain't much you can do about it.” So we're equating a nine year old going to school with going to war.

Jasmine: Schools are not war zones. No, exactly. 

Amanda: I mean, can we brag about… we need some time, I feel like, every episode to brag about Gretchen Whitmer and what they're doing in Michigan, because the complete antithesis to me of all of that is what those Democrats are accomplishing in Michigan. And they are finding a way to pass legislation that supports workers' rights, repealing the right to work stuff, but also has anti-discrimination, anti LGBTQ discrimination all wrapped up in one. And you have so Senator Darren Camary says, “we're going to stand for civil rights and labor rights at the same time. They all go together. They're about the rights of people.” And I read that. I was like, “Yes! Michigan!”

Jasmine: I know. I'm super jelly. 

Amanda: I'm very jealous. 

Jasmine: Just gonna be honest. I'm like, I'm like, can we just borrow y'all just for, just for a little while, 

Jo: But it reminds us that our votes matter. 

Jasmine: Yes! 

Amanda: Super matter. 

 Jo: And that we can be the change we seek by going to the ballot box and making ourselves heard with our vote. Michigan is the perfect example of that, especially this year in the midterms.

Jasmine: And I'm gonna talk about something that's not super sexy, but I think it's very important. Redistricting matters as well. Yeah. I knew you 

Amanda: Yes! I know you were gonna go there, and I was like, “go there!”

Jasmine: It's so unsexy. I get it. Like no one wants to talk about map drawing. No one even really knows how it works, what's going on, but it's literally the way that they determine your representation. The people drawing those lines have the power to mathematically draw districts that can, you know, give you an edge or can completely disenfranchise entire communities. 

We're talking about Nashville and Tennessee is a great example of this. They used map drawing to basically divide up the urban areas into like pieces of a pie. And so instead of these urban areas being a collective voice, they're divided into itty bitty pieces. And then they end up electing representatives that don't really represent their voice, cuz their voice was taken away just with map drawing. And that's really important. 

So I know people don't like to talk about it, but we have to start now. We got 10 years, this is gonna happen again in 10 years. We gotta start talking about it now and getting more and more people to understand just how important redistricting is. And so that is something that I am taking a lot more interest in just amplifying that message. 

All right, so I wanna talk, speaking of representation, I kinda wanna talk about what happened, what's happening down in Florida with DeSantis and the whole Disney thing and the, the fact that apparently whatever he tried to do, they kind of got back at him.

Amanda: I know! Shouldn't he have known better? Like you're a Republican, DeSantis, I know how much you're working with corporations. If you don't know the power corporations have and like all the legal power behind them, wow. I don't know where you've been living for the last century. I really don't.

Jasmine: Right? Yeah. Well maybe it's just ego and you know, for him it was like “I am untouchable.” You know, he's been given little fascist vibes lately. But you know, going after your political opponents or going after people that you don't agree with, removing people, doing all these things that he's been trying to do, you know, I think he just kind of feels untouchable.

Amanda: Yeah. So speaking of ego and people who feel like they have absolute power and know exactly what they're doing, I mean, the grand jury voted to indict Donald Trump. The takes by some Republicans were so awesome. Like, I think it was Lauren Boebert who was like, “Can you believe they would indict him for his crimes?” I was like, yeah, that's what happens when you commit crimes. 

Jasmine: It's so crazy this idea that for them, Trump was untouchable and we should not be allowed to try him for his crimes. So to be clear, Trump is not the first person in politics to get indicted. There are plenty of governors, state representatives, Congress, like this happens. This is not a thing that has never happened in the history of America and has only happened to Donald Trump. It's just the fact that he was president, which he probably never should have been in the first darn place. And now he's getting the same treatment that any other private citizen should get. When you commit a crime, there is a whole process in place. 

Now, I will admit, out of all of the things that Donald Trump has done, it's very interesting to me that it is the Stormy Daniels stuff that is the first indictments that we see. But again, they got Al Capone on tax evasion, so you know how whatever, how, whatever works. 

Amanda: You could not write that story any better. If you wrote that book, people would be like, this is not believable. 

Jo: And this is a guy who bragged about, you know, grabbing women by the, you know what. Here we are with a woman grabbing back. You know, Donald Trump, into the weeks leading up to the general election in 2016 through his lawyer, Michael Cohen paid $130,000 to an adult film star named Stormy Daniels to keep her quiet because she was talking about a sexual encounter that they had had many years earlier. And so then Donald Trump essentially wrote that payment off as a legal expense. And the question is, if the money was sent to keep her quiet, to help himself in the election, that is a campaign finance violation. 

Jasmine: It's weird because like, if I were to use my campaign funds to hire a babysitter, I would get in trouble. 

Amanda: I was just thinking that! Yes! 

Jasmine: But this guy thinks it's okay to use your campaign funds to pay off a porn star so that you can get elected. 

Amanda: I think the FEC did rule in 2018 that at least at the federal level, you can use spending on childcare. But that was 2018. Before then you couldn't spend money on childcare. Like the dichotomy there is just really ridiculous.  

Jo: They can't see the forest through the trees. I mean, this is not a tactical bunch, right? It's basically a bunch of like pounding their chest cavemen who are like, “lock up Hillary. Lock up Fauci. Lock up Hunter. How dare you wanna lock up Trump?”

Jasmine: I know! That irony right there. I love that one.  

Jo: They're not exactly playing 3D chess here. 

Jasmine: Yeah. Oh, so much irony. 

All right, so I think this is a good time for us to switch to our troublemaker Revida. She's a mom in Tennessee and she helps start an organization called OneWillCo, which works with students and school administrators to improve outcomes for kids of color.

Hi Revida. Thanks for joining us. 

Revida: Hello. Thank you for the opportunity. Happy to be here.

Jasmine: So Revida, tell us about OneWillCo. What made you decide to co-found the organization and what kind of work do you do? 

Revida: We started our journey for racial equity in our school system probably around 2018, 2019, after a series of plantation field trips with my brown kid in this majority white suburb school system. And my husband and another parent, that had recently moved to the area from Connecticut, kinda locked eyes on this field trip, like, “oh my God, what, what's going on here?” So there was a lack of truth that was being shared on these plantation field trips. 

And we kinda started those conversations back then to meet with our superintendent and district to try to see what was going on, and went to them with some ideas that were nationwide issues. Like not all students being tested for gifted testing. Trying to increase teacher diversity teaching black history issues that are during a time where there's not trauma. And so we had all these issues that we wanted to kind of come forward with, and that's prior to the death of George Floyd. And so then after 2020 rolled around, our district had been working on different things to talk about equity.

And so Jen Cortez reached out to me and said, “Hey, you know, I really want you to connect with the Black leaders, I can connect with the white leaders.” And Jen is white, so we kind of do this Ebony/Ivory kind of thing. And it has worked out very well for our community as far as bringing forward people from all different backgrounds and everything to talk about the issues that we found to be a challenge in our schools, for our kids.

Jasmine: I love that. I love that y'all saw an issue and honestly, probably an issue that didn't seem like an issue to everyone else. But as we talk about a lot of times on this podcast, the suburbs don't necessarily look like what people's imagination tells them the suburbs are like. And so therefore there were probably people that just, it just didn't ring a bell for them until someone said, “Hey, ding, ding, ding. This is not okay.” 

Can you kind of expound on that? Or can you share some other examples of racism or inequity in the schools that you all saw so people can know what to look out for in their school systems? 

Revida: Absolutely. We had some very direct issues that have occurred in our district, and I think it kind of led to a culture and a problem that we noticed and wanted to just shed a little bit more light onto. We've got students that are being called monkeys, being called the N-word. Just recently we had, in an art class, an assignment was passed around for students to draw something and someone drew a member of the KKK killing an African American and passed it to the only Black child in class. 

So one of the other things that we found in our district is racism is expensive. One of our schools ended up losing almost a million dollars in funding because of the disproportionate rate of discipline for students of color. We are probably 3-6% of the population, and at this particular school, mostly all, it was over 20 students out of the 34 complaints that were African American, Black boys, that were being disciplined.

So we just, you know, when you think about the inequities over a large period of time and the district wants to look at those. We really wanted to highlight some of those things that are national problems, such as the lack of teachers of color. And even, even when we first started. Like now we thought getting Black teachers was rough then? It's difficult getting any teacher now! Nobody wants to come into this battleground and deal with this. So it just creates a lot of issues. 

But we really kind of tried to have an approach of working hand in hand with people who are from any political party, no matter what belief system, no matter what color you are, we can all join in together and recognize that students need to feel safe and welcome at their schools.

Amanda: I love that you talked earlier about how racism is expensive. I think that's such an important way to start talking about these issues, especially in a red state where it can be hard to cut through some of these messages. But I, it also reminds me that racism, some of the stuff you're talking about, it affects all kids. And not having teachers of color, that affects white kids too. It's important for them to have that experience with someone that looks different than they do. 

So what can white parents do to help? Right? We need to listen to students and to parents of color and let them lead, but we also can't just sit back, right? You can't, you can't be the only voice in the room. You need our support. So what is the best way that, that we can do that?

Revida: That is such a great question and I'm so glad that you asked. My co-founder Jen Cortez, we often, when we started our relationship, it was basically like, you know, “I might say something that you might not agree with, that you might not like, but we are in a position where we can talk and communicate about what those things are.” 

I want my white friends and my white brothers and sisters to be able to have these discussions with their children so that their children know what these issues are. But you hit the nail on the head. We can't be the only people that are speaking. We often show up at school board meetings and they've laughed at me because I've told some of our community, “go get your white husbands and get them to stand in line and speak at the school board meeting cuz they often listen to them when sometimes we don't get listened to.” So I know that's a hard reality to kind of take, but it's true.

Allyship is very important. The role that our white friends and sisters and brothers can provide, that information to have empathy for those experiences, learn outside of the colorless bubble that we often have. I just attended a workshop for DEI at a work conference. One of the presenters had a list of 10 people that you list down as your people. And what she noticed, she does this annually, she noticed that a lot of them were the same race, the same sex, the same religion. We have to be intentional about creating a diverse space if we want to have those conversations. 

Amanda: I love that and I love that you talked about the conversation, right? We don't have to get everything right and know everything, and it's okay that we have a conversation where we're trying to understand.

Revida: Yes. And, and it may not be right and we can have a discussion about it. You know, we are not all a monolith. Everybody has a different belief. Me and my husband are different religions. We live in the same household, but we have to figure out how to make it work.

Amanda: Same! Yeah. We're different religions and, and you know what? It works. We can love each other tremendously and be different. 

Jasmine: Absolutely. So Revida, later on in the episode, I get to talk to Angie Thomas, who's the author of The Hate U Give. So in your little red area of Tennessee, or just nationwide, have you focused on book bans and your work, and how do you feel book bans actually relate to like the overall project on racial equity?

Revida: So we've had digital books that have been pulled from our system. We've had hundreds of hours that have been, and I, I don't want to dare say wasted, but I think we have another way that we could utilize those resources. And having a district do a book review on a book, I got to participate in a book review on the River Between Us, which was a fifth grade book about civil rights. We had some parents that were complaining about it. And when I left that thing, I loved that book. It talked about a perspective of women in the Civil War. That is a very rare perspective. 

And so they often wanna ban things that give us those different lights and allow us to see a different perspective, but it's so important to raise a group of this new generation to see everybody and hear everybody. You don't have to believe what they believe, but it is just respectful to be cognizant of other people's beliefs and try to be respectful of them when we can. 

Jasmine: I love that. Thank you so much, Revida for joining us today. I really, really appreciate having you on the show. This was very, very refreshing. 

Revida: Wonderful. Thanks for the invitation. We're happy to be here. Appreciate all the work you all are doing as well, so keep it up. 

Jasmine: Thank you.

Well, that was an awesome conversation. You know, a lot of the things that she's talking about, it reminds me of the fact that when I was growing up here in Georgia, we used to always go on a field trip to Stone Mountain. And as a kid it was just a field trip and I never really even thought about it. But then as I got older and had my own kids and started signing permission slips for Stone Mountain, I realized… why am I sending my Black child on a field trip to a memorial to the Confederacy? With a big mural carved in stone of a confederate general Stonewall Jackson, and the birthplace of the Ku Klux Klan, where they come back annually to celebrate? What am I doing? 

Jo: And it's so interesting because right now what we're seeing is this push to, you know, take away curriculum for African-American studies and this idea that CRT is, you know, in a Rosa Parks book or a book about Roberta Clemente. For every step it feels like we've made as a society, there's this shove backwards where I feel like we're moving in the opposite direction, and that's very intentional. So, you know, this kind of acknowledgement and shining a light on what's happening is more important now than ever. 

Amanda: Yeah, I know. Did you see, sorry, DeSantis with that Rosa Parks book, how they took out, they made those edits to the book. They took out anything related to race. Because they don't wanna know why they were trying to get her in the back of the bus. It was just this, “I don't know. It was just this thing that happened. She was in the back of the bus.” And you're like, no, that is a key part of the story.

Jasmine: That is the story. That is, that is the story. 

Amanda: Other than that, it's like it's just a woman on a bus. Which is not, it's not as interesting a story.

Jasmine: But that's the way they wanna tell it. But that's the way they wanna tell it. I think that this is a reminder that the work literally never stops. Like you think you're making progress, but you can't stop. Cause it's like pushing a ball up a hill. If you let the ball go, the ball goes rolling back down the hill. Unfortunately, I wish it was not this way, the hill is never ending. It's constantly going up. We are constantly pushing this ball uphill, trying to make progress. And you have to rely on the fact that pushing a ball up a hill takes a lot of energy and sometimes maybe you need to take a break, but there's someone else there ready to keep pushing the ball.

But if everyone decides to take a break, if everyone decides to give up, guess what? That ball is gonna go crashing back down the hill and then we're gonna be worse off than we started and we gotta do all the work again to push the ball back up the hill. Yeah, so that's kind of like how I view what's happening in our country right now is there is a concerted effort not to just let go of the ball. There are people at the top of the hill literally trying to push the ball back down the hill. So we're pushing up and they're standing on the other side trying to push it right back down.  

Amanda: That's a good point cause even when we were taught about race, like when, when you're taught about Martin Luther King, I was taught that “then we learned better and everyone agreed with Martin Luther King Jr. And then now we all do better.” And you're taught as if it's done. There is nothing else to work on. Like Martin Luther King did it. Good on him.

Jasmine: Yep. Obama was elected. We're done. We're done.

Amanda: Exactly. Yeah. Fixed it! And you're like, “oh, we didn't fix it.”

Jo: And it's so interesting, like so many for, such a select portion of society has been holding all the weight of that ball and these allyships are so important. Cause it takes this coalition of so many different hands, you know, to keep pushing and carrying that weight because yeah, it's been on the shoulders of too few for too long.

Jasmine: Absolutely. Absolutely. Man. All right, so now we're gonna take a quick break and when we come back we'll have my interview with Angie Thomas.

BREAK

Jasmine: Our guest today is the author of the award-winning New York Times bestselling novels, the Hate U Give, On the Come Up and Concrete Rose. She has a brand new book coming out this week called Nic Blake and the Remarkables: The Manifestor Prophecy. Angie Thomas, thank you so much for joining me on the Suburban Women Problem.

Angie Thomas: Thank you so much for having me. 

Jasmine: I would love to start by talking about your book, The Hate U Give, which is a powerful book. We had our banned book club read it and they loved it. It's a young adult novel about a girl who witnesses a police officer kill her friend. So what inspired you to write a book about Black Lives Matter, and specifically what inspired you to write it from the perspective of a teenage girl?

Angie: I first got the idea for the book back in 2011 after the death of Oscar Grant in Oakland, California. I was living in two very different worlds. I attended a mostly white private college, and it was just 10 minutes from my house. But my house was in a mostly black, poor neighborhood both in Jackson, Mississippi, and I would be going between two different worlds. And I found myself being two different people. Code switching, you know, when I was at school, changing the way I spoke, the way I dressed, the music I listened to when I was at school. But when Oscar Grant lost his life, and his death made headlines because, you know, he was killed by cops and it was caught on tape and it was one of the first instances where something like this was caught on tape and the video was going around. It was one of the early viral videos on the internet and there were a lot of conversations about it. 

In my neighborhood, people were angry. You know, a lot of us, we knew guys just like Oscar. There were men who had been in situations like that and lived to tell the story, you know, so we knew this, this wasn't news to us. We knew that these things happened. But at my school, either my classmates didn't care or they found ways to justify what happened to this young man. And so hearing two different conversations, I found myself having very strong emotional reactions, responses, and I didn't really know what to do at my school specifically cuz I was so angry and hurt when I would hear them justify his death or write it off.

I didn't really know what to do, so I ended up writing a short story for my senior project. And it was about a boy named Khalil who was a lot like Oscar. And it was about a girl named Starr living in two different worlds like I was. And that's essentially how the Hate U Give was born. 

But it took me several years to decide to write it as a novel and to make it into a novel. I was really inspired by this young lady by the name of Rachel Jeantel, who was Trayvon Martin's best friend. And Rachel happened to be on the phone with Trayvon when George Zimmerman approached him. And because of that, Rachel was called to the stand during the Zimmerman trial. And one thing that I remember about Rachel, unfortunately, is that more people talked about the way she said things as opposed to what this young woman was saying. There were few people who were commending her publicly, at least in the media, for her bravery to get up on that stand and do what she did. And there were so many people talking about the way she spoke because she wasn't code-switching. She wasn't polished, as you may wanna say, you know, and that made people uncomfortable. 

But what made me angry was the fact that nobody was making this girl into a hero. So it made me think back to that short story I wrote and I said, you know what? I wanna write this book. I wanna tell this story. I wanna make this into a novel, but I want it to be from the perspective of this young lady Starr, because also Black girls were being left out of the conversation a lot when it came to Black Lives Matter and police brutality. Because so often the victims were young Black men, Black women, Black girls especially, were being left out of the conversation when it was affecting them just as much.

So the timing of it and everything worked out in a way that I could not have had any control over. It was definitely a God thing, but it worked out. And not only that, but it was a way to express myself and it ended up being something even bigger than anything I could imagine. 

Jasmine: I love that story. I love so many parts of that story. I will start with the fact that when I was in middle school, I was that Black kid that was in a school where I literally had five Black classmates, all of my other classmates were white. But the neighborhood that I lived in did not look like that. And so I was a master at code switching. It was just a part of my life. I honestly didn't have a word for it back then. It was just what I did.  And so when I actually watched the movie, The Hate U Give, and I remember being able to relate.

So I saw an interview where you said you wanted to approach writing that novel, not just with anger, but also with love. So can you expound on that? Cause I, I love that. 

Angie: Yeah. Yeah. I, I don't think people recognize that at the root of the anger, when we're talking about these cases, at the root of the anger that you'll see from a community, the reason people are willing to destroy their own community outta anger is because at the root of it is love. They have love for this person. They have love for themselves. And they're tired. They're sick and tired of being sick and tired. They're tired of grieving, they're tired of being fearful. They're, they're tired of the anxiety that comes with being a Black person in this country. But we also love this country and we expect and know we deserve better, you know, and I don't think people recognize that, that there's still love at the core of it. You can't have this kind of reaction to something unless there's some love. You know, it's not just a reaction just of anger. There's some love there as well. 

And so with The Hate U Give, I wanted there to still be that, that base, that foundation of love. We have this love for this young man Khalil. We have this love for this community. And Starr has her family love as well. The reason she's able to eventually speak is because she's been loved on. You know, she's got that village that loves on her. She's got that community that loves on her, and we don't talk about that element enough.

So I didn't wanna just make it just about the anger because we're more than anger. You know, and especially as Black women, so often we get this stereotype placed on us of the angry Black woman. And a lot of times it's just we're passionate. And at the core of that passion is a love for self. It's a love for community, is a love for people in our lives. And it comes off as something else to others, but it's still love, it's a form of love. 

So it was important for me to showcase that throughout the book. There's so many different kinds of love in the book as well, but really the, for me, the big thing is the love of community in the book, period. The love of this community, this neighborhood that gets written off, this neighborhood where people will make assumptions about it just by passing by it or just from seeing it on the news. I grew up in a neighborhood just like that. I grew up in the real Garden Heights. It's Georgetown in Jackson, Mississippi, and my neighborhood is known for all the wrong reasons, just like Garden Heights. But when I think of Georgetown, I don't think of crime rates. I don't think of drug dealers and, and this and that. I think of the love that my neighbors showed me. I think of that love that made me who I am. And so I wanted to pay homage to that and, and I wanted to show that and showcase that. To show that even as Black people, when we're going through our anger and our pain in the midst of these, we're more than anger, we're more than pain. We're love. We're love and at the core of our emotions is love. So hopefully that will further humanize us. That was another hope as well. But it's also sad that here we are in 2023, or when the book came out 2017, and as a creative, I feel as if I still have to humanize my characters. Humanize people who look like me.

Jasmine: Oh man. You have just said so many things right now. I mean, you're right. People don't go to bat for things, you don't get angry about things that you don't care about. I mean, you just don't. So love really is at the root of a lot of these emotions that might come across as anger, you know, once they are manifested on the outside, but I love that the core or the root is love.

But another thing you said that I think is really important is humanizing people. Right now in 2023, I'm a legislator and all these bills that seek to dehumanize, seek to strip people of their humanity, their dignity, their autonomy, all of these things. It's, it's like a, a theme, a resounding theme that I really wish we would just stop. Like, it's, it's, it's too much. I mean, that's been something that's been on my mind a lot. Every time I get one of those bills coming across my desk, I'm just like, “why are we doing this? These are human beings. These are people.” 

So, yeah. All right Angie, you got a new book coming out! Tell us about it! It's your first middle grade novel. So like, how did you approach it differently than you approached some of your past novels? 

Angie: I've had the idea, well, I've wanted to do a middle grade fantasy novel for over 10 years, maybe even 15 years or so. It's just something that I wanted to do because those were the books that pulled me in the most as a kid that I enjoyed the most as a kid. I loved fantasy books, like The Chronicles of Narnia or A Wrinkle In Time. I loved books like that as a kid, but I never saw myself in them. Black girls weren't the main characters. Black girls weren't the ones going on the adventures. And as an adult, I realized that and thought about that and I said, “huh, I wanna do something about it. I wanna write a Black girl having a fantasy adventure, a Black girl having some kind of magical ability, you know?” And I finally decided in 2020 to go ahead and write it. I mean, you know, that was an uneventful year.

Jasmine: No, nothing going on at all. Nothing at all. Nothing going on. 

Angie: But I, you know, it was hard for me to try to sit down and write a book set in real life stuff. I wrote Concrete Rose, my third novel, during the pandemic. But the blessed thing about that was it was said in like 1998, 1999, which, sorry to say, makes it historical fiction. I know! 

Jasmine: That hurts! Oh no, do not say that. 

Angie: I know it hurts so bad. Like, I've had kids who are like, “Why didn't he just text her? Why didn't he text his girlfriend?” I'm like, “Baby, they didn't have texts.” “What did they do?” “He left notes in her mailbox.” You know, and they're like, so once you know, when you think about it from a kid's perspective, it's like, yeah, it's historical fiction, but to us it's like, that was yesterday. 

Jasmine: Yeah, I definitely like in high school, so yeah.

Angie: Yeah. And so it was easy to write that one because I didn't have to write the pandemic. I didn't even have to write social media. But then once I finished it, I'm like, okay, what am I doing now? Do I really wanna deal with the pandemic in a book? And I figured, huh, if I'm a grown woman and I need an escape, I'm sure there are kids who need one as well, right? So I decided to create this fantasy world. I decided to go back to that fantasy book, that story I've had for years, and write it. So that's essentially how Nic Blake came about. It has a literal underground railroad. I deal with a lot of, not just Black folklore and mythology, but also Black history. So it's still an Angie Thomas novel, but it's just a fun adventure and hopefully for those Black girls out there who wanna see themselves on magical adventures. But also for other kids too, to see Black girls having magical adventures and know that Black girl magic is a real thing.

Jasmine: I love it. I love it. Black Girl Magic: The Novel. I'm just kidding. 

So I talked about it a little bit in the last question, but right now we're clearly living in a very divided country. And that seems especially clear when we look at the reception of some of your books. There's the America where your books are bestsellers and get turned into blockbuster movies, and then there's the America where they're in the top 10 most frequently banned books. So what goes through your mind when you think about these two very different responses to the same exact piece of work? 

Angie: It's interesting. And it's, and sometimes it's frustrating because the people who are banning it rarely read the entire thing. In fact, I've had people who did set out to ban it and they were like, “You know what? I'm gonna read it. I'm gonna read it so then I can prove that it's this, this, this, this, this.” Then they read it and reached out to me and said “I had it all wrong.” I think that's what's frustrating because as a Black woman in this country, I am used to people making assumptions about me. That just comes with the territory of Black women. I'm used to people writing me off. I'm used to people making an assumption because that's what America does to Black women. And now I'm seeing it with my books as well. 

And what I wish is that those same people who wanna ban it would actually take the time to read it because the whole. One of the reasons I wrote the book is so that people can put themselves in the shoes of someone maybe unlike themselves. There's a phrase we use in children's lit to say that books are mirrors, windows and sliding glass doors, and I wish that the people who want to ban the book would actually take the time to look in through the window or even maybe step through that sliding glass door for a little bit and come to understand lives unlike their own. Because this is what we're dealing with. The whole thing is a lot of these books are about people unlike themselves. These books are about people in situations unlike their own, and they're refusing to even take the time to understand someone unlike them.

This is a problem America has. Period. We have an entire party that just does not care. Does not wanna humanize, like you said earlier, does not wanna humanize people, does not even wanna take the time to try to humanize people. And that's frustrating because who suffers the most are the kids who need those mirrors, right? And I hate the message that it sends to those kids who see themselves in my books. Because what you're telling them is “you don't matter. Be invisible. Be quiet.”

Jasmine: “You don't exist.” 

Angie: Right. Exactly. “You don't exist.” And I take issue with that, because also you're preventing other kids from getting the windows and sliding glass doors that lead to empathy, that lead to compassion. And one thing we seem to be deficient of is compassion and empathy. And so that, that it's, it's maddening, it's sad. But also I still have hope because kids still find ways to get books. 

Jasmine: Oh, yeah. Honestly, when you ban a book, that just makes kids wanna read it even more so. And with all the technology, us adults, we can try all we want to. We are not keeping up at all. 

Angie: Exactly. So it's just like, okay, y'all are doing all of this. But they still have ways to find out things. They still have ways to learn. And one thing I love about this generation that's coming up is that they want to learn. They want to know about people unlike themselves. And there's nothing wrong with that. There should be nothing wrong with that. So,  I wish more people would recognize that this is such a big deal cuz I've had people who are like, “wait a minute, they're banning books?” Yes. They're banning books all around you in all these different school districts and the only people who are speaking up at the school board meetings seem to be the loud people who want the books off the shelves. Everybody has the ability to go to a school board meeting and speak up and speak out. And I wish more people did that. Yeah. So it, it's, it's an interesting and frustrating time. 

Jasmine: Yeah. We talk about that a lot on our show. And we have people who listen to the show religiously that come to things like our Troublemaker Trainings to do just that. Like they learn how to feel empowered to do things like show up at the school board meeting and you don't have to be loud and boisterous and make a big scene, but you could still be effective. So I love that you brought that up. 

All right, Angie, this has been so much fun. But before we go, we always like to ask our guests a few rapid fire questions. So are you ready? 

Angie: I'm ready. 

Jasmine: All right. Here we go. First question, you're about to embark on a tour for your new book. What's your favorite part about being on a book tour? 

Angie: Ooh. My favorite part about being on a book tour, this is gonna sound so weird, but it’s when I get to my hotel after a long flight and I take a nap.

Jasmine: I'm a napper, so that doesn't sound weird to me at all. That sounds amazing. 

Angie: I, I can, I can nap a little bit on the plane, but there is nothing like getting into my hotel room, taking a shower then getting in the bed. Even if I have an event later on, if I can just get in the bed and nap before my event, it's sometimes some of the best rest ever. 

But also I like meeting my readers. I like meeting the kids especially, and I'm super looking forward to it because I've been doing virtual tours for like three years now, so this will be my first in-person. And getting to see kids in person and talk to them and see their excitement in person is a whole different thing. So I, I love that part. I'm looking forward to that.

Jasmine: Oh, I, I bet, I bet. Yeah. That foray back into like in person after being digital, it's kind of amazing. It's surreal a little bit. 

All right, so next question. You were born and raised in Mississippi, and now you live here in Atlanta where I live. So what's your favorite thing about Mississippi and what's your favorite thing about Georgia?

Angie: My favorite thing about Mississippi is no traffic.

Jasmine: Good point. Good point. Very fair. 

Angie: It was, it was so funny cause yesterday I was driving back to Mississippi to bring my dog to, so he can be with my mom while I'm on tour, and I hit what's called rush hour traffic in Jackson. And my mom was like, “Ooh, look at this traffic.” And I'm like, “this is, this is nothing.” But I also do love the people. Mississippi gets a bad rep, but there are so many good people here. There's so many folks who are trying to change, who are listening and learning and growing. Some of my most diverse events are in Mississippi and people are surprised when I say that.

My favorite thing about Atlanta… I just love Atlanta. I've always loved Atlanta. Before I even set foot in Atlanta, I remember being 12 years old and because TLC was from Atlanta, I wanted to live in Atlanta. 

Jasmine: I loved TLC!

Angie: Yeah, I was a huge, huge, huge TLC fan. But I just, I love what Atlanta did for Black culture. I love what Atlanta has done for music, for hip hop, for R&B. I love that it's a place where you just never know who you're gonna see, what you're gonna see. And, and it's one of those places that there's so much potential and it's still being found. Atlanta is definitely becoming my second home.

Jasmine: I love that. All right, so the next question, you brought up that you had to take your dog to your mom in Mississippi. So what's the best part about being a dog mom? 

Angie: The best part about being a dog mom is if I've gone out on an errand or have left the house for any amount of time, and I open the door and he comes running to the door to jump all on me. I tell people all the time, one of the best feelings in the world is having a happy dog run to you. You haven't had that happen before, find a dog and make it happen somehow, because there's nothing like that love and that joy.

Jasmine: Yes. So my dog is the same. I'm like, “I just went to the mailbox. I was literally right there, like you could see me from the window. Why are you so excited?” So yes. Yes. 

Alright. So what's one TV show from your childhood that you will drop everything and watch it if you see it on reruns?  

Angie: Ooh. This one's gonna be, lemme take it way back. Gullah Gullah Island. I've been trying to find a way to watch it. I think it's online somewhere.

Jasmine: I loved Gullah Gullah Island! I remember that show! Oh my goodness. 

Angie: Like that was like, one of the first shows I remember with Black people, like, you know, a Black family. And it's just, it's one of my favorites of all time and I didn't realize how much that show affected me until somebody posted a clip from it online the other week and I was just like, “Oh my goodness. I loved that show.” But also the Fresh Prince, Fresh Prince was just one of my favorites.

Jasmine: That's a good one. All right. Well, Angie, this has been so much fun. I really, really enjoyed speaking with you. That's the end of our rapid fire questions. So we always like to make sure that our listeners know where they can go to find out more about you and your books. 

Angie: You can go to angiethomas.com. Or you can find me on Twitter as of now. 

Jasmine: I know. Same. Twitter is an interesting place. 

Angie: Yeah. At AngieCThomas or on Instagram at AngieThomas, I also have a TikTok, I think it's like Angie Thomas Author. Oh, and I do Facebook for people who do Facebook. If you look me up, Angie Thomas if you do Facebook. 

Jasmine: I do Facebook! I'm in the Facebook age day and age. All right. Well, I really, really enjoyed talking to you, Angie. I look forward to hearing more about your new book and the Black Girl Magic that you are exuding in that book for our middle grades. And with that, thank you so much for joining us on the Suburban Women Problem. 

Angie: Thank you.

BREAK

Amanda: Welcome back everyone. Jasmine, I loved your interview with Angie, so I've actually not read the book, but I have seen the movie. It is hands down, fantastic. Love it. I also love the whole conversation and the idea about anger coming from love. That we get angry when our communities or our kids are attacked, but the strength of our anger comes from that love that we have for people.

Jasmine: Yep. And our country. Yes. I mean, you know, we fight so hard. I would not care if I didn't care. You know, like if a person is able to make you angry, that's because there's something deep down inside of you that really cares about what they're doing, what they are saying, or something like that. And so I think love of our country, love of our community, love of each other, because we love each other… when things are not going the way we want them to go, it really does anger us because we know that it can be better. And so I loved that part too. Angie was just all around awesome to be honest. Like I really enjoyed talking to her. 

Amanda: And that's a great way to connect with even people who might not be on your side. Like, even like with some of the school board stuff, like clearly these people are upset and they do want what they think is best for their kids when they're asking for these books to be banned. But like if you can connect with them on a level of… you want what's best for your kid, and so do I, right? Like, can we talk about how we might have differing opinions? And if your kid doesn't wanna read a book, what if mine does? Right? And so that is one way where I have actually been able to connect with people and they said, “All right, I didn't think about it that way. That me not having my kid read this book means that you can't either and that's your kid, not mine.” I was like, “You're right.” 

Jo: Yeah. So often we find ourselves in these foxholes and we think we really don't have anything that ties us together, anything in common, and what we realize at the end of the day, especially as moms, I feel like especially as moms, we have a lot more in common. A lot more that connects us than divides us.

Jasmine: Absolutely. Absolutely. All right, so let's go ahead and transition to the Toast to Joy. All right. Amanda, I'm gonna start with you. What's your Toast to Joy? 

Amanda: So I got to do a little hopping around to different places. I was in Boston, actually I was in Savannah, Georgia, which is so lovely. It was super nice. So I love hopping around and seeing other places. It's just a fun little thing to do. 

But while I was there, I was at a Main Street America conference in Boston and I sat down on a bus to go to one of the events and an older woman kind of sat next to me and I was like, “Oh, who are you?”And this is my first time I've been to a Main Street America conference, which really focuses on revitalizing our historic downtowns. And she said, “oh, I'm Mary Means, I founded the organization.” Like, I know I probably should have known that, but I didn't, but she was so kind and so fun to talk to. So Mary is this woman who loved her community and loved her downtown and was sad to see her downtown being ignored and just started this organization so that we could pay more attention to our small businesses and our downtowns. And our downtowns are places where we come together and we walk around and we shop and we meet our neighbors, and they're the places where our neighbors aren't strangers anymore, and where we get to know each other. So I really, really love the organization. I also love that Mary started this as just a woman who cared a lot about her community. So it's super fun to get to meet Mary and talk with her. 

Jasmine: I love that. She sounds powerful. That also sounds like a, so a Jasmine move, like, “Oh, hey, what's your name? Michelle? Oh, my middle name's Michelle! Oh yeah. Oh, Michelle Obama? Oh, hi!” Yeah, that sounds like something I would do.

Amanda: Haha. Yeah, that was totally something I did. I was a little embarrassed afterwards when I told some of the other organizers. They were like, “oh, you sat next to Mary?” I was like, “Oh. Yep.” That was, yeah, it was a little bit embarrassing, but it's fine. Alright, Jo, what is your Toast to Joy?  

Jo: So my Toast to Joy sort of starts out sounding sad, because it is, but like last week, at the beginning of last week, someone made a video of a very violent event using my, my head, let's just say. 

Amanda: What?? 

Jo: Yeah, there was a video somebody put on Twitter. 

Amanda: Does the FBI know about this?  

Jo: Yeah, I reported it to the FBI, I reported it to my local police. It was a video of me being beheaded and it was pretty gruesome.

Amanda: Oh my gosh. 

Jasmine: People are freaking nuts.

Jo: It was pretty awful and, and it kind of hit me in these waves and I just wanted to toast to Red Wine and Blue. Because this community of wonderful people that I get to work with every day was so incredibly supportive. Everybody from the top down was like, “What can we do? Let's rally behind you.” And the number one thing they said to me, which I'm just like so blessed to have had them say, was, “You need to take whatever time you need to take right now and process this. Unplug. Step away. You know, get through this.” Because my inclination, my instinct, was to quit. Was to say, “You know what? I can't do this. It's not worth it. I don't wanna do it anymore.” And I needed time to process it, and they gave me that time and respect and support, and I'm just so honored because it really bolstered me and it made me more resolute when I came back after taking a little bit of a break. To be like, you know what? I am not alone. I have this amazing community of women and men who are out there supporting me. So I feel like I'm stronger than ever now. So that's my Toast to Joy.

Amanda: I love that, and I love that it was like giving space. And so I have this new kid's book and I can't remember, oh, it was, I think it's Rabbit Listens. And one thing that I loved about that book, and I hadn't read it, so my daughter actually brought it home from the library where the librarians let them go pick whatever they want, and this was one of the ones she picked. And she loves rabbits, so I think that's why she brought it home. But it talks about the… I think someone, or an animal or something, I can't remember, was upset. And all the rabbit did was listen and just give space, right? It didn't try to solve the problem or didn't try to tell them what to do. It was just like, give the person space. And it was such a great book. So I actually ended up buying the book cause I was like, I love this book so much I have to buy it. But I love that. Like it's, I think, underrated. Sometimes people just need space and then, you know, we can go from there. 

Jasmine: Yeah, I love that. So my Toast to Joy is to getting another Legislator of the Year award! 

Amanda: Oh, congrats! 

Jasmine: This time it's from an organization called Help for Healthcare Professionals. So here's my cute little trophy.

Amanda: Ooh, look at you, you have like a, you have like a matching trophy behind it too. Jasmine has got all these trophies, they're not gonna fit in her screen. Room Rater’s gonna be like “9 out of 10 because you have too many trophies and it's cluttering it up.”

Jasmine: Haha. Yeah. But Help for Healthcare professionals is a 501c3 that was started pretty much during the pandemic, and it really focuses on making sure that our frontline workers, our frontline heroes, especially in the healthcare spaces, are supported. And I think the, the founder, her name is Shelli-Ann McKenzie. She started this organization because she saw the impact that Covid was having on the healthcare professionals, like from that side, and how there wasn't a whole lot of support for them. Everyone was kind of just like, you know, “this is what you signed up for.” And so she's like, you know, “they're humans too. They need support too.”

And so it was an honor to receive the award. It's always nice to be acknowledged for the things that you're trying to do when you're down at the legislature, because I can tell you for a fact, I hear more negative stuff than positive stuff on any day. I get a lot of people that tell me I'm a horrible human being, I eat babies, you know, I mutilate children. You know, I get all those all the time, but rarely do I get a “you're doing a great job.” So this, it's really nice to get some type of acknowledgement. 

Amanda: Well deserved, Jasmine, you are doing a great job. 

Jasmine: Thank you, Amanda. All right, so thanks so much to everyone for joining us today. If you're enjoying the show, it would really help us out if you could leave us a rating or a view on whatever podcast app you use. Thanks again for listening, and we'll see you next week on another episode of The Suburban Women Problem.