The Culture Advantage

Black Fatigue in 2025, with authors Mary-Frances Winters and Mareisha Winters Reese

• Michael Baran

Share episode

Black fatigue is not just about Black people being tired. It’s about the real psychological and physical costs of racism, inequity, and exclusion. This is a people issue, and also a business issue. Any organization that ignores Black fatigue is choosing higher burnout, turnover, and reputational risk over trust, innovation, and real performance.

In this incredibly relevant and important episode, Dr. Michael Baran interviews two guests: (1) legendary trailblazer Mary-Frances Winters who coined the term Black Fatigue in her 2020 book of the same name, and (2) her daughter and business partner Mareisha Winters Reese who is collaborating with Mary-Frances to write the second edition of that book, to be released in June 2026. Michael and these guests unpack what Black Fatigue really is and how racism literally erodes the mind, body, and spirit across generations. Mary-Frances and Mareisha share what has changed in the forthcoming second edition of the book, including new chapters on AI, global Black experiences, and their perspective on the deliberate attempts to erase Black people, culture, and history. We also dig into the emotional weight of this political moment, the weaponizing of and co-opting of terms like DEI, “woke,” and Black Fatigue itself! We close with concrete ways to learn, act, and sustain resistance, including their upcoming companion workbook on healing Black Fatigue.

Resources mentioned:

Black Fatigue in 2025, with authors Mary-Frances Winters and Mareisha Winters Reese

Is your company struggling, navigating through high turnover, toxic leadership, or a culture that's holding your team back from reaching its full potential? Well, you're not alone. So here's your host and guide, Michael Baran.

Michael Baran: Hello everyone and welcome to the Culture Advantage podcast today. I am so lucky to have the guests that I have. You are so lucky that I have the guests that I have. This is a really important topic that we are gonna be talking about. It's a topic that is well discussed among black people in the United States and not very well discussed or understood at all by White America.

The issue I'm talking about is called black fatigue, and this is a term that was coined by the legendary. [00:01:00] Mary Francis Winters in her 2020 book called Black Fatigue. Well, guess who I'm interviewing today? Yes, Mary Francis herself, and we get the pleasure of having her daughter Marisha join us because Marisha is writing the second edition of that book with Mary Francis.

They're gonna explain what they mean by black fatigue, but to foreshadow a little bit, they're talking about the very real psychological and physiological exhaustion that comes with being black in America. Everything from. Dealing with outright racism and violence to the inequities built into systems and institutions and the biases, whether they're conscious or unconscious.

The subtle acts of exclusion, even by well-meaning people, all of it. Now, if you've heard that term being used in a different [00:02:00] way than that, it's because there has been recently a very deliberate attempt to co-opt that term. We'll be talking about that in this interview as well. Now, before we dive in, I just wanna take a moment to invite you.

Especially if you're white, to really dive in with an open heart and an open mind, and without distractions, letting go of any preconceptions, letting go of any defensiveness. The weight of this issue generally has not been felt or understood by much of White America. I mean, I thought maybe we were gonna get there in the summer of 2020 after the murder of George Floyd, it seemed like white America might actually be trying to understand this.

I even let myself get hopeful, right? Thinking this is it. This is the moment we turn a corner in this country. And [00:03:00] maybe that was, you know, me being white and naive. It was definitely me being wrong. Right? And now look where we are, 2025 with. Black contributions to history being erased in our most cherished museums and archives and school books with the ban and federal agencies to even talk about inequities.

And so much more going on right now. We really need a seismic shift in this country when it comes to race. Not just tinkering around the edges, kinda making some progress and then going back, pendulum swinging. No, we need a seismic shift, so I'm thrilled to be able to think through this. On this episode, I'm thrilled to be able to bring you the authors themselves to talk about this important issue.

Here are Mary Francis and Marisha. I.

Welcome everyone. I cannot tell you how thrilled I am to have these [00:04:00] two guests today. welcome Mary Francis and Marisha. Thank you. It's good to be with you, Michael. Thank you for having us. Of course. Now let me tell you all a little bit about them quickly before we dive in. Mary Francis Winters is the founder and CEO of the Winters Group.

Global consulting firm specializing in workplace culture and organizational change. So exactly the kinds of things we talk about On this podcast. She's been named a pioneer and trailblazer. She's been a leading voice in diversity, equity, inclusion, and justice for over four decades. Known for her thought provoking insights.

She's an internationally recognized speaker, consultant, and bestselling author whose work inspires bold dialogue and advances equity centered transformation. And we have Mary Francis' daughter with us. This is the first mother, daughter duo on the show, Marisha [00:05:00] n Winters Reese is president and COO of the Winters Group, a former engineer.

Turned organizational strategist. She brings a systems thinking lens to workplace culture and leadership development, known for her advocacy for equity and justice. She helps organizations build more human centered and equitable workplaces. So welcome to you both again. Thank you. So happy to have you here to talk about such important issues.

I'm sure we'll talk about lots of things. I thought it would be great to start out with your book, black Fatigue. I know you're both right, working on the second edition, and we should talk about that in a minute. But first I wanna just help people understand. What you mean by black fatigue? The book is absolutely incredible.

Like if you wanna talk about a book that. Really takes an issue and [00:06:00] gets you to understand it from such an emotional, personal level as well as a data-driven level. Like there couldn't possibly be a better book for this. So Mary Francis, could you just help us understand what. What you mean by black fatigue?

Because, and we'll get into this later too. There's some confusion about that right now. Well, I don't know about confusion. There's like, okay, good point. Co-opting, right? Yes, yes. So yeah, so black fatigue, the book Black Fatigue, how Racism Erodes the Mind, body, and Spirit was conceived in 2019 and, first published in, in 2020.

And it was really listening to a lot of our clients. We were doing a lot of, focus groups and a lot of listening sessions in 2020. And I kept hearing from black, , employees, black people, particularly younger ones millennials and Gen Zs. You know, we're tired, we're exhausted. And I would tease and I'd say, you know, you're 25 years old.

Yeah, I can be exhausted. You can't be exhausted yet. But they would look at me with that [00:07:00] side eye, like, okay lady, I'm gonna respect you, but I know that I'm fatigued. So I thought, you know what? You know, what is this? And you know, black fatigue is really the intergenerational malaise that black people have that impacts us both psychologically and physiologically.

And that's been proven and we talk about that in the book from living Daily in a society that is. The foundation is actually racism. And so it impacts our daily walk and how we show up. You know, we talk about things like code switching and all of those kinds of things. It's difficult to be authentic, so black fatigue is the burden, of living in a racist society.

Yeah. Thank you for that. And it's so important how you point out, it's not just like, oh, I'm tired. As if, you know, it's the same as other people being tired. Right, right, right. The psychological, the physical costs, the intergenerational [00:08:00] that's been going on is so key. And it's such, I know we'll get into.

Present moment, but I just want people to recognize how impactful this still is today. Like literally just three days ago, a really good friend of mine, probably one. My wife and her are probably the most positive people I have ever known. And she called me the other day and just said, I just can't do it today.

Like I'm exhausted today. Normally, you know, and this made me think of your book. She's like, normally my relationship with God keeps me good, but today I'm feeling exhausted being a black woman in this country. Like I just can't do it today. And it's every day and every moment. And so that. That's so important for people to understand too, and I think there's so much confusion about that and misunderstanding and maybe a lack of even trying to understand.

So we'll get into all that soon. But, Marisha, [00:09:00] what's happening with the second edition? Like, what's changed? How are you updating, how have you been thinking about this lately? So Michael, we literally just submitted the final manuscript.

You know, there's so much information and there's so much data that we had to update. And so just since 2020 to 2025, there's been so much that has impacted black people and we've had to change dates or not change dates, but data, update data. And, so we've added four new chapters to the book. Wow.

There's a chapter, on how AI impacts black fatigue, right? So AI is very huge right now, and, but you know, AI is not always good. It's, it could be helpful, but we have to also think about how it impacts people, especially those that are, historically marginalized. We have a chapter on global black fatigue.

So the first edition was very US-centric, right? And so we [00:10:00] wanted to incorporate and recognize that racism is not just the us. A phenomenon. Mm-hmm. It's global. And so we added global, and Mary Francis has been spending a lot of her time now in Barbados, so she was able to bring a lot of the stories. From people that she's made friends with there who have also lived in other countries.

And being able to add that. We did a survey prior to this addition to kind of just see like, how are people experiencing, black fatigue, to what extent, how is it impacting their physical, their mental and all of that. And then they also submitted personal stories. So we added a chapter just of real stories from their own words on.

How black fatigue impacts them. So even like you just shared about your friend and feeling exhausted, like those types of stories, right? It's just like we try to put on this facade or and just push through and push through. But that continues to just as the subtitle of the book says, erode our Mind, [00:11:00] body, and Spirit, right?

And so, and then I said, four new chapters. Mary Francis, what am I missing? Did I list the four? I was thinking about that too. Oh, I know, I know. It's Maha's Black fatigues. Oh really? I was like, what is it? Think so in the first edition, you know, Mary Francis had the chapter on her personal story of black fatigue.

So I added a chapter on my black fatigue. And so it just kind of speaks to as well, just the different in generation, you know? So even though my mom, Mary Francis. Created an environment or tried to create an environment right, to protect me and my brothers, you know, she had gone through, was born and raised in throughout the civil rights era, so she had experienced many things and knowing that, okay, when I have a family, I don't want it to be the same, and so, mm-hmm.

Racism that, you know, that's gonna be experienced. So I shared just some of my highlighting that yes, [00:12:00] I had some, you know, some privilege growing up that my mother did not have, but I still didn't 100% protect me from black fatigue as well. And so, so yeah, so we added that. So we had to update, as I said, statistics.

There's a lot of things just about how the current, especially the current administration, the different policies that have been put down, the executive orders, how that has impacted in the first edition, there's a chapter then is now, which is also still in this second edition. But it's like then it's still now, you know, it's just you were not improving the statistics.

Right. And so even that, so it was hard, hard in a sense for both of us to. Update the book because it's like we feel the fatigue of just, there's this much, right. It would've been great to write a book that says, oh, look at how all these things turned around. Mm-hmm. You know, and so, so yeah. So that's the second edition.

And like I said, we just literally submitted the final [00:13:00] manuscript this week to a publisher, and I'm just forever grateful to be able to work on this with Mary Francis, who I will share. I don't know if she wants to, but she did not really wanna do the second edition either. And, you know, 'cause she was tired.

She's like, I'm tired, I don't want to, and I said, you know, she said, if I joined her and helped, then she would do it. So, so thank you, Mary Francis for doing, because I think it's still, it's just much needed and not only for, to affirm. Black people and their experience and to say, okay, I'm not, you know, crazy, I'm not like this is real.

But also for allies or aspiring allies to take a look and understand our lived experience and then to think about, okay, how can I help? What can I to dismantle the system? So. So that is, that was a lot. That is the second. I wanna mention that it will come out in June of 2026, so that your listeners will know when it will come out.

[00:14:00] I wanna also mention one other thing that has changed that was really profound for me. There was a chapter in the first book, called, sublime Ignorance because in 2020, after the George Floyd murder, many, corporate leaders were, sort of saying, oh. I didn't know that racism was still such a big issue.

Okay, let's focus there. And they came out with all of these,. Pronouncements and issued all of these mm-hmm. These statements mm-hmm. That they were gonna focus on anti-black racism. And so that chapter really focused on, but they didn't know. So in that chapter, in 2020, I wrote about, okay, so here's what to know.

Here are definitions, here are some experiences. Well, today. We, I changed that chapter and it's now called From Sublime Ignorance to Deliberate Erasure. Ah. 'cause people are no longer saying that they're ignorant, that they didn't know. Ah, they're basically saying, well, we don't wanna know.

And so we're gonna ban books and we're going to dismantle, you know, DEI initiatives. We're not going to allow people to focus on, racism like the Fearless Fund, which was a [00:15:00] fund dedicated, you know, for black women that was taken to court. And now they've, you know, changed their, you know, changed their focus.

So it went from, oh, we don't know. And now that we know we're gonna work on it to Oh yeah, well, we know, but we're not, we're just gonna deny it. We're gonna, not only deny it, but we're gonna weaponize it and demonize it and make it, you know, a, a horrible,. A horrible, bad thing, so yeah. Yeah. Gosh. Thank you for sharing that context.

I have really literally a million follow up questions. And thank you for sharing that. It's coming out in June. I'm gonna recommend that everyone get it in June, but I'm also gonna recommend you go out and get the first edition right now if you haven't read it, like don't wait till June. It's that important to understand.

So first, maybe just let's start with the current context. I mean. Obviously there's so much going on in that erasure that you're talking about. How do you both feel like you're [00:16:00] seeing this issue, black fatigue, but also racism and blackness in general and US society in general? Like just, just what are some of your feelings going through this current moment and what are you seeing?

For me, going through this current moment is to protect my peace. So I've been in Barbados for the last four and a half months, and I extended my stay a little bit. I will be coming back to the States, but I'm coming back to Charlotte. Why do I wanna come back to Charlotte? Because. The target on immigrants, you know, it's all about, it's racial profiling.

And so if you are the color of your skin looks like you could be. And we all, you know, black people come in all different shades. You know, look at Maha's shade. Look at my shade. And so, as a matter of fact, when she was born, I dunno if you know this, the, OB GYN said, oh, she looks Puerto Rican.

That was the first thing she said when Maisha came out. Right? Oh boy. So, so I mean, so, so it's, if people are just be being identified [00:17:00] and I, you know, obviously I'm empathetic with, our brown sisters and brothers and those who are,. You know, who are being attacked, just viciously and without, without.

Right. And so right now I feel numb sometimes, Michael, I just feel numb. I feel like our inhumanity against people based on their ethnicity and their race. And it's just, I just wrote, . A blog post for our inclusion solution blog that, and I'm calling for the. Religious leaders and the clergy to be more outspoken because any religion that you might be, whether it be Christian or Muslim or Buddhist or you know Jewish, it says we do not treat other people this way. And it's just being allowed. And the way that Donald Trump talks about people calling them names, low life, and, you know, low IQ and piggy, I mean, [00:18:00] that's bullying and we teach our hil what is the next generation if we allow, why are we allowing this? Yeah, I'm sorry.

Yeah, no, that's so all, I mean, that's a good question. Why are we allowing this? Yeah, for me too, I mean, it's a range of emotions. You know, the fear, the anger, you know, at times trying to find spaces of joy or moments of joy when you can, because, you know, even joy is, is a act of resistance. And so, you know, they, I feel like people want you to feel fear.

They want you to feel, you know, upset and angry, but that doesn't help, us advance the work and move things forward. So for me, just feeling, and it's shocking to, you know, having worked, with Mary Francis with my mom for, I always 14, 14, 14 years. Thank you. 14 years. Yeah.

And even just seeing the cyclical of like, oh, [00:19:00] people are so on board, and then they pull back and then they're so on board. For me, whether you believe in like DEI when we boil it down right, is it's just about humanity as Mary Francis said. And so the making sure everyone feels like they're seen, like they belong, like, yes, your humanity matters and we're not seeing that.

And the not seeing. People in power, people that have this, you know, sphere of influence to really make some significant change, speak out and say something is really, it's hurtful because it's, you know, it's kind of like you, it makes you, it tells that story of like, you don't matter, you're black, you know, black people don't matter.

Brown people don't matter. Immigrants don't matter. And so, like, you know, I'm in Charlotte, North Carolina now and. Seeing videos from other cities when ICE came to those cities, it was, you know, it [00:20:00] made me sad. It made me angry, but not having it so close to home, like I didn't think I could get any more sad or anger, but like, having it right in my own backyard, it's hard.

And yeah, so I just, I just, fat. It's fat. Writing the book. After we finished the first draft, which was in maybe like a month or so ago, I had this worst pain, shoulder pain, back pain that just wouldn't go away, like, and it radiated to my chest. So I'm thinking like, oh, I have a heart.

Like, I'm like, am I about to have a heart? I don't know. And eventually I figured out it was just like the tense, like me sitting here writing, updating. Like, you know, when you're one sitting for too long, you, you get problems. But just like, yeah, I could feel myself tensing, like even updating the stories and the data and that's the fatigue, right?

So it's that physical manifestation of the fatigue, [00:21:00] even just writing it and. So all of that, I don't even know if I answered the question or wish doing, but it's just, you know, it's been really hard. And even to the, real quickly, back to the ice and the racial profiling. 'cause we talk about that too.

And then is now, and if we don't, if we don't learn from the bad parts of history. Things are never going to change. Right. And that's also part of the problem, that they're, they don't want us to learn from the bad parts of history. They're banning the books. They're taking things outta museums.

Oh, don't talk about slavery in the museum. Mm-hmm. Right. Yes. It's a ugly story for the us but it's part of this history and we need to talk about it. So it's just kind of like. How the things, you know, return and the history repeats if we don't do something and something systemic to make change. Like, not like it has to be the, you know, the changing the system.

So yeah, it's a lot. Oh gosh. Yeah. [00:22:00] I mean some, I've seen some of the PR you videos that they're showing to kids Yes. About slavery. I mean, talk about eraser and gaslighting, right? Like that's bonkers. Yeah. Yeah. You know, sometimes I've heard people. I think try to put a positive spin on this moment as like the last gasp of like white supremacy before we can have a truly multicultural, multiracial society with more equity.

Does, I mean, Mary Francis, you've been doing this work for a long time. Does that resonate? Does that not resonate? I don't know. Michael. I think I'm, you know, jaded. I think I'm, cynical. Right now because after all that we've been through here in the United States and globally, that the chapter on global black fatigue really opened my eyes.

The trans, the [00:23:00] transatlantic slave trade and how that impacted so many cultures. And you know, here in Barbados, there's just a deep, rich heritage around slavery. Just last week, I was at a conference where. The King of the Asante people in Ghana was here, and he was here, for this conference and to be celebrated.

But I learned that, that people from Ghana were dropped in Barbados. First they were enslaved until the 1830s. But some of the same stories, but this ingrained deep, deep, deep, rooted racism is global. Mm-hmm. Oh yeah. Global soap. Black and brown people are the global majority, and I think the white supremacists as people know that, and they're trying as best as they can to ensure that there's not a flip of the power rather than looking to share power, right?

They're looking to hold on to the power that they have and even though they're in the minority. They have the power. [00:24:00] Even here in the United States, white men only comprise, what, 35% or 33%, you know, of the, of the population. I'm not saying that is all white men, but that, but white. Yeah. Yeah.

Those who are in power all over the world. Right. And they're afraid. Just, you know, the great replacement theory that came out. You know, that was being purported a few years ago. And so I think that they will just do anything. And we are seeing that. And so I don't know. I don't, I don't know.

I, you know, I don't know here's what I think about the fall of the Roman Empire and we may just have to fall because, I don't think that, I don't think that they're gonna give up. I don't think that those who feel so threatened by the idea of a multicultural system and a multicultural society where we seek fairness, where we seek justice.

I don't think, and we're seeing it all over the world. I mean, so it's not just Trump. It's not just Trump, Eastern Europe. I mean, we're seeing it every, you know, we're seeing who's rising to power [00:25:00] throughout the world. Yeah, yeah, for sure. I, you know, I don't talk about it that much, but my dissertation research was in Brazil looking at the way people think about race and racism in this one area of Brazil in southern baia state.

And it was so fascinating a time to do that because this was back in 2002 and 2003 when I lived there, and they were going through this transition of. Kind of going from people thinking like, oh, well, you know, we're all mixed, we're all Brazilian. There's no racism here to understanding. No. Yeah, there actually is.

And it's affecting black and brown people here. That was Lula ran on a ticket of inclusion, back then, right? Yeah, yeah. I was traveling to Brazil around that time. 2002. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Oh, when he won the first time in Baia, it was a party, right. Yep. I, [00:26:00] I lived there during Lula winning the first time, and Brazil winning the World Cup in 2002.

And I think they were different shirt colors, but equally huge parties. And I mean, that's the fascinating thing about Brazil too, right? They went through their Trump. President, right. Bolsonaro who used the same playbook and now they've, they reelected Lula and Bolsonaro is in jail. And yet here we are.

Yes. I mean, Marisha is your out, how's your outlook? Is it similar to Mary Francis? Is it different in terms of like, you're a different generation? How does that impact how you think about what's going on now? Yeah, I don't, I think that, I don't know, for me if it's a, if it's really a generational difference.

I just see, I think with the work that we do and being so ingrained in seeing how organizations either react to like, you [00:27:00] know, react to DEI or pull back from DEI, shows me where we are and shows me that until. Until there's a shift of power. As Mary Francis, you know, talked about, it would just like, as long as the white, as long as white men or white people are more in power, have more control.

I don't see the shift and I don't know how that happens. I don't, you know, but that's like, to me. And in this, you know, you asked about our feelings early in the early question. One feeling too is just like helpless because I, in this administration that we're in now, knowing that each, you know, branch of government seems to be like just falling in line, that makes me feel help.

Like I just am kind of like, I don't know, I don't know how we get. To, you know, to the change. Even though I do believe that there's power, you know, people have the power. , And so the more that we speak up, the [00:28:00] more that we're out there in the streets protesting, the more that we are sticking up for and supporting those that are.

Marginalized. So even here in Charlotte, like just seeing the community support around with having ice here, I think students in Charlotte walked out like the other day just in protest and yeah. So that type of thing gives me hope, but it's also, I think I'm impatient in some ways. I'm like, how long does it, I don't know how long it takes to do the change and to dismantle it.

So yeah, I mean, I do believe I, we can't. Deep down, I believe we can't be here forever. We're not gonna be in this space forever, but I, it's gonna take a long time. It's gonna take a lot of mindset, heart set changes, and then system changes. Like we just can't continue. We like that to me shows like, okay, we, maybe we need to fix some of these rules or laws or different things.

And so illuminate and highlight some of the cracks in our government and the system [00:29:00] that. We may not have known we're there. And so that, those types of things need to be fixed or corrected. And I just feel like, I do feel like it will change. It's just, it take, yeah. And there is some glimmer of hope.

You know, we've seen statistics. There was a poll that we just quoted in our book, you know, that like 72%. Respondents of this, polls over a thousand people who were polled said that they thought that companies should make commitments, you know, to DEI. So I think we know that it's a minority of people who.

Are, who are anti, you know, DEI, anti fairness. Yeah. But they're the loudest and they have the most power. The power, yeah. Yeah, exactly. And the money. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, talk about like ignoring and gaslighting. I listened to. The panel that SHRM had, the so-called listening across Differences [00:30:00] panel with Van Jones and Robbie Starbuck, and I hope you didn't listen to it.

It's so painful. I did. But like, that's the thing, obviously Robbie Starbuck is ignoring everything that you're talking about in terms of inequities and bias and fatigue and all of it. And that would be one thing, but he's getting platform by SHRM as having like a valid side to this issue. And that's really the horrific part of it because that makes people think that this is okay, that maybe there's something to it.

That I can have that opinion too. And that's really painful. Speaking of Mary Francis, the co-opting of the term, can you tell us how are they. How are they co-opting? What are they trying to make it mean? And what was your initial reaction like, oh my, my God. They're really trying to make it mean that my initial [00:31:00] reaction was what?

I mean, what do you mean? I mean, I just, at first I was like, it was just incredulous to me. It was just like It. Do you mean, so the, so this idea that white people have black fatigue because they're tired of black people misbehaving, black people doing, you know. Breaking the law or whatever they think, you know, black people do in greater abundance , than, you know, than white people.

And so it started this sort of, I don't know if it went really viral, viral, but I mean it did. It was getting a lot of, I tried, yeah, attention on social media and of course many black people were coming to our side, you know, saying You can't do that. You can't take that term. You know, here's the author.

People don't even know, right. Kind of misquoting Me too. But they're okay. But, you know, it's like, you know, she coined this term and then some white people were saying, well, I don't care. She can't have it. You know, she can't own this term. We can, I, I mean, and so , I write about that in the book too, and I say, is that privilege?

Is that, you know, an act of white [00:32:00] supremacy? I mean, I don't know that I would ever. Claim that if I knew somebody had coined a term and just said, well, I don't care. You know, I'm gonna, I'm gonna define it this way. And I mean, and that's been, you know, that's with all, with many of the terms. And we talk about that in the book with, yeah.

With Black Lives Matter. I mean, so there are so many, terms, and that's not new right. About this book, even d ei right. Because I mean Exactly. They really dunno what it means. The main one, right. DDEI. Mm-hmm. And so, but this is not new. I mean, it dates back to, you know, when Frederick Douglas had a platform, you know, that they would, weaponize and demonize, , you know, him and the terms, you know, they even had, a term for .

Slaves escape slaves who escaped, I can't pronounce it, but it was a mental disorder if a, you know. Mm-hmm. So I mean, throughout history, they've turned actions of, you know, of around liberation and around freedom and around fairness as, as negative and as. Things that we need to, you know, to [00:33:00] not support and not even not support, but eliminate, you know, in our society.

And yeah, it's so blatant today, Michael. It's so blatant. I was just speaking a report, from, Kimberly Crenshaw, who is credited with the term, intersectionality from back in the eighties, but she's just a released a port that says anti-blackness is the point. That's, and that's the report that, this is the point of all of this.

And she speaks to how so many black women in particular have been vilified, under Trump, been fired, you know, from their roles, from, you know, the first black woman, you know, particular govern government roles and, how he went after Lisa Cook on the federal Reserve board. And she's, and so we're black women.

You know, we see this, what happened with Kamala Harris? I mean, that glimmer of hope that, oh my gosh, could it be that we might have, black and southeast Asian woman as president of the United States? I mean, we, that was like, that just really, I mean, there [00:34:00] was this moment where we were all feeling so much more hopeful and positiv.

Because we knew, we just knew mm-hmm. That a convicted felon who had done so much damage in his first term, would not be elected again. We couldn't, you know, we just knew that wasn't gonna happen. I didn't sleep. I, I mean, I couldn't sleep for days. I stayed in bed for days after the election. It was, it just, and you know, the impact, as you mentioned earlier, the impact that it's had on our business.

I mean, we had a staff of 20. Come the beginning of the year, we'll have a staff of three. Hmm hmm. I'm so sorry. Yeah, I mean, that and the gas, I mean, you know, I ha I interviewed Kaka Roy who was talking about black women being just statistically the most educated demographic in this country and yet the insults that they throw, you know, low IQ and all that other stuff.[00:35:00] 

It's just so far from the reality, but people buy it because of, like you're saying, the anti-blackness, and the bias. Yeah. I had to get outta bed that morning after the election and do a talk at the Shem Inclusion Conference. No, goodness. I completely rewrote the whole thing at like nine in the morning.

Mm. We've been talking a lot about society in general, but you all work with organizations. How do you, the patience you must have, like to go and do this sort of educating people work. When you're feeling such frustration and cynicism and fatigue, how do you do it? Like , how do you stay that patient to work with people?

Well, I mean, I feel that because this is.

It doesn't feel like work. Like in some sense it feels like work, but it's also like calling our passion. Mm-hmm. To know that what we're doing is [00:36:00] bigger than ourselves. Right. It's something that's like, hopefully going to be a piece in that, creating a better world. Right. And so even though we only have a small piece of it or a blip and you know, but if we can.

If we can be in a session where at least one person gets that aha or changes their mind, or, you know, that starts that, trickle down effect or, you know, in, I think now, like now, it's been a harder, of course, because we do go into situations where we experience a little more resistance than we may have.

Right. And so, mm-hmm. Um, or, or maybe the resistance was there but it wasn't as outspoken. But I think mm-hmm. That we have to remember, like we shared earlier, it's still a minority. Like there's still, it's just a minority of people who feel this way, even though they are, tend to be the loudest.

And so yeah, we are trying to be, and go in there and [00:37:00] speak for those who may not be in the room and be able to share their story, share their experience, and. And it's hard, you know? So I don't know. I guess we have patience, but I think it's just more so like we know we have to do it. Yeah. Passive. Yeah.

You have like, we, if so even Michael, when we talk about DEI, right? The terms and you know, there's still now people talking about changing the language, right? And so let's not use diversity, equity, inclusion. Let's use whatever words they wanna use. And we have that, like we were going back and forth, like, do we change our, the words, do we do this?

And it's, it always comes back to. No. Like we have to stick to our values, stick to what we know is true. And I think that's always, even though it's hard in this time, even though the business isn't coming as it was in 2020, after the murder of George Floyd, but we know that. It's still needed just because you take away the letters out of your organization, you still have the same humans in the organization.

Mm-hmm. You need to [00:38:00] know how to work together, understand how to work together, understand each other, that lived experiences. And so we just wanna stay true to our values. And so I think it's just when we continue to go back to that place and understand why we are here and doing it, that helps. Yeah. Helps to get through.

For sure. And that moment, you know, that summer of 2020 after the murder of George Floyd, like you talked about businesses and their commitments, you know, some of which were real and some of which were pretty performative. But there was also the sort of cultural. Openness, like you, like all the book clubs that were formed, the white people reading about history and racism and all of that.

Like the humility that seemed to be there by so many people, like, that's not there anymore. I mean, how do you, [00:39:00] what do you, how do you react to that moment and did it feel hopeful and promising? And then now where we are. Think that, you know, white people, by and large, they don't live the experience and so they don't really have to, care about it.

They could care about it on the surface. I mean, so I'm not saying, I think most white people would say, oh, racism is horrible. It's bad. Right, right. I believe that. Yeah. I don't know that most think that they need to really do anything about it or that it's their responsibility or that they have the attention span because it is such hard work.

Mm-hmm. And so when you start saying, you know, let's read these historical narratives, it's painful. Right. And so if it's not impacting, you know, we, United States anyway, is a very individualistic, you know, society. And so if it's not impacting me, I can care about [00:40:00] it, but I don't necessarily feel like I need to do anything about it.

You know, why do so many of us gravitate to this work? You know, over 300,000 black women have lost their jobs and many of them were either directly involved in this work or in allied Fields, right? Yeah. So why do we do it? We do it because we live it. Mm-hmm. To, not only raise awareness. But work to create societies where the next generation doesn't have to deal with the day to day microaggressions and, slights and not being accepted, not feeling like you belong.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Feeling that you have to defend yourself, defend your presence, defend your humanity. Right. And we've seen that so much in the, you know, in, in the, you know, in, we've seen it happening for people who are in the limelight. For example, Keji Brown Jackson, her [00:41:00] path to the Supreme Court, she was so criticized as being not qualified.

And I think it was, Washington posted something. She was the most qualified of anybody on the bench. She had more credentials than anybody, than any of them. And yet, and still she was, criticized as being low intelligence and Right. You know. Yeah. Yeah. Well that's the sort of the insidiousness of that co-opting too of DEI and meritocracy and all of that, making it seem that anybody of color who's got their position did it because of something other than their, you know, their qualifications, right.

Them out. Which is so wild too, right, Michael? Because when you see people in government, in leadership positions. That have no credentials to where they're, but yeah, so it's just Right. It's mind boggling. But yeah. And the un that, that people don't [00:42:00] see, you know, like. A few episodes back, I had FS Henderson on who was talking about you have to work twice as hard to get half as far.

That people don't see that and realize, they see as opposite, but they see it as our, like it's our problem that we have not gotten, you know, it's not there. There's not the barrier, there's no barriers in place. It's just because you. Your own choice, your own decision, like, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I went around with a videographer and asked people what are some of the things they experience at work that make them feel bad, and other people don't even realize it. And one that is such a light bulb for people is this black woman talking about how people always call her so professional, and she's like.

As opposed to what, like someone with my hair or who looks like me or who sounds like me wouldn't be professional. And that sometimes can be a light bulb for people. And I know you all talked about professional hair [00:43:00] in, in the book as well. And as you put it, it seems like something so obvious and even laughable that we have to have laws about what kind of hair can be allowed in places of work.

And so sometimes that's a light bulb for people, but it's, it doesn't always even work. You still get all the, like, the defensiveness is wild. Yeah, and it's, and even with the hair thing too, I've been seeing clips, Michelle Obama has been going around recently sharing just her experience of being the first, lady and how her hair, right.

She was very conscious of like how her hair was and wearing braids because you know, like when you have, when black women have their hair and braids, it's easier to maybe keep more. Quote unquote looking tame or looking like professional to your point, right, Michael? So it's, and so she was very conscious of that.

And now that she's out of that spotlight, she feels more free. But she brought up that, like that the women, black women in [00:44:00] their hair, that's a big thing. It's a huge, huge thing. And, which it shouldn't be. Like, to your point, it's laughable. It's kind of like, why do we have to have a, the Crown Act to make sure that we're not discriminated against for how we wear our hair in the workplace.

Right. So, right. So, yeah. Yeah. And that's like one, one little thing out of, you know Right. Thousands of things, that, that trigger these biases for people and that, you know, I mean, many of which. So ridiculous. It's so hard to believe that we're still having to talk about it. One thing that's super important in your book is thinking about children and what they experience and what they learn and how they learn it.

I wonder if you could talk about just why is that so important when thinking about this topic? You know, obviously, you know the formative years, right? So what, yeah. Children learn in the formative years, you [00:45:00] know, carries with them and yeah, you know, I know ma and I both tell our stories and when I told my story about it was when I was five years old that I was called the N word.

And I didn't really know what it meant because my parents didn't use that kind of language in the house, but it stuck with me. You know, to this day I remember that. I remember that moment. It's like so, you know, so vividly. And, so I think that children are, you know, we'd say children are impressionable, you know, and they truly are.

And when children are not taught that they are special in a value, have a positive framing for themselves. Yeah. That leads then to all of the things that we see. If people are telling you, you are not good enough, you are less than. That's what you begin to believe in the book we talk about, MA's brother and my son, until fourth grade, Joe was a problem.

I mean, he kept being a problem and now you know, he's a graduate of Harvard, duke, and Princeton and he is a good professor. Just. Gone from Duke to now he's at, gonna be at Rutgers. He was a [00:46:00] valedictorian of his high school class. You know, he got a full scholarship to Harvard because of his academics.

But before that, before, and it was a white male, fourth grade teacher who said, you know. I, I don't think there's anything wrong with Joe, except I think he's just brilliant Uhhuh. And once we turned, re, once we reframed that because we even, we were buying into, you know, Joe's a problem, he's a problem. Once we stopped buying into that and saw him as brilliant, then he started act like.

You know? Mm. Yeah. And so I think that it's really important and for children not to have the books and the images and the role models to know about, you know, f Fred from Frederick Douglas to Malcolm X, to everybody, to Marcus Garvey, to everybody in between. Right. And, and, you know, don't let me leave out some of the women, you know, Tony Morrison.

Sojourner Truth and to not know. I remember, and I write about this in the book, I remember I didn't know have any idea who so Journa Truth was, but my best friend, [00:47:00] Alida in seventh grade got up and read an essay about Sojourner Truth and we were all, even the teacher, 'cause she was a great writer. Alida was just, you know, a great, we were all just stunned.

And I thought, there's this black woman that. Right. And I, I mean, so that just changed my thinking from then on. That's when I became more of an activist and just am much more, you know, around understanding, understanding black power and black people. Mm-hmm. So if we don't allow our children to have this education and to see themselves as brilliant and beautiful and, you know, then what is the next generation gonna be like?

Right. Right. And, and it, and it's all that. And sometimes I even think about like, what names are we using in books for math Word problems, right? Mm-hmm. What, what pictures are on the wall, right? Like all the subtle things, right, that can decenter whiteness from [00:48:00] our schools that people don't always think about, but which are.

Absolutely vital for kids and they can be so subtle. Just in general, the messaging right now is just white anti-black. The only people that matter is white people like that is the message. Even this immigration situation, they're using the word immigration, and we know immigrants, there's way more immigrants than just Latino, but that's when they're going to these cities.

That's who they're targeting. So it's not, they're not going after immigrants. They're going after Latinos, they're going after brown people. You know? So it's like, yeah. When we name that and start naming what it really is, it's, and that's also a frustrating piece for me. It's like, stop this thing.

Oh. Or it's immigrants. Immigrants, like. Yes, they're immigrants, but it's also like you're going after a very specific group of immigrants. Yeah. So, yeah. Yeah. No, white South Africans are fine. [00:49:00] Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. And a lot of people getting terrorized are not immigrants. I mean, they were born here. Right. And that's, yes, exactly.

Yeah. Right. And that's what we were talking about earlier. It's the physical identification, you know, being able to look at somebody and say, oh, you are not white. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, and oh, oh gosh, that's a whole, yeah, that's a whole mental podcast. What, like, I love, I love the chapter too, about. Solutions and what could actually make a difference here in this country, because I think sometimes people just think like.

Like you can do it passively. Like, oh, we just wait for the older generation to die off and then we'll be fine. Which is so not the way it's gonna happen as we can see right now. I mean, the young right. The racism of the [00:50:00] young white men Yeah. Is shocking. So like what, how are you thinking about solutions like.

Do you have what gives? I mean, you talked about some things that give you hope, but are there some things that give you hope on a big scale that any of that could happen? I just think that, you know, there has to come a point in time where there's this tipping point. There used to be, what was this analogy we used to use when the, this,

the, oil spill. Oil spill. Yeah. That analogy that says you had a choice. You could either jump in the water or run into the fire. So you had to do something, right? So what are we gonna do? Are we gonna jump in the water and think we're gonna be, are we gonna, but we have to do something. So you get to a point where you have to do something.

And I guess I have to hold hope that we're going to . Jump in the water and it's gonna be warm water and water where we can all, you know, where we can all survive. And not only [00:51:00] survive, but get to a place where it's, so for me it's about the heart. Get to a place where our hearts. Are not hardened.

Mm-hmm. Where we are a society of compassion and caring and we recognize that diversity just is the way the world was made. Right. Just is right. And that our challenge is to figure out ways. To make it work. Mm-hmm. So that it benefits us all. I mean, that's, that's, yeah. We, you know, that's the work we do, Michael, right?

That's the work, right. , How do we create systems and societies and workplaces and cultures, that value, that diversity just is, was the way that mm-hmm. Work world was made. And how do we create, right. And so, until we get to that point where in the hearts. , The hearts and minds, I think.

But it starts with the heart. Mm-hmm. 'cause if my heart is there, then perhaps I'm willing to be [00:52:00] educated. Mm-hmm. Yeah. But if my heart's not there and somebody's telling me we gotta learn more about black people, my heart's not there. You know? I'm like, you know, so, yeah. And I think that's where I think that the religious leaders come into play.

I meant, as I mentioned, I just wrote this blog post because I was walking the other day. I was just out for my morning walk. I said, where's the clergy? You know, why aren't they outraged? Why aren't they telling people, no, this is wrong. You're being mean and nasty and violent towards your fellow citizens smashing cars and ripping children from their mother's arms.

Don't even know who they're. It got, and you hear about Pope. Pope Leo did come out yesterday. I don't know if you put that in your post I did was part of it. Yes, I did. I did. So Pop, pop Leo has. So I think that is starting like that probably because you know when the po the peaks for many, like that is a, but it was, for me, it was still too mild.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. You know, I think [00:53:00] even by calling it out, like I think just. Fact of calling it out. Like the, that's part of it. It's like for this mm-hmm. It hasn't even been a full year. You know, we've been in this new administration and for the long, like, even in the beginning I was like, oh, it's this can't keep going.

But it then just keeps going, going, but I think, and it's getting worse, right? And so it's like, and we're not here. I'm like, where are the people? Where's the outrage? Where are the people calling out? So I think now starting to hear that even though it's may not be as strong, it's like, okay. Maybe to your point, there's the glimmer, there's the little, the glimmer glint of pope because somebody said something that the whole world, I mean, for the popes, they, it, the whole world heard that, not just us.

Right. Exactly. Like the whole world hears that. So for me, yeah. So it's like those, but I'd like to see him come together with clergy and religious leaders from other faiths. Right, right. So, I mean, I know Catholicism is probably the largest of the. Of the Christian faiths. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

And what about [00:54:00] if you had, what about business leaders? Like if you could get 30 seconds to tell business leaders something about how they could, like whatever's happening out there in the world, at least it's not gonna happen here with us. Like, what would you tell them? I don't know if I have the 32nd soundbite, but I did wanna share that, you know, we are like the elf, the CEO of elf, a cosmetic company recently came out and talked about how DEI like we're, you know, it is important.

It does help business. So I think seeing more of that because. Ultimately, like I like for me too, it's hard to understand why are they not speaking out right? Why are they not saying, no, this has helped me, like this has helped our business. You see what happened to Target so clearly going the opposite direction is not working.

So I don't, and again, we talk about the power, the money, so maybe there's things behind the scenes. I don't understand why people don't speak out.[00:55:00] 

There are, like, there are still those CEOs even that the El CEO talked about. Yeah. It, you know, I talked to other CEOs who get it and who still support this and think so, and then we've seen the, the shareholder votes, right? With certain some com, like the anti DI proposals and they're voting against it.

So there is power in. That stuff also doesn't get shared enough, right? It's like, so the things we hear more frequently is the negative part of what all that's going on, and that's what the news wants to put out. I wish that we could hear more so that we know, like, okay, so it's not all like, it's not all doom and gloom from that perspective.

Not everybody's taking, pulling back from DEI, even though it feels like everybody is, but you have those moments. So my note to them would be like, talk to the elf, CEO and can you all get together too, like as a, you know, the group of CEOs and the group of university leaders. [00:56:00] You know, get together and form a group or coalition against this to push back because Right.

And just say this, you know, this needs to stop. This needs to stop. So. This has been amazing. , Wrapping up, you know, I always like to give people things they could go out and do today or tomorrow if they wanted to. One of those things is that, is you gotta read black fatigue. Like you just, if you go into that book with an open mind.

If you go in with an open mind, there's no way you come out of it, not transformed. So that's one thing I would tell people to do. What would you both add that people could do? I would say that people, you know, could really get educated and that, you know, reading black fatigue is just one, one way and it's start to get educated.

So what is the opposite of woke? It's to be asleep, right? [00:57:00] So I would suggest people wake up, be woke, be woke, be woke to what is happening, how people are suffering, and recognize that as Dr. Martin Luther King said, what affects one of us directly affects all of us indirectly. I'm, I'll phrase it, but it was something similar.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. I love it. Yeah. I, you we're all like, we're all this idea of interconnectedness. We're all connected. So black fatigue is not just a black people issue. It's everybody's issue. And so I would want people to understand that, to question what they're, you know, everything we hear, we should question, do our own research.

So back to that education. You know, educate yourself. Don't just take somebody's word for it. Don't even take our word for it. Educate, you know, educate yourself on all the things from black fatigue to everything we discussed in this podcast about [00:58:00] what's going on in the world and do. I think sometimes people think, oh, I have to do this huge thing to make the change.

No. Like, we're individual people. We like, we can't do such huge things necessarily in our, so do what you can within your sphere of influence and every day commit to something that's gonna make. The world better, the country better, you know, the lives of historically marginalized people better.

Yeah. And I did want to add, we did not tell you this when you asked us about what's new. Mm-hmm. So this won't be in the book, but we're creating a companion workbook called Healing Black Fatigue Practices for Renewal Resistance and Joy. Life fatigue is heavy. The book is heavy, right? It's a lot of just, and we do, there are moments where we talk about things you could do.

We talk about self-care, we talk about different things, but it still is like, if you read it, we, there was somebody recently who said they have the first edition and they have not been able to read it because it's just like, so, you know, it's like I, they don't, that [00:59:00] will add more fatigue. So this is kind of that, what do you do next?

How do you combat, black fatigue? So I wanted to add that, that, that will also coming out with the book as well. Wonderful. Thank you for bringing that up. That's great. All right, Mary Francis Marisha, thank you so much for being here. I really appreciate it. I know our listeners appreciate it, so thank you so much.

Thank you for having us. Thank you for having us. Thank you so much. All right. Be well. Take care. All right, you too.

All right everyone. Welcome back. Now you've got your homework assignments. Mary Francis talked about education being so critical. I know this episode in and of itself was some education. I talked about reading her book. I wanted to give you some other ideas. To, you know, last week we talked about documentaries, right?

Documentary films. If you love documentaries, if you're a visual [01:00:00] learner, check out the documentary by Ava DuVernay, called 13th. I think it's on Netflix still. If you're someone who has, I don't know, a lot of time in cars or something, and you listen to a lot of podcasts. Check out the podcast 1619.

Those are great resources for you as well. If, you know, it's hard to actually sit down and read a book, and I know for some people that's not your preferred method of education. One final note here, if you are listening to this right when it comes out. You're in the us. We're heading into the Thanksgiving holiday.

People love this holiday. I love this holiday, and I can't imagine celebrating it unquestioningly like without even thinking about Native Americans and the real histories of this country. It's so important to not just [01:01:00] believe the myths about our country, but to be real about histories, even if they're painful.

Now in our family, we don't just have one tradition for Thanksgiving. Sometimes we're at other people's houses. Sometimes people are coming here. Sometimes we're with family, sometimes we're with friends. I even raised turkeys, heritage turkeys for a few years here on the farm. They're, gosh, they're beautiful.

But r rounding them up and bringing them to someone to have them, you know, got to have someone get 'em ready for Thanksgiving was not fun. So I haven't done that for a while. But okay. Back to Thanksgiving. You know how sometimes before the meal people may say something, maybe a prayer, maybe a toast, maybe some words.

Sometimes multiple people say things. I'll often say something. About remembering and honoring the real history of [01:02:00] Native Americans in this country. That seems especially important to me, especially with children around my children, other children, nieces and nephews or friends and their kids. It doesn't take away from my holiday to do that.

It adds to it, right? But people have a strange relationship with these painful histories, and I have actually ruined, I have inadvertently ruined at least one Thanksgiving by doing this. I've also other times been shushed as I do this remembrance. It's complicated. I wrote a little something about this six years ago.

Or rather, I wrote something about the movie Frozen Two. I know that might seem like it has nothing to do with Thanksgiving, but in a lot of ways what I wrote about does, and so I'm gonna put a link to that in the show notes in case you wanna read something. Very short, about this and do it before Thanksgiving.

I think [01:03:00] it's interesting to do. As always, reach out to me with any questions or thoughts, michael@cultureadvantagepodcast.com. Be well. Have a wonderful break if you're getting one, and we will talk next week.

So that's it for today's episode and the Culture Advantage Podcast. Head on over Apple Podcast iTunes or wherever you listen and subscribe to the show. One lucky listener. Every single week that posts review on Apple Podcasts or iTunes, we'll win a chance in the grand prize drawing to win a $25,000.

Private VIP day with Michael himself. Be sure to head on over to culture advantage podcast.com and pick up a free copy of Michael's gift and join us on the next [01:04:00] episode.