0:01

We can talk about the hardware and software

0:03

all day, but social technologies

0:06

like trust, like mutuality,

0:08

we have to invest as much intellectual

0:11

and emotional energy into honing

0:13

those, building those practicing those.

0:15

It doesn't come natural, and so part

0:17

of what we're doing is trying to prototype

0:20

new relationships amongst ourselves.

0:23

Like well, our tagline within the lab is

0:25

be careful with each other so we can

0:27

be dangerous together. Welcome

0:32

to How to Citizen with Baritune Day, a

0:34

podcast that reimagine citizen as

0:36

a verb, not a legal status. This

0:39

season is all about how we practice

0:41

democracy, what can we get rid of, what

0:44

can we invent, and how do we change the culture

0:46

of democracy itself. We're leaving the

0:48

theoretical clouds and hitting the ground

0:50

with inspiring examples of people

0:53

and institutions that are showing us new

0:55

ways to govern ourselves. I

1:03

first came across the name Ruha

1:05

Benjamin, such a great sounding

1:07

name, during the peak of my rebellion

1:10

against technology and my realization that

1:12

it was causing a lot of harm. It

1:16

was the fall of twenty eighteen. I

1:19

was living in New York City and working out

1:21

of a place called the Data in Society Research

1:23

Institute. Which is about what it sounds

1:25

like. They're focused on the impact

1:28

of data centric technologies on society

1:31

and how they affect people, especially

1:33

those in marginalized communities. Ruha

1:36

was coming through to talk about her new book, Race

1:39

After Technology, a book that was

1:41

saying out loud and imprint a lot

1:43

of the things that I'd also been feeling and thinking

1:45

and saying. In particular, she

1:48

coined this phrase the new

1:50

gym code. I mean, come

1:52

on now, I'm a sucker for wordplay. That's amazing,

1:55

And this is basically her definition of

1:57

the new gym code. Using technology

2:00

to reflect or even reproduce existing

2:02

inequalities, while concealing

2:05

that by promoting the tech with

2:07

the language of progress and

2:10

objectivity that masks

2:12

the fact that it's built on the discrimination from

2:14

a previous era. I cheered

2:16

when I saw that because it echoed my own

2:18

statements around the time that we might

2:20

find the civil rights battles of the future

2:23

harder to win because they'd be encoded

2:25

in this technocentric language

2:27

of progress and fairness and equality.

2:30

But the systems will actually make us

2:32

more oppressed by literally codifying

2:35

discrimination in the data

2:37

in tech that's based on our unjust

2:40

past. We'd write history into

2:42

our futures, and not in a good way. So

2:50

Ruha was saying all that and so

2:52

much more. When I saw her three

2:54

years later at south By Southwest in twenty

2:56

twenty two, she was moderating a panel

2:59

on a virtual and augmented reality

3:01

experience that beautifully honored

3:03

the life of Brianna Taylor. Sadly,

3:06

we know about Brianna because the Louisville

3:08

Metro Police shot and killed her in the

3:11

summer of twenty twenty. In this

3:13

case, technology was being used

3:15

to help a family and a community remember

3:17

Brianna's life, not just her death, and

3:20

ultimately help them heal. Ruha

3:23

was helping show a different and more positive experience

3:26

of technology and its impact. Along

3:29

with bringing community connection and facilitation

3:31

to the front of her fight for justice. Ruha

3:34

is echoing that same joy and warmth

3:36

that Adrian Marie Brown brought us at the start

3:39

of this season, and her work connects

3:41

to the way we think about citizen as a verb. Here

3:43

at the show, our four pillars

3:46

show up and participate, invest in relationships,

3:49

understand power, and value the collective

3:52

are things she practices, not just

3:54

preaches, Especially on relationships

3:56

and power. She does much of that practice

3:58

as founding director of the Data

4:00

Lab at Princeton, where she also teaches. The

4:03

lab is focused on rethinking and retooling

4:05

the relationship between stories and statistics,

4:08

power and technology, data

4:10

and justice. They invite community

4:13

based organizations to partner with them

4:15

on building technologies that meet their

4:17

needs, from mapping the work of companies

4:20

engaged in immigrants surveillance and developing

4:22

tools for formerly incarcerated small business

4:24

owners, to creating playbooks about black

4:26

maternal mental health and resources

4:28

for tenants facing eviction. And that's

4:31

just naming a few.

4:34

I consider Uja to be a kindred

4:36

spirit and it's so cool to finally

4:38

have her on the show. Now. We got

4:41

together in front of a live i RL

4:43

audience in New York in September twenty twenty

4:46

two. It was part of a conference and

4:48

festival called Unfinished. I've been

4:50

hosting that event for three years

4:52

straight because it's so well aligned with what we do

4:54

here at How to Citizen. This

4:56

gathering is predicated on interpreting

4:58

the project of a mer the possibilities

5:01

of technology, even democracy itself,

5:04

as well as Unfinished, especially

5:07

in this moment where both democracy and

5:09

technology feel like they're on the precipice

5:12

of something, something great or

5:15

something terrible. While it unfinished,

5:17

Ruhat and I sat down for a special live

5:20

taping of Hot to Citizen, which you'll hear

5:22

right after. We pay for this podcast with an ad break.

5:33

Yes, Yes, smatterings of applause

5:36

are encouraged, encouraged,

5:39

Thank you. We're here

5:41

first context on the podcast,

5:44

which I assume you all listened to religiously.

5:46

But there may be one person who's never heard

5:48

of podcasting and hasn't gotten

5:50

around to the billion that exists in the world. The

5:52

premise of our show is that we interpret

5:55

the word citizen as a verb, and

5:57

we see it as an opportunity to include people

6:00

in the process, as opposed to this noun that

6:03

divides us from one another, separating

6:05

people across imagine every line. And

6:07

so I'm sitting here with you, Ruha, because

6:09

of your book, and I was I here yelling

6:11

in these Internet streets about

6:14

you know, the bias baked into the system

6:16

and they're making us new digital slaves

6:18

and black box. First of why I got

6:20

to be a black box? Why can't just be another obfuscated

6:22

box? Why I gotta be black? So I

6:25

feel like you gotta reruha. You gotta reruha.

6:27

So I came across Raced after technology

6:29

the New You Gym Code, after having

6:32

already read the New Gym Chrome many years prior.

6:34

And I would love to know to start us off,

6:38

how you're weaving of

6:41

medicine and technology and technological

6:43

systems with ideas of power

6:46

and ultimately liberation, which we'll get to. Where

6:48

does that come from for you? Yes, so

6:51

many origin stories. First of all, Hi

6:53

everyone, good to see you. I'm so

6:56

thrilled to be in conversation with Bartunde,

6:58

whose work I read I first started

7:00

teaching as a young assistant professor BU

7:03

and it was the first and only book

7:05

that had me cackling on

7:08

the airplane, like to the to

7:10

everyone around. It was mad because I was reading

7:12

this and just loved how incisive,

7:15

how brilliant, how you use humor

7:17

to get us to open our hearts in our minds. So

7:19

thank you. So she's referring to how to Be

7:21

Black, Yes, which if you haven't bought

7:23

your Races, that's

7:26

just the marketing sciences, not it's

7:29

not accusing you back. So

7:32

I just I have been a

7:34

huge fan of bartun Day's work for a

7:36

long time. Um, so so many

7:38

origin stories, you know, when someone asked you, how did

7:40

you start? And also I'll try to just distill

7:43

perhaps two quick personal

7:46

experiences or times in my life that

7:48

have led me to this work. One is

7:50

as a young in growing up in

7:53

Los Angeles. Imagine

7:55

little seven or eight year old Ruha in

7:57

the back of her grandma's gold Chrysler

8:00

cruising down Crenshaw Boulevar exactly

8:04

and how many times have I heard that? So,

8:09

you know, and just being you know,

8:11

just a wide eyed young kid,

8:15

you know, and passing

8:17

by this one moment, passing by a

8:20

group of boys from my school lined up

8:22

against the fence very close to my house

8:25

being patted down very aggressively and

8:28

shamefully, and just kind of

8:30

catching their eye as I'm

8:33

in the back seat and seeing that

8:35

very overt form of policing

8:37

that wasn't just meant to shame them

8:40

and control them, but it felt like

8:42

a message to all of us about

8:45

where we belonged and what we were,

8:47

what we could expect, and that was reinforced

8:50

and amplified in many, many different ways,

8:52

most notably just the

8:54

everyday audible experience of

8:56

police helicopters rumbling overhead

8:59

in Los Angeles, you know, as a resident,

9:01

and just the literal wall shaking in my

9:03

grandma's house a periodic intervals. So I

9:05

think of us as being in police

9:08

occupied neighborhoods,

9:10

and so, you know, as a young mother,

9:12

then I remember times putting my boys

9:14

to sleep in that same house and the lights

9:17

of the helicopters shining in and waking

9:19

them up, and so this very physical

9:21

presence of policing. Then realizing

9:24

that, oh, there are other less visible,

9:27

less audible ways in which

9:29

surveillance technologies are being deployed

9:31

that perhaps are even more dangerous because

9:33

I can't point to them, because I can't

9:35

see them. And so it sort of led me to

9:37

look behind the screen, look at things that

9:40

are out of sight but are nevertheless

9:42

classifying people controlling our lives

9:44

and in very harmful ways. And

9:47

so there's this experience of just being

9:49

someone who understands

9:51

what it is like to be watched and

9:54

not seen that has led

9:56

to this work. The other origin

9:58

story comes from being a

10:00

young mother. I had my sons in my

10:02

twenties and living

10:05

in Atlanta, Georgia at the time, and

10:08

with my first son, realizing

10:10

what the experience was probably going to be like with

10:12

childbirth and the overly medicalized

10:15

approach to childbirth in this country, and

10:17

understanding that there are different schools

10:19

of childbirth. There's the conventional

10:22

obstetrics medicalized approach

10:24

to childbirth that we're familiar with and

10:26

that I Binge watched when I was pregnant

10:28

with the birth story, and just understanding

10:31

what I could expect if I

10:33

had my child in a hospital, which

10:35

is that the schedules of other people would

10:38

proceed mine that I could expect

10:40

various technologies that I may not necessarily

10:43

need, that can be life saving in some

10:45

situations but have become normalized. And

10:48

for those who don't know, the experience of black

10:50

women in particular in our healthcare

10:53

settings and childbirth in particular is

10:55

astronomically worse than everyone

10:58

else. But I learned

11:00

about midwiff free, a different approach where

11:02

you can either have your child in a hospital,

11:05

a birth center at home with the

11:07

accompaniment of dulas

11:09

and midwives birthworkers, and

11:12

the experience is much much different. Centers

11:14

the woman or birth in person, centers

11:16

our autonomy, our dignity

11:20

is based on respect and mutuality

11:22

and trust, and that's what

11:24

I chose to do. And that's when I became

11:27

critical of both authoritative

11:29

forms of knowledge, whether whatever

11:31

sciences or medicine that is,

11:33

but also that other forms of

11:35

expertise that

11:38

exist and that are often sort

11:40

of marginalized and discounted

11:43

in the form in this case of childbirthing

11:45

knowledge, and also became

11:47

critical of the overabundance of technology

11:50

in our lives that we may not necessarily need.

11:53

But that just gives you a sense of my critical

11:55

take on when

11:57

things are being sold to us

12:00

as a straightforward good without

12:02

thinking carefully about how they're actually

12:05

being experienced. Would you describe this

12:07

as your critical race

12:10

theory? Yes, yes,

12:14

I would, Yes, I

12:16

would leap that out.

12:19

I want the people a Georgia.

12:21

But they hear this exactly. Midwifery

12:25

is actually a good and unexpected segue.

12:28

I'd like to spend the bulk of the remainder

12:30

of our time in this word

12:32

seeds and in midwifing

12:35

new ideas of design,

12:37

justice, of freedom, of thriving, of liberation.

12:40

One effort that you've undertaken is to

12:42

create the Ida B. Wells

12:45

Just Data Lab at Princeton.

12:48

What is that? Yeah, I'm happy

12:50

to talk about that. Because that means we get to talk

12:52

about my students, yes, which

12:55

is where a lot of my optimism, hope,

12:57

and energy comes from is getting to hang

12:59

out with eighteen to twenty two year olds

13:01

all day who are both critical

13:04

and creative in their approaches. And so

13:06

Ida B. Wells I

13:08

named it after Ida B

13:10

Wells because, and

13:15

now an explainer to today if

13:17

you're not familiar. Ida B. Wells was

13:19

a civil rights leader, suffragette, and investigative

13:22

journalist who lived from eighteen sixty

13:24

two to nineteen thirty one. She's best

13:26

known for her work documenting racial terror

13:28

lynchings in the United States, and her most

13:31

famous work is The Red Record, an

13:33

historic effort to quantify lynchings

13:35

in the US after slavery.

13:41

I named it after Ida

13:43

B Wells because for many

13:45

reasons, but one very personal

13:47

reason is that her grandson was my

13:49

dissertation advisor, doctor

13:51

Troy Duster, and so I've felt a kinship

13:54

with her, her family and that legacy

13:57

because he's the one who brought me into this

13:59

field of theology of science, knowledge

14:01

and medicine, and so as a tribute

14:04

to that legacy, and also because

14:07

she used both statistics and

14:09

stories to shine a light on

14:13

what is ailing us and the forms

14:15

of violence and injustice. And it's that combination

14:18

those different tools that we need the

14:20

data, but the data itself is not going to save

14:23

us, because people can tell all kinds

14:25

of stories about data to justify

14:27

all kinds of things. And so it's that

14:30

marrying of the narrative with

14:33

the statistics that she modeled

14:35

so brilliantly in the Red Record,

14:38

and that I wanted to use as a beacon for

14:40

my own students. So these are students

14:42

who aren't necessarily in my classes,

14:44

some of them are. They come from many different

14:47

disciplines from the STEM side, humanity,

14:49

social sciences, but they share

14:51

an underlying desire

14:54

to engage in what we call

14:56

tech justice, and so thinking

14:59

about technol oology not just as

15:01

hardware software, but taking

15:03

the stories as seriously as we

15:05

do the software. So we have artists

15:07

up in there. We have people who

15:10

didn't necessarily take a single computer science

15:12

class, but who are bringing a different skill set

15:14

and approach. And one of the ways

15:17

that we've structured the lab is that we collaborate

15:19

with community based organizations insanity,

15:25

humane and consensual.

15:28

That is not the technology

15:30

that so many of us have been subjected

15:33

to in an autocratic kind of way,

15:35

literally as subjects to someone else's will,

15:38

And say, you're describing really

15:40

all those words, this consensual,

15:43

respectful relationship where

15:45

it is a feature not a bug, that someone

15:48

who isn't a computer programmer is involved

15:51

in the programming because non

15:53

programmers are going to be living with these technologies.

15:56

So what sorts of critical

15:58

and creative work have been

16:00

prototyped and researched in this last

16:02

so as I was saying, we take our

16:04

marching orders from the organizations

16:07

that we collaborate with. Rather than study

16:09

them or bring ideas to

16:11

them, we ask what would

16:13

help you as an organizer? What would help

16:15

you as an organization do

16:18

your work better? Silicon Valley, are you

16:20

listening? You have to

16:22

prebake the solution, talk

16:24

to those who are most impacted.

16:27

Whether we have a team working on housing

16:29

justice, we have a team working on workers

16:32

rights, we have a team working on maternal

16:34

mortality. And they collaborate with organizations

16:36

all over the country, some in Canada and elsewhere.

16:39

But again, so getting the questions

16:42

from the source right, And so when we

16:44

think about design justice,

16:46

we think about collaboration. Most

16:49

corners of our world, like if you go to

16:51

NSF National Science Foundation and get a grant,

16:53

they'll tell you better have a community organization

16:56

involved. But oftentimes we're involving

16:58

them much later in the process,

17:00

right, And sometimes it's window dressing. Sometimes

17:03

it's theatrical in terms of

17:05

showing that you have this community

17:07

support, rather than starting at

17:10

the very very beginning and find

17:12

out what questions should we be asking

17:15

as researchers, as a lab

17:17

and get the questions and get the insights

17:20

from the start that let that be directed

17:22

by our partners. And

17:24

so if you go to the Just Data

17:27

Lab dot org and go to the projects

17:29

tab, you'll see a wide range of

17:31

projects that have come out of it, whether

17:34

it's dealing with police surveillance. Oftentimes

17:37

we're casting the light back on

17:39

power, going back to how to citizen.

17:42

Rather than studying the most

17:44

vulnerable who are trying to navigate hostile

17:47

systems, we say, who's creating this vulnerability,

17:49

who's creating this risk? Let's

17:52

actually point our digital lens

17:54

and collect data and shine a light

17:56

on upstream what's creating

17:58

these problems. So I'm

18:00

going back to the pictures you initially painted

18:03

of these brothers with their hands up on the wall being

18:06

subject to an ill system,

18:09

and I'm imagining a world where your lab

18:12

is talking to them, yes, and working backwards

18:14

up the stream. What have been some of the

18:17

results and at least feedback, especially

18:20

from the community members, from being

18:22

much more involved in creating their

18:24

own solutions. Yes, and so you

18:27

know, one example of one of the

18:29

organizations that we have learned

18:31

from is called Stop LAPD

18:34

Spine Coalition. You may have heard

18:36

of them, very subtle name.

18:38

Well, I don't know if I know what they're about. Yeah,

18:41

exactly, the Stop LAPD Spine

18:43

Coalition. And so they have modeled for

18:45

us in their advocacy, in their

18:48

research is they base their

18:50

own advocacy and organizing on

18:52

talking to community members first. So they

18:54

created a survey and with

18:56

a whole range of questions about what

18:59

it feels like to be watched and

19:01

all of the different ways that people might not know

19:04

what surveillance means, They might not know what predictive

19:06

policing means. But when you break it down and say,

19:08

has X, Y and Z have you experienced

19:11

this? Have people in your family experiences

19:13

has this happened to you? Then that is an

19:15

abundance of knowledge that might not necessarily

19:17

have the latest jargon and lingo attached

19:19

to it, but it's a form of deep experiential

19:22

knowledge upon which then they're

19:24

organizing and their advocacy work has

19:27

been built, and they have been so successful

19:29

in actually beginning to change some of the policies

19:31

putting moratory on certain predictive policing

19:34

practices in LA. But that has

19:36

been based on actually listening

19:38

to people, right, so basic,

19:41

Yeah, but it's also what I resonate

19:43

with about that is how does

19:45

it make you feel? Yes? What is it

19:47

like to live like this? And I think we can be

19:49

very abstracted away from other people's experiences

19:52

when they're statistics and a

19:54

word surveillance is not a deeply emotional

19:56

word, factly but not

19:59

trusting. Yes, we know that

20:01

feeling and we don't like that feeling.

20:03

And I'm just imagining some of the other words from my own

20:05

experience that if we could build

20:08

deeper sympathies and empathies around the

20:10

shared emotion, we don't want to project

20:12

that onto other people. It's something that we will want to experience

20:14

ourselves. Yes, yes, anything

20:17

else you want to brag on from from your just data

20:19

student, now, I would just

20:22

really encourage you know. Part

20:24

of it is just as much

20:26

about the process as the endpoints,

20:29

the projects, or the outputs

20:31

we call them outputs, yeah, that you can find.

20:33

And so a lot of this has to do with creating

20:36

new forms of relationships because

20:38

we can talk about the hardware and software

20:40

all day, but social technologies

20:43

like trust, like mutuality,

20:46

we have to invest as much intellectual

20:48

and emotional energy into honing

20:50

those, building those practicing those.

20:52

It doesn't come natural. We have to actually

20:55

price on it, no can't. You

20:57

can't know, and so there's not as much invest

21:00

in it, right, And so part of

21:02

what we're doing is trying to prototype

21:04

new relationships amongst

21:07

ourselves. Like well, our tagline within

21:09

the lab is be careful with

21:11

each other so we can be dangerous

21:13

together. So this is a way of

21:16

you know, treating one another that yeah,

21:18

okay, all right now, because

21:21

you know, for me it's important

21:23

because I have seen from the outside

21:26

so many really noble undertakings

21:29

where the end just you know,

21:31

justifies the mean. Where when you actually

21:33

are spending time with people, we're

21:35

not treating each other in the ways that

21:37

we want the world to mirror back to us.

21:40

Psych is that what's a practical

21:42

Yes, example or implementation

21:44

of how internally, yes, you are careful

21:47

with each other. Where's another institution focused

21:49

on output may not be Yeah, so there's there's

21:51

two. One is sort of you know, might

21:53

seem less less grand, but it's you

21:55

know, really respecting each other's

21:57

time and commitments. So if we see

22:00

we're going to do something at a certain time, don't

22:02

just be respectful to me as the director,

22:05

but I want you to have the same regard and respect

22:07

for each other's time. So that's just everyday

22:09

type of thing. But even sort

22:12

of bigger picture beyond the lab

22:14

for all of us to consider is

22:16

to think about we're in this moment

22:19

of this really flourishing

22:21

of abolitionist thought and imagination.

22:24

So it's this twin process we're trying

22:26

to bring down or trying to grow. We're trying to plant

22:29

these seeds. And so part of that

22:31

is being critical of the way that punishment

22:34

and policing has infected not

22:36

just the obvious police, but so many of our institutions

22:39

are punitive. Healthcare is

22:41

punitive, Like I've heard nurses say

22:44

that, you know, if a patient is a non

22:46

compliant, they're supposed to call in

22:48

the police or do x Y and Z school,

22:52

we know is super punitive, and

22:54

so if we're critical of that, but in

22:56

our own relationships with each other, we

22:59

are punitive. We punish each

23:01

other for all kinds

23:03

of things in ways. It can be passive

23:05

aggressive or disaggressive aggressive, you

23:07

know. And so I remember some years

23:10

back being on this kind of traveling

23:12

caravan with some wonderful colleagues

23:14

going through South Africa, and one of the people

23:16

on our traveling bus was

23:19

the Angela Davis and she

23:21

was standingble I know, she

23:25

was standing in front of an auditorium full of students

23:27

in Cape Town, and there was a question what

23:30

do we do? Question? You know, like we're

23:32

so excited, like what do we do? She was like, well,

23:34

you know, we can't be critical of policing

23:37

out there if we're punitive in

23:39

our relationships in here. We have to start

23:41

modeling. We have to start prefiguring

23:43

the world we want right in how we

23:45

treat one another. And so that's

23:48

part of the ethos to think about, like how

23:50

do we show up and when people are

23:52

not looking, when there's no lights,

23:54

no camera, you know, behind closed

23:57

doors, because if it's all

23:59

just for the for the show, and

24:01

we're not really practicing those

24:04

new values that ethos.

24:07

Then I don't think we

24:09

have a strong foundation on which to erect

24:11

these structures that we imagine we want.

24:13

So in the lab itself, what does

24:16

that look like? Then? Do you do you not punish

24:18

people at all? Do you punish people for punishing

24:20

people? There's

24:22

accountability versus

24:24

punishment. I think that's two very different

24:26

things, right, And that's part of we think

24:28

about, you know, the abolitionist approach.

24:30

It's like it's not a free for all. We

24:32

don't just do things and there's no consequence.

24:35

But it's really about thinking about when

24:37

someone does something that violates

24:40

a norm or it's

24:42

not respectful, if

24:44

we really want that action to change,

24:46

then we have to approach it in a way that fosters

24:49

that invites that change, rather

24:52

that punishment doesn't change people's behavior.

24:54

And so really thinking about you know,

24:57

when we had situations, I mean, we created

24:59

the lab at the of COVID, which

25:01

means people's lives are upside

25:03

down and we want them to focus on work

25:05

and research. I don't care how important it is.

25:08

You have a whole life. You have parents dying, you

25:11

have siblings who are sick, and so

25:13

part of bringing this ethos inside

25:15

the lab is to say we are whole people.

25:18

We are students, sometimes we're professors,

25:20

We're not our jobs. And so

25:22

it's trying to build in that approach to put work

25:24

in its place, you know. And

25:27

so I think we can appreciate that in our

25:29

own beyond what I'm talking about

25:31

and thinking about the role of work and

25:34

you know, getting things done, but also realizing

25:37

that we are living in an extraordinary

25:39

moment in which we're all hurting,

25:42

we're all grieving, and

25:44

so we shouldn't simply just

25:46

put our emotions at the door. We should find

25:48

a way to metabolize it in the way

25:51

that we work and organize ourselves.

25:54

Metabolizing and whole

25:56

person reminds me of

25:59

the dat First all you in person south

26:01

By Southwest twenty twenty two, you

26:04

were leading a discussion about

26:06

an immersive art experience called

26:08

Brihanna's Garden, which

26:11

was erected to I

26:13

think honor the whole person. Yes, it was

26:15

Brianna Taylor, who many of us only

26:17

know as a victim of gun

26:19

violence, of police violence, of the state of

26:21

no knock, warrants of black lives

26:23

not mattering. Yes, and

26:26

so to briefly summarize, this is

26:28

an AR experience, a VR

26:30

experience now that the family

26:33

was a part of building. Yes, that

26:35

has volumetric capture

26:37

of Brianna's sister, the

26:40

voice of her boyfriend. It's a you

26:42

can drop this garden in the room right now. You

26:44

can install it from the app store, and

26:47

you encounter flowers that have voiced

26:49

memos embedded in them. So as you touch

26:52

a flower, you hear a message from someone

26:54

who was moved by Brianna, whether they knew

26:56

her or not exactly. There's voices from all

26:59

over the world, most beautifully

27:02

and non hideously. There's no

27:04

Nazi graffiti in this

27:06

space. There's no hate spewing.

27:09

This is a curated experience,

27:11

a moderated space. And so I

27:13

saw you moderating this conversation,

27:16

and I wonder how did you get connected

27:18

to that project and what did that

27:20

mean to you as far as a

27:23

seed and an imagination of

27:26

how we might be using technologies,

27:28

Yes, in a way that cares

27:30

for allows us to care for each

27:32

other and create the systems we want to live in.

27:35

Yes. So, first of all, you described

27:37

it so beautifully. It's

27:39

no movie to think about it. I

27:41

think if Brianna's

27:44

family was not did

27:47

not co create this was

27:49

not part of it from the beginning, was not asked

27:52

permission for this to be created.

27:54

I wouldn't have come near it with a ten

27:56

foot poll, even though I respected them Bleed

27:59

designer, the team. To

28:01

me, it was absolutely crucial

28:04

that this was their wish,

28:06

that they had input at every stage,

28:09

and that in its circulation

28:12

in the world, that a family

28:14

member is present at all

28:16

of you know, all of the yes. Yeah.

28:19

So I will say I knew

28:21

the lead designer

28:24

on this and how careful

28:26

she was in Lady

28:29

Phoenix and approaching the family, and

28:31

her motivation was that she

28:34

noticed that in the aftermath of Brianna's

28:36

murder that they there was no place

28:39

online, which is how especially

28:42

young people, there's no separation

28:44

like your life is online that

28:47

they could grieve or express themselves. They

28:49

were being harassed and sent death threats

28:51

and getting all of these messages, and so like,

28:54

the seed for her was what if we could create

28:56

a space for the family to

28:59

express themselves their love, their

29:02

care, their grief around this, And

29:04

that was where Brianna's Garden was

29:07

first born. But she went and

29:09

said, is this something that you would want

29:12

again asking permission, and

29:14

if they had said no, she wouldn't have done

29:16

it no matter how. Now it's won all these

29:18

awards, it's getting all this attention, but

29:21

that was not the purpose. The purpose

29:23

was for the family to have a space. And what happened,

29:26

as you describe, is

29:28

that it has become a space for so many

29:30

people not only to express their

29:32

emotions around Brianna, but

29:34

their own unprocessed grief

29:37

at all of the loss that people

29:39

have experienced over the last two years.

29:41

So it's really become this model for

29:44

how we can curate and shape

29:46

and design different values and

29:48

create spaces intentionally for

29:51

healing and for solidarity.

29:54

And so yes, that is the story

29:57

of how I was pulled in, and I think why

30:00

I was because I'm so critical of technology.

30:03

So they were like, if we can get hurt of like that, man,

30:06

we must be doing something good. So

30:08

it's kind of like, okay, ruins on the panel. So

30:12

so I went to that panel and

30:15

I installed the app from the audience and

30:17

I popped it up in my hotel room. Later that

30:19

night, I wept a lot just hearing

30:21

other people and I was left my own

30:24

message about you know, losing my mother to colon

30:26

cancer at a pretty young age of sixty five years old.

30:29

I ended up going months

30:31

later. It's mayish

30:33

and we had these twin foolish

30:37

tragedies self inflicted

30:39

in the US in

30:41

Buffalo with the Masks,

30:43

shooting at the Tops food market

30:46

in Uvaldi at the school, and

30:48

I was at I was at my end with

30:51

like the whole thing. Just America. Yes, I'm

30:53

like, I'm out here, pretty hottest citizen, done

30:55

whatever, do your thing. Yeah, I

30:58

was just I felt a bit broken, Yes, And I

31:00

found myself in DC, where I'm from,

31:02

and I went to the FM Museum

31:05

and a friend works there, and I said

31:07

to her, like, I need to be uplifted.

31:10

I get it. The problems are problematic,

31:13

problem is going to problem. Yes, my heart is

31:15

broken in pieces. So I'm going to skip the

31:17

basement of the museum, which is all about

31:20

the origin of the slave

31:22

trade in Belgium and the ships. And she's

31:24

India Company. I'm like, can you take me to a higher

31:27

level? Literally literally climbed

31:29

the mountain together. And she

31:31

showed me a few of the dark things,

31:34

just to like reconnect. But one of the

31:36

most beautiful things she showed me is that Brihanna's

31:39

in the museum. Yes, there's this beautiful

31:41

portrait. And I popped open

31:43

my phone and I put

31:45

Brihanna next to Brianna in

31:48

the museum, and she had never heard

31:50

this curator and so she saw this, She's

31:52

like, oh my God. And it just felt like,

31:55

all right, My heart was healed a little bit just

31:57

having her in her own garden represent

32:00

it in analog art and digital art.

32:02

Of that augmenting our reality

32:04

was something more beautiful than what the reality I

32:06

was experiencing at a time. So yeah,

32:09

powerful stuff powerful So and

32:12

would I would be permiss if I didn't say, again,

32:14

echoing Lady Phoenix, that the

32:16

purpose for the whole team

32:19

there is not to remember

32:22

Brianna for her pain, but for her

32:24

purpose. Yeah, as we know, she

32:27

was training to be a nurse, she

32:29

was working at the front lines of COVID,

32:32

and so for the team and

32:34

the family, she's carrying on her work

32:37

of healing in doing this for

32:39

all of us. Yeah, which I experienced directly,

32:41

Yes, after

32:53

the break, how reimagining our social

32:55

technologies can help us grow the world

32:58

we want. You

33:00

have this book coming out, Viral Justice,

33:03

which is filled with tales of

33:05

more seeds that we might cultivate

33:08

in water and grow into a

33:10

garden that we would be happy to inhabit

33:12

in terms of the way we structure our society.

33:15

Can you share a bit more of the

33:17

seeds that you're excited about, especially

33:20

as they relate to our ability to self govern

33:23

and maybe with that intersection of technology

33:25

and science as well. Absolutely, so

33:29

I'll try to just give you two or three seeds,

33:32

literal seeds. I mean, like the beginning

33:35

is like literally getting our hands dirty

33:37

in terms of working with the earth. You

33:39

know, there's a man named Ron

33:42

Finley in my neighborhood in Los Angeles

33:45

who the guerrilla gardener,

33:47

the gangster garden gardener. Yeah, and

33:50

so part of it is like him just realizing

33:53

the food and security, the food

33:56

deserts, and the toll that takes

33:58

on our health. And so he looked at these parkways

34:00

that are all over La, the little patch of grass between

34:03

people's homes and the streets,

34:05

and said, what if we just created urban gardens.

34:08

And when he first started, the city sided

34:10

him right again, policing there

34:12

they go, there they go again.

34:16

And so people get you know, organized

34:18

with him, and not only push

34:21

that back, but this has flourished this

34:23

whole, you know, over I think twenty urban

34:25

gardens now using not just the parkways

34:27

but all different kinds of spaces. And so

34:29

it's one of those literal examples of not

34:32

working in your backyard, but working in your front yard

34:34

and just starting to create what we need

34:36

more of, right and so thinking about

34:39

that as a kind of you know, inspiration

34:42

for all of the different ways we can get our hands

34:44

dirty and just work right where we are. Definitely

34:47

advocating for big structural policy

34:49

change, is not taking away from that, but not waiting

34:51

for that either. And so the book

34:54

ends so if it starts with finlay, it ends with

34:56

a group in Seattle called the Seattle

34:58

Solidarity Budget, which over the

35:00

last couple of years has managed by

35:03

bringing together over two hundred different

35:05

organizations throughout the city working on all

35:08

kinds of things, from indigenous rights

35:10

to environmental justice, to healthcare

35:12

to housing to education. All

35:15

of them have come together and have managed

35:17

to slowly start reducing the policing

35:20

budget and investing in all of these different

35:22

things that actually make us safe. And

35:24

so part of it is this coalition, and

35:27

it's thinking about what do we have in common.

35:29

We might have these different lanes that we're in, things

35:31

we really really care about. But there's this bigger

35:34

umbrella that's about thinking about

35:37

budgets, as they say, are

35:39

moral documents. Getting

35:41

back to the data and understanding that

35:43

the numbers, you know, that

35:46

is values in those numbers, not just

35:48

economic values, but our social values

35:51

are reflected in those numbers. And so they

35:53

say, if you look at the city budget, those are

35:55

our values where we're putting the money. And

35:57

so they've managed over time, working town

36:00

hall meetings and zoom meetings you can attend and

36:02

see how they have brought this coalition

36:05

together and are having success in

36:07

shifting the values literally of

36:10

this entire city. And they provide a great model

36:13

for me, a viral justice. Do you

36:15

have any insight into how they are handling

36:18

some of the backlash to these moments. There was

36:20

a peak of people's budgets and participatory

36:23

budgeting and shifting reallocating

36:26

resources away from policing into more community

36:29

healing, which got shortened somewhat

36:31

unfortunately at times to defund the police, because there

36:33

was another side to that argument. Now

36:36

that graffiti's up and crimes up, and encampments

36:38

are up, and some people who might have been along for

36:40

the ride are no longer? Yes, How

36:43

is the Solidarity Budget

36:45

group there? How are they dealing with that? Yeah? I can't

36:47

speak exactly to how they might be dealing with the

36:49

backlash in Seattle specifically,

36:52

but what I've seen as effective

36:55

is people taking seriously this

36:57

copaganda, these narratives about rising

37:00

crime, and taking issue with

37:02

policing as a solution for crime,

37:05

which it's not because with inflated police

37:07

budgets, the so called crime rates, you

37:09

know, like those things don't aren't

37:12

correlating, but also asking

37:15

you know, what do we want

37:17

to invest in and taking issue

37:19

with all of these scare narratives

37:21

around that. And so there's a number of

37:23

people both in terms of social media

37:25

pushback but on the ground, taking

37:28

seriously the stories that are being told about

37:30

our cities and about why people are houseless

37:33

or why people are are precarious,

37:36

and getting to the root of the problem without

37:38

thinking that policing are ever going to be a solution

37:40

to any of these. Do

37:43

you have moments of surrender

37:48

or total exhaustion? And

37:51

if so, how have you

37:54

pushed through them or moved beyond them

37:57

or have you Yes? So,

37:59

I'm travert, as my friends know, and

38:01

so I am very careful

38:04

to refuel,

38:07

like as a matter of survival. And so

38:09

that has to do with me person but it also has

38:12

to do with thinking about when I'm working

38:14

in groups and collectives in terms of

38:16

you know, whether it's student groups or community

38:18

groups, like balancing the play

38:21

and the policy, like you know, we have to

38:23

have that joy as much as we do the

38:25

anger. And so I think just in

38:27

integrating that has helped me sort of trug

38:30

along like the little engine that could. And

38:33

I think, as I said, working with young people

38:35

and feeling like I can't

38:38

give them this gloom and doom diagnosis

38:41

of what's ailing us without offering with

38:43

the other hand, like this is what we can

38:45

do about it, you know, this is how people are

38:47

already doing things about it. So

38:50

for me as an educator, especially at a place like Princeton,

38:52

where they're groomed to

38:55

think of themselves as the solution to

38:57

all of the problems, like create an app for that,

38:59

creative new business for that, my

39:02

mantra is find out who's already working

39:04

on that, Listen to them,

39:07

collaborate with them, learn from

39:09

them, don't think of yourself as

39:12

and so that it actually is an antidote for burnout

39:14

and depression. Because you are working

39:16

with people, you don't have to do this, but you don't

39:19

have to do it, and you should not do this by

39:21

yourself. And because that is another kind of hubrist

39:24

it, burnout and hubrist like, you're not

39:26

supposed to be doing all of that. Why

39:28

are you trying to fix a whole society? Please? You can't

39:31

create one by yourself. Sit down? Yes,

39:36

If two of you want to throw in

39:39

a question or comment, this is the time

39:41

to shoot your hand up with no, I see one?

39:43

Anybody else want to get in the queue? Two?

39:46

Okay, then let's hear

39:48

from you. Let's hear a name, a geospatial

39:51

reference as far as where you reside, as

39:53

specific or general as you like, and then

39:56

your remark. Please. My name

39:58

is Bruce Traus. I live in New Jersey, about

40:01

forty minutes away from Princeton. I

40:03

have a website called One Common

40:05

Purpose dot com. It's a holistic

40:07

look at life. Now talking

40:10

about let's say racism, which

40:13

I call ending mistreatment,

40:16

discrimination and hatred towards those

40:18

who are different nationality,

40:21

different religion, different race, different

40:23

ethnicity, and different sexual irritation.

40:27

There's aspects to that that

40:29

I have never heard disgust see

40:32

the person each of us talks to more than

40:34

anyone else's oneself. There

40:36

are things in life that affect the person.

40:39

Affected in person means you have

40:42

certain thoughts about certain things that have an impact

40:44

on your life. So a racist

40:47

basically has anti thoughts that's

40:50

reinforced by a few other things. I don't want to keep

40:52

it going too long, but to

40:55

me, getting to people and there's

40:57

a process to get to people when they're younger

40:59

so that they can understand aspects

41:02

like that, so that if somebody

41:04

reads or sees or hears something, they

41:06

can withstand it because they understand

41:09

what could happen within their own mind. I

41:12

accept your submission of a comment.

41:15

There was not a question mark at the end of it. I don't

41:18

think, but I want to thank you. Where at such a limited time,

41:21

Well, the question is what do you think

41:23

of that? Each of you? I

41:26

don't know man to

41:29

be Yeah, you shared a lot,

41:31

but it was having a little hard time. Tracking and getting

41:33

to people younger and relationship

41:36

with self feel like two

41:39

very important pieces of the puzzle. As I mentioned

41:41

in our principles. To start with having

41:43

a connection with yourself is very important,

41:46

and I think on that score, so it's

41:48

important before you go out into the world. I

41:50

think a lot of young people actually feel a ton

41:52

of pressure right now to have

41:55

positions and stances and press

41:58

conference ready statements

42:00

about all kinds of complicated things that they

42:03

might be new to. And so

42:05

there's I'd like to apply some counter pressure

42:07

or relief that says it's okay

42:09

not to know. I heard something

42:12

on this stage earlier today that the highest form

42:14

of wisdom is total uncertainty, and

42:17

I was like, Oh, that's a that's an ego check

42:19

right there in terms of the value of hubrists that rue

42:21

I was just talking about. So it's

42:23

related, you know, to your operation and to your

42:26

premise. We can talk more later about

42:28

it, but thank you so much for the offering. I appreciate

42:30

you. There was one more, Yes,

42:33

you do because we're behind

42:35

you. Yeah, they're surrounding You're being

42:37

surveilled. Super quick question, doctor Benjamin.

42:39

Have been following your work so so impressive.

42:42

What would you like to be doing that

42:45

you're not doing right now? And

42:47

you can't say sleeping introverting

42:52

um. Well, in addition to Viral

42:55

Justice, I just finished another short

42:57

book that'll be out in a year or two on

43:00

imagination, and so it's

43:02

called Imagination a Manifesto, And

43:05

I would love to build

43:08

out this space of creativity

43:10

not just with students, but with artists and

43:12

to really do some world

43:15

building with colleagues and with people

43:17

who I respect. And so it would be taking

43:20

this in a more creative way

43:22

and putting into practice some of the ideas that

43:24

I'm working on on that Imagination book.

43:27

I want to follow up on that one. Yeah, So

43:30

imagining new worlds and

43:33

practicing imagination something that we do naturally

43:35

as children and get kind of trained out

43:38

of us as we grow. Do you have

43:40

any brief hacks, approaches,

43:43

tools to just get us to flex

43:45

our imagination muscles more. Yeah,

43:48

that's chapter five. It's

43:51

called the Imagination Incubator. So

43:54

there are lots of prompts and activities

43:57

and things because it is a muscle. It's

43:59

something that we have to practice, especially

44:02

in collectives, because then our imagination

44:04

gets challenged. So the

44:06

key sort of thread in the book

44:08

is that imagination isn't a straightforward

44:11

good. We are in many ways living

44:13

in a eugenics imagination, a techno

44:15

utopian imagination. We're living in

44:18

imagination not of our own design, and

44:20

so imaginations can be corrupting

44:23

and limiting. And so part of it is when

44:25

we work in groups. Then we can see the edges

44:27

of our own imagination. We can try

44:29

to broaden the imagination in which all of us can

44:32

flourish. But we can also see the ways

44:34

that our imagination is infected with

44:36

these really old, deep seated ideas

44:39

about human hierarchy and superiority

44:43

and inferiority. And so the

44:45

goal is to take imagination seriously

44:48

as a terrain of struggle. So when

44:50

I say creativity, I don't just mean the literal

44:53

arts. I mean all of the ways in which

44:55

we are creators. We

44:58

shouldn't simply submit to

45:00

the designs that we're inhabiting, and

45:03

we don't have to wait to be billionaires

45:05

to be able to create something new. Like

45:07

I'm a student of Octavia Butler. You know, when

45:10

you go and you look at her papers at the Huntington

45:12

Library, one of the things you see

45:14

in her own notes before you even

45:16

think about her work that's public, her stories

45:19

and so on, you see her notes

45:21

to herself in the margins of her notebooks,

45:24

where she's building her own life, like

45:26

she's saying I will be a New York Times

45:29

bestseller. I will have millions of

45:31

people. This is before when she was riding the bus

45:33

to work at a potato chip factory, you

45:35

know. And so part of it is her on

45:37

the one hand, really thinking about

45:39

her own agency in her own life. But

45:42

it's also that you see her studying scholarship,

45:44

You see her making notes about the headlines

45:47

medical sociology, and so she

45:49

ends up writing these stories. But it's based

45:52

on a deep research and understanding,

45:54

so understanding the porousness across these

45:56

different fields that were gathered here in and

45:59

to take agency back away

46:02

from these, you know, these overdetermined

46:05

ideas about power and inequality

46:07

that we inhabit and infect our institutions, and

46:09

beginning to seed something different now

46:12

yesterday, seed something like justice,

46:15

justice and joy and

46:17

joy. Oh. I want to keep

46:19

talking, but we can't take justice

46:22

and joy with you. Spread it. Thank

46:24

you so much, Rouha

46:27

Benjamin. It

46:31

should be pretty obvious that Ruha and

46:33

I share a point of view, and I

46:36

just find her to be healing and grounded

46:38

and even humble, and how she practices

46:41

what she preaches, even as a Princeton University

46:43

professor who moderates panels of south By Southwest.

46:46

I find her work to be so relevant because

46:49

technology is increasingly relevant to our

46:51

experience of democracy, and

46:53

I want a democracy that we also build

46:55

with people and not for them, because

46:58

the one we're inside right now was built for

47:01

and buy a very small group of people.

47:04

When Ruha says that we've been living inside someone

47:06

else's imagination, She's right.

47:09

We've been living inside this eugenics

47:11

imagination, and we have to reimagine

47:14

ourselves out of it, democratically and

47:16

technologically so we can live inside

47:18

something better. I'm not just talking

47:21

about widgets and databases and code.

47:24

I'm talking about social technologies that define

47:26

how we interact with each other and even

47:28

how we envision and understand what democracy

47:31

is, who it serves, and

47:33

how we experience it. Ruha,

47:36

She's all about prototyping new

47:38

relationships with technology, with

47:40

the community, with our colleagues,

47:43

and that investment in relationships, that understanding

47:45

of how those relationships relate to

47:48

power. They're two of the core

47:50

principles of how the citizen and when

47:52

it comes to the progress we're trying to make in

47:54

our workplaces, our neighborhoods, our families.

47:57

Ruha stresses that it's as much about

47:59

the process as it is about the outcomes,

48:02

because if the ways we're working to improve things

48:04

don't feel good or loving, how

48:06

can we be sure we're headed in the right direction. Maybe

48:09

by taking our lead from Ruha and working

48:11

to be careful with each other, we can

48:13

be dangerous together against these systems

48:16

too. I

48:23

really hope you check out Race After Technology

48:26

Abolitionist Tools for the New Gym

48:28

Code, along with Ruha's latest book,

48:30

Viral Justice, How We Grow the World

48:32

We Won. It's full of great examples

48:35

of how we can bring democracy and collective

48:37

decision making to our use of technology and

48:39

to our imaginations of the world we

48:41

can live in. And if you'd like to take

48:44

a stroll through Brihanna's Garden, I highly

48:46

recommend it. Download the AAR

48:48

Experience for free in the app Store

48:51

or head over to Brihanna's Garden dot com

48:53

and check out the creator, Lady Phoenix's

48:56

work on Instagram. She's at

48:58

Yes Lady Phoenix In

49:02

the show notes, we always have actions

49:04

you can take after listening to each episode.

49:07

We give you options to go inwards

49:09

and feel into the material to become more

49:11

knowledgeable, or to get involved with others

49:14

to make an impact. For this episode,

49:16

we've provided a suggestion for internal reflection

49:19

that reminds us how witnessing others protective

49:21

acts like standing up for each other can

49:23

have large ripple effects. We've also

49:26

shared two book recommendations from Ruha,

49:28

The New Jim Crow and rest

49:31

Is Resistance. You can find links

49:33

to both these books and many more from past episodes

49:36

at bookshop dot org, slash shop, slash

49:38

how to Citizen, and if you're in the US,

49:41

We've found several ways you can plug into your community

49:43

with your existing skills and volunteer.

49:47

These groups take the guesswork out of how

49:49

to get involved on issues you care about. Don't

49:52

wait, sign up for something, and meet your neighbors.

50:02

If you take any of these actions, please

50:05

brag about it online and use the hashtag

50:08

how to Citizen. Also tag our

50:10

Instagram how to Citizen. I

50:12

am always online and I really do see

50:14

your messages, so sender. You can

50:16

also visit our website, howard to citizen

50:18

dot com, which has all of our shows,

50:20

full transcripts, actions, and

50:23

more. Finally, see this episode

50:25

show notes for resources, actions and

50:27

more ways to connect how

50:30

to Citizen with barrettun Day is a production

50:32

of iHeartRadio Podcasts and Row

50:34

Home Productions. Our executive producers

50:37

are Me barrettun Day, Thurston and

50:39

Elizabeth Stewart. Our lead producer

50:41

is Ali Graham, Our associate producer

50:44

is Donya abdel Hamid. Alex

50:46

Lewis is our managing producer, and John

50:48

Myers is our executive editor and mix

50:51

engineer. Original music

50:53

by Andrew Eapen with additional music

50:55

by Blue Dot Sessions. Special thanks

50:57

to Joel Smith from iHeartRadio and

50:59

La Labina. Next

51:08

time on how to citizen Building

51:10

relationships with the people we're looking to help

51:13

is vital. But what if you feel so

51:15

at odds with the people in your community that

51:18

you can barely talk, let alone work together.

51:20

And what if you also think they are

51:22

out to destroy you? Deepening

51:25

identity based polarization is happening

51:28

in this country. The good news is

51:30

a lot of that is built on

51:33

a lot of false perceptions of the other side. And

51:35

so, for example, on several big

51:37

issues, Democrats and Republicans

51:40

misperceive the position of the other by

51:42

fifty percent. And then you ask how much

51:44

you think the other side dehumanizes you, It's

51:47

off by fifty percent. And

51:49

so what's happening is these

51:51

metamsperceptions are adding

51:54

fuel to how we think about the other side

51:56

in this country. Conflict resolution

51:58

expert Tim Phillips tells us how to

52:00

be in community with people we really disagree

52:03

with, and the risks of letting our

52:05

growing nationwide division persist

52:16

row home productions