Our Dirty Laundry

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Surprise (or not): The Olympics has a racism problem. This Olympics has seemed particularly egregious in its openly racist policies and procedures, so in this first of a two-part mini, we're outlining some of these problems - from Simone Biles, to Sha'Carri Richardson, to banned substances and swim caps. The Olympics didn't invent racism, but in true competitive spirit, it's at the top of the game. Not sure this is one you want to win, though. 

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Our old suffragist friends turn to whiteness once again! In season one, we learned many of the early white suffragists turned their back on women of color in their efforts to secure the vote for themselves. Unsurprisingly, eugenics was also enthusiastically endorsed by many early feminists. Because it turns out, white supremacy has always been a helluva drug. Come learn about Charlotte Perkins Gilman and Victoria Woodhull and get ready for some *drama*! These women were a hot mess! 

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It's a mini, but it turned into a maxi - we said we'd discuss slave labor camp weddings (aka plantation weddings) and we're also throwing in some information about balls. Dances, people, not *those* balls. Don't get too comfortable though, it's still a gross discussion.

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Mandy takes back the reigns for this laundry session, and there's gonna be several loads to get through. We're talking about eugenics - which is basically the idea that natural selection of the fittest could be accelerated through deliberate selection of the "fittest" and, even uglier, "deselection" of the "non-fit" or "degenerate" subsets of the human population.  In this first episode we remind ourselves of our Darwinian evolutionary theory and Mendelian genetics (think peas and monks, guys), and then we introduce the dad and mom of American eugenics - Charles and Gertrude Davenport. They saw themselves as a model couple and template for good marriage, but, well...let's just say, no one was doing the laundry in that house. 

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When the South lost the Civil War, all the white women decided to give up on riding the wave of white privilege and jump on board with reconstruction and restitution, forever ending racial discrimin.....oh who the hell am I kidding! Of course they didn't! Along came the Daughter's of the Confederacy! Defenders of the "lost cause", memory keepers for confederate traitors...I mean, "true patriots", and erectors of statues, -- totally meant to honor their ancestors and not in any way intimidate formerly enslaved people or change the memory of a nation. *eye roll* Guess what? The United Daughters of the Confederacy still has close to 20,000 members today! That's a lot of dirty laundry ladies. Many thanks to Karen L. Cox's fantastic book Dixie's Daughters: The United Daughters of the Confederacy and the Preservation of Confederate Culture. 

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Today's interview is with Hasan Kwame Jeffries, author and professor of history at The Ohio State University. Dr. Jeffries hosts the podcast "Teaching Hard History" and gave a TED talk with nearly 1.8 million views on "Why we must confront the painful parts of US history". We talk about having the curiosity to learn and go beyond the narratives and nostalgia we are typically taught in US history, but also why knowledge is not enough. 

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File this one under things you need to know, but wish you didn't. Your chocolate is dark, and not in a good way. Learn about the history of child slavery and the cocoa industry, and how companies have pledged for years to make changes, but very little has been done. 

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Grab a notebook, everyone—you're gonna want to write some stuff down! Mandy took three pages of notes while talking to David Stovall about Critical Race Theory. We talk about what it is, what it isn't and why everyone if freaking the fuck out. If you've heard some of the arguments but don't know exactly how to educate people or respond to detractors, this is the podcast for you. Definitely master class material!  Listen to hear how we get from CRT to George Washington's dentures to Dan Quayle's mediocrity to Margaret Thatcher believing society doesn't exist.  Dr. Stovall is faculty at the University of Illinois Chicago's School of Criminology, Law and Justice. He is a national expert in Critical Race Theory, the relationship between housing and education, and the intersection of race, place and school. Shout out to the #TruthBeTold campaign, the recent book Mediocre: The Dangerous Legacy of White Male Power by Ijeoma Oluo, We Do This 'Til We Free Us by Mariama Kaba, and Fugitive Pedagogy by Jarvis R. Givens. 

Dr. Stovall is faculty at the University of Illinois Chicago's School of Criminology, Law and Justice. He is a national expert in Critical Race Theory, the relationship between housing and education, and the intersection of race, place and school. 

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You've probably never heard of the Veiled Prophet Ball.  Ellie Kemper definitely wishes she hadn't at this point. The gist - it's a twisted southern debutante/racist rich white person party that started in the late 1800s. Kemper was crowned the ball's Veiled Prophet Queen of Love and Beauty in 1999. After photos surfaced recently, Kemper apologized for her involvement. We're not really throwing shade on Kemper so much as we are the ball itself and the white lady involvement from the beginning. What do you get when you put a clown in a KKK outfit? The Veiled Prophet. Stuff of nightmares. 

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We had the honor of talking to Stephanie E. Jones-Rogers, historian and author of They Were Her Property: White Women as Slave Owners in the American South. Listeners of the podcast already know how much we revere her work and have learned from reading her research. It is even more enlightening to talk with Stephanie and learn about her background and approach to this topic and get her thoughts and advice for what it means for white women today.  Petty detectives unite! For links and more episodes, visit ourdirtylaundrypodcast.com.  Listen anywhere you get podcasts.