We close our series on How to Practice Social Justice This Election Season with a two-part episode called "Letting the Dust Settle".   We now know the outcome of the election. For many folks, there's an enormous amount of fear, anxiety, and dread about the behavior and decisions of the incoming administration. There's also a tendency, especially on social media, to respond to every negative step that the Trump administration makes.   In these two episodes, we distinguish between a reactive sense of urgency and a grounded sense of urgency.   And, the most important characteristic of a grounded sense of urgency is taking the space that you need to grieve in a way that's most fitting for you.   In this episode, Julia and Jeremiah talk about:

• Our experiences with grief this month in our own lives, and the lives of our clients.
• The intersection of grief and the moral incongruence of Evangelical Christians.
• Fear as a key emotion.
• Family estrangement.
• Pacing yourself.

Check out Episode #85: Letting the Dust Settle: Grieving Following the Election wherever you get your podcasts. Show notes and transcript are on the SV website.   Let's heal together!

We've tried to hold two seemingly oppositional positions during our podcast series "How to Practice Social Justice This Election Season Without Being a Jackass".   1) We do not support fascism, most notably showcased by the 2024 Republican Party.   2) We support having relationships with people who think differently (and may vote differently) than we do.   To help us navigate this, we invited Sarah and Nippy from the A Little Bit Culty (@alittlebitculty) Podcast to join us. They talk with us about the parallels between leaving NXIVM and leaving the Evangelical Church/Republican Party. And they also talk about ways that Progressive folks can effectively dialogue with folks leaving harmful organizations. We also talk about ways that Progressive folks can get in their own way.  Check out our conversations about:

• The practice of moral superiority
• The dangers of proselytizing
• Creating change
• The binary and the absence of nuance
• How nuance can lead to more informed decisions
• Focusing on building solutions rather than just tearing things down

Listen to Episode #84: How to Have Relationships with People Who Have Different Perspectives from You During the Election Season on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.

For many Exvangelicals, there's an enormous pressure to move into spaces of advocacy for civil rights, especially two weeks before the 2024 Presidential Election. However, advocacy can easily replicate systems of criticism, moral superiority, and shaming, especially when there's un- or under-addressed fear, trauma, anger.   We're thrilled to have Sally Gary (@sallygary) and Karen Keen (keen.kr) from Centerpeace (@centerpeaceinc) to talk with us about how to navigate the tension between advocacy and healing part of our series How to Practice Social Justice This Election Season Without Being a Jackass. Centerpeace is a supportive space for LGBTQ+ folks who desire a continued relationship with the church and Christianity. We talk with Sally and Karen about:

• The relationship between advocacy and healing.
• Pushing back against the obligation to advocate.
• How advocacy can replicate the communication patterns from Evangelical Christianity.
• Strategies for groups of people to respect the differences within the group.
• How our primary relationships can help us navigate the tension between advocacy and healing

Check out Episode #83: How to Navigate the Tension Between Advocacy and Healing, with Sally Gary and Karen Keen of Centerpeace. And please sign up for Centerpeace's Annual Conference later this week, or donate to their nonprofit. https://www.centerpeace.net   Show notes and transcript are on the SV website!

One of the biggest sources of stress this election season has been the publication of Project 2025. As we continue our series How to Do Social Justice This Election Season Without Being a Jackass, we recognize that many of the policies in Project 2025 are dehumanizing, as well as unwise.   While the content inside Project 2025 is infuriating, it's nonetheless imperative that we familiarize ourselves with it, while also taking care to communicate effectively about its dangers. To help us, we invite Andra Watkins (@andrawatkins), author of the Substack How Project 2025 Will Ruin Your Life. Andra is one of the leading experts on Project 2025, and she talks with us about:

• Navigating the pushback in the deconstruction process
• The theocracy of Project 2025
• The connection between expertise and experience
• Dog whistles and dealing with trolls
• Staying grounded

Check out Episode #82: How to Do Social Justice This Election Season Without Being a Jackass: The Role of Project 2025, with Andra Watkins, author of How Project 2025 Will Ruin Your Life on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.

A series called "How to Practice Social Justice This Election Season Without Being a Jackass" wouldn't be complete without an episode in which we talk about the scene of many crimes of jackassdom: social media.   After all, the ways that we communicate in virtual platforms are quite different from in real life interactions. We can edit the things that we say. We lack the nonverbal context of understanding what happened before the interaction. We don't see how other people respond, which makes it easier to disconnect and dehumanize.   In this episode, Julia and Jeremiah talk about:

• Hiding behind avatars
• The physiology of online interactions
• Shame and virtue signaling
• Gotcha moments
• Short form vs. long-form content, and other social media to-do's.

Check out Episode #81: How to Practice Social Justice This Election Season Without Being a Jackass: The Role of Social Media on Apple Podcasts.    And please give us a five star review and let us know what you enjoyed about the episode!   Show notes and transcript are on the SV website!

Healthy systems, be they families, organizations, or countries, require healthy leadership. In our work as therapists, coaches, and cultural critics, we pay attention to the following question: How does one communicate to the larger system that they are a healthy leader?   This week, we talk with Matthew Remski (@matthew_remski), co-host of the Conspirituality podcast (@conspiritualitypod) about two strategies that folks use to develop influence.   Charisma.   Vibes.   Of course, these are notoriously difficult entities to quantify. And as we talk about with Matthew, there are significant consequences to a system when it assesses success primarily through one's charisma and vibes.    A system that places high value on charisma and the construction of vibes is one that is prone to practice jackassdom. The projection of an emotional experience at the expense of healthy discussion about policies, positions, and context encourages moralism, virtue signaling, and blaming.   Matthew talks with us about:

• Experience versus expertise
• The yoga industry and charisma
• Manufactured charisma
• The -isms and moral superiority
• The dangers of self-flagellation and perfectionism as agents of change

Check out Episode #80: How to Do Social Justice This Election Season Without Being a Jackass: When Charisma and Vibes Interfere With Healthy Communication, with Matthew Remski of the Conspirituality Podcast whereve you get your podcasts.

November's presidential election represents a comparison between two forms of government. One, a democracy, driven by the principle that many people have voices, and ideally a government that works for a large sum of people. Two, an autocracy, driven by the principle that few people have voices.   Autocracies, such as the 2024 Republican Party, often communicate via jackassdom, including blame, repression, and fear-mongering. In this episode, Julia and Jeremiah talk about common communication ploys from autocracy, and ways that progressives and other pro-democracy voters can avoid responding in ways that reinforce jackassdom. We talk about:

• Strategies of Autocracy
• What is populism?
• Political Theatre, a Distraction 
• Populism & Anti-Intellectualism 
• Moralism v. Moral Critique 
• How Social Media Limits Empathy

Check out Episode #79: How to Do Social Justice This Election Season Without Being a Jackass: Understanding Populism on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.   Show notes and transcript are on the Sexvangelicals website.

We are less than two months away from the 2024 Election. This Election season is a bit different, because rather than voting for separate political parties, we're voting for two systems: democracy and autocracy (specifically, a Christian Nationalist theocracy).   Autocratic governments tend to rely on disinformation, propaganda, repression of voter rights, and fear-mongering in order to develop their power. The 2024 Republican Party is no different. A lot has been written about how the public can ethically respond, and quite frankly, there aren't a lot of great answers for the next 6 months, other than voting en masse.    We know responses that make it worse. Name-calling and blaming, while potentially cathartic, only entrench the polarization. Communicating around social identity ("White people do ____." Women think ____.") reinforces the stereotypes that progressivism attempts to reject.   From now until Election Day, we will be releasing a series called "How to Do Social Justice Without Being a Jackass." We'll talk with our guests about how to hold our anger and fear without responding in dehumanizing ways. In our introduction episode, we talk about:

• What does Jackass-dom mean?
• Deconstruction as a Political Process 
• Responding to Hate 
• A Relational Health Approach
• Behavior v. Values 
• Moral Superiority

We'll also close with some specific Relationship 101 tips.   Check out How to Do Social Justice This Election Season Without Being a Jackass: An Intro on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.

It's the first week of school for many students and families. The excitement of a new school year comes with new relationships, new beginnings, and setting goals. For many folks, especially those who grew up in conservative religious environments, setting goals can carry an enormous amount of anxiety with it.    This week, Julia and Jeremiah explore what it might look like to engage with the back-to-school season without the pressure of setting goals. We discuss:

• The pressure to be excited
• The anxiety of heaven being the ultimate goal
• The loss of play
• Setting new definitions on success
• Setting boundaries with the urgency desire

Check out Episode #77: Summer Series: Taking a Break From...Setting Goals on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.   Show notes and transcript are on the SV website