Speak Out with Tim Wise

Although Matt McGorry is best known for his role as Asher Millstone on ABC's How to Get Away With Murder, he is also increasingly known for speaking out on issues of sexism, racism and white male allyship in the struggles against both. With reports of widespread male sexual predation emerging from Hollywood (and the world of politics), Matt's take on these subjects, both in and outside the entertainment industry, is especially timely. On this episode we discuss misogyny and structural white supremacy, the problematic concepts of "good men" or "good white people" (and why our intentions aren't the point where oppression is involved), and navigating these subjects while in the public eye as a celebrity.

Fighting for a better world in a society beset by multiple injustices can be incredibly exciting and rewarding — and it’s obviously necessary. But can it also sometimes bring out the worst in people? Like a toxic quest for ideological purity? Or an overly judgmental tendency to call people out in divisive and dogmatic ways over even relatively small errors in judgment? In recent essays, “Excommunicate Me from the Church of Social Justice,” and “Why I’m Starting to Fear My Fellow Social Justice Activists,” writer and activist Frances Lee explains why the answers to these questions are often yes, and why it matters.
If we wish to build a strong and effective progressive left, we’ll need to find ways to support one another without striking a more-radical-than-thou pose; and we’ll need to re-focus our attention on structures and systems that maintain oppression, rather than attacking individuals when they make mistakes, inadvertently say the wrong thing, or fail to live up to the standards of some on the left.

This September, singer/songwriter Meghan Linsey, the 2015 runner-up on "The Voice" took a knee as she sang the final note of the national anthem before the Tennessee Titans and Seattle Seahawks game in Nashville. Meghan and her boyfriend and guitar player, Tyler Cain, joined players across the NFL that day in this form of protest, in response to Donald Trump criticizing football players for speaking out against police brutality and racial injustice. On this episode, I'll speak with Meghan about the responsibility of artists to speak out in these dangerous times, the importance of white allyship to people of color, and how her experiences growing up around racism heightened her awareness to the need to resist.

Perhaps you’ve heard it said before: “I got spanked as a kid and I turned out alright!,” or “If I don’t whoop you, the police will do far worse” as rationales for corporal punishment, in general, and especially within the black community (and white working class communities). But while the people who say these things may mean well, what damage does spanking children actually do? My guest this week is professor, author, and scholar Dr. Stacey Patton of Morgan State University. Her work (and her personal story) attest to the damage done by corporal punishment and the way violence done to black children for generations under enslavement and white supremacy ultimately became embedded in the thinking of even those victimized by it. As Patton — an unapologetic critic of racism and white supremacy — makes clear, historically speaking, spanking or “whuppin” black children is “literally the whitest thing you can do.” Until we begin to see such practices as antiquated and destructive forms of abuse, generations of young people will continue to be hit in the name of love, embedding deeply destructive mixed messages about the care they deserve, both as children and later as adults.

Imagine a high school program whose students are 5 times more likely than their counterparts to go to college, and only 1/20th as likely to drop out. Now imagine lawmakers banning that program and attacking its leaders as “un-American.” As Dr. Curtis Acosta explains on this week’s Speak Out With Tim Wise, that’s what happened when Arizona eliminated Tucson’s Mexican American Studies Program. But now a federal court has ruled the ban unconstitutional, giving new hope to progressive and transformative educators across the nation. On this episode Wise and Acosta will discuss the program and the effect it had on students, the racist attacks leveled against it, and the future of radical educational reform in Arizona and the nation.

In this episode, I talk with Erika Whitfield, a 7th grade teacher in St Louis, whose recent Washington Post article about her students’ reaction to police misconduct (and the acquittal of yet another white officer in the killing of yet another black man), speaks to the way even 12 year old black kids have come to expect disappointment from the justice system. We discuss what this means, and how she as a teacher helps inspire their learning and optimism despite a system that they already understand is stacked against them.

What does one do when their church no longer wants them as a pastor? When speaking out against white supremacy, on behalf of black lives, and in solidarity with LGBTQ liberation, ultimately costs them their jobs? Does one abandon the church altogether or try and fight for a progressive Christianity instead? My guests this week have answered the questions clearly, and in favor of the latter option. Rob W. Lee -- a descendant of Robert E. Lee -- faced pushback from parishioners in his church after condemning white supremacy in the wake of Charlottesville, ultimately convincing him to resign his position. Meanwhile, John Pavolovitz was fired from his position after challenging some of the more reactionary church positions on sexuality among other topics. Both are adamant however that those reactionary ideologies should not and do not define what Christianity can be, even in a white church community that has often taken a pass on justice struggles. Regardless of your own faith beliefs -- or even if you reject religion altogether -- this conversation is a necessary one for progressives to engage.

In this episode, I'll be speaking to Cephus ("Uncle Bobby") Johnson -- the uncle of Oscar Grant, who was shot and killed by a transit officer in Oakland in 2009 -- as well as Nissa Tzun of Families United 4 Justice. We'll discuss the ways in which families are affected by police violence, but so often do without the support and services of the community when their loved ones are killed. The sympathy that so often attaches to the victims of criminal violence is rarely as forthcoming for those victimized by law enforcement. What do these families need, and need for us to know? And how can we elevate their voices in the larger discussion about reforming policing in America?

Disclaimer: My apologies for some of the sound glitches in this episode. I was doing a Skype recording with both guests at once and it created some feedback, some of which I was able to eliminate, but some of which I was not. Lesson learned, the technical quality will improve from here on out!

There’s an old saying: “You gotta dance with the one that brought ya.” But as my guest Tia Oso explains in this week’s episode, too often Democrats and white liberals fail to acknowledge the centrality of folks of color – and especially black women – to any truly progressive political coalition. Only by amplifying and listening to the voices, agendas and ideas of the most marginalized, can progressives hope to build lasting and effective movements for social change.

For those who wonder why people join hate groups, much like those who gathered recently for the white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, my guest on this episode knows the answers all too well. Christian Picciolini was in one of America’s first Nazi skinhead crews and was a committed white supremacist for years. Now he helps racists leave hate behind and works to inoculate a new generation of young people from the poison of prejudice, and he’s got some ideas about how to respond to surging white nationalism in America.