Rohadi 0:00 Faith in the fresh buy podcast. My name is ro Hattie, coming at you from treaty seven lands ladies and gentlemen, season two is upon you. Season Two of the faith in the fresh fi podcast. Thanks for tuning in, you're going to notice that all of our episodes are available at once while on Netflix. In this season, we have Tony snow he returns to continue a conversation about indigenous spirituality. We're also going to share some history around this region on treaty seven lands, you want to pull both of those episodes out. I have two other guests in this season. The Tony interviews were recorded last year and my other two guests, Deb and moneta. They were recorded this year in June and July. That's important because that's smack dab in the pandemic world that we live in, and also in the middle of the anti racist protests. So I'm excited to share with you this season. I hope you find some gems that you share it widely. I'm also excited for next season to get ahead of myself. Season three is going to centre the anti racist movement. We're gonna pull in so many different voices. I think I'm going to try to pull in voices from the decolonizing Christianity Canada group that is emergent in Canada. In the meantime, this episode, Deb launches us off. In season two, we're going to talk about her background in policy how policy making can be used to enact change in society. Deb is while she has wisdom beyond her years, she's building space for leaders of colour on the board of some organisations holding space for leaders of colour, she just launched a magazine centering black authors and writers. Her background is in policymaking and communications, where she has focused in the past on immigration and refugee protection, and is now stretching beyond that in her work. Sticking with public policy and stretching beyond we're going to chat in this episode about policymaking about reimagining neighbourhoods and what safe neighbourhoods look like. We're going to talk about what is safe neighbourhoods look like for neighbourhoods of colour, or people of colour? What does it mean to reimagine our city, our neighbourhoods in light of new public protesting around the call against anti blackness, what it means to become anti racist, we're going to have all sorts of different conversations on identity, defunding the police why or why that may not be a good idea. All that packed together in this 40 Plus minute episode, so I didn't cut it into two, you can pause it if you need a break and process some of these ideas. I hope you find some gems. But we're gonna go straight into our conversation about identity public policy, and reimagining our city neighbourhoods and beyond. Speaker 2 3:37 So my Nigerian name, which is from my tribe, which is the Yoruba tribe, is a Lula formula. And it means God has given me joy. And most Nigerians that you meet will have a name, that's a sentence. And it's probably a name, that's a sentence about God. Rohadi 3:54 Let's go back to the top because we were chatting about names and and our funny names, and it's like, wait a minute, why, why are these names funny? They're my name. And it's our identity. And so how did we were just chatting off off air? About the your three names and how they kind of came into this country and its format or Speaker 2 4:21 share with us? Yeah, so I guess like in Nigeria, you can just sort of, like change your names, but you're the order of your first and middle and everyone has at least like so when a baby's born there's a naming ceremony. And so every member of your family gives you a name so everyone has like 10 names minimum you don't know them all and throughout your life like you forget them and but like the family member that gave you that name, like the auntie that named you something is gonna refer to you as that and not whatever you name your parents gave you. So just sort of a thing. So we moved to the country and my parents, were gonna keep the names that they gave me which is my middle name and my like, Hebrew Jewish name, I guess, which is Deborah. And so we moved and they just sort of put like my Nigerian name first and didn't think anything of it. And now it's like followed me on my social insurance number and my passport and every documentation because it really matters like, what's your first and what's your middle? Rohadi 5:11 Did that mess you up in school? Speaker 2 5:13 Thankfully, like in the CBE system, you just like can say which name you want to be referred to. So it was never my teachers never like would have seen it on their attendance. But sure enough, they messed up my last name all the time. So it's fine. How you pronounce your last name? It's Mabu de. So every E, there's two e sounds and the Yerba alphabet. So it's, it's different than the way that we use the and people can't figure it out. It's not their fault. Rohadi 5:41 You need to have some ethnic grounding and history. The first language in Nigeria is English. It's English. And and so when people are like, Oh, what's your English name? It's like, what are you talking about? Like? So you you don't have a backup name. You just have this this rich ethnicity behind you have different obviously or have the naming ceremony and all the different pieces that comes together. no backup plan. My parents gave me backup plan. What's my backup? My backup is Barry. Unknown Speaker 6:22 Like Barack? Yeah, yeah, Rohadi 6:23 yeah, straight up. Like what now? It's like Baroque. Lee Madrona was not like Baroque who is Baroque. That's dope. I've never heard someone say like Barack feely berry now Unknown Speaker 6:35 presidential. Rohadi 6:36 I'm feeling so presidential. Suddenly. Speaker 2 6:39 Can I say something funny? Quickly? I don't know if you guys were on Twitter earlier, but it's Trump's birthday today. Okay, and sitting the podcast. Well, yeah, that's okay. But just for the sake of saying it. It's his birthday. So everyone's saying all birthdays matter. Yeah. Really tragic. Hashtag. Yeah. And I really like it. And then they're also using the opportunity to say like, this is the first Obama day like, we're gonna mark this date for Barack instead. Yeah, that's very the connection to Barry. Rohadi 7:05 Be. We're Twitter buddies. I like Twitter. I could message Barry right now. We could be two berries in a pod. Speaker 2 7:13 He follows you is that you're saying? Well, yeah, but I follow him I Rohadi 7:17 think is the bigger No, Speaker 2 7:19 that's not that's not it's not that headline. That's a big deal. Well, I Rohadi 7:23 think it was just huge when the Democrats are first coming into power and I was big into I was a big berry fan. And so I guess they liked that. Unless it's him. You think? I mean, it's definitely Trump on his account. Barry Yeah, so my parents gave me a backup name, but I've never I've never really used it. And sometimes in business, I've used it just just as a mechanism to to help white people Speaker 2 7:50 hire me. Do you get a better reception with that name? Rohadi 7:53 For for if it's just because a lot of my work is online and marketing and so having berry makes things more accessible. I've dropped that since I still have a number of my emails in business are connected. So some people just think I have a brother. But But yeah, I tried to now as a form of not protest but yeah, to double down and and tell people my full name. I don't let them get away with row. See, I'm gonna move my close friends call me row, Hattie. But you can call me row. This is a new pot shot to people. So names, Unknown Speaker 8:31 call me or honey, but everyone I hate calls. Rohadi 8:36 Subtle, subtle protests. Speaking of protests, we're just in the midst right now. Again, we date this podcast, but it'll come out at a different time. We're on treaty. Seven lands are in Calgary. And we were talking just after the George Floyd, which is just it was a symbol. He is a symbol. More than that. But the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back. And the symbol that led to all this pent up rage and sadness and everything connected to protests. And we were remarking right around it broke in Minneapolis. We were saying protests protests in a group chat. Yeah, I'm not really feeling protests. I don't really comprehend and this is our context in our city. Calgary doesn't protest like, what's the point? And you made a remark that you know, in Ottawa, it made sense. You go up onto the hill, and you protest and a higher chance of being seen and making some noise. But in Calgary, it's like when was the last protest that was idle? No. That wasn't that big occupy, occupy you know, a bunch of progressive and, and and unemployed. White kids were camping out in the Olympic Plaza. It was confusing a little bit. Yeah. And so you remember that conversation right? And then we were in blown away? Speaker 2 10:00 Yeah, I was I stood very corrected. It was surprising. And like I said in Ottawa, surprise, it's not even just going to the hill because of the hills there. But it's also like every embassy to every country, with the exception of a few. So like, you can always if there's something going on and like Saudi, you go to the Saudi Embassy and you like stand outside or if something goes on the US, you're like, Let's go be mad at Trump. And so there was just such a protest culture, like there was there was always a protest, and people would actually show up and there would actually be sort of like, a statement made. And so I just didn't think the Calgary did that or had that same capacity or interest. But I think it's all Gen Z. Those folks are Gen Z thing. They are out in the streets. I think they're also bored from Coronavirus, lockup on some level. But yeah, very legitimately. There were so many it was young people in particular, but also other ages. That seemed to really take this seriously in Calgary. And I was surprised. Rohadi 10:56 I was surprised to because and I'm not, you know, the oldest and maybe we have our fact checker checkup with the years of Gen Z. I know the official answer. But yeah, you said culture, we do not have a culture in oil town, which is affectionately known as like the Houston or the Texas of Canada. Now it's kind of turning into the Florida of Canada. Without the great weather. We do not protest. We're a bunch of oil barons, we have a lot of money and we don't rock the boat. And then suddenly 1000s of people were clogging the streets taking over bridges. And I've never seen anything like that my life here. Speaker 2 11:42 It was remarkable. Like, I don't know what the numbers were knowing. I'm sure some journalists sort of had an estimate. But it was clear that it was way more than we ever had. And it was three events in a single week. That all had record numbers. So it was surprising. It was like Okay, the first one had a lot of people like okay, maybe it was a fluke. Nice weather. And then Wednesday, same thing. And then the Saturday, same thing and it was like, Rohadi 12:06 Wednesday was huge. I don't know how big Saturday was. What do you think like, but Wednesday they're shutting down downtown. Yeah. And this is just not something that Canada doesn't really do it. Although, in Toronto, you might see that a little bit more in Montreal, of course. Yeah, that French thing, I guess. Yeah. And Calgary does not. It's just like tumbleweeds of the prairies, but a million people happy to just make their money. Gen Z, I'm going to Gen Z should be 85 up to 2004. I know some people just go by the years it was a fact checkers say mid to late 99 DS from Gen Z. So millennials go to 84. So millennials are 85. Speaker 2 12:52 I've heard so many different demographic breakdowns with that, like sweet, sweet generations is but what I've heard most recently around millennials is like an NS around 97. And then it sort of like that people that were born in 2000. And like, onwards are the Gen Z like they do is like Millennials come of age in the new millennium. But like, I don't know, I'm born 95 Like I was five in the new millennium. I don't feel like I came of age at that point. But in most times I hear about millennials, I'm looped in with that as like one of the later millennial, you're a Rohadi 13:23 later millennial, whereas I guess I'm a purist. And yeah, it's supposed to be generational, because I've always been told, you know, you're an early millennial. But if you go about generations, which is 20 years, and they start after the end of World War Two, right, that means our Boomer generation ends around 6464 65. And then Gen X up until 8485 8485. Now, so put me as a late Gen X er, which makes way more sense because I feel like an old soul in this body. That is into neon fanny packs at Wagga system that come back somehow. And that's the millennials. And then so Gen Z. So you're but so you would say that the were younger than you. Speaker 2 14:12 Here's why I say that. It's based mainly on a friend of mine who told me that it was her the younger siblings and like all of their friends that were there. I didn't attend. And that's because of all kinds of reasons, including family members that are sick in my home. But from what I saw, there were a lot of like high school aged new university, which I think is normally who leads movements like historic so I'm like this, like the young people. Yeah, so it's not surprising. But I do think that there was also a good number of people that are older. I think the fact that lots of people are home from work meant that way more people could be there Rohadi 14:49 that was a factor for sure. Definitely younger, but I feel that there has been a in swelling of response of momentum. him across the board, particularly in the church as well. That's where I pay attention to and that social media to some degree, there's something shifted, something has shifted. Have you felt that? Speaker 2 15:12 Yes. And maybe you want to go into this later. Because I've also felt the opposite shift. I've had to delete a good number of people from my old church who have just been overly vocal on the internet about how systemic racism is a fake thing and how white people are unfair, that people are out there protesting and we can't go back to church, and how are we being sheep being led to just join the crowd and protest? This thing doesn't exist, and they're not racist, therefore, racism isn't the thing. So that's the element of the church that I've been very disappointed by. I think I've actually been more disappointed by the church. And no, there's there's been obviously some great showings from a lot of churches. But I think there's also been this like, desire to believe that this isn't a problem. And even like, if you believe this is a problem, it's like an affront to Christianity. On some level, I don't understand it. But that's really something that I've perceived if Rohadi 16:07 you've seen a lot of that in your because maybe my old my social media, yeah, Speaker 2 16:11 I'm starting to like last week, I was like, these are people I'm going to delete now. And they're helping me know that they disagree with me and my existence on some level. Rohadi 16:22 So here's the cultural exercise that Canada, US as well. We've been culturally shaped to know and believe that racist acts are wrong or wrong, because we have reduced racism as merely the single actor. So the one dudes, you know, spraying a swastika on a synagogue or saying the N word. And so long as we don't do those single actions, racism doesn't exist. And if I'm not a racist, and doing those things, and racism as a whole doesn't exist, if you're a white person, or someone working really hard to assimilate, then it all makes sense for you. Because you have managed to not merely assimilate yourself, but you are matching the dominant, which is in this country, white male gaze. And so everything looks normal. And you're intentionally trying to dismantle and reject the stories of your Black and Brown Brothers and sisters, you don't want you don't want to listen to those of injustice in our midst. And might, I feel like this momentum has shifted. Now, I don't know how many white people know what they want to do. And culturally, we're not prepared or able to handle grief and sorrow. We want to internalise and individualise all those pieces. But I just have this encouragement that at least something has shifted that white folks. And the dominant narrative is cracking. For Speaker 2 17:47 sure. Yeah. So something was totally different. Last week, I was joking with a group of not even like individual black friends, I was just chatting with last week about how like, so many white people were being so nice, and like, apologetic, and like just like in weird, muddy uncalled for worse ways. Like a friend of mine was driving, and got to a complete stop kind of thing. And there's a driver who was like, upset with him, and then saw him and that he was and then like, we're assuming that maybe in another week, this could have happened, but all of a sudden was like, oh, no, you go ahead. Like just Rohadi 18:18 like, oh, really good to do that thing. Yeah. Speaker 2 18:20 And the amount of messages I got last week. You get Are you okay is from that, and I really appreciated it. It was amazing. But it was like this has never happened before like, and there's been plenty of people that news who have died who are black, by police brutality or otherwise, then this is the first time that I'm seeing like multiple sort of like, yeah, people reaching out. And even like the trolls on my Twitter were like being kind of hoping nice, but they're being like, careful. And like, I found them really funny. Like one person had said, Well, I am a more disturbed by the traffic on 10th Street Bridge than I have ever been by racism. So I don't really feel like this is the thing, like even that you're obviously being a troll and dumb, but like you're being hilarious about it. So yeah, anyways, last week just seemed really interesting. But I think it was really a moment where people were feeling like they, it became a bit more of a collective societal problem than just like the individual communities that are affected. And all of a sudden, I know there was just like, allyship from every direction. And even people that are I remember seeing a thread from this is someone I don't know. But like, she calls herself a Karen like she's a middle aged mom from like, the Bible Belt kind of thing. And she was saying how like in the course of a week just from reading, she's all of a sudden now like up on the political opinion of like defunding the police and basically laid out like a 30 part thread about why defunding the police is going to be good for people and why the policing system is built to basically like oppress certain marginalised communities. And anyways, there's just like a lot of people listening and changing their minds about things which you don't normally see like that quickly. journalists were all of a sudden covering different sorts of Ideas. There was obviously like the Rex Murphy's, and the Stockwell days that are always vocal. But the old stock. Yeah. But there was this other like sort of radical opposite point where the CBC is discussing, like, how do we defend the police, which is a conversation that the week prior they weren't going to even have. Rohadi 20:18 They're changing so fast, even in the language that they're using. Yeah. And that was a Canadian Press, I think now switched. And just this past week, you're gonna capitalise black? Speaker 2 20:28 Yeah. Really, and things that people have been asking for for a long time are all of us, it's like, oh, our demands are being met. And sort of seeing really funny things like just friends taking advantage of people's generosity and being like, if you really want to support black lives matter, like, support a black woman, like send her an E transfer today. Or like there was a really funny comedian who I don't know if you guys saw this, a fedora thing. Last week, it was Fedora is for freedom. He was like, thank you to all the whites out there for you know, your support this week. But if you really want to help black people, we're asking you to wear fedoras tomorrow and hashtag. Somebody does it mean, like so many people. And I think some of them thought it was a Joe, or some of them knew it was a joke, but some of them were totally well behaved. And like, the blacks have asked us to do this, like, we're standing in solidarity. Here's my fedora. Oh, it's amazing. I don't know when we're very willing to just like jump in and help. And I think that was really new. Rohadi 21:24 The sustainability of this is my question. It's all of our question. Is this sustainable? Because I'll tell you why that is so nice on social media. Tomorrow, that doesn't matter. It is the podcast of the don't let Black Lives Matter hashtag become the next Kony 2012. Because right now, we're in the midst where y'all don't know what's going to happen after all this social media stuff dies down, because if you actually put in the work, you're gonna lose your privilege. And when that happens, we'll see who's still around. Speaker 2 22:05 I think there'll be a remnant. And that's like all we can ask for it. Because it won't be everyone it's can never be, Rohadi 22:11 you don't know the loss. What's the end, and I had that in my book, but I could never find and I'm not sure if there is a known author to it, but equality to the privilege looks like oppression. If you're going to lose your privilege, man that looks like you are losing something that's traumatic. Speaker 2 22:30 Yeah, I was at servatius house, I'll just name drop her, because why not Rohadi 22:35 share Risa. And so just to give her a quick plug on what she's doing for women of colour? Unknown Speaker 22:41 It's like youth of colour in Canada. Use Rohadi 22:43 of colour in public policy, is it? Yeah, okay, what's the word called leading colour leading in colour named Ching, we'll put in a sound effect. Speaker 2 22:53 But um, this is like, this is a bit of a side story. But it was a group of friends for her housewarming, there's like 30 of us, all from her church. And it was a really diverse white church wasn't white, but for some reason they're young adults is very, like, diverse. So there's like Asian people, like, you know, South Americans, lots of people from across the African continent. Like, it's a pretty good subsection of folks. But there was like one white guy. And at some point, during our conversation, we're playing a game, it was one of those like, I think the question was something like that career advice, or like the worst advice you can give to someone looking for a job. And his, like, smart response was identify as a white man. And he then like, and I, when he said it, I was like, read the room, my dude, you're really outnumbered. But then he went on to say, like, as a white man, he's as a result of like, affirmative action, he's lost jobs and not able to get into certain spaces. Line was sort of like whining and asking for empathy, as like all immigrants, Rohadi 23:51 and then like the record needle came off. Speaker 2 23:56 But he did raise a legitimate a semi legitimate, you know. If you are going to make spaces for other people, then maybe some people that are normally in the sort of privileged position are going to lose some of their ground, I still firmly believe he has a way more access than I will probably have in my lifetime. But he doesn't know that necessarily. But what he sees is that, like, there's certain doors that are close to him. When for us, it's like, Oh, finally, there's doors that are open. But all he can see is like what he's lost. Rohadi 24:27 You know who the number one benefactor of affirmative action was? Isn't it? White women? White women? Yeah. Women. Yeah. And they never brought in people who are unqualified, Speaker 2 24:39 and you still have to, like the people that are getting into those positions are still having to meet that criteria. Like it's not like we're now just bringing in like the Asian guy. Who's like 50% good, but then he's 100% Asian, so we're good to go. It's like no, he still has to like beat the criteria. Rohadi 24:54 good at math and piano. Check. I can make that joke. The I mean, not without its criticisms, of course, which sort of segues us into policy action. When we're talking about systemic racism, which is hot now, everybody on systemic racism, because some people just heard about this word and other people just like, yeah, doesn't exist Rex Murphy hashtag, Speaker 2 25:19 I feel like it's so indicative or just like, it is a result of our very individualist culture, like, people have a total misunderstanding of even a system like the concept of a system or something being like things working together, or there being any sort of collective like, because that idea is so divorced from like capitalism and all the other things people cannot make. They're like, they cannot understand how could there be systemic racism, like, systems don't even exist, everyone's an individual, my actions happen in a vacuum, and things have happened to you or like one off things connected, and we're not going to draw any conclusions. Yeah, because why this isn't really isolated. Yeah. Rohadi 25:57 So it's a total lack of understanding of history. But it also is indicative you're incapable or at right now, we've been incapable of seeing systemic elements at work at society that seek to denigrate black and brown skin and indigenous skin. In this country. Speaker 2 26:14 I think it's also like, if I can just speculate my theories, like when so as a black person, like I represent black people incorporated trademarked. But I feel like so many white people get to be individuals. And so like, their action is just theirs. But like, if some I don't know, when I went to junior high when there's one other black guy in my whole grade, and like he smoked cigarettes in the upstairs bathroom, it was like, Ooh, black people were smoking. But like if the, the like the white guy that he smoked with wasn't like smoking for all white people in the school. So I think there's even that piece where it's like that cop did that thing. But he's just like that one cop. Rohadi 26:52 Yeah. You know, he's been in good police. Speaker 2 26:56 Yeah. But like, you guys had the same training, which is that is that not some sort of a form of like a systemic education that happened together collectively? I don't know. It's, it's weird to me. Rohadi 27:06 What disturbs me about the policing and, you know, I had to walk a tightrope on this, but the reality is we don't we don't collect race based stats. Yeah, so you would find out immediately, and this is part of Desmond calls book, you would find mediately hash hashtag that people of colour are carted street checks at a astronomically higher percentage. But if that's not a problem, then start collecting the stats, start collecting the stats, because when we see policing in Calgary and Edmonton specifically, which are still the city is predominantly white, Toronto is not, and Toronto's facing some serious problems around anti blackness in the police force, not perhaps that's that's a different, totally different police force, but systemically and institutionally, this is what happens when white institutions are faced with populace that is no longer white, and they're fighting to cling for survival. And in this case, are responding with violence. defund the police is that I haven't I haven't spent a lot of time analysing that one in a Canadian context. How would you even do that policy wise? Speaker 2 28:28 Yeah. And I should, like start disclaiming, I guess that I'm not defund the police like advocate. Personally, I definitely believe in like, huge reform. And I know, a lot of the the argument behind defunding the police is that like, we've tried reform for all this time, and nothing's really changed about it. Yeah, my mind is really like let us reallocate money in a lot of ways. So one of the main ideas behind sort of, I don't want to call it a movement, it's also not a new idea, like it's been talked about since like the Black Power movement. Black Panthers were talking about it. People like Angela Davis have been talking about it for decades. But obviously, in the newest sort of iterations, and as it's being talked about, now, it's ideas like, rather than a first responder, who's often up who is a police officer, in most cases, and is often called for things like mental heists health crises, someone's having like a episode of some kind, or they're dealing with something. They're, they're trained not to deescalate but really just to like, what's the word to contain someone or to like, get them to stop so they're going to pay someone they're gonna shoot someone, they'll do what they need to do if they feel like someone is being violent or if they feel like they're being attacked or their safety is going to be sort of compromised. So rather than having like police be the first people that come how about you have people that are actually like trained in de escalation, like a social worker, or a nurse or someone who's like, or even I saw her something really funny around like, just bring in moms like they're so good at De escalating their toddlers like Every day, so people who their first thought is not like, let me shoot, but they're not trained to go for a gun, they don't even have a gun, like their job is to deal with this thing, and to help this person who's dealing with something. So that's part of it is like, let us I mean, some of the defunding the police is, the whole policy is all of the money that goes towards the police department goes towards like community safety precautions. The idea being like, we don't need policing so much is we need like safety. Like, that's the problem that we're trying to solve. And like, police on in a lot of communities of colour do not provide safety. So what can do that better? So yeah, it's ideas of sort of like a, like a community patrol, sort of like police officers being peace officers instead. Those are some of the ideas, even ideas around like the amount of money. And I heard this in the Toronto context that goes towards policing, traffic or not traffic, transit writing violation. So people that go on the TTC, and don't pay all the police officers that are doing that, why don't you just make transit free, and then there's no need to police it because everyone can just get where they need to get. And because policing in that scenario is so often just targeting poor folks that are trying to do stuff and like live their life and get around. And so it's ideas like that, just like how do we creatively take our massive police budgets? Like in Calgary in 2019, the budget was about 400 million. So $400 per Calgarian? How can we like slash that money? Totally, or just use it in ways that are actually solving the problems rather than for to police? Yeah, Rohadi 31:34 so that's about in the last I looked at the stats or something like 13 15% of the total budget, Speaker 2 31:40 which is not as big as in other cities. But it's still significant. Rohadi 31:45 Yeah. And I'm just a thought came across my mind as, as you're talking about walking with a gun or a taser. I'm like, I'm curious to know what anti blackness looks like in the police force in Britain, because they haven't certainly different training. But I don't think this is something that is solved by better training. It's certainly a reorientation, or rather a reimagination of what our neighbourhoods look like, because the reason why our police budget is so high is because the cans in the suburbs are saying we need safe neighbourhoods. That's why police budgets are in touch. We need safe neighbourhoods, from gangs and drugs, and black people and junk Indians, because those the only Indians we know. It needs a total reimagination. Of which I don't know if we have that imagination I would have. Yeah, well, we don't even know what that looks like to say defund police to what we have no, I Speaker 2 32:36 there is a complete lack of imagination. If there's anything that is learned from like, I don't know, watching policymakers are just politicians in general, like, in a lot of scenarios, it's like you can't even conceive of a way to do this. I think of Alberta, I'll just quickly shout out our like, lack of imagination around like diversifying the economy. It's like, how could we exist without oil? That doesn't make sense. oil is oil, we'll just switch to natural gas. What like, yeah, there's just no sort of concept of like solar or wind or all the other things that like we can retrain people to do. So. I think there is a lack of imagination. But I do think people are sort of, I don't know, if you can shape the the arguments and the policy recommendations in a way that sort of appeals to people and makes sense. And isn't too like threatening? I think I think we can definitely, I think some some creative things will come out of this time. But it will it will. It requires people to acknowledge the problems. And I think if we're still getting caught on the conversation around systemic racism, like we can't get there. Rohadi 33:33 Yeah, we're just starting. We're just starting on, on the problems, I think part of the issue with public policy and ask you this question and give you a second to process it that what would be a public policy shift in order for us to reimagine neighbourhoods in a different way. But I think part of the problem is certainly connected to the fact public policy makers are also white. And those with the power have either inherited that power, or they have the wealth in order to enact public policy changes. nonprofits, NGOs are predominately white. The government, of course, is staffers. So there's there's even that institutional bias within the mechanism, the potential mechanism to change. What is a public policy shift that could happen to reimagine neighbourhoods? So we didn't just say safe neighbourhoods? I think it's reimagine healthy neighbourhoods. Yeah. Speaker 2 34:29 I don't know that I fully have the answer for that. I've been listening to a lot of different voices, and even to bring back the defund the police sort of ideas. Even there, there isn't like a full sum. From what I've heard, strategy of like, this is what it will look like this is who will do these things. This is how we now operate and move forward without police. I think there's, I think on some level, there's disagreement, but I think there's also like, a challenge to sort of think of it because we're so tied and connected to and familiar with police. Maybe this is like super theological, but I don't believe that we will have like safety in this world. Like, I don't know that that's possible. Fully anyways, like, I just believe that sin is really a thing. And like principalities and all these things like, I believe that racism is like a huge principle like, there's, there's a lot that's just connected to the brokenness of this world. So I'm a little bit less idealistic that like, getting rid of police will solve all the problems, but I think definitely reimagining police will do so. Definitely recognising that police themselves do a lot of violence. And that's even where we're coming from. That's the conversation we're having to begin with. And, and even like, police officers are often the ones that are like in their own homes, the perpetrators of domestic violence, and a lot. So you know, I mean, so anyways, I'm not sure what the answer is. And I don't know that anyone really knows. Yeah, and I could say it's heart change. I could say, like, you come to know Christ, and that solves problems. But like, we're even having a conversation around people that know Christ, and they're super blind to these issues, and they're unwilling to confront them. And they're unwilling to acknowledge that they even exist. So I'm not sure but I definitely think a smaller police presence is a starting point. And I do think like, a strategy that's not so there's a word I've been looking for. It's not even reactive, but it's like, why is violent force, the way that we want to solve problems of violence? Like, I don't think that makes sense. Rohadi 36:28 Some news are non violent. So I mean, if you have a violent approach to your understanding of the cross, in this is in a Christian context, you're going to develop a violent understanding of dealing with sin. Yeah, I know, there's some initiatives in this city and most cities to build health. I like the notion of Holistic Health, how to get there, I think, requires a dismantling of some cherished institutions. And we don't we need imaginations to at least test. I think that might start with dreaming shared dreams of the dreams that we have similarities in the hopes for our neighbourhoods and for cities. And I think the church needs to be co collaborators, not a leader of that, because their most churches are not well in tune to their neighbourhoods. Today, at least the parish church has kind of lost. We need a reorientation of our understanding of sin. Yeah, that's a funny thing with systemic racism, especially Christians who would claim that are the same ones who would believe in original sin, and that sin is systemic. Unknown Speaker 37:34 And the only system that they believe in though Yeah, so Rohadi 37:37 but they haven't made the connection that if sin is systemic, that one of the expressions of that power and Principality of sin can can manifest itself into real systems, and systems that have been in place for hundreds of years. And it's the formation of those systems and how they are enacted today, but have formed culture, our culture and impacted generations of persons and Christians of colour. It's the formation of those things that have left us in a in a place where we're asking and calling for justice, because something is not right in the world, for sure. Abraham Kennedy, wrote a book on it. And this is not precisely his own idea, but he definitely elaborates on it that there are only two things, you're either a racist, or you're an anti racist. And so just for a moment, here, let's I'm using clarify, I'm using the term racism in the sense of racism is power plus prejudice, power plus prejudice, anybody can be prejudice, and it can be racialized prejudice. All right, but you can't enact. And this goes into policymaking racist policies if you don't have power to make that happen. And so POCs don't have that power. So racism, power plus prejudice. Candy, however, threw a wrench in that a little bit for me, in that. He says you're either a racist or an anti racist. And if you're not doing if you're not working to dismantle racist systems, then there's no middle ground, then you're still underneath, or implicitly supporting racism, you're a racist. What are your thoughts on that divide of anti racist to racist and nothing in between it is ironically, black and white. Speaker 2 39:34 Nice. I struggle with, I get the idea. It makes sense in terms of like, we are moving on, there's a current and the current is moving towards racism. And unless you're swimming against it, like by default, you are moving in that direction. It's Rohadi 39:48 a good metaphor. Is that a dub special? Speaker 2 39:52 I think I've heard in some contexts before, like, you know, I gotta remember things are moving. Folks. I think I heard in the evangelical space based around like, No, that's a weird place there's either like sin or you're like countering so right like our default our sin nature is gonna make us sinful so you gotta like fight against it. So that makes sense in the in those terms but I do struggle with like this super binary like you're either for us or against us and I was talking with Curtis about this if you want to shout out Curtis Rohadi 40:20 DJ can walk I don't know if he has anything out though, but download his CD, Speaker 2 40:26 mixtape or EP. But he was saying like he was struggling about the the idea that like because he wasn't posting on Facebook like he's wasn't being an ally and the idea like, if you don't know, we were talking you're not in the Black Lives Matter like, you're now silent Yeah, doing it silence is complicity and so on. And in that particular case, I say that's not true, because there's so many other ways to be vocal and advocate like, yes, there's the Facebook warriors that are like in the comments, and they're fighting for me, and I appreciate that. But like, also, I appreciate people like writing a letter to their MP and being like, hey, racist MP stop it. Or like people that are like, protesting. Like, there's all of the different ways and I don't think it's either or I think it can be both and are all in that case, like, I think that's a lot of the conversation from last week was, I guess I'm dating this was like anyone that's not talking like I'm seeing you like you're being silent right now. Therefore, you don't care. But I think people are still being anti racist in ways that are less visible, which, in a lot of ways, like what we saw in this past week was performative for a lot of people. And so I would rather you be like sincerely doing something and like not posting on Instagram, then. But yeah, but the idea that like, you're either racist or anti racist, in the sense that you there is a default current and you're either swimming with it, or you're swimming against it. That makes sense to me. But I just want people to remember like, there's not just one way Rohadi 41:49 there is a lot of grey in this, but you know, that's the tension is it in fact, black and white you either are or you're not, which really throws a lot of white folks under the bus but the curious piece of this is the whole reverse racism you know, conversation, it's not a conversation that's an All Lives Matters, stupidity. Don't Don't say that. Reverse race. However, however, in this anti racism or racist spectrum, people of colour can be racist. Yeah, in this understanding, if you're if you are not actively dismantling, even if the system says you're not quite as good as the top, you're working hard to assimilate, you are part of the problem. Now, does that make you a racist? As I guess, yes. Unknown Speaker 42:35 towards your own people, if that's what we're Rohadi 42:36 No, I think it'd be your upholding the systems of anti blackness. Right? And so, if you're not actively working to dismantle them, you're part of the problem. Yeah, that's an indictment to everyone. But that includes POC so in the sense that reverse racism well, maybe now, you can't necessarily enact racist policies as a POC with ease, but what you can certainly do is Speaker 2 43:03 hold them Yeah, and align with those that are doing that. Yeah, for sure. Rohadi 43:07 And is that are you a racist? Speaker 2 43:10 By I'm gonna say by association. If Rohadi 43:14 you don't have the keys to the car, you're not driving but you're in the backseat, you're part and you're allowed to go to the desk Speaker 2 43:21 along for the ride. I don't know if you saw Terry Cruz's contract. Yeah. around saying like, if we are trying to be anti racist, yeah, including white people, then that's just we're just enacting if we're trying to dismantle white supremacy without white people that are just gonna get blacks and so many people were gracious leaders comments, like delete this. Yeah, what happened to Terry but it's because he doesn't understand that power and privilege piece. He's also I should say, like a black Christian that a lot of like, white Christians, like so. So I think part of his base is unfortunately, like, I don't know if he listened to them, or if he just has that perspective, or there's a lot there. But um, when he said that I was like, I'm not surprised because of your like, I don't know. I don't know his politics, but definitely you're losing a lighting. Yeah, Rohadi 44:08 yeah. Could be and you know, there's there's no one black boys. We're not it's not all black people smoke in the upstairs bathroom. Right. Yeah. So I mean, there are there's a rich history when it comes to lament and how to deal with the loss of we in black and brown theology that we need to look to because white church doesn't have it. There's no no way that white church has any capacity to understand lament in the sense of a corporate centre corporate loss because there's been nothing to lament about corporately. Right, and if you're at the top of the food chain, and if your privilege has pushed you to a place where you think that even an all lives matter, or Black Lives Matter, rather, is oppressive. My word. Yeah, lamentation escapes you, you have no sense of corporate Cinzia. Your black and brown brothers and sisters are crying out for deliverance and liberation. And the key thing is, our liberation is tied. We all gotta get out of this whole white supremacy thing that seeks less of us. All those systems. Speaker 2 45:16 I heard a stat and it was in the American context, but it's something to the effect of like, I'm not going to get it quite right. But out of 100 friends, a white person will have like, one of each have like a black, Hispanic, Asian. Yeah, and so on. 95% Yeah. But then a black person will have like 10 white friends, and like this many Asian and this many has been, I think, actually, the blackness. And Asian communities in the US are a bit not at odds, but like, they had less sort of inter mingling, I should Rohadi 45:46 say, white. So you know, white Protestants actually have the least diverse friends. Yeah. Speaker 2 45:50 But there's something to the sense of like, even just in that small example, like a black person will have like, 10 times as many people that are, that don't look like them, or that are different than them than like their white counterpart. Yeah. Three, right. But it's still something that nuances like your understanding of the other and like, and then there's even the whole sociological theory around like the outside or within when you're a minority, and you have a better understanding of like, the majority population than they would ever have a view and you kind of are able to see your culture and there's so yeah, I think let's go less systemic in this, because that's what comes to my mind is just like reach across the aisle, whether it's political, or like racial, or even like go to never go to another neighbourhood, maybe go for a stroll somewhere else and like meet people that are in a different socio economic strata, like I don't know. But I think there's there's definitely value to like, being able to meet people that are outside of your echo chamber. Rohadi 46:48 Even churches are segregated, which is the problem divided by faith by Michael Emerson is where you would pull out some of the data from that what I just said on the white Protestants, which is probably about 2025 years old now. And but he's, he's repeated some of that data before. Any parting thoughts? Thanks so much. Speaker 2 47:08 Yeah, this was fun. parting thoughts, I had something jumped in my brain, it's now gone. Rohadi 47:13 Racism, anti racism, nothing. Yeah. Speaker 2 47:15 I think like, a really key thing that I've been aware of in this last couple of weeks is that people don't have an understanding of our history in Canada in particular, yeah, we're even a little bit more attuned what's maybe on average yet, but like to the US history, and then that's like our perfect like, yeah, we just sort of like clean our hands. Like, we didn't have that. So therefore, yeah. And yet, Rohadi 47:36 we did tell us about that. Speaker 2 47:37 We didn't have a history of slavery. Yeah. Tell us tell us. Yeah. And I got into an argument this week. This is Twitter's Great. This dude, so I won't get the whole backstory. The point was, he was trying to tell me that slavery didn't exist in Canada. And we're the only country that didn't have it, stupid statement. And and so I pointed him to an article, you know, to peer reviewed, blah, blah, blah. And he was like, well, even this fraudulent article says that, Rohadi 48:04 actually an article not from the post, like this is actually peer reviewed, Speaker 2 48:07 and it's a scholar and academic and so on. Obviously, even your fraudulent article shows that slavery, legit slavery ended in 1834. and Canada was actually Britain back then, therefore, like Canada didn't have slaves was the argument. And I was like, okay, so because like something happened prior to a country like naming itself arbitrarily. At some point, when it decided to 1867 Slate, that means that we're clean, like amazing. Nigeria was never colonised because it wasn't Nigeria at the time. Oh, it was just, it was so interesting to me. I was like, What a weird argument. So yeah, so there's a lack of history. And then even when people do get, you know, the fat because they're not willing to, I guess, like, accept them. So anyways, I think something important to do, and all of us should do this, is just do more reading, and listen to voices that are within communities that we want to support. Like, I've done this with the indigenous community. I guess the digitus communities across Canada, just don't mind reading. I didn't have to, like call someone and like, ask them to explain to me the racist incidents that they've experienced in this country, or like how they feel like intergenerational trauma from residential schools has affected them. It's like, no, no, let me go out of my way to find this information without like, putting someone asking someone to like, share their trauma with me. Yeah, I think that's, that's really key. And I think in the church and outside of the church, there's value there. And then I think for Christians in particular, I think there's a lot of value to challenging yourself to read like liberation theology and theology is that black Rohadi 49:39 people make that Yeah. Like Brown. Not just like Speaker 2 49:42 the white theologians, especially because like who in the Bible was not who the Bible's white, first of all, Rohadi 49:49 maybe the Roman Cinterion I guess, maybe. Speaker 2 49:52 It's just the reality that like, there's Jesus, there's actual you know, it doesn't have to be a pagan idea because it didn't come from a white Christian. Yeah, Rohadi 50:01 that's that's the formation of white supremacy is a white Eurocentric thinking. Yeah, you're right. There's so many resources out there. And I encourage everyone to reach out we'll have some of those pieces. I mean, Cypher church in a in a small way as a church formed around resistance around white, European thinking. But we all share in that formation as well and can't escape it. So there's a tension. It's a good one, but we need to navigate it and continue forward in some way while we linger in the pain. So Thanks, Deb. Thanks so much. I think we covered a lot. It's, we don't make public policy. Cool. Oh, it's so cool. But yeah, you make it cool. So thank you. Thanks for that. And maybe we'll do it again some time to figure out where we have reached with all these dreams that we had.