Adam MacLean: Hey Peepadoodles. Welcome to Find Your Light of Post Shame podcast. I'm your host, Adam MacLean.
Find Your Light is a show where we shine a light on shame and imagine Post Shame world in Act One, we'll meet a Post Shame warrior. Someone who I think is up to something special and has a tool to teach us to help dismantle shame.
Then an act two, we'll play a little game of armchair quarterback by re-examining someone's public shaming through the lens of PostShame. If they had had access to this tool before their downfall, do we think they could have come out a better leader and helped others dealing with something similar?
We'll see. And now on with the show. Peepadoodles , thank you so much for coming back for another episode of Find Your Light. Today, my interview is with journalist and media personality, Zach Stafford. He is he's amazing. I have a total friend crush on Zach. I'm so excited. He agreed to do this interview.
He's so brilliant. I love his brain. I love his insights and he's had a really long career in journalism, which we'll get into in the interview. And he has just been so committed to investigations, uh, investigative journalism, truth, clarity, transparency, and he's brought it to everything he does. So I introduced them at the top of the interview.
I can't wait for you to get to know him. And here's my interview with Zach Stafford.
Welcome back for another episode of Find Your Light. I'm here with my buddy, Zach Stafford, who I'm so excited to talk to. I'm going to do a quick rundown of his bio because he is such a bad-ass journalist and has done so many things. He's currently an MSNBC contributor. He was formerly at Buzzfeed news. He was the editor in chief of the advocate at that same time that he was doing that job.
I don't know how his schedule allowed for this. He also did a morning show on Twitter called AM to DM. That was so fun, but he was one of those people that was like up at like four in the morning, working with producers, like meeting celebrities than rushing off to go do his, his, did you feel like you were like Nina Garcia?

Zach Stafford: Yeah, because I took a car every morning to set that's it? Yeah, it's really it's every morning. So that's why I don't know if the subways very well. Cause I came here to do the show and also run the magazine, but I had an office in LA. So when I got here they were like, okay, well we have cars for you in the morning and I didn't learn the subway.

AM: And did you ever like aspire to that at all? Cause like that I would love someone I was working with was just like, we're sending a car. I would be a wash. It's just a good feeling. That's just a nice feeling.

ZS: I would say. And a lot of people in my life would agree to this. I think one of the best luxuries in life is having a driver. I think that's like peak chic,

AM: but also like peak efficiency.

ZS: Yeah. It's so efficient because you also can work and get things done. You also like don't have to stress about that. And at the time I was running a magazine and hosting and producing a live show on Twitter that had, I think a half a million people watch every day. So it was like a lotta and there were a lot of celebrities. It was eight celebrities a day. So it was like a lot. So I had to, like, I was in the car reading scripts.

AM: Just constantly, just constantly working. Well, yeah, not relatable content with the driver, but absolutely relatable content with the hustle, you are hus-tl-ing getting it done. But you started this whole reporter career, like legit newspaper, like beat reporter.

ZS: Yeah, it was, well, it was kind of this interesting journey where I began. I mean, my history with journalism is that I never thought I was going to be a journalist. I didn't want to be.

AM: Love that.

ZS: I studied geography in school and gender studies.

AM: So like a map of the world and then like

ZS: through body parts yet, I'm thinking, no, that's not what it is. Yeah. It's kind of that it's like, I studied, like I was really,

AM: Please tell me you had a queer theory thesis that was like mapping the planet through my body. Or like something like something really,

ZS: this is so weird that you're saying this. I had a project that showed it all this geography conferences. It was called mapping desire. So it was very that. And what I was doing as the take, I would take Craigslist ads for misconnections. You use the data that people list and create these maps to tell the story of desire and cities. So I was, I was obsessed with space in place.
So it was the reason why at the time was, you know, this I'm in school. And while I'm in school, this thing called Grindr happens and grindr was the first time we see GPS, which is weapons technology used for social.

AM: We talk about Grindr in every episode of this podcast or the fact that you've like correlated weapons technologies,

ZS: And I say this as the ex chief content officer grindr, and I would talk about this. I mean, that's how I got to grindrs. They had me come in and give a talk. Because you know, I began my career. Uh, I was in school. I was writing, I hated academic writing. So I started writing blogs and all this other stuff eventually got recruited by the Chicago Tribune to write a column.
And they wanted me to be very Carrie Bradshaw esque and I was 21 and I was like, sure, that sounds fabulous. So that's where I began as opinion writing, but I was using my training as a geographer to do stories. So I would do stories like, um, should you date your neighbor? So it would be this idea that like, what is closeness and proximity to people due to intimacy and desire because geography, the type of geography I study is cultural geography.
So this idea that places express culture through the actual enviroment. Like the city of New York and how we've built New York and how it's on an island and all these kinds of physical elements do correlate to the types of art or the ways in which we think about the world compared to like, you know, desert, like in Dubai, there's a reason why certain aesthetics come from there.
So I was really interested in like what comes, what is expressed in space. And Grindr was really interesting to me because it was literally a new space, the digital space that was like, we were all having to build new bodies online and they were expressing things and we got to choose what we wanted to express. So I became obsessed with that world.

AM: And choose what parts of our body we wanted to commodify to get the best result.

ZS: And it also, we're thinking about that commodification within a capitalistic system. And let's kind of like, okay, my ex is really sexy, so I'm going to put that out. So anyway, people were thinking about their bodies in ways I didn't think they ever were thinking about before. So I was writing about this things a lot. At the time I have this mentor, Spencer Ackerman at the Guardian and he told me one day I got pulled into a reporting story. So I was eventually I get to the Guardian and I'm an opinion columnist. And I have like a great career of like the youngest opinion columnists ever at the Guardian with the oldest newspaper in the world.
And he told me, cause I got pulled into a story where I had to report one day and I didn't think I'd be a good reporter. I was like, I'm good at opinions. I don't know, reporting. And that day I was pretty good at it naturally. Cause I like talking to people, and he said to me. You know, everyone has an opinion, but if you want a job, a career, you should learn to report better.
And I like a challenge. So then I started working on it with him and then the rest was kind of history. We became like a reporting duo and won a ton of awards over a few years of talking about how black people were being disappeared by Chicago police. And that's how I became like Zach Stafford the reporter. And then that became like, I became like a real journalist then, and then my whole life changed. So.

AM: Wow.

ZS: But it began with sex columns.

AM: All, all roads begin all over like Carrie Bradshaw. Yes.

ZS: Yes. And at the time it's so funny when I think about the very first column I published was, it was called what you date my neighbor and it's because I was like kind of going on dates with this guy that lived a few blocks from me. And I knew if I wrote about him in my column, he would read it and see me kind of talking about it. So at the beginning of my writing career was also me using my platform to, um, find love. Like . I was like, I don't want to use grindr, I'm wanna use the Chicago tribune. Um, and it didn't work. It didn't work.

AM: I mean, I'm trying to theorize the company next door, next door. And like, I wonder, do people find dates on that?

ZS: People find dates on like, um, there's like word games that the app stores like, what's the one where you like a Wordle is Wordle Wordle. I think people fell in love with people, find love in so many different ways. And it's . Always through

AM: Thanks for the reminder Zach. Thanks for the reminder that it's always out there to find.

ZS: And this is really this idea that like, you can find someone doing the thing that you love. So there's that idea like you like hiking, you want to date someone hiking, go hiking. You also think as a church and you better go to church, you know, there's all this stuff.
Um, and I say this as someone who met third boyfriend years ago at a CrossFit gym, which I was like, laughed about how gay that is, absurd. but we've never talked.

AM: But you lived in Chelsea at the time?

ZS: I lived in Chelsea at the time and we met,

AM: This is peak queer, this is queer excellence.

ZS: And it's also funny because I like how, I mean, if we're talking about Post Shame and all these things today is that. I had a crush on him. I didn't know if he was gay or not. So then I did what any reasonable gay person would do. Who's also a journalist is I got behind the counter of my gym, pulled up his profile, found his name had found that he already followed me on Twitter. So yeah. And then I was like, you're gay.

AM: That is reporting slew thing of the highest regard.

ZS: I was like, next time you talk to me, I was like, let's hang out in that time,

AM: This is like mission impossible style. Like, were you on wires after like the gym had closed and you were like tapping in the password to the computer? Or were you just friends with the front desk person?

ZS: I waited to know who was at the front desk. I walked behind.

AM: You're kidding.

ZS: It was very easy to do.

AM: I mean, he knows the story now.

ZS: I've told him this. Yes. And I tell this to people, sometimes. I'm telling this. Yeah, I think it's just like, I don't know. People were like, well, that's so creepy. I'm like, he already felt, he knew who I was already and hadn't mentioned it.
That was also creepy to me. And this was like, let's combine our creepiness that like, you're talking to me at the shim and you're not like saying that like I, cause I was his editor once,

AM: But that would get, that would make me even. Wait you were his editor once?

ZS: He like wrote an op ed at the Advocate. And I had no idea that was him like, cause it was like,

AM: Okay, I love all of these like, um, connected elements. Uh, so speaking of like connected elements and the GPS and everything grindr. When you were at grindr, you like, I don't know if this was accidental or intentional, but you like shut down their, their thing that you did. You were chief content officer for their website into what's it called into more just into?

ZS: It's called into, but the website was into more 'cause into.com was too expensive.

AM: Got it. So you're chief content officer at into and you needed to oversee the reporting of your boss who had made comments saying that he was against gay marriage. Yes. That he believed the definition of marriage was a man and a woman. One of those statements that's they think is worded very thoughtfully and you're like, it's still, it's not. Okay.

ZS: Yeah. And it was, um, in a, it was a Mandarin Chinese too. So it was like, uh, I got flagged on this. I mean, the story of it is very funny to where this guy named Scott Chin, this is a very Google-able, he's an ex Facebook executive. Um, and he had a pretty big Facebook following he's from Taiwan and China, but he's originally from Taiwan and he went to school in China and he had a pretty big following of mostly people from his home countries and they were pretty conservative and he was very open about working at grindr.
He was very proud about working at grindr actually. And he would post a lot on his facebook. I was the chief content officer for the whole company and he was president and I reported to him and he was my only boss and the board. We were together all of the time. And I was part of meetings where we would like monitor different things.
I was with the heads of PR and all of this stuff. So I knew everything going on. And I got flagged one day through the systems. I had that, like, we were getting a lot of traffic from the, on the site from like a random article that was coming from a Facebook page. And like what we do in media, we can always see where traffic is coming from.
So I did a dive and I was like, where is this traffic coming from? Like, why is this one Facebook page driving so many clips in Southeast Asia. And then come to find out it was his personal Facebook where he'd been posting in his native tongue. In conversation with a bunch of people about marriage. I work with Google translator first and translate.
It was like, Ooh, that doesn't look good. Let's hire a real translators and work with real reporters that I had on staff. And we began to look into it. Um, because the thing with, into when it was at Grindr was there was a very clear wall. Is that into, is its own media platform that had all the privileges that a newspaper should have, even if it's inside of a tech company.
And we should support that in the company, knew that if something ever went awry, like we would report on it. And that was our agreement. Then grindr had gone through a few ownership changes. So the new owners had agreed to my terms, but didn't know what that would look like in real life. And then this incident happened.

AM: They didn't know they had like a newspaper inside their data

ZS: Or they didn't think they thought they could control it more. And I'm such a stickler. Like I know I said that, like I came from like a, like a columnist background. I was a sec writer, all this stuff, but I've always very much believed in journalism and believe that like, journalism is so important to democracy and it's an important thing to have to keep true the whole truth, the power.
So that never changed for me. So even if. I'm an executive here. Like you said, this thing in public that people have read. We are reporting on things. You are the head of the largest gay company in the world. And you were saying

AM: That's really the important qualifier, the largest gay company. Yeah. Like this, it's not just like a services organization. This is where gay people are congregating. This is the largest queer space. This is the best known thing to straight folks.

ZS: Yeah. And we're doing marriage equality work in other countries. She's like the company was funding through its own apparatuses that this work in Sub-Saharan Africa in the middle east, like we were doing all this stuff, but he didn't actually agree with the missions of the company.
So that would be news anywhere. And we were at the time, the largest LGBTQ outlet in the world. So I was like, well, we will write about this. And yes, we wrote about it. He was not informed until he was asked for comment. Um, which is like its own thing.

AM: That is what they make the movies about

ZS: It's very, it's a very, it was very dramatic day that day. Some of the board was in town to LA and I had to defend everything in front of everybody. And, um, and it got really rocky. I was there for a few months after that, but then eventually I left because,

AM: Well, there was nothing for you to do.

ZS: I came back, but like budgets for, it was just, the writing was on the wall. So, uh, I was, um, poached by pride media to become the energy for the Advocate.
Cause they were trying to invest in reporting there. And, and since some of that team came with me through and they, all, others went to other things, but you know, the site still lives it's owned by Q Digital was sold. This has come up in meetings about other jobs, but they're like, would you report on us like you reported them. And I'm like, oh yeah, I would like, I've been offered, I won't say names, but I've been offered editor-in-chief of like very famous outlets and I, that comes up and I say to the publishers, oh yeah, yeah, we totally would. And like, okay. And they still want to hire me, but I'm just like, I'm not, I'm not going to let you, uh, not get a,

AM: Is that a commitment to transparency or, or do you just call that your commitment to journalism?

ZS: I think it's a commitment to like truth. It like exists. Like if something's in the world. So for that incident, you know, here, he said it in public, it existed. Staff had seen it in the office. Like it was something people had even been talking about.
Oh. So it was like, it's already out there. Like, and that's the thing with journalism. It's like, when something is real and tangible, you write about it. We don't create things. We write about what's happening. So for me, that's already in the world so we can talk about it and things get better. When you talk about it, if we try to ignore it, I dunno, it doesn't work for me.

AM: That's part of the mission of Post Shame is we have to do a reckoning and you have to look back in your past and you just have to get clear with that.

ZS: I mean just lately, I've been thinking about this, cause I've been like in my early thirties and I've been working in journalism for over 10 years and now I can like look back at like my work and be like, why did I make these decisions?
What drove me that? And I think this obsession with telling the truth and dealing with the realities of life come from my work when I was working a lot in, uh, in hate crimes. Um, so I spent a lot of my time as I was becoming like a real journalist at the Guardian, I was being assigned to a, it was like 2014.
Um, so at the time we were seeing the beginnings of this epidemic of trans homicides that we're talking about now. So for years, we never tracked when trans people got murdered, I was not a box you could check on any police form. It was nothing. So none of it got reported. So I was part of like a team of reporters in 20 13, 14 that began being like, wait a minute.
When we get these reports from police, that someone was found dead with a purse that is probably a trans identified person that's being mis-gendered and we should look into it. So we began looking into it and through these con these hate crimes I was looking at was, um, a lot of people responding to shame that they were, you know, we'd have like a male identified session or guy who his family just found out his girlfriend was trans. So he would murder her because she told, or someone would become HIV positive and they would kill the person they thought, you know, expose them to the HIV virus. And all of that was about shame and trying to hide it. And I was fascinated that people would feel so much shame and be so afraid of the truth getting out, but they're willing to kill people because also the act of killing people also exposed you.

AM: This is reminding me of that quote. All violence is an effort to turn shame into self-esteem.

ZS: Yeah,

AM: I don't think it's, is it still legal in many states, but the gay panic defense haven't we finally outlawed that,

ZS: It's gone but there's times where people try to argue it. So it's still like kind of around, but it isn't, uh, like the, the, um, the politician that killed Harvey milk got away with it like he served some time but got off.

AM: Um, he also got off cause like he had like a low blood sugar twinkie defense kinda thing.

ZS: Yeah. twinkie defense is quite a thing. But yeah, it used to be a real thing. And that's the same with like, um, like lynchings and all, any history of violence in America that focuses on a minority is always about fear. Um, and we allow people to enact violence to protect the status quo.
So, um, with hate crimes, that was always about shame always. And, but what was so wild to me is that. You do love this person you do, or you are attracted to them, or you are engaged in a relationship in this thing. And the fact that people know you're willing to destroy a body in your life at the same time.
So I know that's just been something that I was like, so I would travel around the whole country, the world. I mean, yeah. I traveled outside the country to doing these stories, looking at all this. And I was just fascinated and like, why couldn't people reckon with what is cause like the thing happened, but you're still alive.
You're still here. So I think like that kind of question is that comes up for me. When I look at like the grindr reporting where I'm like you said, these things like you might as well let people know that.

AM: I like that framing. Why can't people reckon with what is, because there are other factors in their life that are telling them that it's not like maybe it's an oppressive religion saying trans folks aren't real. Or it's a Florida governor saying gay people don't have a place in our society. Uh, God, I can't believe this don't say gay bill is, is continuing and that it's not popping up in other states.

ZS: Did you see this Missouri bill that's coming? They're trying to make it illegal for trans kids to get gender affirming care. They now want to extend that to adults. So it was like bad enough that with the kids, then now they want to outlaw being trans in total, which has happened before. This has all existed before, but now it's all going backwards and it's really, really weird.

AM: Yeah. That, that I hope the Supreme court can get itself sorted out in time. I just, I applaud your commitment to transparency and good journalism. And the fact that you have brought all of your experiences into everything you've done is totally, bad-ass like building that mosaic of that early reporting, just boots on the ground, looking at data. I think that's so rad. You have gorgeous podcast voice. That's one of the many reasons why you've been invited on here. Uh, but you have other podcasts projects. Tell me what in the deepest.

ZS: Oh yes. Yes. So I have a show called in the deep, it's a show with iHeartRadio and what's really crazy about it is that I was approached to do it in the pandemic. So I've only done a season, nine episodes, and they came to me and they were like, we want to do the show that's for Black and LatinX men, just to talk about the world around them and things they've been through.
And a lot of the show was beginning, was focused on HIV at the beginning, cause I've done a lot of work from HIV. But then I went broader and it was just really about, you know, men, everyday men, who have been through things and wanting to talk about that, the stories. And it was really about, um, that tagline stories that shape us is I, I believe so much in that.
Um, like I did a book like 10 years ago called boys, which was, um, a collection of essays by various people who are now bigger, like is in it it's the first place that they ever published something. But it was a book about queer stories that weren't about coming out. And I was like, I want to know the stories before the coming out or after the coming out, like the little bitty moments in your life.
Cause I think like the biggest things in history happened in the smallest breaths. And I don't think everything's these big historic like marches or big speeches. So I really like smallness, I think smallness leads us to like a lot of bigness. So the show when they pitched it to me was can you sit down with like,
I dunno, like the advisors to Obama on HIV and just talk to them about like falling in love. And like, I wanted to use that as a way to get us to like the larger stuff that they're working on, because I think people have this idea that big people have big stories that led them to bigness. And it's like,

AM: Oh, I I'm so guilty of that. I totally see certain public leaders where I'm like, oh, they've just lived a life of service. And every project they've ever done, it just is he knocking it out of the park is huge.

ZS: It's always the opposite. It's like always very small moments where people have the biggest inspiration is like, I dunno, you have coffee with a friend one day and you finally, this thing clicked in you.
So I was really interested in that, especially through black and brown men. So the show was just like this, like sit down where I got to like, just talk and what was crazy about it. And I think it's coming, it's coming back to this winter is that, um, these people aren't famous, they've done a profound, interesting things and they've been in public before, but they're not like, and I'm talking to Billy Porter or, you know, Denzel Washington.
I was talking to like a preacher from Atlanta who is famous in his community. And I love that so much because I feel like when I was doing AM to DM who before the pandemic hit and were to shut down, um, I sat down with like the most famous people in the world. I said, I even moderate a presidential debate. Like I've like been with the most famous people.
I find famous people really boring. And they like the very PR and very, like, they have a message and I want it to get into like really hard, complicated, not perfect conversations. The ones that I had when I was a reporter, when I was like helicoptering into Kansas city to deal with a murder, like people are just like going through their lives, talking to me, they haven't talked to a PR agency.

AM: I feel like that's a little bit of guidance for Post Shame that I'm not demanding that everyone released their nudes. I don't have this like bold vision where I'm like, everyone has to do life this one way. I think it has more to do with, you know, if you're trying to run for school board and you know that there's like a treasury you know, position that you might be assigned to, but you know, you have a history of money troubles, like even in a tiny community, you could be like, this was my college debt and credit card debt. And this is when I stumbled and this is how I put it back together. And I, I want to help run this organization.
That would be so Post Shamed to say, don't go looking for this in my past. I want to bring it forward, but tell you how I've learned from it. So it's an opportunity for the little stories to build your bigger story.

ZS: Yeah. I'd love that. I love that.

AM: Or even my journey in Post Shame, I could have left these nudes that I've talked about in episode one and the essays and everything. Like I could have left them behind because that's part of the story is that I did get them extinguish.

ZS: Yeah.

AM: I did get them removed from the internet. Yeah. I was like, that feels unfair. This tiny thing that happened. You know, was consensual. The nonconsensual set was still me. That is me in the photos. Um, it's just truth, but there are these little moments that it's like, no, let, let this inform your future. You don't have to just, there's a difference between pushing things under the rug and leaving things behind. Yeah. There's a difference.

ZS: Yeah. Yeah. And as you're saying that, I just made me think about, um, I can be very visual sometimes, if anything, about, um, like water erosion on rocks, you know, like as waves crash, and it's always, you can't take that away. Every wave makes some kind of imprint and like, right.

AM: Which is why every coming out story is important. So let's use that as the, the segue into Jerrod Carmichael coming out. So, you know, I, I have to admit, I only met Jerrod Carmichael when he hosted SNL.

ZS: I mean, same. I knew who he was vaguely. Like, I kind of knew his work.

AM: As soon as he showed up on SNL, I was like, oh, this guy's handsome. And then he comes out as he admits that his HBO special, he comes out of the closet and I'm like, what? We're getting gay slips that I don't even know about.

ZS: And also, you know, the better part about all that. He's a gay celebrity that you don't know about that doesn't have social media. Like he doesn't even like tweet or post on Instagram. Have you noticed that?

AM: Uh, I, I might admit that, yes. I noticed that because if you don't think that I didn't go to Instagram and search and try to find it. And I was just like, what's his deal with city is he in? Cause he makes a joke in the special, the HBO special about Raya where he's like, you know, if you know, praying a little bit every time, you know, he's liking someone on Raya like, you know, they kinda liked me back and I'm like, wait, I'm on Raya. Maybe they want to sponsor this podcast.

ZS: I'm so glad you're sharing this because I also used to be on Raya and I was like, wait, I never matched with you on Raya. That's messed up. I could've been, I could've been the person you're making jokes, but I'm not a vanilla king. As he said, like,

AM: Oh, he goes into a whole, whole thing. And we're putting a pin in vanilla cake for later. But, you know, you've interviewed these black and brown men talking about their stories. One of the episodes of in the deep deals with coming out was so, and you yourself are a person of color. Who's also happens to be gay. Where do you think we're at? And when you see a celebrity like Jerrod come out, like, what does it do to you?

ZS: What I loved about it. I see the black man from low-income area, you know, he built this huge comic career.

AM: Yes. It's like weird that we don't know about a more, like he's done a lot of HBO specials and had a sitcom on NSBC yeah.

ZS: Yes. He's been very public and that's the point is that like, you can be so public, but still be so private. Like he is 35 and been so in the public eye and yet he was still hiding so much that we're, so it's so interesting to him that even his mother didn't know. I just love that like reality of himself, uh, presenting that to be like so many people around you are living such interior lives and choosing how they live in public and choosing what they want to share.
And, you know, he has the texture of being black and queer and from a religious place, so there's like really great light in that for black queer people, it to be like, oh, I can see myself. And your story sounds really familiar. And, you know, while we see more queer kids out than ever before, a lot of people don't have the safety or the space to be that.
Um, so just because you can go on Netflix and see, it doesn't mean it actually exists in schools and all this stuff. I mean, homelessness rates still are 40% of all homeless kids are queer or making only up only 5% of all youth populations. There's a vastly messed up and Jerrod shows why that is the case.
Like he, he only could only come out in this way because he's rich and famous, which he kept talking about. He's like, I'm a millionaire. I have all this money. I can do this. And it's like, and even that took him like a decade to do being rich couldn't even do it. So I don't know for me, like I know coming out stories are always seen as very.
Passe. I think that's so boring. Cause I think like what he shows us is the coming out is like the big ta-da of it at all. But like it's all those other stories, all those little moments with his mom and his family even doing the show is what really makes it pretty special. Cause also coming out just like a moment, they gotta have a whole other life after this.

AM: Yeah. You gotta go on dates.

ZS: Yeah. You gotta go on dates. You gotta Raya again. Now that he's been recognized. So it's like a whole thing.

AM: Yeah. Well that also leads us to a musical opening on Broadway. A big, I love that y'all have chosen this as the tagline and I get to say it a Big Black Queer Ass American Musical. It's so exciting. It's called a strange loop. I'm wearing the t-shirt for it right now. I got to see it this past weekend and I mean it slaps. It's one of these shows that is no intermission. And it is like a freight train.

ZS: Yeah. once it gets going, it goes,

AM: It gets started and it rolls. And I don't know. How do you, instead of me describing a show, I'm just seeing, I mean, you're involved in, in as a producer and, you know, part of the production team, like how do you describe it to people and, and are you afraid of like giving anything away? Like how do you describe it?

ZS: I really struggled with this a lot. Cause you know, the tagline does such a good job. And when people ask me, I'm like, okay, it's a story about a black boy in New York that is gay and works on Broadway. And wants to find love, wants to feel loved, wants to create work, but it feels like he can't do to all these things around him.
And it's the shows about him going on this journey of, you know, getting there, hopefully, maybe we'll see, but it's also like, well, I think the show is so special because I came in after it won the Pulitzer in 2020, um, and the pandemic hit and it was like, you know, this is like getting to Broadway was not a definite thing.
Like, not just because you get a Pulitzer, it also doesn't mean you go to Broadway, like getting to Broadway is very hard. 'Cause Broadway requires these are businesses. Like these shows cost tens of millions of dollars to do. And they used to make it back and just get something, get the Pulitzer. It doesn't mean people are going to go to it.
So that's the first step. So, but it got there because a lot of us came together and got it across the finish line and now it opens and now it is open. And, um, for me, the show is so special on Broadway because the character Usher played by Jaquel Spivey now. Famously by Larry Owens before. Um, who's now in a bunch of TV shows on HBO.

AM: Yeah. He's busy. He's booked and busy.

ZS: She's a very busy girl. Um, but you know, the idea of this is what happens to the shows. This guy wants to have a musical on Broadway. So when it opens and now it's open, um, it's on Broadway. So for me, when I look at Michael R Jackson, who worked on it for 16 years of his life,

AM: I, and by the way, I need that, like that, just knowing that, that he worked on it for so long and it's finally here and it opens like it. When we're recording, it opens tomorrow. He must be just overwashed in so many emotions.

ZS: Yeah. Tomorrow, like I have been emotional for him and I'm like, yeah, like girl, I haven't even known you for 16 years.

AM: I'm just a fan and I'm emotional for you.

ZS: Because I've loved his work for so long. And now I get to work with him. So now it's like, when it opens tomorrow, by the time you hear this, it will be open. It will have done this thing that makes the name make sense. A strange loop where it's literally a boy named Usher. Who's on Broadway that wants to write a musical about being black and queer on Broadway. That's about someone being black and queer on Broadway. And now the show went to say enters Broadway because now Lyceum has done that.
So now it's this infinite thing. And I think when we talk about like black futurism and blackness and blackness is like looking as like, uh, as like the essence of creativity and like life, like the show kind of embodies all of this like radical theories, because like it is, I don't know, there's something just as magical about like this black fat actor character on Broadway is like, you know, when you send in a mirror, the two mirrors and you see infinity and around you, that's what the show is doing by being on Broadway.
So it just shows like the power and expansiveness of black queerness and that, like, it can be a place where anyone can go to learn something about themselves on Broadway now, and it can empower you to build your own dreams that may take 16 years, may take two years, whatever it is.

AM: So there's a paradox there in, and I love you brought up black futurism, which, uh, I think when I'm talking about it, in context of like my show with Danielle James Safe Space, and we talk about black joy and looking for black joy, watching the show afterwards, she said, I don't want to take these words out of her mouth, but it's like top of mind here that she was like, yeah, I didn't love watching it with white folks because I didn't like that. Y'all saw a black pain.

ZS: Yeah.

AM: I didn't like that you saw black struggle and you and I are talking about the show is this like success and this journey and the 16 years, and it's open on Broadway, but then paradoxically, the content is hard. Hard. Struggle. There are moments in the show where I, as a cisgender gay white dude, I'm like, oh my God, universal themes. So it turns out we all go through this. That's my, I realized I'm voicing my interior monologue.

ZS: What are your thoughts? Because all the other characters are thoughts.

AM: I didn't want to give it away, but the other characters on stage are the interior of Usher's you know, inner monologue. So my inner monologue is yelling like the, see these themes are universal. We're all the same. This is so speaking to me as a queer man, looking for love. And then there are moments in the show where it lands like a thud where I'm like, oh yeah, Nope.

ZS: That was very specific

AM: Very specific, nope. Very different. Yeah. I don't know that experience say yeah.

ZS: Uh, for me as a storyteller, that's always the tip check for what is a good is, is this a good story? I think the best stories are super specific. They're very much about a specific person's life, what they went through, et cetera. And through that intimacy, you can then begin to find your own threads in that. And I think what people get so freaked out about, is it, think that the whole story they're supposed to relate to and it's like, no, you're supposed to, like, you take pieces of it.
And that tells you where you sit in this kind of like big spectrum of identity. And then you learn from that and make your own stories around it. Say, I don't think people need to look at stories all the time as being in a super definitive or having to like encapsulate their entire life. I think every story's supposed to be very specific to one person and that's why all of our stories matter and they become a chorus that helps us live in the single life.
So I think the show there's going to be some moments where you watch it. You're like, oh, was like, a white woman. You may see things cause white woman, now that won't, I won't spoil that part, but why womanhood is a big part of the show is a big part of the show too. Um, but it's like, we all got to parts of each other everywhere and it's really just listening to each other and finding those points of connection, but not letting them define all of us in totality is really the specialness of it all.

AM: The way you're describing it is like, there are pieces of everyone in us. All I can hear is that like ridiculous thing that white gay men say a lot, how they're like, there's a black woman living inside me and she's so fierce. And then they're like quoting them. It's just like, yeah, it's real Housewives of atlanta thing. Like, yeah, what do we, what do we do with that?

ZS: I think what people have to learn to do is that you can see similarities of yourself and other people and other things, but you also don't own that person's story, life, body, experiences, like you were not that person.
And what you have to be. It's very specific. Like when I hear people say I'm a black woman inside a white man's body, what are you actually saying there? Like, where are you pulling from? And I think people should tell those stories of where, how you, how did you arrive at I'm a black woman. So you're saying what you speak out, you use certain slang and like, that's what you're actually saying.
So why not be, I don't know that specific, but also I don't want to give anyone grace for saying like that phrase because I really hate it. So

AM: No, it's, it's truly, truly, truly ridiculous. But I'm realizing now and talking about it out loud. When I talk about the show, a strange loop, like I do want to admit to, especially my gay friends and be like, there are a lot of pieces of this that made me feel understood, you know, it's just that thing of seeing the romantic struggle on stage and then the moments where it really reveals to me how different my experience is from Ushers on stage and that I've walked through this life with privilege. I'm just like, okay, do I process that as shame? Or do I process that as just recognition? And then just try to let it inform the rest of the thing.

ZS: I love that out of the latter part, you said as recognition and just let it inform, I think it's what you gotta do. Yeah. I think people see if they sometimes with difference. I think like when we look at what we were talking about hate crimes and fear and on some people, but like when people see something that they understand or they don't see their whole selves in, or they see parts of themselves or whatever.
You know, they freak out a bit and they don't know what to do with all that. And it's like, just sit in that, be like, okay, like, you don't need to be complete in other people's stories. You can just take the pieces, walk away, keep and keep moving. Like, it's really not that serious. And I think people will get so like obsessed with like, I mean, standoms are, yes.
Standoms is very much about this where people are like, I, I love Beyonce because I, I am Beyonce, all this stuff. It's like, okay, you're not Beyonce, but you can like, you have parts of you that she inspires and that's okay. But it's, I don't know. You.

AM: For people who don't know that contracted word, standom, you know, it's like, you're a fan, but you're so much of a fan that you're a stalker fan. So you become a stan and you're obsessed, but you're right. A lot of the beehive is like committed to saying like, yeah, she is me. I am her, we are oneness.

ZS: And people are so obsessed with like this exterior affirmation all the time. And like those, I think when you see yourself in Beyonce, uh, whoever Usher on stage, those should be great points to reflect inwards, not keep looking outwards. It's like, what is that thing that you're picking up? And then what is the memory it's taking you back to you? And then sit in that, but I don't know.

AM: So in addition to Big Black Queer Ass American Musical, should the second tagline be like, don't freak out, like relax,

ZS: Like unclench, you know?

AM: Oh, I like that unclench, but I told you it's like so fast it's like coming at you.

ZS: Did you see slave play?

AM: I did.

ZS: I feel like they're both evoking interesting conversations about intimacy and race on Broadway, right? Um, one's musical. One's not.

AM: I shied away from intoning slave play when I was talking to other people about it, because it felt too easy. Oh. But I know in like marketing world or like when people are just trying to use a shorthand, they're just like, yeah.

ZS: I mean, the show is just for people that really care is like, I would not say a slave play is specifically the same, cause one's a play once musical ones about like couples dealing with racial violence within their relationships. And I would say Ushers dealing with racism of the world and the isms of the world.
And how does that interrupt his pursuits for love of work, love of life, love of self, all this stuff. So one's very much about like the body in a world. The other is about, I was like two bodies in the know very interior worlds of their sex lives. Pre-independence south.

AM: Yeah, exactly. So, yeah, but go see both is Slave Plays touring right now or is it in LA?

ZS: It's in LA, just closed in LA. It's touring it is. I mean, it's around.

AM: So in continuing the conversation about seeing yourself in art, there is some of the show. Yeah. You knew where I was going. There were moments in a strange loop that kind of attempt to wrestle with interracial relationships and, you know, I'm white you know, having that crush on Jerrod Carmichael. Um, and then I go see a strange loop and I'm like, huh,

ZS: Okay. The problematic ness of a swirl. Yeah. Yeah.

AM: I even allowed to say that.

ZS: I think I'm the, I am a mixed person. So that's why I'm like I, where I sit in this conversation is like, and we can go there about like interracial politics and love it because this conversation has been happening for so long and America, but I'm literally the product of a black man and a white woman coming together.
So that's why I'm always like, okay. Yeah. Like I know like I'm a black man and like, my partner is not black. Uh, but, uh, yeah. I, I, yes, it's complicated.

AM: I love it. I love it. All, all roads lead to it's complicated. Uh, and I have some friends that are in interracial relationships and it comes up, it just comes up. Like there's no way for it to not come up. But I have to say, I walked away from strange loop. More uncomfortable around addressing the discomfort of inter racial relationships. I'm not giving it a review. I just met my experience of it was, I was like, huh?

ZS: Yeah. Cause it made it hyper political.

AM: That's what I mean. It was, it was, um, it was just a pin point, there wasn't a resolution to that point and you know, the show doesn't end up getting a white boyfriend.

ZS: Yeah, no, there's no white boyfriend at the end.. I mean, slave play was dealing with those power dynamics of like white boyfriends or white partners.

AM: They kind of like talk it out, but strangely it has a, a different take on it. Is there, is there something that happens to you when you, when you watch it or

ZS: At the time of this taping, I have not seen it with my white boyfriend, um, sitting side by side, sitting side by side, which will be happening in the next 24 hours. That will be interesting.

AM: I so desperately want to be in the row behind you.

ZS: I don't know. I'm so used to, I think I'm different because I'm so used to it. Like I grew up in the era of jungle fever. What, with Wesley Snipes, the movie that was like such a big cultural moment.

AM: Thank you for clarifying the movie.

ZS: Sorry. People don't remember there was a movie called jungle fever. It was about a black man and a white woman. And my parents at the time who were no longer together, they were like interviewed by radio stations.
And that was just like, they were, yeah, it was like this whole thing because people forget in the nineties, like when I was a kid, I was told that being mixed means I was going to be mentally unwell because I'm going to be so confused. Oh, yeah. People thought like mixed people thought mixed kids were like, cause they're going to be, they don't know if they're white. They don't, if they're black, they don't have a community. There's like all this like anxiety.

AM: What was the nineties? How in the world, where was so much of this shit allowed?

ZS: Yes. People are saying, this is what I grew up in. My sister and I even have stories of like mixed people coming up to us in the streets being like, you are beautiful. It will make sense. One day there's just was so much

AM: So glad you had those guardians.

ZS: It was like wild. So I'm used to like interracial conversations and I find them really funny. I do think there's something to be said. Um, cause even like I'm working on, I mean, we can talk about this and work on this thing with the New York times, which I'm exploring this too, where like what Michael's getting at in the, the show, Michael R Jackson, the playwright is like, there is this like moment in, uh, queer people of color's lives, where they become successful. And this happened even in straight people's lives, but this is idea what you become successful and you date interracially. That's just like, that's what, like jungle fever kind of explorers, uh, waiting to exhale with Whitney Houston.
That's a big part of it with them. Everyone seeing the gif of Angela Bassett lighting a BMW on fire that's because her husband left her for a white woman. So there's a lot of cultural references there about like when black people have success, they leave blackness behind. And I think Michael's work is trying to command or demand us to think about black success being within black bodies in black spaces at all times.
And what would that look like on Broadway and that's what's happening? So I think it's like, yeah, I don't know. It's complicated. It's always complicated. And I think. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know. I've been writing about interracial love and race for a long time, so I just constantly thinking about it and like, um, I mean, I was obsessed with like sexual racism for a long time.
Like I even went on the daily show with Trevor Noah and like talked about sexual racism as like a whole thing, but me Jessica Williams. All these people are Ronnie Chang. So like, I don't know if I'm ever gonna have the answer to it, but I just love talking about it and the show talks about it.

AM: Okay, well thank you for, continue to talk about it and thank you for being. Open enough where like I'm even allowed to like ask. But that's really badass.

ZS: I know people get freaked out. Cause it's like, I mean, what people will say is like, um, well of course, like with me, what I've, what I deal with is, um, I'm seen as a successful black man and people will say, I mean, Jarrod talked about this in his show where they're like, oh my God, you're dating a white man now. Oh my God. And there is this fear that when black people, black men specifically start succeeding economically, professionally, whatever it is, they'll leave black people behind. And I think like what I tried to show in the work that I do that like, you know, my current partner is white, but I haven't left black people behind, but like I do so much, I try to do so much additional work around like supporting a strange loop and producing on that or doing stories or lodging magazines with mostly POC staff.
Like it's just like all this stuff, like, but I'm not perfect. And I don't know if perfect means I'm going to have a black partner. I don't know, like, I don't know if that's like, that's the call. Cause I don't think like, just cause if I had a black husband right now, would it make the world better tomorrow? No, It wouldn't. It would just mean I had a black partner.

AM: Well, you're, you're doing a great job of wrapping up act one that the point of Post Shame is to kind of refuse this perfectionistic modeling of our lives on social media, of, uh, you know, doing things for other people's expectations, looking for the nuance, looking for the gray area in life, and you're doing it by continuing to engage the conversation and saying it's complicated.
So let's take a quick break and we'll come back for Act 2.

Welcome back for, Act two of Find Your Light. In Act 2 play a little game of armchair quarterback. And we look at someone's public shaming or scandal through a PostShame lens and try to offer them advice as though we could've caught them right before the scandal broke. I'm using these terms like armchair quarterback as though, like I've ever sat on a couch and ever like talked about the game, you know, these are the games of life and, and media and communications that I'm most interested in.
So someone who I like and adore a lot, Alexi McCammon in 2021. I learned about her through Axios, where she was a reporter. I mean, I didn't know the name or face behind the byline, but when Axios became very video focused. Yeah. She was this young, very beautiful black woman who is like a bad-ass reporter and asking tough questions and like getting amazing answers. And then she's named as Editor in Chief at Teen Vogue and then very swiftly tweets that she tweeted when she was in her teens.

ZS: Um, like eight years before this. Yeah.

AM: Uh, resurfaced. And she's an example of, I don't actually know if she's technically Gen Z or Millennial.

ZS: She is young millenial. I think she's 28 now or 29. Cause this happened when she was named editor in cheif of Teen Vogue, she was 27. And I remember that cause that's the first time I became editor-in-chief so I really related to her. But I also knew what was coming for her because she wasn't, like she's not part of the inside baseball, she's DC, not New York media.
It was like a breeding ground of like the next era of like leaders, immediate people. And like, who've been around like, no one really knew who she was in like, especially women's mag. She never worked in a magazine. She just wasn't, she was a political person. She's DC. And, uh, she came out of nowhere and then by coming out of nowhere and these old tweets coming out, but she'd already apologized for, she had already apologized for that really? Uh, yeah, she was destroyed in public pretty swiftly.

AM: And I don't feel like there was enough conversation around allowing her room to grow, apologize for something done in her teens. We are now starting to see the first generation of peoples whose online traffic in their teens is starting to come out, be it on YouTube.
I think there are so many kids who are YouTubers, who were saying stuff that are going to regret There are kids tweeting stuff that they don't even think they're kids, but we don't have to hold them to that. Yeah. I'm not saying like racist tweets are okay.

ZS: No, this is what people like grow and have to learn. They learn. Yes. And that's the thing with her is that as the internet has kind of compressed all the lived years of our lives into something that feels always immediate.
Like her tweets, when people read it, it was the first time they seen it because of the collapse of time, time doesn't exist sometimes. So just like we're dealing with like the fact that time collapses on the internet, things never die on the internet. And then people are being. You know, held accountable, like she just tweeted it today.
So if she worked at Axios whole different conversation than being in college and saying that not things she was right, when she tweeted it, then she should have known better. She should, she was in college and we all said wild things in college I'm sure. And where I always focus on with her is that she had already publicly apologized as a reporter, as a public facing person.
She had already dealt with it. So the fact that she was going through this again made me really question, you know, Conde Nast and why they didn't have a better plan around this was no one protecting her. Was there a way that she could have announced this to the staff? Like this is something she'd been, she knew was a big red flag in her life. So I just confused by all of that.

AM: So that's where PostShame comes in. Is that exactly you do have to integrate your past with your future and act on it in the present, like. You're right, I don't like that she would have had to go through this, but she would have had to apologize for it all over again at the new jobs.

ZS: And just bring it up. And it's like, we, especially with the editor-in-chief job, you were vetted. You're supposed to be vetted deeply.

AM: So this is, yeah. This whole thing is actually a Conde Nast mess. Yes. Like they did not prepare for this.

ZS: I'll say this carefully. Um, we have seen in the past decade, how they don't take care of things and how they blow up in their faces. So Bon Appetit, um, different, like there's lots of, there's lots of examples of Conde Nast has never dealing or having a good plan on how to talk about racism within their companies, within their employment. And they just like, kind of let it explode in public and then don't know how to deal with it. So I'm just like, this is an ongoing issue at Conde Nast. And Alexi was just the most glittery example. And I feel bad that, um, I don't really hear anything from her anymore.

AM: She's back at Axios.

ZS: I saw she got hired back. Is she on TV now?

AM: I haven't seen, I haven't seen her on TV.

ZS: Yeah, it just kind of, I was so happy they brought her in, cause it was like, great. Someone's going to like, make sure she has a job, but like, I don't know if she'll ever be part of the New York media crew because of this. Which is like something NY media needs to get over. Right? Yeah. And that the thing it's like, she's a black woman. Like she, black people say racist things all the time. Of course. But like she wasn't defending.

AM: I don't know what you're talking about racism only exists over here.

ZS: Well they can for now. But my thing with her is like, I always look for, are people growing? Are they listening? Are they changing? And if they can show that, then I can like, think through. I can give a lot of grace, but if they're very Trump about it, they're like dog it it not listening. Then I'm like, okay, no, cancel them get rid of them. But like, she's doing the work.

AM: So you see, this is the thing is canceling real. This canceling exists. It's all anyone talks about. Is it maybe because I'm working on PostShame it's all like, it's all, anyone is ever talking about.

ZS: People are really obsessed with it. And like, I hear from so many celebrities, they're always freaking out about it and it's just

AM: Every high ranking business person is just like, I don't want to be canceled.

ZS: Everyone's just so afraid. And when I hear that they're afraid of not being perfect or they're afraid of not being prepared or not being like the perfect package. There's all this other anxieties about not being enough. And that this one thing that you weren't enough in is going to destroy everything that could be.
And I just think there's like a, when people need to like calm down and know that like most people, like when they get canceled, like, uh, Louis CK continue to have careers in other ways and it morphs itself and changes. But there's also the reality of like the life that, you know, it now will change because you said something wrong.
I did a lot of rape victim advocacy work in college. And, um, you know, the really hard conversation I was challenged by back then was what does rape victim advocacy work look like working with rapists themselves? So what's it like to support people that are survivors of sexual violence? I am a survivor of sexual violence.
So I I've got that. I've supported people, you know, reporting, dealing with police, all that stuff. What does it look like to look at people perpetuating violence and beginning to give them space to be held accountable, but also give an opportunity to change and talk about what's going on underneath there because

AM: That's real restorative justice.

ZS: And I very much believe in restorative justice because it's like we shouldn't be putting the one onus on reacting to violence all day, but how do we stop the root cause, which is dealing with the messy. Dirty bad people of the world and figuring out like what's wrong with them in a real compassionate way.
Um, that doesn't say like, we should let people, of course keep assaulting people. At all, I'm saying it's like, we should be doing two things at once the dealing with the violence itself and also helping people support the victims of it that are survivors. So I think like with these conversations on canceling, it's like, what does the world look like?
You say something racist and that you're held accountable for saying something racist, but also called in to learn then also like given models to change and do better than giving opportunity to move past it. And I do think a lot of people I see get canceled, don't want to even move past it. Some of them become like Fox news obsessed.
They use it as like their martyrdom to build careers out of. So those people like you weren't canceled, you just use like a very public famous moment to now build a new media career. So it's like both ways,

AM: But it's like, you can see it on their face when they looks like slimy and sad. There are so many folks that I see do that journey. I'm thinking mostly. Who's that young man who was like intimidating the native American at the Supreme Court steps.

ZS: Yeah, the young boy from Kentucky. Um, he, he knew it's like all of this stuff.

AM: It's crummy. I know that story is absolutely like a mosaic of truths. I know that there are so many things that were happening.

ZS: I remember reporting on that.

AM: I'm not claiming a view on that, but watching him lean into that side of it.

ZS: Yeah. It's like that boy in Wisconsin, I forget his name, but he's 18. The shooter.

AM: I like to, I'm not even going to say his name, not necessarily and auctioning off the gun and just like doing all this garbage stuff,

ZS: You saw the same thing with George Zimmerman. There's a world in which these people are never canceled. They just find new audiences to build careers.

AM: It's such an ugly terminology. That's become so commonplace. You can't cancel people. They don't go away. Don't stop. And if you just wish them self harm and suicide, like what

ZS: And it's been very few people that I can think of that have just like. I mean to get really dark with it. You think you still see people like rallying behind Hitler or trying to rationalize Hitler again, Tennessee, you heard legislator all the time. I'm from Tennessee and it's like another like Hitler has, I think by most of the world be seen as an evil, terrible person. I think most people are not down for Hitler, but I don't think it's like any moment in which people are fully eradicated from this earth because people are all have their own points of views and capacities for letting people be terrible.
And I don't. Yeah, I don't know, but I didn't like, uh, sure. Can you be fired from your job for saying something racist? Yeah. And that's okay. Everybody, I don't know. This is such a bad thing. Oh, should you be, can you be fired or take an, have a, an award take it away because you were a predator. Yeah, not a bad thing. Like I don't, I just don't get why people are so allergic to, like

AM: I think you're describing being allergic to the accountability.

ZS: Yeah. Whenever someone tells me that they are. Um, and I hear this a lot. I do know a lot of people who are in the public eye for various things, and a lot of them do talk about this.
And I always have this moment where I think, well, what are you doing privately that has you so nervous? Cause like, I don't really move personally, knock on wood, move through the world, anxious I'm getting canceled ever. Like I just think, like, I think if I mis-gender someone, I say . Something not totally correct in a conversation, I know that I'm not meaning to perpetuate any violence I will own. I will listen to what someone calls me out on it. And I will like live in that community with them and do whatever they need me to do to make it right. I'm cool with that. I've had lots of people be mad at me for a thousand things. But I'm willing to like, get dirty and listen and talk about it. So when people say they're so afraid, I'm like, well, one, what are you doing that you want to keep getting away with?
And then two, or you're not willing to like, listen to someone when you, when you hurt them. Like you just walk away from people all the time. Cause I'm not built that way. Like I want to like talk to people, deal with this. So I don't know.

AM: I think this is due now, but let's all listeners and Zack do not interpret this as like white apologists ism, or that's not a term, but like, I think it has to do with folks being shown that their like normal state or their normal way of being like isn't okay.

ZS: Yeah. Yeah.

AM: I mean, that's the whole problem with. Yeah. Unconscious bias all the time.

ZS: Yeah. People get really freaked out by unconscious bias. Yeah. I remember when I was doing the sexual racism stuff, that was like my big obsession for awhile. And it took me over to the daily show. I would say to people, I was like, go on your Tinder, go on your Hinge and look at everyone you've matched with and start looking at trends, themes, look at language you're using.
And in that, you'll see like how you are filtering unconsciously through lots of people. Like have you never met with a black person? What does that say? I, when I would say this to people, I still say this to people say, I'm like, I'm not damning you in the spot with I'm saying, look, it, all of this is really your reality.
This is what's happening around you. And you could either live in a world. It's kind of like the matrix. You can live in a world in which you were aware of systems and how they influence each other, or you can live in one where you don't, you just, you kind of like float around until you die. You never have a real thought in your head and you can do both things.
But one is going to keep creating a lot of violence and harm to people, to yourself, even to the other, maybe could put you on a path where you can start, like you can't stop harm all the time, but you can at least have better tools to deal with it or deal with disappointment or shame and kind of have more agency instead of just floating around, waiting to be hit by something.

AM: I think our digital world of algorithms that are feeding you more of things you already liked. Has created a lot of people with an unconscious world view where they think that things are supposed to be comfy, they are supposed to be cozy. They're supposed to be familiar and similar to the other things that they enjoy.
So accountability, forget it. Stopping in your tracks to recognize that something you said that you thought was normal. Is it, you know, it turns out isn't gendering is a, is a good one. I, I serve on several boards. I interact, I have a lot of intergenerational friendships because of it. And to hear these folks get frustrated, you know, boomers get frustrated, but why would I say they them when it's not plural?
And I'm like, what? The number of times I have to say, what's it doing to ya? I, I don't think I have enough time to explain to you other people's lived experience, but what would it do for you to just honor what they're asking for?

ZS: I have always struggled. Yeah. Journalism is a practice of listening to people's stories and like fact-checking and like, there's this whole idea that like, you know, you gotta like hear someone and then like kick the tires, make sure it stands up all the stuff.
And that's, that's a good practice you should do. Like, are people telling the truth, but like, I've always been so in love with journalism. Cause it has this radical idea that how you see the world or you look at the world is so valid that it should be in the newspaper. And it should be part of a course of other people that tell the story.

AM: Sometimes that even frustrates me, when I read news stories, quoting people where I'm like, why would you include that other quote, it's so lame!

ZS: So there's some diligence that needs to be done. But I do think like what is so bad about letting everyone have a way in which they want to look at the world at the same time? Like, why is it so scary?
And I dunno, I, when I hear people push back on they/ them or other language, or even like how people think about their body, whatever it is, when people are like telling the world how they want to be seen or dealt with and people push back on matter what to legislate around that I'm like, what's so scary about letting people be free.
And I think that comes from my own, you know, life as a black person in growing up in the, in the shadow of slavery. Like I, like, I look at the ancestors of my family and I have a very clear evidence of how people were so afraid of them being free, that they did all this stuff and they continue to do things like take voter rights away, all this stuff, because they're afraid of us having power and saying something.
And I don't know, they're just so wild to me that like freedom. So freaks people out so much. And when you hear intergenerational people talk about gender and all the stuff like, but they're fighting against this. Someone's freedom to be themselves. And it's like, well, why are you willing to put such deep stakes in the ground to block that I don't get? And you see that like a, I dunno, it's like a hindrance to your own life. It's cause it's not.

AM: Yeah, but now you're also talking about the difference between this historical power over that is waning. Power with and empowering everyone to do this big experiment together is the only way forward. And conservatism is an effort to make sure that it stays power over.

ZS: Yes, because people feel like they need to have power with someone, for them to have power and they don't see power as like everyone being empowered. It's interesting in that. It ain't right. I don't know.

AM: It ain't that ain't right. I will say I feel so powerful with you. Thank you so much for letting me ask some questions and like trip over my shoelaces. I'm sure. When I listened back to this, I will be like, huh, that's the way I wanted to say that. But thank you for, for holding space for it. And for being out and proud because every person coming out and being themselves, especially in the media landscape, It's amazing.

ZS: Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you for having the space for me to come.

AM: Absolutely. Thank you so much. Find Your Light turn towards the light

Peepadoodles. How awesome is Zach? He's so smart and I love his insights. I love his view on Post Shame. I love the ways that he's a PostShame warrior out in the world, and I'm just so excited that we got to have that conversation and he's a bad-ass and follow him on Twitter. He is @ Zach Stafford, that's Z A C H S T A F F O R D.
Post Shame is made by magical people. Our brand design is by Veta and Saloni.
Our social media manager is Jose Rodriguez Solis, who's also online @ cacidoe CAC IDOE he's also a really cool makeup artist. So please go and see his work over there.
And our theme music composer and show editor is Zach Wachter.
Thank you so much, everyone. No matter how you're feeling up down or sideways, a reminder, just turn toward the light. Just turn toward the light. Find Your Light, feel the light on your face. It's the way to be. I love y'all. I'll see you next time. Thanks so much. Bye.