Nuance is Sustained in the Context of Community w/ Beth Silvers and Sarah Stewart Holland of Pantsuit Politics

In this episode, Bethaney sits downs with the Cohosts of the Pantsuit Politics Show, Beth Silvers and Sarah Stewart Holland. In this conversation, they talk about racial identity, the treatment of race in mainstream news and media, leading others from a place of courage and care, as well as the collective work it takes to sustain nuance in today’s social climate.

Sarah and Beth are the hosts of Pantsuit Politics Show where they bring a different approach to the news. They are also authors of the newly released book, “Now What: How to move forward when we’re divided (about basically everything.”

Transcript

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

nuance, people, race, conversation, workplaces, privilege, organizations, stories, question, leaders, community, person, white, assumptions, subtraction, hear, fear, helpful, talk, real

SPEAKERS

Bethaney Wilkinson, Beth Silvers, Sarah Stewart Holland

Bethaney Wilkinson  00:00

Hi, this is Bethany Wilkinson. Welcome to the diversity gap podcast the home of race conscious leadership. Hey there friends, welcome to another episode of the diversity gap podcast. Okay, so today's show, I am so incredibly excited to be sharing this conversation with you I had the absolute privilege of interviewing Sarah Stewart Holland, and Beth Silver's, who are the CO hosts of pantsuit politics. Now, I don't think it can be overstated how big of a fan I am of pantsuit politics, I started listening to their show, back in November 2020. Their work as a team really helped me to understand what was happening with our election. And since then I become a premium subscriber, I listen to them every day, they really provide a different approach to the news. And I don't know, I just, I can't really imagine my life without them now. And so I was so nervous to interview them. Seriously. So nervous, I was reviewing my questions over and over again. I'm like, I hope these are smart questions. I want to talk to them forever. How do I honor their time I went through all of these loops in my head. And it was great, it was so good to connect with them and to learn from them and to hear their thoughts on race and identity and the news and how we as a community really collectively hold the nuance that we need to move forward. I don't know if I said this already. But Beth and Sarah are also the authors of the new book. Now what how to move forward when we're divided about basically everything in in this book, I just got it yesterday, because it just released in this book I've already read like, I don't know, I would say the first half of it. They just provide such practical, human centered insights and ideas for how we can really build trust us citizens, especially in this time where we are all over the map in terms of who we are and what we value and what we hope the future of American life will be. And so I hope that you enjoy this conversation. If I'm awkward at all, if I have like weird pauses, or if I just don't sound like myself. It's because I was so nervous. I do think it was ultimately fine. But it was just really great to be able to interview people who I respect so so much. And I hope that this conversation is a gift to you and to the organizations you lead and to the work that you're doing in your communities to create a more racially equitable future. So enjoy this conversation between me. That's Silver's and Sarah Stewart Holland. Well, my first question for each of you, and either of you can jump in when you're ready, is when did you first know that you had a race or ethnic identity? And how did you know?

Sarah Stewart Holland  03:15

What a great question.

Beth Silvers  03:18

Well, I remember vividly, so I'll start. I was in a sociology class in college. And my professor Dr. Thompson, who I have grown to just admire so much, ask us to write down what it means to be white. And I just stared at the paper and thought, I have no idea what it means to be white. And he used that as a really meaningful way to introduce us to the concept of privilege. But it was college before I learned about privilege. That sounds crazy to people today. Right? But that's the moment when I started to understand and he and he kind of helped put that into some context by talking about, if I asked you to write down what it means to be a woman, would you know what to write down? And I thought, Well, absolutely, I would know what to write down. And he said, Well, you need to develop some context for yourself where you could write down what it means to be white with that amount of specificity. I love that. Yeah, I mean, I think I'm probably embarrassed that mine took so long to um,

Sarah Stewart Holland  04:23

I think. I mean, because I associate, being white with privilege, right? Think the first couple of times people reveal that privilege to you, becomes cemented in your mind and linked up with sort of your experience of whiteness. And so I was in law school and our race, crime and politics class. We were talking about experiences being pulled over. And I said, well, people just get pulled over for speeding. And all the people of color in the classroom we're like, You're cute. No, like that's whyYou get pulled over, that is not the only reason people of color get pulled over.And I still remember that moment, it was like, you know, the curtain drops, you sort of see the matrix, or little teeny tiny peek of it. And you start to realize, like, oh, this sensation of notexperiencing whiteness is the experience of whiteness, right? The hidden nature of that privilege and the hidden nature of that sort of the stereotypes and assumptions surrounding the color of your skin.Is, is a huge part of that. 

Bethaney Wilkinson  05:40

Yeah. Yeah. I'd be curious to hear from each of you. Knowing that, so you were in college, I guess, relatively later in life compared to people who have different identities? What role does your racial identity or your awareness of your racial identity plan the work that you're doing today, if any?

Beth Silvers  06:00

I think it absolutely plays a role in the work that we do today. I think sometimes we're better at being conscious of that than others. And I feel really grateful for the fact that we have an audience that will will flag that for us. You know, I feel like we have cultivated a relationship with our audience. I hope this is true for everyone. I'm sure it's not true for everyone. But I hope it's true for that for most people, where when we miss the role that race is playing in, in our, in our analysis, someone will tell us that and they'll tell us in a forthright way, but in a way that is connective where they're telling us that of care, not out of that, that sense of like, You're the worst. And I, I think that there's a there's a trust about our intentions, because we do intend to be humble about our own perspectives. You know, we say in our book, in the very beginning, now we're what we seem to be, we are two white ladies, we are from Kentucky, we are married to men, we identify with the sex, we were assigned at birth. And so there are all these limiting factors on how we see the world and factors that shape how we see the world. Sometimes they're not limiting, right, they're just they just are. And so I hope that we continually improve in our ability to give voice to that, inside our own heads, and also in our conversations in a way that makes room for for all of the things that of course, are missing, when the two of us sit down to talk to to each other about an experience or an idea. 

Sarah Stewart Holland  07:38

Well, and I think there's a temptation to let race inform your perspective,from a very certain place, right? I think, especially as white people, the experience of having your racial perspective or privilege or identity revealed to you is is so affecting, that it can be cementing in a way that I think is not helpful. And can be driven by, you know, shame or self righteousness, which is are often two sides of the same coin. From a place of sort of fear and scarcity. And I thinkthat's just it's really unhelpful. And so I tried to let you know, I tried to be cognizant of that. I think we both do. And when we speak to her, it's not only that we're open to, you know, connection and other perspectives, but that we hold it loosely, we keep a stance of curiosity. We, we allow room for grace and redemption and growth right to continue on this journey and not get stuck in one place, which is often I think, how conversations around race feel in this country.

Bethaney Wilkinson  09:26

Yeah, that's a really helpful segue into another question that I had and maybe you'll have more to say than you just did, Sarah. But I something I appreciate about your work is that, From what I can tell on the outside anyway, it's like you have you hold your racial identity and other identities in the light of your act of awareness without being paralyzed by any of the stories that are maybe tied to it stories you chose the stories you didn't choose. And so I'm thinking about the audience of this show and how many of them are leaders or their aspiring leaders in their communities or organizations, and they're trying to figure out how to remain aware of their white racial identity without without getting stuck. And so I'm wondering if there are, I don't know, stories, a posture as you spoke to curiosity and grace. But are there any? I don't know, what would you say? Or how would you encourage other leaders to keep moving without getting stuck or cemented in, and whatever fears they might be feeling around their racial identity?

Sarah Stewart Holland  10:30

I think, you know, conversations around racial identity are rightly, an offense centered in the past. And I think it is important to, as much as we can, I mean, I can't give you an exact formula, but to also center some of our conversations in the President in the future. And it's like we do this thing where we think, you know, any optimism is naivete, or any hopefulness is an indication that you don't take the problem serious enough, seriously enough. And I think it's just it's just a recipe for burnout. And I want real and sustainable change in the future. And burnout cannot be a part of that equation. Right. And so, you know, I think as much as we can, sort of putting that that lens on not in every conversation, but as a as just a part that we hold of the complicated hole that hope has to play a role. And also, there's lots of hopefulness even in looking back at history, right? And I just think that, that it's a muscle, the more we use, the easier it is to use it.

Beth Silvers  12:01

There's a poem I love called say yes, by Andrea Gibson. But I've been thinking about a lot lately, because she has this beautiful line in it, that the math of war has always been subtraction. So live is an action of addiction addiction. And it occurred to me when you asked this question, because I think in organizations, I think about workplaces, nonprofits, churches, when you're the person who is introducing initiatives around justice, inclusion, equity, you're always kind of selling it as additive to the organization, you're saying, Here are all the ways in which this will enrich our workplaces, our congregation are our constituency. And then something seems to flip in everyone's brains, probably not everyone's but in people like me, with my life experience, our brains kind of go, this is going to somehow be subtraction, right? This is going to mean that I lose these things, or I get these things wrong. Or when I say something the wrong way it's going to be held against me. Or maybe I lose my place at this table or my opportunity for this position or whatever, we just get into subtraction mode. And so what I would say to leaders who are concerned about this is to just keep in that place of addition, like Keep looking for all the ways in which people are getting things right, or we heard an idea we never would have heard before. Or, you know, we we thought about something that we've missed in the past and look at all the possibility now because we thought of this, you know, when people reach out to us about our conversations, especially on issues of race, sometimes they'll say, well, like, here's the thing I think you've missed, and that can feel like subtraction. But then when we get to the thing we missed, it's just addition, it is just pure.Here's how the conversation can be better and more meaningful, and richer and connect with more people. And so that that simple reframe, I think, could be could be very encouraging, as you kind of explore this work. Yeah, that's really beautiful. 

Bethaney Wilkinson  14:09

What's the name of the author? Again? 

Beth Silvers  14:11

It's say yes, by Andrea Gibson, and you have to watch it on YouTube, because you need to hear her say it like her delivery of it is one of the most beautiful things I think about it all the time. Perfect. I'll definitely link to that in the show notes. While I'm thinking about something that I heard you say on an episode once, Beth, looking forward to the work of rebuilding trust as citizens, and when I think about this book, I haven't finished your book yet, because it just got to me yesterday. I did as much reading as I could before this conversation. But I'm thinking about this work of rebuilding trust to citizens, and I'm also thinking about people who are leading teams and organizations, businesses. And I'm wondering what you would say the role is of leaders, if any, and facilitating some of that trust rebuilding work. I think workplaces play an incredibly powerful role made even more powerful by the fact that we don't talk about the role that workplaces play in our understanding of power and our political participation often enough. It's a little bit cliche right now and I Rowley to say, like, we need to do more storytelling. I actually think we just need to do it instead of talking about it, though, I think that trust is all about allowing people to see the fullness of you as a person. And, and understanding that you will invite and accept and celebrate the fullness of their a person to. And so that, to me means if you've got somebody who is just like, furious at how a budget is being spent, or totally an uninterested in coming to this training session, or really not supporting some initiative, that you run to that person to understand their story, not to debate the topic, but to understand their story. Why is this really important to you? What is it about this that, that is prompting some kind of reaction, I had an experience like this, when I first started doing HR work in a law firm, I had rolled out some initiatives around legal assistance, that I thought were going to be just great for everyone. I thought I really understood what I was doing. I had good ideas. And soon everyone's life was gonna be better because of me. And there were some really long tenured assistants who were just very, very resistant to what I was doing. And I took a group of them out for coffee, I let them outnumber me. I wanted to kind of set the stage that like this is about you. And I'm here to listen, I'm not going to intimidate you in this in this chat. And I said, just tell me about your career here. What has worked in your career, what have you enjoyed? What is it about what I'm doing that's bothering you. And I just listened to their stories. And I hung on to those stories. And then I shared the parts of those stories that they gave me permission to share in meetings later, when I advocated for certain things. When I talked about why we were doing what we were doing. And and my stories connected with their stories in that discussion in a way that made them real champions for what we were doing going forward. Now. It changed what we were doing going forward. It wasn't just that they that like I manipulated them into getting on board. Right, I had to integrate what I heard from them. But I think the more that we practice that skill of like seeking out the story, and really hearing it and letting it be meaningful. That's where we're kind of getting to the good stuff that we can do at work that I believe will ripple out into our politics in really powerful ways.

Sarah Stewart Holland  17:48

It's always so hard for me to have a perspective on workplaces, because the truth is, I didn't spend a lot have not spent a lot of my adult life inside workplaces. Just because of the nature of the work we do. And the career path my I kind of went on with the birth of my children, I took a lot of time out from traditional workplaces, and I went to law school, all that to say, sometimes I can't decide if that's like a unique and helpful perspective or a not helpful perspective. Um, but what I what I do know is that I think you're right, I think we spend so much time there. And for better or for worse, we define ourselves through our roles, and the value we bring to a workspace inside our culture. I mean, it's just what do you do, right? It's just on our lips. What do you do? What do want to be when you're up at all at all times with all humans? That we most certainly can't ignore it. We most certainly can't ignore it. And I'm encouraged that culturally, we seem to be having that conversation more and more, especially since COVID. Like, what does our work mean? What do we want it to mean? What do you want it to look like? What does it mean? Or say about our values? I was just reading an article about workplaces post ro and it was like, you know, at the end of the day, these massive corporations are capitalist, and they have to have employees, and they have to think about what their employees want. And they're, you know that so that's a massive piece of their calculation, which means that employees hold a massive amount of power with regards to values inside workplaces, especially sort of big corporate workplaces. So and I just think we have to acknowledge that we have to see that even though it is absolutely scary to claim that power from time to time.

Bethaney Wilkinson  19:47

For those who are so they they're working in these organizations, they are claiming that power for themselves in the ways that they can and you, When it's met, I'm thinking about where when leaders hear their employees or team members advocate for these values, it can be met with resistance that I often think isn't so much, you know, ill will, as it is, fear. What does this mean for us? How do we unpack this? What would you say to those leaders who are receiving this feedback from their teams, or they're receiving this feedback from their communities, hey, that we, these are our values you want more justice, more diversity, whatever it might be. And they're feeling all of the anxiety around those things. They're feeling the fear? Just how would you encourage them to take the next step and to keep listening even though it's scary, and it feels like subtraction? 

Sarah Stewart Holland  20:44

I mean, what's their other option? Right? I mean, what's your other option? is, you know, I can get I have a real Dr. Phil energy from time to time. I've never even watched Dr. Phil. But I've seen enough of his clip saying, how's that working for you? And it's kind of want to be like, Well, what's your other option has that been working for you? Because it might be scary to try another path. But if the if the path you're on leads to scary results, well, then you're tackling fear no matter what. And I think that's always important to keep in mind.

Beth Silvers  21:16

A skill that we talked about in the book that I learned from a therapist is like annotating our relationships. So it's not just that you're having a conversation, but that you're also having a conversation about the conversation and about what's going on in the dynamics among people. And I think as a leader, this skill is really helpful. We know how to do this, as leaders, if someone comes to you who's a fantastic employee and wants a raise. As a leader, you have to be able to say to that person, I really want to give you this raise. Also, we're not in our budget cycle right now. So I'm gonna have to work really hard to get this done for you. And I will do that work. And I will do my very best, I just want you to understand it might take three months, what can we do in those intervening three months? So all that we're talking about when we discuss these initiatives toward greater equity, and justice is being able as a leader to say to people, okay, I'm with you, I hear you, I think this is important. I also think the implementation of it is more complex than I wish it would be. And so how can we work together to take steps along this path where a giant organization, or we're a very small organization with not enough resources to do what we want, or we're a medium sized organization, where everybody feels like they need input on everything, but it makes it massively hard to input to, to roll out whatever the case may be, to just annotate the relationship with the groups of employees that you're talking with and say, what you're saying here is important to me, it matters. I want to operationalize it in a way that's effective. I don't want to just give you lip service that makes you feel better today. I don't want to do one symbolic gesture, and then have you feel let down six months from now when the symbolism doesn't cut it. So let's talk about step by step and a timeline, and expectations and how we check in with each other. And accountability, as we together build something that reflects what you're talking about. more clearly.

Bethaney Wilkinson  23:16

Yeah, that clear communication of expectations is so helpful. Because a lot of people just need information. And they don't know how they don't think about the budget cycle. They're thinking about their needs, which makes perfect sense. And so I think as leaders as you're setting a tone, communicating those expectations is so so helpful. So this is kind of a random question that I missed before you both read a lot of news. You cover a lot of you just covered a lot of ground, I can only imagine how much content you take in in a week. And so I'm curious to hear in what you've observed about how race as a topic or an issue is treated in the news overall. What are you seeing or what have you seen that is like especially unhelpful? And you maybe have touched on this some? And are you seeing anything that feels especially helpful and constructive? If you think about it in terms of sweeping themes across all the different places where you're reading and learning? It's a big question.

Sarah Stewart Holland  24:15

I mean, I think the biggest thing I see in media is they are terrified of the topic. Truly, just terrified. As organizations and certainly as individual writers and thinkers, especially white writers and thinkers. I think there's just a real fear of saying the wrong thing. Fear of getting it wrong. Just a lot of that. I think. There's also lots of assumptions about where Americans are, were in it. There is a person who can sum up we're all All of America is on race, I don't want to like to meet that person, because there are a lot of us. And in my personal experience, there is not a consistent experience or even opinion on race, even within different racial groups in America, much less across the spectrum of the population. And so I just think I see all that like ambiguity, ambiguity, ambiguity, I can't say the word, ambiguity precarity fear in the coverage in the way people talk. And that sounds like when and that's why when somebody like, you know, Tanahashi, Coates comes out, and it's just like, the, the raw honesty, and, and also, but like, a posture of curiosity in a lot of ways. Like, that's why I think that breaks through because we're so not used to it. Yeah. And so everybody wants to get it right. And they're so afraid to not get it right. And sometimes, you know, they're their version of getting it right is policing everyone else.And it's just, it's so it's so difficult. It really, really is difficult.

Beth Silvers  26:16

I was reading an article this week, that only identified the race of one person in the article, and it said, like the name of the person, comma, a black man. And it really was jarring to me, because because no one else in the article had been identified. And it made me realize, hey, we've kind of come a long way, I am accustomed to seeing either everyone's race being identified or no one's in a story. And I think that's really positive and helpful. And as I read this, I just thought, like, who's the editor, what's going on here, this was this was a big miss, where I still see major problems that I think could pretty easily be fixed is around coverage of crimes. I wish that we could maybe just all agree that when someone has committed a crime or been accused of a crime, that we just use the image of like some documents state versus Jones or whatever, instead of a photograph of the person. Because those images that are selected, I still think, reflect our worst biases around race and the worst assumptions that we make. And I think they just reinforce attitudes, not just about race, but about crime in general and about social class and about just human psychology, that are that are really detrimental. And I think there are so many ways that reporting around crime could be contextualized more effectively, and presented less sensationally that would go a long way towards improving our attitudes and our and our behaviors around issues of equity.

Bethaney Wilkinson  28:04

Super, yeah, spot on really helpful. And I Yeah, the therapies, even me doing a podcast on on race, it's so I'm just in my little corner of the world, and I thankful to have a community of people who listen who are really engaged and generally positive and supportive. But I've gone through my own bouts of intense anxiety about what I'm sharing and how I'm sharing it. And, and I do wonder what it might look like, for those who are creating media and the news to collectively move beyond that fear and to get us to a place that's just healthier for all of us. But I also know that's a huge, perhaps complicated task. I was having coffee with a friend years ago, and we were talking about something happening in our church life, we were, I was leading some sort of racial justice thing. And she was just kind of a part of it, like on the edge, she was just kind of looking in. And I was advocating for patience and nuance and grace. And, yeah, but we have to build this bridge to understand one another. It doesn't just happen overnight. And she looked at me and said, I'm gonna mess it up. But effectively, she was like, you have to be in a position of privilege in order to enter into nuance, because if your life is on the line, Nuance isn't always available to you. And that really challenged me because as I compared like, my social location to hers, even though we were both women of color, there were some differences socio economically in terms of access to the leadership in this organization. And so I was wondering if you to ever think about that or, or wrestle with it, and I don't mean it as like a gotcha sort of thing. I mean, it is like, I'm sincerely trying to make sense of what does it look like to really have capacity to sustain nuance? Is it a matter of privilege? Is it a matter of emotional maturity? What are your thoughts on that?

Beth Silvers  29:59

All of the above I think that's right. I mean, look, we talk a lot about trying to see issues with nuance and to have grace and conversation. And we don't live up to that standard all the time, because we're humans. I think there is definitely a hierarchy of needs. And that if your most fundamental needs are not being met, entering into relationship is really tough. I think this is the value of trying to surround yourself with people with lots of different life experiences. Because it is good when you're trying to make a decision to have people at the table for whom it is life and death. It is good to have people at the table for whom it is kind of a philosophical exercise. And it's good to have a lot of people in the range that lives in between those things. Because now we have people for whom it is very, very real people who might be able to step back and see it a little bit more clearly. And folks who don't know it's unclear for them how this issue might affect their lives. I mean, I think, on my healthiest days, that's how I can see it. Now, I say that as a person with a lot of privilege. And there are people who say that about our work as a real criticism, like this work is not valuable, because it is written by privileged people, for privileged people or created by privileged people, for privileged people. And to me, it is both a fair critique and very reductive at the same time, and it flattens all of us out in a way that I think is antithetical to trying to move forward in a healthier way. But I think it is absolutely fair that in some contexts, on some issues, it is an unreasonable expectation to say to someone will like you really ought to have some compassion for how others are feeling right now. And that's okay. I don't believe any message needs to be universal to be valuable.

Sarah Stewart Holland  31:53

We've struggled with this a lot. And I think, scratching netted enough. What I've unsurfaced is a couple of assumptions that really bother me, when people make that critique. The first assumption, I think, is that nuance is an individual pursuit. But I don't think it is certainly not what we argue in our new book, Now what, I think it is a group and it's a community pursuit, that's what best naming there like I don't, in any given moment has to sustain all the nuance the way the nuances sustained is because we carry it together. And then at some moments, my perspective, is more valuable, and I can add it and other moments, your perspective is more valuable, and you can add it, and we dance that dance together. Instead of fighting by ourselves as like Nuance warriors or something, you know, I think the second assumption that bothers me is that it speaks of privilege, as if it is a stasis, as if it is some black and white assignment given to all of us this finite number that cannot be altered. Privilege is as as much as a flow to me as much as anything else. There are many spaces in which I'm very privileged. There are other spaces in which I have no privilege. That's true of every single one of us. Every one of us. Now, again, that's not a math equation. That doesn't mean like I have 20 points of privilege. And sometimes I have 20. And sometimes I have one. Like, that's not what I mean. But what I mean is that it when we say you are privileged, and you're excluded from this, it just assumes this very, like Beth says, like this very reductive understanding of human relationships, and human community of identity. You know, I just think I sometimes get frustrated, even with the conversation in America, about, you know, white folks and black folks, because the reality is we got lots of folks in America. So many folks, so many ethnicities, so many races. And, again, when we sort of reduce it down, and carry it as individuals, I think that's how we, we get stuck.And I'm really sort of anxious and impatient and ready for us to integrate a lot of what we've learned up into this point, in a way that feels productive, instead of reductive.

Bethaney Wilkinson  34:56

What do you think that integration might look like?

Sarah Stewart Holland  35:00

As a person that believes a massive piece of this puzzle is systemic issues. Real integration looks like systemic change, it looks like policy change. It looks like legislative change. And so, I mean, I think I want conversations, I want deeper understanding. But at the end of the day, I want those to contribute to pragmatic, change changes that improve people's lived experiences. And so that level of integration where we can move past, finding about the conversations, and start, you know, deciding on some of the necessary changes, I think would be life giving, in every sense of the word. 

Beth Silvers  36:07

On a more individual level, I'm not sure. I think that's part of just the work that we all are all trying to do. In my own life, sometimes I think, I wonder if I ought to learn a lot more about my heritage, because I have kind of understood myself as just a generic white girl from Kentucky, right? Like, I don't know much about my family's history. And I think what I be more connected to people with diverse experiences, heritage, culture, ethnicity, religion, if I were more in touch with my own story, I don't know. And then sometimes I think, well, I could I could go down that path and get, and like, it'd be it had the opposite effect, right, that it could center me more. So I don't know, I think it's really difficult. You know, what I valuetremendously in my work right now is the opportunity to constantly hear from people all over the country and world. I love that we can talk about a labor shortage and hear from restaurant workers. Or we can talk about something happening at a nuclear plant and hear from nuclear engineers. And when we talk about issues of race, we can hear from people who have multi racial backgrounds, all over the world, and who have experiences that are not just defined by America's framing of questions around race, but who have seen it in lots of contexts around the world, you know, I'm really grateful for that, that is a blessing. And so for today, my answer to that integration on an individual level, is to just keep taking all that in and and learning from it and finding my place in the flow of it. Knowing like Sarah said that none of it is static for me or for the storytellers who are so graciously sharing their experiences with me.

Bethaney Wilkinson  38:07

Oh, that's such a really good, I think, a good place to land for today, I I'm struggling to find the words to express how grateful I am to both of you and to just the ways not only the ways you show up, but I've learned so much about this collective pursuit of nuance and the importance of curiosity and humility and patience and holding stories, but also being really honest about my own limitations. And me being a human. And I just, I have, I don't know, I can either ramble or stop talking altogether to express how grateful I am to each of you. And thank you for this time and for supporting the diversity gap. In this way. Where can people follow you find you keep up with your work.

Beth Silvers  38:58

You can listen to Pantsuit Politics, anywhere that you listen to podcasts, our book is now what and how to move forward when we're divided about basically everything available anywhere that books are sold. Our front door is pantsuit, politics, show.com. There's, that's where you can find our newsletter or membership, community, all the things in one place. And it was really a privilege to talk with you, Bethany. Thank you for doing this work. I love that you said at one point that it can be scary to do this. And I can only imagine. And so I just really appreciate that you put yourself out there and that you're creating this. There's such a need for real conversations, especially in organizations around what we mean when we say diversity initiatives. And I'm so glad that you're out here doing the work.

Bethaney Wilkinson  39:39

Absolutely. Thanks for being here. 

Sarah Stewart Holland  39:41

Thank you. Thank you so much.

Bethaney Wilkinson  39:51

So much wisdom from Sarah and Beth. I hope that you enjoyed that conversation. As much as I enjoyed having it. I'm still thinking about this idea. Yeah of nuance really only being sustainable in the context of community. And it's making me wonder what it looks like to create boardrooms and executive leadership rooms and community spaces where we are able to hold space for the true diversity of perspectives that exists in that in that environment. What does it look like to not assume what people think or how people feel based on their identities? What does it look like to say, hey, now it's your time to step forward and your time to step back? How do we create these environments together? That's a question that I'm taking with me. I hope that you're able to grab a moment to capture one idea, one question, one nugget that really challenged you or really inspired you to carry into the rest of your week. Otherwise, please rate and review the diversity gap wherever you get your podcasts and I will catch you here next week.