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Hope, Power, and Community with Suzanne Pharr #54
35 Plays10 days ago
Description:
Kenyon Farrow and Mattie Bynum welcome legendary organizer and writer Suzanne Pharr for a moving conversation on movement-building, queer liberation, and the urgent need for community. Suzanne reflects on her decades of activism, from anti-violence organizing to writing landmark books about homophobia, authoritarianism, and democracy. She explains why reconnecting with one another is essential in a time of isolation, fear, and political division. The episode also explores how pride becomes power when it is turned into action. Through wisdom, humor, and clarity, Suzanne reminds listeners that hope is built through relationships and collective struggle.
Guest descriptors:
Visionary, Grounded, Fearless
Episode tags:
#SuzannePharr #QueerLiberation #communitybuilding #GrassrootsOrganizing #Politicalntegrity #Authoritarianism #LGBTQHistory
#Hope #socialjustice #PowerBeyondPride
Tags again:
#SuzannePharr #QueerLiberation #communitybuilding #GrassrootsOrganizing #PoliticalIntegrity #Authoritarianism #LGBTQHistory #Hope #socialjustice #PowerBeyondPride
Tags again:
#SuzannePharr #QueerLiberation #communitybuilding #GrassrootsOrganizing #PoliticalIntegrity #Authoritarianism #LGBTQHistory #Hope #socialjustice #PowerBeyondPride
Recommended
Transcript
Importance of Connectedness in Queer Community
00:00:00
Speaker
I think particularly in the queer community, it was difficult for us to find another person like us that we would even see ourselves mirroring because so many of us were isolated, like me growing up in the country.
00:00:12
Speaker
So now we've built this movement in which you can see yourself and you can see people like you. But what we had to put in that is our connectedness. It's not enough just to see the reflection of ourselves in another person. We had to feel some sense of connected humanity.
00:00:30
Speaker
And if we lose that, we are diatribe.
Introduction to 'Power Beyond Pride' Podcast
00:00:35
Speaker
Hello and welcome to Power Beyond Pride, a weekly change-making podcast bringing voices and ideas from across our fierce and fabulous spectrum to transform our world.
00:00:46
Speaker
I'm Kenyon Farrell, I'm a writer and activist, and I am the biggest fan of our guest tonight. And I'm Maddie Bynum, your hostess with The Mostest, and we are your co-hosts on today's queer cash
Introducing Suzanne Farr
00:00:58
Speaker
journey. In this episode, we are talking to the iconic Suzanne Farr, organizer, writer, strategist, and political handyman.
00:01:05
Speaker
Suzanne is a Southern queer feminist and anti-racist organizer. She founded the Women's Project in Arkansas in 1981 and was co-founder of the Southerners on New Ground in 1984. Farr is an organizer and political strategist who spent her entire life working on a broad-based, multiracial, multi-issue movement for social and economic justice.
00:01:29
Speaker
So first of all, again, I just want to say welcome so much, Suzanne, thats to this conversation. And I know a lot about you and having been mentored by you and worked together going over 20, 20 some odd years.
00:01:44
Speaker
But I think for our audience who may be unfamiliar, How did you become an organizer?
Suzanne's Early Organizing Experiences
00:01:50
Speaker
Settle into it, I think. or maybe it came from being the youngest of eight children. Or you had to organize your way into kitchen, to getting what you need, that kind of thing.
00:02:01
Speaker
But really, actually, I think, would say that I started organizing in the early nineteen seventy s i would start i say when I basically walked right into the when this movement and I was already working on oh protesting the Vietnam War.
00:02:22
Speaker
but When I got to the women's movement, it was matter it was basically organizing a new world, like creating creating a community center for women, discovering that Brazilian people, women were being raped and realizing we had to organize. We had to create some way to work with those women.
00:02:41
Speaker
that we followed that. of course, was we realized that women were getting beaten, so we had to create a women's anti-violence movement, a domestic violence movement. So we were looking to get both rape and also just violence on the street as well as violence in the home, and particularly violence in the home. And then there was just so many things to organize. We
Impact of Combahee River Collective
00:03:04
Speaker
organized women's land where we would have land communities organized events where, example, the music, the creators of the tourerifics, when this music, feminist music, was just going across country at that time. could hear them even if you were in smaller cities because that was a thing, write music for a new generation of people, write music for new movement.
00:03:38
Speaker
So it's on and on, what we organize about. And then there serious organizing when I think of it. was after after and I'll talk about this probably a lot tonight.
00:03:51
Speaker
After coming into contact with the Combahee River Collective Statement, which was the great feminist, black feminist statement, talking about how all of our issues are intersected and that what we need to do is intersectional work.
Suzanne's Literary Contributions
00:04:08
Speaker
And that was like the mid-70s. And i had a great number of people. they All the people who founded Song with me, the other 65 people, we were grounded in that idea that we would not be doing identity politics.
00:04:22
Speaker
We would be doing politics where social change would be about all the people and their suffering and all the people and their advancement connected together. You know, and now I love that. i mean, you was talking about writing while ago. I've noticed that you have penned a lot of literary books. I mean, I just want to go over a couple of the titles, but you have Homophobia, a Weapon of Sexism in 1988. Then you authored In the Time of the Right, Reflections of Liberation in 1996, and Transformation Towards the People of Democracy in 2021.
Intersection of Homophobia and Sexism
00:04:57
Speaker
When you are writing these books, do you... How do you organize your thoughts and context to put in into the book? And do you sometimes feel like you're writing to yourself? What is your style? Do you write to yourself or do you write to yourself?
00:05:10
Speaker
Well, it's been different with each book. The first one, the homophobia with sexism, that was for me groundbreaking. And i was gifted by being able to do This this was came out of the domestic violence movement, out the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, was recognizing that the issue of homophobia was existing within our organization and that we had a conference where women walked out for two reasons. One, they walked out because the car right
00:05:47
Speaker
a group of black women had organized and the other one was but lesbian women. And so it's one of those times where you saw some in the section, but they were like, no, we can't have lesbians in this. It would destroy our reputation. And so out of that, the National Coalition for Homestead Violence decided want to send couple of us around to do speeches and to do workshops on homophilia.
Organizing Against Right-Wing Movements
00:06:14
Speaker
And doing those workshops It didn't take very long to get more and more information that sort of settled in my head to make me understand really clearly that this is not just about dislike of queers and fear of queers.
00:06:32
Speaker
This is a means of suppression. It's a means of suppression of us and our gender. And so you see you you see that move through time where As awareness grew about trans people, it moved heavily to that.
00:06:49
Speaker
So queer people beginning to receive some recognition of maybe this is close to being like the rest of us because they're getting married now. It was a moment of.
00:07:01
Speaker
Whether that was a good moment or not, it I think it moved people to some sort of ah adoption of their okay. So then it turned, and this is the right wing making this turn for us, of saying, oh, look at this. This is the worst horror. You think those queers are.
00:07:18
Speaker
Look at this. This is like a version of even homosexuality. It helped, I think, all of us to understand But homophobia was definitely connected to gender and sexism.
00:07:31
Speaker
And so it was laid in my lap through doing the work. ah You do 30 or 40 workshops and you get to hear all these smart people talk because everybody who comes to one is smart.
00:07:43
Speaker
When I wrote in the time of the right, this was actually I had been organizing since around the right, watching the right since 1980 when Ronald Reagan was elected.
00:07:55
Speaker
And so what I wanted to do there, tell me i saw this thing growing, this effort to divide people, to shape the way they thought, and to basically destroy civil rights for everyone across the board, but particularly basing it on race.
00:08:15
Speaker
And it was It was clearly a threat to democracy and was going to prop become a greater threat. So I felt necessity to write about what I had seen.
00:08:27
Speaker
i had just also come off working on ballot, against a ballot initiative in Oregon, which we'll probably talk about later. in which the right had made one of their first moves to try to actually embed this kind of thing in the Constitution and were making a law that was prohibitive of any recognition of queer and trans people, whether it whether it was in schools or whether it was through being on government property or
00:09:01
Speaker
The whole long list of things. So I thought this had a sense of urgency with that. I wanted to write something that was not too long, that was filled with both examples and stories so that people could read it in an easy kind of way and a language that was understandable.
00:09:20
Speaker
and that would be able to be used like in a high school. That was a dream. Imagine how anyone considering even the possibility of that. But, you know, the idea that in an 11th grade, it would be good to read something like shouldn and And so i' ah published that in 1996, but the most writing of it was in 95.
00:09:43
Speaker
And it was just critical to me, each of these things as it rose up. Each time I would see this kind of violation of our rights, watch the beginning of the attack against immigrants, you know that that kind of thing. But really watching the slow takeover of governance and government both.
Re-publishing Motivations
00:10:04
Speaker
So that book led me into the third book, which was based on articles that I wrote for our newsletter at the Women's Project over an almost two-decade period of what we were seeing. What we were seeing in all areas is very intersectional.
00:10:24
Speaker
that you thought it was. And so I would have an article in that four times a year. And so that book is a collection of many of those articles talking about not only the right, but the fact that we have to have transformation of our society.
00:10:41
Speaker
And I think we know that. We know that now more than ever. I understand that. And then that definitely i I've enjoyed. like I said, I started reading your book, The Time of the Right and Reflection Deliberation. So I am enjoying getting into it. I can't finish it.
00:10:57
Speaker
But we do have to run to a quick break. and when we come back, I know Kenyon had another question about that book. So we'll be right back.
00:11:09
Speaker
Welcome back. This is Power Beyond Pride, a queer change-making podcast. And I am Kenyon Farrell here with my co-host, Maddie Bynum, talking with the amazing Suzanne Farr.
00:11:21
Speaker
So ah quick question I have for you, Suzanne, we were just talking about your book, In a Time of the Right, which you recently have re-released, originally published in 1996. and And you were getting to this at the end of your the end end of your response, but re-release that book now, right? What about this particular political moment made you say, i think I want to revisit this for audiences in this moment?
00:11:51
Speaker
spring of last year when I decided to republish it. It had been suggested to me before, but by the spring of last year, early summer, it was really clear that we were heading deeper and deeper into authoritarianism and fascism. And I had written so much about it in this book, the way it worked, the way it was built, all the ways in which it were intersected piece-to-piece to build power and to take away power from others.
00:12:24
Speaker
And I thought, I need to get this thing out. I think there's a great possibility with this much activity. And then, of course, by fall,
00:12:35
Speaker
You had Project 2025, where it was just laid out in front of us. Okay, Suzanne Foer, you don't have to imagine what's going to happen. Here it is. Here it is for all of us to look at and say, wow.
Empathy in Overcoming Social Division
00:12:50
Speaker
And course, the inclination of for a lot of people, I think, was this can't be wrong. This can't be true. This is too much, too many details, too many pages.
00:13:02
Speaker
No, it turns out every bit of it was perfect planning. Planned it since the last presidency of Trump. And so I wanted to get it out as soon as I could so that would be in the hands of people to be able to understand what they were seeing,
00:13:20
Speaker
and what was happening without having to go to Project 2025 and look at the details there. In 1996, a lot of people thought that I had really overreached, you know, that I was writing kind of wild things. I'm sorry. What can say?
00:13:39
Speaker
what can i say I can always say i did not have big enough imagination in 1996 to dream of the horror that we're facing right now and how closely built it how perfectly in many ways it's executed, imperfectly in some, but it has stacks of people ready to act, ready stand in line and say, yes,
00:14:10
Speaker
That's not the... They won't be using that. one I will not use the gesture that they would use out of Germany. But...
00:14:22
Speaker
But so many are standing in line. And I'm sure we'll talk about this. I see a lot of darkness, but I also see hope. That's why I added the reflections ah on liberation, that two-thirds of the book is a about, this is really bad news. Look out for this.
00:14:39
Speaker
And the last was, we do have ways to work against this right now in 96. We can take these work ways. We can start working in community. We can build a base.
00:14:50
Speaker
We can build connection. but We can have strategies. We can be well-trained organizers. And i'm go to be honest. I recently watched your speech that you gave on June 4th, 1997.
00:15:02
Speaker
tiny step And it's crazy how that's nearly 30 years ago. But I was, all I could think about listening to you talk is, this is right now. Did we not pay attention to you then? Like, I don't understand how we could have heard that speech.
00:15:19
Speaker
and still ended up in the same position. Like, I think that's all I could think about while i was watching the speech, because I was like, this was given in 97, but this actually correlates to right now. When you was talking about the national parks going to private corporations, I'm like, that's what they're trying to do right now. The prison system constantly going and becoming private. I'm like, oh my God, it's crazy. But it also shows the dynamic of nothing new has been created until This is all the same cycle that has just been brewing and brewing.
00:15:48
Speaker
And so I love how you take especially aspects of the female liberation, queer liberation, and try li all those things, and you piece them together to create the melting pot of your activism. And I love it.
00:16:03
Speaker
I definitely wanted to quote one of your quotes that you had recently said while you were on tour. And I want to get your opinion behind that because it was very interesting to You said this is what we must be ever mindful of.
00:16:17
Speaker
To create self-hatred and low self-esteem in people is to weaken their will for survival. It is then a more simple task to dominate free of the threat of organized resistance.
00:16:31
Speaker
In order to resist, we have to believe that we are worthy. Our lives are worthy and our people are worthy enough for us to live and die for the struggle for freedom, equality, and
Suzanne's Influential Activism Quotes
00:16:45
Speaker
justice. When you make that statement, see, do you see evidence of that happening now? Or do you, what what do you think that we need to do that more people understand that's really the weapon that we have to to fight.
00:17:00
Speaker
I was just going to say that is the work now. I think in many ways we have done a lot of that work. I think particularly in the queer queer community we have, because we started this place where we were told we were were of zero worth.
00:17:16
Speaker
And we were it was difficult for us to find another person like us that we would even see ourselves mirrored in. Because so many of us were isolated, like me growing up in the country. Who is there? Who is there?
00:17:29
Speaker
look that looks like me or acts like me or talks like me. So now we've built we've built this movement in which you can see yourself and you can see people like you.
00:17:41
Speaker
But what we had to put in that is our connectedness. It's not enough just to see the reflection of ourselves in another person. We have to feel some sense of connected humanity.
00:17:52
Speaker
And if we lose that, we are in dire trouble. So that's one of, I think, strategic things is how do we build a sense of empathy with other people, a sense of connectedness.
00:18:07
Speaker
And I think we're, I talk about this a lot, but we are in such a hard time Because after Reagan and how we moved to such general international work, moving jobs abroad, and not jobs abroad, we just moving factories abroad, workers so suffering here, people here moving just all over the place trying to find jobs. You suddenly found this tremendous loss of community.
00:18:34
Speaker
and tremendous loss of family because, you know, your nephew's over here and your uncle's over there and your aunt's over here because they're trying to get a job. And so they're in three different states and you can barely get home for a family reunion.
00:18:49
Speaker
Where do you have that sense of connectedness and responsibility for each other? And so I think that we have to Add to that, add to the deletion of family and of community, then add COVID-19.
00:19:05
Speaker
And COVID put us in isolation from one another. So one of the things we have to do now and do it more rapidly as than we are is to move ourselves out of that isolation and move ourselves into connection and whatever way that we can do that.
00:19:19
Speaker
And it may take, we don't all live in the same place. It may take just like three people right here being able to talk to each other over a period of time together and see each other's faces. But the more we can get together directly, the stronger we're going to be.
00:19:36
Speaker
So I think what will save us will be community and connection. And those are things that I think we have lost. And so it takes building. They don't just happen.
00:19:49
Speaker
We have to have that sense. We are bound together in our humanness and we are bound to nature and the world we live in. So if those are just standard, got to do it, got to do it, got to do it. I definitely agree. And if we don't take nothing from tonight, just remember, like she said, we have to be found together in a human connection.
00:20:11
Speaker
So, and but it's on this theme of what gives you hope right now?
00:20:18
Speaker
but That ah there is a really good conversation. And not everybody has this, but you have it I have it. And I hope that you have it and as well, Maddie. But it it is my movement friends.
00:20:32
Speaker
And the way I am bonded with them and the way I work together with them, that gives me the most hope. Because but if we can be in places in ourselves, that we believe that it's possible to continue trying to change the world.
00:20:47
Speaker
And we see us so we so we are connected to five, six, ten other people who not only have that spirit and that belief, but also have the love one another. That's subjective, to have that sense of connection and that that sense of we we can move. I believe that we can re-examine and rebuild our nonprofits. I think they had we have to take a very hard look. I have hope in that.
00:21:16
Speaker
I think that people ah will come to some sort of recognition now that what we have had has not worked for us in building the movement that we want. I have hope that we will move into organizing on the ground.
Optimism from Grassroots Organizing
00:21:32
Speaker
That we we will not be talking about nonprofit to nonprofit. We'll be talking about the thousands and hundreds of thousands of people who are out there living in communities who are struggling for their well-being.
00:21:45
Speaker
And I think so. I have hope around that. I hope i think that we will look up and see what is happening is the opposite of what we want. We don't want to have a nation that continues to grow in it and it's and its willingness to be dominated by money.
00:22:06
Speaker
i don't I think people will snap too at some point on that and say, what does it mean to have so much money in the hands of a few and so much suffering in the hands of many, you know, in the lives of many?
00:22:20
Speaker
I believe those things can be changed, but I think that we have to carefully point them out. And i think it's it's going to take, it would take a lot of it movement integrity and political integrity.
00:22:35
Speaker
I was on a call today with Southerners on New Ground, by one of my old places. and And we were discussing to it political integrity and what that is actually acting in the very way you claim to believe.
00:22:51
Speaker
If you say, i believe in the equality of people, you have to then put that in practice. If you believe that we should be working with more than the middle class, then you have to move into working directly with people who were are a class below you. I mean, ah all of those pieces, if we believe that capitalism has this in its grip,
00:23:14
Speaker
We'll stop having your yours pay a scale be so high at the top and so low at the bottom. That is political integrity that we put into practice, what we say that we say that we believe.
00:23:27
Speaker
And that's I think that's our respond responsibility as movement leaders.
Rebuilding Community Connections
00:23:33
Speaker
And I think anyone who's active in movement is a movement leader. all right You know what, yet again, Ms. Suzanne, you are dropping mics tonight. I thank you for all the words that you're saying because you definitely are hitting home for me because i'm definitely agree we have lost the community. We need to get back together and work together. And my hope is built around seeing my connection with people grow and build. So most definitely.
00:24:00
Speaker
and We will be taking a quick break right now, but Ms. Suzanne is not going nowhere. Ken is not going nowhere. And I personally am not going nowhere. We will be right back with more information and more things talk about.
00:24:18
Speaker
and Welcome back to Power Beyond Pride, where we are talking with the amazing organizer, writer, strategist, political handyman, and honestly, my script says to call her a complete powerhouse, but she is more
Beyond 'Pride': Building Community Strength
00:24:32
Speaker
than a powerhouse. She is a brick house and a dynamite all rolled up into one. I love her so far, Suzanne Farr.
00:24:39
Speaker
canno not say I say I love you more than enough. This conversation has been the epitome of what my friends and my core group has been talking about and how I feel about open moving forward. So I'm glad to be right back here with you this evening.
00:24:55
Speaker
And Kenyon, I can't forget Kenyon. Look here I'm so sorry. you not like i'm loving on too much. I forgot. I'm sorry. Totally fine. No, it's totally fine.
00:25:07
Speaker
But since we're back, before we get into our, the kind of final segment, one question that we ask all our guests, when we talk about the queer movement, right? We often talk about Pride and Pride Month and the sort of celebrations there, but but taking the title of this podcast, Power Beyond Pride, when you hear that phrase, what does that mean to you?
00:25:29
Speaker
I said think what it means to me, took me back when I heard it it's like, how are we on Pride? what is What does that mean? That Pride is a great display.
00:25:40
Speaker
When we think of Pride events, it's a great display of kind of our joy and showmanship and know all of and games.
00:25:52
Speaker
But there's so much more to it. And i think pride events for me have become very difficult. haven't been to one in a long time once they started being commercialized so much with major funding and that sort of thing. It lost a lot of the glory and a lot of food lot of the fun.
00:26:14
Speaker
it takes more than I'm seeing just proud of the fact. that we are who we are. And that to me is what pride was always a statement of, that you may shame us in every way you want to. You may throw things at us, you may kill us, but we will take pride who we are.
00:26:33
Speaker
And what's beyond that is what we do with that pride, what we do with that sense of self, what we so do with that sense of community, how do we take the strength that comes from that in order to build something greater.
Historical Models of Activism
00:26:50
Speaker
And i think that I think we have examples of doing that. For example, if i was hoping that you would talk a little bit in in this interview about the work ah of Acton, I just thought that what a victory that was to come to that kind of sense of power, to bring about bring out recognition of what it meant to be cast cast aside as worthless, to be have people dying and resist that.
00:27:23
Speaker
And risk to have the intention of survival, not only survival, but continuation of the lives of our people. So I think that's what I think is beyond pride.
00:27:36
Speaker
better It's the pride and what you do with it, I guess. Yeah, thank you for that. And yeah, to talk about, i mean, ACT UP, I'll just say what's interesting now is here, so in in Cleveland, the as a result of what has happened in the last election, the an act of though former organizers of the ACT UP Cleveland have reconstituted the chapter and they called a meeting and like 75 people showed up to the first meeting. maybe great wrong Yeah, which has been really exciting to see. So I think
00:28:07
Speaker
You know, people are going to be either looking at either past models or building new things or some combination of the bow of both, right, given the level of collapse that we're facing, right? There's no other word for it, really. Yeah, so I think you know's yeah I would agree with your response to my question in that
Rapid-Fire Questions with Suzanne
00:28:27
Speaker
sense. It's like those things and that kind of those moments of like reconnection that are giving me hope right now.
00:28:33
Speaker
yeah So, yes, I'll move us ah to our our rapid fire round. Oh, no. know that right So first question. So again, we just will throw out questions and as quickly as you can off the dome respond is what we'll do. So.
00:28:52
Speaker
First question is, you write in silence or with music? I write in silence. Okay. Write in silence. See, I write with music. I usually like to hear, but I write with instrumentals because there's lyrics and I'm playing a music video on my head, but I like something ambient. So I'm like, I'm Chaka Khan all of a sudden. I'm like, you know, I can't do it with music. I can't do it with lyrics. It has to be like jazz or classical or something ambient that has no words. And anyway. Okay, Chaka, look over here. You are every woman in this. I'm like, I love it, Kenyon. I love it. But you know, I will say I'm the same way. I have to write with music and I typically listen to jazz when I start writing.
00:29:36
Speaker
I'm currently writing. Most definitely. Okay, so my next question is what is a book you think all organizers should read? What is on our to-do list read? I can't make a fast one about that. She said, hmm.
00:29:53
Speaker
That's a problem with too many books. maybe I think maybe one of the best books to read would be Miles Horton's books.
00:30:04
Speaker
And I don't know necessarily whicher which would be better. But Miles Wharton was the person who created, was one of the founders of the Highlander Center and was one of the best organizers I know ah no around.
00:30:18
Speaker
And so I think it's, I think something goes deep into organizing would be what I would recommend. All right. And let's see, who are some of your queer feminist role models? Oh my goodness.
00:30:32
Speaker
Audre Lorde. You want more than one? Sure. You could speak to Audre. I mean, that's a big one. word I mean, Audre Lorde is so large in being a model that...
00:30:42
Speaker
that would be covered. One that I loved with all my heart was Jean Hardese, who did founded Political Research Associates. I loved her integrity, I loved her mind, her willingness to fight authoritarianism with every bone in her body.
00:31:02
Speaker
I miss her so terribly. I wouldn't call her really young when she died, but she was younger than I am now. And over would the years, it's been a gap in my life.
00:31:15
Speaker
But that level of integrity and Jean was always, as she studied the right, she would go to their meetings and see what they did. But what she wrote about and her writing about the right was about the ordinary person who was taken in by that.
00:31:36
Speaker
and how this was affecting people that were regular folks in our communities and asking us not to attack them, but attack those who were moving them and keep us clear on that, who we want to take aim at.
00:31:52
Speaker
So don't punish every person who voted for Trump, but to look at those people who led them down that lane, those are the people you want to watch.
00:32:03
Speaker
and that you want to get out of their positions at now. Suzanne, you got to stop dropping your damn book here. The whole thing is like a good soundtrack to life. I'm telling you, oh my God, don't punish the people that voted for Trump. Punish the people that led them down that road. Oh, Jesus, that's a whole other conversation.
00:32:19
Speaker
All right. As we go into the summertime, because it's June, I would i like to ask, what is your favorite thing to do to relax in the summer? Work in my garden. yeah i um I'm a farmer's child, and I still love to be in the dirt raising raising vegetables. and I find it the most calming, soothing.
00:32:45
Speaker
People suggest to me that I could wear a headset and listen to music while I'm doing and I'm like... Are you serious? No, I'm listening ah listening to everything that's out here.
00:32:58
Speaker
So it's my calming place to, in terms of my mind, going into the too much information, particularly now that it's dark information. So summertime is great, particularly spring, because everything's growing right now. All right. So next question. Let's see What's one thing you would do different in any of your history of organizing work? What's one thing you'd like, I wish I had have done a instead of B?
00:33:29
Speaker
I know there are many things. I'm just having a hard time thinking of one that want to talk about online. Right. there's got see I wish that I received and sought out more training, that I had skilled myself up more.
00:33:46
Speaker
I mean, I did it i did a great deal, but a lot of it I just got working alongside people. And so i I wish that had more serious training. Like I wish I had training.
00:33:58
Speaker
um but within the labor movement, for example. It's one of many places. I wish I'd read more history and studied more history. I absorbed it more through conversation than I did study.
00:34:12
Speaker
So I wish I had added that that discipline to my life. And for my last rapid round question, I would say is, and being a writer,
00:34:23
Speaker
If you could title your own biopic, what would be the title? Wow. interesting Stay in the game. I like that. I like that. I like that. Stay in the game.
00:34:36
Speaker
okay Yeah, and once again, that's another shutdown moment.
Accessing Suzanne's Work Online
00:34:41
Speaker
So as we wrap up for the day, where can people ah follow you and your work? And how do they find my work?
00:34:51
Speaker
Yeah, or get in touch. Yeah, if you want a place for me. and Oh, okay. I'm on social media, and that's a little bit of a lie. I have someone who is working with me who's kind enough post things on social media. I do i do appear on Facebook, but...
00:35:08
Speaker
You know, well, I'm not as adept with social media and stuff. But to get in touch with me, are the best way is through my website, which is SuzanneFarr.com.
00:35:21
Speaker
And was bu it has all three of my books on it. They're all in the Creative Commons so that... You can download them and and read them for free or you can read them right there is while you're on the website.
00:35:34
Speaker
And the reason for that is i believe that we have to figure out a way to spread the information that we have through throughout our people. theyll say We can't make them out to pay 25 books for a book in order to read what's happening, what kind of analysis is going on and what kind of cool theory is.
00:35:56
Speaker
So as much as we can put in the Creative Commons that people can reach and have it. I mean, you can go to Amazon and order it. to but yeah the Virginia Tech had contract with them, and so there is a paperback form of the books there.
00:36:14
Speaker
But just in terms of reading it, just the best thing is to download it, direct it from the website. And that's that's adam my my sense of economic justice is to try in every way we can to get infl information to people because there's such an effort now to take away history, particularly black history. We would take away the actual presence of players in education, whether it's in books, whether it's in movies, or whatever it is.
00:36:50
Speaker
whatever ingredient is and to I think we're looking at the end of public education and libraries are going to have a hard time remaining public as well. so I think we had to fight that fight for the ownership of our bodies and our minds, that we cannot let people take that power away from us.
Closing Remarks and Future Engagement
00:37:13
Speaker
We had to stand firm on that. That is going to take a lot of resistance. No, if we had to take every book and keep it at home so that we still have a library, if we need to do that.
00:37:25
Speaker
if we had to do period we I think we need to do alternative things like parallel education. What would that look like? would what the what were the freedom skills of the day look like?
00:37:37
Speaker
Indeed. So folks listening, you got some work to do. I just want to say thank you again, Suzanne, for being with us. And unfortunately, we're out of time. I feel like we could, there's so much more we could have talked about, but I'm really glad ah to have you here for this spell and hope maybe we can join, have you come back at some point, i talk some more.
00:37:57
Speaker
It's really lovely having you. it was such a pleasure being here. You're all both fun and smart. And those are two of my favorite things together. So put those together and I'm having a good time. I'm right there with you. I'm having a blast.
00:38:12
Speaker
My God, echo Kenya. Thank you so much. Not just for feeding us this evening. You have truly fed into our spirits, our souls, our minds, and our beings. thank you. Thank you for that. And like she said, everyone listening, you can go to SuzanneFar.com. You can download her book. You can find out all her information, what's going on. So you can follow her, keep in touch.
00:38:32
Speaker
And as for me, Maddie Bynum, I am your host for the evening. One of your hosts for the evening. I have a co-host, but my social media is Instagram. I am Maddie Simone 737. Facebook is just simply Maddie Bynum.
00:38:46
Speaker
And I'm your other co-host, Kenyon Farrell. And you can follow me just at my name at all all the socials. And just remember to subscribe and get your friends to subscribe to Power Beyond Pride on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And please also check out our website, powerbeyondpride.com.
00:39:06
Speaker
Power Beyond Pride is a project from A Great Idea, clear-owned design, and content agency. Learn more about them at agreatidea.com. This episode is produced by Shane Lucas. Smita Sarkar is the project developer.
00:39:20
Speaker
Our editor is Jared Redding with support from Ian Wilson. We are both part of the podcast host team. We are awesome people. And we want to invite you to not only just join us in listening, but send us your questions, comments and concerns to Power Beyond Pride dot com. So that way we think can continue you to give you content that is helping you, like Ms. Suzanne said today keeping hope a alive and moving forward. Check out our new episodes each week. And we look forward to queer change making with you next time.
00:39:50
Speaker
Thank you from all of us at Power Beyond Pride.