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Power, Protest, and Community with Kate d'Adamo #52
48 Plays26 days ago
Kate d'Adamo joins Melody KG and Danielle W.K. Lee to break down what actionable, community-centered advocacy looks like in practice. From her work with Reframe Health and Justice, Kate shares how organizing grounded in harm reduction and equity can create real impact. She emphasizes the importance of local engagement, building interdependent networks, and moving beyond performative activism. The conversation also explores how DEI work can evolve by focusing on equity-driven, localized solutions rather than one-size-fits-all approaches. Listeners walk away with tangible ways to build community, challenge systems, and lead with intention.
Guest descriptors:
Radical, Grounded, Insightful
Episode tags:
#SexWorkAdvocacy #HarmReduction #queeridentity #communitybuilding #Carcerality #socialjustice #mutualaid #DEI #equity #activism
Tags again:
#SexWorkAdvocacy #HarmReduction #queeridentity #communitybuilding #Carceralit #socialjustice #mutualaid #DEI #equity #activism
Tags again:
#SexWorkAdvocacy #HarmReduction #queeridentity #communitybuilding #Carcerality #socialjustice #mutualaid #DEI #equity #activism
Recommended
Transcript
Understanding Systemic Issues
00:00:00
Speaker
We are dealing with full systems of carcerality, of criminalization, of oppression, of marginalization. And so we need to look at the histories of these things to understand how we got here and also to recognize how precarious some of these things are. If you look at things like loitering for the purposes of prostitution, we're looking at something that was 50 years old.
00:00:18
Speaker
We can take that off the books. It's not normal. It's not natural. We don't have to live with it. I think our work is radical. i think it's really interesting. We challenge each other all the time. And we are so incredibly grounded in love and respect for each other.
Podcast Introduction
00:00:35
Speaker
Hello and welcome to Power Beyond Pride, a weekly queer change-making podcast bringing you voices and ideas from across our fierce and fabulous spectrum to transform our world.
00:00:46
Speaker
I'm Melody KG, a Minneapolis-based artivist and provocateur. And I'm Daniel W.K. Lee, poet, author, and a love that dares not speak its fame.
00:00:58
Speaker
We are your co-hosts on today's QueerCast journey.
Guest Introduction: Kate D'Adamo
00:01:01
Speaker
In this episode, we're talking to Kate D'Adamo, she, they. Kate is a partner of Reframe Health and Justice, queer people of color collective working at the intersections of harm reduction, healing justice, and criminal legal reform.
00:01:18
Speaker
Kate draws on a background of community organizing, lived experience, direct service and program development, focus on health and wellness people, and the sex trades, including survivors of violence, exploitation, and trafficking.
00:01:33
Speaker
Kate is also co-host of Harbion Pride. How are you doing today? i can't complain. How are y'all? Good. it's so glad to I'm so glad to have you on the podcast, both as a co-host in this project and in this moment getting to interview you.
00:01:54
Speaker
a big fan of you. i'm a big fan as well, both as podcasts. And luckily, I also get to work with Melody on the day-to-day. That's pretty rough. Yeah, Kate and I get to work on a couple of projects here and there. One that's been going on for about a year and a half.
Kate's Work in Justice and Harm Reduction
00:02:11
Speaker
doing some diversion work in rural Missouri. And it's been really fabulous just to see your working style and getting to know your expertise in all of these really cool areas, including harm reduction, sex workers' rights, direct services, and really systems change thinking.
00:02:33
Speaker
We've been doing some interviews and one the one we've done earlier, I was surprised to learn that, Kate, you are part Asian. And that made me realize that i we've been working together and I and don't know much of your story. So tell us about like, where'd you grow up and what young Kate was all about?
00:02:54
Speaker
What is she like? Well, yes, I am mixed race. My family is from Japan on one end and basically Philly on the other. Who am I kidding?
00:03:05
Speaker
but Yeah, I am I'm one of those people that like bounced around quite a bit when I was growing up. I was born in Philly, but I'd say my formative years were actually California and New York.
00:03:17
Speaker
I was a little queer weirdo troublemaker. and Growing up, I you planned my first protest in the fifth grade. um And it wasn't even anything like interesting or cool. I was really mad about the lack of student involvement in curriculum development.
00:03:35
Speaker
And so I decided to protest about it and dragged a couple friends in who I have no idea if anyone knew what was going on, but I was very upset about it.
00:03:48
Speaker
And that was my first protest. And... Yeah, I was ah an angry little queer kid who then made the GSA president to sex worker organizer pipeline.
00:03:59
Speaker
As one does. And yeah, i in my early 20s, I moved out to New York and I was a community member and then became a community organizer at the Sex Workers Outreach Project.
00:04:11
Speaker
And then everything else from there is history. I started just getting really excited about advocacy and activism. um I was passionate because it was my people.
00:04:23
Speaker
And I was really interested and curious. I think figuring out how change happens is so interesting. And doing it while you're bringing a along like your community and your chosen family and your people is just magical.
00:04:38
Speaker
And so, ah yeah, I guess that's the long and short of where I came from. So I have some questions about fifth grade Kate. This is fascinating. So you organized your first protest around lack of student involvement in the curriculum at fifth grade.
00:04:56
Speaker
So, A, can you remember what curriculum it was? And B, like, how did the teachers, how did the administration, like, follow up to that sort of zelle?
00:05:08
Speaker
What did you like, did you learn anything from that experience as like a young organizer? I think the teachers thought it was really entertaining. Nothing happened and nothing changed.
00:05:19
Speaker
ah You don't, you see the protests growing up and you're like, that's a thing. And you don't actually learn about follow-up. And you don't learn how to plan them until years later. And you don't learn about things like having a meaningful ask.
00:05:32
Speaker
I have no idea what what I was protesting as far as what they were actually teaching. i bet it was around books. Because I did the same shit in high school, just less protests about school stuff. I protested other things like the Iraq War, like a normal person.
00:05:51
Speaker
Yes. But all through high school, i I just one after another, I was like I'm not going to read that book. I am not interested. And I will write you a better essay. I'll take whatever test you want, but I'm not reading that fucking book.
00:06:04
Speaker
And a big part of it was just growing up in public school systems, even in California, every single year we were reading John Steinbeck. We were not reading women of color. we were not reading people who were anything outside of that exact description.
00:06:20
Speaker
and so I just got really tired of it really fast and refused to refuse to just take in more of that, more of just like white,
Exploring Identity and Activism Roots
00:06:30
Speaker
straight male perspectives.
00:06:32
Speaker
And so I am absolutely certain that it was probably book related when I was a kid. And yeah, it didn't do anything back then. But it formed a really good little memory about the fact that it was possible and the fact that i knew even just being there and taking up space and saying it out loud was something. And I didn't know what it was. And i wouldn't have known back then.
00:07:00
Speaker
But I think it it made me feel and made me feel like i was part of a dialogue that I wanted to be part of. And figuring out what to do with that comes next. But just saying, I'm upset about this and i I think it should be different was what I got out of that.
00:07:16
Speaker
Was five years, I'm sorry, fifth grade, Kate also had does she already have queer self-awareness? Like you were saying, i was a fifth grade queer kid and did it. ah Is that like more revisionist history or in fifth grade, did do you have that? Like I'm attracted to not just what society expects me to be attracted to.
00:07:39
Speaker
Well, luckily, i'm a millennial, and so I got to grow up with the term bi-curious. And that was the safe space for everyone to be in And so, yeah, I think i I absolutely knew that there was something that didn't fit.
00:07:55
Speaker
And I don't think I had language for what it was. And now looking back, I realize we had, like, Ellen. And looking back, I absolutely Dear God, my baby femme heart. I remember being obsessed with Genesis from The Real World, the first like femme lesbian on TV who was unapologetically femme and was absolutely, you know, that feeling of I don't know if I love you or I want to be you But it was I specifically remember Genesis from from Real World Boston.
00:08:31
Speaker
Oh, who also has an unfortunate alum from that season. But yeah, I knew that something was up. I looking back, I think the part that I'm now seeing like in the rearview mirror that I I didn't understand back then was much more about gender than sexuality.
00:08:51
Speaker
You have the language of a lesbian. You see Tori from Save by the Bell and something's up. You watch Foxfire and you lose your goddamn mind. But the thing that I look back on now and I realize was going on that I don't think I had language for a really long time was non-binary gender.
00:09:08
Speaker
Yeah, as a fellow millennial, I super feel that. Super also leaned into the bi-curious... identity as a shield or as the only sort of language that existed that was remotely inclusive at the time. I'm wondering, like,
00:09:28
Speaker
What role your upbringing, your parents, your family contributed to this sort of like radical young femme who's taking on the public school system one white man written book at a time?
00:09:44
Speaker
did Was that because of other media you were exposed to or what role did sort of your family have in that? Oh, I love that question. i think first and foremost, I lucked out with parents.
00:09:55
Speaker
I know how special that is to say out loud for queer folks and especially for queer folks of our age. I was blessed with awesome parents that were really accepting and really loving and really supportive of all of the weirdness that I was.
00:10:12
Speaker
um And I think that at the end of the day, like, That's more important than anything else. you Everyone has to find they' their political formation. And some people are lucky enough to have ah parents that really want to do that and know how to communicate that to a kid in a real and a meaningful way.
00:10:29
Speaker
And I think actually at the end of the day, I just had awesome, weird parents who were really cool with all the weirdness that I brought and were really supportive of it and didn't want to didn't want to tamp that down.
00:10:43
Speaker
I think the other thing... was And maybe this is on my mind because I was literally talking about it last night with a friend of mine. I remember we were living in Philly and then we were living outside in right outside D.C.
00:10:58
Speaker
And in both spaces, they were ah there weren't just Asian families. There were not mixed families in those areas. And there were not that I know. I didn't know another mixed race person like closely that I wasn't related to for a really long time when I was growing up.
00:11:15
Speaker
And I remember really, i don't know if they were open or if they were just the things that are said that you don't notice around kids, which is terrifying. But I remember this one time my mom came home from a PTA meeting and i was like, oh, my mom went to the PTA meeting with the other moms.
00:11:33
Speaker
And ah you envision that, I think, sometimes about your family, that you're going to fit into this mold, especially when you don't see another family that looks like you anywhere.
00:11:44
Speaker
And I remember my mom coming home and just very distinctly being like, that was weird and we don't fit in here, but we're going to pretend. And this is just what we have to do. And it's not going to feel comfortable. It's always going to feel off, but it's fine.
00:12:02
Speaker
And I think just having a lot of that language, and they are, my parents are super progressive, but I think just having that understanding of there is a world.
00:12:12
Speaker
We do not fit into the world as it is structured. It is uncomfortable and it is weird. And you don't have to pretend when you're in your, when you're with family, chosen or otherwise, that's the space where you don't have to pretend that the outside world is normal.
00:12:29
Speaker
That's incredible. We want to hear more about you and your work, Kate, especially some of the more more recent than fifth grade and goings on in in Kate Diadono's
Involvement in Sex Work Activism
00:12:41
Speaker
life. But we do need to take a short break.
00:12:43
Speaker
Please stay tuned to Power Beyond Pride and our conversation with Kate Diadono.
00:12:56
Speaker
Welcome back. This is Power Beyond Pride, a queer change making podcast. And I'm Melody KG here with my co-host. Daniel Lee.
00:13:08
Speaker
Talking with our activist and a co-conspirator on this podcast, Kate D'Adamo. So just before the break, I was was asking about ah your entree into a sex work activism. How did you get into that space?
00:13:24
Speaker
So I moved to New York when I was in my early 20s. and And that's really where you make a big move in your early 20s. And that's really where I became an adult and became like a human person.
00:13:37
Speaker
And I, like a lot of people, was a community member. And I actually found community in kind of an ass-backwards way. I was, i had a variety of experiences but and i was working part time doing labor rights work.
00:13:56
Speaker
I was always really fascinated by worker organizing and especially really drawn to thinking about class and class struggles. And so I was doing some really interesting international solidarity work.
00:14:09
Speaker
That I loved and really shaped how I think about a lot of a lot of social change work, especially in the global South and especially as a country from the global North. Thinking about the way that we insert ourselves was a big part of that work.
00:14:24
Speaker
And one of the projects that I got to work on, i had absolutely the most amazing boss in the world. And I learned just so much from her and still think about her to this day.
00:14:35
Speaker
And she was putting together a meeting at the World Social Forum called What Does Labor Rights Have to Offer Sex Workers?
00:14:45
Speaker
And it was like a two-day meeting with sex worker organizers from all over the world. And everyone sat together and talked about labor rights and sex work and community organizing.
00:14:57
Speaker
And so I was listening to this meeting. And my job was to like help plan it. She got to go. And then when she came back, I transcribed it. And it was so difficult. I am not a tech person, but dear God, transcription ah is phenomenal for tech because it was ah one of those meetings where it was a room of people. Everyone was from around the world. So everyone had the most beautiful accents.
00:15:24
Speaker
with two or three microphones sitting on the tables. And so, of course, some people are this loud and some people are this loud. And everyone is cross-talking. And it took me a month to just describe to transcribe the full meeting.
00:15:39
Speaker
But what that meant was I spent an entire month listening to sex worker organizers from around the world, talking about what was going on, talking about the hardships that they were living through.
00:15:50
Speaker
And some of them, some of them I was identifying with. And I had never anticipated that. i had not conceptualized myself as a sex worker. i didn't identify as a sex worker. But I had had experiences that did not have meetings.
00:16:05
Speaker
And some of the things that she was talking, that she, and if it was one person, some of the things that were coming up in that meeting were things that I had identified with, I had experienced, and I had completely shoved down on under the rug and never thought about again.
00:16:22
Speaker
And as I was listening to this over a full fucking month, I just had one wave of realization after another. And the most beautiful thing about it is when you get those experiences from that conversation, every single experience ends in community empowerment, in community organizing, in solidarity, in community-based solutions, in people just showing up and caring for each other.
00:16:49
Speaker
And that's how they were fighting everything. And so just at the same moment that I was having just one revelation after another, i was also being offered the most beautiful, thoughtful, grounded way to heal.
00:17:04
Speaker
And so at the end of the month, I went and I talked to my boss and I was like, hey, so just out of pure curiosity that has no grounding in experience whatsoever, if there was like a community organizing group in New York for sex workers, where would i even look for that?
00:17:20
Speaker
And she connected me to Swap. And I became an organizer. I organized there for years. We built up an amazing organization that I, to this day, I was so proud of. That chapter did the coolest shit.
00:17:35
Speaker
And it created a I found my community. I found my people. I found advocacy that I was so deeply passionate about and a really incredible way to do that.
00:17:48
Speaker
And so that's what got me here. That's awesome to hear. So you gots to New York in the aughts, was it? 2006 seven?
00:18:00
Speaker
thousands six or seven but I mean, i lived in New York when I became a adult human person to you. it was my from my late teens to
Life and Activism in New York
00:18:13
Speaker
mid 30s. And I definitely that's why I often say that I was raised outside Chicagoland, but I grew the fuck up in New York because I became yeah an adult human person there. And it's so.
00:18:27
Speaker
That experience is are instrumental how I see myself. And even and by five years in Seattle, I was just, oh, I'm just a New Yorker in Seattle. but but You know. Where in New York was, did you become a real human person?
00:18:40
Speaker
I mean, I went to NYU and so it was at least like the easiest, most expensive landing landing I could possibly ask for while getting ah high priced education.
00:18:55
Speaker
and honestly, though, like I do know I have a lot of friends who were do all often say I would take it all back. Yeah. But I don't. i It was and easy, easier transition to go from being somewhat of a city rat in Chicago and then coming to Manhattan and just...
00:19:19
Speaker
having the ah sufficient buffers to like figure out myself in the mid ah late is 96. this is a little bit of a tail end of the, the height of, we'll say the intensity of, of act up New York.
00:19:38
Speaker
Although yeah was also the, the beginnings of but the sex wars, this battle right between what we might be called conservative elements of of gay rights versus a very queer mobilizations and resistance towards kinds of organizing and kinds of thoughts about about especially promiscuity and and and that kind of thing yeah I just it's such an interesting i think after definitely say Giuliani after the Giuliani period or Giuliani changed things I'll just say that and uh
00:20:24
Speaker
and When people say that, oh, New York, when I met younger people ah while i was living in New York and they're like oh, New York isn't what I thought it would be. And I would ask, well, when you come here? They'd be like 2000 something or whatever. I was like, oh, that's because you weren't here before Giuliani.
00:20:40
Speaker
Giuliani was a very, was a far, I mean, it depends on who you ask, but like, I think he did make it New York worse. He likes to prop himself up as the kind of America's mayor because of September 11th or whatever. But it, yeah, New York is quite the place to become a human person.
00:21:01
Speaker
New York is such a strange place to become a human person. And i feel like when you're in New York, you're forced into history in a different way.
00:21:14
Speaker
Being able to say, i moved to New York Right as ACT UP was closing up. And you mentioned the sex wars. And I was like, oh, my I remember the first sex work protests that I organized in New York.
00:21:28
Speaker
It was about Backpage. It was in front of the Village Voice. All of the big anti-sex work players decided to come down and you just insert yourself. And no matter how old you are, everything just feels so or at least for me.
00:21:41
Speaker
Looking back, it feels higher stakes and higher profile than anything we're prepared for. Intensity is a pressure cutter. good Yeah, absolutely.
Reframe Health and Justice's Mission
00:21:52
Speaker
And Kate, I know that Reframe does a lot of work and trainings, especially around the cataloging of the war on sex as parallel, especially to the war on drugs.
00:22:08
Speaker
I'm wondering if you could talk a little bit ah about that work and about how Reframe Health and Justice got started and where all of this has sort of brought you to today.
00:22:22
Speaker
Yeah, actually, the i guess it's like comparative historical work has really just it's been a passion project of mine for a long time. When I was doing graduate work, that was actually where I started some of the the historical work.
00:22:39
Speaker
And it was just based on this idea that I was looking at sex work. I was looking at the history of sex worker organizing the history of the use of trafficking, of the use of that language To say if these if trafficking as we understand it, so trafficking is the exploitation of another person through force, fraud or coercion. It's a form of violence and exploitation.
00:23:01
Speaker
And my question was, everyone talks about trafficking and labor now. If these two things have actually always been paired together, then movements forward in anti-trafficking work would happen at the same time as movements forward in labor rights work and workers' rights.
00:23:18
Speaker
And anyone who knows trafficking knows that is absolutely not true. um They have no relationship to each other. It's not even that they antagonize each other. It's that they literally just don't have relationships to each other.
00:23:29
Speaker
And so I thought if you looked at the history of like major movements and major moments in trafficking, What it was connected to was going to tell you much more about what it was doing.
00:23:40
Speaker
um And turns out it was very much connected to progressive feminism, unsurprisingly. But that was really, and that has continued and taken shape at at Reframe. And it really comes from this idea that like to understand how to move forward, we have to know how we got here.
00:23:55
Speaker
And not only is that work, I think, really helpful to understand the foundation of what we're working with, to better understand what we're fighting against, to better understand what we're fighting for.
00:24:06
Speaker
it also is really, it really puts things into perspective. Like the idea of police, seems eternal.
00:24:16
Speaker
And actually modern per policing is like 200 years old appass and at best best used very loosely. And the idea of such work criminalization, actually not that old. It is incredibly new. it used a zoning issue when people took it, where when people were upset about it.
00:24:35
Speaker
and Talking about like the 1800s and where it was just like we just don't want to brothel on Main Street because of of dumb morals. But we don't have a problem with sex work. We don't have a problem with sex workers. So much of white supremacy and colonization is about rewriting history and rewriting history to think that things that are not normal are actually completely natural to us. Like cops, like prisons, like national borders, like the criminalization of sex work.
00:25:00
Speaker
And so it so the work at Reframe Health and Justice around some of that archival work is really just to say, okay, we we are dealing with systems. We are dealing with full systems. We are not dealing with like single misdemeanor laws.
00:25:15
Speaker
We are dealing with full systems of carcerality, of criminalization, of oppression, of marginalization. And so we need to look at the histories of these things to understand how we got here and also to recognize how precarious some of these things are. It is actually not impossible <unk> paul a two hundred year law off the box to pull a pull 50-year law off the books, because if you look at things like loitering for the purposes of prostitution, we're looking at something was 50 years old.
00:25:41
Speaker
We can take that off the books. It's not normal. It's not natural. We don't have to live with it. And so that's where a lot of that work really comes from and is leading towards.
00:25:52
Speaker
And so, yeah, Reframe, we are a collective of queer folks of color. that my I tell people one of the things I'm most proud of. about I love the work that we do. i love the work around just connecting movements around thinking about really healthy, trauma-informed organizations doing good service in line with their values. And I feel so honored that I get to do work with amazing people who are so values-aligned and get to do it with some of my best friends.
00:26:23
Speaker
I think we've done incredible work. And I can say we are a collective that we are seven years old and we like each other more now than we did when we started.
00:26:34
Speaker
And I think if nothing else, that is something that I am deeply proud of that. I think our work is radical. I think it's really interesting. We challenge each other all the time. And we are so incredibly grounded in love and respect for each other. It's it's I'm so grateful to be there.
00:26:52
Speaker
That's really awesome. We i have to take a break. And but when we get back, we'll get to know some of the maybe idiosyncratic side of you. We'll be right back.
00:27:10
Speaker
Welcome back to Power Beyond Pride, where we're interviewing our co-host, Kate DiAdamo. I'm Daniel, and I'm here with my co-host, Melody. All right, Kate. So this is where we're going to ask you some rapid fire questions just to get to know you better.
00:27:25
Speaker
Try to answer without giving it too much thought. Ready? Always. Okay, great. Kisses or hugs? Kisses.
00:27:36
Speaker
Weed while gardening or weed with horror movies? Weed well gardening. I love horror movies, but there is just something about being in your own backyard, smoking a joint and playing with beautiful flowers and soft colors. It's magical.
00:27:53
Speaker
I think that sounds like romantic romanticizing yard work.
00:27:59
Speaker
You know what? Because I hate i it. I promise you'll become a devotee. Amazing. What's the favorite thing in your garden? Right now, so I'm a very nascent gardener. i am still getting used to like living in a house again.
00:28:15
Speaker
And so in my garden, the first two years planting stuff, this year for the very first time, the two plots where I planted tomatoes, I'm trying to rotate my crops.
00:28:27
Speaker
Everyone, every time I actually look into it, it turns out that I have such small plots where I'm actually growing this that it doesn't matter. I just need to put down compost. But in my heart, I'm a cute little farmer. who's doing crop rotation.
00:28:40
Speaker
And so right now i am growing snap peas and beans and kale in that plot. And just this week, I started being able to pull off the snap peas and eat them right off the vine.
00:28:53
Speaker
Oh my gosh, that's that sounds delicious. It's little so wonderful. Yeah, it sounds like you've been doing some strategic planning for your garden as
Personal Struggles and Inspirations
00:29:05
Speaker
well. it My deliverables are mapped out. You should see my time spread.
00:29:10
Speaker
Oh yeah. a And this question, share an embarrassing fashion moment you've had as a kid. Oh God. All right, it's not a fashion moment.
00:29:22
Speaker
ah but But good dear Lord, I want to send so much love to every mom and every parent and every baba and every dad of a mixed race kid who does not understand the texture of their child's hair, no matter how hard they try.
00:29:42
Speaker
and that kid doesn't know. I now love my curls. It took until my 20s to figure out how to love curls. And my mom has wavy hair. My dad has coarse hair. And I ended up with ringlets and thick knots and not understanding that no one in the magazines that I was seeing had my type of hair.
00:30:08
Speaker
And I even remember the picture, i think it was from Teen Vogue, of the cutest little bob on this very adorable redheaded girl.
00:30:22
Speaker
And that was such a profound mistake to think that it was ever going to work for me to just have a straight A-line bob while I had unkept curls. It was a disaster.
00:30:36
Speaker
I can so relate to that. I also have a mixed race sort of lineage with, grew up with a white mom who, bless her heart, just didn't, told me to wash my hair with shampoo every day.
00:30:53
Speaker
I had the very same sort of thing of not really understanding what to do with my I'm still like on my hair journey, right? As a 37 year old person. That's so real. And I think that the magazines, especially at the like, kitty barber shops or whatever, like really fucked me up because I was like,
00:31:15
Speaker
I want this cute little Jennifer Lopez hair. Like, I want this cute little, like, this cute little white girl with her little synthetic curls. I want that. And it was always like, you know, that's not what your hair looks like if you ask for that cut, right?
00:31:28
Speaker
Yep. Oh, I feel it. um What's your favorite band? All right. I don't know if I'll have if I have a current favorite, but I will say the band that will always answer that question because they were the first CD that I ever bought. The first band I fell in love with.
00:31:47
Speaker
was garbage. And it was specifically the Shirley Manson only happy when it rains video. And Mellie, you need me in my twenty Like a shift dress and knee high boots was my uniform. was cute.
00:32:02
Speaker
It was cute. And yeah, that band, Shirley Manson, that just angsty, ah heartfelt misery while also being like a tough femme, beautiful, flawless.
00:32:19
Speaker
That's awesome. What was your favorite family vacation? I will say, it so um so my mom grew up in Japan and then Hawaii. um And so when I was growing up, my grandparents still lived in Hawaii. And so I was very lucky that I got to go spend time in Hawaii when I was a kid and just live with my grandparents for a little while.
00:32:39
Speaker
Awesome. Oh, man, that sounds incredible. what What island? Goabu. Oh, beautiful. What an incredible experience to be able to do that.
00:32:50
Speaker
Yeah. And sure, Hawaii is a gorgeous place. know, 25 years ago, 30 years ago. ugly, great ugly mom Being able to be there for long enough to where like you see the same families on the beach when you go to where you get comfortable. There is just something different and beautiful about the cultural space, about hanging out with locals. Like my uncle still lived there. And so he would like he knew where to go and he was a local.
00:33:22
Speaker
And yeah, there is just something beautiful and fundamentally different. I remember the first time I was hanging out with someone who also grew up in Hawaii and we had met separately.
00:33:33
Speaker
And I'll never forget we were talking about and we were both in our early 20s, both gay. And i remember we were talking about Hawaii and someone else asked something about like LGBTQ something.
00:33:47
Speaker
And I remember he said, I didn't come out. Like they asked him something specific about that. And he was like, i don't have a coming out story. And it there's just something different in those spaces.
00:34:00
Speaker
Yeah. Speaking of Hawaii, how deep is your love for spam? Oh my God. Spam musubi is absolutely one of the unsung heroes of cuisine. It is absolutely fucking delicious. I love spam. It goes on so many different things.
00:34:16
Speaker
I will not, I will never renounce my love for spam. I don't have a favorite new flavor, I will say. There's a lot of new flavors out. I am an originalist.
00:34:26
Speaker
But yes, I am a, I'm a big fan of spam. I too love the spam musubi. What a great quick, pick-me-up snack, little bit of protein, little bit of carb.
00:34:39
Speaker
Absolutely. That beautiful sticky rice. Gorch. Salty joy. like but How many shots of tequila do you think you could drink in a single setting?
00:34:50
Speaker
I mean, what is the bar? Like, I can drink and not die. i won't pass out. i won't like you won't pass out. Like, how many until you're leg at your limit?
00:35:02
Speaker
Oh. I have had a rule for the last couple years. When I tell everyone we should get shots, take me home. Yeah.
00:35:12
Speaker
So I think that might be the That's the beginning of the end. all that's just the The moment I call for tequila shots, because it's always tequila shots. The moment I call for tequila shots, that means we should end the night. Yeah.
00:35:24
Speaker
That's smart. That's a smart, safe word for your platonic friends. Yeah. I will say i i love And... i love tequila and I'm not one of those people who has I had a negative encounter with tequila and now I blame tequila for things like you. You are doing things and tequila just happens to be there. It's not tequila's fault.
00:35:45
Speaker
And so, yeah, I think that might be the right answer to that question is i love tequila. I'm a big fan. i very much enjoy a good night at the bar. i very much enjoy having a good time.
00:35:58
Speaker
And as soon as it gets to tequila shots, take me home. As a quick follow-up to that, do you have a favorite brand of tequila? but I don't right now. Right now, I'm actually really into this beautiful bottle of mezcal that I just picked up that is infused with lemongrass.
00:36:16
Speaker
Okay. That sounds delicious. Smoky but lemony and grassy. It's a beautiful, it's a perfect summer on the porch. Little bit of lemonade, couple of ice cubes.
00:36:29
Speaker
It's after a day of gardening when you're all hot and sweaty, you sit on the porch, drink a mezcal. Excellent. What is your dream vehicle? It doesn't necessarily have to be a car. Like, I want a Vespa hard, but... My dream vehicle, that ship, the Dawn Treader.
00:36:49
Speaker
What's that? Oh, it's one of the last Narnia books. Okay. Yeah, it's it's the prettiest story in the Narnia books, I think. mean it's called Voyage of the Dawn Treader. And it has this huge, gigantic, gorgeous ship full of magical creatures.
00:37:03
Speaker
Okay. Okay. Wow. Whimsical. All right. Last question. Who's your first celebrity crush? I mean, I think i've seen I've disclosed my feelings about Genesis already.
00:37:16
Speaker
Yes. so um The first one that I could like super, super remember being like, i have a crush on a celebrity who was probably Leonardo DiCaprio.
00:37:27
Speaker
How very straight sound of you. I worry. I'm kind of shocked. I'm shocked. I have a joke with so many lesbians that look just like him.
00:37:38
Speaker
but yeah Oh, my gosh. that So I don't know if you were ever following this account. There used to be this. I think it was Tumblr.
00:37:50
Speaker
And then it was maybe Twitter and then maybe Instagram. But I could originally talk about lesbians who look like Justin Bieber. I'm talking about lesbians who look like Conan O'Brien.
00:38:03
Speaker
One of the earliest, like, a memeable things on Tumblr, just, like, redheads on the subway of New York with the super, like, pixie cut. and it just Yeah, I'm so excited to track this down right now. Seriously. And yeah, there is I will say, when people are like, oh, what kind of... who I used to say, lesbians who look like Justin Bieber.
00:38:24
Speaker
That's a lot of my type. But yeah, I mean, looking back as a queer femme, I very much recognize... Who tipped off something, but also it's still off and not off in the way it just like it doesn't quite click.
00:38:43
Speaker
And I think part of that, like I think a lot about Tori from Saved by the Bell. who had such gay energy and was absolutely very clearly queer. boy was that's not the character. That's not what they were doing. And so I look back at Leonardo DiCaprio and stuff, and I think so much of that is just looking for queerness and not having...
00:39:06
Speaker
Not having butches, not having masks, not having anyone to look to that would represent that. And so so I think that's part of why I struggle with that question is, sure, Leonardo DiCaprio.
00:39:18
Speaker
Like, I remember picking one ah of the members of NSYNC just because everyone else was. And they were like, who are you into? And I'm like, literally nothing in front of me.
00:39:31
Speaker
You have to... You have to have a celebrity crush. And Leo definitely looks like a lot of women I popped up with. Okay, now that is the gayest answer.
00:39:43
Speaker
Went from the straightest answer to the gayest context. I love that. so That's amazing. That's amazing. Before we end, I want to just ask ask What would be your recommendations or thoughts for someone who is trying to get involved, especially in our current political climate?
Building Community in Activism
00:40:10
Speaker
Maybe they've been deactivated or they haven't been active in a while or they're a young person just starting to get into like the politics it the politics of um the now. What would you say to that person?
00:40:23
Speaker
I think especially right now, there's nothing that makes me more excited, more curious and feel better about the future than just connecting and building chosen family and building your community right now.
00:40:37
Speaker
I think that there's a lot going on. I love federal advocacy. I love federal policy. i think it's fascinating. i love... Administrative. I love administrative policy and figuring out what you can do in contracts with your grant manager, like to be able to change things in a meaningful way. I think it's fascinating.
00:41:01
Speaker
And especially in this moment, there's nothing that en energizes me more than actually like sitting down with the people that I'm locally connected to my chosen family, the people that I love around me, my neighbors.
00:41:14
Speaker
And building those relationships and becoming more interdependent. And I think especially and yes, we go to protests and fight and i call my senator and I try to call like once a week and sometimes just call to be like, and yeah i don't like what's going on.
00:41:32
Speaker
And sure, all of that is super important. We have to stay engaged. But i think, honestly, the most radical and the most meaningful thing that we can do right now is actually just build care and love for each other outside of the system and in a way that is not reliant on the systems that we're trying to save and dismantle and improve at the same time.
00:41:54
Speaker
And so I think the most radical thing you can do right now is literally getting together with your neighbors and becoming really dependent on each other and finding what mutual aid looks like, figuring out what your skills are, figuring out what the needs are and figuring out how we actually can just rely on each other. And we don't need to rely on a state that was genuinely created to, at least for everyone on this call, none of us are supposed to exist in this country. We're definitely not supposed to thrive in this country.
00:42:22
Speaker
We absolutely... but Daniel, I don't know your background, but like, Melody, you and I are literally not supposed to exist. And so i think that the most radical thing that we can do is actually live into a space that says i am not going to be dependent on a system that didn't want me in the first place and definitely wasn't meant for me to thrive and live and be happy.
00:42:44
Speaker
And I'm going to bring my community and my family together. into along with me in that kind of liberation. And so I think above everything and the greatest thing that we can do to each other that we can do right now is just connect to each other. And I think it's also the most radical thing that we can do right now.
00:42:59
Speaker
I absolutely agree. And that's such a beautiful sentiment. I want to ask one more question before before we wrap. I really want to know, especially from someone like yourself who has historically done a lot of DEI practitioner, what is the future of of work look like for DEI practitioners or reframe health and justice in race and equity?
00:43:27
Speaker
And and activism around DEI. What does that look like, do you think? It looks really different. um Equity was this evolution that was really important because we realized like diversity wasn't enough.
00:43:41
Speaker
Diversity is a numbers game. It's a measure of difference between a bound within a bound group. And we went for diversity and that wasn't enough. We went for inclusion. We're working towards that and we're really trying towards equity. And all equity is say seeing disparities. Disparities are differences between people and groups that aren't supposed to be there.
00:44:01
Speaker
Disparities are differences in outcomes that are created by structural inequality. And entirely result because society treats people differently.
00:44:12
Speaker
And so equity is just about closing those gaps. And so I think the future of that word is going to be fraught. I think the way that we have to do that is going to have to be really different.
00:44:23
Speaker
And I think I think we have to start really focusing on closing those gaps in the outcome. And recognizing that maybe forcing equity into an inequitable system isn't going to get us as far as we think.
00:44:40
Speaker
I don't know what the future of diversity and equity work is. I hope that it is actually a lot of outside-the-system experiments that Because the other thing about equity is not scalable.
00:44:56
Speaker
If you are going in with a one-size-fits-all solution, it is by nature an inequitable solution because people are different. People are just too different for that to work. And so I think that the future of equity not only scalable,
00:45:09
Speaker
a lot of outside the system figuring it out. I think it has to be before it's real. And that I hope that the change that happens is that we stop looking at it as ah what are these big blanket interventions that work for everyone where we can just put A mobile health unit here because a mobile health unit really worked in downtown Detroit. So it's definitely going to work in a small city in Nebraska.
00:45:38
Speaker
And instead, I hope that what we're doing is actually building experiments for how we want to exist with each other and how we want to be in community and in relationship to each other that don't even consider equity because creating a solution, creating an intervention, creating even just a project that is right for the people who are at the table is by nature an equitable solution. And so I i do a lot of equity work.
00:46:04
Speaker
And what I actually hope that moves forward is that instead we're doing a lot of little experiments that have all of that just baked in. I love that. Thank you. That's so wonderful. And stuff to do with you.
00:46:18
Speaker
Same Zs. Well, we're out of time for this podcast. I want to thank Kate. And again, everyone, why don't you tell people where they can follow you, Kate?
00:46:30
Speaker
Sure. You can find me at reframehealthandjustice.com, on Instagram at harmreductionfums, and at Kate D'Adamo on blue sky. I'm your host, Daniel W.K. Lee, poet, author, and adult hungry person. You can follow me at at Daniel W.K. Lee. That's L-E-E at Blue Sky or at Strong Plum at Instagram or on Instagram.
00:46:57
Speaker
And I'm your co-host, Melody k g your Minneapolis-based artivist and provocateur. You can follow me at Melody KG on Instagram, M-E-L-O-D-I-E-K-G, or Public Nuisance on Blue Sky.
00:47:15
Speaker
Remember to subscribe and get your friends to subscribe to Power Beyond Pride on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And check out our site at PowerBeyondPride.com.
00:47:28
Speaker
Power Beyond Pride is a project from a Great Idea, queer-owned design and content agency. Learn more about them at agreatidea.com. This episode is produced by Shane Lucas.
00:47:40
Speaker
Smitar Sarkar is the project developer. Our editor is Jarrett Redding with support from Ian Wilson. We are both part of the podcast's awesome host team, and we invite you to send in your questions and comments at powerbeyondpride.com.
00:47:56
Speaker
Check out our new episodes each week, and we look forward to queer changemaking with you next time. Thank you from all of us at Power Beyond Pride.