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Summary
Julia’s guest on today’s podcast is Ai-Jen Poo. She’s an award winning organizer, social innovator, author, and a leading voice in the women’s movement. She’s the executive director of the National Domestic Workers Alliance, co-director of Caring Across Generations, cofounder of Supermajority and trustee of the Ford Foundation.
Ai-Jen is a nationally recognized expert on elder and family care, the future of work, gender equality, immigration, narrative change, and grassroots organizing.
She is the author of the celebrated book, The Age of Dignity: Preparing for the Elder Boom in a Changing America.
The conversation that Julia and Ai-Jen had focused around a theme of integrating healing and action. Ai-Jen told us the story of recovering from her own experiences of both harassment and assault and what an important part of her healing journey it was to get into action. She also talked about how important it was to have a community of people who could hear her story and believe her story and get into action with her to help change the conditions that so many workers like herself still face on a daily basis.
She listed for us a number of different healing resources that are available out there, whether you are a domestic worker or you’re anybody who is the survivor of workplace discrimination, harassment, or assault.
https://MeTooMvmt.org
https://DomesticWorkers.org
info@domesticworkers.org – to get in touch directly with an organizer who can help you if you’ve experienced harassment or discrimination as a domestic worker
The Time’s Up Legal Defense Fund
Julia and Ai-Jen also talked about a number of the different legislative actions that she is undertaking with the various organizations that she leads and which you can get involved in, helping to change the law to improve the lives of workers everywhere:
National Domestic Workers Bill of Rights
The Be Heard Act
Universal Family Care
Supermajority.org
Would you like us to keep making more episodes like this one? Make a contribution here. Join the Solving #MeToo community: email: feedback@solvingmetoo.com Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/199718984507390/ Twitter: @Julia_Kline, @SolvingMeToo #TheSMTPodcast, #SolvingMeToo
Transcript
So I’d like to jump right in talking about why it is that this topic of Solving #MeToo is so close to your heart. I met you a couple of months ago, right here in Chicago. you were doing an event for Supermajority together with two of your co-founders, Cecile Richards and Alicia Garza.
And after the event, I walked over to say hello and tell you how much I enjoyed it, and when I mentioned that I was doing this podcast and that I would love the opportunity to interview you, you said “Absolutely. I can definitely make time in my very busy schedule for doing that.” What is it about this topic and in what ways does this topic really touch your heart and speak to the work that you are doing in the world?
Sure. well, there’s a few different ways that, I have been really deeply invested in the #MeToo movement.
And, one aspect of it is because I’ve spent the last 20 years working alongside domestic workers who work inside of our homes as nannies, house cleaners and home care workers. And are incredibly isolated in the work that they do. and this aspect of sexual violence and vulnerability to sexual violence and harassment has really not broken through in terms of how people understand the vulnerability of this workforce. And yet it is so pervasive and so much a part of the experience of this work on part of so many women across and age and ethnicity, and it has been such a widespread, it’s almost an epidemic in this workforce. –
and also such profound silence and shame around it that the fact that, you know, the #MeToo moment went viral a couple of years ago and offered an opening for people to talk about it. Mainly the workers themselves has been this hugely cathartic moment of release and connection and truth telling that is so long overdue for this workforce.
The other piece is that I look around, and I feel like women are at the heart of so much change in our world, both in terms of how our workplaces are changing, our families are changing, our culture is changing, and our economy is changing, and yet still this aspect of being able to live free from violence – and the threat of violence – is still so, so rare. You know, so many women feel like they live inside of a constant threat of violence still in 2020. Even when we have women who are, you know, candidates for president of the United States and, winning elected office and driving so much change and leading companies and leading local governments. And yet still violence against women and gender based or sexual violence overall is still such a profound part of the experience of life in this country. Just feels like if we don’t crack that nut, we’re never going to achieve the kind of equality and freedom that we deserve in this country.
And then finally myself as a survivor of violence and harassment, , throughout my life I think, this issue is really deeply personal to me. I understand what it feels like to feel all of the emotions around having survived a sexual harassment and assault. The isolation, the shame, the regret, the self blame and self doubt. , all of the emotions that people have been speaking about so publicly in the media for the last couple of years. that experience has a new voice and a new platform is a profoundly redemptive and hopeful for me.
Hmm.
So I think a, a great place to start is with your personal story. let’s go right into the, most tender heart of these issues for you, which is your own personal experience with violence and harassment. please share with us what has been your experience.
well, first as a worker, in the restaurant industry. I waited tables and worked as a bartender for many, many years, as a young woman, through college. And, the kind of daily harassment, and that was both racialized and gendered. the kind of relentless onslaught of sexual harassment from customers, from coworkers, from your employers and your managers. And, you know. Having your whole experience really be defined by that, is, you know, is definitely something that I experienced.
I wonder if you can describe how that shapes you, how that impacted you, because that storyline of just constant sexually inappropriate words is so common to almost all of the women who I interview. And yet there are still so many people in the world, mostly men, but including some women who don’t yet feel it. They don’t yet get it. And so I ask every woman who I talk to to offer your description of how it was impactful, how it was harmful, how it was limiting, how it was shaming to experience those words in the hopes that maybe YOUR way of telling it will get through to the people that need to understand in their heart how that behavior is damaging.
an example is, there was, and this is an example from a customer in the restaurant, who was a regular, I used to work the graveyard shift, so it was late at night, from 9:00 PM to 9:00 AM in a 24 hour restaurant. And, um, he would say things like, , I had a dream last night that I had a geisha and she looked just like you and go into really graphic detail about the sexual things that she was doing. and so it was definitely, you know, equally racialized, for me and is almost always for women of color. And just very demeaning. And you know, I told my manager about it cause this person is a regular, and would routinely kind of harass me and follow me around. and the manager did nothing and just laughed it off and just said I had to toughen up
a male manager.
Of course.
Occasionally I hear stories about female managers who couldn’t have cared less about the harassment, but so go. Go ahead. So you told your manager.
Yeah. And just the response was. There’s nothing, I mean, it was kind of a joke and that I needed to toughen up and it’s just part of the job , to accept that kind of treatment. , and so, you know, at the time I kind of just assumed that was the way it was going to be, and that was my job, my livelihood. So, I had just kind of put up with it and I just did my best to avoid that person.
And that’s part of then how it starts to define you, is you end up spending so much energy trying to avoid, the people who are harassing and abusing you, and a lot of emotional and psychic energy, that, that goes into that. That can be incredibly depleting and lead to depression and, an a sense of isolation and kind of living in a constant state of fear kind of dynamic is, is not emotionally healthy.
it’s like death by a thousand cuts where you have these acts of aggression that don’t rise to the level where people take you seriously, and are just kind of assumed or taken for granted as part of the culture of how things work, the norm. you end up internalizing those dynamics in a way that do injure you internally and emotionally. but it’s very hard to articulate.
Yeah, yeah, it sure is. It’s very difficult. And I have conversations, with men, all the time, and , many of them want to understand and they just don’t. And I can see the struggle that they have because one part of them is like, I don’t get this at all. I don’t understand why you didn’t just slap the guy or throw a drink on him or tell him to shut up. I don’t get why you took it and I don’t get why this is such a perpetual problem and I don’t get why you don’t just make it stop and they genuinely don’t, and many of them want to.
But it’s like, I almost watch it kind of like, kind of like spinning around in their heads and they’re like, can’t compute, can’t compute, can’t compute, can’t compute. So it just like finally spits out and says, this can’t be right. This isn’t, this can’t, there must be something wrong with you. You know?
Cause I can’t figure out how this experience could possibly exist. Therefore it must not. Somehow you must be making this up or there must be something broken with you, or there must be something you didn’t do. And that’s with the men who are, you know, on the lighter shade of gray, as far as being allies. Forget about the men who have no thought of women’s equality being a goal to strive for.
and just frankly, there are a lot of deeply held narratives in our culture about, Asian women and, or, you know, every group of women of color has a story that gets told and reinforced over and over again in our popular culture that, Mm. Helps to, reinforce the idea that it is our fault, right? That we are somehow, you know, here to be objects of sexual desires of men , you know, there’s a long history, the sexualization of Asian women and in film and television and has a lot to do with our history, our military history in Asia and our role in that part of the world. So there’s a lot there culturally, that is underneath and helps to reinforce a culture where men blame the victim or the survivor, for whatever violations she or he has to endure.
I have this hypothesis that a part of it, it’s a, it’s a deeply concealed unconscious, outgrowth of a much more visible and accepted pattern – there’s a story in our culture and our history – our shared American culture I mean – that, the only expectation of men is that they go out and earn a living and that they protect their families. They provide and they protect, and that that’s all that a man has to do. And the narrative says that’s really super hard and he can’t be expected to do anything else. And therefore it is woman’s job – mother. Wife, sister, in some cases, even daughter – it is a woman’s job to take care of everything else for a man’s life.
And it’s her responsibility. And so if a man doesn’t have a clean shirt in the morning, it’s not his fault, it’s her fault. If a man doesn’t have anything to eat at night, it’s not his fault, it’s her fault. And I wonder if this sexual narrative that you’re describing is an a subtle unconscious outgrowth of that.
That if a man has a sexual desire that’s inappropriate, it’s not his fault. It’s her fault. Right?
Right, of course.
If anything,goes wrong for a man. It’s a woman’s fault. It can’t possibly be his fault because nothing’s his fault. What do you think about that?
Yeah, I mean, I think the way I think about it is that our world is, defined by hierarchies of power and privilege that value some lives. and contributions over others. That values the lives and contributions of men over women, of white people over people of color. and those hierarchies are shaping all of our cultural narratives, our economy, our institutions . They have structural and cultural implications. And , they essentially determine the rules. And there are written and unwritten rules that say what is appropriate and what is inappropriate for men and what is appropriate and inappropriate for women.
and definitely, , in instances , Where there has been sexual violence, did something , to deserve it or to bring it on or , to create that context or put themselves in that position. I mean, In every story. where a survivor comes forward to report abuse almost always. as a part of the process of seeking accountability, her own actions will be on trial first, and really scrutinized first and most. And that to me is a reflection of power and privilege , and a world where the lives and contributions of men are valued more than women.
Yeah. And I absolutely want to dive into the question of power because it relates to so much of the work that you’re doing in so many different ways.
and before we go there, I want to return to your story. you were telling and I interrupted you to ask, ask you to, you know, kind of define and clarify and, and, You know, give emotional depth to what you were describing as the harassment you experienced as a server, as a, as a waiter. and please pick up your story from there.
Well, I was just going to share that I think that when the #MeToo moment exploded and went viral a little over two years ago, that one of the things that was so powerful and resonant to me personally was just that it was women from all communities and survivors of all walks of life, all industries that sexual violence and harassment was so pervasive.
there wasn’t a single industry or community that was not touched by it in profound, profound ways. And so whether it was my experience in the restaurant industry or my work as a tutor at a community college where my supervisor harassed me, or just even being a woman on the street. You know, coming home from my job at a restaurant where I was physically assaulted by two men coming home at night.
That it is such an everyday experience for so many of us, to be surrounded by the threat of violence and actual violence. And the fact that we were finally, finally having a moment of cultural reckoning, was really profound. And I hope that it penetrates into every industry. And I know for domestic workers the truth telling has only just begun. And it is so profound to bear witness to. These days in almost all the meetings that we have, a survivor comes forward and shares her story for the first time. And it is – yeah, the process of breaking that silence of me sharing with our membership and my staff that I was assaulted on the street, coming home from work one day and that I know what it feels like to be a survivor of violence – and for all of us to feel the spaciousness and the community to be able to speak that truth , is definitely, Profound and cathartic and also very challenging. That’s a hard thing to do to face that reality and the depth of the human cost of violence. .
I, I’d like to talk a little bit about the sexual assault that you experienced fro through the lens of your healing journey from that, because that’s a big focus of this podcast is inspiring and awakening authentic personal power in everybody, but especially people who have experienced trauma. have experienced assault.
again, because I think that these are all personal journeys, it’s worth hearing how each individual person walked that path. And what were the ingredients for you in recovering from and healing from and finding strength from that experience of being assaulted on the street one night by two men.
well, I would say that the healing process is always ongoing. It’s not like there was one day I woke up and I was like, Ooh, I’m healed. certainly it’s something that, survivors live with and becomes a part of who you are, , and it is possible to heal. . you know, for me, a big part of it was community, right? Having a circle of friends and women, and other survivors who, were there to support.
So you were able to tell about what happened to you immediately.
Yes.
That’s such an important part. It’s such an important part to be able to have the courage to tell your story, but embedded within that is having the belief that the people around you will believe you and will support you.
Right? And will honor you, you know, and, and, and hold you through that experience. Whereas unfortunately, so many people who are assaulted have the opposite experience. They feel as though they have to hide what happened because they feel shame or because they feel that they will be shamed or they won’t be believed, or because the man that harmed them is , an important beloved person in the community and how dare she speak against, or he occasionally, as you. Pointed out and not occasionally, men and others are assaulted as well. It’s not just women, but you know, how dare we speak out against this important person, right? So.
Yeah. And imagine if you’re an undocumented immigrant, and in this anti-immigrant climate right now, you are going to try to seek — I mean, one of the things that you’re going to immediatelask yourself is whether going to seek services or any kind of help support, or reporting a crime, a sexual crime What kind of vulnerability to deportation, or family separation that will put you in, and the risks, that immigrant women in particular and women of color, of all walks of life face. On top of just the challenge of actually coming forward and telling your story. all of that gets compounded, in these different situations.
So you said the first part of your healing was the community and your ability to tell your story and the support that you received from your community. is there anything else you can share or say that is instructive or helpful about additional steps that facilitated your healing process?
Yeah, absolutely. And the most important thing is, it’s a really big part of why I do what I do as an activist and as an organizer, you know, Tarana Burke . who is our brilliant leader on this front. She often talks about the relationship between healing and action. And the #MeToo movement, which she founded, is really reinventing how we understand the relationship between the two things.
Most of us think about healing as something you do over here as an individual by yourself and action maybe as something that you do over there as part of a community or taking on a system or an institution or engaging in the world. And the two things are not the same or connected. And in reality, taking action and being a part of a movement of everyday people who share your values and your goals and your vision for a world free from violence and abuse and injustice. Right? That that in and of itself is part of healing.
So action is actually part of healing and healing is also action. And that we have to, to break down the silos that have really, segregated those two steps that need to happen and actually see them as part of a whole process for survivors.
So let’s talk about breaking down those silos. And as you referenced earlier, one of the big problems with domestic workers, but with all women, all victims, survivors of assault, is, the, the, the, the tendency to not speak out. and, and you referenced in for some people who are undocumented, part of that is the fear that if I do anything to like, you know, stick my head up, you know, I’ll, I could risk deportation.
but let’s, how do we break those down? How I, I know you’ve. Put a lot of thought into and you’ve, you’ve done a lot of organizing around breaking down those silos and what are some of the key components of it? What are some of the things that you are doing with the work that you’re doing that is breaking down silos that can offer, you know, hope and, and, like a, a branch to hold onto you to the people who are listening like, Oh yes, people are out there doing this work and it’s succeeding, we’re making it happen. And to what extent can others then learn from this blueprint that you’re laying down. Like this is how you encourage survivors who feel disempowered and alone and therefore unsafe to find courage, to find power, to find strength, to speak out.
How do we do that? How do we break down those silos? What are some of the steps?
Well, I think, to create safe spaces where survivors are supported, to share their stories or not. , and I think in our movement, what we’ve done is actually really try to create a space where people are safe and free to share or not. and to get support or to just be. And, be in the context of a movement that’s trying to move forward real solutions.
And so, you know, we are part of a coalition that’s supporting a new federal bill called the Be Heard Act, which will address the anti harassment and discrimination laws that a that protect survivors in the workplace.
And so right now our anti harassment laws at the federal level only cover workplaces with 15 employees or more. And there are so many women and men who work in workplaces, in small businesses or in environments with less than 15 employees. In fact, the entire domestic works industry, the entire care sector, is effectively excluded from any kind of anti harassment protections in the workplace at the federal level as a result.
And so the Be Heard Act would address that and make sure that every workplace, regardless of the number of employees, would be protected. I the title VII anti harassment protections.
And then there’s over 200 bills at the state, local and federal level that move forward on different aspects of support for survivors of violence, in the community and in the workplace. They strengthen laws at the state level, human rights laws that protect survivors, and many, many others. And those bills are systemic ways of addressing our failure to create an environment where people can expect to live in safety and dignity, live and work and safety.
And so I would say that, you know either through my organization or through the national women’s law center, or the me too movement or justice for women, there’s so many organizations that are working on these policies all over the country that survivors can get involved in and can play a key role in. Our movement is set up in a way that really puts survivors, their stories and their voices at the center. you never have to share your story, but if you want to share your story and help move these bills forward with your voice driving that story, that solution forward, there many, many platforms for you to do that. And, and our organization is one for care workers and domestic workers in particular.
So I love what you’re describing, for those listening who are survivors of assault and who are still kind of in the beginnings of their own healing journey and maybe haven’t yet told their story at all and don’t feel any community where they even could if, like you said, there’s a choice to tell and also a choice not to tell. Right. and, But to even, even if you choose not to tell story, to be around people –
To be in community, exactly.
Yep. That’s so powerful. I personally have never been physically, sexually assaulted. I’ve twice in my life, been in pretty scary circumstances. but I was not physically at risk, in either one. And also I have been lucky enough to have access to a tremendous amount of healing resources in the – I’m 49 years old, the first one happened when I was 15, so what is that 34 years? – so I’ve had a tremendous amount of healing resources in those 34 years to, for me to heal those.
But I’m putting myself in the shoes of somebody who’s listening, who has maybe not found their way to those healing resources. And, so what would be the first step? You said that there’s all kinds of resources, but I like to be very specific and explicit. can you offer, here’s an organization and email a website, you know, here’s where you can go if you’re feeling tender and needing to make sure that this first outreach is a supportive one. Here’s how you can do it, and for sure for sure you’ll be embraced and given the support that you’re craving
if you are a domestic worker or a home care worker, you can reach out to us at the national domestic workers Alliance and the website is DomesticWorkers.org. And if you email info@domesticworkers.org an organizer will actually be in touch with you. And if you’re a survivor, regardless of any what community or what industry you work in, you can reach out to the #MeToo movement, Tarana Burke’s organization, and they have a new web platform that is meant to be a resource for survivors. And it’s just MeTooMvnt.org. And if you need legal counsel, and can’t afford it, the Time’s Up Legal Defense fund is there and they’ve been providing legal support to survivors, especially low income women who can’t afford representation.
I love that. That’s awesome. because after all this podcast is solving me too, right? We’re looking for solutions and, having these resources available, that are, you know, first places to start for people who need that. I, I love that. That’s fantastic.
So let’s talk about about, power structures. And let’s talk about, how Unequal amounts of power results in unsafety for people. And let me have you start by describing that through your lens, and then we will talk about how, a couple of the organizations you’ve founded and are working together with and the initiatives that you’re undertaking are seeking to remedy the power imbalances that exist.
Yep. so in the domestic work context, if you think about the industry, it’s base, it’s. It’s in our homes, which is already very unique. You could go into any neighborhood or any apartment building and not know which homes are also workplaces. Right? It’s unmarked, almost defined by invisibility in that way, and oftentimes nobody really knows that you’re working there. It’s not like there’s an official registry or anything like that. There’s no signs, there’s no indication. And so oftentimes it’s just you and maybe your family and your employers, the household that you work for, who know that you work there.
And it’s generally just one person per workplace. There are some very, very wealthy families that have a staff, but most people just hire one nanny or one house cleaner and one home care worker or , home care worker who works in shifts. And that work is incredibly isolating. It’s like definitely no water cooler or HR department or even a coworker to go to, to ask for advice from or support from.
And so already you’re in an isolated situation, and oftentimes the people who are doing this work are immigrant women or women of color, women of some form of marginalized social status. And they are working in an industry where the workforce has been systematically excluded from basic labor rights that most of us take for granted when we go to work every day. We’ve had to fight for domestic workers to gain inclusion and minimum wage laws even, right? basic basic rights and protections, the right to form a union. these have all been that never been available to domestic workers in terms of protection. So there’s already a systemic exclusion.
And culturally it’s work that’s associated with work that women do, right? As mothers, and it’s oftentimes taken for granted that women will do this work. It’s assumed. And as a profession, it’s always been associated with women of color. Some of the first domestic workers were enslaved African women, right.
And so there’s all of these ways in which power has shaped and does shape reality, and you’ve got an incredible amount of isolation. And in that context, just a cultural story that a home is a man’s castle. And if you think about how long it took us as a culture to even acknowledge that domestic violence was a reality, imagine the leap then to understand that domestic workers – people who work inside the home – have rights and are real workers who should be treated with dignity and respect, as opposed to some just profoundly subordinate, person, who is in a servant-like position.
And so all of those layers of power and privilege are at work. so it’s, it’s. It’s a heightened state of vulnerability to abuse by people with more power, especially the men in the household.
And I’ll add one additional layer to everything you already described, is that domestic work doesn’t generate any revenue. And you alluded earlier to the, economic, factors in , the challenges that face domestic workers specifically, but across the board, right?
Well, it technically does generate trillions of dollars in revenue, but it’s all invisible under the ways that we understand value in our economy. In that if it weren’t for the work that domestic workers do every day, millions of working families could not go to work and do what they do. That’s why we call it the work that makes everything else possible. If all the domestic workers went on strike in New York city, there’s not a single industry that wouldn’t be profoundly shaken, ,
i see what you’re saying. So because I am able to hire a nanny I’m able to go out and work. Exactly. Because I’m able to hire a caregiver for my aging parent, I’m able to go out and work.
Exactly.
Because I have a housekeeper. I’m able to work longer hours because I don’t have to worry about doing all my own house car and all the other, I understand you’re saying
your productivity in the marketplace is directly a result of the value that gets created by domestic workers.
That makes a lot of sense. Yep. I get that. I get that.
You don’t, we don’t, I’m culturally, we don’t even recognize that. Right.
So, no, we don’t. And, and I think, I think part of the reason why it’s hard to see that is because it is the individual that is being helped by the domestic worker in their home. And in our economy as we know, the pace of worker’s compensation has not kept up with the pace of inflation. And workers increasingly are not being paid enough to even keep house and home together, much less live the, idealized middle-class lifestyle, say nothing of upper-class lifestyle. And so most workers feel as though they’re just barely making enough to get by. And so the idea of basically carving out a piece of their revenue to go to this person who is staying at home it like, it feels like I already don’t have enough. how am I now also supporting the person who’s at home giving me the opportunity to go and work at this shitty job?
to me it all goes back to the same hierarchy of power that values the lives and contributions of men over women. Because historically that work inside the home was assigned culturally to women. we were the default care infrastructure, that enabled everything else to happen. It was assumed that women would somehow stay home and take care of the family, or if they decided to work outside the home, they’d manage both. Right? That was, that was the assumption.
And we’re today in the 21st century, that is simply not a sustainable reality. We need a really strong workforce to take care of this huge and growing older population that we have in this country. Especially as the baby boomers age and people live longer and the millennials are starting to have babies at a rate of 4 million babies born per year. There is no way that we can take care of our families in this country without a major investment in our caregiving systems, including this workforce. But we are not at all culturally predisposed to that because of the way that we just haven’t valued this work. Because it’s work we’ve assumed women will do, right?
Yes. I agree with you 100% and also what you just said, we need to make an investment in the caregiving. Well, who has the lion’s share of the money that is available to invest in anything? It’s not individual workers, increasingly, right?
No, I agree. Individual workers don’t have the money solution.
Okay, so, so yes. Now let’s talk about what is the solution to this? What is it that you are advocating to rectify this solution that we have?
You know, politicians out there talking about different things, right? We have a, we have Andrew Yang talking about a, a universal basic income that every single American citizen should receive, over the age of 18 should receive $1,000. specifically, part of his reason for advocating for this plan is for this kind of thing, because then somebody who is staying at home and taking care of whoever it is or taking care of is at least being given $1,000 a month as, as acknowledgement from the federal government.
We have Elizabeth Warren, who’s plan includes a universal pre K so that now families aren’t having to figure out who’s going to provide for the, the, the nanny or the, you know, how are we going to care for the child right there. And there’s, there’s many more. I don’t want to go into all of the candidates, but please speak to this.
Our contention is that in the 21st century in this country, that none of those plans go far enough, and that what we need is what we call universal family care. Which is one social insurance fund that we all contribute to from the time we start our first job, that we can all benefit from. That helps us cover the cost of childcare, elder care, and paid family leave and if we have someone in our lives with a disability, also support for that person. and it’s basically everything we need to take care of our families across the lifespan while we’re working. And $1,000 a month, I just don’t think that that cuts it. You know?
I mean, talk about the reality that 70% of American workers earn less than $50,000 per year. And then we look at the fact that the average cost of a room in a nursing home is more than a hundred thousand dollars per year, and the average cost of childcare is at least $10,000 per year. The numbers just don’t add up. And so I think we need to be looking at a much bigger solution that these risks around the cost of care are too great for any family to bear alone. And the only way to do it is to pull it into a social insurance fund.
And we have a whole bunch of social insurance experts that have done a bunch of research that you can look at on our website, UniversalFamilyCare.org and they all agree that the best way to do it is for us to do it together. And that when we do it together, it’s actually really manageable. Whereas right now, the way we’re paying for it is so inefficient and expensive and unsustainable.
I want to tie this back around to the beginning of the conversation, which was how these various multifaceted mechanisms for disempowering workers creates opportunity to take advantage of workers.
And we’re talking about take financial advantage, but then also take sexual advantage, the harassment and the assault. And so, in addition to what you were just describing, I want to go back to the Be Heard Act and if I’m not mistaken, also the Domestic Workers Bill of rights cause that that’s still going forward as well, correct?
Absolutely.
Both of these, if I’m not mistaken, have specific aspects to them , that protect workers from sexual harassment and assault and provide support for survivors. And can you talk a little bit more about that with both or either of those pieces of legislation, how they’re different, if that matters?
Right?
So just having universal family care doesn’t necessarily address the epidemic of sexual violence and harassment in our workplaces. , and what the be heard act does is ensure that Workplaces across the country and across all kinds of industries are protected by our Title VII anti harassment protections. and that there is capacity and resources to investigate claims of survivors.
and then what the national domestic workers bill of rights does is it offers a whole new framework for rights and protections for this workforce that faces, as I said earlier, really unique challenges to exercising those rights, as a really isolated workforce in a really unique workplace. and included in it is the kinds of protections that are in the be heard act, but also all kinds of resources and support for survivors, a sense of community, and services, that are available to survivors.
oftentimes people think about community and support in one bucket, and then they think about activism and movement building in another bucket. But all a movement is, is a community that tries to get as large as it can in the service of a vision or a common goal. And our movement to try to end sexual violence and harassment is a movement that is inclusive of everyone and is trying to turn that experience of violence into a community with real power to change laws and systems. Like with the Be Heard act and the domestic workers bill of rights, and the only way we’re able to do that is if our community grows.
And so just knowing that that experience is key to us achieving the solutions that we need, and that the link between your sense of community and our ability to win is actually pretty fundamental.
And so I want to wrap up by talking about super majority. that is a new organization, if I’m not mistaken, it was formed in 2019.
Correct.
and my understanding is that it’s founded by yourself, Alicia Garza and Cecile Richards. Are there other founders in there in the mix of,
there are, there are just Miralis for kedo Dierdra shuffling Catherine Granger, a bunch of great organizers who basically saw all of this energy out in the country among women to do more, to get more involved, to be a part of the solution, right? To be solutionaries in this moment when our country is in crisis on so many levels. And that the challenge wasn’t that we had any lack of energy, enthusiasm, knowledge, or resources, but really that we had an organizing challenge. That we needed a way for us to come together and feel a part of the super majority that we are, right? When we’re the majority of everything, including voters, how come we still don’t feel powerful, right? How come we’re not in charge? how come we’re still dealing with inequality on so many levels, including violence? ? so super majority is an effort to create a new home for women’s activism that helps us feel connected and powerful, like the supermajority that we are, and we’re going to be mobilizing voters to get out to the polls and vote, in unprecedented numbers. Our hope is to train at least 2 million women to turn out millions more to vote in 2020. And over and over again, what we heard from women is that sexual violence and harassment is a huge motivating factor, is a huge indicator to them that we have not achieved equality, and we’re far from it. And the only way to address it is to organize and do it together.
So for the people listening, saying, hell yeah, I’m in, I want to get involved with super majority. talk about like, what does that mean? Are, do you do local meetings that people can show up at? Are there webinars that they tune into? Are there online trainings? what does that mean? What does that, you know, actually on the ground mean to be a member of super majority to join that coalition.
Great question. And it’s all of the above. if you go to super majority.com and sign up to become a member, there will be a survey – a membership form -for you to fill out and a way that we can then understand where you are and what kind of issues you’re interested in. And we’re gonna try to connect you to local resources and other women who are in your same boat, who you may or may not already be connected to. And then we’re going to be offering off a whole training and educational series that will support women to be their most powerful selves in the 2020 context and to turn out millions more to join our movement.
That’s fantastic. That’s fantastic. Cause yeah. Women, we are the super majority. And, what I personally really, like about super majority is that it is diverse women. there are a bunch of other political action groups out there, many of which at this time are dominated by women. and, they generally – in my knowledge of them – are not terribly diverse. There’s some groups that attract the white women. There’s some groups that attract black women. There are some groups that attract immigrant women. And Sort of, we’re all on the same page. We’re all fighting for the same thing, but we’re doing it in silos. That word again and super majority, you all are, you know, you all who are organizing it are diverse. And so the group that you’re coalescing around you is diverse and there’s such terrific power in that. I think that’s very exciting.
Yeah, I mean, I know for sure. I’ve been organizing with women of color who work as domestic workers for more than 20 years, and they want to be a part of a movement that is multi-racial and as big and bold and powerful as can be. and I think we’re in a moment where that’s true for lots and lots of women. We just want to be connected and be powerful together. Hmm.
What a great note to end on. Be connected and powerful together. I love that. That is what we are all about.
Thank you so much Ai-jen I really appreciate you taking the time to talk with us today.
I appreciate all of the work that you’re doing in the world, the inspiration that you are, the container that you’re holding for others to live into their greatest selves. it’s all just wonderful stuff.
Thank you. . Great conversation.
Great. Have a great rest of your day.
You too.