Jasmine: Hi everyone. Thanks for joining us. I'm Jasmine Clark.
Rachel: I'm Rachel Vindman.
Jo: And I'm Jo Carducci, filling in for Amanda Weinstein.
Jasmine: Welcome back to the pod Jo! Thanks for filling in for Amanda.
Jo: Thank you for having me.
Jasmine: So can we pause for just a minute to acknowledge that this is the first time that Amanda has not been on the pod since we started? So I know I've missed a couple of days. And Rachel, I know you had to miss a couple. So I think Amanda deserves a little break.
Rachel: Wow. I I did not realize that! It's that military, like, you know, work ethic that she has.
Jasmine: Exactly. So here we are, we are on our weekly election countdown and we are now at four weeks. In many places, early voting has already started. I know in Georgia, early voting starts on Monday. But a lot of people still haven't decided how they're going to vote. So you can still make a big impact by signing up for our Great Troublemaker Turnout at redwine.blue.
All right y'all. One of the best ways to convince people how important these midterms are is to find the issue that speaks to them. For some people, that's abortion. For others, it's democracy. For others, it's schools. So we are going to focus on each of these topics over the next couple of episodes. And today we're gonna start with schools. So I'll share my conversation with Grace Lynch of the podcast Teaching Texas. And before that, we'll be joined by Kim Beyondi, an English teacher who just left education after 21 years because of right wing extremists.
So before we get to all that, Rachel, you just finished up your great Troublemaker Tour. What's going on?
Rachel: Well, I did, I finished in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, just north of Philly. It was another sort of unhinged school board situation. It was… I'm not gonna lie, it’s still kind of keeping me awake at night a little bit.
Jasmine: I can imagine.
Rachel: We actually talked about Bucks County before, we had an everyday troublemaker who came and she talked about the venture capitalist in the area that was giving… he spent half a million dollars, he gave a lot of money to individual candidates who were running on “keep our schools open,” even though the schools weren't closed. So that was interesting.
But basically what you have in this situation, I think this is very interesting. There was a place to exploit. You know, we've all, we keep talking about norms. We've talked about norms and how the Trump administration really just threw norms out the window. You know, they did do some things illegal, but a lot of stuff, they just didn't follow the rules. Or like the “norm rules,” right? But there wasn't something written. And we've just been held together by, I don't know, duct tape and sheer force of will for a long time. Or, you know, duct tape and norms. But it's held together without us needing to actually codify these laws.
Well, that's great until you have people who don't care at all. So these disruptors came in and they caused a lot of problems and you have these neighborhoods in these communities that are, they hate it and they wanna get back to normal, but you can't get back to normal until you get rid of this. You have to address this issue. Right. And it made me really sad when I heard people saying, like, even their friends didn't wanna put out signs, they didn't really wanna get involved in the discussion with their friends. They just, you know, like, “Oh, well we made a decision with our neighbors. We weren't gonna put out signs. We just wanted to get back to normal.” Okay, Yeah, that's great, but–
Jasmine: That's not how it works.
Rachel: Right! That ship has sailed. You know, we're closing the barn door after the horses are out. and I wanna get back to normal too. I mean, don't you guys?
Jo: Yeah, of course.
Jasmine: Yeah. But I think the way to get back to normal is not to pretend like things aren't happening. The opposite needs to be done. We need to put normal back into these seats.
Rachel: And not have these, you know, extremists who honestly, probably before this had no desire whatsoever to even do any of these things.
Jasmine: Absolutely. They just have found like, “Oh, I can be a disruptor and now people listen to me and I have a platform and I'm now just gonna use it.” It's kind of like the first time someone goes viral and they're like, “Oh, people listen to me. How will I use my powers for good or for evil?”
Jo: I will say, like, Rachel, what you were saying about them being afraid to put lawn signs up and stuff is like, unfortunately, like they're not gonna be able to then speak out once this goes, you know, out of control. And then they'll have all this regret, like, “I could have spoken up then and now this has gotten so far beyond my reach, like now I can't change it.” It's like now is the time to get loud. Now is the time to be brave.
Jasmine: Yeah. So I wanna switch gears a little bit because I feel like we have to talk about this. You know, we talk about normal, nothing has been normal here in Georgia in the last week. I mean, things are just going all kinds of haywire.
I always knew that the abortion issue was about power. It's always been about power and control, and I feel like this saga with Herschel Walker has solidified that it's about power and control. And so for those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, news came out that Herschel Walker not only paid for an abortion, but apparently his son, Christian Walker, who has been basically like on the campaign trail for him up until now, talked about the violence that him and his mother had to go through. It's honestly a very sad story.
Herschel Walker denies it, while literally every other Republican is like, “Oh yeah, we already knew.” So here we go again with that. Like, “oh, the evidence was planted, but I declassified it.” We're doing this again, where like, there's two different stories from two different camps, but ultimately, everyone's saying the same thing. “Doesn't matter. Doesn't matter. Yes, we are a hundred percent against abortion except when Herschel Walker pays for it.” Because then the exception to abortion is “the life of the candidate.” That's pretty much where we are at this point.
Rachel: There was one night I fell asleep on the sofa for like 30 minutes and I woke up and I was like, “What? What just happened?” My phone had all these messages and… yes, the information came out about Herschel Walker paying for an abortion. There was, I think the Daily Beast had a story with some receipts as it were. Not actual for abortions, but just some like a card and some other stuff. And then–
Jasmine: Well actually was a receipt for the abortion. Like legitimately there was an actual receipt.
Rachel: Oh, okay!
Jasmine: But also other receipts as well.
Jo: And the card.
Rachel: Yeah. Yeah. And the card. The card was in nice touch. Oh my gosh. Anyway so, but then his son, Christian. He’s quite outspoken. And I would classify as a young man who's really hurting.
Jasmine: Yeah. I would say the same.
Rachel: Like can we just talk about how there are a lot of people that the Republicans don't mind using it all that just seem… mentally ill?
Jasmine: Yeah. And they're using them.
Jo: Yeah, but they don't care. What Christian is bumping up against is realizing that the Republican party doesn't care about the reality of his father and the things that his father's done.
Like, I mean, the one thing he kept hammering and he made all those videos that went all over Twitter, all over social media, was like, “He's lying. He is not a family man. He is not a good father. He was abusive. He is not pro life. Like these are lies.” And the Republican party knows that, and they didn't care. They ran him anyway, because what they also know is that the truth doesn't matter, right? It never matters. I mean, they're out there spreading the Big Lie as we speak. They're out there with the so-called leader of their party being considered devout when we all know that the thrice-married serial-philandering sexual-assault-bragging melted circus peanut is not devout! But they don't care because they can create these fictional narratives. They can get all they want.
Dana DeLoesch, I don't know if that's how you say her name, but she said it. Like she didn't care if Herschel Walker paid to “abort endangered baby eagles.” It was about power in the Senate. And so like the, to, to what Rachel said, if they're mentally ill or if they're terrible candidates, the Republican party doesn't care. Because all they know is that the people who are voting are going to find what they wanna find in these candidates. And that power at the end of the day is all that matters to them.
So you can take these terrible candidates who are totally unstable and run them anyway, then as long as they say the things that voters wanna hear, then they'll vote for them. It's terrifying.
Jasmine: I think that the Republican party does not uplift, you know, people like Barack Obama or Rafael Warnock because they– the Barack Obamas and Rafael Warnocks of the world– show a picture of Black men that do not fit the stereotype.
Walker, however fits their stereotype, their caricature of what Black men or most Black men are like. So sure he's an absent father - aren't all Black men? Sure he's violent - aren't all Black men? Sure he can't string together a sentence - aren't all Black men? The Barack Obamas and Rafael Warnocks of the world, those are anomalies. This is the picture of the Black man that we will present to you because this fits our narrative of what Black men actually are.
So, you know, a lot of people haven't said this, but it's something that's really been sitting on my heart for a while, is his candidacy is not just rooted in their absolute thirst for power. It is also rooted in white supremacy and racism. And so yeah. That's pretty much what I see when I see this and I'm in Georgia, I'm at ground zero, so I'm seeing it, I'm watching it, and it's disgusting. It really, really is.
Rachel: This kind of reminds me, last week I mentioned there was a really– actually, I don't think I mentioned on the pod, cause I didn't see it till later–but the school board candidate that I talked about in North Carolina who's running… who was at the January 6th insurrection, by the way. There's a lot of candidates like that apparently. They're very proud of this. Even for school board. I was not aware of this phenomenon, but it's like a feather in their cap that they were at January 6th. And they're very proud of it. And they're like running on it.
Jasmine: Weird.
Rachel: I know. It's so weird.
Jo: Upside down.
Rachel: So she made a video where she said things… I was trying to explain it to my husband and I couldn't even use the words that she used because they were so offensive to talk about Black people. I mean, it was all the tropes. The things that she called them and she posted this video like, with no shame at all.
Like the critical race theory thing. That's still an issue that we're still talking about. I did notice of all the places I went, it was a much bigger deal in North Carolina than anywhere else. We have a disproportionate number of Black and brown authors whose books are banned. And I just read The Hate You Give - it is definitely a tough read, it's definitely something that you want to talk to someone about, I mean, I think that the recommended age was 14 and I would let my daughter… I mean, honestly, if my daughter wanted to read a book that long, I would let her read it like, yesterday. It's a tough subject. But I think she can handle it and we can have a conversation about it. I just don't understand.
Jasmine: But I think that's the point. They don't wanna have that conversation with their kids. Because then their kids might start questioning the way they treat people in their lives and in their world and say, “Wait a minute. What are you doing, mom? What are you doing, dad? Why are we treating people this way?” Or “Why are you saying these things?” And so it all comes back to fear, and it's a fear that they'll be exposed for who they are. They say it's about “I don't want my kid to feel guilty.” It's not the kids that are feeling guilty, it's them that are feeling guilty.
Jo: Right. And they want to be able to perpetuate their behavior, and if they don't have those conversations with their kids, then they can perpetuate that behavior so that they can continue to validate what they're doing.
Rachel: Exactly. Yeah. I mean, I would say I could take it further, like, what if the kids are already saying that and the parents are just mad?
Jasmine: Yeah. They're blaming it on the school. They're like, “You've been indoctrinated.” And they're like, “No, mom, I just don't think that what you're doing is right.”
Rachel: Yeah, no, for real. I mean, it's just like Don't Say Gay. Like we're not gonna say gay because if my child's gay, someone else must have made them gay. If my child is socially and racially conscious, then it must be cuz someone else taught them that. Cause I sure sugar didn't! So someone else must have.
Jo: “Someone's grooming him!”
Rachel: Yes! Grooming them to care and think that people have should be treated with dignity regardless of their skin color.
Jasmine: Oh my God. God. The audacity.
Rachel: Yeah, I know, talk about the audacity.
Jo: I know people here who think that children are being groomed to be transgender. I honestly have heard people say those words. Like the thing is, so much of what they're doing, it's so outside the realm of reality! They're talking about, like, pole dancing classes and kitty litter boxes in schools! And banning books is just an extension of all that other craziness. But like, they're just making things up. They are to push their agendas and like honestly, it's craziness. None of it's grounded in reality at all.
Jasmine: Like literally not at all.
Rachel: No, and if you say, “Where did you hear this? You know, where are you seeing this? Does it happen at your school or your child's school?” No, but it's happening out there. I can't let it happen here.
Jasmine: Mm-hmm. Everyone thinks it's happening somewhere. That's why it's so urgent, right?
So, we desperately need good teachers, but so many of them are leaving the profession. And I mean, who can blame them?
Rachel: Oh gosh, yes.
Jasmine: Mean low wages. All this testing, the utter lack of respect, and then straight up harassment. So let's bring on our troublemaker Kim to talk about why she left a job that she absolutely loved.
Hi Kim. Thanks for joining us!
Kim Biondi: Thank you so much for having me!
Jasmine: So you were an English teacher in North Carolina for 21 years. Could you tell us about why you loved teaching and what made you decide to leave?
Kim: Well, the answer as to why I loved teaching is a very easy one. I loved my students and I loved what we taught. You know, I loved English, it was my dream job to stand up in front of a room full of students and, and introduce them to the joys of great literature and debate and discussion.
And why I left.. it's what I told my final group of students. I said, “You know, when a teacher leaves, it's almost never the kids. It's always something else.” It's, you know, the paperwork or the politics or getting bogged down in bureaucracy, things like that. In my case, extremists, right-wing extremists, had taken over our board of education.
They're currently trying to enforce book bans, but even before this, they were targeting teachers in the community, threatening termination of employment if teachers spoke out against what was happening or made CCS schools look bad. It's a scary place to work now. And I thought, for the sake of my mental health and physical health, I needed to retire.
And I, I have children in the school system, so I thought, well, you know, now I have the time to be an advocate for them. To be on the parent teacher organizations, to continue to be a presence in the schools. I've been very heartened to see more parents coming out, supporting, you know, the, the sane non-extremist voices right in our community, speaking out against book banning, speaking out against what this board has been allowed to do, which is ride roughshod over its teachers and its educators and its schools.
Rachel: You know, I met you when I was in North Carolina a couple weeks ago, and this past week I was in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, and I talked to a young teacher. I was so heartbroken for her as a young teacher who clearly loves what she's doing. What do you say to a young teacher when she wants to do her best and she wants to stay there to do it? What do you say to a teacher like her?
Kim: It's a hard thing for me to say, Rachel, because I really have come to the point where I think that teachers need to put themselves first. Teaching is a profession that is obviously dominated by women, although most of the administrators and you know, superintendents are male. So take from that what you will. But women have traditionally been put in a position where we've been asked to give and give and give of ourselves until we have nothing left to give. And we see this play out in families, we see it play out in many female dominated professions, nursing…
Rachel: Have you been listening to our podcast? Haha.
Kim: Yes! Haha.
Rachel: But it's true.
Kim: It is true. I think every woman knows that, you know, that she has been asked to give and give and give. You know, these professions, you know, you always see slogans like, “teachers teach for the outcome, not the income.” Or, you know, “a teacher's influence is felt years down the road.” That's all well and good. But it is not enough in the here and now.
It would be hard for me to say anything to a young teacher because obviously my children are still in the public school system. I believe in the public school system. I want good teachers in the public school system for my kids and for everybody's kids. But at the same time, I cannot in good conscience say, you know, “stay in this profession where you were going to get eaten alive.”
Jo: I worked in public education for the last seven years as a paraprofessional for autistic preschoolers, and it didn't pay a living wage. Really. It didn't pay a living wage. And I know that that wasn't just for the aids. You know what I mean? So the thing is like, not only are they. Expecting these teachers to come in and, and like you said, for the outcome, not the income, but then they're subjecting them to these attacks. Like you yourself were attacked.
Yes. I think at a school board meeting by a parents group that was like an offshoot of Moms for Liberty after 20 years of teaching. Like what did it feel like to be attacked like that?
Kim: It's so horrible and so isolating. Many of my colleagues are fearful of visibly supporting me because the few who did were themselves attacked. And themselves named at board meetings. I couldn't really talk to anybody about it.
You know, I saw that it wasn't getting any better. I thought, for the sake of my own mental health, I better find something else to do. And then of course, once I was out of it, I was better able to advocate.
Jasmine: So speaking of, you are still advocating for students by trying to stop these book bans in your district. And you do that through something called Guardians Against Book Banning. So could you tell our listeners a little more about that?
Kim: Sure. This is an organization completely grassroots, not started at all by me, but one of the women who started it reached out to me because she had seen some comments I made on a Facebook page.
This was not long after our illustrious board had come up with what they called the “literature review committee.” Big quotations around that. They pulled The Hate You Give. They pulled Poet X, they pulled the Perks of Being a Wallflower, they pulled The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian. They pulled several others, but I'm sure you're seeing a significant pattern here. It's all books that have protagonists of color or characters who are not cis/het. You know, so these are threatening ideas. Ironically, it's only a few years ago that these same books had been purchased by our county as a way of introducing more diverse literature into our classrooms and teachers were using them and students were loving them because they spoke to their experience.
And the Guardians Against Book Banning Group, it started out small, but it is definitely growing in size. They are putting a spotlight on what this so-called literature review committee is doing.
Rachel: Grassroots groups matter. They do the work. When we do it on the ground, we are going to overcome this because the grassroots aspect of it is authentic.
Jo: That's the thing. That's the intangible. That's what we have going for us that these big groups don't have.
Rachel: Yeah, and it's difficult to quantify. But we know it's there. You know, we have to keep that hope alive and don't let ourselves lose hope.
Jasmine: So if you could tell our listeners one thing about public education before the midterms, before they go to the ballot box, what would that be?
Kim: Please research your down ballot candidates. Please look at your school board candidates. Please look at your county commissioner's candidates. In our county, the county commissioners determine what the schools get. Please make educated and informed choices. And I, I say this as someone who five years ago, was still wandering into the ballot box, I knew who I was voting for for president. I knew my Senate candidates and I felt good about that. And then the farther down the ballot I went, the less informed I became.
Rachel: Thank you for being able to share that because I think so many people are not willing to admit that and it's okay. Everyone starts somewhere. I just think it's so important that we share that all the time. You’re like, “Hey, I came, started at zero. Everyone does. And you know, I had to learn this myself.” So I think it's really important that we, not just in this form, but we're talking to everyone that we share our story and that it wasn't always on our radar, right?
Jasmine: Thank you Kim, so much for joining us today. This has been such an eye-opening conversation. I hope that the people listening took something away from this, whether that's to not be afraid to join a group of people and try to affect change, or whether that's not being afraid to put yourself first, and definitely to be informed about the people on the ballot.
So much information today. So thank you so much.
Kim: Thank you so much for having me. This was really a pleasure.
Jasmine: Now we're gonna take a quick break and when we come back we'll have my interview with Grace Lynch.
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Jasmine: Our guest today is a storyteller and multimedia producer. She's produced podcasts for 538 and Wonder Media Network, and she's currently the producer and host of Teaching Texas, a podcast that takes a deep dive into the American education system. Grace Lynch, welcome to the Suburban Women Problem.
Grace: Jasmine, thank you so much for having me.
Jasmine: We here are such fans of Wonder Media Network. We've interviewed Kate Kelly from Ordinary Equality and A’shanti Gholar from the Brown Girls Guide to Politics, and Jason and Ravi from Majority 54. So we're going for a full bingo. And so we are super excited to talk to you about Teaching Texas! So could you tell our listeners a little bit about your podcast and how it came about?
Grace: Well, first of all, I know that all of our hosts really loved being on this show, and so I'm happy to join the ranks. Especially, I work very closely with Jason and Ravi, and they've said lovely things.
And I'll also say that for Teaching Texas, it has been a really exciting exploratory project. This is building off of a show I made in 2020 called Winning Wisconsin, which looked at the outsized impact Wisconsin plays on our electoral politics, specifically presidential elections. And this is instead looking at Texas’s outsized impact on our education system.
Texas is the largest market for textbooks in the nation, and so they have had a lot of sway over publishers over many decades. But what I think is so fascinating about the story is that it's really, even, even in that, it's not who you'd expect who has this sway. It's not education professionals or academics or even textbook head honchos. It is small town activists, often with no education background, who are really infusing the nation's education materials with their own values and point of view.
And the show starts back in the 1960s and then brings us all the way to the current day of CRT debates, and really kind of tries to answer the questions of “what is the purpose of public education” and “how do we wanna think about the stories we tell about ourselves and who we are as a country?”
Jasmine: Wow. Yeah. You know, I knew that about Texas. I knew that a lot of the textbooks that get adopted around the country kind of originate from Texas. But I never really understood why. Why is it that Texas gets to be the deciding voice for public education textbooks in all other parts of the country?
Grace: Yeah. It's rather fascinating and it’s one of those kinds of insidious bureaucratic processes that, you know, don't really necessarily seem wrong at the outset. But then you realize if you manipulate the system to your will, it can cause a lot of problems.
So essentially why, like the nuts and bolts reasons, is that a lot of states adopt textbooks by school district. Every district gets to pick for themselves what textbooks they want. Then there are some states that are called “adoption states,” where a centralized group for the state selects the textbooks that every school and the state will use. Texas and California are the two biggest ones who do that.
So California is a huge market for textbooks as well, but they only adopt textbooks K-8th, and then high school gets to decide district by district. But Texas goes all the way K-12. And in high schools, that’s when you start to get into more kind of complex topics where you start to grapple with, you know, higher stakes ideas, right? You teach more complex histories or science or sex education. And so the fight over textbooks really ramps up in those higher grade levels and Texas is the primary player there, and so kind of what they say ends up going, all the way K through 12.
Jasmine: Wow. So I saw a promotion for your show that said, “what do a quiet couple, a textbook analyst, and a creationist dentist have in common?” And the answer is they've all played an outsized role in deciding what's taught in American public schools. So I love that, that's quite a hook. And I just love to hear more about how these few individuals have actually shaped our schools across the country.
Grace: Absolutely. So I think this is what really makes the show special. And this story's so fascinating because the system alone, the fact that Texas adopts more books per grade and therefore, you know, has, you know, kind of a whole lot of heavy weight in the textbook industry, isn't necessarily interesting on its face. And this is what gets back to what I mentioned earlier, it's really the people behind the scenes that are the fascinating characters here. Right? And so, as I, you know, started reporting this story, I realized it was gonna be something big when I started realizing the unique characters involved at every turn.
So our story begins with this quiet couple in east Texas, Mel and Norma Gabler, who, when their son came home from school one day and they realized that his school books weren't really teaching the version of American exceptionalism and the American ideals that they believed in, decided they needed to say something. They wanted to get more involved in the process. And that desire to make the experience more transparent, to add citizen comment to educational materials, that eventually morphs into a point where people are now asking them… “Well, what should we put in here? Like you're right, we're all riled up and angry. Well, what should it be?” And suddenly you have two people who never really necessarily meant to be the ones dictating specifics in education suddenly answering that question for everyone.
Jasmine: Oh, wow.
Grace: And because they're in Texas, what they say ends up everywhere else. And later, as they, you know, age and kind of pass on their work, their protégé, Neal Frey, enters the scene and he is a zealot in many ways beyond their approach. And he doesn't think that the public needs to be involved. He just wants to influence the powerful folks. And so we had a really fascinating interview with him in his office in Longview, Texas. He is still working today and is still fighting what he believes is God's plan for him. And so that is, that is a feature of episode three and I highly recommend folks check that out.
Jasmine: That sounds interesting!
Grace: It was an interesting experience! As a bit of a preview, Neal works in an office that is on the second floor of an abandoned strip mall. It has no windows and no AC, and we were there at the end of June in East Texas.
Jasmine: Sounds like something out of a scary movie!
Grace: There were moments of that for sure. It felt super surreal and especially to think of how much power that man has actually wielded over education in America. It was certainly a little alarming. And then yes, eventually the State Board of Education in the early 2000s is run by a creationist dentist named Don McLeroy. He is also a wild character, a documentary was actually made about him back in 2012. He's been on the Colbert Report, he's a bit of a lightning rod in the state. And was very generous with his time with us and is a, has a very kind demeanor, but had a lot of power over what kids learn in this country.
Jasmine: Wow. I mean, that's a lot. I, I'm very interested to, you know, to listen and to just to hear about all these things, especially as a parent. I have children in public schools and I know we have curriculum committees that are like, community curriculum committees where people from the community can come in and kind of help decide what books we use. But it is still a process that is not very accessible to a lot of people. So I'm always very interested in what actually gets chosen based on who is available to be on these committees in the first place.
Grace: Yeah. Later in the season when we're speaking a bit more about the current battles that are happening in public schools in Texas and across the country, we dive into this idea of like, “who are the people making these decisions presently, and where does this idea of like community engagement and community involvement, where does those boundaries get pushed to, where there are now parents who are kind of imposing their beliefs on other kids? And how do you protect those lines?”
And you’re right, you know, historically speaking, and also very present today, the people who have been able to be involved is a lot of white women. Because they were in the financial situation to be able to stay home and really be involved in the education of their kids and their community, and had more access, to your point, to those spaces. And so later on in the season we speak with some really incredible moms who are part of the Round Rock Black Parents Association who are working to stop books from being banned in their communities and are kind of leveraging that oppositional community involvement and force in a really compelling way.
So I just wanna make it, you know, clear that the show isn’t all doom and gloom about the state of education. There's a lot of really powerful people who are coming from all sides of this debate and this story.
Jasmine: Well, speaking of that, as we know schools have become ground zero for these culture wars. Between the uproar over Critical Race Theory, here in Georgia, even Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, to wearing masks… have schools always been this political or is this something new? Like I'm trying to figure out, am I just now noticing it or it's always been this way?
Grace: I think the answer is both. What kids learn in school has always been political. It's always been politicized. People have always tried to exert their political power over this, but that has typically taken place in these obscure rooms and these, you know, conference rooms or board hearings that no one's attending or paying attention to. And what's different now is that now it's on the national stage. Now it's in every headline. It's all over the national media. It is very public.
So I do think that, just as all politics have become national, I think that like this topic has also become national as opposed to something that was very niche and very quiet and sometimes insidious in its quietness. So on some level it's great that it's out in the open, but on another, when I talk to many educators in Texas, a lot of them feel that this is the culmination of a long fought battle on the right to destabilize public education. And that CRT has been the most successful boogeyman to motivate people to not trust their teachers and their local school, to not trust the curriculum, to not trust what's going on there. And I don't think that the pandemic helped that.
So I think that right now we're at a moment where the right really needs to mobilize and win back white women in particular and using the CRT boogeyman has been an incredibly effective mobilizer for that demographic. And I think that that's why we're seeing so much hubbub today.
Jasmine: Yeah, I think it's really unfortunate, because you know, as a parent of children in public schools, I just really hate how the children are the ones that really bear the brunt of the adults fighting. And in the end it is their education that is affected. And especially as a parent of Black children, their education and their experience is specifically affected by those who wish to remove things like Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion from our schools. And, you know, it's just, it's unnerving.
So I will say this. As a parent of public school educated children, I know that these issues are driving me to the polls. They're not, not just this issue. There's a lot. What do you wish more people knew about education going into the midterms?
Grace: I think what you just said is a perfect tee up to that, which is that it is ultimately kids who are being hurt by this.
We spoke with a librarian based out of San Antonio who really proudly puts on a banned book week every year. She calls it her holy week of school. And all the rest of the faculty knows that that's her jam. And she works in a district that has a lot of diversity, most of her students are Black or brown, many of them are queer, and when she talks about “why are some of these books banned,” it's that a lot of the characters are just like her students. And so what that is teaching those kids is that there is something about you that is dangerous or scary, right? That people have a problem with it. And she's like, “You know, that's a horrible message to send to a kid.” And I don't think that's centered enough.
And so I think that when people think about, you know, “Oh, we shouldn't be teaching this,” or “Our schools should be less…” whatever their beef is, think about the message that you're actually telling these children that there's something wrong with them. There should be no louder thought than that.
Jasmine: Right? How are you affecting children? Yes, and I hope that people think about that when they go to cast their vote at the ballot box this year. Our children have basically been a target. Whether, you know, the people doing it feel like they're targeting children are not, our children are being targeted.
All right, so before I let you go, we always like to ask our guests a few rapid fire questions. Are you ready?
Grace: I am ready.
Jasmine: All right. Here we go. You've produced a lot of podcasts. What is it about podcasting that appeals to you?
Grace: I love the intimate nature of the medium. I love that people's voices can tell so much about them, but that we also get the opportunity to strip away a lot of things that lead to people having preconceived notions of someone, when you just take the visuals out of it. So I think it's a really powerful medium for creating empathy, and I don't think that there's anything more worthwhile right now in our culture than reinforcing empathy.
Jasmine: Oh, I love that. All right, so you also have some training in theater. So if you could star in any Broadway show, what would it be?
Grace: I absolutely love this question, and I think it would have to be playing Amanda in Noel Coward's “Private Lives.”
Jasmine: Oh wow.
Grace: Dream role.
Jasmine: Nice, nice, nice. All right, so let's go a little more low-brow. What's your favorite guilty pleasure TV show?
Grace: Again, perfect for me because I pretty much only watch guilty pleasure TV shows. I like to just rerun sitcoms back and forth. Reruns of Parks and Rec right now is what I'm using to get through the day, but the ultimate soul soother for me is Gilmore Girls.
Jasmine: Oh, I used to love Gilmore Girls. I didn't even know they had reruns of that.
Grace: It's on Netflix and it's a problem.
Jasmine: Haha, I love it. All right. So if you could live a hundred years in the past or 100 years in the future, which one would you choose?
Grace: I'm too curious to not choose a hundred years in the future.
Jasmine: I think I would choose the future too. A hundred years ago is probably not the best time for a person like me, with all of my dreams and aspirations.
Grace: No. Yeah, for, for women everywhere, it’, yeah. Not great.
Jasmine: Yeah. So Halloween is coming up before we know it. So what's your favorite Halloween costume?
Grace: I think my favorite one that I've done personally was one year I dressed up like a fox and then put on business attire, like a blazer and a suit, and I was Fox News.
Jasmine: Oh, I love it!
Grace: Which was very silly, but it was very fun and very easy to do. I will also say this year my fiance and I are dressing up as the coyote and road runner. Or, yeah, it's Wile E Coyote and Road Runner. I'm very excited for that. So maybe that will be my, if you'd asked me this in like a month, maybe that's my future answer.
Jasmine: I love it. So that's actually it, that's the end of our rapid fire questions. Thank you so much for participating.
Grace: Happy to!
Jasmine: Where can people who are listening go to find out more about you and Teaching Texas?
Grace: You can listen to Teaching Texas anywhere you listen to your podcasts, whatever platform you're using to listen to this wonderful show. We have episodes coming out weekly. If you subscribe to WM Politics, plus you get episodes early, and it's really great. It's a wild experience and a really important story, and it's been an absolute pleasure to work on it with the team here at Wonder Media Network. And I just couldn't be more excited and I hope you'll give it a listen.
Jasmine: I love that. Thank you so much for stopping by the Suburban Women problem.
Grace: Thank you so much for having me!
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Rachel: Welcome back everyone. You know Jasmine, It's good– I mean, it's pretty wild–but I think it's really good that people can see what's happening in Texas, you know. That a few people in big, big Texas, you know, have determined what textbooks are used across the country. That's insanity.
Jasmine: It is. It really is. And I think the part where she talked about exactly who those people were, like creationists and just like some random couple that didn't like something, but they had time and power and so they're like, “Hey, I'm gonna like influence textbooks in my area.” And how that has an effect on the entire country I think it's something that a lot of people don't realize. But it's something that's like, it's a big deal.
Jo: Absolutely.
Jasmine: All right. So I think this is a good time to transition to our Toast to Joy. This is a time where we get to really talk about something good that has happened or something exciting or something that brings us joy. So Rachel, I will start with you. What is your Toast to Joy this week?
Rachel: My Toast to Joy is a little down in the weeds, family wise, but last week my husband turned in his dissertation that's been looming and hanging over the heads a little bit like a guillotine for quite a while. He took a break on it when the war started, but then he had to get back to work on it and he was even busier , I think, during the busiest time. But he got it in and he got feedback really quickly. I mean, honestly you guys, I couldn't even make it through like four pages, and he had two of his advisors who got back within less than a week. Not only did they read it, but they gave comments. And I'm like, “Oh wow. Bless your hearts.”
Jasmine: Yeah. I was surprised when I got comments back from my dissertation. I'm like, “Y'all read this, didn't you? Like you actually sat there and read this!” When I defended my dissertation, like we have to do it in person, like on a podium, and you invite your friends and family. And I remember my mom coming up to me afterward and she was like, “You did really good! I have no idea what you said. Like no idea at all. But you looked really good and it seemed like other people in the room knew what you were talking about. So you know, great job!” And I will never forget that moment cuz she was sincere. She was like, “I think you did amazing. I don't know what you were talking about, but I think you did great.”
Jo: If that's the case, I'm gonna go and defend a dissertation I didn't even write . I was just gonna get up there and be like, use some big words and blah, blah, blah, blah.
Jasmine: Yeah, and most people will not know what's going on!
Rachel: Haha. So yeah, that, that's where we are. So that is my Toast to Joy. But Jo, what is your toast of joy?
Jo: So mine is… my son, my oldest, turned 13 last week, so he is officially a teenager. Yeah, he's definitely a teenager in every way.
Jasmine: Welcome.
Jo: He's awesome though. He’s got a good heart. He's a good kid and you know, all he wanted for his birthday is… his Dad and I are divorced, and all he wanted for his birthday was for us all to get together and go out to dinner. And it's the first time that we ever really did that.
But we went to a restaurant and it was crazy, it’s a place the Hudson River, it's on a boat. It's like a sailboat.
Jasmine: Oh, nice.
Jo: And I was like, “they must have it inside cuz it was cold.” But no, you sat on the boat, which is on the river, it's like an old sailboat. And we had dinner outside, right underneath the Freedom Tower. And it was very, very cool.
And so he was, he didn't, of course, articulate like how happy he was that we were able to do that, but I, you could just sort of feel he was at peace. And like that was, that's all he wanted. He didn't want a gift or anything. He wanted that. So I was really glad that we were able to do that for him and get together.
Rachel: That's sweet.
Jo: That's my Toast to Joy.
Rachel: Look, I mean, I feel like this is a metaphor for politics. Like it is possible people! You don't have to agree with everyone and everything. But you can be civil. For the greater good.
Jo: I mean, I feel that way about baseball too. There's always this common thread, like you can go to a game and if you're rooting for the same team, no matter what. In that moment, like we can all find something that ties us together as humans, you know, in any situation. We’ve lost sight of that so much, now more than ever. And we really need to stop.
Jasmine: I think the same way about concerts. Music, food, and sports are ways that you can be like, “You know what? I don't care what your politics are today. Let's just root for our team. Or let's just listen to this song that's amazing. Or let's just eat this awesome food.”
Jo: Absolutely.
Jasmine: So yeah, it can be done.
So my Toast to Joy this week… I kind of wavered on whether I wanted to talk about this, but I think it's important. I mean, we are in election season, so my Toast to Joy is to having a great quarter going into the last month before the election. By the time this episode airs, we will have 27 days until election day. And so I had a really good quarter, fundraising quarter, and I was able to outraise my opponent and now I just need to take that and outwork him as well. Which I feel like we're doing.
And so I'm just really excited. I also have just been enjoying this last little part of the campaign. I've been hanging out with Stacey Abrams, for those of you who are fans, actually right after the recording of this, I'm gonna go launch a canvas with Stacey Abrams today. And then I am hosting a debate watch party next week. Like this is a part of the campaign where it's like, “All systems go.” Everything's running, everything's moving, and you never really feel like you're sitting down. The energy is so high. And so I'm really looking forward to just like this last month of campaigning.
And so my Toast to Joy honestly is to the next month of being full speed ahead all the way through the finish line, outworking my opponent so that I can get this win on November 8th.
Jo: Woohoo. Let's go! That's awesome. That is awesome. I love it. I love your energy.
Jasmine: Yes, yes. I gotta keep it up. Gotta keep it up. I also, yeah, I need lots of caffeine, but , you know, it works. It works out.
All right. So thanks so much to everyone for joining us today. Our voting tip of the week is something that's critical to keeping our democracy functioning. We need people to sign up to be poll workers in your area. This is really important, you all. Poll workers are so important.
If women turn out like we want them to, like they did in Kansas, we literally won't have enough poll workers to cover them. So earlier this year, two towns in Alaska didn't get to vote in their special election because there weren't enough poll workers. So this is an actual issue that we need to be aware of.
So please, please, please sign up to be a poll worker. It's awesome, you get to do your civic duty, and you get paid. To sign up, go to PowerThePolls.org.
Thanks again and we'll see you next week on another episode of The Suburban Women Problem.