DISINFORMED: The Future of the Internet with Sydette Harry

look like. And one of the most prolific people doing this work today is Sadette Harry. I kind of think of Toadet as the ambudsman for underrepresentative voices in tech, interrogating how we're included, are not included and its impact. In a recent piece for Wired called Listening to Black Women the Innovation Tech Can't figure Out, Sidet argues that tech creators and journalists have ignored the experiences of underrepresented voices like black women, and in turn ignored the harm

that quote innovation can leash in our communities. She writes, harmful behavior towards black women isn't enough to inspire change until others are harmed, but the original harms are often lost by journalist task with covering tech, the power and rhetoric that went unchecked becomes common, and tactics used against black women for lulls become weapons used in conspiracies destabilizing the very nature of truth, from the swarming of victims

to posing as black women to destabilizing communities or countries. Defining systemic abuse becomes a frustrating exercise of describing an empty space that no one believes is there. Sedet pushes back on the idea of who is considered to be the assumed standard user online. Her journey with tech and the Internet started with a truly hellish commute to a retail job at the Apple Store. I had one of

the longest communes in New York, point blank. And I think that is very important because when we talk about the birth of the Internet, we often focus on Twitter, and I would I would say, I was like, I'm a not a user of the Internet in the way that people are excited, But I'm a user of Twitter social media at certain platforms, and some of my work diffuses out. But I have one of the longest commutes

in New York. I'm from far Rock, New York. It's the last stop on the train I had been blogging for a bit, but I was a graduate of University of Pennsylvania. My father was deported. I had been blogging for a little bit, and there was I got a job as a specialist for Apple fifth Avenue, so I came in through retail, and I said, I have other training, but I was working in retail, so not making even twenty dollars an hour. And I came in right after they started selling the first iPhone, so we got a

small discount or actually, but I had the power. And as they got that and people were developing. We had internet, we were able to get things. And I was in a form ments or interested in performance. So this was like, oh, I was getting sold all my music and I was getting to look at libraries and as those things developed, how how do we use them? But I'm also on the Apple Store, A big cube of the iconic is

on fifty Nights five I live in for Rockaway. I've got to take the a Traine from from Columbus Circle to the last stop. If you know New York, that is a that is a journey. And I was using it back when you weren't sure that you would have reception at everything so I would have a book in one hand, my notebook another hand, and I wouldn't have

the brand new shiny iPhone. And when you get above ground in on the A train, you're getting above ground at eight and once and then you're going to Rock Boulevard and then for Rockaway Boulevard you're crossing two bodies of water past the JFK stop. So I'm seeing a lot of humanity because I'm saying, every person who has to get go to JFK Airport, that's what I grew up in, that's mine. That's part of my life in the city, that's part of my life as a human.

And I'm above ground. So now I have WiFi, flash cellular, I have the new device, and I've been writing a Boggins, so I'm used to I'm taking to this literary form and but and I'm also bringing in some of the issues and things that we've had from blogging. And for me, it's always been about conversation and building community. And my job, with my job at the time, involves my gifted gap. So hey, I am built. I am specifically in spaces.

And I think that's the thing we don't talk about, is this like you have certain talents or certain um inclinations to these things. Like when people talk about Twitter is the voice of the world, I'm like, Twitter is getting better, but for a long time, Twitter is not accessible to people can see that's a literary form that's

already not accessible. People are talking about clubhouses. Oh this, and I'm just like, clubhouse doesn't work on Android, doesn't have really good translations, mostly in English, is ephemeral, and it has no close captioning, no caption so if you can't hear site, it's very hard for you to use. You are saying because people we are used to thinking as cultural creators are excited. But for me, that is I fit that demographic, that kind of user, that that

early adopter that wasn't what they thought of was mit. Yes, that's how I started using it, and early adoption gets you a base, gets you people you're were with. But there was a time when the actual joke of it for me is if I was to tell my story as a person with like user research in my community background is is that I happen to be connected to more of the privileged aspects of accessing that basi tech while having an identity that would make me a novelty,

because that wasn't who they intended it for. So that is all about how you build community and reach people online, which can sometimes be a bit fraud. When Facebook announced that video, not comments, are written articles, was the wave of the future news rooms My own included laid off thousands of media workers and an effort to pivot to video. But it turned out Facebook was actually inflating the metrics of video reach rather than getting distracted by the shiny

new thing, whether it's pivots to video or fleets. Sedet work to make sure that systems that are already in use actually sort of the people who use them. She worked with the Choral Project, a project would increase public trust and media and journalism and make online dialogue and comments sections better through open source software. I moved into user community researchly for a Coral Project, which developed common

systems which are now used in multiple newspapers. Back when everybody was like, oh, get rid of comments, and we were just like, don't do that. People need to talk, we need to access. What are you doing. Everybody got rid of promise, everybody went to Facebook comments, everybody pivoted to video, and then hey, they're lying about all the mentris, all your stuff is on Facebook. That was but it was the newest, shiniest thing, and I was like, that's

a bad dear. It's not about the newest shinest thing. It's about who you serve, what you want to do. Have you made sure that those are the people can access? And I think that right now we're living in the fall out of that. We're living in that idea of we've created this myth of esoteric. When people ask me to tell my involvement with tech, I always thought with that it's because it was poor, it was because black, and it's because I was working in retail that I

had that specific entry and this experience specific examination. And I have education and all those experiences. But the the only way I can describe it is having those melts. You have to be all those things, and every user, not just the ones with a high profile, not just a verified one, every single user will have this kind of story. Think of a universe that exists on screen or on stage. How is that universe fleshed out? Who's the main character and who are the side characters whose

inner worlds aren't really fleshed out? Who has given a point of view. The death's background and performance has shaped perspective on the Internet. Namely asked her to interrogate who is the assumed main character of online experiences. The problem is that we have an Internet and platforms of lots of casts of characters, but who we make point of view characters? And that's a very big thing for me, and often like people watch me and they're like, what

are you talking about? Like, we have to start thinking about who we make a point of view character because we have everybody on the Internet and this wealth of gorgeous humanity, but you still think that the point of view character is a white man between the ages of five to sixty of a certain socio economic background, and everybody else can only be up a point of view character for a very short period of time or one viral moment that is going to affect what we think

the Internet is and affects what our art is because we are watching real time in the world about how we can't abandon each other and how we cannot pretend we are the only people that make our realities and things like that because we are doing really badly because we thought that was the way we need into one Yeah, I mean, that's a that's a good question. I have something that I something that I um read in one of your pieces was that we've designed an Internet that

does not look like the real world. Right. There are not sex workers there, there are not people who they're not working class people there. There are not people who have disabilities there. We've designed this Internet as if these people do not exist. But we know those people exist

in the real world. So I guess one of my questions for you is, you know, what are some ways that you see different experiences and identities just be completely marginalized or suppressed on the Internet that you know exist in the real world. I I I am a little to answer that for because I think the justice was like, we don't see them in the kind of focus point of view way. They are always the underpinning, They are the foundation of content. Their aesthetics have informed so much.

Anybody who tells you how Instagram developed does not involve sex workers is a liar and a fraud Like that person says that, and I'm just like, oh, you're lying on the Internet. But the other thing about that is that I am not a sex worker. And the first thing is once and the first thing that I firmly believe that if the thing I'm saying is that we need to see those people, I'm not the opposer is supposed to be asking the thing we need to work

on the things that I wouldn't work on. It's like, how do we have better spaces for those people who are often already doing the work and developing the thing to cover themselves and speak for themselves, as well as how can we be effacal about it? How can we protect their security? And what does it mean for that

to happen? That that And this is a thing where we often go like when we people talk about content, it's like we have all the content who gets forward, our relationship with it, our desire to protect it is different, and we do not honor how people want to speak about it, from its creation to its access, to its um sustainability to its permanent And these are the kind of and people offer go, oh, that's so meta, blah blah blah. Sometimes it's just it's just as granular as

does it have close captions? Right? Does it have? Can you delete it? Can you be forgotten? And they're made meta when they need to be singular. And that's the thing that I like to poke, and that's the representation. Because subcultures change, trends change, morality changes, people live. How do we give people the ability to access and melode and create or where they are now? And how does

our media that we've created work for that? I think that because of all the things that you've said, the sort of I guess ephemeral nature of a lot of the things that are online, I feel that I feel strongly that our work, our contributions in terms of how

people have seen them as worthy of protection. It pains me to think that so many of the things that we have, that marginalized people have created online will not be preserved unless we preserve it right, And so I I I wonder, you know, how has that shaped our understanding of the experience of being online? That we are the only like we cannot trust anyone but ourselves to lovingly preserve our impact when our impact has been so great. I think that number one, this is an experience that

we've had in history. And I think that's why the power of like like, power of librarians, and powers of our chives are most important. Because we're picking and choosing what to preserve. Let's take a quick break and our back. For black folks, there's an urgency in preservation. We die earlier, and our entire country was built on washing the way

our voices and legacies. We have to be intentional to make sure our stories are told, let alone remember are preserved as black people specifically coming from the Atlantic slaves, trate and those like. We've had an experience of having to create cultural lines and cultural limitage when they did not exists, and when they do not when they where they have been designed to be failed because that was

the project of building the world was help. Help was getting us to build it without like honoring our contributions.

I think for right now is there has to be I think very material in some things and the other the other figures to that like even as I do other work, I kind of like I started to leave get the itches, like wanting to go back and do library sciences and just like the basics like how do you curate and how do you teach people to do things, and how do you hold things and not necessarily interpret everything, but leave people the space to be able to make

their own interpretations. Because we have to confront our mortality and we have to confront death and you really have to start asking, like people get exactly the face made. It's it's very it's heavy and like we're in it, but it's like, what would you want to hand someone after when you're done, and can you do it in this current current? Things like we have I still have a Bible, I have earrings or there are earrings for me,

I can't touch them from people I've loved. There we go through and we see the books and the architecture and all of that, and those are these are things for what we want to be left behind. But we also hear that in music and blues and how are they compatible and not compatible with the ways that are

accepted to leave things behind and for us? And that is a heavy question, but it's a question we have to ask more and more now, and especially when we are also being confronted with the reality of we die early. M we lost two years as black people of our life expect to see during this what I often get upset with when we're talking about data intact of that. Everybody says we'll get to what we'll get to, what we'll get to it, and I'm like, we're dying early.

We have less money, things are more stress is more likely to kill us. How much time do you assume that black people have for you to be wasting and playing in my face? But also we have created bridges across time despite that, we exist in those multiplicities because that's part of my family history where time is thought

us to be in generations, not just me you. Right now we're all playing with those ideas of time, but we're trying to fix what are the things we want to hand, What are the relations again, the relationships we want to have, And those are not just momentary in terms of the tweets I just sent, but they also and from across time. What are these things? And these interventions are playing with and I think for marginalized people, but specifically Black women, because that's how I walk this eve.

I have to. I am literally a living embodiment of a moment in time from a line that I'm going to try and transport through the people who I will touch, who will live different realities in different spaces. And that's simultaneous,

asynchronous and safronous. And but right now we are very concerned with the do we have, but are we going to do enough in the time we have to make sure there is a place to give and send because the world's on fire and everybody's like, oh, we'll have time, We'll have time because they're used to telling certain people, people who look a lot like me and you and who are the people that helped made us, that we

can always wait. And now that the fact that no, it can't wait when they said that, that is now circling up towards them. How do we light of fire under people's asses to say we don't have like, where do you think we're getting all this time? How do we create more urgency? We don't uh me you specifically? Are we live in this world? No? And it's um.

I think that that was glib, but I think for most important it's that we have mutually we have pressurings, but we are literally trying to stay alive, and everything we do that tries to ensure our own survival tangentially helps everyone else because we have yet to figure out how true we save ourselves without saving everybody else, specifically as black woman, I promise you if we ever, as a collective black woman in fence, black people larger in general,

if we all got together and ever figured out how we could do this without everybody else. I promise you we would have chucked our deuces and left a long time ago. Everything we do that is designed to keep us alive potentially helps everyone else, because in a lot of ways, getting a black woman to be valued in the way just humanely that other people are involves a complete destruction or reassessment of the system. It does, It

just does. And I am and I walk, and I changed back and forth because we're dealing with extraordinary times. But everything turns into what more can we do? What more can be done? And I'm just like, make what I'm doing right now sustainable enough that I can actually have the space to think forward. Until I have that space, I've stopped responding to the what can we do? This is something I struggle with so much in my own work, in my own life. True, What what does it mean

to truly have space and to have time? I feel that so often, even if I'm having a good experience, I am filtering that through. You know, I should be putting this on Instagram so that people know that I'm doing this, or I should be you know, marketing this, Like what does it look like to actually have time? And I think that, particularly for black women in THEMS, that looks we have like it's just a struggle. I

guess I'll put it that way. It's it feels like a struggle to actually feel like I have the space and time, like to even just rest, yeah, to even just rest on my laurels, to be like, oh, I'm I'm doing this and having this conversation. I'm doing this work because I want to, not because it feels like it's so urgent. I need to I need to be moving to the next thing. Does that make sense? Yes? If you there's the NEP ministry who I believe is doing golf. Oh yes, And it's a hard thing and

it's just like this is again. It was like I I very much loathed the idea of being the lone expert in anything except what I'm actually an expert in, and that's the thing that we're often not allowed. There are times when, because I think that we also have

to confront the idea of like the hustle struggle. Lying culture is bad for us in terms of how it focuses on us in production to capitalistic values, but it's also badness because it doesn't allow us to get a real um extent of expertise, because there's a lot of like when people talk about imposter syndrome, there's imposter syndrome, but there's also a system that has told you over and over again that you are not valuable, you will

not be compensated for were value. And then there is also just healthy self assessment and avoidance of Dune cruig in the syndrome like I'm not the best person for this does not necessarily mean that I am holding myself back or whatever. That's just sometimes mean that I have a good idea about the skills required for this, and the humility to know I don't have them. That's a gift you want. Oh, this is going to involve a lot of math. I joined the High High i Q

Society because I couldn't pass math. I am wonderful and great and smart and intelligence. But if people's lives develop on me getting the math right, know what I can do in the best essential of my humanity is tell you immediately to hire someone else who will get the

math right. That's not me. And yes, there's like and I think there's and I think often for me like that focusing like on aposter syndromes and and often, like a lot of literature becomes like like this is how we are in comparison to mediocre white man and Bubba. I'm just like, I have no desire to com prepare myself to the mediocre. I have a better, stronger desire to create the fantastic. I love that it's mediocre, Like these people are so mediocre, but they get so far ahead.

M okay, and they're gonna continue being mediocre. How do I make what's great? That could be from like a really good apple pie, that could be a really amazing piece of software, that could be a stunning visual That is all? That is where I think. Often I'm like, okay, and I think it's bad because for our society, like black women, for a lot of us, is like we're constantly trying to create any The stress we feel is

because we don't. We don't have that space where it's this thing of like I don't have I done everything I can to get on, have I done everything I can to what needs to be happening. And you feel that because you don't feel secure what you have, because you're not even you're making, you're making this as well, I feel like it will go away I feel I don't know if I'm making enough income this week, and it's like, if you had those other things taking care

of you would have a better assessment of that. And there's also the reality that I don't know what any we are. I wouldn't ask anyone to make deep assessments of what we're doing right now. We're all we're all in stressed to traumatize. After the Capital insurrection, I feel like we had an afternoon where people like seem to be reflecting, and then the next day it was back

to the normal shittiness. You know. I'm so I'm so sick of moments where yeah, for that day, people seemed to be really reflecting, and then the next day they all woke up and we're the same with not worse. Well, it's also like I looked at every single person they trotted out as an ex expert and things like that, and I was just like, everybody's white. Yes, everybody's from the same force schools, And people are like, do you want to be there? And I'm like, I don't know.

In some cases yes, because I have feelings and thoughts that I want to get out. Because I've been talking about this for years and I have moments, but then they're also scared that it goes back to the other things, like, well, if you want to talk about it in like online community, the things that I actually have expertise in, Yeah, if you want to talk about it in the mechanics of AI, if you want to talking about heavy duty legal, there's

no reason to have me there. My problem is is that you have a wealth of people who should be there who are not there, like they're talking about just like, I am not the person you need to be talking to, but you're not gonna ly in my face and tell me you can't find a single black woman to talk to. After a quick break, let's get right back into it.

Black women are rarely cited or centered in conversations about the Internet, even about their own experiences things like online harassment or the kinds of racialized disinformation campaigns that kicks harder the Capital insurrection. These things overwhelmingly target black women, yet we're rarely given the space to talk about its impacts. The Death says that tech media let themselves off the hook by writing black women like her office problems or

not likable or professional enough. It's us giving themselves license to exclude our voices from the narrative, essentially blaming us for our owner rature. Are you complained about my tone? And I'm just like, my tone is very specific. I chose a screen name that is kind of confrontational. I've got a collection of cat tattoos and aesthetics that maybe looking back now, I might have turned down the eile on or maybe I might have turned the doll up.

Who knows, but they say something, and I'm aware of that, the visual era, and we're aware of that, the packaging brand era. You are not going to lie in my very librarian inclined face and tell me you can't find a black woman who does not have these signals, who does not have this attitude, who does not have this tone, but who is more than qualified and considered and thoughtful to tell you similar things. You don't like me to

get their days. I don't like me, But if you actually like the work you define somebody you keep asking pointing at me because it prevents you from actually doing the work of finding somebody else. And I think that's experience a lot of black women have. It's like, oh, well, she's a problem, she's a problem. I'm like, yes, I probably there, or she is, or maybe even I don't like her. But if you care about what the work is,

you have a two prompt thing. If you care about the work, and that is the expert, that is the person you should be talking to. Stop trying to get around talking the person. It's not about your like me, because you never seem to have that problem when it's a white man. Some of these dudes are running around being demons, demons on earth and actual fashions and racist

and but we can't go around them. Weird because you always managed to go around the black woman or the Asian woman or the Latin x um, that non binary person that you all admit as an expert. But you could find a way around them because they're difficult. But you never find you never feel the same disposition to that when it's a terrible white man. Eclipside of that being oh you don't like that person. They're awful, they're problematic, Yes they are. They you know what, they're some people

who I don't like them working with other people. They're not nice, they're not kind, But you keep do you keep involving them because it allows you to discredit for the work, or you are completely right. There are seven other people um all orientation shape sons like labors, who are wonderful and competent. Go ask one of them. Go ask them, because they're ready to work. You just you create a roadblock where there isn't and you create a roadblock because it serves you, and you created because it

serves you. But what we're asking you to run do right now serve everyone else? Well, I think you. I mean, something that you said that really sticks with me is this idea of just who we hear from and who we don't hear from, particularly as it pertains to talking

about online communities. You know, in the aftermath of the of the interaction, like how many different experts from the same four schools that we need to hear from, how many different you know, like how many different outlets rush to interview a Proud Boys member or a Q non believer, and just how little they center the people who are directly impacted. So we didn't hear about the black women

who have been talking about online harassment since forever. Who you know, if someone had listened to them, someone with power, this whole thing might have gone differently. We just didn't even have that conversation I and and this is where my rude steps in. But people glove when I challenge them on that to be like, well, I've just been starting since two thousand sixteen. I was like, I had my first run in with some of these people in

two thousands twelve and two thousand and fourteen. Tell me you don't care and keep it moving, but do not waste my time. Well, we know you were gonna reach outs, like you told me in a tweet. I know. For the other thing about it is because the work I tend to do tend to be designed spreads news or research and archival. And this is a this is a little quirk that I've had um for a while, is that they're sometimes there's awful things about people who are

hiding from ghetto names and things like that. In HR and how hiring works is that I have a very kind of My name is distinct and it's hard to find and because s c O Black woman, they shoved me down visually. Four Now, if you google me and you don't see a picture of my name, a lot of people think I'm white a lot of because of

my name. If you don't see a photo and it doesn't surface a photo, people think of why and because of my family with West Indians and my mother had a very quitely odd um obsessions with speaking properly and to the point that went until I was like a certain age, I actually had a vaguely British accent and it's something I able to fall to and like we all code switched in like your professional voice, and you sometimes will hear me doing it in this but it's

like when I'm like my professional voices, good afternoon, my name is said death Harry, I will be your toxic for the day. And if you're not looking directly at mine,

go to black face. People think what. So I've often experienced this where folks will stay and talk to me face to face when they're looking at me or about things where when they see my abby and they will, they will, and the different like they're just like, well, you don't understand or you don't comprehend and maybe you and and all of this, and I'm just like mm hmm, and who are you citing? We and they'll sit an

article I wrote for Model que Culture. Sometimes it's it's happened to me once or twice, but why are now and I was just like, you decided, what's that. It's a debt, Harry. And it happens to other women too, but there is a specific racial thing for it sometimes, or like someone who called me on the phone and then meet me in person after I've done some research and they're like, yeah, I spoke to this woman on the phone's debt and she was and like that happened

to me more than once or twice. And I'm not going to say when to protect people, but they were just like, yeah, she had these really great faults. She was really connecting it to manuscripts and other things. And I was just like, uh huh. It's like, I know you're And this is the person who actually started going to like I know you're more social because they read social media in some ways, especially for black women, they read social media deftness as a fad and not a

skin like a lot. There are a lot of white male journalists who are doing exactly what I was doing in twenties now, and they're paid for it, Like they barely write articles. They just tweet. For me, it was a problem for them. It's a job, and they'll be like, yeah, she talks about these things and and I was like, very interesting. I'm to just like sit that Harry, uh yeah, like and I'm just like and they're just like, oh,

so I'd like to follow you on Twitter. And I was like, Okay, this is my screen in black Amazon and they're like, wait your sit that hery? Yes, I am daring. What is that? Like? Um? But it's the mind. It's a mind black women experience. Like it's an interesting like that's my version of it. But I believe they are black women all over the space that has said of like like there is a very like there's it's for me the experiences. And I talked about the tattoos.

I got my tattoos later in life. All of them started in the thirty and if you haven't gotten it yet, be careful because like I got mine after thirty and it's an addiction. I'm just like, I haven't had its actually early a year and a half, y'all. But like there, I was like I was talking to someone who was probably a very well minded theorist, and they were like,

but at the oranges of the Internet. I was like, let's talk about printy culture and mass communications and that's my thing, and they're they're like, well, it's strange, and like the person was very much hedging, and I was like, because I have tattoos on my right farm, on one of my my right warm is specifically designed to be the type script for the first mass produced slave sheets, which was also convincedly and oddly enough type script for

um the first really sarafants that were printed the first full year of Shakespeare. Really we know it hard in these streets, um me. But but it's also it's it's it's it's it's a telling part of our culture that, like the mass production of the identity of Western literature, was also the same mass production that was used to retain black enslaved people, to create nations and create identities. And I was and it's like, this is a and these were people who are just like, well, it's not

professional and it's unprofessional. And I was and I was like, great, it's not professional. That doesn't mean that I don't understand the historical significance. But that is the thing that like for me, I experienced sometimes visually tattoos, but I think sometimes black women experienced it. With your speaking choices, your names, are you really an engineer? I think all black female engineers have heard experiences that like you you have to

put out more. You might do some performances or your performing the cues are read differently, but you have to do more work. And then the mind funck of that is just like I don't know what it's like to not have to do that. You and actions of your life don't know what it's like to not do that. That there is a world like there is a world or there is an identity and experience that at some point people just believed what was true about you without

you having to do more than that. That's the screw up. It's like, I'm at this point where I'm like, Okay, we're gonna go We're gonna go around, You're gonna get it, and then I'm gonna have to bread you up a bit and whatever that is and that I can or whatever can or cannot do it, that's the thing. But I think the the the the mind screw is that there is someone whose entire life they've never had to do that. That's the thing because I'm just like, oh,

this happens. Like I've had men like just try and upbraide me about and especially within tech, tech, media, tech journalism as everybody gets silly moved into missing this information and online harassment and I'm just like you are. So people be like who if you knew? And I was like, so, what's the number? One? Like there are two books that were do your Times bestsellers? And it is also for me. I've talked about this before. I feel like someone of Jack asked, when I do that? Do you sign it?

Two books about New York Times bestsellers? Um, please go to the acknowledgements for the dedications. That's gotta name, that's gotta feel good, Like that kind of feel good in a kind of way. That feels good because I've been eagle, and it feels good because no matter what, I'm always I'm a New York genre. I'm a New York shity, always have been. And sometimes you've gotta let these people know. That feels good on that level because you if you

you better ask somebody. But it also feels terrible because like, these are experiences that were difficult, and these are relationships and moments and rather than just believe towards the goal of no, we're trying to stop to stop the abuse, We're trying to stop these experiences we get I've got to spend thirty minutes or ten minutes or really uncomfortable situation of me looking and you like this, like tell me more rather than us actually doing the work of

improving the thing. What would have happened if I didn't have to go through that, if I didn't have to pull out all the what happens? Like we talked about receipts, but like the stress of receipts, what would happen if instead of a day, a week, a month, a couple of years of us having to pull receipts? How to prove what happened? You just did the work. We just got to do the work. Like that's the thing that is very like, uh you want that moment? Like that

to me is the the the actual mine. Like in those moments you realize how much and with time, you realize how much energy you have wasted necessary and unnecessary because like sometimes you need to do it to get it done, and sometimes you do it out of reflex so, but how much of that time is taken from the thing you want to do because and it goes out to the basically there for some people upward and there's some people who are oh, they're like, there are some

people who like when they dressed them down, You're just like, oh that was when I was a piece of odd. Go. Girls don't like you. You get that like there are some people who are sculled that there and it's a beautiful watch the work and they then they enjoy it. And I love the van and joy because they are good at it. I might have some facility. I'm not as good as they are, But for me, I'm usually just tired. I'm like, okay, so we did that. Now

we're done. Like we don't know you you you, You're good, You're you're good, You're good. Let's get to work. I have to ask this is kind of a this is kind of a random question, not related to I guess it just sort of related. You are so yourself, you know, even looking at you right now, You've got the print shirt, these bold glasses. How did you find the freedom and space to show up like this as yourself in this way?

How did you walk in this confidence? That's who you are in some of these spaces that you walk in. There's a performance training. I am streaking line. I've done theater. I studied offer for nine years. I am very good at the fake it or till you make it, or ask for confidence and confidence to be given to you when you're good at performance. And it's one of the things I talked about. It's just like I'm often nervous. They're my last, my last, one of the last big

speech I gave. I spent a lot of time on the tables, and I was like literally with the person I was talking to, like, oh my god, people, it is a performance. You get up, you get ready. I was training that get up, get ready, give it, sell it out. And then like the minute you step off stage, you kind of cook, curling a ball and rock back and forth. Um. Also, I've talked about it before, but like my my I like theory. I like wanting stuff. I like the combinations, like looking at the things and

just making them happen. That allows me to have a lot of interior time or time and stacks and time and books to just beat myself. Some of it is just like the way I was born, conclusion to be having another option I am. We are not seeing people in full body and like the pandemics discomfort were all

discomfort using weight Gangley. But at my general right now, I'm about five eleven, two hundreds, so there's like not a lot of I can hide in my person and and that is a like I'm a tall human and that and it seems like a strange thing to be so formative, but for me personally, there's not there's not a lot of option of camouflage. There's not a lot of like, hey, I'm gonna walk into certain rooms unnerved, unnoticed,

and especially as a black woman. And I was, and I was part of I'm from far Rock and this is a underresource neighborhood. We have certain access that we don't So I was in a lot of things like one of the lonely only I couldn't hide in a room I would be purposely ignored. But I'm going to have to be this person. And the way I am built, both physically and emotionally, was like I want to leave this challenge or I want to at least get good at faking it. Like people were like, I have such

anxiety sometimes about large groups of people. I know how to make that anxiety look like I'm working the room. But it's like here, quick tip. If you really don't like talking to large groups of people and you're in a large groups of people. If you are very instantly and personally find every single person and talk to them for two to three with ups, it looks like you're working through the room. You're actually working the runaway people are like, she's the life of the party. That is

a specific thing for me. It was important for me to develop a skill. I felt it necessary to develop a skill that I was going to be very solidly myself. I was gonna be strong about it, I was gonna be clear about it because I didn't have the option for other things. One of the things that a lot of some of my line thin people are like, Oh, you're being mean and this person is so nervous and anxious, and I'm like, what makes you think I'm not mhm, Why have you decided that I'm not anxious? Why have

you decided that I'm not scared? Or have you decided that it's okay for me to be scared based on what you think I am allowed to be Because there have been a lot of times of oh, you're the big men, move and I'm like, okay, no I'm not. Because while I'm talking to you, I'm on the phone

with somebody else and I'm crying. I am heaving sobs, like oh, Like there are times and a lot of times with black women's like anybody who defends you, like, oh, you're just seeking your people or your followers on them, And I'm like, what would happen if you thought of them as my friend? What would happen if you thought of Some of the people who are saying back up or leave me alone are saying that because they know me as a human and they know that this affects me.

What like, like what happens if my distress wasn't funny to you or a topic to you? And I think that goes back to like what we were talking about for the subject. And a lot of this is that people say black women, but they don't name them, And it's the back to the citations of black women is like we become a concept, We become a they say black women the way you would say pineapples or like fruit, like oh fruits you or have this composition like not

but it's not sentient being. And with the engagement what's happening to us, it's along the same lines, like it's very much we are a thing to be discussed, but we are not people with which these things have effects on. They mean things and often being like, no, this hurts, no, this is scary, Like people I was like. People often say like, oh, you're like oh, Like sometimes I told you so is not an admonition, It's not a dunk.

It's a cry for help. Sometimes I told you so is a question like their lives is like but we told you or I told you so. It's like, I am not trying to be the smartest person in the room. I really want to understand what was it about what I said, what I said that didn't register for you, that didn't make you act and what would it take for it to be something you acted upon? So that

brings me to my to my big question. You know, what could the internet look like if we listen to black women and recognize our humanity and and centered us what what what could the internet be like? The internet would look like the world? The internet would look like

a world we actually live in. I would love to know what an internet that could distract It could honestly describe the feeling of having a really good piece of pineapple with loved ones at the edge of the beach when you are exactly that moment because we were like, oh, you invited to a product and it is exactly what you want in a space you want, or like when you have ever read or heard something and it starks something in you in that moment of just oh wow

that What would happen or what would happen if the places where you bought your clothes showed people who looked like you? Or what would happen if when you looked at descriptions of your neighborhood it wasn't just the same things or like those spaces at that time, or what would happen if when you when something said all access, it was actually all access that you could sign into something and it wasn't about worrying whether or not you

had anything like you. When movies in cinema a big thing and like those are, it's rough because those are some of the largest pieces of mass communication and the largest places we get culture one of the most resistance to talking about it in any way that does not involved gatekeeping. But it's just like what would happens is when you walked in the movie theater, you knew you could watch the movie For people who are visually and auditorily abled and mobility abled, we'd never have to think

about that. There are so many people who do not who have to think about that doesn't have hearing capabilities, does it have visual descriptions or is that an only one showing that is a that is a huge part of like if you're from the world and like that you're actually from the world, you're front you you went into something that pretend that talked about the city you lived in and the story actually looked like those people you encountered in your life, or that if you went

to a unlike movie, could just because they're both visual and media concerts. But if you were looking at the showings, and we're looking at the showings in a big city that had multiple languages and had people of multip language, when you looked at the cinema, you knew that someone could come in and hear what they needed to hear, or that at least one of those stories reflected them, and that wasn't they didn't have to worry about that.

Those kind of tease outs and changes. And I think for me, the way I would close it is that what would the world look like if they listen to us? Is another question is what would listening look like it's like there would be a constant conversation of making everything two do that, to do something new and to do something but not just profit off of it. And that space, which is still in the videous and isn't an answer, would be magical and I think that would lead to

multiple more conversations. But like I think of Pineapple by the ocean surrounded by people in a way to actually convey that in all of these mediums, and that's that's that's what happens. Like people will tell you how to sell that right now, we talk about how to sell it, how to influence, etcetera. But to actually convey to a person point to point, hard to heart, this is what it feels like for me and for you. And that is both like for me, you pineapple by the Ocean South.

But what if we had somebody who liked apples or apples and the hills, it was a completely different thing. And they will be like, and it's here's the thing. I want to know what that's that's that feeling is like I want to know what they think of that. I don't necessarily need to make them feel the same thing I do. But that's that to me is the CrOx of it, like we we what would we get if we actually move towards having those discussions and not

about these whole influences? What and does what? Like? That's the question for me, is that actually answers it, answers it beautifully. Now I want pineapple on the beach so that I cannot thank you enough for taking the time to speak. I wish I have chills your I don't know, I have something about the way you show up in the world is such a gift, and I yeah, I I am so grateful that you are a human who exists. Thank you, grateful for you? Oh please, no, but I

am no. No, don't you dare, don't you dare? All right, this is a real thing. Every day we look at black women and we are we are often feeling it alone. We feel we unseen, we feel understood, misunderstood, And every day I get to look at you and I get to look at others and we're here and we're building. So I am grateful for you, and please understand that is honest and true and meant from the heart. You are amazing both for being bridget but also for being human.

No one else likes you exist in this moment. I am thankful for that. Oh you cannot cry. You cannot cry, or I'll cry and then no, that's dope. Stop. So I appreciate you so much. If you've enjoyed this podcast, please help us grow by subscribing. Got a story about an interesting thing in tech, or just want to say hi, We'd love to hear from you at Hello at tango dot com. Dis Informed is brought to you by There Are No Girls on the Internet. It's a production of

I Heart Radio and Unbossed. Creative Jonathan Strickland is our executive producer. Tory Harrison is our supervising producer and engineer. Michael Lamotto is our contributing producer. I'm your host Bridget Tod. For more great podcasts, check out the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.