34: Raising Our Children To Be Allies & Advocates For Social Justice

In this episode, Change Catalyst Founder & CEO Melinda Briana Epler engages in an important conversation with Margenett Moore-Roberts, Chief Inclusion & Diversity Officer of IPG DXTRA, about how to raise our children as allies and advocates who can disrupt and redress race-based harm. 

You’ll come away from this episode with an understanding of why and how to have tough conversations with children about racism, so that they can live in a just, fair, and peaceful world. We also discuss the critical need of reforming the white supremacy built into our American educational system, one that has often taught a one-sided and biased perspective of history. 

About This Episode’s Guest:

Since joining the industry in May 2018, Margenett Moore-Roberts has been nominated for an IPG Inclusion Award, and selected as one of The Holmes Report’s 2019 Innovator 25 and one of The Network Journal’s Top 25 Women in Business. Her perspective has been featured in industry publications and events, including PRNews, PRSA LA Diversity & Inclusion Panel, The Atlantic Roundtable on Diversity, and the PRSA Tri-State Conference.

Some of Our Favorite Quotes from This Guest:

“Kids can be purveyors of race-based harm or disruptors of race-based harm. Help them become a disruptor.”

“Working through the discomfort of this, this becomes the opportunity. We have not figured out how to stop racism in hundreds of years. We haven't. We are born into it. All of us. But, again, as a parent... you can change the trajectory of racism just by having a conversation. Let that be your motivation.”

“Children don’t process differences as a deficiency. How did we arrive at the conclusion that if you are different, if you are not white specifically, somehow you are deficient? Just because it is different doesn't mean it is a deficiency.”

Additional Resources:

Interview with Ibram X. Kendi about his upcoming book with Jason Reynolds, “Stamped (For Kids)”: https://www.ibramxkendi.com/Educational videos for teachers on “Freedom Reads: Anti-Bias Book Talk” https://www.teachingforchange.org/freedom-reads-video-series-launchAbout Rodney King, beaten by police in 1991: https://www.cbsnews.com/video/how-the-police-beating-of-rodney-king-and-what-followed-connects-to-black-lives-matter-movement/“What is water to a fish?" - thinking about race from a white male perspective: https://in-training.org/this-is-water-a-perspective-on-race-from-a-white-male-20373An article about Amy Cooper, who called the police and falsely accused a Black man of threatening her in 2020: https://www.npr.org/2021/02/16/968372253/white-woman-who-called-police-on-black-man-bird-watching-has-charges-dismissedAmanda Gorman’s children’s book, “Change Sings”, and poetry collection “The Hill We Climb” https://www.theamandagorman.com/More about Juneteenth: https://www.nytimes.com/article/juneteenth-day-celebration.html

 You can watch the live show on Change Catalyst YouTube Channel here, with live captioning and ASL interpreters: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qPosjcykHvg

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