Issue 4: There are too many words
Did you work through the coup? LOL, I tried.
How will history retell the stories of the last year to third, sixth and eleventh graders in 2040? As a hobbyist historian (my college minor was American history), I always enjoyed the subject but never really thought about the connection of perception of historical events and morality until recently. Maybe it started with the Black Lives Matter protests, maybe it started with the 373,000+ COVID-19 deaths from the past year. Maybe, selfishly, it’s because so many what should have been personal milestones to be celebrated in 2020 were affected by the pandemic (yep, #pandemicbride here). But all I know is that 2021 should be about action. Everyone has the power to act in small ways to ensure they’re on the right side of history. So grow that victory garden however you can: challenge your elected officials to do the right thing, examine your language and purchase decisions, and encourage your communities to give however they can. As communicators, we are the conscience of the organizations we advise. And I challenge you to act like it.
Photo by Jake Schumacher on Unsplash
Learn by listening: Chef Dave Chang has a podcast, and it isn’t just about cooking (though yes, there’s plenty of food talk). This week, he re-aired a particularly chilling episode with the Yale professor James Q. Whitman, author of Hitler's American Model: The United States and the Making of Nazi Race Law. One of the most disturbing things I learned during quarantine is that Hitler looked to American’s treatment of indigenous people as inspiration for policy; it’s something historians have shied away from explicitly stating, even if you read serious tomes like The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany. The episode is a worthy listen, but note there are both chef and tenured professor egos on full display. Fun fact: in my year of reading very big books in 2019, I read a paperback version of The Rise and Fall, which has a giant red swastika on the cover. got some very funny looks from strangers when I read it on the bus.
The mob wasn’t all white: I am deeply and personally ashamed that several Filipino-Americans were part of the mob that stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, as The Asian Journal reports - one of whom used a walis - a distinctly Filipino broom - to hold up a banner of hatred. The Philippines itself has a violent colonial history and a paired colonial mentality that has enabled generations to absorb a white supremacy mindset. I recommend learning more about it in E.J.R. David’s excellent book, Brown Skin, White Minds: Filipino -/ American Postcolonial Psychology. There’s more to Filipino-Americans than Jo Koy jokes and purple sweets, friends - and nearly a third of the nurses who have died of COVID-19 are Filipino (CNN). So before resharing that meme making fun of the looters for their “Trump teeth” understand that the rot of white supremacy can go beyond hillbilly teeth. It can infect communities and countries to their very core. So please, think before you belittle.
Healing from abuse: My friend Cynthia Horiguchi, another communications pro that I’ve known since my college newspaper days wrote a beautiful piece on her blog about “fixing” an abusive relationship with our country. I won’t say more - just read it. Her point of view is needed and it will hit you hard.
Thanks for reading this week’s newsletter - which I’ll now upgrade to “try-weekly” - I’ll try to get an issue out every Sunday, but if it ends up being an every-other-week thing, so be it! As always, please send me feedback and tell me what you want to see in future issues.
To close, sharing some interesting roles for business communicators…
Director of Acquisition and Growth Marketing - Highspot
Executive Communications Manager, Keynote Development and Speechwriting (Remote Eligible) - Okta
Disclosure: Books links are shared with a Bookshop.org Affiliate link.