Episode 201. Strategies for Breaking Cancel Culture Cycle with Bianca Sprague
In this episode, I sat down with Bianca Sprague, founder of Bebo Mia. Bianca shares her business birth story, her firsthand experience with cancel culture in 2021 as a result of misrepresentation, the personal and economic impact of cancel culture, and tips on how to resolve conflict going forward.
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Transcript:
I also want to share in full disclosure, I had a moment where I almost [00:01:00] thought it might not be a great idea to air this episode and I'll tell you why, as I say inside of the episode, while I'm talking to Bianca Sprague of BeboMia, I was not very familiar with Bebomiya. I had heard the name of her doula training company probably years ago when I was working with primarily doulas, and that's been a few years now.
And even then, I was not super familiar with what they did, where they were, who they were. . I've never met them.
And then a couple of weeks ago, I got an email, a pitch to be on the podcast from Bianca's um, , who I believe is her virtual assistant. And I get a lot of podcast pitches. I probably get three to five a week and almost all of them are completely unaligned. I actually don't think I've ever had anybody on the show who has pitched me, um, that's not somebody I already know.
But when I read the email, there were a couple of topics that I thought, Oh, that sounds really interesting. And I'm curious to hear more about that. And being that she was in the birth industry and I've recently been, um, doing these birth worker retreats, I [00:02:00] thought, you know, I'd really like to meet her first, right?
So we scheduled a quick 15 minute, zoom call. Let's just get to know each other a little bit. And I want to feel who you are. So we have this zoom chat, uh, about a week before we recorded the episode. And we talked a little bit about different things that she's very passionate about. And I talked about a couple of things that I'm passionate about.
And I felt like I do think this would be a really helpful conversation to talk about cancel culture. Now, what I didn't know at the time was that.
So during the recording, this is all new information to me and I did have a moment where I thought, Oh, this might not be a great idea to share, right? This could be really divisive for a lot of my community who tend to be in the birth industry. And what I came to after hearing her out was that that's exactly why it should be [00:03:00] shared.
That I think people deserve to be heard. And I also believe that there can be multiple truths in any given scenario.
So I chose compassion. I chose listening. And if you also choose compassion and listening, no matter what. Right. Or wrong or whatever. She shares some very important information about cancel culture and more importantly. What we should do instead when we feel like somebody may say something that's harmful.
I Or act in a way that may harm an individual or a group of individuals. So that's my preface to this episode is I hope you listen with the same level of compassion that you might want somebody to give you. If you ever go through an experience where you're misunderstood or you say something that could harm somebody,
and remembering that you don't have to have the same belief system as somebody else to have compassion for them and to hear them and sometimes to find a lot of value in certain things that they discuss.
I look forward to hearing your thoughts on the episode, and because it's a little bit choppy in the beginning, I'll [00:04:00] introduce her here. In this episode, I interviewed Bianca Sprague, and she is one of the original founders of Bebo Mia a large doula training organization and they've trained doulas in 49 countries.
In this episode, Bianca shares her personal experience with cancel culture, how we can move away from cancel culture and the impact of cancel culture Of cancel culture. And then more importantly, what can we move toward instead? That may be more beneficial , for humanity.
I'll catch you on the other side.
We want to talk today about a topic that we were chatting about last week of offline. , she introduced this concept that's really important to her and something that [00:05:00] I'm really interested in hearing more about her perspective because I have my own perspective on this as well.
And that's moving away from cancel culture. And if you've been watching my show for any amount of time, you. No, anybody who's listening knows that I'm not a fan of cancel culture and not just being away from cancel culture, but what she'd like to see us moving towards.
, but before we jump into all of the juice, I'd like to know a little bit more about your business birth story, about Bebo Mia, like how did this come to be? , I don't know your history. I mean, I've run into Bebo Mia throughout. My time when I was more in the birth industry, but it's been a while. .
So I'm curious, can you share a little more? Hello. Thanks for having me on the show. And I'm so happy we're talking about this topic and it feels extra timely because it feels like weekly there's massive issues coming up within our birth community. Um, so. While we're in the middle of one that does not include me, which is nice, um, it feels important.
So Bebo Mia, um, [00:06:00] was born about in 2008 and it really came out of, um, you know, I started a private practice after the birth of my daughter and I felt so Much rage in my body when I got home from the hospital. Um, and I knew that my whole, my whole life, I thought it was going to be an OB GYN, um, because I imagined it more, I guess, like the role of a midwife and it wasn't until I had my daughter that I realized how much harm OB GYNs did, um, around me and to me and how hard I had to work to have an, um, uninterrupted life.
Yeah. Birth. And, um, and so it's literally, I got home from the hospital and paced with my daughter and was like, okay, I can't, I can't do that job. Um, so through med school out the window and, um, decided to do my doula training and it, it was actually really hard for me to adjust to the idea of becoming a doula because I also had this reverence for doctors.[00:07:00]
And so I had this, like, I was leaving, you know, The top of the pyramid. Um, and then I was going to be like the lowly bottom and I felt really angry that this job was the most important and it was the least paid. It was the least honored. It was the least respected and it took me, I don't know, probably, I'd say, like, 8 years to get really comfortable with that, um, and I know that this is the most important person in that room is the person who's protecting, educating, um, Um, and so it started just really me solving problems.
So I, I started able, or no, I started my private practice because I was like, that can't ever happen to anybody else. Like, holy smokes, what was that in that hospital? Um, and then I just started talking to parents and being like, what do you wish you had? You know, and then I met another doula because my roster was full right away.
Like I just started building community. And I want to put a caveat here is that a, I was. Pretty young, [00:08:00] I lived far away from my family. I had no resources. I was living in domestic violence. Um, I had a brand new baby and I, I built it and I built it quickly because I went on the foundation of problem solving and community building.
Um, and so. Bebo Mia came because I actually couldn't, I was only one person and so I met another doula who I didn't know, like we just kept bumping into each other, Natasha, and we co founded Bebo Mia together and, um, it just kept again growing on problem solving and community building. And so we obviously didn't start out to be a doula training organization.
Um, we started out serving families in Toronto in a brick and mortar and then we bought a chain of fitness. Um, centers because we wanted to talk about, you know, anti fat bias and movement and then we started training people to work in our practice because I just found the weekend trainings. Um, just not enough to go out and start a business and [00:09:00] feel really secure in what you're doing.
And so it just, it grew and grew and grew. I mean, now we're. In 49 countries, and we refuse to put down our original beliefs around solving problems, building community. And so I think what we've built as far as, you know, the activism that we do and the, um, business support and all of our courses, everything from a feminist lens, um, it, it stayed so true to the compass of.
You know, me as this pacing 26 year old kid with no money and a shitty home life. Um, and, and I sat back and I just, I'm in awe of, of what it's become. Um, yeah, that's, that's Bebo Mia's birth story in a nutshell. I appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. So you go back to 2008. You know, it's interesting too.
I was thinking when you were describing, um, how you always thought you're going to be an OBGYN and then realize how that just kind of wasn't necessarily what [00:10:00] your perhaps younger mind thought it might be like. It's funny because could you imagine if. You took another route and you were like, actually, maybe that's exactly where I'm needed to help that.
But then if you did that, this wouldn't have come into play. So perhaps your reach and the amount of people that you've reached through training so many doulas is compounded, right? Then what you could have done as an individual OBGYN. , so super cool, really cool. Um, yes. And I was going to ask if you built in Toronto, where, cause I know you're in Canada.
, and I was curious as to where, because I actually have quite a few Canadians in my community, which is really cool. Really interesting. I guess we're not that far, right? Um, we, we touched on her then a whole giant border. Yeah. And I love Canada. I mean, I've only been, uh, once and I've only been to one area, but I was actually, yeah, side note.
I really want to come back to Canada now that we can. Yeah. Now that we [00:11:00] can actually come and see you guys. . . So talk to me about cancel culture, you're really into activism and, helping to really, it sounds like to me, expand consciousness for people who might be kind of stuck or stagnant in old stories and old pattern.
, so what brought you to this particular leg of activism and what's really important to you about moving away from cancel culture? Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, the origin of how I experienced it, like, I always hated bullying in school. Like, when I would see a kid being bullied, I'd immediately go over to them.
Like, it just, I, it hit me in a place that felt so wrong. Um, and. As our business started growing and I noticed, um, you know, we started taking up a lot of space, um, and I, I don't believe in in competition. I believe we can do better with collaboration. And I started noticing people [00:12:00] doing actions in response to Bebo Mia, um, either by directly copying stuff we were putting up or, um, just like basing what they were talking about on the back of you.
You know, on us, and I remember how that felt like I had this, like, what are we doing? This isn't going to serve our mission. So it started having these, like, little, these little, like, prickly things. And then in 2020, obviously, you know, racism was momentarily in the, in the front of folks who typically, you know.
Didn't give it a lot of attention, which was really exciting for us, because we were like, finally, we're going to actually have some movement in, um, you know, unpacking white supremacy on a global stage, and we're going to have, you know, just like really breaking down these experiences of white supremacy, capitalism, and the patriarchy.
And, um, but what I noticed was. You know, this, this violence that was [00:13:00] essentially, we were holding one another, we'll call us the lefties, everybody, and if anybody doesn't see themselves in that, just bear with me, because the right isn't doing any better, but for the first time, the, like, the lefties were, we were, we were demanding perfection from one another at a level that was like, so much higher than.
Um, you know, these, these tools, like, we were just like this nuance and how every person spoke and, um, you know, what terms were we using and show the receipts and all these things. And I, I knew in my body that I was like, I don't feel like this is. This is going to how this is like, how the needle is going to move fast forward a little bit.
We actually made it through 2020 doing like, really, really great anti racist work. Um. You know, our, our team is really diverse. We have a lot of representation and we are really proud of, um, you know, what happened. And then in early 2021, we were misrepresented. And so there was somebody who came and said that they had worked for us, um, and that we didn't pay [00:14:00] them and that, you know, Bebo Mia doesn't take care of their, of their black staff.
Okay, so full disclosure, this person never worked for us, um, and it was their marketing plan. So they were building a doula training. Um, and so can I cuss? Is this a cussing? Yeah, this is cool. Um, and so they actually had a coupon code that was like, fuck Bebo Mia, and they got all the white folks real whipped up.
So, you know, there was, I would say, immediately I started reaching out to all the black organizations we work through, um, for anybody who can't see me, I'm a white person, um, and so I was like, it was really important to me that, um, the, the, these relationships that I'd nurtured for a long time, and immediately, like, I can't tell you how many times I picked up the phone, I'd be like, hey, so and so, I There's a lot of stuff happening right now on social media about us, and I don't think any of the phone calls were more than three minutes with people being like Bianca, our relationship's fine.
Like, I know what you guys stand for. I know what your team, like, you know, we've, we've had a lot of project [00:15:00] partnerships with you. We've had scholarships with you, like all of these relationships. So I was like, okay, cool. So we, we do have these really strong anti racist. Connections, like, so we're continuing linking arms doing this anti racist work.
Um, but because we had just come out of 2020 and, you know, white folks were doing their, their woke racism thing, it's obliterated Bebo Mia. Um, we had mental health crises. I lost half my team. Um It harmed our students, it, like, you know, it just, it was a, it was a bomb that went off and there was literally no place to go.
Like, if we were like, we didn't, we didn't hire them. Then there was like, we'll pay them anyway, because why not? They're an under resourced racialized person. Like, and so then our, our, um, we had a self segregated. Um, team with our, with our black staff that we're, you know, trying to troubleshoot what, like, how do we feel about this?
Like, what's happening? Because, you know, we're being called whitewashing. We're calling race traitors. Like, it was a terrible [00:16:00] and, um, I got really quiet. Like, I stepped back. Not everybody likes the stance I took, but. You know, it was terrible. My world fell down from under me. I had like friends. I lost friends.
I lost a partner. Like I lost all of these things because nobody wants to go near the person who's being cancelled because you get cancelled by proxy. Um, and so after that, I started. Really like deep diving. Um, you know, what is this? How did we get here? What's the history of it? Why is this tool used to further harm the most marginalized?
So, um, women are the most marginalized by cancel culture. They're the most harmed. Um, and so, you know, when I started looking at. What, what a, like a tool of the, of oppression, essentially, um, I started uncovering, you know, how, based on the history, how did we get here? Because it did start originally that [00:17:00] there was a company that was canceled.
It was a fitness company. Like LA Fitness or something like that. Um, I don't want to say the wrong one. So sorry if it's not LA Fitness But it was a gym that and and the people like they took it to the streets and they held that business Accountable and that was great. And then it gave everybody this hit that like Oh social media and the web we can finally Hold people accountable and, but the accountability was supposed to be for our politicians, for the Uber rich, for policy makers, for, for commer like businesses that are harming us.
Like anybody in Canada, like cancel Loblaws. That's what it's for. Like Galen Weston, oh, I think he stepped back now. But like Loblaws is, has a food monopoly for Canadians and they are just. Keep raising and raising and raising and raising the prices, cancel your telecommunications, cancel politicians that are doing harm.
But unfortunately, those folks are uncancellable, but who we can see a hit from [00:18:00] is from canceling individuals and small businesses. And that is. It, it so doesn't match whatever the crime, the quote, crime was that happened. And, and you know, I'm talking about like, even when people do something homophobic, something racist, like they're shitty for doing it.
Like every time I'm with my family and, and we're called like dykes or, you know, Oh, I'm gay. When I'm out with my family. And somebody says, and my daughter's racialized, so like, if somebody says something anti black or anti queer, um, talks about our bodies, you know, any, sexualizes us, like, they're assholes for doing it.
But do I think that they should be put on a public platform and shamed at the level of that's happening? I absolutely don't. Even when somebody says, we're dirty dykes and we're gonna go to hell, that I'm like, okay, that's your journey. And, and, I really hope you, like, unlearn this and you, you know, [00:19:00] I don't, I'm not like, it's fine!
Um, right. But the tools of cancellation are ones that we've actually stopped doing as a punishment, like from our criminal punishments or anything like that, because they are the worst punishments on the planet to be rejected from community, like, that's what the town square used to be, like, you would drive, drag somebody through and you would, you know, boo and jeer and throw stuff at them.
The impact on our physical and mental and social health is so great that we actually don't do it. We privately and quietly sentence people, and then they go into a quiet and private place, like, with a new community. Which, don't get me started, I'm an abolitionist, so I think all of it is bullshit and terrible, and I don't believe in our industrial prison complex even a baby bit.
But, like, There's crimes that are like violent crimes and they are not treated in the way that, you [00:20:00] know, a mom posts a picture in a group about her new car seat and by the end of it, she's like, a bad mom. Can you believe you do that? Your kids got food in their hand. Did you know you shouldn't have their jacket on?
Um, how have you not done this? Must be nice to have a car. This is a bit tone deaf considering somebody in the group last week talked about being in a car accident. Like the world just blows up. And so I have this, like, how do we stop doing this so that we stop this, this lateral violence with one another and stop holding each other to this perfection that is impossible?
Because a lot of it is how we as individuals are interpreting it and we can't control how people interpret us. We can be as responsible as we want. Like I'm as responsible as I possibly can be with my language. And I still know, I'll say something and I'm like, oh, I can feel from that person. I just did harm and it was not my intention.
And, and people do it to me like I lost my dad to [00:21:00] suicide in, um, 2012. And so I have some language that I am particularly sensitive to. I don't say died by, I say died by suicide. I don't say committed suicide. It's a cause of death like any other. Um, I don't like when people say like, fuck my life or make like suicide.
Jokes or gestures, but somebody around me doesn't know that that's my lived experience. So I can't hold them to the level that I hold my intimate relationships. So like, if my wife says, fuck my life, I'm like, whoa, that's a no go. I can't believe you would do that deliberate harm to me. But if you said it to me, because you didn't know this about me, if you were like, Oh, my kids, fuck my life.
I'd be like, Maybe I would correct it, but probably not because I'm like, that's, that's my thing and I have these like, very clear, um, you know, language expectations. And so what's happening within our birth business and like the reproductive health and justice field. Is we're trying to be okay for [00:22:00] everybody, which is impossible, because I know when I'm talking about anti racist work, um, sometimes I might use the term BIPOC and somebody that I'm talking to will say like, actually I prefer for it to be Black and Brown and Indigenous people, or I prefer if you said Black, or African American, or American African, Afro Canadian, Afro Caribbean, I prefer racialized, I prefer people of color.
Like all of those terms would be up to each individual of what they feel seen and celebrated in. And, and the reverse, some of those terms might make them feel not celebrated, not seen and isolated. And so, you know, when we're, when we're looking at this topic, there's, there's. It's impossible to do it. All right.
And for sure, dragging somebody through and having them the loss of relationships economic, you know, have their businesses harmed that can't be the solution, especially y'all everybody listening. We are [00:23:00] all. The most marginalized people in society. Every person drawn to birth work is going to be sitting in non dominant culture.
Now they might have areas of dominant culture. They sit within race, gender expression, sexuality, um, class, but it's safe to say every one of us, our main identity markers are those that are marginalized. And so the consequence of taking and having things taken from people that already have The dominant culture, like, we can't have this be the punishment.
Like we, I don't know what we need to do, but we have to stop. I mean, I have a lot and we'll probably talk about it today, but I have a lot of things we can do. Um, but, but I feel so passionate about, um, us, us looking at one another as the people who are protecting new. New life on this planet, um, we're, we're, we're guiding babies and, and we're guiding [00:24:00] adults into parenthood and we cannot be the wild, wild west gladiator style behind the scenes, like it's, it's incongruent and it, and we can't do the job of protecting if we don't protect humanity across the board.
And I don't think that it, I don't really think that it moves the mission forward, right? Like, if what's the goal, like, what's the goal of the collective birth worker community, right? To improve the outcome of birth ultimately, right? And people's experiences during birth, but does that actually move the needle forward?
I don't think so. I think sometimes it can put you in more of a stagnant space and a contraction space, which, um, Contractions are helpful in birth because it does help move things forward, right? Because it's, it's working. It means something is working. Um, but outside of birth, I don't think contraction state is what we're meant to be in.
I think we're supposed to be expanding and growing and moving and flowing. And with [00:25:00] that, and in order to do that, I think, uh, a much bigger dose of compassion. And I think that Yeah. I'm going to say this part. So one of the people who, um, I feel like taught me the most just by being himself over the last, I don't know how many years now we've known each other, but especially in 2020 is my husband.
I'm going to give him his flowers because he has, he has had so much compassion for me and I felt like if he could have that level of compassion for me and not yeah. You know, when we met, I was 20. I don't know. I was young, 25 and I'm 40 now. So we've been, we've known each other 15 years, I guess. That feels weird to say like impossible.
I don't feel old enough to even say that. Like I think that all the time, like we're old enough to have known each other this long. That is odd. Um, I'm too young for that for the record, but. He's had so much compassion with me over the years and [00:26:00] allowing me to learn and correct and continue to flow. And he guides, I guide, we, you know, we continue to guide each other.
And like, I have, I have learned a lot from him. With compassion for humans, because, um, I dunno, I also feel like my husband's from Chicago and I don't talk a lot about him publicly because he's super private, but, um, I do feel like Chicago Chicagoans are built different. They think differently and, uh, in a good, in a great way, I think a lot of times and it's really.
Impressive to me. I'm from Florida. The south is different, you know, people very, you know, our, our education system is embarrassing. And so it's like, you know, hearing his perspective on so many things has been enlightening. And I felt like, um, I don't even think that that was his intention. To teach me that way, you know, he, it was just him being him and it was really, um, helpful to me in 2020 and beyond.
And yeah, so I want to, I want to give him credit where credit's due and [00:27:00] I've seen it. I didn't know about your situation. I, I mean, that's how out of. out of touch. I've been in the birth community for a while. Like, I mean, I still have a lot of people in the birth community who are in my space, but I don't, um, I think I got really turned off a long time ago being in so many birth groups and, uh, doula birth professional groups, doula groups, postpartum doula, all these birthy groups.
And there was just so much hostility. Sorry. It's the pit of hell. Yes. It's the pit of hell. I exited, I think almost every single birth group I was in and I was in like all the big ones. I ran one that had, you know, I don't know, 1600 ish birth professionals and mine was pretty squeaky clean in terms of like, Hey, we, we're just not going to be nasty here.
Like bottom line, we're going to, we're going to come with kindness first. Um, and so I felt like mine was pretty great. I had to leave all those communities and just kind of stop following most of the industry. I don't follow except people that I have a personal [00:28:00] relationship with because it just felt really, um, hostile and I don't want that in my, in my space anymore.
So I really didn't know about any of that. So thank you for sharing all of it. I had no idea and I can see how harmful that would be. And I remembered feeling even, I mean, this is strange that I'm going to be talking about this publicly right now, but even in 2020, I was scared to talk about. My experience as a mother to black children, because I felt like, am I centering myself?
I don't want to do that. It's, it's, it was just so complicated. And finally I was like, okay, enough overthinking. Like people are going to think what they're going to think they're going to say what they're going to say, but I know my intentions are pure and I have to say what I want, what needs to be said for me and for my kids.
Um, and I know my intentions. And even now I speak on things, um, that there may be people who don't. Love some of the stuff that I share about the conflict in Israel. Right? Like that's another thing that I feel like, um, people are being canceled for. And anyway, [00:29:00] that's a whole separate conversation, but right.
My, um, I've thickened up the skin a little bit to where I no longer feel, um, I do think it takes some learning experiences and some, a heavy dose of personal growth and compassion to build up that ability to like have the. Audacity to speak what's on your heart when, you know, it's going to be people who don't agree and you don't say it with the intention to be like, I'm here to trigger you.
It's not that it's, you know, this is something I need to say and I don't intend to do any harm. Um, but sometimes there's things that are just important to be said. Um, it's tricky and it's hairy and I, it's not always well received and that, you know, I, I trust that people are experiencing what they're here to experience too.
And sometimes that comes hearing it from me. So yes, having said all of that, [00:30:00] um, what are, what's your perspective on where to go from here in the birth space and beyond really lessons we can apply outside of the birth space. That's a really good question. And I, I want to flag, um, one of the things you said was essentially the, the, we try to mitigate being canceled by self censorship and, um, and, you know, I think it's a great place to start rather than continuing the pattern of self censorship, which is really hard.
Like y'all knowing what it was like being canceled, knowing the economic impact, the, the, I actually went to a conference with a whole bunch of folks who had been cancelled because we were looking at what can we do for insurance? What can we do for the law? And what can we do for policy? What can we do to hold social media companies accountable?
And we wanted to talk about how it impacts health care, because the impact of being cancelled is comparable to PTSD for more. And [00:31:00] so we're And so the goal is to have it added to the DSM 5, um, because it's, it has a, a tremendous toll. Um, there's some sites that you can go where there's a roll call for folks who have lost their lives, um, to deaths of despair due to being cancelled.
Um, like, this shit has an impact. So when I talk about it, I talk about it with the same urgency that we talk about. Of such a violence and, um, human rights violations in the hospital, um, because this is happening to our fellow birth workers and our fellow entrepreneurs and our helpers and healers, um, and we're doing it to each other.
And so if we can stop doing it laterally and focus all of our energy on taking down white supremacy on taking down the patriarchy on changing policies for, for reproductive health and justice, um. This is how we can gather to, you know, overthrow oppression, um, because. You know, some, some history for you guys and some context is, um, there's a really great book by, um, it's called the algorithms [00:32:00] of oppression, um, and it's by Dr.
Safia, sorry guys, it'll come to me, um, the algorithms of oppression. She's amazing. Um, she talks about a, that women are the most harmed in cancel culture, but she also talks about what happens neurologically for us. Like, we get a huge hit when we media shame and blame and like, you know, so we're having this, this dopamine serotonin, like this feel good like this.
We're part of a mob. Um, and it feels exciting and, and we feel justified because we cannot believe that they said that. We cannot believe their business posted that we cannot believe they turned those clients away. We cannot believe that they put that picture or didn't put that picture. Um, and so we're like real mad because it connects down to some deep value that we hold.
So now we're on this like, ah, feeling, um, and then we take it to the streets, which our streets are [00:33:00] Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, YouTube, like wherever we can have a platform to yell. Um, now what's happening in the background is these algorithms are scanning words like disgusting, um, any words associated with hate, um, any of these like, Rage words, these really powerful rage words.
And so they get scanned and, um, they boost those posts because it means more eyes are going to get on them. And so then every time those boosts happen in the backend, so you don't know that all you've done has been like, I cannot believe this doula training organization did this, or this birth worker did this, or can you believe blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Um, that they actually get more eyes on them because. Social media is selling attention, um, and they want more eyes on the platform. And the longer you're on the platform, they sell more ad space to you. And they make so much [00:34:00] money. Every single time you like, share, and comment on anything that causes lateral violence.
So like, just take a beat there. So if that's not enough, that like, you don't want to continue to participate to the, you know, the very, people that like put us in this position, which is like the uber rich white men. Um. You can actually just have that be your motivator to no longer like, share, or even comment.
Comment in any way, not even like, jump in to defend. The thing we can do is take it offline. The thing you can do is to reach out to the like, origin story and be like, how do we get this off here? Um, so I start, that's like a huge why for me, is I will not line these. Billion going on trillion dollar industries with lateral violence because it's not going to change you cannot shame somebody into doing better.
All you do is create extremists and [00:35:00] martyrs and people who have more reason to have an us versus them on whatever this thought crime, um, or, you know, whatever it is, even you guys, if it's something that, like, I just want to keep clarifying, even if that person said something like. Transphobic, fatphobic, homophobic, racist, like, we, we can't fix racism by allowing the myth, the pinnacle of white supremacy to profit off of us trying to hold each other to a different level.
Um, so I want to start there. Now, looking at our specific industry, if, if you're not sure how you can stop, or if you don't believe me, that, you know, this isn't holding people accountable, which it's not. It doesn't it's I, you know, I'll I have a resource list. That's amazing. But if you need another reason that's not giving Zuckerberg more money, parents are watching us.
Policymakers are watching us. Insurance [00:36:00] providers are watching us. And if we are taking it to our, you know, reproductive health and justice spaces, which parents are in, and policymakers, I promise, if you don't think they're looking at them, they are looking at them. So, I mean, I don't, I'm not pro regulation, only because we saw what happened to midwives.
Um, like, I just, I like Doula's flexibility, but I do want insurance to cover us. And and if we can't get our shit together and stop tearing each other apart, we will not be taken seriously as an industry. We will not be able to, you know, join together and have this be considered, you know, primary or like a critical figure, even though some of you right now are like, well, in my hospital, doulas are considered, you know, non negotiable, but I'm like, the majority of us, it is not.
And. We won't be able to do that unless we are together and not tearing each other down. So recently, I, I actually like you stay like [00:37:00] right out of that space. I stay in my lane. I don't really know what's happening in other, um, you know, I have my, my private groups and. I like it. I curated my life to keep my heart rate down.
Um, and, but recently it came to my attention that there was, um, a doula training organization that, um, allegedly fired somebody for, for saying a free Palestine post and everybody started sending it to me because I've been really loud about, um, a humanity movement for all people and taking it away from, um, Um, out of the scope of religion and out of the scope of the individual and really like holding states accountable for genocide.
Um, and so because I've been really loud about that position, I've had a lot of people writing to me, even though through the whole thing that I'm saying, no civilian should be harmed in a state conflict. And this is heartbreaking. And like, we cannot continue to have an us versus them, a white versus brown, a Jewish versus Muslim, like, like, this is the shit is not working, but is [00:38:00] we have to protect.
Humanity, anyway, so people started sending it to me and I was like, oh man, and then I was watching. So I put eyes on it and I was watching and some of the suggestions were essentially obliterating this entrepreneur in our birth field and the questions I wanted to ask is. Um, did they do anything different?
This particular person using this example, who a person who I don't know, I don't know their organization. I literally learned about it through these posts. Um, and I was looking at it being like, this, this organization has never posted a political political thing in their life. So the fact that they want.
A no politics space side salad birth work is political, but like, that's fine. They had a goal to try to achieve somehow a movement with no political. But like, okay, cool. Um, but like, Bebo me is opposite. We're very political and we're very loud about our politics. And we're, we're, you know, our goal is to [00:39:00] try to, like, motivate people to take down oppression.
Um, and so I'm like, yeah. This person has never been political. So like, why is this surprising right now? And, and then it was so quickly how this one, this conflict between a founder and one white employee, it went into directions around queerness and race and religion so quickly, even though those were not the foundation of what the issue was.
And so when we do this, which we always can, because we are harmed every day as oppressed people and marginalized communities. So like our fit, our skin feels thin, like it feels like we're rubbing our raw nerves up against, up against sandpaper because we, we are oppressed and we are mad about it and we were under resourced and we experienced violence and nobody gives a shit and we get sexually abused and no consequences happen like we have a lot to be mad about and so it's very easy to it.
Guide everything back in there. I know this as a [00:40:00] sober feminist type killjoy. Like I know this intimately, um, that, that everything like makes you mad. And I perceive everything is like my, because of my, my woman ness and my queerness and my invisible disabilities, like all of these things. And, but I just kept thinking like.
A, this person's American, the states has blatantly not supported it as a, like, they're, they're funding this genocide, so how can we hold an individual from the nation who's single handedly supporting the genocide to this, to this level that is different than how we're holding the U. S., um, regard, like, no matter where you sit on the issue, um, this person is in the, swimming in the water of, The like heart of this conflict, um, a B they're not political and C rather than obliterating their business because of one of the tips was like, go over to her channel and her podcast.
Give her 1 star, like, you know, [00:41:00] wreck her business. And I'm like, instead, go and if you have given a 5 star review, maybe mark it down to 4 and then write. This organization isn't political, and as a political birth worker, if you're looking for that, it's not going to be this. But this person still led and guided and excited and trained and motivated a massive group of women and queer folks.
And so I'm like, why would this one act, which is private, that's a private act of whatever happened with their employment stuff. That is nobody's business. Like the social media, it's not up for all of us to even negotiate. They have legal systems, there's employment law, there's things, there's channels for them to go work that shit out.
Yeah. And and to have her again, I just want to keep putting caveat. I do not know her. I do not know her business, but like, what is what happened there? So I did reach out to all the people who felt very harmed by this to be like, how do we take this offline? Like, I immediately [00:42:00] reached out and was like, I'm here.
I will support you. Get this offline, get this into email, get this into higher mediator, higher, higher, whoever you need to, but get this, get this off of here and do not go blow up her business. Like, that cannot be the resolution. And I really hope somebody reached out to her and said, I'm going to take your phone away.
Here's our care plan. I'm so sorry. This is happening to you because you guys, that's a person. That's a person who wakes up with her kids crying and cramps and a messy house and not enough money to cover her cell phone bill. Or maybe you do. And sorry. Good for you. Um, but like. You know, he's going through all the regular stuff of not feeling enough, you know, maybe diet cultures harming her disordered eating.
Like, we don't know. I don't know her, but you never do. You can't, you can't have a thousand people now coming at you for a private matter, because what does that do? Now we've taken out a doula training [00:43:00] organization that did inspire a lot of people like we need more of them because we need more birth workers.
And I want to know that there's. 20 founders of doula training organizations that I can reach out to to be like, so who wants to join me in an NGO? Who wants to hold our States accountable? Like I can't be the only one doing it. And there's like, you know what I mean? I needed her to know I could reach out to her.
And, and she was overall. Doing way more good than harm. Right. And so leave her community. Everyone has the right to leave her community. If you want to take a stand, that's why, like, boycotts are working. Like, there's just places that I'm like, sorry, I don't shop from you anymore. I don't buy your products.
And that's my right. But, but when we're talking about small businesses, even if right now, some of you with even smaller businesses think that, like, she's a have, yeah, We're all in the have not bucket. None of our businesses have enough [00:44:00] economic strength to justify thinking that it's going to be beneficial.
And so I know I was perceived as a super have, um, and. So everyone thought like they were only as rich as we can take them down and I wanted to be like, anytime we had an increase in revenue, um, like an exceptional increase in revenue, the things I did with it, which I was very public and it was all like, you know, you could go check it out.
I hired more folks and I always hire equity seeking groups. So more people's jobs. Um, we bought more books from independent booksellers because now we could. So we supported. A ton of, um, you know, people who would otherwise not have their stuff on, you know, Indigo or Barnes and Noble, like these kind of small independent books, um, I would always make more art that represented, um, folks going through the reproductive journeys because we always hire artists to draw it because we can't get really great photographs [00:45:00] of people to have them be represented.
Um, we got to create more programs and projects to draw, you know, continue to. Undue oppression. Um, we invested in more feminist tech. We, like, all of it, we offered more scholarships. Like, all of it got rerouted back into feminist spaces. And so I just kept standing there being like, by you doing this to me, and you think you're holding me accountable, you've actually, I did a calculation because back when I was really like, all I was talking about was anti cancel culture.
I made some graphics that were like, this is truly the impact of you, quote, holding me accountable. So, like, fine, you can blow up Bebo Mia because everyone's demanding that we closed. Um, and so I was like, great, we'll close, but then somebody has to come up with 450, 000 for the salaries of all project partners, staff, artists, and authors.
Um, somebody has to come up with this amount that Is we paid bail bonds, we created safe housing for if any birth worker wrote in saying they [00:46:00] needed support with their housing, um, like this was all these funds that Bebo Mia was distributing. So I was like, great. Who's going to pick them up? Fine. Take me down.
That's fine. I'll step back. But somebody has to pick these things up because those. Bail bonds for incarcerated mothers. They're expecting that money and those artists is expecting that money and those all of my team is expecting their pay and all of like these places. And these are the really short sighted things.
So. Before you hit outraged and like, share and can you believe and call somebody and tell them like, you know, now we hate this brand or this store or this birth worker or this childbirth educator, this lactation, like, before we do it, take a beat, because feel your feelings, because they might have done something that was really shitty and shit.
You know, an ism, that we're not denying that part. If you feel really [00:47:00] called to it, after you collect yourself, write to them, and say, can we jump on a call? If it feels important to you. But, but also check, like, why, why does that feel urgent? You know, you're, you're not going to sway, if somebody thinks I'm going to hell as a gay person.
I'm probably not going to sway them. Um, and so then it might actually, I might choose to do an action that is empowering for other queer birth workers to be like, maybe I should do like a fun event because if I know how heavy this stuff is, maybe I can organize like a queer birth workers game night. And that would be the response that I would have to it.
And so, you know, the stopping of keeping it in the public space stops people profiting from our inviting it. It allows private things to remain private, like a crime. A contract negotiation is a private thing. Like, even if we're just like, can you believe that this person didn't do this thing for this other person?
There's channels for that. Um, and so just trust [00:48:00] that that shit will work itself out and also trust that everybody's allowed to do their business the way they want to do their business and there's space for all of that because I know in those doula groups, if somebody puts in, like, I'm thinking about a 24 hour clause, but I want to make it 12 hours, you know, like where you can call in or you charge your client more after a certain amount of time or charge for the backup coming in, like, yeah.
As a test, somebody go put that in a doula group and see what happens to you. And now I'm always watching being like, everyone can do their business how they want to do their business because their potential clients are going to read the contract. And if they read the contract and are like, I'm sorry, this other doula doesn't have that, and that's what I support.
Or they might be like, that makes sense, because I want a fresh doula after 12 hours, so of course I'm going to sign it knowing it's going to be 600 if I go after 12 hours. Like, we're not working with folks that don't have rational ability to decide who they want to work with. I mean, the, the [00:49:00] practical, like these very practical tips are, are really helpful for what you can actually do.
I'm going to toss in a little bit of an energetic angle as well. Okay. So I'm going to toss it in and then I am already, um, I want to keep talking, but I had a meeting that started three minutes ago. Um, because I didn't. I didn't realize I wasn't checking the time. That's okay. That's okay. This is important.
And I want to keep going. And so what I want to toss in is a little bit of what I'm feeling like energetically, right? So I speak a lot about energetics and, um, example, everybody can think about how they felt in 2020. A lot of that, um, low vibrational energy was, the dial was turned up. Right. The dial was turned up on a lot of things.
And what we were feeling was a lot of that low vibration energy, fearful energy, stuff that you just like grab onto it, sinks its teeth [00:50:00] into you and grips you and pulls you in. And so what you, my suggestion. Energetically for you as a, as an individual, as a human is to tune into your sovereignty and tune into where you want, what energies you want to allow to come into your field.
And what do you want to allow yourself as a human to tune into what vibrations? We talk about like, Oh, good vibes only. And no, it's not good vibes only first of all, but. There's lots of different vibes, i. e. vibrations, right? So there's lots of vibrations you can tune into and you can choose what vibration you, you desire to be with and be on.
And this lower frequency vibration is what we're talking about here. It's cancel culture. It's. , fear about everything in 2020. It's just everything that doesn't feel good, right? There may be a dopamine hit, or there may be something you're experiencing by that mob, um, mentality, but it is actually a, it's that sometimes those vibrations.
They can really [00:51:00] attach to you and then spread like wildfire. And it's really tricky in, in the beginning if you're not used to it. But what I encourage you to do if you're open spiritually, is to like tune into your sovereignty and decide what is real. You know, tune into like what is real? Is this individual a real human being?
Are we actually the same? Are we actually very the same? We're different. We're very different. And we're very connected and we're very the same. And so, mm-hmm, , that's great. Our labels are, our labels are different. You know, are all these things are different about us? But we're actually all the same too.
And so when you tune into that and you are truly sovereign in yourself, then you could decide which vibration you want to effectively, like in my head, I feel like you hop on this, um, magic carpet, like Aladdin magic carpet. Like, where do I want to ride? What vibe do I want to ride? Do I want to ride something that feels like freedom?
That feels like compassion? That feels like love? Do I want to ride something that feels like fear and like hate and anger? You know, where do I want? Where do I want to go? And [00:52:00] that can even be a little bit cancel culturey like my, um, yeah, like my opinion on the conflict, you know, it's my father's home countries, you know, he's from Israel and there's a lot of history and I've been pretty close to it more so than probably a lot of Americans.
And even still, I don't understand it at the depth, but what I do understand, I don't understand all of the nuances. But what I do understand is that the vibration, the energy, the frequency that I'm choosing to tune into is one of like, we are actually the same and when one child, like when one child is harmed, I don't care what they look like or what part of the line they're on when one child is harmed, when one individual is harmed, like it hurts all of us and.
It is my, my whole body is, especially my thighs are like super tingly right now, but even that can be a little bit scary for me to talk about because a lot of people that I love very dearly might feel different. And you know, I feel like, um, you know, in anything you can choose. Um, but I want to [00:53:00] put your energy and what you want to allow into your field.
And so it's really hard and it's really hard at first. And even after a while, it can still be tricky. Um, but that's my, my two cents that I want to throw in. Um, as we like have to wrap up, which I don't want to do, because I feel like I have so much more I want to talk to you about, but. I do want to tell people too, that I'm going to share links to where they can connect with you in the future.
And then we're going to be chatting again later this week, cause I'm going to come and hang out with you on your show and topic to be decided. Um, so yes, thank you so much for hanging out and sharing and, um, Move, helping to move the collective mission forward in a positive way, high vibration way in a way that I think would really benefit all of us.
So thank you so much. Thank you. I just have one final thought is based on your energetic thing of how you can, folks can move there easily is just get curious when you see something, ask questions to yourself and, you know, the details do matter [00:54:00] and then what actually happened. And so just the idea of put maybe in the front of it.
So when you see a post, maybe that happened, um, and that will help you kind of check in with your body rather than assuming what you're reading is truth. Um, and I would love to hang out with anybody. Um, you can check us out on our Instagram at Bebo Mia Inc. Um, B E B O M I A I N C. And we will see you on the Hot and Brave podcast next week.
Thank you so much, Bianca. Have a good day. I'll talk to you soon. Thanks. Bye.