The Musical Innertube - Volume 2, Number 176 - Amy Julia Becker

JOHN

We are very pleased to welcome Amy Julia Becker today to the Musical Innertube. Amy Julia, who we’ll call AJ, helps people reimagine the good life through her writing and speaking on disability, faith, and culture. Those things run through books she's written, such as, To Be Made Well, White Picket Fences, Small Talk and A Good and Perfect Gift. She's here to talk about many things, including her wonderful recent essay titled “Caring for Humans is Slow, Messy and Beautiful,” subtitled, “The Hidden Human Cost Of US Aid Cuts, And Six Ways To Respond When We Feel Powerless.” Welcome, AJ, to the Musical Innertube!

A.J.

Well, thank you so much for having me. It’s really fun to be here.

JOHN

I think it's just about time I had you on my podcast! You don't have to have me on yours, but I wanted to have you on here for a long time. So, AJ, it seems as if our culture, which is so rich and has so much to offer, it seems to have an issue with caring, with people who care for others. The caring classes, those needing care, having injuries or debilitating conditions, I'd love for you to meditate for a moment on our difficulties with embracing and honoring caring.

A.J.

Yeah, that is a great question, or line of thought. I think it has to do with the way we understand ourselves as human beings. And that we are really afraid, or want to deny, the very natural human limits that we all run up against in different ways, But what comes with that? I mean, to me what comes with human limits and vulnerability and need is also human possibility and giftedness and offering. And actually, one of the things that connects us to each other as humans is exactly that interplay of need and gift, and so there's actually a great beauty and interconnectedness that can begin to happen when we recognize that about ourselves, about others. But when we kind of divorce, when we put caring over here and needy people over here in this category, and then we put like the strong people in a different category instead of saying actually this is just a human category and we all belong there - when we start to divorce those things, I think that's when we get into kind of a hierarchy of in our culture, at least, a hierarchy in which there are those who seem to not need. I don't think there actually are any of us who don't need care, who can pretend that we don't when we, they, whoever it is, are on top. That's when I think we start to get into that trouble, which we see in our culture as far as. Just the rhetoric around caregiving or the amount that we need. I mean literally, whether that is a teacher or a nurse or, you know, all sorts of people in the caring professions. And the kind of concept of, yeah, some of the language around and attitudes around disability. I think I could go on and on, but that that's where you're thinking, in the beginning at least.

JOHN

And I think it's a beautiful and wide-ranging answer, because those of us who are lucky enough not to be sick, not to have disabilities, it almost seems as though we are arranged on one side. Separate from those who must be cared for. And it's almost like there's an opposition, or almost a shame attaching to it. One of my favorite writers is. Is Deborah Nussbaum, who is really good on this and it seems to me that the caring classes especially, I mean they're underpaid in this country and we make much about how as you as you point out your essay how messy the whole thing about caring for somebody can be. Any one of us who had to care for someone for any length of time, and that includes all three members that are talking to one another right here. Don, I know has had to do a lot of caring, and I've had to do a bit. You do some because  -you're a parent!. Hello! You know, and we know what caring means.  And yet, sometimes somehow it seems as though the argument is well, it should be more efficient. Should be cleaner.

A.J.

Yeah, and it should be productive.

JOHN

Yeah.

A.J.

I mean again it kind of goes back to what we value and we do, especially in American culture, we value being able to put a dollar amount on. What we produce, but I think what we what gets us into trouble is when we then think. When we start to imagine ourselves as people whose identity comes from what we produce and what we can prove is valuable, there's a constant need to continue to do that. It's relentless. And at some point I mean, if we are not, you know hit by a bus and kind of taken out very quickly. All of us are going to be in a position of needing care, whether that's physical or I mean as we look at the statistics about our culture right now, whether it's adolescents or adults, the people who are in like high achieving. Schools or professions are incredibly lonely and have like a serious mental health crisis going on. So they might be being rewarded for actually behaviour that leads to a lot of loneliness and depression and anxiety. And so it's like, OK, even the people who. Are being rewarded for not needing care. Might actually need care. And in fact, maybe we should provide that for each other and and. To solve some of these problems.

DON

First of all, Aji wanna commend you for talking about people who are slow, messy and beautiful because that describes John. To a tee.

JOHN

Well, first two slow and messy. I would say you know.

DON

Well, OK all. I you. All right.

JOHN

But thank you, John.

DON

See.

JOHN

I love you.

Speaker

You.

DON

Well, I'm trying to throw a little bouquet your way.

JOHN

And the Valentine's in the mail?

DON

Thank you so much.

JOHN

Thank you so much.

Speaker

But let me let.

DON

Me. Take you through a progression that just occurred to me while you were talking. That. 20. We've got Hillary Clinton saying it takes a village to raise a child and she is relentlessly mocked for this.

A.J.

Yeah.

DON

Then we have just a few years ago the Surgeon General of the US saying we have a loneliness.

A.J.

For the.

DON

We have a crisis in this country where, like like you said. People are are not connecting with one another and of course all sorts of good things are made about. Cell phones and and that's what I think keeping us apart. But really, people are keeping themselves away from. There there's there's seems to be an active thing of I don't need anybody else and I don't need anything else. And now we've got, of course, the the macho boys who are out there to make a buck running the country. So we seem to have slid down this path in a very short amount of time. That leaves us kind of in the mud at the bottom of the hill, where everybody's on their own. And nobody needs anybody. Or they say they don't and and it's kind of A to me. It's a divorce of what people actually are and that is. Caring, communal human beings. You know creatures that need other creatures.

A.J.

Yeah.

Speaker

Remove.

DON

I mean, when we're born, when an animal is born, it gets up and walks away and starts eating or something. We're born. It's easily 910-1214 months before we can do anything like that. So we need people from the very beginning. Beginning.

A.J.

Yeah, and it again. The word needy is often seen as a -1 of the ways I really began to contemplate this is when our daughter Penny, who's now 19. But when she was born and was diagnosed with Down syndrome, I really, I guess I realized that I had. Put disability and defect or disordered in the same category. So I thought that if you have a disability, there's something kind of fundamentally wrong about you, your humanity. I didn't mean to. That, but I realized I did. And so I kind of played it out like. So what do I if I think that disability is some sort of deviation from a norm or an ideal, what do I think? Ideal is and as I played it out in. Head I. Realized that my vision of an ideal person was. Kind of like Superman or Wonder Woman where it was like you can do everything by yourself and for yourself. I thought that is like the. Vision of a human. I can come up with. And yet it's the one that I'm walking around with, as if it's great. And so having a child with a disability made me recognize that again, human limitations are so inherent. Who we are, we can see that as you said any. Infant. But what if they're actually true and part of who we are all the time? What if they actually what enable us to be in relationships of love? Because my limits and my gifts kind of intersect with other people's limits and gifts in at least theoretically, what can be a really beautiful way? So instead of seeing myself as inadequate because there are things I can't do for my kids or. You know things I don't love in the. I can actually just celebrate the fact that there are other humans who are able. To step into those gaps, to create works of art that I'll never create, or to build machinery I'll never build, or whatever it is. I think there's like an opportunity for celebration instead of competition, and for really, as you said, being the communal creatures that we. Are, I think kind of designed or have? That we who about who we are. Yeah, I I think that. Our understanding are kind of rugged. American individualism only goes so far in terms of being in any way healthy or making us whole.

JOHN

I mean, we there's even been a book written. Very famous book Bowling Alone, which which talks about. The inherent isolationism of a lot of American life, a lot of folks. First of all, they sort of live their lives at work because that's sort of what work is and.

A.J.

There.

JOHN

You come. And maybe you have 4 hours a day to spend. Your family. That and, but a lot of people. Never reach out and and connect it. You know to any great degree with others. Certainly once outside the family, a lot of folks don't have that many contacts. And it's interesting, I think because. As you say, it deposits. A model that's not working. A model of the way. You know what a person is. That's that. There's something about that is not adequate to what really happens. For example, your your daughter Penny, you've written so beautifully about her over the years.

A.J.

Thank you.

JOHN

I'm just wondering how she doing right now. What's up with Penny?

A.J.

While Penny's 19, which means she finished high school last year and she is now in a program at a local college where she is taking one class auditing a class. And also doing some work on campus and taking what they call like a transitions class. So developing skills towards whether that's, you know getting a job or you know having just positive social interactions which has been really good. Been a great program. So. And she's also, I mean, you know, she takes a couple of dance classes. Going to hopefully have a summer job. She is. 19 and she doesn't drive, which is, I think, for her becoming a little bit of a reality. You know, we're working on figuring out, OK? Do you use? And she hopes in a couple of years to do a residential college program where she would, you know, her long term goal would be not to be living under the same roof as her mom and dad. Would be happy to have her, but for good reason. She is a 19 year old who's thinking about that. Yeah. And so again, Penny does have limits.

JOHN

Yeah.

A.J.

I just mentioned not driving she. 4 foot 6 which is in part because she comes from a very small mother, but also because of having Down syndrome and you know she is a very concrete thinker. And abstract problems math a lot of social interactions can be challenging for her. But then she also has things like. It's really. She is the person who moves and thinks the most slowly in our family, and I've always seen that again as something that's kind of like an unfortunate aspect of pet, like poor. She doesn't move as quickly and it was really interesting 'cause a couple of years ago she was writing down goals for her life and one of the things she wrote down was not rushing. As a goal. And I thought, wait a second penny does not see moving slowly as a detriment as a as a problem about her. She sees it as like a lovely way to be in the world that her and her family is the problem. We're the ones getting in the way of.

DON

Yeah. Yes, you're too fast.

A.J.

You know, and it was really. Totally. You failed and it was such a great. I mean again in terms of what we're talking about here, that sense of like. Huh. I have someone in my life who invites me to slow down. Wonderful is that. Like how much can I appreciate? And it doesn't mean there are times when we need to get out the door. And she has to like hustle and then. But there are other times where it's like, you know what you need to not be quite so fixated on, you know, making this happen really quickly. That's a it's a little thing, but it also speaks to. To the ways that when we are in relationships with people who have different gifts and abilities and limitations than we do, it also can be tremendously like, yeah, beautiful and good.

JOHN

I was just gonna say Penny has taught you something.

A.J.

Teaches me a lot, yes.

JOHN

Ah.

A.J.

For sure.

JOHN

Yes, absolutely, absolutely.

DON

Yeah.

JOHN

And teaching is a beautiful thing whenever it.

DON

Happens when you when you talk to families of, of disabled children and again disabled is I hate that.

A.J.

Mm. Hmm I.

DON

But again Otherly abled is also as you know it's almost as nasty.

A.J.

I mean. Think the point most people in the disability community are like, you know. We're not ashamed or afraid of saying disabled it it. I do think like the etymology of the word bothers me, but the sense of identity that it can bring does not so anyway. Proceed.

DON

There you go. When you talk to to parents of of children with disabilities, one of the things that I've noticed in in my interactions with with disabled people with disabled children and the the families is it these kids are smart.

Speaker

Hmm.

DON

The no matter what the physical limitations may be. Inevitably, the children are thinking 2 steps ahead of you most of the time you find that and you find that the that the other families are saying things like that.

A.J.

You know, there's such a wide range. And so it's really hard to make categorical statements about and. And this is true of any group of people. But when you're talking about disability. You are talking about, you know, uh, as you might have mentioned, like someone who has. Cerebral palsy and uses canes to walk around and you're talking about someone like Penny, who has essentially no physical disabilities and you know truly has a hard time with a multiplication problem. A very simple multiplication problem. You're talking about. That is, if you give Penny a battery of intelligence tests, there's some things where she's going to they call it a scatter shot or where there's. Gonna be off the charts low and others that are just like her typical peers. And then that also gets into the question of, like, OK, both intelligence and giftedness. Does it mean to have emotional? What does it mean to have physical intelligence to kind of sense things in the world? So I think there's just such a range, but for me, what it is more is. I've I think what I've learned from having penny in my life is to assume that every human I encounter. Has something that I from which I can learn or grow like that. I I need something from knowing this person but also that I have something to give in return. You know, I don't know what it is and I may or may not know them long enough to have that exchange, but to try to have that posture of assuming possibility for relationship even with. Someone who you know again 20. Ago I would have thought they are simply a meaty person and I am the one who gets to be charitable or something and it's like a totally. Way of seeing now so.

JOHN

This uh. Essay which moved me to call you up and get you on the show. Yeah, it starts in a beautiful. It starts where we've just been talking about actually, which is you saying that you know your experience as a parent? Has has shown you what the nature of of caring for another human being is like. And as you say, it's three things it's messy. It's slow, takes a lot of time, right? It can.

Speaker

Listening.

JOHN

Can be sloppy. Can have. It you know it, as you said, it could be hard to see progress, hard to see any productivity coming out of. But it's also beautiful, as you also said, that there are things that the the the one who is cared for. I'm going to be like. Uber and I am now in a minute, but the one who's cared for is actually changing places, sometimes with the care and and the two of them care for each other. There's so many beautiful things that. And then then you move to our present situation. Where there's been an order going out for at least a threatened order of a near total freeze on on foreign aid, including really cutting at US aid. And reducing staff from around 10,000 to 290 people. And I think you point out very nicely in your essay that there's certain assumptions about what is waste, right?

A.J.

Right.

JOHN

And you know, in a certain intolerance being shown for the messiness that always comes with human caring. But he wants to talk about the hidden human cost of such cuts, and I'm wondering if you would expand on that a little bit for our listeners. Are some of the human costs if we were to, like, cut this deeply and and say fire? 9800 of the 10,000 people who now work for. Different kinds of International Development. Efforts.

A.J.

Yeah, I mean there I think those costs are. Wide and deep in multiple. So you know there's the cost to the Americans who are doing this work in terms of losing their jobs and their and their families and the ecosystems of people who depend upon their. Umm, there's, you know, one of the things that has come up is the farmers who are providing. Lot of food for. Aid and again, many of them are American farmers who all of a sudden are not, don't have anywhere to sell their crops.

JOHN

I.

A.J.

So you know, so those kind of just kind of wait a second, is that what we just meant to do? And then. Think in the essay I read about a friend of mine who runs an organization called Special Hope Network in Lusaka, Zambia, among the poorest of the poor. Serving families who have kids with intellectual disabilities who are largely in their culture. Really seen as the I mean the lowest of the low status wise and it's just been really beautiful to follow their work now for many years. And I asked, you know, how is this affecting you all 'cause, they don't get USAID funding specifically? I was just curious what they were seeing. Say. Well, first of all, the foreign aid workers who are not, you know, locals have already left like they're they're gone. So. Not just, it's not just that they. May or may not have lost their jobs, but everyone again who is depending upon them to buy food at a restaurant tonight or to you know, pay for their kids to go to school or to pay for someone to garden, or that whole infrastructure is gone. But then. I think the the most acute cost right now in human terms is this question of. HIV, AIDS and the antiretroviral drugs that are truly life saving for, I mean hundreds of thousands. I don't think I'm exaggerating to say that if we're if we're talking over time, I was actually speaking to another doctor. Today, who is a an American doctor? But in a Mission Hospital in Kenya? And he said, you know. We were looking at a horizon where HIV AIDS was gonna be like polio, where it's like, Oh yeah, there was this thing that people used to have, and it was terrible. And we've and occasionally we see one of these thing, but like it's just and that she's like. Like, that's where we were headed. And now, I mean, we truly don't. So again, we can argue about the kind of benefits of that type of. Aid from AI think there's a humanitarian? I actually also think there's a national self-interest argument for it like that. From a political perspective.

JOHN

Oh please, please make. Yes, please make that argument that that, and I think that there is too, and I would like to compare arguments. But yeah, it seems to me that we benefit from the aid we give and not just in some with the philosophical sense. I'd love to hear you talk about it.

A.J.

Sure. I mean, I just you know, so there's this whole idea of soft power. So again, I was as I was talking with this doctor Matthew Loftus today, he was saying like, yeah, when you drive around Kenya in the hospital. Umm, what you see are these, like, actual signs saying USAID, like, you know that the United States is helping this community and you see that daily. So there is just a sense of kind of everyday. People around the world being like, yeah, I know the US is helping and I also know the US is a really powerful country. And so the fact that they are helping tells me something about their character, and maybe, you know, I kind of want to, I think well, so there's the soft power idea. But then there's also the idea that we are literally a global community. Now whether we like it. Not. And so we are. If AIDS begins to kind of run wild in various nations throughout Africa, again, it's not long before a mutated form of the virus comes to our it doesn't respect borders, right? There's a public health again, just purely self-interest, not to mention humanitarian and. Just there. Umm, we benefit from, you know, cheap labor around the globe as consumers here in America. And again, that gives us, I think both an obligation but also you know, we want the people who are working in some ways on our behalf to actually. Have some healthcare and some ways to continue to live. I think there are lots of reasons why. I mean, honestly, my primary reason for wanting our foreign aid to continue is humanitarian. But I do think there's also just a purely self interested political reason, especially for us not to just. Off without any plan, any sense of how how to do what we're doing in a way that actually, and I guess here's the other thing I do think it like demeans all of our humanity when we are so drastic in a cut of aid because it's essentially saying. We there are some humans that are worth caring for and others who are not. And when we say that about, you know, a child who is in Kenya, it's not long and maybe it's not anytime at all before we're saying the same thing about a child who's in America, but who back to our earlier conversation, does not measure up to a stand. Of activity or self, you know sufficiency or independence, and that all concerns me a lot because as I said, we're all vulnerable humans and we need each other. If we're going to pretend that's not the case, I. Know what's going to happen.

DON

Yeah. At one time, we wiped out polio. Wiped out smallpox. We thought we wiped out eugenics, too. That's still around. Also I I I had heard from somebody on a fairly political level, an official who said if we leave China steps in.

A.J.

Oh, totally. Yes, China, especially in Africa, you know, Africa is like on the rise population wise, even if they, you know, have another plague of AIDS.

DON

China is all about helping, yeah.

A.J.

Yeah, there is a race to see where those allegiances will go. So you're absolutely right that from. Yeah, just a long term power structure in the world. Which is the reason that USAID was, you know, established by President Kennedy in the 60s was because of the Cold War. And I do think there are still reasons to pay attention to which countries are going to see themselves as allies of the United States.

JOHN

There's a knock on effect in in the world of business too, because for the past 30 years at least, China has been eating our lunch. In Africa, they have moved in and done all sorts of business enterprises with local businesses, the kind of thing that America could have done if we were focused on Africa, which we have not been.

A.J.

Yeah.

JOHN

And now that's a Chinese presence there. That's that's wearing a pass in the. There's now a tradition of of of Chinese business connections in all of these places where it could have been us, you know, and I'm not saying that everything has to be a fight. Or a race. But you know, if you say that. All soft power can convert to kinds of hard power as in like a business presence. As as in like the image of you know benefaction when we can give it. It it's it's. It seems inarguable that that this is a. This is sort of a crisis that we've we just haven't been thinking of of Africa very much.

A.J.

Yeah. Well, and we've also had an incredibly effective this again is where what I've been learning that, like PEPFAR, which is the specific program that the United States has enacted for about 20 years as far as the antiretroviral drugs. To prevent and kind of keep at Bay the effects of HIV, I mean has have just been transformational for, you know, families, communities, nations and. We've done that like really effectively and that. Is as actually separate from US aid. USAID like it was a newer program, but this, you know, freeze on foreign aid has completely affected and potentially decimated that program as well. Yeah, the sledgehammer approach, which I also write about just to me, seems unconscionable. Also, just like really short sighted for all the reasons we just stated.

DON

Yeah. You also mentioned in your article that there were six points and you don't have to recall them exactly or anything like that. What are some of the points?

A.J.

Yeah.

DON

That we can do because you know, as as individuals, we can feel kind of powerless watching what's going on right now. But on the other hand, it doesn't look like anything is going to turn this around, except for grassroots. And getting our dander up right.

A.J.

Right. And I do think especially with things like this, which is like, oh gosh, I I might. I care about it. It also seems far away and like I have no power so. And I think people are feeling that, not just in this area, but in lots of areas. I have found that as. You know, for me, as a mother of a child with a disability, I do, who also knows a lot now because I've learned a lot about disability, I do try to speak up publicly when it comes to. Political issues that affect disability, even if it's not affecting my child, so in this case it was like literally thinking about disabled kids around the world. In other cases, it's thinking about like special education or thinking about even the language that's used to talk about disabled people. With our current administration. And like, that's an area where I'm going to speak up. There are other areas where I'm not because of both exhaustion as well as like I actually don't. I might have an opinion, but I don't necessarily know what I'm well, so I one of the things I said in terms of how we can respond is to speak up sometimes. So it's both giving ourselves permission not to feel like we have to, like rally for every single cause. But it's also saying that we can be careful and yet. Courageous in using. Voice. Uh, and in fact, I think people listen more when that's the case when they know that you're not just like jumping on every single bandwagon, but then also I think it is still in our that we need to be good listeners, especially the people with whom we. I think you mentioned earlier just that sense of like not. You know, bowling alone, not having as many friends outside of kind of our families. Read the cover essay for The Atlantic. Was about how we've gotten closer to our families. Literally, the people we live with and to our tribes, the people we connect with online or, you know, in the kind of. Information ecosystem of I'm only hearing people who agree with me. What we have much less of is literally knowing our neighbors, being a part of institutions, whether that's a faith community or a school or a civic organization. Where we don't actually politically agree, but we do want to get the local park cleaned up so our kids can play soccer.

JOHN

Right, right.

A.J.

Or whatever the civic thing is. And so we it's those, a relationships that we need, but also those conversations we need to have. I was in a small. We just recently moved, but about 3000 people. In our went to a church there where I think the congregation is probably 5050 Democrat and Republican. So it was really good to actually be in common cause, friendship and care relationships with people who were very politically divided, umm. And to say, Oh yeah, this makes it impossible for me to demon. Those people, because they are my people, like they.

JOHN

Right, yes, right.

A.J.

They are my people and so that was actually. So I do think those types of relationships and conversations of listening and kind of careful disagreement are important. Then of course, there are things like. Hauling our senators and representatives and taking that type of political action that still does make a difference. And again, I as a person of faith, do believe that, like actually prayer and in this case the type of prayer, I think I wrote about was called Lament, which is to actually cry out and say this is not OK and to like, that's actually a form of.

JOHN

Laments.

A.J.

That we find in the Bible. I mean more than almost anything else. Is the prayer that says what were you thinking? This is terrible. So I think that's important for people to know that like there is, there's like a structure and permission in at least the Jewish and Christian traditions for. Saying this is not OK and I'm gonna actually pause to lament for that, which I think is actually an act of hope because it's saying. I'm going to complain about this to God because I believe it's not the way it's supposed to be and that I think can be empowering. Actually, in terms of like, OK, what is my small but faithful step I can take in my very ordinary everyday life that act. Moves towards that hope. And against a place of like cynicism or despair.

JOHN

Yes, I think that very often, you know, it just happened. Not just now, but I mean in American. Social discourse, it often seems as if everything is reducible to party differences in partisan. You know differences, but as a matter of fact, most of what we do has no reference to that. You know, you know, I mean help, you know, helping a neighbor dig his garden, you know?

Speaker

Right.

A.J.

Yeah, yeah.

JOHN

And or or do a clothes drive for the needy. Or there's so many things don't really have anything to do with the partisan dialogue.

A.J.

Like.

JOHN

That really just speaks as you've been doing so well to our commonality, to our connections that we have, whether we want to.

DON

What's her?

JOHN

Whether we want to acknowledge them or not, you know, even the people who bowl alone are are more like you and me than they are different, you know? So I I love.

A.J.

Yeah, yeah.

JOHN

I love how. You know you do list. It's never, it's not necessarily a step by step. Up to see, but you know.

Speaker

Hmm.

JOHN

It the question what can we do? Does have a few. I mean, you've talked about lament and then I love the way you've put this speak up sometimes that is, don't be scattershot yourself. Look at.

A.J.

Yeah.

JOHN

Look at what you can focus on. That you can really talk about, you know, not everybody's gonna. Be just as good about interplanetary travel and plants. Right, not everybody. Don is very good at both, but.

DON

Well, that's only because I have that space seat in the backyard.

JOHN

I help. I think I helped you plant that.

DON

I think so, yeah.

JOHN

Yes, you did. And so speak of sometimes. Well. You've just talked about having difficult conversations, calling your senator and or representative. I think a lot of people feel they can't do that for some reason that. You know, but in fact you're supposed. They're they're they're, you know, constituent service actually isn't that.

A.J.

Yeah.

JOHN

And senators and representatives, that's what they actually do most of the time. Most of the time, they're not voting. Not in front of the camera. They're fielding phone calls and they and their Staffs are trying to figure out who needs what and how can I help them.

A.J.

Hmm.

JOHN

So you know it's something you could. Do and then respond instead of react.

Speaker

Yeah.

JOHN

I love that. In other words, you know reaction is things like anger and.

A.J.

Hmm.

JOHN

Respond is something like grace and hope and understanding right where they're both kinds of responses, but one is more.

A.J.

Yeah.

JOHN

Reactive and. It's more visceral and a lot of the time it it precludes further conversation, you know.

A.J.

Right.

JOHN

And the and. And the notion of real response is an invitation to dialogue in the end of the at the end of the day, most reaction is not that.

A.J.

Right.

JOHN

Most reaction has a shut up component, right? You know? And then finally remember what you're for.

DON

Yeah.

JOHN

In other words, before. Not just against things which I think is such a such a good piece of wisdom.

A.J.

Thank. Yeah, that you know, I as I was kind of working on the. Was that final one that took the longest for me to even be? Oh, right, right, right, right. Because honestly, I I think actually that's maybe related to the react and respond that what we're against can get us very animated and heated. But there is a sense of also. At a certain point, it's just exhausting and not worth. Like being against something I don't know. At least for me it only animates me for so. But. Feel like I can be for what you just mentioned love and hope and joy and justice and goodness and beauty in this world. Like that can sustain me forever and not to say I always have the answers or know exactly what you know. Policies are on the side of hope and beauty and justice, but at the same time to remember that that is actually what? Any. Yeah, any hard conversation I'm having or any, you know, time. I'm putting myself out there online knowing that getting whatever comments, you know, in disagreement coming back my way to be doing that for. Something and not just against something helps a lot.

JOHN

Well, uh. AJ. Amy. Julia. Thank you for joining us on the musical inner tube. Today, both your podcast and your your essays, and so much else. Is at your website amyjuliabecker.com and I love everybody to read this essay, which I think is so beautiful. Name of the essay is. Caring for humans is slow, messy and. And the irony and and the loving kindness in that title, just speak volumes. That's what AJ is. So thank you so much for joining us.

A.J.

Thank you so much for having me. Was really really. To be with you both.