http://voicesofequity.com/
Recorded via Zoom on 24 November 2021. Edited by Paula Blair with Audacity.
Music: commonGround by airtone (c) copyright 2018 Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial (3.0) license.
and though you're very welcome and see another audio visual cultures this is a podcast where we hope can poke and the Nixon crannies of media arts and all things cultural production I'm your host Paula Blair and I am really delighted to present this conversation today with Damian Taylor he does lots of software's loads again in this episode me and the team and has been using his vast experience and the technology industries to find creative solutions three storytelling to address gaps in representation and media and tech industries and you'll hear a love bite this in the episodes were gonna talk about Damien's podcasting particularly his series tak which of which he is the creator and co writer and we're gonna talk about aids Ludovic different experiences and it's a really lovely conversation I know you'll get a lot idea for this ninety S. so before I pass over to the my past self and Damien a massive sign Kate are amazing patrons over it PhD on dot com forward slash AP cultures for supporting the podcast it really means a lot that you keep supporting the show and may making asked if anyone else listening is interested and getting some extra content on some early releases we've called a special behind the scenes here and there's by PT Sierra which would just help maintain the podcast and help keep improving everything and give me something for it to work that IT making this show because I don't have ads on the show and I'm to turn amends to keep it that way however I am very happy T. T. and kind thoughts with us our podcasts so if anyone's listening and you're interested in that sort of thing yep I've got a little thirty second ads so %HESITATION just separate and see one of your shows and I'm very happy to do the same on a more fun notes I don't do it very often because it's a bit scary but I occasionally that casts a cast on the lead X. for the show and I think I have started to enjoy concentrating more on what countries were being unloaded and and Belgium keeps coming back on top by I don't know what it is but hello Belgium Bonjour you're so welcome I love the people there listening to the show or at least I'm hoping it's whether you're listening or not who knows that you're consistently coming right up of the UK and the U. S. so %HESITATION well done yay I'm just so excited to have you on board space to get in touch I'd love to hear people %HESITATION lesson from and to learn about why you're listening %HESITATION that would be amazing I'm gonna stop bothering you because I just enjoy it so much chatting with Tammy and I really enjoy listening to his podcast C. makes another podcast called professional confessions I really recommend because we talk about it it's come up in the podcast before that we've dealt way stocks are twenty hole and Rachel Breck we've talks about a toxic workplaces and abuse in workplaces and that sort of thing before so professional confessions is actually a really pretty helpful podcast listen to there's only a few episodes so far it's pretty quite a so please stay make sure you go in like in the show notes below where third links for all of these things for night enjoy this time with Damien he's brilliant Damien Taylor here so welcome J. audio visual cultures I've been really excited to talk she said Jeremy attend school and talks last week and your exactly Hey I wanna talk say on the spot so if you're so welcome thank you for joining me I thank you so much I'm so flattered I was really excited yeah so if it's okay can I start by asking you hi are you are you doing okay and where a bite sorry of course of course I'm doing great I'm enjoying this unseasonably warm fall that we're having and I'm going to Los Angeles so very odd Paul it's been it's forty degrees today eighty degrees tomorrow and Ben Rainey and the sun is out you're melting so these are but I'm enjoying it approximations okay he had over in the stylist rose of autumn where I am and you cast upon talking very cold I'm very dark so yeah and some enjoying the brightness of your screen while my son darkness so damn man I have been really enjoying lasting three year different call casts and read now on all your work thank you Jenna cross different media you have a real emphasis on addressing the lack of diversity across different media I'm sure we'll talk about it a lot of those issues we can I assign a lot of talk for people and pets so I'm really keen to hear about your your faction scripted podcasting as well as your nonfiction podcast saying I am missing a lot see professional confessions and I %HESITATION there when he was Olivier I don't race some really really getting a lot of thoughts but first seat would you be happy to describe your style and give us an overview of he Damien Taylor is what you're all about aids and the kinds of things that you're working on sure it's funny so I'm probably the most bizarre creative you'll ever need to so I I started off doing medicine and science and for my career yeah and so coming into I've always played in both creative and very scientific spaces and most people don't do that and I I get bored if I don't have both of those elements going on in my life at some point and so I have always approach everything from this perspective when I worked for major studios and when I work at studios I'm usually the date a guy who's building the strategy for which films to redo what audiences we want to go to what channels you want to use but by that same token I was moonlighting as a photographer and editor of the magazine currently working in studios and so I've always played in both of those counts and I take it awhile but I've been able to bring both of those things to bear into my creativity now I I can use data to help inform my created and that's really it's not that I'm not paint by numbers sort of creativity I have an idea but I never really fully know if it's something that's interesting to anyone else or is it just something that I can see and so I usually use data and test it out and see does anybody else like this depending on the the response then I'll try your choice which projects they work on first and yeah so I have to say geek with a creative soul I love flat nerves are very very welcome on this that's a good place to be yeah because I think on your website is that you say scientific methods for content it's not the kind of thing %HESITATION gotten into yeah yeah that's definitely their probes I take for a lot of the creative is finding out why do people like it that's the thing that really makes me happy even in my career I've always always been around sort of taking things apart checking out what makes it work and so getting to the crux of what discipline enjoyed about this movie this TV show this short video this photography whatever it is and then deconstructing that sometimes taking out everything that's of course was just distilling it down to about one thing classrooms into making my life so much simpler because I realize that a lot of extra layers did you and it feels very bind up and technology as well and hi much of part of our lives signee technology is and I think we're talking very modern technology and computers to digital and extra absolutely definitely I mean it's when I think about what a lot of people have told me throughout my career especially other creative sense I always go to my god I don't like to use data battle his way my creativity and I actually disagree with that very strong because our god is data it's a small data sets in a combination of all of our experiences and the things that we've learned and it impacts or they have or haven't had and we take that I mean we formulate that ones in district work based on all those experiences and so what I like to do is take my seat well I have the small dataset which is my experience how universal is that experience or is there a bigger audience if I just look at it as a way of supplementing that instinct that we have which is in essence a collection of data points collected throughout life hi are you in what ways are you channeling that and then into your more creative like pets night because I'm probably thinking mostly your podcast tak which which is in its second season and I saw today that there is work under way on an animated pilot for the past two weeks very excited yeah I've never been in the role of animation I've always wanted to but now finally get your enemies this is super exciting tech which is probably the perfect example of this is unique process that I I I like to use for creativity yet it was an idea that I had so going back to my main you're done I love fantasy club started by and I wouldn't able I was also watching I don't remember as I was watching something it may have been a doctor who episode or something in my head wanted to figure out I wonder if there's a way to make something that's both sides by fantasy I would be the perfect series for me and just through that process in my head I came up with which is to control technology would be and thus the idea was born but I didn't know if I was the only person who bought %HESITATION it was you know something more universal so that when I actually remember I I talked to a couple for you're working on a production together and I dropped the idea just kind of casually Hey you know what I just think it would be kind of cool yeah vehicle one was over okay I'm gonna ask a couple more people and they they kind of said the same thing and I figured well I should probably do some more testing because this is also my circle of friends and we all seem to think so and so I actually did I went to our guide to Facebook pages and we have one that's all of our content I went to the digital compendium H. and I could have been added Jack I had some help design a poster for a whole lot line and everything in a campaign as it was coming out tomorrow coming soon check out tech which I see if you want to be interested and literally overnight our page went from nine hundred dollars to eleven thousand and what happened and the people I love this is would be great register something so we decided to check which and it was initially I wanted to do an animated from the start the brand of music label partner who was going to work with us and for me music is really really important through everything I mean it's it's a big part of my creative process even in doing photography I usually start with music and the sound can be removed and then how do I bring that to light is only so I could use a cable is a perfect partner for doing this and then call me laid off eighty percent of the team and had no more money in my business partner and I and the writing team we're just trying to figure out what what do you do if no one's paying for this podcast we don't need much money to do it we can reroute the scripts and so that's what we did it started building it out that way and then we realized it was a perfect way to hone the story and tested out and build an audience before we did anything animated anyway I'm not was so such a frequent process I think most radio so many shows that way sank off the US television shows they started off as a radio serials so yeah that really works I mean if it's not broke why fix it we could go exactly and it is very visual when you're listening to it I find I was listening to the some of this is this morning and I think between both the speech and music you're seeing a world your world is kind of coming to life in your minds you know so I think it is really a access you you're ready picturing the characters I think because sorry I forgot the name of your narrator he's he's reading the stories okay okay and then not set and she's great at performing their dialogue of the character she noticed you so you start to actually flashlight these different people here and having conversations and things you know so it does feel very good you know and the artwork for it is very sad that so you can start to imagine it maybe as an animation so that's ready to go it was amazing I remember we were looking for voice over talent and I was thinking of going after all these actors and we're gonna have to do this big production %HESITATION and writing partner trade well why don't we just have a narrator leader like an audio drama comes on board with that because for me it meant it was cheaper to make and so I was really excited and I started looking I couldn't find anyone J. that happen to be one of my grade school friends her husband's cousin and she's all over my my my husband's cousin is staying with us for a couple weeks and she does voice over do you want to talk to her in my head I was thinking chore okay your husband's cousin and I spoke to her and she said just send me the first two days of the script and I just read them into recording for you for free that we can get a sense for my boys Asian so I did it and she read it and she brought all the characters to life in the sounded like different people even though it was just her voice in that moment I said forget it I'm not talking to anyone else no more auditions you have it this is great she's been amazing she's been such an amazing part of it she remembered around the writing process just to how would we bring this to life what do you think about this she has such amazing insight and I really like that we can now collaborate as a team hold their purses for segmenting and passing things off %HESITATION that finds underfoot systems a great process I mean it's one of those things are sometimes nepotism con work which is really wrong %HESITATION no I somebody so good and she's a singer choose at some point I'd love to into this year is but she's just so professional in such a brought recommendations and tricks that I never even thought of to bring and %HESITATION and she even made suggestions and really early on she was so incredibly respectful she said well I know that these are your words and it's really important so I don't overstep my bounds if it's okay with you can I make a suggestion and she was very accurate said no it should be completely fine but I've course you would let me know how and she's been amazing just hoping to stay grounded and even rising to the challenge right through a couple extra characters I I think one time I did for like five characters in the same scene and she's all you for doing that to you but I really enjoyed it because now I have these characters and their goal is not different in this scene because I'm the only person hello this is that it be helpful then if we can't actually tell people what we're talking about we're talking about the story this is true so tech which is a story about two twins local emerging Matthew who discover that their families it's been thought that their family just doesn't help matters that are kind of magical and then they discovered that that's not actually the fulfillment of a prophecy it's unlocked and their twenty first birthday where they discover that they can control nature like other which is but they can also control manipulate technology and so it's interesting to see their journey going from accepting the fact that they were critical magical does J. accepting the fact that now that they are the super powerful which is that kind of outside everyone and how they deal with that struggle but it's also interesting that what we'll see later is and this is way later in the this year's that there's this interesting conversation of is technology so different from each artist major different from technology to Berkshire becomes something that's different select biotechnology for example it will start to look at that it just it really fun and I'm white and I suppose I need there's a little touch of family drama and they're lots of family drama brothers and sisters by being that he is just so I'll holdings today goes with a during life out and at the same time by the way you happen to have these new powers and get I suppose that mode of storytelling I mean you told us about the creative process and I was quite she acts by our circumstances and lately but also are there any other E. Ms waste that method of storytelling is there anything else you're trying to address through the tech quick stories yeah that's what I do this I'm trying to do this with all of the stories and series that we bring out is I really want to be able to highlight diverse voices but not in a way that so egregious and I think other even creates more division so often I think you'll like it what happens is you'll get something in it if the main character is black it's going to be named black something so you know I mean my opinion is we have our eyes we know that we don't need you to tell us right instead of focusing on the universal nature of our community the job that they're expressed an ad experiences are different but the underlying reactions and emotions are the things that we all share I think a lot of times it doesn't happen it's I wanted to make sure that I could do that my story so what you'll see is intact which you don't hear anything about their race specially the first season we didn't even put visuals relate to them on purpose so that people can imagine how they wanted them to be but we included total himself or realistic to life so you would know what this character is going through so if you were somebody who had a similar experience you would know that if you're someone who didn't you wouldn't be locked out you wouldn't feel it you couldn't understand what was happening I think a great example is low in the arcade he's playing there's two this won't give anything away for you wouldn't listen but there are two guys at his school who have been picking on him for ever and so they're they're just basically believing him and she has a big Afro and throwing things in it I can imagine who's ever had a big curly Afro knows about happens or someone tries to cut your hair right it's something that subliminal it's not saying Hey this kid but it's saying that this is something that happens in life but the thing that everyone can identify what is being picked up yeah and that's the universal experience and we can identify it doesn't matter what color you are what you look like everyone has had that experience at some point and so I want to be able to draw on those experiences that we can all relate to %HESITATION some more than others in the specifics of it but really it capitalize on what the emotion as I tried to use this data to draw that out yes Sir any nice example would you like to receive updates links and special offers straight to your inbox and visit audio visual cultures tower presto com to sign up to our mailing list he mentioned this while working on digital compendium and they say you have a magazine that's not right yeah yeah so that's that magazine is slowly becoming the ground for that the series that we have coming out so right now there's tech which and there are two more stories are going to be coming out next year under it one of them is called incubus curse it's about a guy who goes to college and he's kind of really smart run of the mill but very average and for the most part forgettable she's mistaken identity gets in Kirsten he's turned into an interest or not he has to deal with the sudden really strong urges that happened in college sort of heightened college sexuality exploration but then also the fact that now he's visible because of it this new change in his life he suddenly really busy how does he handle that scenario what is it due to his life around him in other words I'm really excited about it's called muses I've been really big into Greek mythology there's a podcast called let's talk about minutes baby it's amazing it's amazing I love live she's that she's a host and she talked about a lot of Greek mythology and which is also really fun to hear me criminology is really misogynistic regardless specially zoos are not good people but it's still really fun to listen to your %HESITATION but in that %HESITATION I was postulating around uses what if there is no one knows how many pieces are ready or sometimes you're thirty sometimes there's not this exact number and I took that to like its most extreme logical conclusion what if there was an incident number they were everywhere and what is their ability to inspire actually allowed them to control and manipulate your animals so there's a story about uses about a woman who's a reporter who is following a senator around and discovers senators actually using that most if not all people in power users and they were just leveraging that to control him out into her mission to sort of expose it and let the world know what's going on is that I think that is really fun because it's really grounded you don't have like these big super powers of people their influence is I can make you do what I want I speak into your I sing a song you feel inspired or created motions and you answer her question suppose it actually puts her at in peril and so she finds herself running for her life and hiding out at the risk of just trying to tell him and what's really going on but that would still but and still he is the creator of those send your writing is that right do you have other production roles with those so yes I am the creator of them I'm writing I have a writing partner who's writing tech which with me I haven't found a writing partner from users that I really would like to find one I've had people who speak in Celtic but I'm also I don't want to be that person who has the respect I can write from this woman's perspective I can do it anyone else can that's not my experience so I want to be able to let a real experience %HESITATION through somebody who can really speak to it because what I'd be looking at from the outside in I want someone who can actually convey the nuances I don't have access to so when I opened it to find one and then into this curse I'm writing as well I do the production of the podcast yeah I love finding new music that's my favorite okay so for me think tank has been attacked which it is it is very electronic you know that the music and the sign design and that's one of those where what a sign design what is music you know it kind they slipped over one another car that I find so what do you eat you know for the music while involvement he has for detecting for you know what's going on there for years so it's it's funny it's it's usually sometimes music has been chosen before any work has ever been written I think we spoke about this a little bit earlier how just hearing something and understanding that this will be a motion you create an image in your head and so %HESITATION usually they seem to check which for example that haven't happened yet with them their third season out and I could use it for them already just because I I know that emotion I can feel it I can see in my head I happen to have been listening to Spotify or something and that song happened to fit really well with that visual that I had in my head he told that story and so that's going to but I usually really try to on the the more guttural emotion the music first and so for something called tech which it seems weird if I went in with like all of actual music it felt like it needed to have something that was a little bit more chaotic can that fits today's world where there's something always vying for your attention which is why I will help you know sound and music and sound that's how I felt actually when I was listening to and I focus I think this is deliberate where I did it you know because I find myself listening to the music and happened to really concentrate to listen to the voice again you know it this it's going back and forth and I thought this is what our rights are like you know Instagram Twitter whatever you know she expected and you know do your actual job all right %HESITATION that sort of thing that's important for check with your specially there tiger I want the music so if you never hear what Caitlyn is staying the music is telling the same story so you are really missing anything and so I wanted to make sure I have there are a couple of times where I usually find music without lyrics there couple times right looks to be in on purpose because the lyrics tell the story as well so let me be really quiet in the background then it'll slowly builds overtake the voice but it's because now they're competing and the one thing that's interesting is working with music you can hear multiple things going on at the same time it was just a bunch of people speaking you didn't get it but if it's music it certainly makes sense you can comprehend all the lines are conversations that are going on so I do have a purpose to let the music tell the story in a way that I don't think that we can do in normal speech %HESITATION we can't be as dramatic or as a motive in normal speech as we can and use again so I I I do that on purpose in some people it's it's too much and it's overwhelming and I I realize that I think the visual series will make that easier for those people looking for the people who are interested and want to it I think it'll it's it's a fun challenge I think it be an interesting experiments teach us a lesson ten a completely desensitized environment you know in the dark eyes closed and just the next nine yes so that's a challenge anybody's last name go and try and be with tax question not why and I think I will try that because I did find myself struggling to concentrate when I was listening tests it's funny I do that that's actually after we get to the final okay I'll do that and I realized that if I don't have something else in front of me it's a lot easier for me to listen to it and there been times right before I go to bed or %HESITATION listen %HESITATION Justin see what if I were someone else listening to this and have nothing else around what we eat can I find a gift will be pulled into the story though even though I wrote it I know the story when I remove all the other distractions around me it it helps it's a little bit of an experiment but I'm enjoying it that's gates at skip practice to be self critical as well and to try and imagine yourself as the complete the claim that Snapchat as well that's brilliant yeah I was gonna ask you as well because your studio Prometheus digital studio is that right and the name send I decide that that makes sense now that you've set up a lady and Prometheus and so your company I mean if I understand correctly you're using that company to try it said read the address of water gaps in representation across the board and it's not just race and not just standard but things like testability and you know social class and and all sorts of things to talk hi do we work together to tackle these things across cultural production media production police are said sayings you're so busy you've got all these different things go at is that something you'd like to set up special interest as well maybe just the role of that company and your role in that company and the broader ians and high you're going to buy no so one of the answers all the state has to be these podcasts but you know are there other things as well yes %HESITATION previous is it's sort of the bread and butter that forms the podcast and we have some a lot of consulting clients work with advertisers cetera and a lot of the of the conversation that you there and a lot of artists that we have %HESITATION all turn it around integrity and I and I know that a lot of people have this thing and it makes a diverse city and everyone has their own interpretation of it was actually fun to talk to because what you'll find out and we've done this exercise some people mean gender some people meet race race and gender some people get everything and so there's a lot of misunderstanding around it because everyone is defined it differently but assumes that we ought to say and what we really want to do it for me kisses to help address that in a way that's authentic but not through the lens you are so under represented or you are you drew the short straw we wanted to really do you from the lands let's remind ourselves of our common humanity I think we've become so accustomed to data and stats and numbers even more than we think I mean my company by definition is a data company and my goal in that though is to bring humanity back into it because so often we hear people talking about fifty percent of people in there just a number or just that they don't understand that you have to get behind it and so the way that we interpret our data is we have that number what does that mean for actual people what are the people behind it feeling how are they interacting what does that mean for daily lives and that's really the the lens through which we like to look at everything we do so instead of coming in just give me the number that you know like thirty percent your audience is women at thirty percent of your audience is women who have this preference or live this lifestyle or facing this challenge or whatever it is so that we can start to understand that these are people are not just numbers part of the way that we do that in is even how we addressed the audience we started to move away from demographics being focal point because demographics is usually just a short cut to get to a behavior or preference or something that you want to understand what people say oh yeah we want to target man for this series of this blah blah blah what they really want is they want people who exhibit these behaviors are like these types of things %HESITATION who do you have this preference and so we really try to get people to focus on that because in doing bad what you see is you start to understand your audience your consumer as a person and not as a stain or objects that you can move around right and you start to see more respect towards the people that were speaking to and so I think that's always been a really big part of how I looked at data especially when it comes up audience and consumers and Hey being told that that's not right there's a short cut to it and so I started a company because I was tired of waiting for other people to do if I want to see change I'm actually part of the problem I don't actually make a concerted effort to be the chain seven asking for so that's how Prometheus was born we'd love to be part of the conversation with AP cultures called on Instagram Facebook and Twitter and we also have discord just coming up and when your plane to bite people having different definitions of what what do we mean by diversity and I think there's I think we're experiencing certainly in the U. K. we're experiencing quite a lot of push back on the idea of woke tests so you're promoting you know any kind of can we just have any other kind of human being day's best thing that's you know I mean I love white man they're great it's a lot of them are not full but sometimes it's just it's a bit boring obscene O. comunque maps just anybody else or changing this thing but then you can get told off for B. and J. woke up bite stuff and that's a bit of a problem and so it's there so many tensions are Rhines trying to say even the playing field for people but also trying not to alienate the people who feel like they're having something right away from them when I say if we even the playing field we all when we all do you better everybody gets left it up to you I think a lot of people don't realize you man suffer because as of yet Cherokee as well if we sort the beat Cherokee we sort everybody for example many other examples D. N. kind tear any challenges Anne Heche back any toppling dying you know what are your experiences and trying to take a major names I do and I I mean I think part of the reason you touched on it as well as that people feel threatened right right now everyone is making a white man that big bad that's not fair right it's not like you guys out to get your that's not the case and I think the other thing is so I'm part of this group called the multicultural insights collective and so we do research around how can you be more effective at diversity in the first project that we're doing right now is called words matter what is the language that we use that we can make sure that we're talking about in a way that's inclusive but also that resonates across the board right that everyone can get sick we can align with us is a lot of the focus that we talk about they'll take a word and it means one thing to someone else and it becomes pejorative to a different group and serves you immediately create tension what I've discovered throughout that is a lot of even the most vocal critics of wokeness or diversity really when you get down to support it but what they're not supporting it is a fact they've been demonized right and so there's a there's a defense mechanism that's activated at that point right and there's there's also a fear of what you're taking away from me %HESITATION versus the reality of what what do we all gain and we talk to my other podcast professional compassion which is totally not scripted and it's it's very serious but the goal it out when it was really we did that because I realized that a lot of the conversations we had were people misunderstanding each other we're talking past each other and then there's also the piece of people activating about things but nothing ever really happening and I didn't want people who had really genuine intentions were afraid because he didn't want to be labeled as well or did not make a mistake and there's a service chamber on not knowing or asking the question how wonderful is there a way that I can help mitigate that so we created a podcast where people could not in this week share their experiences so when they don't have to have the same ticket ask the question I can bring on an expert could arrive there's no way I could get expert in all of these things right but I had to bring on an expert who can speak to that give a solution for what's something that you can do to you don't have to wait for your government or your job or whatever sixty you can just do today to help increase diversity and not lose your shirt on it right and that I think is really bad and seems to be helpful in communicating the fact that becoming more diverse that diversity is not a zero sum game you give up something I get something which on both sides I think you'll find a lot of people into treating it that way that they want people talking about humanism or black lives matter I just want the right to be in a presser myself and I'm like that's not that's not diverse I just basically put it so when you talk through the podcast we've been able to speak to a specially that notion zero sum game it's hard to break that down and kind of include everyone and point out that we can't have true adversity to be honest and last white men are also part of that conversation when my gas which was really it I think probably one of my favorite but also one of my more difficult episodes we talked to about their own handwritten express I see him but he's he's a white guy who wrote a book called lightning go from fragile to agile and I didn't realize until we had that conversation how uncomfortable it was for me to talk about a white man right got something done before and I realized in order for us to have that conversation I had did you willing to be open and receptive and listen but I also had to be willing to be vulnerable in a sense to express areas where it would for me it's a challenge but I think in doing that and having that conversation I think that will be okay great what was that we actually have to be brave enough to just have a conversation to begin and give each other room to make mistakes so often I think the problem with this is that we don't give people room to make mistakes no one's going to be perfect going to make mistakes and %HESITATION I think that'll get pushed back at someone else like it he tried there's are damned if they do they're damned if they don't so why pardon and it feels that I've seen it mostly on Twitter for people's responses can be and century you know they're explosive amount doesn't help when somebody's genuinely go and %HESITATION I've just heard about this what's going on and they want to learn and I think people should be supported and learning a night completely understands people's frustration with well it's not my job to educate you he you know I'm exhausted as a woman I've done not hello and I think you know it I've had experiences that may be you know at least call can't say what a black person may have experienced space oppression in certain circumstances so it hasn't happened to me as a white person but it something similar happened to me as a woman for example your accent test them you know I'm a northern Irish person in England so I I get bother if I open my mice you know so it might be small but I understand some things and I think when you can appeal to someone's understanding is you're talking about aids but it's having the environment that's safe enough to do that and I think social media has not helped in a way and it had a cage help it has to call raising to help because it has the power to create a lot of the problems in the first and I think you know and heart X. lights how far we have actually come in we haven't come far enough of course but we have come quite far and you're seeing big cultural institutions began to acknowledge their colonial past sins just be blown to bits because at the time from Asian I suppose coming back circled say Dada you know which information these things happen you know and if we don't say yes these things happens because we're not gonna get anywhere for everybody just because Bob so sorry here some money to make up for what your ancestors suffers you know it's not really going to be helpful but if we go this happens I'm get educated and that's try to do better for Austin for future generation I mean that's kind of high I feel about it I don't know what you're feeling about it as yeah I I agree I mean he recently come to the conclusion that yes we want our governments are our institutions or companies to have a bigger role but until that happens it's really important for us to embrace what we can control you should influence and if I'm able to work with %HESITATION speech to or one person two people have at least done what's within my power to do I may not be a big network but the network that I do have I can make an impact on I think it's good started taking perspective more it would really be helpful in understanding it I go back to my mother my grandmother you know certainly now that I'm an adult so why is right my mom used to always say to my grandmother deal with people where they are not where you want them to be of that section and it's it's something that's really hard but it I find myself having to remind myself of that not everyone is where you think they should be or not everybody's had the experience or the information that you do so instead of trying to shun them for not being where you are I understand that we deal with them where they are if they don't know it's okay to say I'm not in a place where I can educate your top my top but I'll tell you how I learned about your culture and maybe you can do the same right and leave it at that it's a way to allow them to make a mistake if it allowed them to me to ask that question but it also doesn't penalize him for having to ask a question and trying to learn yeah that's an excellent point I think that's because not everybody has the privilege of education so they might have privileges and they'll resent those things being called privileges because they don't feel very privileged and so I just say you know you have to make them on on where they are at that moment you know what's going on in their life they don't have the vocabulary that some of the rest of this might have because we are actively can shaming knowledge on these things and trying to just reprogram the brand I'm not sort of thing because we all have our prejudices we all grow up by Sam and we all think of some other kind of person as the enemy and it's a long reconditioning and read learning things and I'm learning things say wise up from not go north and holy and have either just tryin I'm rosary life the same as we are so some ready wonderful quite fair and I think you know that's a really really important one is the scale just be kind to yourself and if you can just talk to one person and say them why did you why did you do that are you homophobic you know just kind it gently talk to somebody you care by I know we a year say F. R. sehr and just have a child to buy what was out on the bike why did you show I thought at that person %HESITATION you know going on there yeah and just hear the story and then realized that a lot of the time it's something going on within themselves so they're angry if I eat and not necessarily the stranger exists over there exactly and I think it's it's interesting because that's where I am well not recently but I just over my life I increasingly see the power of media and having that conversation as well because a lot of times you may not have exposure to set group right that you don't understand them so you don't have anyone to refer back to or even to talk to and I remember I I was living in but when I lived in Spain it happened a little bit when I was in South America that was particularly poignant where I have a friend and I were going to subway we were going to meet some friends of his and this gentleman sat across from us and he heard us speaking writing me never in Chile were all speaking Spanish our actions were in Chile and %HESITATION so my friends from Porto Rico and I'm from LA but both have very Caribbean accent so he stopped us and he asked where you guys from and it's over from support returning to Los Angeles there's no way you can get from a senseless are you from Brazil sounds yes or no you're not white so where are you from leaving where is your family from and I told my parents are also born in Los Angeles and right at least one of my grandparents was but they're all just from Los Angeles and she kept saying nope that can't be right and she stayed on the subway he passed to stop state on the subway really and then we got off the subway or walking across a bunch he followed us and asking no you can't I've never seen a black person from Los Angeles they're surfers and their yeah all of these things you're not a basketball player are you around for them no I'm not actually sure business school both of them no one I'm from Los Angeles thank you must be games I've seen Danish people on TV you were black so you must be a he just kept going to everywhere he seen black people can be from African Jamaican and no I'm not in all his references are from what he'd seen in media and I realize that several times I have that sort of experience for people equate to what they see on television or radio station on social media and they assume this must be the world and so I started doing some research on just media in general and from its inception radio TV and newspaper media industry has been very self aware of it influence you get half over diversity and how people perceive each other and very pointedly has chosen not to or do you do it in a way that's divisive but gets industry more modern their riveting studies from even just the thirties and the forties are around yeah and in doing that I realized that while a lot of people think it's just hard it's just you know entertainment but actually it does more than not because it does create a cultural and societal reference point for people yeah I think that's important and it allows us to have some of these conversations about actually having them sometimes not so interesting that's just reminded me that because that you know I grew up in at an incredibly white yes and it was during that conflict in Northern Ireland as well so there was very little migration actually coming in well any that there was and the ninety days Hong Kong was still still belongs to Britain says Hong Kong but other than that you didn't really see very often unless it was a soldier or something you didn't really see but he did sometimes but very very rarely %HESITATION so I was very naive and and I probably had a lot of those beliefs says similar to that man I don't think I'd have stocks somebody say makes yeah I just remember one of my favorite films when I was a teenager it was empire records and it saddens go and then I grew up on a read loads of stuff at night watches his things I read those are things that are set and some friends asco and it's clear capital there's loads of different kinds of communities they're slot since led the team depot there's loads of African Americans there and then you go back to the sound and you go where's all that gay and not to white people all white kids had %HESITATION normative quite rich my name gosh and this is the nineties you know this is a boss like you know the fifties or anything I mean their sons in the fifties and you've got more African American characters in yesterday and they kneel roles but they're they're me and it was quite a shock and also meant so much to me as a as a teenager and then learning a bite there ray ensure that was going on and and maybe psych class and allowing kids like me elsewhere in the world to grow up believing that San Francisco was just fell of white people that is a real problem and it has been quite a shock when you do you learn about those things and not everybody does learn those things I don't you know I did a film degree so you know I I started to learn about those things but most people here generally aren't going to be so not so interesting that example but that sounds actually quite scary and I think that's where the idea of you for me at least starting to realize that there are certain privileges that I have right it's heteronormative male going someplace with a friend some guy following us not not much of a threat there two of us and one of you and so physically we don't have that fear of him attacking right and if you did they're still two of us to just one okay so there's something different I mean it was night or another country and I doubt I did never crossed my mind right I just thought he was like a sliding and knowing and I did you go away we're gonna go visit some friends and even though the last episode of professional confession I spoke about that a little bit where I realized I had actually been sort of on the receiving end of discrimination and completely threw me for a loop because it came from a woman Jewish woman and it's not a place right specter just yet and it's not a wall that I realized I found myself in the thought is that you know well I am a black males of course that was going to be the area where I would get discrimination but using the mail is on the part of it with a discrimination complaint with the black and so this time it wasn't a black man is described it was not something that should interfere with it said we need to realize that I had to have some level of privilege because I've never had that experience I'm used to I can hear certain questions right I can do something and it's never been a I've never had anyone talk about how it worked these men are useless or like you can't really trust them so having that experience was really useful in making me even more empathetic but also realizing that I can't clean the victim there all the time right there even in being a black male I still have because I'm male their rooms in conversations that I've brought into that women don't get pulled into and so coming to that conclusion was actually it was kind of a challenge to be Frank I couldn't say that oh no no no no but I'm always with the idea of intersectional there are multiple societal factors at play really did stand out so I am not even creating tech which end users and a series of recruiting I want to make sure that not being so full of hubris and the notion I can tell every story and really allow someone else to tell their own story right because it my perspective on it is my perspective but it may not be accurate do more harm than good but I really value tie lessons about episodes of professional confessions and I really value G. being so open because I don't think that's an easy thing for a man to talk about actually because it's something I have encountered I am have a former life as an academic and thought kind of delaying is quite right and a lot of institutions the worst Belize I've had to have been women and that's the sort of people he not and I'm malicious way I don't think they even realize they're doing a lot of the time but the the latter up after them because I think well and I try to get this taken away from the night and I can't help anybody else up because then they'll be better to me and you know so it's IBM started again but I really value to talking about that because I witnessed it happening she male colleagues by the CM senior women colleagues who were J. E. repelling me the repelling man who were my peers as well I think unless we talk about these things and an open way on is difficult and it's difficult for some people they hear a smile next you know I find it really difficult because you know sacrificed feminism you're not supposed to be negative about women but actually there's a lot of women night they're here not feminists even if they think they are you know and your sexuality again the ex what flavor is your M. S. M. and unfortunately I mean I can't speak said the individual that you're talking about I don't know what their context as but I have been quite church women who think that the way to even things always is to J. St man today Walkman have historically been doing to women all this time and now some high balance it all right but it was like you mentioned earlier you just become a carbon copy of the oppressor you know each just may fade and spot Preston he's a processor and that's not helping anyone I really valued you going through your own story and being ready open it but I think that's ready for yes an important and hopefully will encourage other people to do the same thank you know that that means a lot because honestly I I spoke to your team and I was really nervous about releasing that episode it's a really personal experience first and I also didn't want to come across isn't he being negative toward women in two minutes okay that wasn't the intention it was really easy for me to highlight that it helped make me more empathetic and I realized that in that situation there are temporary privilege but I also realized that not everyone is immune from bias sees and prejudice that I really wanted to communicate that and hopes I was really glad to get a positive response from it because I was so nervous okay okay I'm going to publish but it turned out well so I'm not actually I figured it was something that could hopefully help someone else yeah I think so I definitely got a lot I'd it's listening takes I recognized so much of what you were talking about H. me whether they ever hear it or not but I know if individual man that I'm friends waste you would benefit from this things yet so I'm going to pass it on you know just in case yes at con even if it's just you're not alone man you know this is happening to other people yeah thank you that I I think it's it's important I mean so much of the work is sadly just starting the conversation brought to light now and no one knows and I think the one good thing that happened with the pandemic and Andy ups follow black lives matter which has been around for awhile or certainly the people felt empowered to verbalize to express things that have been sort of laid under the surface for so long and they felt that they were just needs to suffer in silence and deal with it because that's just the way of the world and then once people started expressing and sharing it realized that it wasn't just in the world there are other people sitting and suffer in silence as well with a slightly different circumstance they were also doing it so it brings it back to the highlighting the fact that there are differences yes what you need at the end of the day that the commonality of the human experience as we have in the outnumber those those differences that we've been focusing on yeah sure well demand I'm wary of keeping a much longer and %HESITATION you've been so wonderful can you point people towards where to find out more about you eight website socials that sort of thing yes definitely %HESITATION so you can go to Prometheus digital studio dot com and we have a drop down menu for contents you can hear both of our podcasts that are active right now digital compendium podcast that's our our brand but you'll see tech which and professional compassion those in that you are working on and it will be added to that where you can find us on Instagram and Facebook digital underscore compendium or Prometheus digital either one is great and feel free to reach out to this messages we reply love to have conversations with people I think it really helps keep us grounded and we don't get too full of ourselves and plus it's fun to learn from other people well I really hope we can keep in touch I just figured I fear any advance speaking CA and I really enjoyed your company I'd love to hear more about your life in Chile I'm a little bit faster generate love to go there some day research it was fun it was really really great we should definitely do something about that and I I was actually working in media there and I ended up somehow on a news talk shows when I was there we were we were touring and TV station and they ended up pulling my classmates on air and here is it was really funny but yeah there's definitely a lot of media interesting yes okay thanks so much demand aspen just sum up that pleasure thank you so much for everything you're doing thank you so much for having me Paul I really appreciate that this is a great conversation hopefully we can reach and we'll try to get in sooner I love that you're welcome back anytime and you get your other podcasts fired up let's have a big chunk is definitely definitely thank you so much
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