Indivisible
This week, I had the pleasure of having workplace expert Denise Hamilton join us on the Radical Respect podcast. Her new book Indivisible: How to Forge Our Differences Into A Stronger Future urges readers to reexamine long-held beliefs and dismantle the hierarchies that shape our society. Here’s an excerpt from the prologue:
“What does it mean to be indivisible? A few years ago, I was scrolling mindlessly through my phone, when I saw a statistic about the maternal mortality rate in the United States. Black women were dying in childbirth at 3 times the rate of white women. According to a 2021 statistic from the CDC, the national average maternal mortality rate for Black women is 48.9 deaths per 100,000 live births, compared to 14.7 deaths for 100,000 live births for white women. Not because they were in rural areas or having their babies at home, not because they weren’t vocal about needing medical attention or didn’t have money for proper care: Serena Williams nearly died because her doctors initially dismissed her concerns that she was short of breath. She insisted she needed to be examined, and the doctors found blood clots in her lungs. Black women were in the same hospitals with the same doctors. They just weren’t receiving the same treatment. At a time when these women were most vulnerable, they were dying, dying from difference. I was furious. I remember the terrifying experience of giving birth to my daughter. As a Black woman myself, I was enraged at the deep tragedy of having to manage both contractions and racism. I didn’t die, but I consider myself lucky. I shouldn’t have to be lucky to survive. None of us should.
The next day, I came across another objectively horrifying statistic. The suicide rate among white men in America is one of the highest in the world. I felt nothing. I didn’t care, I didn’t care at all. In my experience, white men were the winners. They had nice jobs and nice houses, and they didn’t care about me. As a Black woman, my whole life had been spent navigating their rules and battling their arbitrary advantages. From my vantage point, they had every opportunity, and their wealth, power and success were usually derived from people who look like me. Why do they need me to worry about them? Who cares what their struggles are?
My sleep was fitful that night. I got up the next morning tired, and shaken by my deep hypocrisy. Like so many of us, I told myself the story that I was a good person. Kind, understanding, and inclusive. But when presented with a story that challenged my understanding of the world, was I?
That morning was the beginning of a necessary process of exploration for me: How did I get here? What did it mean to be human? How were we all connected? What is our responsibility to each other?”
In this episode, Wesley and I discuss Indivisible with author Denise Hamilton. You can listen wherever you get your podcasts, or here: https://radicalrespectbook.com/podcast-season-3
