Exploring Identity with Jill Louise Busby

Jill Louise Busby is a writer and filmmaker critiquing, imploding, and barrel-laughing at our personal and communal hierarchies; the myth of white fragility (and other words for racism); the endlessly-pending and highly-exclusive revolution, identity, and reaction-based illusions of societal progress; and the boundaries that all place on our lives.

Believing a shift away from anti-difference begins with an outpouring of radical, multi-generational, inclusive, and validating honesty, Jill’s work charms audiences just past their limits of comfort, inviting them to seek a new and more genuine freedom in the discomfort of truth.

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Episode Questions:

• Jill says these days she feels like "Identity is a reaction to oppression". Is this true for you? What identities do you claim? Which of those markers are linked to oppression? Which markers are linked to privilege? Which are linked to general experience?

• Think about the identities that you possess. What is the first identity you remember claiming? What identity or identities do you claim most ardently now? What identities have others tried to affix to you that you've taken issue with or rejected?

• Jill humorously referred to the internet as a virtual high school where people show up as representatives of themselves but not their actual selves. What's your internet high school avatar? What may people miss about you if this is the only version that they see?

• Jill mentioned that she doesn't want to live governed by the reactions of other people or in defense of who she is. What would it look like to resist giving systems of dominance our lives and energies while still cultivating space that affirms those impacted their oppression?

• We live in a culture in which it is easy to call others out but what sort of things do you need to check yourself on? How do you hold yourself accountable as you work towards personal and social transformation?

• Jill notes that in 10 years everything we say could end up being problematic. What could it look like to hold people accountable but also cultivate empathy for others and ourselves as we work to disengage from toxic patterns, thoughts, speech, and behaviors as we evolve?

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A special thank you to our Collaborators on Patreon:
Ahren Samuels
Anne Tomkinson
Donna Lynn
Janet Elsbach
Jason DeMeo
John Tomkinson
Michaela Doelman
Mike McHargue
Rebecca Williamson
Regina-Wink Swinford
Samantha Ham
Samuel Muthiah
Scott Unger
Stephen Matlock
Michael Kinman
Ryan Ku-Borden

New Music: The Love In Her Eyes by Andre Henry

Music: Supa Dred II (Wake Up) & It Doesn't Have To Be This Way by Andre Henry