Ep 030: Navigating Important Conversations: Talking to Kids About Race and Gender with Veronique Porter
Jennie (00:01.63)
I realized the last few episodes, we've done a lot of like chit chatting before I hit record. And I kind of like let guests do that because they've never talked to my dad. So it's like, let them, you know, let you guys chit chat for a few minutes or whatever. But I find at least with our last guest, there's sometimes a lot of stories being told that I'm like, oh, you should like, I'm doing all the talking right now, so it doesn't matter. But like our last guest.
Veronique Porter (00:08.92)
Mm.
Papa Rick (00:29.599)
Yeah.
Jennie (00:30.706)
was doing a lot of talking to my dad about things that she and I had already discussed. And I was like, wait, we're gonna let's hit record. I want to capture all of this. Like, um, so anyway, so I'm going to, I need to get back into, um, hitting record faster and, uh, getting us like jumping into it. So anyway, welcome. Hello.
Papa Rick (00:40.64)
We're wasting the good stuff, yeah.
Veronique Porter (00:42.322)
Yeah!
Papa Rick (00:53.392)
I'm just sitting here highlighting every line for interesting questions. You've got a lot of interesting stories for any.
Jennie (00:58.037)
I know.
Veronique Porter (01:00.213)
pops out.
Papa Rick (01:02.656)
Wow.
Jennie (01:03.894)
We have a lot in common. So, yeah. So dad, I also noticed, I've been noticing that we never get you at the beginning. I always say hi and welcome and you don't ever talk until I ask you a question. So I wanna make sure everyone, just, no, I just want you to say hi in the intro. Like to be like, hey, like that you exist. I know that people know that you're there at this point.
Papa Rick (01:19.859)
You want me to talk more?
Papa Rick (01:26.26)
Gotcha.
Veronique Porter (01:30.548)
Thank you.
Jennie (01:32.114)
Um, but anyway, so when we say, hi, welcome back to the relational parenting podcast, if you just be like, Hey, or whatever, just like that you exist.
Papa Rick (01:35.413)
Gotcha.
Papa Rick (01:39.036)
Gotcha. I'll try to be more interactive. I feel like I feel like I'm a sidekick, you know, the Ed McMahon when they introduced Johnny Carson, Ed McMahon didn't go, hey, I'm here too.
Veronique Porter (01:50.385)
You're definitely a main character of Operator.
Jennie (01:52.514)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (01:52.712)
That's right. I'm a sidekick material.
Jennie (01:56.27)
No, you're co-host, you're co-host. So, so yeah, so I think, well, and I think the role that you're playing, you like, you bring the sounding board, you bring really great questions and you bring your generation's perspective on things. And that all is going perfectly. Like it's just, I'm just asking you to.
Papa Rick (01:57.577)
I'll jump in.
Papa Rick (02:15.92)
Yeah, that's the hope is...
We do this and I'm like.
Jennie (02:26.443)
And you're like, what?
Papa Rick (02:27.356)
Yeah, while we do, while we do this, while we do this kind of, I try not to interrupt too. I'm an interrupter. You know, I know while we'll do this, it's like, yeah, this is, I remember doing this to Jennifer. If I had it to do over again, I would probably do this differently. Kind of, you know, like, you know, you know, it's too bad. There's not more training or testing before you get to be a parent, you know, somehow.
Veronique Porter (02:33.318)
I'm sorry.
Veronique Porter (02:42.241)
Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Veronique Porter (02:49.209)
Great. Let's teach them a lesson.
Papa Rick (02:52.848)
It's not that bad getting a driver's license. You know, why is there no parenting license?
Jennie (02:53.154)
We're trying. Parenting Institute.
Veronique Porter (02:59.643)
Mm-hmm. Hehehehehehe.
Jennie (03:01.002)
Right? Parenting licensing. So anyway, so I'm going to welcome everyone to the podcast. Everyone's going to say hello in some way and then we will get started. So welcome back to the relational parenting podcast, everybody. Welcome our guest, Veronique Porter. Welcome. Hi. There it is. All right. So we are on.
Veronique Porter (03:22.145)
Huh? Hehehe.
Papa Rick (03:22.976)
Hello, how you doing?
Papa Rick (03:27.636)
Hahaha
Jennie (03:28.822)
And Veronique, you are, please tell us who you are and what you're up to in the world today.
Veronique Porter (03:37.189)
So my name is Veronique Porter. I often go by V as well. And I run a business called Ampersand Workspace where I work with groups and organizations around race and gender to help them have a better, more welcoming, productive workplace culture and environment. But I spent almost 20 years, maybe it was more than 20 years, something around that, something around the 20-year mark, even though I'm not that old, in child care. It's my longest running career and I'm hired.
Jennie (03:39.394)
Yeah.
Jennie (04:02.99)
Great.
Veronique Porter (04:05.833)
in 2021. So I did all sorts of different types of child care, different ages, the whole shebang, my favorite are babies and toddlers. I was just doing that alongside of my previous career in international development, my travels around the world, I've done it internationally. And when I started in the ampersand workspace, I finally needed all of my bandwidth and all of my time to put towards a business. I'd never done it before. But
Jennie (04:16.043)
Yes.
Jennie (04:29.934)
Mm-hmm.
Veronique Porter (04:34.385)
I miss my littles and I literally have littles all around the world and they really do delight.
Papa Rick (04:36.478)
Aww.
Jennie (04:42.462)
Yeah, you called yourself, you called yourself the forever auntie.
Papa Rick (04:43.294)
Very cool.
Veronique Porter (04:47.745)
Oh yeah. Cause my favorite is, I love littles and I will spend all the time with them and I will play with them and do all of that. But my favorite, absolute favorite thing about them is giving them back to their parents. So, yeah.
Papa Rick (04:48.34)
Ha ha ha.
Jennie (04:49.151)
Yeah, I loved that.
Jennie (05:01.358)
I'm sorry.
Papa Rick (05:04.716)
That's a sort of kind of grandparenting then.
Jennie (05:07.851)
Right?
Veronique Porter (05:07.969)
In a way, I'm happy to be a part of the village, right? Like, you know, I'll be a caregiver in whatever way that I can and help out, but they got to go back home at some point.
Papa Rick (05:10.857)
Yeah.
Jennie (05:18.478)
Right? You can always give them back.
Papa Rick (05:20.66)
nice. And you've got them in France and Africa and where are all your littles internationally?
Veronique Porter (05:21.79)
Yep.
Veronique Porter (05:28.041)
So I have Littles in various spots in the US. I have Littles in Mali, West Africa. They're not so little anymore, actually. They're all kind of. It's been a long time.
Papa Rick (05:32.02)
Okay.
Papa Rick (05:38.804)
That's the problem with 20 years of doing it. They're not little forever, you know.
Veronique Porter (05:41.285)
Right? I was like, how did that happen? I have Littles in Nantes, France, and I got an official godson there as well. And yeah, Littles spots all over the US. Yeah.
Jennie (05:42.263)
Right?
Papa Rick (05:54.3)
Neat.
Jennie (05:56.714)
I love it. And we have, when we were chatting on the phone many months ago to set you up as a guest, you had messaged me and you were like, you're like, hey, I'm also a year, you know, a nanny of 20 years. Cause that's something that I put in my post when I reached out to our group to get guests. And we had a very similar story of nannying for 20 years, taking care of children in various.
Veronique Porter (06:14.867)
Mm.
Jennie (06:24.878)
places for 20 years and then transitioning to being business owners. So we had a lot to talk about in the parenting space and like coming from it as an outsider, quote unquote. Because even though we don't have our own children for me yet, we both had been parenting. Like when you're a nanny, it is.
Veronique Porter (06:41.128)
Mm-hmm.
Jennie (06:53.506)
so intimate. It's such an intimate job. And I don't even like calling it a job because it's such like, yeah, you become more like a forever family member. And like you said, like Auntie, there are children all over the world that call me Auntie. Yeah.
Veronique Porter (07:01.441)
It feels weird to call.
Papa Rick (07:09.undefined)
Yeah, you get attachments.
Veronique Porter (07:15.913)
Yeah, because you're in people's homes, right? So you're taking all the ins and outs of their family as you're also helping to raise their children, right? So you're supporting or uplifting whatever they're investing in their kids, and you're having those serious conversations. You're seeing their developmental process and contributing to it, hopefully positively. So there's no way you walk away from that. And it's like, yeah, it's just a job. I'm logging off. It's like you're like, paparazzi invested, you know?
Papa Rick (07:40.508)
Yeah, yeah. Little different than like being a Sunday school teacher or even a school teacher where, you know, you're expected to go back in the closet at the end of the day and come in, come back out, you know, it's more of a, more of a parenting situation.
Jennie (07:42.082)
Yeah. There's.
Veronique Porter (07:47.939)
Mm-hmm.
Jennie (07:58.606)
When you're with them, many hours weekly on a repeating basis, if not more waking hours than the parents even are. There are some positions where I was awake and actively caring for the children for more hours in the week than the parents were.
Papa Rick (08:10.332)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (08:21.736)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (08:21.766)
Yeah.
Jennie (08:24.406)
And that's like, I mean, I'm at that point, those parents are like asking me what to do with the kids. They're like, this behavior is happening or have you noticed this or have you, you know, whatever. And I'm, you know, I'll be like, that's developmentally normal. We're working on it. This is what we're doing and share what I'm doing. And then they do it, you know, on the weekends when I'm not there so that we're having like a consistency of care across the board and vice versa. If they're like, hey, we've really noticed so-and-so starting to like,
Veronique Porter (08:30.921)
Mm-hmm.
Papa Rick (08:30.926)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (08:39.393)
Mm-hmm.
Papa Rick (08:39.901)
Yeah.
Jennie (08:53.202)
engage in this, this is what we want to do to mitigate, you know, can you help us please? And I'll be like, yeah, I'm on board. Like, let's, I'll do that with them too. Right. And it's really like a, you step in as like a third parent teammate. It's very.
Veronique Porter (09:00.354)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (09:07.029)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (09:07.881)
Yeah, it's definitely a week. Definitely a team for sure. Yeah.
Jennie (09:11.266)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (09:12.492)
When you guys were nannying, you guys, you women, were nannying and helping out with families, did you ever do it with single parent families? With, I mean, was it like, was it ever two moms or a mom and a guy and you? Or was it mostly pairs of parents? I've kind of hooked up on the, got fascinated by the fatherlessness thing.
Jennie (09:19.326)
Ooh, yeah.
Veronique Porter (09:35.689)
Good question.
Yeah.
Papa Rick (09:39.028)
going on in the world. Single parenting is a real common thing out there for parents. Were you able to nanny for single parents? Or is that, I mean, that would be hard to afford, I would think.
Veronique Porter (09:50.833)
Yeah, I think that like I can't recall a family where I was like babysitting here and there. Sure. But like consistently nannying or even like after school care or something like that even. There have been, you know, like continual babysitting sort of things or like, you know, I've done tutoring in the past. So maybe that. But as far as like actual nannying or like really long term like house kids.
Papa Rick (09:56.99)
Mm-hmm.
Papa Rick (10:11.881)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (10:16.156)
Long term, yeah.
Veronique Porter (10:19.005)
Usually I haven't come across any single parents, but I will say that I was raised by a single mom and so that really contributed to like me doing this early on and You know, it feels in some way that I'm like naturally good at it, but it's just that I had training so much earlier on but They're my siblings. So I don't know if it's an innate natural thing for me It's more so that you know I've had that training so early on and so deep and helping out my mom when we were growing up in that
Papa Rick (10:33.372)
Yeah, yeah.
Jennie (10:34.007)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (10:45.3)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (10:46.221)
That definitely related to the ways in which I was able to do that as a caregiver when I was helping out with other families.
Papa Rick (10:54.94)
learning. Yeah. I think a lot, I think comes from being exposed to child care, whether it's older sibling, helping mom, or whether it's, uh, babysitting for, for young girls, you know, going out and doing babysitting and, and learning to deal with children that were not their younger siblings, you know, kind of, kind of training, training women up to, to raise kids. There's so much of that missing now.
Jennie (10:55.531)
How?
Papa Rick (11:24.424)
you know, going into other people's homes. I bet the whole industry of babysitting as a teenager is different now.
Veronique Porter (11:32.581)
Yeah, I don't even know if they do that as much anymore. Most of it, times perhaps, but yeah, also folks are looking for like, you know, somebody that they feel like is reliable or trustworthy. And we just don't, we don't look at adolescents that way anymore. They're so, and not to invoke like a helicopter caregiver sort of thing, but it's like, I really want to make sure that the kids are good, right? And like they have all these things.
Papa Rick (11:35.792)
Yeah, going into people's homes and...
Yeah.
Papa Rick (11:57.264)
Yeah, yeah.
Veronique Porter (11:59.877)
And so I think back in the day, it was very much so like, you just need to keep them alive, you know, 16 year old, 14 year old, they're gonna be like, warm something up. And it's like, no, they have routines, they have structure, they have things. So now we need to really respond to do those things. So it's falling away culturally for sure. Not that it doesn't exist, but it's definitely falling away a little bit.
Jennie (12:04.095)
Yep.
Papa Rick (12:05.394)
That's right. Minimize the blood.
Jennie (12:06.624)
Yup.
Jennie (12:13.761)
Huh?
Papa Rick (12:15.622)
Yeah?
Papa Rick (12:21.96)
Yeah, yeah, so different.
Jennie (12:23.15)
I was going to say, I see it depends on, I've seen differences in income levels. So parents who can afford the luxury of a full-time nanny or even a part-time nanny are wanting someone who is 25 plus. A lot of them are looking for someone in their late 20s, early 30s, or they're looking for like older women who have like retired.
Veronique Porter (12:31.957)
Okay.
Papa Rick (12:37.023)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (12:37.057)
Absolutely.
Jennie (12:50.09)
but who are still running around capable, et cetera, who know child development, who are experienced, have five plus years of experience with children, especially if they've got a newborn, they're looking for a newborn care specialist. But those are people who with dual incomes and they're like doctors, lawyers, in marketing, in finance, making a lot of money. I've seen...
Veronique Porter (13:05.249)
NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN
Papa Rick (13:07.6)
Specialist
Papa Rick (13:13.396)
Very privileged, yeah.
Veronique Porter (13:13.589)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Jennie (13:18.146)
in smaller towns and areas where when I do job searches and stuff on different websites for jobs, there are a lot, or even in a lot of the Facebook groups that I'm in, there are lower income families who hire teenagers, not like 14 year olds, but like 16 and up.
Veronique Porter (13:32.574)
Good.
Veronique Porter (13:43.047)
Mm.
Jennie (13:43.474)
But they are looking at like these teenagers are posting like I've taken CPR. I know this. I know like I have first aid CPR. I've got this. I've been, you know, I'm the oldest sibling. I've been helping with my siblings for a long time, you know, and they're hiring them not necessarily as full-time nannies, but as like after school nannies with older kids, things like that.
Veronique Porter (13:55.645)
Okay.
Papa Rick (14:06.502)
Hmm.
Jennie (14:08.982)
But it is definitely, nannying has also become more of a career. Whereas before it was like a minimum wage kind of entry level gig that girls, usually girls, sometimes boys, but usually girls were doing like while they were in high school or college and it wasn't like a career option. Um, and it wasn't seen or respected as one either.
Veronique Porter (14:31.826)
Mm-hmm.
Papa Rick (14:34.544)
Yes.
Jennie (14:36.951)
until really the last like five years.
Papa Rick (14:37.361)
Exactly.
Veronique Porter (14:37.669)
Yeah, but...
Mm-hmm
Jennie (14:42.686)
Yeah. But to answer your question really quick, dad, I did work for one single mom. She was, I was like 19. It was the summer that I was 19, I think. And she hired me, but she wasn't paying me like, cause she had one income, right? She was divorced. And so there was, so she,
Papa Rick (14:47.904)
Hmm.
Veronique Porter (14:52.554)
Mmm.
Papa Rick (15:09.268)
Certainly.
Jennie (15:12.674)
had her full-time job, she needed a full-time nanny for her three kids for the summer. And she said that she had applied to, I think it was the state that she was getting child, like a childcare stipend that she had applied for and that she would pay me when that came through. Well, that came through at the end of the summer. And so for three months of work though, I got paid, I think like $800.
Veronique Porter (15:27.643)
Oh yeah
Papa Rick (15:30.734)
Okay.
Jennie (15:42.918)
Yeah. Like at the time I was 19, I was just like, I was kind of like, I just, I didn't care that much. But, but yeah, I mean, it was, it was nothing. And it
Veronique Porter (15:43.307)
Ugh.
Papa Rick (15:44.113)
It's just amazing.
Papa Rick (15:59.976)
not representative of the value.
Jennie (16:04.026)
Yeah, but I mean, but anyway, that was also 16 years ago. 17, 17 years, 16, I don't know. How old am I? 16. Right, when you said, V, when you said at the beginning, you're like, I was in child care for 20 years. Not that I'm that old. I say it all the time. I'm like, OK, I've also been in child care for over 20 years now. I'm sorry.
Papa Rick (16:05.032)
really in some ways.
Veronique Porter (16:11.996)
Mm-hmm.
Papa Rick (16:12.768)
And there's that 20 years creeping up on you again. Yeah.
Veronique Porter (16:15.241)
It's so weird.
Veronique Porter (16:28.193)
I think people look at me crazy like, how? You know, like.
Jennie (16:31.222)
Like how? Yeah, like you're not old enough for that. And I'm like, I know, but it's true. Right? Yeah. Not counting six year old. Yeah. No.
Papa Rick (16:34.372)
I started when I was six. Yeah.
Veronique Porter (16:36.437)
Hehehe
Papa Rick (16:40.564)
Since I got out of kindergarten, I was in childcare.
Jennie (16:44.342)
Right? My dollies will vouch for me.
Veronique Porter (16:48.266)
I'm sorry.
Papa Rick (16:48.392)
Well, when you're, when you're a kid, if you're, if you're helping a single parent, you know, that's really kind of probably true, you know, watch your, watch your little brother for a few minutes while I, uh, run outside and get the mail or whatever, you know, whatever, all the, uh, single moms need help, man. Yeah.
Veronique Porter (17:01.809)
I mean, we don't run the household, right? Like I was good at cleaning. I was taking the siblings back and forth to school, making sure their forms are clean. You know, I literally helped her manage the household in that way. Otherwise, I don't know how to do it. Okay. Yes.
Papa Rick (17:08.733)
Yeah!
Papa Rick (17:14.527)
Fully function... Yeah, yeah, fully functioning parenting part.
Veronique Porter (17:21.374)
Yeah.
Jennie (17:23.783)
Um, so.
Papa Rick (17:24.816)
Ooh, Jenny was talking about parentifying. We had an episode about parentifying kids. That's, oh, I just love this, you know, drawing box, I think in boxes and arrows. And so all the little topics we come up with, you know, that's, it's like, well, okay, sometimes you need to do that. And yeah, it's interesting.
Jennie (17:28.238)
Mmm.
Veronique Porter (17:28.993)
Mmm.
Veronique Porter (17:33.143)
Oh, yeah.
Veronique Porter (17:42.963)
Yeah.
Jennie (17:48.879)
So V, were you the oldest?
Veronique Porter (17:53.385)
Frankly enough, no. I always joke, I am the oldest. I am the oldest girl though, which, you know, gender, I can't gender. But my older brother is like almost 10 years older than me. So you know, he was just in a completely different, completely different thing. And he helped the house a lot. He just wasn't there.
Jennie (17:55.52)
Okay.
Papa Rick (17:56.182)
Uh oh.
Papa Rick (18:02.018)
Oh, yeah.
Jennie (18:02.029)
Yeah.
Jennie (18:13.09)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (18:17.104)
Yeah, yeah, not to be sexist or anything, but there's a boys and girls are different. You know, that's the boys are not. Yeah.
Veronique Porter (18:23.773)
But we're second rate? For sure. Ha ha ha.
Jennie (18:28.578)
Well, but that leads us to the topic that I am really excited for you to share with our audience, with our parents, who are looking at having, you know, with their older kids having these really difficult conversations, especially with the social climate today, with race and gender being such hot topics, and really the veil being pulled back, because it's not that these things haven't existed.
Papa Rick (18:29.863)
Interesting.
Veronique Porter (18:45.752)
Mm.
Meh.
Jennie (18:56.79)
forever and constantly. It's just that no one's been paying attention to them except for the people suffering. Right? And so I am curious about the work that you are doing not only with corporations, but what you've also seen and what you can share with our parents in the way of like how to have these conversations with their children as they're
Papa Rick (19:01.684)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (19:04.734)
Mm-hmm.
Jennie (19:26.67)
growing up as they're seeing the real world and experiencing these conversations from peers or other adults in their lives.
Papa Rick (19:29.704)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (19:37.013)
I think in general, you know, race and gender ended up being such a heavy topic, even for adults, right? And we hold so many sensitivities and so much discomfort around that. That's literally a lot of my work is with adult folks in the office is helping unpack some of that, right? Because there isn't really a way to do that. Right? The internet is not necessarily a safe space. And often our friends are an echo chamber, right? And so
Papa Rick (19:47.208)
Yeah.
Jennie (19:55.408)
Mm-hmm.
Papa Rick (19:55.444)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (20:00.372)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (20:03.665)
If that's our experience, when we have children, when we're around children, we wanna shield them from that. We wanna protect them from that. And they don't have to deal with that right now. But the tricky part is, is that before that, when the utero, race and gender stuff is coming into play, period. And so I really do honestly feel there's a way to have an age appropriate conversation about anything with a child. It's not easy.
Jennie (20:18.988)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (20:19.4)
Yeah.
Jennie (20:27.779)
Yes.
Veronique Porter (20:29.161)
Don't get me wrong, it's not easy. And that idea of a parent being on all the time and then they get one of those topics and it's like, I don't have it, what's the language? So I'm not saying it's easy, but we have to not shield children from that until they expose it in the world, until it becomes a problem. We need to start preparing them from day one. And we talk about indoctrinating children. As parents, we're always telling children what we think they need to know in order to be good human beings on this earth.
Papa Rick (20:37.65)
Ah, that's right!
Veronique Porter (20:58.377)
And those race and gender conversations are part of that. You don't want to be on the defense of, they've already been exposed so much, it's already a problem now, now how can I correct it? You can give them tools, again, age appropriate tools from day one that really prepares them. So when, you know, for example, if I were to have a child and my child goes to school and gets called a derogatory term, I would hope I've prepared my child, and it's not that it's not gonna hurt, it's not that it's not gonna be a conversation, right?
Jennie (21:21.627)
Mmm.
Papa Rick (21:22.357)
What are you?
Veronique Porter (21:27.989)
but it'll be a different conversation if I've already been talking about race and gender with that child versus if they had no idea whatsoever. There are all these stories that come out now about adults my age that are like, the first time I realized I was black was when I was called a name at school, right? Like black, right? When you realize you were other in society or something like that. So I wouldn't want my child to go into that blind. I would want my child to already have a healthy sense of what being black is. So that when it gets called,
Jennie (21:43.298)
Hmm.
Papa Rick (21:44.298)
Oh nice. Ah.
Jennie (21:48.663)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (21:49.952)
Yeah.
Jennie (21:56.062)
Yeah. Yes. Yes, like a pride, a built foundation. Yes.
Veronique Porter (21:57.909)
They're like, I know that doesn't define me, right? We still get.
Papa Rick (22:00.211)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (22:03.753)
Yeah, like it bounces as opposed to cutting deeper, right? And it applies to all children of all races and all genders. Having these conversations, again age-appropriate, that's the tricky part, but having those conversations when they arise beforehand as they come up and being able to just kind of like give them those little tidbits, it really does help prepare them so that even when they're having those same age-appropriate things happening in school, they know how to deal, they know how to talk to their friends about it, and they might even be, you know.
Jennie (22:07.158)
Yes.
Veronique Porter (22:32.701)
the leaders of that conversation with their peers.
Jennie (22:35.319)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (22:35.688)
Yeah, that's really why we're doing this is getting there's I had dinner with a couple of guests I'd like to have on next year, Jenny brought up kind of got me thinking about the fatherlessness things. There's a there's a whole there's a whole group, a large group of people that are being raised that haven't been exposed. Don't don't know that. I mean, you're talking about getting out in front. What's the difference between indoctrination and preparing?
Veronique Porter (23:03.487)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (23:03.556)
It's like, well, we know this is going to happen around here. And so you can call it in. I'd be interesting to pick apart the people who call that kind of thing indoctrination, but you know, it's like, Hey, this is going to happen. And I'd like to get out in front of it so that when it happens, I know what to say. They, they know it's not right. Um, I was kind of a sheltered protected, I think kid, I was the fifth of five and
Jennie (23:03.928)
Mmm.
Veronique Porter (23:06.959)
Mm-hmm.
Jennie (23:31.863)
Me too.
Papa Rick (23:33.092)
And a lot of, yeah, well, you weren't the fifth, but yeah. But yeah, exactly. I remember she, she called once and had jumped out, just, just pulled up to the convenience store for a minute and jumped out of the car to run in and left her purse in there and there was somebody sitting in the car right there waiting for that and, and ripped her off. You know, you could see the video. I think you had a piece of the video or something. You could see the second she slammed the door and headed in there.
Jennie (23:35.042)
Denver was a rude awakening for baby Jenny. Ha ha ha.
Veronique Porter (23:53.524)
No.
Papa Rick (24:01.832)
The guy next to her was coming out of his car. They were just, you know, and it's like, we don't get that in small town America very much.
Jennie (24:08.75)
I had never locked my car doors in my life. I got robbed three times and my car got stolen before I finally fucking figured out to lock everything, hide everything and don't leave yourself vulnerable. That's how small town I was. It took like five years for me to figure out that I lived in a big city and to stop fucking around with your shit.
Papa Rick (24:18.609)
Yeah.
And I remember.
Veronique Porter (24:27.873)
I'm gonna go to bed.
Papa Rick (24:28.424)
Yeah, yeah, you got to look at, I felt bad a little bit going, you know, I don't know how I would have prepared you for that. You know, it's that's your kind of your job as your parent is it's like, well, I, you know, I'm sorry that plane fell on your head. I wish I had known how to prepare you better for that. But that's after the fact, what you're doing V is, is terrific. Is, is let, okay. Let's everybody get it out there.
Veronique Porter (24:34.997)
Yeah.
Jennie (24:35.666)
In our town, yeah.
Jennie (24:43.487)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (24:51.588)
And this is, I think this is a good platform for it. Cause everybody's flipping through looking at videos. If we can get that out there and get people thinking about it, then, you know, the world's a better place for it. And, and thanks. So thanks for being here. This gets us thinking.
Veronique Porter (24:58.567)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (25:04.953)
And you know, today it's a little bit easier, right, in that like children, because kids are like on iPads and on screens, right, like they're seeing different shows, the characters, right, and you can ask them questions. You know, you can buy all sorts of diverse books that show different types of lifestyles and life and color and gender expression and all sorts of things that literally, you know, A, normalizes that people are just different, right,
Papa Rick (25:13.864)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (25:26.548)
Okay.
Jennie (25:32.95)
Yes.
Veronique Porter (25:33.641)
normalize that from day one. But I'm often surprised, and I think this is why I have so much fun around children, the ways in which their curiosity manifests. And so a question that you would anticipate that an adult would ask is not the way the kid is going to ask, and it's not the subject the kid is going to think about, or even what they would like to focus on. And so again, you don't have to sit your child down and give them lessons on how to do this and how to do that.
Jennie (25:48.522)
Uh-uh. Yeah.
Papa Rick (25:57.245)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (25:59.293)
But at the same time, when they have that random question, instead of brushing it off, to really have a conversation about it, you know?
Papa Rick (26:05.812)
Yeah, yeah.
Jennie (26:06.006)
Yes, or even in their in daily life and experiences, like when you have your three, four, five, six year old with you and you're running around running errands at the grocery store, whatever, like they might run, you know, experience, they might point out someone who looks different than them or whatever. And you can have very or run into someone at preschool, you know, or they, you know, a teacher said something about this, that boys do this and girls do that, like whatever it is, or these topics will come up very, very organically.
and to take that moment and like you said, not brush it aside, but take that opportunity. Like the experience is presenting itself. Have that conversation, let it be a little teaching moment. Take five minutes and be like, that's so interesting you teacher said that, you know, in our house, this is what we value, this is what we see, this is the world, you know, this is how the world works and have that conversation.
Veronique Porter (26:36.269)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (26:49.189)
Mm-hmm.
Veronique Porter (26:59.813)
Yeah, it's even small things like earlier when Papa Rick corrects himself about saying you guys that was something that I started doing last year. I was trying to eradicate doing that all the time and I still slip up too. But I was with... That's all we can do is try progress over perfection. And I said you guys and then I corrected it and said like y'all because I love y'all and
Jennie (27:10.123)
Yes.
Papa Rick (27:14.428)
I try.
Jennie (27:18.498)
Hehehehehehe
Papa Rick (27:20.008)
Yeah
Papa Rick (27:27.912)
There you go.
Jennie (27:27.946)
Y'all.
Veronique Porter (27:29.977)
One of the girls, she's about eight years old at the moment, she was like, what's wrong with you guys? Like why wouldn't you say you guys? And so I was like, well, there are a lot of different reasons, but look at all of you, you're a girl, the other three were actually boys. But I was like, you're a girl, and so it doesn't make sense for me to call you all guys because you're not all guys. It would be really weird and jarring if I called you all girls. So I really approach it, just saying what it is, and that's it. I'm really trying to work on not saying you guys.
Papa Rick (27:36.264)
Nice question.
Jennie (27:54.083)
Right?
Veronique Porter (27:59.937)
because that's not appropriate for everybody and everybody's not necessarily a guy, so I don't wanna normalize that anymore in my own vocabulary. And she thought about it and was like, well, you know, everybody does it or says it. And I was like, it's not something that I'm gonna correct you about, but it's something that I've chosen because it's in line with how I wanna operate in the world and I don't think that's the right way to go about it. So that's why I'm correcting myself, but it's a choice that I've made for me, even if society is not on board with it. And...
Papa Rick (27:59.996)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (28:27.933)
Okay, kept moving, started talking about something else. But those little...
Papa Rick (28:34.673)
That's a real good point. I mean, we have to start by changing ourselves, right? If you want the world to be different, if not who, me, if not now, when, and without, yeah, and you wanna do it so that people get on board with it. You don't wanna be over-militant with it, because I mean, the language doesn't even have constructs for that, you know? I mean, you...
Veronique Porter (28:38.514)
Mmm.
Veronique Porter (28:45.044)
Yeah.
And they see it. Look it up, you know?
Papa Rick (29:01.288)
We grew up saying you guys and there isn't really a, you know, y'all is kind of a Southern thing. It's like we have, sometimes there just aren't the words for it that we got to kind of come at it organically. Yeah.
Veronique Porter (29:07.106)
Mm-hmm.
Veronique Porter (29:12.58)
Mm-hmm. Yep.
Jennie (29:13.486)
I was going to say, you guys, for me, I was like, I had like a little like hint of pride, dad, when you corrected yourself. I didn't even think of it as anything until you corrected it. And I was just like, oh, like, that's like, he's like, you know, your awareness and you're like, you're like, you know, enlightening yourself, like all of those things. But I, to me, the phrase you guys has always been neutral. The word.
Veronique Porter (29:23.461)
Thank you.
Papa Rick (29:25.513)
No sir.
Papa Rick (29:33.32)
You try. Yeah.
Jennie (29:42.53)
guys has never, like, yeah, if you're saying like all those guys over there, then it means I'm talking about a group of men, males, right? But if I'm just like, come on, you guys, like, listen, or whatever, you know, whatever. That was always neutral to me. But that's also because it's been normalized and used in different instances, etc. And to, you know,
Veronique Porter (29:44.594)
Mmm.
Papa Rick (30:00.288)
Hehehehe
Jennie (30:12.674)
bring the awareness to the language that we're using to be more precise with our language. To be, it's even past serving, serving to bring awareness to gender and being sensitive to that issue and the comfort of the people that you're addressing. It also just makes you a better speaker and communicator. Like it makes you pay attention to the rest of your language.
Papa Rick (30:41.965)
more precise. Yeah.
Jennie (30:43.391)
and how you affect the world.
Veronique Porter (30:46.525)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (30:47.324)
Yeah, recognition, it's bordering on political correctness, which can be overdone, but it's also more precise and it recognizes that there is diversity. There are people, especially with all the transgender stuff going on, there are people who that affects them. And so it's like, well, let's be polite and let's not, it's not that, I mean, there's also.
Jennie (30:47.607)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (31:11.944)
There also can be people that can be offended. You know, sometimes people are just in a tough place and just all they need is one more. You're on my last nerve kind of thing. And so it's like, you know, okay, well, we can pretty easy to just make our language a little more precise and stay away, you know, don't be, don't be stepping on people's nerves if you don't have to is I don't know. For me, political correctness a lot of time really just boils down to being polite.
Veronique Porter (31:22.85)
I'm out.
Papa Rick (31:41.44)
consider it, you know, instead of, yeah, instead of just being, well, I have a right to say that and so I'm going to be ignorant, you know.
Veronique Porter (31:42.842)
and respectful. Yep.
Veronique Porter (31:51.834)
I say to people all the time who like to argue with me about the use of the N-word and how they get to use it. Usually people that look like me that I'm having this argument with. And it's like, if one person has expressed that it is possibly problematic to a group of people, is that not enough for you? Like what? That like you are holding on to the right to say that so much for.
Papa Rick (31:57.637)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (32:10.325)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Jennie (32:13.26)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (32:17.78)
Yeah. What is... Help me understand why you need to bother everybody. Yeah.
Veronique Porter (32:19.233)
Why do you need to say it at the end of the video? Yeah. So it is one of those things where, to me, it always boils down to the idea of, like, there's a difference between I didn't know and I know and I'm still going to choose to do this because you don't want to respect or acknowledge or just treat people with kindness.
Jennie (32:32.366)
Uh huh.
Papa Rick (32:39.356)
Yeah, that's a big red flag for me when people do that. And just in terms of being part of the tribe, you know, you know, being part of the village and people deliberately, when it becomes apparent someone is deliberately kind of irritating half the tribe here around half of our group. It's like what is and their justification is, well, I have a right to do that. Then I'm like, OK, you know, yeah.
Jennie (32:39.575)
Yes.
Veronique Porter (32:47.539)
Mm-hmm.
Veronique Porter (33:05.633)
else.
Papa Rick (33:09.124)
If that's the only reason you're doing that is to exercise your power over other people, then you're not, Mike, you're not, I don't want you in my tribe.
Veronique Porter (33:13.929)
Hmm?
Jennie (33:17.09)
See, and then the behaviorist in me goes, what's the need behind that behavior, behind that need for control, that need to hold on to self, that sovereignty, that right, I have the right, I have, it's like, okay, that person is feeling not in control of their life somewhere, somewhere in there, they're feeling like they don't have power. And so that's like where the tribe,
Papa Rick (33:24.199)
Mm-hmm.
Veronique Porter (33:37.236)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (33:38.984)
Yeah, yeah.
Jennie (33:45.858)
can come in and be, and this is like, you know, in a regular modern setting where like, if you V, you know, I use the N word and you say, hey, like that's not cool, that's really derogatory. Please don't say that word around me. Please don't say it around other black people ever. Like, and you, and you.
Papa Rick (34:07.656)
Yeah, just don't say it. Just, uh, yeah. Give it up.
Jennie (34:09.358)
You kindly explain that to me and my reaction to you is to be like, I'm an American and I can say whatever I want to say. And like, you know, in that situation, you're not going to then seek to heal me or look at the need behind my behavior. But in a tribal setting or in a home family setting, like where are the places that we can respond to people who make that claim who argue for that, that
grip on control. Where can we tap into that and speak to it and help them understand the effect that they're having? We're not trying to take your power away. No one's trying to control you. You are in control of your life. In fact, the way that you're expressing yourself is like there's a cause and effect.
Veronique Porter (34:57.686)
Yeah.
Jennie (35:05.394)
and you can control the effect you have on the world. That's the control that you have.
Papa Rick (35:10.903)
Hmm.
Veronique Porter (35:11.477)
that you brought that up because, you know, I feel like at the root of all this race and gender stuff, whether you're a kid or an adult, it is about this power, right? It's about a power dynamic. It always has. And you hit the nail on the head when you're saying, you know, when folks are really pushing back, even when the rhetoric makes no sense, even when it's just because I want to, because I have the right, it does come back to, I feel like a loss of power and I need to exert that over someone. So, completely. But that's why for me, it's much easier to have
Jennie (35:19.734)
Yeah. Yes.
Papa Rick (35:20.657)
It is, it is, yeah.
Veronique Porter (35:40.865)
small conversations, right? And so like, they can't take place because I don't know you, you don't know me, we haven't figured out tone, what's my reason for trying to correct you versus, your, like, nothing's gonna get done. But when you're, they, you,
Papa Rick (35:43.624)
Yeah.
Jennie (35:54.838)
Right. It's just going to be a confrontation.
Papa Rick (35:59.496)
That's well, it's true in business. That's true in a lot of places, you know, where it's like, let's start with four key people and then we'll, we'll eventually have a conversation with 25 people when we kind of have some people who can guide the conversation. But yeah, starting off with two mobs. That's not a, that's not a great problem solving strategy.
Veronique Porter (35:59.701)
but in person.
Veronique Porter (36:03.433)
Y-Y-Y-Y-
Veronique Porter (36:17.757)
And part of it is like, let's have this conversation in a way that's safe and creating that safe. Like I know, even though I feel like you're very wrong, I can see that you're hurting, right? So that grace is important, but I see you as a person, I see you as an individual, and this isn't necessarily like a personal frailty that can't be fixed, that you're completely broken or you're completely trashed or you're completely rotten.
Papa Rick (36:31.124)
sampling. Yeah.
Veronique Porter (36:45.237)
there's something there that needs to be fixed, right? And I can do that in a conversation. But if we're talking about on the internet or just random person in passing, we're not getting anywhere with that. But with people we know and a family in a community, approaching them with that sort of grace and that sort of understanding does help you get aid to the root of the problem much more quickly. But also how can we come up with methods for you to like understand a bit better how we can be in community together as opposed to there being a power relationship?
Papa Rick (36:47.656)
Yeah.
Jennie (36:56.534)
Right?
Papa Rick (37:14.3)
Yeah, yeah, needing to exert compensation that need to exert your power in, you know, over other people. Yeah. Powerlessness is not good.
Jennie (37:15.382)
Yes.
Veronique Porter (37:19.857)
Yeah.
Jennie (37:24.09)
We did an episode, I can't remember, a few episodes ago, and we got into talking about the only thing you are in control of is yourself and the way that you respond to the world around you, your own actions, your own choices. You cannot control other people, you cannot control the chaos of the things that happen that occur in the world. The weather is the...
Veronique Porter (37:39.401)
Here.
Papa Rick (37:40.776)
gets right down to it.
Jennie (37:52.302)
perfect example of that. No one can control the weather, right? We can't control natural disasters. I mean, there's some climate change stuff that plays into that, right? But you can't go push a button and control it, right? And so we touched on that in a past episode and it applies here. That all you have is your choice, your actions, and you're not
Veronique Porter (37:54.653)
Mmm.
Veronique Porter (38:05.619)
Right.
Veronique Porter (38:13.599)
Mm-hmm.
Jennie (38:21.462)
the way to make the choices that you want to make, what effect do you want to have on this world and make choices according to that, to your values. Not based on what I can be in control of, who I can have power over or whatever. You don't have power over anyone, except maybe your child, in which case it's abuse. Um.
Papa Rick (38:30.88)
Mm-hmm.
Veronique Porter (38:40.432)
area.
Papa Rick (38:43.216)
Well, you yeah, I mean, you can. I mean, parenting, especially that's an especially powerful parenting concept, I think is yes, I can grab you and lock you in the closet. And I am bigger than you. And is that one of your values? I mean, is that what you, because that's what they're going to do to their kids when they grow up. If, if, you know, you know, so yeah, so it's, it kind of requires some, a certain amount of relaxation to be able, you know,
Jennie (38:48.812)
Yeah.
Jennie (38:55.81)
Mm-hmm.
Veronique Porter (38:58.441)
Mm.
Jennie (39:03.778)
Right? You're spreading that into the world.
Papa Rick (39:12.972)
a certain amount of money, a certain amount of being in a place where you can stop and think about what you're doing as opposed to feeling like, you know, I think the compensation when people are just are just exerting power to exert power, you know, I think that's a sign they're coming from some place pretty tough where, you know, you have to exert power just to keep people from coming over and grabbing you and locking you in a closet or whatever, you know, they're coming from a different place.
Veronique Porter (39:36.681)
Yeah, yeah.
They're awesome. Yeah.
Papa Rick (39:41.08)
Yeah, you know, and so that's, that's where diversity, being familiar with the concept of diversity and, you know, being exposed to things, having a little, uh, a little broader experience is good. That's why, that's why parochialism, you know, being isolated is, is not good. You got to get out in the world. That's why, that's why I have so much respect for going, you know, I went to France to learn French. It's like, wow, I wish I'd have had the guts to do that when I was young, you know?
Jennie (39:55.276)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (40:09.384)
Let's get up and go see how another, you know, go to Africa, go to France, go see how other parts of the world work. And so then you're not quite so surprised when somebody steals your purse when you leave it sitting in your car, you know, it's like, I've been in a big city before. Oh yeah. You know, good, good to have experiences.
Veronique Porter (40:14.847)
Yeah.
Jennie (40:22.582)
Right?
Veronique Porter (40:23.051)
Hehehehe
Yeah.
Jennie (40:27.206)
V, do you, I've been thinking about this for about 20 minutes. Usually things disappear in that amount of time and I'm like, well, it's gone now. But this one has stuck around, so I feel like it's important. Earlier you were talking about having these conversations with our children and you were talking about...
Papa Rick (40:27.95)
Oh my.
Papa Rick (40:41.052)
I make, I write stuff down, yeah, yeah.
Veronique Porter (40:45.814)
Hehehe
Jennie (40:55.454)
you know, different races and kids have, you know, experiencing these things out in the world and being proactive. I'm curious on your, with your expertise, if you feel, I'm trying to, let's see, how do I want to ask this? Do you feel like different families, different races?
Papa Rick (41:03.785)
Yeah.
Jennie (41:23.522)
that conversation looks different inside of different families of different races. A white family versus an Asian family versus a black family.
Papa Rick (41:28.36)
Huh, like Asian, black.
Hmm.
Veronique Porter (41:36.857)
were hearing a lot of those same things in the past couple of years around like the talk that Black people have with and my mother's never had the talk with me in part because I was born and raised in Chicago like you know we were you know negative interaction with the police were like day one or like days in which Chicago is one of the most diverse cities in the world but also very segregated always happened continues to be so
Jennie (41:41.943)
Mm-hmm.
Papa Rick (41:49.362)
Hahaha.
Papa Rick (41:53.692)
Yeah. Oh.
Papa Rick (42:04.466)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (42:06.345)
Growing up in that sort of air. I never had to have the talk But this idea of like being aware of your blackness very early on right and what that means People treat you and how you are supposed to act in certain spaces so that people treat you well You know if I'm downtown Chicago, you know how people are perceiving me and especially even their versus now so that idea of You know the conversations that I'm having out of my home versus like a white family who is not talking about race at all who's not
necessarily, you know, equipping their children to think about themselves in public spaces with the question of race on their brain, right? When boys go out and about, it's like, you'll be fine. As to where one girl can go out, it's like, watch your drink, protect yourself, stay with your friends, don't, you know, do... You shouldn't wear XYZ thing. So of course those conversations are different.
Papa Rick (42:45.511)
Yeah.
Jennie (42:55.168)
Yes.
Papa Rick (42:56.017)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (43:04.817)
Yes, those conversations should look different because, you know, the way in which a white family talks about race and the way a black family talks about race is completely different because of the way in which they experience race. But that doesn't mean they shouldn't be talking about race, right? So in the same way that, like, Black people are having to talk about race in general with their children, everybody else should be talking about race and how that plays out into the world. And so that shouldn't be something that, you know, kids are...
Jennie (43:16.95)
Yes.
Papa Rick (43:26.344)
Yeah.
Jennie (43:26.378)
Yes.
Veronique Porter (43:33.597)
having conversations about in college, critically. They should be having those conversations critically in their homes from day one, you know? Yeah.
Jennie (43:35.969)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (43:40.34)
Day one, yeah.
Jennie (43:41.61)
It's just like, it's just like, um, with, with gender, with sexual predators. I am so sorry. You were still talking. You.
Veronique Porter (43:48.037)
Oh, no.
Papa Rick (43:50.96)
I'm losing your sound a little bit sometimes too. Yep, yep.
Jennie (43:52.918)
The mic cut out, yeah.
Veronique Porter (43:53.618)
Me?
Oh, that's rude. Sorry about that.
Papa Rick (43:58.761)
Sorry.
Jennie (43:59.042)
That's okay. What was your finishing thought on that?
Veronique Porter (44:03.361)
It was just that there are, you know, again, I know that that's not easy, but there are tools for that. And there are resources these days, and there are age-appropriate ways to go about it. But it still needs to be done.
Papa Rick (44:14.164)
Yeah.
Jennie (44:15.658)
Yeah, it makes me think of how just recently, especially with like the Me Too movement, the discussion about sexual predators was just with young girls and women. And we were the victims, right, most of the time. We were the victims of that violence.
instead of the discussion being amongst boys and men and raising your sons to not be like that, to control themselves, to have how to respect what consent looks like, etc. The conversation was simply about girls and how to protect yourself and victim blaming. And I think that there's a parallel with race here in that Black families have been having this discussion for centuries.
Papa Rick (44:47.392)
We're tough. We don't like to talk about that.
Papa Rick (44:55.985)
Yeah.
Jennie (45:08.534)
Whereas white families or other races who have not experienced that level of racism were either completely fucking blind to it or were perpetuating the racism. And so it was either getting swept under the rug and not talked about or it was being perpetuated. Meanwhile,
Veronique Porter (45:08.609)
Mm-hmm.
Jennie (45:31.522)
the victims of the racism were the ones having the conversations about how to protect themselves, how to act, how to, and being victim blamed basically. And so I see this responsibility in white families, in Asian, and in any family, but I mean, let's be honest, the white families, colonizers, like that's the kind of the base, the source of it, where it all begins.
is there's their needs like, what do they call it? Color blindness was a hashtag that came up during the pandemic with all the race revelations of white families not being like, oh, well, I don't see color. I'm not racist because I don't see color. And the response from victims of racism was, well, that's not helpful either because it's real.
Papa Rick (46:26.949)
Wait a minute, yeah.
Jennie (46:28.67)
And this is happening to us and you need to see color and have an understanding of what's occurring.
Papa Rick (46:33.928)
Yeah, that's sticking your head in the sand. I'm also seeing, there's a new movie out, Sound of Freedom, about the slave trade, the sexualization, right? Slavery hasn't always only happened to black people. I mean, that's been around, conquered nations and slave the other people, and it's kind of a social thing. You can't ignore it.
Veronique Porter (46:36.094)
Exactly, exactly.
Veronique Porter (46:46.25)
Yes.
Papa Rick (47:03.612)
You know, it's not like, oh, I'm colorblind. I don't see color. It's like, yeah, you need to acknowledge it and adapt. You know, people have trauma when people have a trauma, you acknowledge, okay, I'm not going to put, I'm not going to pick on that particular scab of yours, you know, just to be part of the, just to the tribe runs better. Um, and now we're finding out that.
Veronique Porter (47:26.474)
Mm-hmm.
Papa Rick (47:29.052)
You know, the Jeffrey Epstein and all that, you know, there's a Truman, there's a lot more that I like the internet, because it helps. That kind of thing is easier to hide slavery. Whether whether it's trafficking or whatever, it doesn't what's the what's the newspaper motto about truth dies in darkness or something like that, you know?
Veronique Porter (47:41.778)
Mmm.
Papa Rick (47:57.14)
It's bringing to light a bunch of things that we are now having to, at least in this country, deal with and find words for, because it was so well hidden for so long. You know, we didn't really have the words. Like Eskimos are supposed to have 400 words for snow. You know, most people have one or two or three about snow. We're having to develop vocabulary in the language to even talk about some of this stuff.
at the level, you know, when you start to dig into it and get precise with your language, it's like, well, I don't really have a word for that. What do we call that? You know, you're having to make up words. So we experiment with color blindness. It's like, well, no, that's not really quite right. It's right. I enjoy watching the, watching the world evolve. It's not always comfortable or nice, you know, but as thinking human beings, if we're going to make the world a better place, we got to learn how to do it and to tie it all back.
Veronique Porter (48:30.505)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (48:51.572)
parenting is where it starts. You know, as parents we need to get with it and figure out how to talk to our kids and other kids.
You know, it's the valuable skills. Good. Be aware of this stuff. You can't start until you're aware of it.
Veronique Porter (49:08.106)
period.
Papa Rick (49:12.undefined)
Sorry, see, when I talk, I go for a while. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
Veronique Porter (49:14.687)
NOBODY
Jennie (49:15.303)
No, I love it. I was listening.
Veronique Porter (49:18.253)
I'm reflecting on the fact that like it's really refreshing, I think, to hear from someone of your generation that like, you know, this is important conversation to have and this is important discourse to take up and these are important things for us to work on. Because I think the overall idea is that, you know, Gen Z is doing this work and Gen Z is pushing this forward. And you know, you are Gen Z and here you are.
Jennie (49:43.406)
I'm sorry.
Papa Rick (49:44.768)
Gen Z has no clue how to proceed because they're, you know, they haven't been trained up. We kind of screwed up later generations in some ways, you know, and so we got to, we're like grandparents now. It's time to start fixing that a little bit.
Papa Rick (50:03.816)
Then I lost, I'm sorry, I lost your sound again there. Go ahead.
Jennie (50:04.715)
today.
Veronique Porter (50:07.55)
I'm so sorry about that. I don't know what's happening.
Papa Rick (50:10.14)
internet.
Jennie (50:10.278)
It's when, when he or me and me too, it's not coming through on me when I notice it, but when dad, when you talk under her or she's like, like a normal conversation, we are all like, yeah, yeah. Like we're all, but if anyone talks at the same time, her, your sound cuts for me. So I think if
Papa Rick (50:23.552)
screws up her V sound.
Veronique Porter (50:29.793)
Mm-mm.
Papa Rick (50:32.944)
Okay. All right. And you're blurry. Jenny's blurry and your sound comes in and out. I always just kind of figured it was the internet between the things. So it's a recording locally. Hopefully it'll all be there.
Jennie (50:43.826)
And sometimes it, yeah, sometimes it uploads and it all is fine. It like, our blurriness, it completely disappears. The blurriness is just what we see. But when it uploads to, like it's uploading from your computer individually, his computer individually, and my computer individually, it all uploads very clean.
Veronique Porter (51:08.606)
Okay.
Jennie (51:09.418)
But sometimes we hear things differently than they're recording. And so it just makes for like weird silences where we're all like, wait, what did you say?
Veronique Porter (51:18.805)
I'm out.
Papa Rick (51:18.876)
Yeah, I would apologize if I'm talking over you too. I can't even see Jenny's lips, you know, it's like, and I can see your mouth. It's I'm trying to watch and not talk when you're talking, but there's delay.
Jennie (51:24.695)
right?
Jennie (51:28.298)
Yeah. And so, yeah, our cameras disappear sometimes just because the app is managing bandwidth and stuff, but it all uploads great. So I don't know.
Veronique Porter (51:38.113)
Beautiful.
Papa Rick (51:38.344)
We'll, we'll, we'll upgrade when we get rich and famous at the podcasting business. Does something.
Jennie (51:46.626)
What were we talking about? So V, you were reflecting, yeah, you were reflecting on his generation.
Papa Rick (51:48.608)
I agree. No, it's important. It's important to talk about it. Yeah.
Veronique Porter (51:55.837)
Yeah, I just think it's really powerful to hear, like to see you correcting your language and to hear how much importance you place on, trying to, again, be a part of the larger community, right? Not just saying like, well, in my day, we did X, Y, Z things. So it excuses you in some way. And we're used to a lot of generations doing that. And so it's so refreshing. Like you could go on forever. And I'm like, yeah, because I just, I love hearing that.
from someone of your generation. It's super refreshing to hear.
Papa Rick (52:26.124)
I wish I could bottle it. You know, I have siblings who I have trouble sitting in the room with, especially when there are children around. And in fact, I kind of gave up going to family gatherings after my kids got past 25, because I always felt like I was running interference for the children in Earshot because of the conversations that went.
Veronique Porter (52:34.901)
Mm.
Veronique Porter (52:39.251)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (52:51.297)
Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Papa Rick (52:55.712)
And I've got at least two siblings, maybe three, that would disagree with everything I've ever said, that political correctness is, there's absolutely no excuse for political correctness, and you know, needing to exert their power. And, you know, I, the last, someone at a family gathering was talking about how horrible it was that Mexicans were crossing the border.
on the South of the United States. And I said, so how does that different than white people coming from Europe and showing up and exterminating the Indians? And there was just no conversation to be had about that. Yes. Yeah. See, I'm still a victim of my, you know, I'm not so just to prove I'm not that enlightened, you know, you're right.
Jennie (53:38.908)
Native Americans. Indians are in India. See, right?
Veronique Porter (53:50.261)
Hehehehehehehehe
Papa Rick (53:51.196)
You know, and it's just, it's, we are, we are, we are products of our history to some extent. You know, that gets into the whole, what do you, what do you do about people in the past? All you do, all you can control is yourself and you work at it.
Veronique Porter (54:06.345)
Yeah.
Jennie (54:08.494)
I want to start a drinking game now of, of dad jokes. Anytime you hear a dad joke, take a shot, or anytime dad or someone on the podcast corrects dad, what in enlightened language.
Papa Rick (54:12.224)
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahah
Papa Rick (54:26.64)
Yeah. Like when I say, say a classically boomer thing, you know? Yeah. Boomer, boomer language or millennial language or Gen Z language or what? What, what's in the middle there? Gen X. Is there a Gen X after Gen Z or before Gen Z? I got to go back and read.
Veronique Porter (54:28.032)
I'm gonna go.
Jennie (54:36.96)
Yeah.
Jennie (54:42.818)
Gen X is after you. So boomer, Gen X, millennial, Gen Z.
Papa Rick (54:49.268)
There it is. All right.
Veronique Porter (54:49.283)
Yep.
Jennie (54:50.25)
Elder millennial though is an important one. Elder millennials are not the same.
Papa Rick (54:53.984)
Uh-oh, uh-oh, see, we get more and more precise. As we discuss things, we learn to be more precise and we need a new word, elder millennial. Yep, just the way it works. You start talking, that's why when you talk to PhD guys in something or other, talking, and you can't understand them because they had to make up all these special words to even have a conversation about their stuff, you know? That just made up words.
Veronique Porter (54:54.069)
Yeah
Jennie (55:02.526)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (55:17.249)
Hehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehe
Jennie (55:20.876)
Yeah.
Jennie (55:26.347)
Yeah, I want to, I have so many different, let's see. So I want, so V, I would love for you to share. I know that most of your work with your business is with companies and corporations and going in and helping them create a safer, more welcoming, more diverse environment. And you're teaching these things. You're teaching.
more precise language and how to make an inclusive environment in the workplace and all of those things. I'm curious if you can translate a few of those pointers to parents who are looking for advice on how to initiate or engage in conversations about gender and about race in the home.
Veronique Porter (56:03.744)
I'm sorry.
Veronique Porter (56:14.281)
Yeah, I think something that Papa Rick said earlier, which is a big part of my work, even though I work with teams or organizations, for me, it's always coming down to the individual, right? Because that has to make the choice, that individual has to choose to educate themselves, that individual has to choose to be a better manager, to uphold some of the culture that is being, you know, distributed throughout the company, right? So it has to come down to that individual, and that individual is the one who's in the driver's seat.
Papa Rick (56:37.065)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (56:42.705)
And so it's similar with parenting, where parents will be like, well, how do I talk to my kids about diversity and all of their friends are white and look like them and were raised in the same type of neighborhoods and have the same type of degrees and the same type of jobs. So the example that you are putting towards your kids, you can't teach them something that you don't understand enough to implement into your life and that you don't.
Papa Rick (57:06.266)
Exactly.
Veronique Porter (57:07.577)
So it's really about that parent, again, taking that initiative, say, this is important to me. How do I, you know, in the same way that you might buy your kid a book that has diverse characters, how many books are you reading? Or how many articles are you reading by diverse authors, right? So really it starts with that parent, with that individual. And then it also starts with the union. Modeling, right? But also you can't teach what you don't know.
Jennie (57:25.442)
Modeling.
Papa Rick (57:27.88)
Yep.
Jennie (57:29.494)
Yeah. Yes.
Papa Rick (57:31.38)
bumper, that's a bumper sticker. I like bumper sticker saying, you can't teach what you don't understand, yeah.
Veronique Porter (57:37.607)
You can't teach it and you can't, and not even a model, you can't teach something that you can't do. But then also modeling is really important because if what you're saying conflicts with what you're doing, they're getting a problem and then they have to choose which one they decide to leave.
Papa Rick (57:50.868)
Yeah, they more often come away with what you modeled, not what you say, you know, do what I say, not what I do kind of thing, yeah.
Veronique Porter (57:58.353)
So that's thing number one and thing number two that also plays into the union if we're talking about a partnership even if it's co-parenting If it's an actual marriage or an actual romantic partnership like y'all got to be on the same page So y'all have to talk through You're going to approach some of these things around gender I have a really good uh set of friends and i've worked with them and their kids before but now I just adore them and Their family and we're really good friends and I visit them like twice a year um and
you know, they have conversations around the ways in which they parent the kids, right? And like, for example, pointed out how like the dad babies the girl, right? She's the oldest even when he babies her. He gets the way things because she knows she can like kind of manipulate that. And so mom was able to like point some right. The ways in which like he favors the boy this way or that way. And that conversation, not in a way that's like, you know, you're a horrible parent, but I've noticed some things.
Papa Rick (58:30.569)
Hmm.
Papa Rick (58:36.124)
Yeah.
Jennie (58:45.577)
and
Veronique Porter (58:54.881)
But anything happened, that's what I'm summing out. So those sort of conversations about gender and race and parenting have to happen with your co-parent, with your village, with your tribe as well, right? And the same way you would have a conversation if you had a nanny to say, these are behaviors I noticed, or this is something that I wanna reinforce or whatever. It sounds like, oh yeah, it's automatically happening, but it doesn't. I think people assume they're on the same page with their partner or assume they're the same co-parent. And you have to have those conversations to make sure that you are.
Papa Rick (59:06.996)
Yeah.
Jennie (59:25.166)
Hmm.
Veronique Porter (59:25.389)
And also to create that open space, that open communication so that, yeah, if there are some things coming up that folks can point that out to you and it's a conversation and not an argument, right? Or a debate or like, again, you're a horrible parent. It's more like we're tweaking as we go along. And these are things that are important to us. They're valuable to us as parents. So we're going to convey that to the kids. But first we got to check in with each other.
Jennie (59:30.427)
Eh?
Papa Rick (59:46.804)
Yeah, yeah, very much because, you know, I, and sometimes that's going to be hard to do in the structure of an existing. I mean, if you can't, uh, that's a, that's a, goes to your core values, you know, is that we were talking about, are we teaching, are we giving, are we teaching to our values and then questioning your partner's values or bring, or, you know, there's all kinds of conflict, if you're.
Jennie (59:49.363)
us.
Papa Rick (01:00:18.5)
If your relationship with your partner is not conducive to that, is not strong enough to have talks with each other about each other, which I'm going to say, given that half or more first marriages don't make it and everybody that does make it is on a bell curve, I'm going to say that's a really small percentage of, you know,
Veronique Porter (01:00:25.275)
Mm. Yeah.
Veronique Porter (01:00:29.567)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (01:00:44.148)
5-10% of most marriages, then that's a... if you're gonna have kids work on your marriage. That, I guess, is the short version of that, so that you can get on the same page.
Veronique Porter (01:00:52.321)
Yeah. But it-
Veronique Porter (01:00:56.389)
parent or a partner so I don't want to give advice that feels like I'm over that way but what I have noticed for example is that like for first-time parents that baby comes if their first baby and the mom is over protective I see this more often not where it's like you didn't change it after my way or like they're doing this cry and that means this and it's my baby even though it's clearly our baby
Jennie (01:01:14.197)
Mm-hmm.
Papa Rick (01:01:23.145)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (01:01:24.241)
overprotectiveness, usually with the second and third, less so. But the mom is the hormones, it's getting used to things. It's, I know my baby. And more often than not, because you know, the way in which the mom is bonded with the baby and again, the hormones, the dad is the one that is not doing it right. And he is not on the same page and there's a lot of that, right? And so
Papa Rick (01:01:44.848)
Mm-hmm.
Veronique Porter (01:01:47.673)
more often than not, they find a place where the mom is able to let go a little bit, the dad is able to be more active and find his footing a little bit faster with the baby. But it can be a point of contention, right? And so I say the same way that like, you have to like find that learning curve of how are we being parents together? And maybe you do, there's something we've decided that we both do the way, this is the way to do it. And sometimes it's like, dad's going to do his thing, and I'm going to do my thing, and that's going to be okay.
Papa Rick (01:01:55.089)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (01:01:58.706)
Absolutely.
Papa Rick (01:02:16.713)
Yeah.
Jennie (01:02:16.8)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (01:02:17.749)
Place, absolutely not easy, absolutely tricky, but those conversations are necessary, right? And in the same way that when that new baby comes, those conversations are necessary and sometimes contentious. That's what's gonna happen with these other values too, where it's like, no, I'm not questioning your values, but I'm questioning how you doing it. And they have to work through that in order to get to a place where it's like, all right, now I can point out this thing to you and it's not a big deal. Like that I mentioned, they didn't just arrive at that. They've been working at that for some time.
Jennie (01:02:29.166)
Uh huh.
Veronique Porter (01:02:46.817)
they've been together for some time. But it's not, there's a lot that comes out from conflict, right, we look at conflict and we try to shy away from it. But if everything is smooth, a good sailor does not learn to be that with smoothies, right, like, it's the positive part, but you gotta go through it, you can't go around it.
Jennie (01:03:01.182)
Right, right.
Papa Rick (01:03:01.673)
Right.
Papa Rick (01:03:06.696)
You've got to be with somebody who you can be in conflict with and still not be super threatened. You know, it's not like if I aggravate you, you're liable to shoot me or, you know, poison me or, you know, it has to be okay to have a level of conflict or wow, you know, there's no, you know, there's just no getting around together.
Jennie (01:03:06.904)
Yes.
Veronique Porter (01:03:16.645)
Yeah.
Jennie (01:03:23.29)
Mm-hmm.
Veronique Porter (01:03:28.243)
And that is that.
Jennie (01:03:28.322)
For any...
For any conversation to take place in any disagreement, in any critical philosophical discussion of a multifaceted issue in any space here on a podcast, like we have to be able to disagree. This is something that's like, this is a huge underlying foundational issue, especially with the polarization that the pandemic created.
is that we can no longer disagree and maintain relationship with each other. There's this significant disconnect and alignment with those who only agree with me and my values and my opinion on things. And anyone who's outside of that is morally reprehensible. And like there are some things
Papa Rick (01:04:04.896)
productively.
Veronique Porter (01:04:25.197)
Mmm.
Jennie (01:04:28.854)
for me that are like human right, like moral things, but those are very, very few. Most things there, it's not even two-sided. It is, there's eight sides to things. There's multifaceted. There are reasons that people do things that we have never even like thought of occurring in our own lives. And the ability to have a civil conversation.
Papa Rick (01:04:36.596)
Mm-hmm.
Papa Rick (01:04:43.008)
The world is complicated.
Jennie (01:04:58.114)
to be in what is technically conflict, disagreement is conflict. Not all conflict is bad. In fact, most conflict serves to build and grow and deepen connection and relationships, right? The relational parenting podcast, this is what we're all about, is if in your family and your couplehood, whatever your parenthood relationship is, whatever the quality of that relationship is,
is going to translate to the quality of relationship that you experience with your children and that your children will experience with other people for the rest of their lives, unless they do research and education to fix it. And so if you can't get good at conflict together, like there is a serious foundational piece missing from your family.
Papa Rick (01:05:47.228)
work on it. If it's a problem, work on it.
Veronique Porter (01:05:48.238)
Mmm. Whole work.
Jennie (01:05:51.722)
And I say that as a person who is 1000% imperfect at conflict. That is not a judgment. That is not me sitting on a high horse telling people what they have to do. That is, from my current and past experience of life, if we can't get along and disagree at the same time and maintain love and connection, there is no hope for joy and living.
Papa Rick (01:05:58.313)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (01:06:05.406)
Yeah.
Jennie (01:06:21.802)
a life worth living without that.
Veronique Porter (01:06:24.757)
See ya.
Papa Rick (01:06:24.964)
You were raised by people not good at conflict too, you know. And conflict goes, I know you know that, this is what you know. V may not have known that.
Jennie (01:06:28.847)
I know.
Veronique Porter (01:06:35.241)
You can be good at conflict. I feel like that is definitely a red flag as well, if you are good at, like, I think we all, you know, struggle with the idea of conflict. It's, again, theory, and some of us are like, yeah, okay, more than others, and less conflict avoidant, but I feel like if you're good at conflict, that's a whole different problem.
Jennie (01:06:44.078)
Mm-hmm.
Papa Rick (01:06:56.5)
Yeah, some of it is too, like you're saying, mothers who are going through huge hormonal shifts, you know, just their brains are getting rewired and people with past trauma, there's all kinds of reasons why people are not able to think straight, you know, the lifetime of stress from being black or from whatever it is, you know, abuse and families, it's, it wires your brain different.
changes your expectations. And so there can be some real hard and a lot of growth and change comes, you know, it doesn't, people don't change radically because it's fun. It comes out of, I have to do this or die. You know, there's, there's some, there's gotta be some kind of pain, a cattle prod to get people to change. And, you know, and, you know, I would imagine in the course of a workplace, that's gotta be a, you know, when you're asking managers to change.
Veronique Porter (01:07:38.676)
Hmm. Mm-mm.
Veronique Porter (01:07:42.805)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (01:07:53.126)
Mmm.
Papa Rick (01:07:53.96)
Figuring out what the cattle prod is in a very civilized way has got to be a real challenge.
Veronique Porter (01:08:00.305)
And also in a way that tells them like, in the same way that you are trying to have that conversation with your partner and say like, I'm not coming for your values, I'm coming for your... That is also the conversation with leaders where it's like, I'm not coming for your leadership style, I'm not saying that like your 25 years of leadership were wrong. That's not what I'm saying. Society is different, the workforce is different, and the culture that you are in now, your leadership style doesn't serve that at the moment. So how do we adapt that?
Papa Rick (01:08:10.058)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (01:08:18.6)
Yeah.
Jennie (01:08:23.158)
Yes.
Papa Rick (01:08:28.916)
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (01:08:30.145)
How do we change that? How do we make that you, but make that a you that serves you, as opposed to a you that is holding you back, that is holding your nation back? So that's...
Papa Rick (01:08:40.301)
Yeah. Here's a new skill. Yeah.
Veronique Porter (01:08:42.757)
Yeah, it's adding, it's not taking away, it's not showing that. It's saying how can we make some adaptions, how can we make some changes that reflect the world we're in, that reflect the problems that you're having and move towards solving that.
Jennie (01:08:55.851)
Yes.
Papa Rick (01:08:56.69)
No, hey, there's another use for my beginner mind, new mind. Kanji.
Jennie (01:09:00.406)
Beginner's mind.
Veronique Porter (01:09:02.656)
Hehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehe
Jennie (01:09:04.174)
Well, and that's what it is. That can be translated to parenting too. As a coach, I always tell parents, like, I'm not coming for your parenting style. I'm not telling you that there is one way to parent. I'm telling you there's new research and there are new methods and there is new information that we know better now. And I want to give that to you. I want to teach that to you so that you can incorporate it into your parenting. I'm not coming to change who you are, change your values,
Veronique Porter (01:09:13.918)
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
Veronique Porter (01:09:28.649)
Right.
Jennie (01:09:34.23)
your intrinsic, innate, intuitive knowing of your children and what they need. I'm here because child development, brain development, science, you know, has proven these different things. We know now that these things work and these things actually cause harm. And so why not add these tools to your belt? Why not learn these things and produce a child that contributes to a more loving, connected
Papa Rick (01:09:51.601)
Mm-hmm.
Jennie (01:10:03.602)
enjoyable society and life. Like who doesn't want the best for their child? There's not a parent in the room that would say no to that. And we know now that relationships and feeling connected in a community and having healthy relationships is the number one determining factor of feeling fulfilled in life. Number one.
Veronique Porter (01:10:11.637)
here.
Papa Rick (01:10:13.62)
Hmm
Veronique Porter (01:10:29.333)
Mm-hmm.
Papa Rick (01:10:29.592)
Yep.
Jennie (01:10:31.619)
is the quality of your relationships. So why wouldn't you wanna learn that and teach that to your children?
Veronique Porter (01:10:37.941)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (01:10:38.172)
New information, keep up with it. That even extends to the legal system. I mean, one of the few reasons you can get out of jail once you've been in jail is new information has come to light, you know. It's gotta be pretty radical, but new information is a great cause in all kinds of frameworks.
Veronique Porter (01:10:49.831)
Mm-hmm.
Jennie (01:10:59.242)
Yeah. And why wouldn't managers want to have the best information? They want the best for their company. They want the best for themselves. They want the best for their employees. Why wouldn't you want the new tools? Here's tools to add to your tool belt, your management tool belt, right?
Papa Rick (01:11:12.788)
That's a great... That's... That's the cattle prod, right? You know, hey, you're not keeping up. You've become a dinosaur. Get some new skills.
Veronique Porter (01:11:21.557)
Mm-hmm. And yeah, you're right. The organization wants to be the leader in their industry and wants to be ahead of the curve. So yeah, it's a lot easier to have that conversation when it's framed that way, because I think it automatically feels like an attack. But framed in a way to create this open space, to create a way to unpack some of the discomfort and sensitivities and say, okay, now that we've done that, and we know where we're coming from, we're all on the same page and feel a little vulnerable, let's do something to help us feel more confident.
Jennie (01:11:22.83)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (01:11:28.636)
Yeah.
Papa Rick (01:11:36.768)
Thank you.
Jennie (01:11:36.782)
Uh huh.
Veronique Porter (01:11:51.705)
tools that will help us make the way that's better.
Papa Rick (01:11:55.124)
So all those times when I would go to my boss and say, you're a stupid old dinosaur, quit doing things that way. Now I have a new tool in my box. Ha ha ha. Good new information.
Jennie (01:11:56.194)
Yes.
Veronique Porter (01:12:04.039)
Exactly. You said, new information.
Jennie (01:12:09.705)
Right? And employees can be assholes too, right? And that's just it.
Veronique Porter (01:12:11.259)
I'm sorry.
Papa Rick (01:12:14.176)
hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahah
Veronique Porter (01:12:15.361)
He he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he he
Jennie (01:12:19.886)
Oh, all right. This has been so wonderful. I feel like it's like, it's like so like full of so much amazing information for parents and for anyone listening. And I'm just so grateful that you are here, that you are our guest and that you shared all of this knowledge and perspective that you have with us. Thank you so much.
Papa Rick (01:12:21.818)
it.
Papa Rick (01:12:48.688)
Yeah, yeah, this is, this is fantastic.
Veronique Porter (01:12:49.734)
No.
I know it's been many moons that we talked and getting this together is not easy in the background of a podcast I can only imagine. So I appreciate the work that y'all are doing to equip parents with better information and help support them in their journeys. And I definitely am very honored to be a part of this and thank you so much for having me.
Papa Rick (01:13:15.188)
You bet, thanks. Thanks, V.
Jennie (01:13:15.342)
Oh, you're welcome. We'll have to, I say this to almost everyone because everyone that we've had on is just amazing, but I just, I'm like, all right, well, we need to get you back on for another episode next year. So yeah, thank you. And I wish you all of the best in your blossoming business.
Veronique Porter (01:13:26.52)
I'm sorry.
Veronique Porter (01:13:38.516)
Ew.
Papa Rick (01:13:38.688)
Yee-haw!
Jennie (01:13:40.558)
All right, well, happy parenting everybody and good luck out there. We'll see you next time.
Papa Rick (01:13:41.248)
That's good.
Papa Rick (01:13:52.208)
Excuse me. Are we off now? I didn't get a countdown or anything.
Jennie (01:13:52.322)
You guys want to say bye?
Veronique Porter (01:13:54.889)
Bless you.
Jennie (01:13:56.45)
Do you guys want to, no, do you want to say, you guys got to say bye.
Papa Rick (01:14:01.259)
Oh, okay.
Jennie (01:14:02.574)
It's okay. Ah!
Veronique Porter (01:14:03.601)
Okay, bye!
Papa Rick (01:14:06.464)
Okay, bye.
Jennie (01:14:07.958)
See, this is why we have editing. I can edit all of this out. Ha ha ha.
Papa Rick (01:14:13.006)
I'll have to come up with a pithy tagline.
Jennie (01:14:16.034)
Right?
Veronique Porter (01:14:16.99)
Oh yeah, you should come up with like-
Creators and Guests
