Let's Give A Damn

It’s been a few weeks but we’re back! My guest this week is the brilliant Katie Bogen. In her own words, Katie is a clinical psychology PhD student, a trauma therapist, a sex researcher, a rad Jewess, a queer activist, and a cottagecore rabble-rouser. Katie is truly a wonderful soul. Over the past few months, ever since this horrific genocide began, she has been one of the most helpful voices on social media. She has made loads of content to share the truth about Zionism at its goals, to give a clear headed picture about what’s actually going on in Gaza, to debunk bullshit lies floating around on the internet, and so much more. And she does it with such clarity, intelligence, passion, and grace! If this is your first time encountering Katie and her work, I hope you’ll begin following her on Instagram and TikTok immediately. Also, if you want to read more about her professional work and to read her dozens of published papers, click here. Katie is a certified badass.  --- 🔥 Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Instagram, Twitter, and Youtube. ✉️ Sign up for our weekly email. ✊🏽 Support Let’s Give A Damn on Patreon!📱 Reach out anytime: hello@letsgiveadamn.com. ❤️ Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

I know it’s a bit late—hello 2024!—but I wanted you to experience some of my favorite moments and some of your favorite moments in 2023. I spoke with some incredible folks last year and I learned so much from them. Here’s to many more incredible conversations in 2024! If you want to skip around this episode, here are the timestamps for each highlight: Simran Jeet Singh - 8:07  Rachelle Lefevre - 16:54 Megha Desai - 24:18 Rainn Wilson - 31:16 Patricia Velázquez - 38:09 Noor Tagouri - 47:45 Listen to my full conversations with Simran Jeet Singh, Rachelle Lefevre, Megha Desai, Rainn Wilson, Patricia Velásquez, and Noor Tagouri. And if you’ve already listened to all of these conversations, check out the more than 250 other conversations on the pod! --- 📱 Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Instagram, Twitter, and Youtube. ✉️ Sign up for our weekly email. ✊🏽 Reach out anytime: hello@letsgiveadamn.com. ❤️ Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

Noor Tagouri’s name literally  means “Guiding Light.” And a guiding light she is! Noor is back for a second time. Her first appearance was for episode 19 of the podcast in the summer of 2017!  At 29, Noor is an award-winning journalist and producer, a touring speaker for over 15 years, and has told stories in every medium from radio and print, to documentaries and brand campaigns. In 2019 Noor founded At Your Service Media, a consulting and production company telling representative stories as a form of service. In 2022 Noor launched her investigative series “REP”, in partnership with iHeartMedia. The series explores the concepts of representation and objectivity in media, and received a Webby Award Nomination: Best Limited Series. With a finger on the pulse of people’s concerns, Noor’s storytelling is recognized for her innovative approach to fostering relationships across lines of difference. Visit Noor’s website to learn more about her work.  Listen to the REP investigative series. It’s so good! Follow Noor on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.  --- 📱 Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Instagram, Twitter, and Youtube. ✉️ Sign up for our weekly email. ✊🏽 Reach out anytime: hello@letsgiveadamn.com. ❤️ Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

Meike Ziervogel is a German-British novelist with five novels to her name. She is the founder of an award-winning publishing company in the UK and a fluent Arabic speaker. Since 2018 she has lived in Lebanon. From 2018 to 2019 she transformed a failing needle art workshop in the Shatila refugee camp into a sustainable independent business, providing a monthly income to 100 refugee women. In January 2020 she set up Alsama Project with Kadria Hussien, a Syrian refugee living in Shatila. Meike is now the CEO of Alsama Project and has shaped it into one of the most innovative and successful NGOs serving Syrian refugees in the Middle East. Follow Meike on Twitter! Make a donation to Alsama Project! Follow Alsama on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook! --- 📱 Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Instagram, Twitter, and Youtube. ✉️ Sign up for our weekly email. ✊🏽 Reach out anytime: hello@letsgiveadamn.com. ❤️ Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

My guest this week is my friend and incredible human, Rev. Dr. Jacqui Lewis. Jacqui is an author, activist, preacher, and public theologian toward creating an antiracist, just, gun violence free, fully welcoming, gender affirming society in which everyone has enough. Read the rest of her bio here.  Watch or listen to Jacqui’s Listen, Learn, Lean Into Peace series. Learn more about Freedom Rising 2024! Follow Jacqui on Instagram, Twitter, and Youtube. --- 📱 Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Instagram, Twitter, and Youtube. ✉️ Sign up for our weekly email. ✊🏽 Reach out anytime: hello@letsgiveadamn.com. ❤️ Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

My guest this week is the esteemed Tim Wise. Tim is among the most prominent anti-racist educators and authors in the United States. He has spoken to audiences in all 50 states and internationally about systemic racism, inequality, and methods for dismantling racism in institutions from workplaces to schools to law enforcement.  He is the author of nine books including his most recent essay collection, Dispatches from the Race War, and his highly acclaimed memoir, White Like Me: Reflections on Race from a Privileged Son.  He tweets (or Xes, pardon how that sounds) here and posts regular commentary on Instagram here. During our chat, we talk about being a Jewish person raising in the South, how he got into anti-racist work, the horrific war happening in Palestine and Israel currently, Zionism, where we go from here, and so much more. --- 📱 Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Youtube. ✉️ Sign up for our weekly email. ✊🏽 Reach out anytime: hello@letsgiveadamn.com. ❤️ Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

My guests this week are two truly remarkable women. I met Sophia and Patricia at the Clinton Global Initiative 2023 meetings a few weeks ago.  Read more about Sophia Kianni’s work here. Follow her on Instagram and Twitter. And make sure to check out Climate Cardinals!  Follow Patricia Velásquez on Twitter and Instagram. Consider getting involved with the Wayuu Taya Foundation. --- 📱 Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Youtube. ✉️ Sign up for our weekly email. ✊🏽 Reach out anytime: hello@letsgiveadamn.com. ❤️ Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

“All that the sun shines on is beautiful, so long as it is wild.” — John Muir Barbara Jo Jenkins co-authored The Walk West (William Morrow), which became an international bestseller and part of the permanent White House Library. A nonfiction blockbuster, it sold 15 million copies, became a Reader's Digest condensed book, and was chosen as one of the most influential bestsellers related to American culture in the last 100 years. Jenkins' three-year, 3,000-mile walk across America with her former husband became one of the most popular stories in the National Geographic Magazine, (Cover story, August, 1979).  She co-authored The Road Unseen, (Fawcett) a number one mass paperback bestseller and winner of The Gold Medallion Book Award. Jenkins wrote I Once Knew A Woman (Wolgemuth and Hyatt) and Wit and Wisdom for Women (Thomas Nelson). 40 years later, Barbara is ready to tell her side of the story. And, believe me, it’s a damn good story. Her brand new book, So Long As It’s Wild, is out today and you need to purchase a copy as soon as you possibly can!  Learn more about Barbara Jo (including upcoming book tour dates!) by visiting her website. Also, you should definitely follow her on Instagram. Lots and lots of wholesome words and photos. --- 📱 Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Youtube. ✉️ Sign up for our weekly email. ✊🏽 Reach out anytime: hello@letsgiveadamn.com. ❤️ Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

From their website: “Rise & Shine TN believes every Tennessean should enjoy a free, safe, and vibrant life. Rise & Shine was started as a home for those who want to harness their hope, anger, sadness and fear and use it to build change. This is more than meetings with legislators who won’t hear us. This is more than calls that won’t be answered. This is more than business-as-usual. We draw from our training and experiences as parents, organizers, entrepreneurs, educators, healthcare providers, artists, non-profit experts, small business owners, corporate managers, musicians, native Tennesseans and new transplants who all agree that more must be done to protect our communities.” Donate online and follow them on Instagram and Twitter/X. --- 📱 Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube. ✉️ Sign up for our weekly email. ✊🏽 Reach out anytime: hello@letsgiveadamn.com ❤️ Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

Flamy Grant is a shame-slaying, hip-swaying, singing-songwriting drag queen from western North Carolina. Her 2022 debut record, Bible Belt Baby, was nominated for Best Pop Album at the San Diego Music Awards, and she is a winner of the 2023 Kerrville Folk Festival New Folk Competition. Both a powerhouse vocalist and an intrepid songwriter, Flamy blends the art of drag with her iconic folk/rock sound to create a memorable musical experience. Flamy has collaborated with Adeem the Artist, Jennifer Knapp, Semler, and Derek Webb. In addition to playing the New Folk winner's showcase at the 2023 Kerrville Folk Festival, she has played Wild Goose Festival in North Carolina, San Diego Pride's SheFest, and is headlining Blount County Pride in East Tennessee this September. Much of Flamy’s music centers on the queer spiritual journey, telling stories of resilience and recovery from religious trauma in a world where LGBTQ+ people are frequently ignored by, harmed in, or ejected from religious spaces. NEXT STEPS: - Check out Flamy’s website for tour dates and so much more! - Follow Flamy on TikTok, Instagram, and Twitter. - Listen to Flamy’s music on Apple Music and Spotify. - Is Flamy doing a show near you? If so, go see her! ___________________________________________ Reach out to us anytime and for any reason at hello@letsgiveadamn.com. Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with everything. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! If you love what we’re doing, consider supporting us on Patreon! We can’t do this without you. Lastly, leave us a 5-star rating and review on Apple Podcasts! Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

I met my Natalia Antelava about a month ago in Tbilisi, Georgia, at the storytelling festival she co-founded that I spoke at. At this festival, I spoke alongside Sean Penn, Armando Iannucci, Aaron Rasmussen, Joe Sabia, Sarah Natochenny, and 70 others. I was impressed by her then and I am much more impressed with her now! She’s an incredible human that has gone through so much, been to so many places, and continues to give a damn in very beautiful and meaningful ways.  A co-founder of Coda, Natalia is an Emmy-nominee and award winning journalist. Originally from Tbilisi, Georgia she started her career freelancing in West Africa. Since then, she had been BBC’s resident correspondent in the Caucasus, Central Asia, Middle East, Washington DC and India. She has covered the Russian invasion of Georgia in 2008, the war in Eastern Ukraine and reported undercover from Burma, Yemen and Uzbekistan. Her investigations into human rights abuses in Central Asia, Iraq and the United States have won her a number of awards. In addition to a career in broadcast journalism, Natalia has also written for the Guardian, Forbes magazine and the New Yorker among others.  Over the past few years, Natalie co-founded two incredible organizations we talk about at length in today’s conversation—Coda Story and ZEG Storytelling Festival.  NEXT STEPS: - Follow Natalia on Twitter. - Follow Coda Story on Instagram and Twitter and consider supporting them on a monthly basis. - Check out what happened at ZEG Storytelling Festival last month and consider joining us next year! You most definitely must add Tbilisi to your travel plans. ___________________________________________ Reach out to us anytime and for any reason at hello@letsgiveadamn.com. Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with everything. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! If you love what we’re doing, consider supporting us on Patreon! We can’t do this without you. Lastly, leave us a 5-star rating and review on Apple Podcasts! Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

It's Megha Desai Day is on the podcast! Megha is a corporate advertising powerhouse turned President of The Desai Foundation. After years working at some of the top advertising agencies—like BBH, Anomaly, and Wieden & Kennedy—Megha decided to join her family's foundation to help them grow and increase their reach in meaningful ways. The Desai Foundation is an organization that empowers women and children through community programming to elevate health, livelihood and menstrual equity in rural India. They inspire women and children to dream beyond! NEXT STEPS: — Follow Megha on Instagram. — Follow The Desai Foundation on Instagram. — Learn more about The Desai Foundation on Youtube. — Watch the Heroes for Humanity Film. ___________________________________________ Reach out to us anytime and for any reason at hello@letsgiveadamn.com. Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with everything. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! If you love what we’re doing, consider supporting us on Patreon! We can’t do this without you. Lastly, leave us a 5-star rating and review on Apple Podcasts! Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!1

If you don’t already know who Matt Bernstein is, where the hell have you been? Living under a rock somewhere? Matt is a content creator, a makeup artist, and a self-described “queer jew with very long nails.” Matt uses a simple and unique design style to create infographics and other images that are meant to raise awareness around LGTBQ+ issues, antisemitism, bigotry, and so much more. Matt is also incredibly gracious and puts up with a tremendous amount of shit from trolls.  Matt doesn’t like being called an activist (you’ll hear more about this in our chat) but there is no doubt that Matt is an effective builder of community. We have so much to learn from Matt in this conversation and on social media.  NEXT STEPS: — Follow Matt on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok. — Keep an eye out for Matt’s brand new podcast, A Bit Fruity, which will release soon on all podcast platforms. ___________________________________________ Reach out to us anytime and for any reason at hello@letsgiveadamn.com. Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with everything. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! If you love what we’re doing, consider supporting us on Patreon! We can’t do this without you. Lastly, leave us a 5-star rating and review on Apple Podcasts! Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

I don’t need to tell you about Rainn Wilson. You know about Rainn Wilson. He’s one of the best fucking humans out there. I’m so glad he’s a friend of mine and a friend of the show. His words and wisdom are needed so badly right now and I’m pumped that we get to hear from him again right here on the podcast. Soul Boom! Spirituality! Happiness! And so much more! NEXT STEPS: — Follow Rainn on Instagram and Twitter. — Buy Soul Boom! — Watch The Geography of Bliss on Peacock! — Support Rainn and Holiday’s nonprofit, Lidé Haiti! ___________________________________________ Reach out to us anytime and for any reason at hello@letsgiveadamn.com. Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with everything. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! If you love what we’re doing, consider supporting us on Patreon! We can’t do this without you. Lastly, leave us a 5-star rating and review on Apple Podcasts! Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

Benjamin Perry is a minister at Middle Church and an award-winning writer whose work has appeared in outlets like The Washington Post, Slate, Sojourners, and Bustle. With a degree in psychology from SUNY Geneseo and an MDiv from Union Theological Seminary, Perry has worked as an organizer with the New York chapter of the Poor People’s Campaign and as an editor at Time, Inc. Perry has appeared on MSNBC, Al Jazeera, and NY1, and is the editor of the Queer Faith photojournalism series. He and his spouse, Erin Mayer, live with his best friend and brother in Maine, nurturing a small apple orchard. NEXT STEPS: — Follow Benjamin on Twitter and Instagram. — Check out Benjamin’s website. — Order your copy of Cry Baby: Why Our Tears Matter today! ___________________________________________ Reach out to us anytime and for any reason at hello@letsgiveadamn.com. Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with everything. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! If you love what we’re doing, consider supporting us on Patreon! We can’t do this without you. Lastly, leave us a 5-star rating and review on Apple Podcasts! Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

During this Black History Month, we’re bringing you some snippets from conversations we have had over the past few years with incredible Black writers, speakers, professors, preachers, actors, and artists. “Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.” — Barack Obama After you listen to the incredible clips in this episode, make sure you listen to the full conversations: Episode 27 with Clint Smith Episode 143 with Lisa Sharon Harper Episode 163 with Eddie S. Glaude Jr. Episode 169 with Chloé Valdary Episode 182 with Colman Domingo  Episode 210 with Joél Leon ___________________________________________ Reach out to us anytime and for any reason at hello@letsgiveadamn.com. Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with everything. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! Lastly, leave us a 5-star rating and review on Apple Podcasts! Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

Simran Jeet Singh, Ph.D., is the Executive Director of the Religion & Society Program at the Aspen Institute and the author of the national bestseller The Light We Give: How Sikh Wisdom Can Transform Your Life. Simran's thought leadership on bias, empathy, and justice extends across corporate, university, and government settings. He is an Atlantic Fellow for Racial Equity with Columbia University and the Nelson Mandela Foundation, a Soros Equality Fellow with the Open Society Foundations, a Visiting Lecturer at Union Seminary, and a Senior Advisor on Equity and Inclusion for YSC Consulting, part of Accenture. Simran is the author of an award-winning children's book titled Fauja Singh Keeps Going: The True Story of the Oldest Person to Ever Run a Marathon (Kokila, Penguin Random House). He earned graduate degrees from Harvard University and Columbia University. Simran is a recipient of the Peter J. Gomes Memorial Award from Harvard University and, in 2020, TIME Magazine recognized him as one of sixteen people fighting for a more equal America. He writes regularly for major outlets, including The Washington Post, Harvard Business Review, CNN and TIME Magazine, and he writes a monthly column for Religion News Service. Born and raised in San Antonio, Texas, Simran now lives in New York City with his wife and two daughters, where he enjoys running, writing and chasing his kids. NEXT STEPS: — Follow Simran on Twitter, Facebook, and Instragram. — Check out Simran’s website. — Order your copy of The Light We Give today! ___________________________________________ Reach out to us anytime and for any reason at hello@letsgiveadamn.com. Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with everything. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! If you love what we’re doing, consider supporting us on Patreon! We can’t do this without you. Lastly, leave us a 5-star rating and review on Apple Podcasts! Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

Welcome to the first episode of 2023! We have an incredible year ahead for you. We're just getting started! This week's guest is the incredible Nazazin Ash. Nazanin is the CEO of Welcome.US—a new national initiative built to inspire, mobilize, and empower Americans from all corners of the country to welcome and support those seeking refuge here. This organization is led by a truly incredible team and is co-chaired by President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama, President Bush and First Lady Laura Bush, President Clinton and First Lady and Secretary Hillary Clinton, and President Carter and First Lady Rosalynn Carter.  Welcome.US is only 16 months old but they have already accomplished so much: — 800 organizations and 221 leaders make up the welcome coalition and council — The Welcome Fund, in partnership with GoFundMe.org, has raised more than $20M, supporting resettlement agencies and 180 frontline organizations, nearly 70% of which are refugee, diaspora, veteran, or faith-led. — Welcome.US CEO Council members contributed $179,074,000 in goods, services and funds to resettlement efforts in the U.S. over the past year. — More than 58,000 Afghans and Ukrainians Welcomed by American Sponsors. Over 130,000 Americans have signed up to sponsor, and Welcome.US is powering Americans’ desire to help. — 68,000 jobs posted by 224 companies on the Welcome.US Employment Exchange. Plus, nationwide hiring fairs for newcomers. — 29 organizations are on the Welcome Exchange, and $18.8M in-kind donations have been made to resettlement organizations. NEXT STEPS: — Follow Nazanin on Twitter. — Follow Welcome.US on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook. — Become a sponsor! It's such an incredible opportunity.  ___________________________________________ Reach out to us anytime and for any reason at hello@letsgiveadamn.com. Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with everything. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! If you love what we’re doing, consider supporting us on Patreon! We can’t do this without you. Lastly, leave us a 5-star rating and review on Apple Podcasts! Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

I can’t believe this is the last episode of the year! We hope you’ll stick around and get more involved in what we're doing and building here at Let’s Give A Damn in 2023. We have so much that we’re planning on rolling out next year. This Best of 2022 episode features clips from some of our favorite moments during our conversations with the following incredible guests in 2022: — Episode 219 with Jacqui Lewis — Episode 222 with Rachelle Lefevre — Episode 225 with Tyler Merritt — Episode 227 with Hillary McBride — Episode 228 with Andy Grammer — Episode 232 with Frederick Joseph — Episode 233 with Alok Vaid-Menon — Episode 236 with Pádraig Ó Tuama — Episode 243 with Anand Giridharadas  Reach out to us anytime and for any reason at hello@letsgiveadamn.com. Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with everything. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! If you love what we’re doing, consider supporting our nonprofit foundation! We can’t do this without you. Oh, and make sure to sign up for our weekly email. Lastly, leave us a 5-star rating and review on Apple Podcasts! Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!

Detra Denise is a woman determined to tell her heartbreaking and hopeful story to as many people as possible in as many ways as possible. NEXT STEPS: — Follow Detra on Instagram and Facebook. — Follow Detra’s Story on Instagram. — Visit the brand new Detra’s Story website. — Buy her limited edition, 5-pack cigar sampler! ___________________________________________ Reach out to us anytime and for any reason at hello@letsgiveadamn.com. Follow Let’s Give A Damn on Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter to keep up with everything. We have so much planned for the coming months and we don’t want you to miss a thing! If you love what we’re doing, consider supporting us on Patreon! We can’t do this without you. Lastly, leave us a 5-star rating and review on Apple Podcasts! Have an amazing week, friends! Keep giving a damn. Love y’all!