VIRTUAL Core Seminar Agenda & Handouts 2020
VIRTUAL Core Seminar Agenda & Handouts 2020
VIRTUAL Core Seminar Agenda & Handouts 2020
AGENDA
1. OPENING
• Introductions & Agreements
• Origin Story: How we all got here
• Five Core Questions
9. CLOSING
• Five Core Questions Redux
• What’s next: How we’re going to CHANGE THE CONVERSATION
• One more thing: what you can do when you walk out the door
• 84% of experts cited on Sunday morning TV political talk shows are men
• 90% of top Hollywood producers and directors are men
• 76% of tenured faculty at top universities are men
• 90% of Wikipedia editors are male
• 80% percent of Congress is male.
In short, much of the world’s brainpower is missing. This presents a huge problem for those of us whose voices are
underrepresented—as well as a tremendous opportunity: what might be the return to society if together we invested
in our missing brainpower?
Lots of people have debated whether the problem is biology or sexism or socialization or something else. But we
launched The OpEd Project because of a more obvious—and more solvable—part of the problem, which is that
women are not participating in key “front door” forums with anywhere near the frequency that men are. At the
Washington Post, for example, a five-month tracking found that roughly 90% of op-ed submissions come from men—
and about 88% of published Post bylines are male. If you think about it, women are actually being fairly represented,
in relationship to our participation/submission ratio. Isn’t the obvious solution to get more smart women submitting?
That’s where we started. Partnering with universities, think tanks, non-profits, corporations and community leaders
across America, we began to scout and train underrepresented experts (especially women) to take thought leadership
positions in their fields (op-eds and much more). We began to connect participants with each other and with our
national network of high-level Mentor-Editors (journalists who believe a wider range of voices should be shaping the
world, and who volunteer to mentor new voices). We also channel the best new ideas and experts directly to media
gatekeepers who need them across all platforms.
We envision a world where the best ideas – regardless of where they come from – should have a chance to be heard
and to shape society and change the world.
• Because the lack of women and other underrepresented voices in the most powerful idea forums conveys the
wrong idea that we aren’t leaders.
• Because whoever tells the story writes history. If we are not telling our story, then someone else will tell it for
us—and not the way we would.
• And most importantly: what is the cost to ALL of us when so many of the world’s best minds and ideas are
missing? What could we accomplish – together – if we invested in our missing brainpower?
—Katie Orenstein
Founder & CEO
4. What’s the bigger picture – and how do you experience your reality?
5. Do you understand your knowledge and experience in terms of its value to others?
EXPERT: RULES:
1. Be specific
You are the go-to person in 2. Use exact phrase
the group on your topic, and 3. Pick ANYTHING, but
potentially far beyond. only one thing
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YOUR ARGUMENT
In ONE sentence, what will you make a case for? It could be a new initiative or a new analysis of an existing one;
a policy you think is needed; a project you want to see implemented; a way to change something unfair or create
something new. For example: “The Company should offer paternity leave for all global employees”
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YOUR OUTCOME
What is your intended outcome?
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Lede:
News Hook:
Argument:
Evidence
To Be Sure:
Conclusion:
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The original 1975 film, in which suburban husbands killed and replaced their partners with blonder, bustier
robotic look-alikes, dramatized the feminist argument that marriage transformed women into ever-smiling,
floor-mopping automatons. In those days, the vast majority of new American houses were built in suburbs, and
women — who in midcentury began marrying younger, having children earlier, and doing more hours of
housework than in previous decades — were complaining of a malaise brought on by what Betty Friedan had
dubbed "the feminine mystique." The remake, in contrast, stars Nicole Kidman as a high-powered TV executive
who, previews suggest, is more than a match for her husband — or anyone else's.
While the wives of Stepford have advanced since 1975, along with the rest of us, not everything has panned out
the way feminists envisioned. American women today tend to delay marriage; we have careers; we demand that
men do their share of the housework; we expect to be equal partners. At the same time, we have internalized a
piece of Stepford, becoming, metaphorically speaking, our own Stepford husbands — imposing a conformist
definition of beauty and femininity. Girls' and women's magazines incessantly promote perfect thighs, abs and
hair, and achieving the perfect look has moved beyond diet and exercise. More and more, we place ourselves
willingly under the knife, happily embracing the plastic.
The remake opens at a peak in our Stepfordian obsession with cosmetic surgery. No longer reserved for the rich
and the old, reaching for the knife begins these days with the first wrinkle. Along with collagen implants and
Botox, summer beauty treatments now include toe-shortening and even pinky-toe removal — the better to fit
into pointy shoes.
Television reality shows like "Extreme Makeover" and "The Swan," in which contestants undergo extensive
surgery, reinforce our relentless pursuit of physical perfection. On MTV's "I Want a Famous Face," men and
women endured radical reconstructions to look like their favorite movie stars. On Fox's series "The Swan,"
surgically altered women competed against one another for a chance to be part of the beauty pageant in the
final episode.
Because they undergo many of the same cosmetic procedures — breast and chin implants, nose and teeth
straightening, liposuction and hair lightening — executed by the same surgeons and beauticians, the contestants
on these shows ended up looking eerily alike. And, not incidentally, like the two blondes who vied for the
Bachelor's hand in marriage, who in turn looked like Britney Spears. All could be knockoffs of the blond Nicole
Kidman in the "Stepford" movie posters.
Why do we wish to reinvent ourselves so badly — and so blandly? Our desire taps a powerful myth of self-
transformation in which we magically become — and are recognized for — our most ideal selves.
Scholars have debated the meaning of this narrative path, some calling it a seasonal or fertility myth, perhaps
derived from ancient ritual. In the eyes of Bruno Bettelheim, the popular Freudian psychologist, the Cinderella
tale embodies sibling rivalry and Oedipal conflicts. In its modern incarnations, as in our real-life fixations with
rehabbing ourselves through diet, cosmeceuticals and surgery, the fairy tale lends itself to a literal
interpretation, as a mere physical makeover. But it also has metaphoric power.
Narratives of physical transformation can be read as symbolic of our desire to be seen, and loved, for who we
really are — and to find love, recognition and acceptance that transcends stereotype, class, age, poverty and
physical imperfection. The truly climactic moment of Charles Perrault's famous 1697 version of "Cinderella" is
not the moment soot stains disappear from the heroine's cheeks; rather, it is the moment when she is
recognized, while still in rags, by the prince — thanks to her ability to fit her foot into a tiny slipper (a detail that,
incidentally, most likely derives from China, where foot-binding produced a standard of beauty and
womanhood).
We could say, then, that the myth of self-transformation is really about recognition of the inner person, perhaps
explaining why so many "improved" contestants on "The Swan" and "Extreme Makeover" say they feel for the
first time that they look like their true selves.
At what point, though, does a myth about recognition, acceptance and truth become just the opposite — a tale
of artifice and disguise?
Myths often contain the seeds of their own inversion, and so it is in this case. In our quest to be Cinderellas, we
are risking becoming her impostor stepsisters — eagerly slicing off toe and heel (as they do in the Grimms'
version of the fairy tale) to fit into a false shoe.
It is not men (or at least, not men alone) who do this to us. Indeed, Paramount's Web site for "The Stepford
Wives" hardly mentions husbands. Instead it addresses the female viewer, showcasing "before" and "after"
photos of the character played by Bette Midler much like those belonging to "Swan" contestants, and inviting us
to upload our own photos for a personalized "Stepford Makeover."
It's a funny but frightening parody of our aspirations, given the original movie's dark ending. As Sylvia Plath
warned us, not long before her suicide in 1963: "The woman is perfected/Her dead/Body wears the smile of
accomplishment."
Catherine Orenstein is the author of Little Red Riding Hood Uncloaked: Sex, Morality and the Evolution of a Fairy
Tale.
I want voters to have confidence in my knowledge of ever more complex procedures. I want to serve them well so
they enjoy exercising their right to vote. I don't want them to stand in long lines or feel scrutinized as if they are
passing through an airport security checkpoint. Most of all, I hate telling students that their student ID is not an
approved voter ID. When I inform students of their options, I apologize and say, 'Please promise me you'll get the
proper ID and come back. I want you to be able to vote.'
As a last resort, I can tell those voters they can still 'vote' by casting a provisional ballot and presenting the city clerk
with the proper ID within four days. But what good is a vote if it's not counted? Of the 123 provisional ballots cast
citywide by voters without ID on April 5, only 41 were counted in the end. Voter impersonation is virtually
nonexistent — yet, lacking an approved photo ID, familiar voters listed in our poll book are silenced. How can I
possibly feel good about that?
On election day, 24,625 voters registered at the 87 polling places in our city. I appreciate Wisconsin's same-day
registration policy, because I love to serve both new voters and regulars who have changed address. I usually spend
most of my time assisting long lines at the voter registration table, but I find that task is now more complicated and
even troubling.
For instance, I'm very uncomfortable with current requirements for recording a voter's proof of address. Wisconsin
banks and businesses: Do you realize that voter registrars must write down the last few digits of people's account
numbers when they register them to vote? I find this very intrusive and unnecessary, not to mention a complete
waste of time. I know you respect your customers' privacy. I know you would not release information to an official in
order to verify a voter's address without a court order.
Do you see why I've come to dread my job? I'd like to anticipate the November presidential election with excitement,
but, instead, I'm upset about unnecessary and time-consuming requirements that confuse voters and make them
wait longer to cast their vote. To make matters worse, Wisconsin legislators cut early voting hours in half and
eliminated early voting on evenings and weekends, creating yet more pressure on election day. Hiring additional poll
workers so the April 5 election would run smoothly increased our city clerk's costs, in addition to the challenge of
recruiting and training all those new workers. We are doing our best to serve voters. Wisconsin legislators, I have a
suggestion: Why not spend a day as a poll worker before you pass more laws that create obstacles to voting?
They took me to the homicide division, and played a cassette tape on which a man I knew named Kevin Freeman
accused me of shooting a man. He had also been arrested as a suspect in the murder. A few weeks earlier he had sold
me a ring and a gun; it turned out that the ring belonged to the victim and the gun was the murder weapon.
My picture was on the news, and a man called in to report that I looked like someone who had recently tried to rob
his children. Suddenly I was accused of that crime, too. I was tried for the robbery first. My lawyers never knew there
was blood evidence at the scene, and I was convicted based on the victims’ identification.
After that, my lawyers thought it was best if I didn’t testify at the murder trial. So I never defended myself, or got to
explain that I got the ring and the gun from Kevin Freeman. And now that I officially had a history of violent crime
because of the robbery conviction, the prosecutors used it to get the death penalty. I remember the judge telling the
courtroom the number of volts of electricity they would put into my body. If the first attempt didn’t kill me, he said,
they’d put more volts in.
On Sept. 1, 1987, I arrived on death row in the Louisiana State Penitentiary — the infamous Angola prison. I was put
in a dead man’s cell. His things were still there; he had been executed only a few days before. That past summer they
had executed eight men at Angola. I received my first execution date right before I arrived. I would end up knowing
12 men who were executed there.
Over the years, I was given six execution dates, but all of them were delayed until finally my appeals were exhausted.
The seventh — and last — date was set for May 20, 1999. My lawyers had been with me for 11 years by then; they
But then I remembered something about May 20. I had just finished reading a letter from my younger son about how
he wanted to go on his senior class trip. I’d been thinking about how I could find a way to pay for it by selling my
typewriter and radio. “Oh, no, hold on,” I said, “that’s the day before John Jr. is graduating from high school.” I
begged them to get it delayed; I knew it would hurt him.
To make things worse, the next day, when John Jr. was at school, his teacher read the whole class an article from the
newspaper about my execution. She didn’t know I was John Jr.’s dad; she was just trying to teach them a lesson
about making bad choices. So he learned that his father was going to be killed from his teacher, reading the
newspaper aloud. I panicked. I needed to talk to him, reassure him.
Amazingly, I got a miracle. The same day that my lawyers visited, an investigator they had hired to look through the
evidence one last time found, on some forgotten microfiche, a report sent to the prosecutors on the blood type of
the perpetrator of the armed robbery. It didn’t match mine; the report, hidden for 15 years, had never been turned
over to my lawyers. The investigator later found the names of witnesses and police reports from the murder case
that hadn’t been turned over either.
As a result, the armed robbery conviction was thrown out in 1999, and I was taken off death row. Then, in 2002, my
murder conviction was thrown out. At a retrial the following year, the jury took only 35 minutes to acquit me.
The prosecutors involved in my two cases, from the office of the Orleans Parish district attorney, Harry Connick Sr.,
helped to cover up 10 separate pieces of evidence. And most of them are still able to practice law today. Why
weren’t they punished for what they did? When the hidden evidence first surfaced, Mr. Connick announced that his
office would hold a grand jury investigation. But once it became clear how many people had been involved, he called
it off.
In 2005, I sued the prosecutors and the district attorney’s office for what they did to me. The jurors heard testimony
from the special prosecutor who had been assigned by Mr. Connick’s office to the canceled investigation, who told
them, “We should have indicted these guys, but they didn’t and it was wrong.” The jury awarded me $14 million in
damages — $1 million for every year on death row — which would have been paid by the district attorney’s office.
That jury verdict is what the Supreme Court has just overturned.
I don’t care about the money. I just want to know why the prosecutors who hid evidence, sent me to prison for
something I didn’t do and nearly had me killed are not in jail themselves. There were no ethics charges against them,
no criminal charges, no one was fired and now, according to the Supreme Court, no one can be sued.
Worst of all, I wasn’t the only person they played dirty with. Of the six men one of my prosecutors got sentenced to
death, five eventually had their convictions reversed because of prosecutorial misconduct. Because we were
sentenced to death, the courts had to appoint us lawyers to fight our appeals. I was lucky, and got lawyers who went
to extraordinary lengths. But there are more than 4,000 people serving life without parole in Louisiana, almost none
of whom have lawyers after their convictions are final. Someone needs to look at those cases to see how many others
might be innocent. If a private investigator hired by a generous law firm hadn’t found the blood evidence, I’d be dead
today. No doubt about it.
A spokeswoman for the United States Air Force Central Command confirmed that it became aware of a “civilian
casualty allegation” in Mosul the day after the airstrikes. In an email Friday, the Air Force spokeswoman, Maj.
Genieve David, said Centcom was assessing the credibility of the reports, before determining any follow-on
action, which might include a “formal investigation.”
I desperately want the Islamic State to be defeated, but I wonder if our rage at it has made us blind to anyone
we kill along the way, even those whose lives have been terrorized by the group.
Iraqi civilian losses used to be referred to as the inevitable “collateral damage” of war; but from the scant Arabic
media coverage and the silence of the Western press, it is painfully clear that the deaths of my loved ones have
not even earned that ghastly euphemism. These civilian victims are simply lumped together with the death toll
It will not bring our relatives back, but I want their deaths to be counted and for them to be recognized for who
they were: Muslim civilians, not Islamic State militants.
I visited their elegant homes, disastrously mistaken for a weapons depot. My Iraqi relatives’ lives were full of
love, laughter, books, delicious smells of food, gleaming marble floors, white curtains floating in the breeze, and
children running up and down the stairs. Now relatives send me pictures of unrecognizable rubble.
Last Sunday night, I sat in an airplane seat with my son in my lap, gliding past the largest moon I have ever seen,
eclipsed by the slow-moving shadow of the Earth below. Like millions, I was transfixed by this glimpse of proof
to the naked eye that the Earth is in motion. Seeing it was also proof that I am here, alive and able to witness
such fleeting beauty. What a beautiful, terrible sign: a moon the color of blood.
As a Muslim, I believe that everything in the skies and on Earth is a sign inviting reflection. That does not mean I
reject science or reason, only that I believe there is a creative, divine source of the dust that made the moon
appear red. And I believe that the source of my life is also the source of my mortality. These beliefs are shared
across many religious traditions, yet some insist that there is something warped, even pathological, about how
Muslims understand life and death. This sustains the racist lie that for Muslims, life is cheap, that Muslims prefer
death to life.
The Muslim prayer for the dead is a simple line from the Quran: “Surely we belong to God, and to God we shall
return.” Muslims understand the sustenance of life, and death, as acts of God. Some take issue with Muslims’
view of the all-powerful God who creates and extinguishes life because they presume, wrongly, that this negates
free will. They blame Muslims for their “fatalism,” which they argue makes God’s will an alibi for human error
and corruption, and encourages Muslims to passively accept their fate and suffering.
Muslims strive for justice in this world, though we believe only divine justice is perfect. We cling to life though
we know death is inevitable. The fact that some of my family members survived the airstrike by God’s mercy,
and others did not, also by God’s will, does not erase the human culpability and barbarity of war, the human
error that caused them to be targeted.
As we flew in that slim aluminum tube with wings, under the eclipsed moon, I felt so grateful for the blessing of
the illusion that my safe arrival home was certain, that I would live to see countless full moons.
Zareena Grewal, an associate professor of American studies and religious studies at Yale University, and a Public
Voices fellow with The OpEd Project. She is the author of “Islam is a Foreign Country: American Muslims and the
Global Crisis of Authority.”
The North’s victory in the Civil War did not bring peace. Instead, emancipation brought white resentment that
the good ol’ days of black subjugation were over. Legislatures throughout the South scrambled to reinscribe
white supremacy and restore the aura of legitimacy that the anti-slavery campaign had tarnished. Lawmakers in
several states created the Black Codes, which effectively criminalized blackness, sanctioned forced labor and
undermined every tenet of democracy. Even the federal authorities’ promise of 40 acres — land seized from
traitors who had tried to destroy the United States of America — crumbled like dust.
Influential white legislators such as Rep. Thaddeus Stevens (R-Pa.) and Sen. Charles Sumner (R-Mass.) tried to
make this nation live its creed, but they were no match for the swelling resentment that neutralized the 13th,
14th and 15th amendments, and welcomed the Supreme Court’s 1876 United States vs. Cruikshank decision,
which undercut a law aimed at stopping the terror of the Ku Klux Klan.
Nearly 80 years later, Brown v. Board of Education seemed like another moment of triumph — with the ruling
on the unconstitutionality of separate public schools for black and white students affirming African Americans’
rights as citizens. But black children, hungry for quality education, ran headlong into more white rage. Bricks and
mobs at school doors were only the most obvious signs. In March 1956, 101members of Congress issued the
A little more than half a century after Brown, the election of Obama gave hope to the country and the world
that a new racial climate had emerged in America, or that it would. But such audacious hopes would be short-
lived. A rash of voter-suppression legislation, a series of unfathomable Supreme Court decisions, the rise of
stand-your-ground laws and continuing police brutality make clear that Obama’s election and reelection have
unleashed yet another wave of fear and anger.
It’s more subtle — less overtly racist — than in 1865 or even 1954. It’s a remake of the Southern Strategy,
crafted in the wake of the civil rights movement to exploit white resentment against African Americans, and
deployed with precision by Presidents Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan. As Reagan’s key political strategist, Lee
Atwater, explained in a 1981 interview: “You start out in 1954 by saying, ‘N-----, n-----, n-----.’ By 1968 you can’t
say ‘n-----’ — that hurts you. Backfires. So you say stuff like ‘forced busing,’ ‘states’ rights’ and all that stuff.
You’re getting so abstract now you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are
totally economic things, and a byproduct of them is blacks get hurt worse than whites. And subconsciously
maybe that is part of it. I’m not saying that.” (The interview was originally published anonymously, and only
years later did it emerge that Atwater was the subject.)
Now, under the guise of protecting the sanctity of the ballot box, conservatives have devised measures — such
as photo ID requirements — to block African Americans’ access to the polls. A joint report by the NAACP Legal
Defense and Educational Fund and the NAACP emphasized that the ID requirements would adversely affect
more than 6 million African American voters. (Twenty-five percent of black Americans lack a government-issued
photo ID, the report noted, compared with only 8 percent of white Americans.) The Supreme Court sanctioned
this discrimination in Shelby County v. Holder, which gutted the Voting Rights Act and opened the door to 21st-
century versions of 19th-century literacy tests and poll taxes.
The economic devastation of the Great Recession also shows African Americans under siege. The foreclosure
crisis hit black Americans harder than any other group in the United States. A 2013report by researchers at
Brandeis University calculated that “half the collective wealth of African-American families was stripped away
during the Great Recession,” in large part because of the impact on home equity. In the process, the wealth gap
between blacks and whites grew: Right before the recession, white Americans had four times more wealth than
black Americans, on average; by 2010, the gap had increased to six times. This was a targeted hit. Communities
of color were far more likely to have riskier, higher-interest-rate loans than white communities, with good credit
scores often making no difference.
Add to this the tea party movement’s assault on so-called Big Government, which despite the sanitized language
of fiscal responsibility constitutes an attack on African American jobs. Public-sector employment, where there is
less discrimination in hiring and pay, has traditionally been an important venue for creating a black middle class.
So when you think of Ferguson, don’t just think of black resentment at a criminal justice system that allows a
white police officer to put six bullets into an unarmed black teen. Consider the economic dislocation of black
America. Remember a Florida judge instructing a jury to focus only on the moment when George Zimmerman
Only then does Ferguson make sense. It’s about white rage.
Carol Anderson is an associate professor of African American studies and history at Emory University and a Public
Voices fellow with The OpEd Project. She is the author of “Bourgeois Radicals: The NAACP and the Struggle for
Colonial Liberation, 1941-1960.”
So what would happen if suddenly, magically, men could menstruate and women could not?
Young boys would talk about it as the envied beginning of manhood. Gifts, religious ceremonies, family dinners,
and stag parties would mark the day.
To prevent monthly work loss among the powerful, Congress would fund a National Institute of Dysmenorrhea.
Doctors would research little about heart attacks, from which men would be hormonally protected, but
everything about cramps.
Sanitary supplies would be federally funded and free. Of course, some men would still pay for the prestige of
such commercial brands as Paul Newman Tampons, Muhammad Ali's Rope-a-Dope Pads, John Wayne Maxi
Pads, and Joe Namath Jock Shields- "For Those Light Bachelor Days."
Statistical surveys would show that men did better in sports and won more Olympic medals during their periods.
Generals, right-wing politicians, and religious fundamentalists would cite menstruation ("men-struation") as
proof that only men could serve God and country in combat ("You have to give blood to take blood"), occupy
high political office ("Can women be properly fierce without a monthly cycle governed by the planet Mars?"), be
priests, ministers, God Himself ("He gave this blood for our sins"), or rabbis ("Without a monthly purge of
impurities, women are unclean").
Male liberals and radicals, however, would insist that women are equal, just different; and that any woman
could join their ranks if only she were willing to recognize the primacy of menstrual rights ("Everything else is a
single issue") or self-inflict a major wound every month ("You must give blood for the revolution").
Street guys would invent slang ("He's a three-pad man") and "give fives" on the corner with some exchange like,
"Man you lookin' good!"
Men would convince women that sex was more pleasurable at "that time of the month." Lesbians would be said
to fear blood and therefore life itself, though all they needed was a good menstruating man.
Medical schools would limit women's entry ("they might faint at the sight of blood").
Of course, intellectuals would offer the most moral and logical arguments. Without the biological gift for
measuring the cycles of the moon and planets, how could a woman master any discipline that demanded a
sense of time, space, mathematics-- or the ability to measure anything at all?
Menopause would be celebrated as a positive event, the symbol that men had accumulated enough years of
cyclical wisdom to need no more.
Liberal males in every field would try to be kind. The fact that "these people" have no gift for measuring life, the
liberals would explain, should be punishment enough.
And how would women be trained to react? One can imagine right-wing women agreeing to all these arguments
with a staunch and smiling masochism. ("The ERA would force housewives to wound themselves every month":
Phyllis Schlafly)
In short, we would discover, as we should already, that logic is in the eye of the logician. (For instance, here's an
idea for theorists and logicians: if women are supposed to be less rational and more emotional at the beginning
of our menstrual cycle when the female hormone is at its lowest level, then why isn't it logical to say that, in
those few days, women behave the most like the way men behave all month long? I leave further improvisation
up to you.)
The truth is that, if men could menstruate, the power justifications would go on and on.
If we let them.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: This response to a published statement by eight fellow clergymen from Alabama (Bishop C. C. J.
Carpenter, Bishop Joseph A. Durick, Rabbi Hilton L. Grafman, Bishop Paul Hardin, Bishop Holan B. Harmon, the
Reverend George M. Murray. the Reverend Edward V. Ramage and the Reverend Earl Stallings) was composed
under somewhat constricting circumstance. Begun on the margins of the newspaper in which the statement
appeared while I was in jail, the letter was continued on scraps of writing paper supplied by a friendly Negro
trusty, and concluded on a pad my attorneys were eventually permitted to leave me. Although the text remains
in substance unaltered, I have indulged in the author's prerogative of polishing it for publication.
While confined here in the Birmingham city jail, I came across your recent statement calling my present activities
"unwise and untimely." Seldom do I pause to answer criticism of my work and ideas. If I sought to answer all the
criticisms that cross my desk, my secretaries would have little time for anything other than such correspondence
in the course of the day, and I would have no time for constructive work. But since I feel that you are men of
genuine good will and that your criticisms are sincerely set forth, I want to try to answer your statements in
what I hope will be patient and reasonable terms.
***
We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God-given rights. The nations of Asia and
Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but we stiff creep at horse-and-
buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter. Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt
the stinging dark of segregation to say, "Wait." But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and
fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse,
kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro
brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find
your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she
can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in
her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority
beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an
unconscious bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son who is
asking: "Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?"; when you take a cross-county drive and
find it necessary to sleep night after night in the
uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in
and day out by nagging signs reading "white" and "colored"; when your first name becomes "nigger," your
middle name becomes "boy" (however old you are) and your last name becomes "John," and your wife and
mother are never given the respected title "Mrs."; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact
that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are
plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you no forever fighting a degenerating sense of
CHANGE THE WORLD’S CONVERSATION 25
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"nobodiness" then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of
endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can
understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience.
***
If I have said anything in this letter that overstates the truth and indicates an unreasonable impatience, I beg
you to forgive me. If I have said anything that understates the truth and indicates my having a patience that
allows me to settle for anything less than brotherhood, I beg God to forgive me.
I hope this letter finds you strong in the faith. I also hope that circumstances will soon make it possible for me to
meet each of you, not as an integrationist or a civil rights leader but as a fellow clergyman and a Christian
brother. Let us all hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass away and the deep fog of
misunderstanding will be lifted from our fear-drenched communities, and in some not too distant tomorrow the
radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation with all their scintillating beauty.
Mentor-Editors are experienced journalists and thought leaders—columnists, pundits or editors—at the top of their fields,
men and women alike—committed to improving public discourse and supporting new and promising voices. Mentor-
Editors volunteer to read the op-ed drafts of OpEd Project alums who have come through at least a full-day OpEd Project
seminar. This is an opportunity for successful writers, editors and thought leaders to dramatically improve the quality of
public conversation—to inspire, and be inspired—in a very meaningful way, in about an hour a month. As an OpEd Project
alum, you may request a mentor match any time you have a draft op-ed you’d like feedback on. If use the Mentor-Editor
program within one month of taking an OpEd Project seminar, we will extend your access to mentoring for two more
months (three total). Mentor-editors statistically double your odds of success.
HOW IT WORKS
1. You may request a match any time in the one month after completing a full-day OpEd Project seminar, by submitting
your op-ed to our online portal. Your access password can be found in your closing note when you complete your
workshop. If you use this program at least once within the one-month window, we will extend your access for an
additional two months (for a total of three).
2. You must submit a solid draft op-ed to initiate the match. It must meet The OpEd Project definition of an op-ed: a
timely, evidence-based argument of public value. It should be approximately 600-800 words. We will not match you if
your op-ed draft exceeds 1000 words.
3. Upon receiving your request, we query Mentor-Editors to find the best match for you. This process can take 2 business
days, although it may be faster.
*If you are working on a very time-sensitive op-ed and need immediate feedback, we encourage you to tap your seminar
group for peer mentoring.
4. Mentor-Editors commit to providing positive critical feedback in a tone that encourages and inspires. We ask Mentor-
Editors to do everything they can—in the manner they feel most appropriate—to empower you. They may comment on
broad ideas, suggest copy edits, or both.
5. Your mentor will not pitch your op-ed for you—that is your job. To help you, we post submission and contact
information for hundreds of media outlets on our website, and we encourage you to read our Frequently Asked
Questions (FAQ) page on the Resources tab of our website. In it, we address questions like, "Where should I pitch?" and
"How do I follow up?”
6. Although Mentor-Editors occasionally share personal contacts, you should not expect this.
8. This program was founded to support your voice – please do not use it for ghostwriting.
To request a match: submit your request and draft op-ed to our online portal:
theopedproject.org/mentoreditor-submission