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Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning again, everyone. Listeners, we're going to talk about two things now with Kai Wright, host of WNYC's The United States of Anxiety which are both so relevant now. We're going to open up the phones on both of these things, too, for your stories, celebrating Pride Month by including parts of your culture, whatever that culture is, and how you celebrate or observe Juneteenth. Here are two questions for you listening and who might want to call in, feel free to answer one or both. Here's the first, what part of your ethnic or national culture of origin finds expression in your LGBTQ life? 212-433-WNYC.

Now, one reason we asked earlier this month, a stand up comic and Emmy-nominated Saturday Night Live writer Sam Jay, was a guest on Fresh Air. She talked about how she felt not fitting into gay culture, which, to her, looked like white gay culture in Boston, as she was coming of age and realizing what her sexual orientation was. Listen.

Sam Jay: When I was growing up, and I'm learning about what lesbians are through media and TV and what gay is, for me, what I saw was a lot of like Lilith Fair lesbians and a lot of show tunes quoting dudes and I just didn't see a lot of Blackness in that.

Brian Lehrer: Interesting quote. She eventually found Black gay circles that had different cultural expressions when she moved to Atlanta. Here's a little of that.

Sam Jay: You've still got to listen to your hip hop music in the club, you've still got to hear future. There was going to be Hennessy [laughs], there was going to be a good time as to what I knew a good time to be. It didn't feel as isolating as when I would go out in Boston to a gay club, and I was like, "I don't fit in here."

Brian Lehrer: Sam Jay. LGBTQ people who are Black from any background, Latinx from any background, and the word Latinx applies here, AAPI from any kind of background, Native American, too. Are there LGBTQ artistic expressions or ways of hanging out or foods or clothes you wear or any other expressions that reflect your particular intersectionality which might not be, as Sam Jay put it, Lilith Fair lesbians or show tune quoting gay men, more white things. Tweet @BrianLehrer or give us a call and tell us your story. 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. Let's expand on that thought that I'm sure had heads nodding in agreement when Sam Jay put it out there with Terry Gross the other day.

Our guest, Kai, who wrote a book about people growing up Black, brown and gay in New York City, will also host a Juneteenth special on his show, The United States of Anxiety, Sunday night at 6:00. He will go live from Texas this Sunday. Why Texas? Well, as some of you know, before Juneteenth became a federal holiday, it was Black Texans who were first to mark the day that some of the very last enslaved people were freed from the Confederacy. That happened in the Lone Star State. Here's our question, second question for you right now. How are you planning on celebrating Juneteenth this Sunday?

Whether you're from Texas or any part of the South, and have long celebrated it, or people from around here who started celebrating more recently, perhaps, what traditions are you keeping or adding or making with your family and friends, maybe for the first time? 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. On your culture of origin and your LGBTQness or how you celebrate or observe Juneteenth. 212-433-WNYC, 433-9692. I'll throw one more Juneteenth-related thing in here. Anyone want to weigh in on the commercialization of it? What Juneteenth products will you buy as, "Oh, kind of cool, look, they're selling Juneteenth theses or thats." Or, what gross you out like, "Oh my god, really? They're appropriating Juneteenth to sell that?"

Quick Google search shows Juneteenth flags and banners seem to be popular. Will you hang one of those outside your home or buy a t-shirt, a Juneteenth-inspired watch, whatever? 212-433-WNYC, 433-9692. Hi, Kai.

Kai Wright: Hey, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Let's start on the Juneteenth side of this. You've got a great lineup for your special of Sunday. Professor Annette Gordon-Reed, Miss Opal Lee. You'll be talking to a Houston public radio correspondent who'll be stationed in Emancipation Park down there. Let's start a little bit with Professor Gordon-Reed, who listeners of this show know. She's been on here, in fact, on Monday, the Federal holiday observed, when we're getting our team off we're going to repeat, conversation we had here with Professor Gordon-Reed. What do you expect to be talking about with her?

Kai Wright: Well, let me answer that by starting with, I really love the framing of this conversation because we are going to be live both for Juneteenth and for LGBTQ Pride. They're both holidays that are deeply important to me personally, as a Black gay man. Both holidays that are complicated for me at the moment and that's what we're going to be wrestling with. That's part of what we're going to talk to Annette Gordon-Reed about, is that-- because both of these holidays, these are rooted as explicitly political events. These are events that were started because individuals and communities said, "You know what? I am not going to take this anymore."

They are celebrations of the personal and communal emancipation from violent oppression, in both cases, that was sponsored by and aided by the federal and state government. These are deeply political events. How far are we removed from the meaning of that politics? What we're going to talk to-- and how do we stay close to it while we celebrate the joy in that? We're going to talk to Annette Gordon-Reed just about that political history of this moment. She has written a new book called On Juneteenth that is about this specific piece of history. We're going to learn more about why Juneteenth in the first instance? Why quite Texas as a place that it began, and how we can hold those things close, as it now becomes a national holiday that is also a celebration?

Brian Lehrer: Can you talk about the mix of joy, you just used that word, and other feelings that you have or that you think a lot of people have regarding Juneteenth? I've heard people call it, The Black Fourth of July. I don't know if you like that comparison or not. Of course, it's celebrating the last gasp, the real end of slavery. It's freedom, but boy, did it come at the end of hundreds of years of death and living horror. What's the mix of joy and other stuff, you think?

Kai Wright: Well, it is a celebration in the end, it is a celebration of freedom. I think it is so important, A, for Black people, period, anywhere, to celebrate our freedom because we cannot take it for granted. We've never been able to take it for granted. We have and continue to work very hard to protect it. It is very important. An enormous part of the political project of anti-blackness is to convince us to constantly be tragic and constantly be in a place of defending ourselves and never celebrating ourselves. We need to unapologetically step into that joy and that's the joyful part of it. I'd say the exact same for Pride. Things are true. The stepping into the joy of it is an essential part of the fighting for the freedom.

Brian Lehrer: Let's take a phone call. Kanene in Harlem, you're on WNYC. Hi, Kanene.

Kanene Hi, Brian. Hi Kai. Thank you so much for taking my call. I'm literally typing up something now. I'm doing an event about it, and I call it, "Juneteenth Issues." [chuckles] I feel like because I do Black Issues issues, this is an issue, this is the Blurgent issue. There's so many Blurgent, Black and urgent issues, like education, fixing the curriculum, making it much less whitewashed. That doesn't seem to have the same level of expediency and excitedness as these budgets for all of these events. There's like 29 events in Brooklyn for Juneteenth [laughs]. People are inviting. I can't be omnipotent and omnipresent. That's what whiteness is. Whiteness is omnipotent and omnipresent. I, a Black woman, [chuckles] cannot be in 29 different events in Brooklyn and then another 14 Juneteenth observances in Harlem. It's like they're packing the entire concept of Black History Month into one day with this ecstasy of proliferation of, "Ooh, all things Juneteenth." It's decontextualized because it's like, what about the reparations? What about the repair? What about actually acknowledging the bones that we are walking on, the African burial ground? I was in the 4th grade and it totally remixed the concept of what we learned about history, that it happened in the south and Harriet Tubman freed the slaves and got them to freedom up north.

The whole notion of freedom needs to be rewritten. I think it's lost in a lot of these concerts and parties. I get Hallmark greeting cards this month, "Happy Juneteenth." [chuckles] That's why I'm producing Juneteenth Issues.

Brian Lehrer: Out of all those things you've been invited to, and with various ambivalences that you just laid out, what are you going to do on Juneteenth?

Speaker: I produce Black Issues issues, so I will be literally interviewing people how not to celebrate Juneteenth. Actually, I poll audiences, so I'm going to be polling people on the streets.

Brian Lehrer: How not to?

Speaker: How not to, yes. I think we need to get very clear and plan for Juneteenth 2023, because I think Juneteenth 2022 clearly was planned-- How many months ago? They were like, "Let's get these speakers. Let's get these DJs. Let's get these singers." What about getting these Blackademics, these historians and academics that actually study and, I like to say, amplify the issues and accelerate the solutions? I just went to a conference that featured Nikole Hannah-Jones-- shout out 1619 Project. One of the sessions was about emancipation in New York City, because New York City had slavery, first of all. Most people don't know that either. How Black publications, people were writing in op-eds as to how to celebrate emancipation. Toning it down. Let's not get too ecstatic. There was a lot of what you call tone policing and then also respectability politics, even in the 1840s within the Black community. This is not--

Brian Lehrer: Interesting. So many through lines. Kanene, I'm going to leave it there for time. Thank you so much for your contribution, as usual, when you call in. Kai, boy, you talk about complicated feelings about these holidays. She laid some of those complicated feelings right out there.

Kai Wright: On the one piece, I'll say what we're going to try to literally do on the show is be in a both ends space, which, personally, I struggle with these false either or choices. This is, to me, it's not either learn from the academics about the history and the reading, or have a good time. It is both. As I say, the joy and the celebration is an important part of Black freedom, of both gaining and holding onto Black freedom. I think, the food, the way we party, how and why we party, these are all deeply personal choices and family-based choices. We want to celebrate all of that, while also centering that this celebration is a celebration of a fight for and a claiming of emancipation from slavery.

Brian Lehrer: You're doing the show from Houston on Sunday night. Do you want to talk a little bit about why?

Kai Wright: To full disclosure, we're going to broadcast it from New York, but we're partnering with-

Brian Lehrer: Oh, got it. Sorry.

Kai Wright: -three Houston public radio stations. We're going to take callers from all over the country because it'll be a national broadcast. We want to center callers from Texas, and particularly Black callers. That's because this was a holiday created by and for Black Texans. June 19th, 1865, is when the Union Army finally arrived in Galveston, Texas, to deliver the news of the emancipation proclamation. That is the beginning of this celebration. Now that it is a national thing, and I should say that it is a national thing in large part due to the work of Black activists in Texas who wanted it to be a national thing, so we're going to talk about that, too. Now that it is, we want to hear from them. How do they think we should celebrate it? How do they celebrate it? Why do they celebrate it? We're going to try to center that conversation.

Brian Lehrer: On the Pride side, here's a tweet from a listener, "As a non-binary, queer Ecuadorian, it's difficult finding a space that both respects and validates me. Hetero and cis genderism can be very toxic in our culture. I was lucky to find and become friends with artists from Guayaqueer, an Ecuadorian queer collective that makes great art." They give the handle for that. Oh, that's just their Twitter handle. I'll leave that private. You can see it, folks, if you want to go to Twitter for that person. I wonder if that touches off a conversation, Kai, that might even be relevant to the book that you wrote a number of years ago about coming of age as Black and brown on the streets of New York, in which you wrote about various people you followed.

Kai Wright: It's funny. The book is so long ago now. I hardly remember it, but I do-- One thing that always stuck with me as it relates to Pride is one of the young men that I profiled in the book, he lived in east New York. He's Puerto Rican, he lived in east New York. He was in his early 20s before he even knew that Pride existed in lower Manhattan. He was a subway ride away and he literally just didn't even know it was there. That is a statement to me about how distant some of the things that happen in the Capital G, Capital C Gay Community can be from the many, many people who have a wide range of sexual and gender identities who are looking for community.

Also, my own journey has been about creating my own space as a Black gay man. This goes back some years [laughs]. I remember as I was first beginning that journey, it is difficult because the world that is presented, what is presented to you as the queer community is a very white, very middle-class space, and very "gender normative" space, and very cis-gendered space. If you aren't any of those things, you really do have to do a little more work. One of the things I actually love about Pride in New York City is, once you're there, there are a million ways to celebrate Pride and a million communities present there. That's one of the things that I do quite take a lot of joy from.

Brian Lehrer: Did you relate to those Sam Jay clips about coming of age and going to what seemed like gay bars or gay hangouts in Boston, but as you put it, Capital G, Capital C Gay Community tended to be white. It was Lilith Fairs. It was guys singing show tunes, but there are other expressions we should be talking about, too, that are related to other people's cultures?

Kai Wright: I have to say first off that I know an awful lot of non-white queers who love both Lilith Fairs and show tunes. I think the point is that the journey for me and for many people is letting go entirely of preconceived notions about what it means to be lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or questioning, or anywhere on the gender spectrum. That the journey is about letting go of any and all preconceptions about it because there are-- That is ultimately what the act of coming out is, is saying, "I am an individual. This is to me." Ultimately, it's about saying, "I am an individual. I am me. What do I want for my life and how do I want this identity to live in my life?" Then going and building that. From whatever direction it's coming that's telling you what you should be or how you should do it, that is the antithesis, in my mind, to the journey we're supposed to be on and what Pride is about.

Brian Lehrer: Rena in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC. Hi, Rena.

Rena: Hi. I'm from Buffalo, New York. I grew up there with a wonderful woman named Alliah L. Agostini, who has a great children's book out called the Juneteenth Story, celebrating the end of slavery in the United States. It's really a wonderful resource for children. I've bought a lot of copies for a lot of friends and kids already. Alliah's grandfather was one of the co-founders of the celebration of Juneteenth in Buffalo, New York. His name is [inaudible 00:20:12]. She does a wonderful job of laying out the history and also connecting it to modern-day historical connections in Buffalo, New York.

Brian Lehrer: Rena. Thank you very much for that book suggestion. Leanne in the Bronx, you're on WNYC. Hi, Leanne.

Leanne: Hi. I was just wondering-- thoughts on-- is the commercialization of Juneteenth and how we're talking about it not as a federal holiday, watering down what Juneteenth is really rooted in, which is this idea that enslaved people were freed two and a half years before, and that there wasn't enforcement of that, that the United States clung to holding people in enslavement for as long as possible, and rather just making this almost a happy ending story without acknowledging what really this march in Galveston was about and having to send in federal troops to actually forcibly free people.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you, Leanne. She's right, Kai. It's so important to say that out loud what the actual Juneteenth story was, and that gap between when officially slavery ended, and when people got the word in South Texas and slaves were actually emancipated there.

Kai Wright: Yes, but again, I have to say, for me, I think it's the work of trying to hold multiple things at one time, which we just struggle to do. It's hard, but certainly, in political conversations. That is the origin and we really need to center it. We also need to center the fact that it was a celebration and that it is a celebration and that we require celebrations now. I have to say, and on this, we will absolutely wrestle with this corporatization question for both Juneteenth and pride, companies that have taken this moment to use it as an opportunity to sell things. How do we sit with that?

I have to say that the answer isn't always as simple as it seems to me. I know people in both of these spaces who feel strongly that-- listen, don't snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. What we want is a world saturate, absolutely, whatever reason you're doing it, tell us, saturate us in Black stuff, saturate us in queer stuff. Absolutely. We need that in the world. In particular, if you're going to highlight makers and service providers who are in fact Black, who are in fact queer. I hear that, but I also hear that, again, these are holidays and commemorations rooted in a very particular political statement about freedom from oppression. If you are a company that is not actively engaged in freeing Black people or queer people from oppression now, and you are selling products tied to these events, that raises questions for you.

Brian Lehrer: Last thing. We've got a thread on Twitter and some people on the phones who are not going to have time to put on in their own voice, who are white listeners who are looking for guidance. Here's one tweet that just says, "Should white people celebrate? How?" Another caller who I think is white is asking, "Should I be saying 'Happy Juneteenth' to people?" Any--? Not to put you in the position of being--

Kai Wright: I'll kick the can down a road a little bit and say, these are questions I will absolutely ask Ms Opal Lee on Sunday night, who, of course, famously is the 94-year-old, I guess she'd be 95 by now, who advocated heartily for this to become a national holiday. I'm eager to hear what she thinks about that, but I would say it is also, as a national celebration of the end of enslavement in the United States. That is a holiday for everybody. Everybody needs to celebrate the end of enslavement [chuckles]. Black people have a very special and particular celebration to have there, but certainly white people need to be engaged in and thinking about where they sit in the work of having ended enslavement and now ending the legacy of enslavement in the United States.

Brian Lehrer: As a straight white cisgender male, I will say, "Happy Pride-"

Kai Wright: I thank you, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: "-and Happy Juneteenth, Kai."

Kai Wright: Thank you so much.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, you should tune in every Sunday at 6:00 to Kai on the United States of Anxiety. This Sunday in particular, they will have a Juneteenth special right here on 93.9 FM and AMA 20, or live stream it @wnyc.org. As always, Kai, thanks for coming on with us.

Kai Wright: Thanks so much, Brian.

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