New York, I Love You But You've Changed

Places on the Internet to Learn More:   Soft Power Vote website and Instagram and their June 2021 Primary Voter Guide and their Candidate Criteria Ranked Choice Voting Info and where to find your poll site and sample ballot Dianne Morales’ Campaign Woes Rebecca Traister on Maya Wiley and New York Magazine’s feature on Andrew Yang New York Nico interviews the Mayoral Candidates

Kelsey Jones and Gabriela Tejedor, are the founders and Co-Heads of School and the respective Math and ELA teachers at Brooklyn Independent, a private middle school with a sliding scale tuition model located in Fort Greene. BKI names diversity and inclusion as keys to effective learning, and the school’s goal is to cultivate a community that sincerely reflects the racial and socioeconomic diversity of Brooklyn. Gaby and Kelsey started BKI as a response to the stark segregation and inequity that plagues New York City’s school system, two things they witnessed and felt in their decade-long careers as educators. Gaby and Kelsey opened the doors of BKI to their first class of 6th graders in the fall of 2019 after years of intense, and at times, disheartening, planning. BKI is now in its second year of operation, serving 6th and 7th graders, with plans to expand in the coming years. This conversation is rigorous (to borrow an overused word from the ed world) and emotionally rich and thought provoking and very very

Brittany Owens Micek is the founder and lead organizer of Meditating for Black Lives, a community organization that uses the principles and practices of various meditation traditions to support community efforts to heal oppression. Brittany started Meditating for Black Lives last summer with hopes to create a space for attendees to sit in contemplation together to process our absorbed trauma and breathe for the lives of Black and Brown people, and for all people, throughout the world. On Saturdays and Sundays from June 2020 lasting through the fall, Brittany or other intentionally selected guides led up to 2,000 attendees through 30 minute guided meditations in both Bed Stuy and Brownsville that focused on the privilege and precarity of breath. This is part two of our conversation with Brittany. Topics include, how the wellness industrial complex has co-opted the ancient practice of meditation, leaving it falsely synonymous with whiteness and money… and also how Meditating for Black Lives is an attempt to cou

Brittany Owens Micek is the founder and lead organizer of Meditating for Black Lives, a community organization that uses the principles and practices of various meditation traditions to support community efforts to heal oppression. Brittany started Meditating for Black Lives last summer with hopes to create a space for attendees to sit in contemplation together to process our absorbed trauma and breathe for the lives of Black and Brown people, and for all people, throughout the world. On Saturdays and Sundays from June 2020 lasting through the fall, Brittany or other intentionally selected guides led up to 2,000 attendees through 30 minute guided meditations in both Bed Stuy and Brownsville that focused on the privilege and precarity of breath. You will hear our conversation with Brittany in two parts. And they are both damn good, if we do say so ourselves. This is part one. In this episode, Brittany and Alexis talk about their spiritual relationships with New York City and its often overlooked natural beauty

Today, we bring you part II of Alexis’ conversation with Rev. Amanda Hambrick Ashcraft. In part II, Alexis and Amanda discuss: the tension of being a white person in the anti-racist movement and how they wrestle with that tension, how anti-racism needs to show up in day to day life beyond Instagram, the complicated relationship between the Black Lives Matter movement and capitalist institutions like the Grammys, the danger of white feminism and the off base assumptions progressive white people make. Alexis also explains why this moment in time feels, to her, like one long episode of Atlanta. Amanda shares the story behind her controversial decision to appear on Fox News, twice, the relationship between spirituality and protest, and her own decision to go to seminary. She also discusses the history of Middle Church as a progressive spiritual haven and it’s future after a devastating fire burnt it’s Second Avenue sanctuary to the ground last December. If you missed Part I, Amanda Hambrick Ashcraft is a white m

Do we hate the player, but love the game? Ball is Business is an investigation into the complex world of amateur basketball, from the players who love the game to the systems that break their hearts. In September 2020, Alexis' original pitch for “Ball is Business” was chosen as one of 10 finalists (out of 1,800 entries) in iHeartRadio’s Next Great Podcast competition. She had three weeks to create a pilot of an narrative documentary podcast investigating the exploitative nature of the high school basketball recruitment circuit. The pilot features interviews with ESPN’s Baxter Holmes, The Last Shot’s Corey Johnson, top NYC youth basketball recruit Jermel Thomas and Dr. Akuoma Nwadike discussing the effects being a star athlete as a kid has on your mind, body and identity. Alexis is currently pitching the series to outlets who are interested in producing Ball is Business into a full series with care, passion and a relentless pursuit for truth! Take a listen to the pilot and hit us up if you know anybody who fit

Amanda Hambrick Ashcraft is a white mother raising three white kids, a 5 year old daughter and 7 year old twin boys, in the East Village of NYC. She was born and raised in a small town in Kentucky, went to college in Birmingham, AL and to seminary in Richmond, VA. She has lived in NYC for 13 years. Amanda is a movement builder and leader who writes, speaks and studies at the intersection of race, faith, politics, feminism, and parenting. Amanda is the founder of Raising Imagination, an online movement platform that looks at the evolution of social issues through the lens of imagination. Her platform is largely dedicated to the necessary work white parents must undergo to raise their white kids as anti-racist and how to involve kids in advocacy. Her work has been cited in CNN, Refinery29, the Wall Street Journal, WNBC, and Crooked Media. Amanda is also the Executive Minister for Justice, Education & Movement Building at Middle Church, a historic, multicultural inclusive church in the East Village. In toda

Nattalyee Randall is an actor, singer and voice over artist based in Manhattan. She is also the founder and leader of the 50 Mile Run for Justice Protest, a national initiative to use running as a means to fight for and celebrate the lives of Black people who lost their lives because of police brutality. In November of 2020, she ran a 50 mile route that spanned the five boroughs honoring 50 Black lives lost to police violence. She is currently training to run 100 miles for 100 lives lost on Juneteenth 2021. These impressive feats, along with Nattalyee’s personal running journey, will be documented in her upcoming documentary The Race Against Race. Nattalyee lost her mother Tinnie Randall to Covid-19 in December of 2020. Nattalyee and her sisters have organized a commemorative scholarship, dedicated to their mother, that will be awarded to two 6-12 grade students who have lost a parent or parent figure to the coronavirus. The link to apply by May 1st, 2021 is below. In this episode Nattalyee discusses being an

Michael Shelton is 28, from Washington Heights, a music lover, biker, software engineer and activist currently living in Williamsburg. Michael is also an organizer and member of Riders 4 Rights, a community organization that organizes bike protests, leads educational rides and provides mutual aid to New Yorkers across the city, all in the fight for Black Liberation with the intention of building community and keeping its members safe. In this episode, Michael fills Alexis in on how life in the NYC of his childhood compares to the NYC of today, what drew him into organizing, the beauty of the bike protest, the agony and ecstasy of summer 2020, the power of organizing in community and what it means to be an LCD Soundsystem groupie. Places on the Internet to Learn More: Follow Riders 4 Rights on Instagram Why Passive Voice in Journalism is So Dangerous, Adrienne Samuels Gibbs, September 3rd, 2020 The Black Led Groups Biking Against Racism, The Guardian, July 2nd, 2020

Marcus Alston is 18 years old. A Bushwick native. An activist. A Fashion Killa. A 2020 graduate of Pace High School in lower Manhattan and current freshman at Lafayette College in Easton, PA. Marcus is an activist who is in love with activism and his people. He has spent the last four years fighting for a more equitable city, with a specific focus on school suspension reform and integrating New York City’s very segregated schools. In this episode, Marcus shares with Alexis his experience growing up in Bushwick, its gentrification, his history as an activist, his experience protesting last summer, being a Black person at a PWI and living outside of NYC for the first time in his life. We also hear his take on the impact of a year of protests, the power of his generation and his hopes for our city moving forward. Oh, and how much he loves thrifting and Pop Smoke. Marcus’s interview is the first of our second season, which is a love letter to New York City after a year of sickness, sadness, and tragedy that was a

Alexis won an award! The pilot episode of her show, Appropriate:Stories from the grey area of consuming culture was award BRIC Media Arts 2019 B Spoke award- recognizing a show that pushes the boundaries of free speech in podcasting. In this episode she examines her relationship to hip hop and attempts to answer the following questions:Why do so many white people like Chance the Rapper? Why were there so many of us at his concert? Why are there so many of us at rap concerts in general? Why do so many white people listen to rap music? Have we always listened to rap music or is this some sort of new thing? Am I overthinking this? Do I overthink everything? Is it even a big deal that we listen to rap music? And what’s up with the WAY we listen to rap music? Spoiler alert: she doesn't come up with any final answers, but she sure tries. Tune in to hear Alexis examine her own relationship with rap music with NYILYBYC favorite Ruth, as well as her conversations with poet and cultural critic Hanif Abdurraqib, Refiner