Will you help us relaunch the Let's Give A Damn Foundation? 🙏🏽❤️
Joél Leon! Genesis Be! Audre Lorde! Big changes!
Hey friends,
How are you? Where are you finding hope and joy today? To borrow a question that my good friend Noor always asks, “How’s your heart?”
Please reply with your answers. I really want to know!
Before I share our most recent podcast conversations with two absolutely stunning humans, I’d like to share with you some big changes happening within our nonprofit.
Most of you know about the podcast and other work we do but did you know we have a nonprofit? We launched the Let’s Give A Damn Foundation during the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests as a means of raising and sending money to people and orgs all over the country that needed food, supplies, etc. After the protests, we continued to send tens of thousands of dollars all over the world to various organizations and causes.
This was incredibly gratifying work but we are, however, changing course. And we’re so damn excited about it! As Scorpion sang after their visit to the Soviet Union and as the Cold War was coming to an end:
🎶 The future's in the air, I can feel it everywhere, Blowing with the wind of change 🎶
The winds of change are, indeed, blowing! After many conversations with our Board of Directors, Advisory Board, mentors, and friends, we are relaunching in October with an exciting but very different mission and vision. For us to be able to relaunch well, we are raising $20,000 over the next 7-10 days. I know that’s a huge number but I think we can do it! Our friend Rainn Wilson started us off with a generous donation. Will you consider joining Rainn and many others who will donate overt the next week?
To learn more and to make a donation today, please click below:
Thank you for reading and for considering our campaign to relaunch the nonprofit. Onward! In case you missed them, here are the two most recent podcast episodes we’ve released:
🎧 PODCAST(S) TO LISTEN TO
A few weeks ago, I interviewed my good friend, Joél Leon, on the Let’s Give A Damn podcast. Born and raised in the Bronx, Joél is a performer, author, storyteller, and damn-giver extraordinaire.
Here’s what the Lin-Manuel Miranda had to say about Joél: “Joél’s words are where I go when I need some inspiration. And he never lets me down.”
Listen to our chat on Spotify or Apple Podcasts. Or if you’d prefer to watch our conversation, we put it on YouTube for ya.
And here and here are a couple of clips we shared on socials.
Lastly, buy his latest book, Everything and Nothing At Once: A Black Man’s Reimagined Soundtrack for the Future. It’s brilliant.
And now for our most recent podcast conversation…
Y’all know Genesis Be? If not, change that really quickly. Genesis is one of the most incredible people I know. Her spirit is so deeply powerful. A force of nature!
Genesis Be is a dynamic artist and activist that harnesses the power of music to amplify marginalized voices and advocate for social change. In this conversation, we talked about People Not Things, collective liberation, how to humanize instead of dehumanize, and so much more.
Listen to our chat on Spotify or Apple Podcasts. Or if you’d prefer to watch our conversation, you can find it on YouTube.
And here are a couple of clips we shared on socials:
— We are all complex human beings, worthy of dignity.
— I asked Genesis how we should view and talk about Zionists. Her answer helped me deeply.
Order Genesis Be’s latest book, People Not Things: Love Poems and Paintings for Humanity.
And make to read more about The Philosophy and Practice of People Not Things.
🧠 QUOTE(S) TO PONDER
“You cannot use someone else’s fire. You can only use your own. And in order to do that, you must first be willing to believe that you have it.” — Audre Lorde
“If they cannot love and resist at the same time, they probably will not survive.” — Audre Lorde
Love and resist. Love and resist. Love and resist. Memorize it. Say it to yourself. Say it to others. Live it.
👋🏽 GOODBYE FOR NOW!
Well, that’s it for this week! Thank you for reading. I'm truly grateful. Consider forward this email to a friend? Or send them this link so they can sign up. And if you’d like to support our work, consider switching to a paid subscription here on Substack or you can join our Patreon community.
I’ll be back in the next week or two with good news and more steps we can take together to make our world a much better place. We have a lot of work to do. Love y'all.
Peace and love,
Nick Laparra
 | A guest post by
|