“I'm a black man supervising a white woman, and we're supposed to be dealing with racial disparities. There's a tremendous amount of opportunity in this and a whole lot of pitfalls.”
In Episode 2 of How’s Work? with Esther Perel, a Minnesota lobbyist and his ex-staffer express long-simmering frustrations about the rupture that came between them following George Floyd’s murder. He is a black man, she is a white woman. She felt undervalued, underpaid and undersupported by her closest friend while he suffered the injustices of a system organized around white privilege.
What seems at first like a requiem harmonizes into a more hopeful duet once filters lift and true feelings are voiced. Still, dissonance lingers in Race, Gender and Money as black vs white experiences in America counterpoint the narratives.
What to listen for in this episode of How’s Work? with Esther Perel: