This week, host Farai Chideya interviews longtime TV and film producer and now co-director of the Sundance award-winning documentary Aftershock, Tonya Lewis Lee and one of the film’s featured subjects, reproductive justice advocate Shawnee Benton-Gibson. Benton-Gibson’s daughter died in October 2019 after giving birth – one more fatality in a long epidemic of Black maternal mortality. Farai also speaks to Lewis Lee one-on-one about how her work in media and experience as a children’s author led to her work as a maternal health advocate. Then, in our weekly segment Sippin’ the Political Tea, Farai interviews legal analyst and NYU Law professor Melissa Murray and University of Pennsylvania Ph.D History candidate Kimberly St. Julian-Varnon about the impact and implications of the highly politicized conviction of WNBA star Brittney Griner in Russia.
Farai Chideya:
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Farai Chideya:
This is Our Body Politic. I'm Farai Chideya. In October, 2019, Shamony Gibson died just two weeks after giving birth to a baby boy. At only 30 years old, Gibson's death was one more fatality in a long epidemic of black maternal mortality. Shawnee Benton-Gibson, Shamony's mother knows this problem well. She's a licensed clinician and author, and she was an outspoken reproductive justice advocate and activist long before the issue hit so close to home.
Shawnee Benton-Gibson:
I never thought that this would happen to my family because I do reproductive justice work. But just also, why wouldn't it? We're black and brown. She's a woman. She was having a baby. So, why would we think we would be exempt? Because we have the knowledge?
Farai Chideya:
In the United States, black women, pregnant and giving birth, die at a rate three times that of white women. The film Aftershock co-directed by Tonya Lewis Lee and Paula Eiselt won a Special Jury Award at the Sundance Film Festival and is now streaming on Hulu. The movie spotlights, Shawnee Benton-Gibson's story and other bereaved families, as they grapple with loss and try to combat systemic medical racism, dating back hundreds of years. Today, we're joined by Aftershock's director, Tonya Lewis Lee, and one of the core subjects of the film, maternal health advocate, Shawnee Benton-Gibson. Welcome, Shawnee.
Shawnee Benton-Gibson:
Thank you.
Farai Chideya:
And welcome, Tonya.
Tonya Lewis Lee:
Thank you, Farai.
Farai Chideya:
Let's dive into the numbers first. A 2016 survey found that almost half of white medical students surveyed held false beliefs about the biological differences in black patients like the myth of fewer nerve endings, the myth of feeling less pain. Another study found that black babies are more likely to survive if they're cared for by a black doctor.
Shawnee Benton-Gibson:
The ambulance came. It seems like forever, but it was only minutes, and I immediately started talking to them about what was happening. She just had a C-section, I'm telling them the symptoms.
Omari Maynard:
They kept asking me. They kept asking her mother, is she on any drugs or anything like that? Was she taking any drugs? I was like, "No. She doesn't take drugs."
Shawnee Benton-Gibson:
Next set of people come in. "Is she on drugs? Does she use drugs?"
Farai Chideya:
That was sound from both you Shawnee, and also from Omari Maynard, who was Shamony's partner. What did you learn from that conversation with the EMTs taking your daughter as she was in crisis?
Shawnee Benton-Gibson:
Oh, my gosh, my brain was on overdrive that day, but what I was very present to in the moment is the shock of what was happening to Shamony and the level of insensitivity and focus on something that had nothing to do with what was happening in the moment. I'm like, "We have precious moments to address what her medical emergency is, and her life is in the balance, and three, four times you're asking me the same question about whether she is using drugs."
Shawnee Benton-Gibson:
I wish I could say they were concerned about medication she was on, but no, they were concerned about illegal drug and substance use. If they knew anything about Shamony and our family, that's just not us. I'm actually... We don't talk about this a lot, but I have 30 years of experience in addiction counseling, and if that was something to share, I would've shared it right out the gate. So, I'm like, "This is what their focus is when they see a black woman, when they see a black family in distress." When they come into a home in Brooklyn in Bed-Stuy, the first thing they think of is that this person must be acting this way or demonstrating these symptoms or these behaviors because they're under the influence of illegal drugs." It was just jarring to the spirit, but I'm like, "I'm about the business of saving my daughter."
Farai Chideya:
Tonya, the beginning of the documentary is so powerful. I mean, the whole documentary is so powerful. We cover black maternal health and the losses of lives on a regular basis on this show, and I feel like you really were able to knit together an incredible focus on the disparities, but also on the passion and power of people like Shawnee, who are able to bring this into focus. How did you choose what moment of this long journey to put into your film?
Tonya Lewis Lee:
It was really important for us to show who Shamony was as well as Amber, and we had the good fortune of having footage that Shamony's sister, Jasmine, had shot because Jasmine, as an aspiring filmmaker, has documented a lot of their family's lives. So, we had a treasure trove, a footage of Shamony living her beautiful life. We wanted to show who she was. We wanted to show who Amber was.
Tonya Lewis Lee:
I think their spirit comes through when the people who are left behind through Shawnee, through Omari, through Bruce, we get to know the beauty of these women, the love that they had. And I often say that what I've learned from the film is that grief is love, and these families are activated by a love of the people they lost, a love of each other, a love of community, trying to make it better for all of us. And I think when you focus in on the love, the sadness and the trauma certainly is there, but the love is strong, and then you realize that when we work together, we can really make the world a better place.
Farai Chideya:
I wonder if you can tell us, first Shawnee, and then Tonya, about how you have processed the connection to Omari and Bruce, the gentleman who are the bereaved partners of the women, whose losses are featured in this film. Obviously, black maternal deaths are something that are considered a women's issue, but I think that this film really makes it clear that it's a human issue. It's an issue that crosses genders. Shawnee, you lost your daughter, but you also have this member of your family who is parenting your grandchild. How do you process your connection to him and other men who are dealing with this loss?
Shawnee Benton-Gibson:
Oh, that's such a beautiful question, and it's so deep that over the last couple of weeks, Omari and I have been talking about our relationship as it relates to other people's thoughts about our relationship and what it could be.
Shawnee Benton-Gibson:
This man is the father of my grandchildren and he is forever family. Shamony and Omari didn't get to marry in the sense that the world thinks of marriage, but he is forever going to be her partner, even if he manifests another relationship, which I hope he does. And we talk about that too. So, it's unfathomable to me not to be connected deeply to Omari. He co-created those beautiful babies that I get to be the grandparent for, so I can't fathom not being connected to him in a deep way. And then, to think about Bruce as an additional family member, a chosen family member is just a perfect opportunity for Omari to be covered in a deep way, which I want him to have. And then, also for Bruce to get extended support and coverage.
Shawnee Benton-Gibson:
We've been brought together by spirit, so who am I to interfere with that? Also, I'll say really quickly, we debunked the myths about black men and their relationships, black men and how they emote, black men and how they care for family and partners. And I love that we get to do that because there are so many false paradigms and narratives about brothers out there. So, this film gives us an opportunity to make sure that that doesn't continue.
Farai Chideya:
Tonya, how did you knit together, Bruce and Omari's story into this narrative of these women who've been lost. Amber Rose Isaac is the second woman, whose life lost is helping to anchor your inquiry in this film. I've heard so many times from people that they're so grateful to see accurate representations of men, who step into the role of primary caregiver through circumstances. They didn't anticipate. And there are many men who step into that role without the extraordinary circumstances, but specifically black men who step into the role of caring for children and caring for community. How did you center these men?
Tonya Lewis Lee:
People have asked us the question of how did you find these men as if we were looking to cast them and looking for these perfect black men? The truth is that we met Omari and Shawnee. Omari was two months into his grieving process, and thanks to Shawnee, we were able to film at such an early time. This is who Omari is. He was a man who was grappling with his grief, who obviously loved his partner, Shamony, very much. He had two children to raise. He was looking for healthy ways to work through his pain. That's one of the things I also really think is interesting with the film. Omari works out. He paints, and that he talks a lot about-
Farai Chideya:
Beautiful painter.
Tonya Lewis Lee:
Beautiful painter. That was really exercising his grief, a really healthy way of working through what he was going through. Also, he was looking to reach out to other men, who were going through similar situations that he was going through, to offer support to them, and in that, when he had heard about Amber's passing, he reached out to Bruce. And because they formed such a connection, he introduced us to Bruce and Bruce allowed us to follow him.
Tonya Lewis Lee:
I think you said that maternal health is not just about women's health. It's about a family's health. It's about a community's health. So, I think people often think about maternal health, maternal mortality and morbidity as only impacting women, but it impacts families. It impacts men. It impacts extended families and full-on communities, and Omari and Bruce are really showing us just through their actions, what that impact is. And then, you also see in the film, Omari meets other men and Bruce too. There are other men. There's a community. Omari, at one point, said, "We're a member of this messed up fraternity that nobody wants to be a member of." Yet they have each other to be supportive of each other for themselves and for our extended community, and it's a beautiful thing.
Farai Chideya:
That was Tonya Lewis Lee director of the film Aftershock, with advocate and film subject, Shawnee Benton-Gibson. Coming up next, more on the film Aftershock about the movement to save black mother's lives with advocate, Shawnee Benton-Gibson, and co-director, Tonya Lewis Lee. We also learn about Tonya's career and work on health and advocacy. Plus, Kimberly St. Julian-Varnon, and NYU law professor, Melissa Murray discuss Brittney Griner's nine-year sentence in Russia and what it says about race, gender, and geopolitics. That's on Our Body Politic.
Farai Chideya:
Welcome back to Our Body Politic. We've been discussing the new documentary Aftershock co-directed by Tonya Lewis Lee and Paula Eiselt. The movie shines a light on the ongoing crisis around black maternal mortality in the US. We're talking with co-director Tonya Lewis Lee, and advocate, Shawnee Benton-Gibson who's featured in the documentary and lost her daughter, Shamony Gibson. Here's more of our conversation.
Farai Chideya:
Shawnee the film sort of ends with a focus on the forward motion of this movement. What has happened just in your life around the move to actually preserve black women's life as people who bear life and people who deserve to live long and healthy lives?
Shawnee Benton-Gibson:
When the cameras stopped, my life continued. I've been in this work for a very long time, training and developing the Department of Health staff, doing black maternal health work as far as coaching and speaking. I run a support group for those who have fertility issues, who have experienced miscarriages, stillbirth, different types of birth trauma. That work continues and of course the work has been amplified.
Shawnee Benton-Gibson:
I'm big on partnership and having a collective impact, and that collective impact work means that I'm working with organizations and entities across the country, so that we can mitigate eliminate these issues. The work was existing when Shamony was alive and she was a part of it. It continued when she transitioned and it will continue after this film. What I love about the film is that it's a call to action. It's jarring. It's gut-wrenching, and it's also joyful and hopeful, and a lot of people have been reaching out.
Shawnee Benton-Gibson:
So, I'm about the business of responding to all of the folks who have reached out to us when the trailer was first out and we were promoting the film, to now that it's out, asking if we can speak, teach, co-create with them. Now, that the film is out, I have more community. More and more people are asking what they can do and how they can be a part of that, and that's folks that identify as black indigenous people of color, and also those who identify as white that are wanting to be a part of this movement.
Farai Chideya:
I'm going to turn to you, Tonya, but I want to play a little bit from the doc of Shawnee speaking in Washington, DC in front of a big crowd gathered to address this issue.
Shawnee Benton-Gibson:
Black lives matter, but black wombs create black lives, and when we forget that, we forget our humanity. We want to make sure that our grand babies, our children have mothers to raise them, and that fathers are not left to figure it out on their own. We must stop this. Black lives matter because black womb's matter. Black lives matter because black womb's matter. Black lives matter because black womb's matter, and a black womb created you.
Farai Chideya:
Amen to all of that. A black womb created me. I can't help but think about just the devastating reversals in reproductive justice that have been happening, which we cover on a routine basis on this show.
Farai Chideya:
Tonya, you've been doing screenings in many places, and I saw one of them recently, and you talked about how kind of the white supremacy underlay reproductive policies, including the banning of black midwives, the persecution and prosecution of black midwives, which you cover in this documentary. All of these things that were not about the health and the well-being of birthing women or just society in general were institutionalized, in order to create other structures of power or profit. So, where do you go from here?
Tonya Lewis Lee:
The conversation continues. I mean, I think the key is what we wanted to do with the film is really create a conversation. We're in this situation in the United States, where we have these high infant mortality rates, maternal mortality rates, and that's the marker of a health of a nation. You have the black indigenous populations that are dying at higher rates than the general population, but the general population is not doing that well either. So, we really have to examine what is the system that's set up? Why does it work the way that it does?
Tonya Lewis Lee:
I mean, often people will say, "Well, the system is broken." The system is not broken. The system is working the way it was set up to work, so we need to reimagine what it could look like. I hope that with Aftershock and in this sort of post-ops world, if you will, that we look at other industrialized nations that have better outcomes than we do that have midwives integrated into women's healthcare, and I think we need to really examine what that looks like.
Tonya Lewis Lee:
When you talk about the history that we cover in the film about midwives, it was the taking of the birthing industry out of the hands of women, putting it into the hands of men and into hospitals to control, to experiment on, to learn from, but also take the economy from the women. So, we need to really reexamine what we're doing. And I will say also that abortion care is a part of women's healthcare, and we need to make sure that the conversation is inclusive of all of it, so that we're working for better outcomes.
Tonya Lewis Lee:
Voting matters. I keep saying this to everybody. I know we get very frustrated with our political system. It's a disaster right now, but we the people can't give up and we have to keep out there fighting, voting, not only in our national elections, but in our local elections because that's where all of this really happens.
Farai Chideya:
Well, that's fantastic. Shawnee, if there's anything you'd like to say before we let you go, please do say it.
Shawnee Benton-Gibson:
Thank you so much. I was thinking about what Tonya stated. When I was thinking about the title of this show, Our Body Politic, I immediately thought about the political decisions that have been made, that have embodied consequences for those whose voices are heard the least, if at all, for those who have been marginalized for more time than we've been alive. And even some of the decisions that we've made here in the United States, especially under the former administration have impacts globally, and that our decisions here have impacted access to contraception, access to abortion, access to reproductive health and care.
Shawnee Benton-Gibson:
It just incenses me and it also stirs me up to take action to do something, not just in the local community, but nationally and internationally. When I think about maternal mortality and morbidity, with the new Supreme Court decision, we're going to have unfortunately, more near-death and death experiences. They're taking us backwards rather than forwards, and the implications on our community, they're going to be devastating if we don't do something to shift this.
Farai Chideya:
Shawnee and Tonya, thank you so much. Shawnee, we're going to say goodbye to you. Thank you for joining us. I really appreciate it.
Shawnee Benton-Gibson:
My pleasure. Thank you for having me.
Farai Chideya:
This is Our Body Politic. That was advocate Shawnee Benton-Gibson, who's featured in the new documentary Aftershock, co-directed by Paula Eiselt and Tonya Lewis Lee. I continued my conversation with Tonya to hear more about her career and her work in media and health.
Farai Chideya:
Tell me how you became the person who did this film. You have had a really interesting career ranging from children's television development, to this very brilliant, serious, heavy, but also just uplifting documentary. Give us a little walkthrough on how you got to this point.
Tonya Lewis Lee:
Back in 2000, I wrote a book called Please, Baby, Please. My children were young and I was noticing that they were realizing they were black in a white world, and there were not enough children's books, television programming that featured kids of color, and it was like, "Somebody should write another book, and maybe I should do that."
Tonya Lewis Lee:
So, after Please, Baby, Please came out, the US Department of Health and Human Services, the Office of Minority Health, reached out to me and asked me to be a spokesperson for their infant mortality awareness raising program, A Healthy Baby Begins with You, here in the United States. So, I had the opportunity to travel the country and learn about infant mortality, the causes. Each community has a different need or has different issues. And I had the chance to talk to groups of black women about how we access our healthiest lives because of course, when you're talking about an infant's health, you're talking about a woman's health.
Tonya Lewis Lee:
In those conversations, often, someone would tell me the story about someone who passed away from childbirth complications. I did a small film about the infant mortality crisis called Crisis in the Crib, and had been thinking about how to tackle the US maternal mortality crisis. When these articles came out in the New York Times and ProPublica in about 2017, 2018, I thought to myself, "Now is the time I better hurry up and make this film." So, I met my co-director Paula in November 2019, and she had a shared passion for maternal health that she had just finished directing her first film called 93Queen. She had some good chops as a director, a way to tell a story that's intimate about a broader issue. We met and a week later we were making this film.
Farai Chideya:
That's amazing.
Tonya Lewis Lee:
Yeah.
Farai Chideya:
You also now are working in producing supplements for people to try to shape their own health. I've had COVID two and a half times, and a friend of mine who's a doctor has been telling me that every time you get COVID... This is a reason to still be safe people. It can increase your long-term deleterious health outcomes like projected future diabetes, projected future X, Y, Z. I don't want to be freaked out about it, but I also realize, as someone who's a black woman in her fifties, I have to take care of myself. So, how did you go from also being someone who's documenting health crises to saying, "I want to produce a product for it"?
Tonya Lewis Lee:
Yeah. Well, I think really in my travels with that campaign, I discovered too that I had to take care of myself. I mean, health is everything. I'm in my 50s and I know I should be indexing higher on all sorts of things, and I had to figure out for myself how to find a lifestyle that would support my health and wellness, and part of that is talking to other women. For me, the supplements, creating Movita Organics was a way to continue that conversation with women because I'll be the first one to tell you, no one vitamin's going to do it, but it can be a part of a healthy lifestyle.
Farai Chideya:
Absolutely. I mean, I've had a number of health crises in my family, as various loved ones reach maturity, elderhood, and I'm really thinking a lot about my elderhood like how do I reach a healthy elderhood? I've passed childbearing age. I'm on the other side of menopause, but as I think about the journey of black women in particular or women of color and women overall with health, there is this moment where we have to reckon with our bodies. We have to reckon with the good, the bad, and the complicated of what it means to live in a women's body. To me, watching your documentary, even though I'm someone who's had kids, really felt like a bit of a reckoning with the trials and tribulations that women's bodies are asked to do in a society that doesn't support them. So, how do you deal with the broader questions of things like black maternal health and the more specific questions of how you treat yourself, Tonya?
Tonya Lewis Lee:
Yeah. It comes back to Audrey Lord that quote, "As a black woman, taking care of yourself is self preservation and political warfare." That's what it is. To me, I think about it very seriously in those terms. First of all, I think, as black women, living in our bodies, we're a threat to this society, for some reason. On the one hand, as Helena Grant says in the film, "Our worth was what our womb could produce for the plantation, and now that we are claiming our own autonomy, that becomes threatening to society at large."
Tonya Lewis Lee:
The fact that we index higher in most poor health outcomes is not because it's our fault. It's because of systems that are set up for us to be in those situations. So, it is very difficult to overcome that, which is why I say we must be in conversation with each other and share with one another about how we overcome this because our communities are only as strong as the women at the center of them.
Farai Chideya:
I do worry that the arc of black female wellness, black female healing, women of color healing is separated from the broader constructs of American society. A lot of times the constructs of women of color healing that I'm seeing are very much community based, but the constructs of healing on a broader level seem to be based on what can you pay for, which is not bad to pay for things, whether it's supplements or medical care, but there's not as much of a community focus.
Tonya Lewis Lee:
Well, I think that in order for us to have true healing, we have to hit it from every angle, and I think everybody has a role to play, and one doesn't exclude the other. I think there's a spiritual piece that also, we need to reckon with. I'm not talking about religion. I'm talking about really connecting in a spiritual sense to ourselves, and then to each other.
Farai Chideya:
Absolutely. Imagine that there's a 14-year-old girl, a couple hundred years in the future, and you're saying, "This was what happened with maternal health and this is what we made change." What would you say to them?
Tonya Lewis Lee:
Hmm. Well, I would say that this time right now, feels like a real turning point, and if things work out the way I'd like, I would say that people woke up and realized that understanding the health and wellness of the most vulnerable, which happened to be black and indigenous people in the United States, that we went through a reckoning. People acknowledged and understood the sacrifices that were made for this country to be what it was. There were reparations paid back to black people, black women. We also grappled with what birthing should really look like and decided that we needed to have women-centered birthing, and now, we're in a space where the outcomes are better. Midwives are a regular thing. Young women start going to midwives when they start menstruating, so that they understand what their bodies are, that we talked about menopause and we all understand what that is now. That's what I had hoped.
Farai Chideya:
Well, I absolutely love that vision, Tonya, and I'm so grateful to you, and to Shawnee, and all the other people in the documentary Aftershock, so thank you.
Tonya Lewis Lee:
Well, thank you Farai. I'm grateful to you for being in conversation about all of this. I think it's really important that we talk about our health, our wellness, and keep working to make for better outcomes in this country.
Farai Chideya:
That was Tonya Lewis Lee, co-director of the new documentary Aftershock, and an advocate for women and infant's health. Coming up next, our weekly roundtable, Sippin' the Political Tea, gets into Brittney Griner's nine-year sentence in Russia with Penn State PhD history student, Kimberly St. Julian-Varnon, and NYU law professor, Melissa Murray. You're listening to Our Body Politic.
Farai Chideya:
Each week on the show, we bring you a roundtable called Sippin' the Political Tea. This week, we're talking about WNBA star, Brittney Griner's conviction in Russia and the effort to bring her home. Joining me this week is Kimberly St. Julian-Varnon, a PhD student in history at the University of Pennsylvania. She specializes in race and blackness in Eastern Europe. Hi, Kimberly.
Kimberly St.Julian-Varnon:
Hi.
Farai Chideya:
Also, joining us is Melissa Murray, the Frederick I. and Grace Stokes Professor Of Law at New York University. Hi, Melissa.
Melissa Murray:
Hi, thanks for having me.
Farai Chideya:
This week, we're discussing the case of WNBA star Brittney Griner.
Brittney Griner:
I pled guilty to my charges. I understand everything that's being said against me, the charges that are against me, and that is why I plea guilty, but I had no intent to break any Russian laws.
Farai Chideya:
Now, Brittney Griner was found guilty by a Russian court for charges of drug smuggling and possession for carrying cannabis vape cartridges in her luggage. Kimberly, what do you make of the process surrounding Brittney Griner's arrest trial and subsequent conviction for nine years?
Kimberly St.Julian-Varnon:
The process that we witnessed Brittney Griner's entire ordeal in Russia so far is part and parcel of what we've seen towards other Russian cases towards Americans, Paul Whelan, Trevor Reed, Marc Fogel. You tend to see a very small or minor situation become major, and then you see charges that are usually overcharged and more serious than the instance. So, what's interesting about Brittney's case is that she acknowledged her guilt in Russian court. Trevor Reed did not do that and Paul Wayland did not do that. They maintained their innocence throughout, which one could argue is why they got particularly severe sentences. But it's also notable that in Russian court, acknowledging guilt doesn't actually change the process of the court proceedings.
Farai Chideya:
Melissa, as a skilled legal analyst and law professor, what are you learning from this process of observing the Russian judicial system, through the lens of Brittney Griner's conviction and what are you keeping your eye on?
Melissa Murray:
Well, I think there are a lot of lessons to be learned from this international context. Why was Brittney Griner in Russia, in the first instance? It's largely because the WNBA has a shorter season. It pays less than other professional sports franchises. And for that reason, many of its players, including star players like Brittney Griner find themselves going to overseas markets, where they're paid much more than they would in the American context and they have other perks. So, one question we can ask ourselves is not simply about the sentence she's been given, but why she was in Russia in the first place.
Farai Chideya:
Kimberly you've tracked how black people and other people of color were treated in the evacuations of the Ukraine, and how the Russia-Ukraine War is affecting other geopolitics. So, should we contextualize this arrest at this time in any way with Russia-Ukraine or is it completely separate?
Kimberly St.Julian-Varnon:
I think we cannot divorce Brittney's case from the war in Ukraine. For me, there is no coincidence that she was arrested literally one week before Russia invaded Ukraine. Russia knew it was going to invade Ukraine. It knew there would be an international response to its invasion in Ukraine, and now, it has the most high-profile American it's had in decades in its custody. Usually, this is an administrative offense, so two years ago before this war, this is a ticket. This is a very large fine. But in March, 2022, when Russia is already committing war crimes in Ukraine, they have an American who they can use as leverage and this is leverage that Russia's never had before against the United States.
Farai Chideya:
I want to play a little bit more of Griner's statement before I turn back to you, Melissa.
Brittney Griner:
I want to apologize to my teammates, my club UGMK, the fans, and the city of Ekat for my mistake that I made and the embarrassment that I brought onto them. I never meant to hurt anybody. I never meant to put in jeopardy the Russian population. I never meant to break any laws here.
Farai Chideya:
Now, I dare say that a vape pen probably does not endanger the entire Russian population, but that was a political statement. Melissa, if you were someone who was communicating with Brittney and her wife and her family about what happens next, how do you make sense of how she played her cards to this date and what cards are left to be played?
Melissa Murray:
Well, I think this was an incredibly moving statement. She's sort of thinking about things, I believe, in the context of the American legal system, where mental state and intent is actually incredibly important. She's essentially saying, "This was not an intentional crime. At most, it was negligence. I didn't realize I wasn't supposed to have this material, but I had it, and I'm profoundly sorry for it. I'd like to move on."
Melissa Murray:
That's not enough in the Russian system. She has pled guilty, but the trial will continue nonetheless. It's also, I think, worth noting here. Again, this goes back to the American context. This is something of a disability rights issue. I mean, this is a person who plays at a very high level in professional sports. She has chronic pain, which she has talked about. These cannabis items were prescribed by a physician ostensibly, for the treatment of that chronic pain, and she's in another country playing, and therefore, needs to recover and she's using this. So, part of this is really about how do we treat chronic pain of this sort and how that translates in international context, in a world where many of our professionals, particularly sports professionals, are going to be incredibly mobile?
Farai Chideya:
I also want to note that there's been some really gleefully destructive... I guess that's the only way I would put it rhetoric. After the death of Breonna Taylor, Griner said she didn't want to have teams play the national anthem before a WNBA games. She told the Arizona Republic, "I don't mean that in any disrespect to our country. My dad was in Vietnam and a law officer for 30 years. I wanted to be a cop before basketball. I do have pride for my country." Now, some people are trolling her for that stance. After she was sentenced, the conservative commentator, Tomi Lahren tweeted, "On the bright side, B Griner won't have to endure our national anthem for nine whole years. What a win for her." Melissa, and then Kimberly, what's the metanarrative here?
Melissa Murray:
Well, I mean, again, this is sort of a standard conservative trope that anyone who expresses or dissent against certain aspects of our national landscape are unpatriotic, they hate the country. She made very clear this wasn't necessarily about expressing derision for law enforcement. She comes from a family of law enforcement officers, but about this particular incident involving a black woman like herself. We've seen this happen in the context of Colin Kaepernick, just simply expressing any kind of dissenting view with regard to the country's treatment of black and brown bodies is enough to render you anti-patriotic and someone who hates the country. The conservative response here, I think, is retaliation for someone who has used her platform to bring attention to these issues. It also, I think, is about expressing retaliation to a league that has perhaps been far out in front of any other professional sports outfit in expressing concern for these social justice issues.
Kimberly St.Julian-Varnon:
I completely agree with Professor Murray. Conservatives and Trumpist say, "Well, Trump could have gotten her home," ignoring the fact that Paul Whelan and Trevor Reed were arrested and detained during Trump's administration. But now, that she's received this nine-year sentence, suddenly all these stances come out saying she deserves this because she was practicing her First Amendment right as an American. But also, what's really disturbing is that the same people who were saying that Brittney deserves to be locked away in a penal colony for nine years are now saying that the FBI is a political institution, and that the law isn't being applied for everyone equally, but this is just pure cynicism.
Farai Chideya:
Yeah. You're listening to Sippin' the Political Tea on Our Body Politic. I'm Farai Chideya. This week, we're doing a special roundtable on WNBA star Brittney Griner's conviction in Russia, with Kimberly St. Julian-Varnon, a PhD student of history at the University of Pennsylvania with long experience on Russia and Ukraine. Plus, New York University law professor, Melissa Murray. I want to go back and pull in the family angle a little bit. Here is Cherelle Griner, the wife of Brittney Griner.
Cherelle Griner:
I'm frustrated that 140 days have passed since my wife has been able to speak to me, to our family, and to her friends. I'm frustrated that my wife is not going to get justice.
Farai Chideya:
Kimberly first, but both of you please weigh in here. What should we be keeping our eye on in trying to assess from the outside, whether or not a black gay woman is going to be treated with respect in Russian jails?
Kimberly St.Julian-Varnon:
I think it's hard for a lot of Americans to kind of understand what Brittney's going through. Cherelle spoke earlier about how hard it was to see Brittney testifying from the iron cage that's in the courtroom or that Brittney is transported in a cage from her prison to the courtroom. It's about two and a half to three hours. That is foreign to our justice system, but in Russia, that's standard operating procedure. Every Russian goes through that.
Kimberly St.Julian-Varnon:
So, what I try to do is contextualize these things because Brittney is already in a tough situation, but now she is a part of this geopolitical struggle. When we think about the optics of what it looks like for her, we have to remember also that Russia has always laundered its reputation through black suffering, particularly through the suffering of African Americans at the hands of racism. So, I try to balance that out.
Kimberly St.Julian-Varnon:
So, what I'm looking for, particularly in Russian state media, is how they talk about her, and so far, the Russian state media has tried to show that she's doing okay, that she's in a small cell with only two cellmates, that her cellmates have a conversational English, and that they're trying to teach her Russian. So, I think all of those are signaling to American audiences, that they understand the value of the person that they have in detainment, and I think that's to her benefit. Brittney is worth entirely too much to Russia for anything to happen to her.
Farai Chideya:
Melissa, I can't help but think about the incredible amounts of physical conditioning that someone like Brittney Griner would normally be doing. I mean, like, "Hey, I can Netflix and chill all day every day, and my body's not going to change so much," but that's not true for someone like Griner. She's in ace and now she's in a cage.
Melissa Murray:
Yeah. I think you cannot overstate the impact that this will have on her professional longevity as a top flight player. I mean, she's currently being housed in a cell that is equipped for people who have standard height. She is six foot nine. Not to mention the fact that she isn't getting access to the kind of training and conditioning that she would have on a regular basis. So, yes, we should not forget that she's in Russia in order to advance her career because she cannot do so because of massive pay inequities in the United States, yet this will leave her open to really having a hard time getting back on track as a professional athlete.
Farai Chideya:
Let's go deeper into the possibility of the prisoner exchange. Most of the attention has focused on international arms dealer, Viktor Bout, who helped supply bloody conflicts in Africa, Latin America in the Middle East. There's also been a mention of adding a convicted murderer to the trade. Kimberly, does it weaken the US internationally if the country makes a trade for Griner, vape pen, for a global arms dealer?
Kimberly St.Julian-Varnon:
I'm of two minds. The first is what kind of leverage does Russia have and what could Russia ask for the longer they keep Brittney Griner in custody? Because the Biden administration has already made overtures, and they've also stated publicly that she is their highest priority, bringing her home. Russia, knowing how much she's worth to United States gives Russia a lot of leverage.
Kimberly St.Julian-Varnon:
Viktor Bout is a convicted arms dealer, arms trafficker. He served over 10 years of his sentence in federal prison, but he's also aging. He's older and the Russia he would go back to is not the Russia he came from. The connections and networks that he had before he was imprisoned are not those that he would have now, if those still exist. So, I think when people approach this question from national security, we have to keep that in mind too. Viktor Bout of 2022 is not the Viktor Bout of the year 2000.
Kimberly St.Julian-Varnon:
The problem is if you trade someone Russia wants, such as Viktor, and they've been wanting him for years, does this engender the possibility that more Americans will be used in hostage diplomacy in Russia? I think that's a legitimate concern, but we have to understand and think about, are Brittney and Paul worth Viktor Bout, and does engaging with Russia in this way make us weak or does it give us more leverage in the future because they can no longer hold these two over us as leverage?
Farai Chideya:
Melissa, turning to you, I want to read something from Washington Post journalist, Jason Rezaian, who is detained in Iran for 544 days. He wrote an article in March, again, really prescient about Griner's detention. In it he says, "Time and time again, hostage-takers are allowed to seize control of the narrative while hostages' governments and employers are left flat-footed. The US government should make it clear that if a detention of an American is found to be politically motivated, there will be swift and severe consequences. The current, long-standing public approach of responding in a diplomatic and noncommittal tone, lest we further agitate the hostage-taking states, actually ensures the opposite. It leaves our citizens languishing in prison, often for years, and signals to offenders that they can get away with it." What do you make of the questions of the US's options, Melissa?
Melissa Murray:
I think that's incredibly astute observation that he's made. That part of what has compounded the trauma of all of this, both for Brittney Griner and her family and everyone watching is that the response has been a little flat-footed. This might be different if it weren't a black queer woman, professional athlete, and instead were someone who was more high profile, Tom Brady, LeBron James. You have to ask, is part of the flat-footed response on our end, reflective of a society in which black women are not held in the same esteem as some of the other members of society?
Farai Chideya:
Kimberly, I'm going to wrap up with you. Putin has been epically trolling the United States for quite a while now, in a wide variety of ways. In the past and in the present, in terms of political administrations, he is an incredible strategist in terms of using the tools that he has to get what he wants. So, knowing what you do about Russia, how do you make sense of this question of how to respond?
Kimberly St.Julian-Varnon:
I'm glad you pointed out that Putin is a strategist. I've always pushed back against it like, "Putin's a crazy person." It's like, "No. That's not how this man operates and he's never operated that way." This is the first time really we've heard of a prisoner exchange before it happened, so that's a very big change. But also, she was declared wrongfully detained earlier than all the other Americans who've been declared wrongfully detained. She had diplomatic access to the President, the national security advisor, who've spoken to her family months or even years earlier than other detained families, and I think that her case has forced a change in how the United States deals with these kind of situations.
Kimberly St.Julian-Varnon:
All of this hinges upon how Brittney's situation ends, how soon she gets home, how soon she's able to reintegrate into society. All of that's going to dictate how America's going to respond in the future. Do we say upfront, we will not deal with this? You can talk tough to Russia, but if you engage in a prisoner exchange and that's it, and nothing else happens, Russia has no reason not to continue to engage in hostage diplomacy. These are the questions that the Biden administration and future administrations are going to have to ask themselves, what will we do to respond to hostage diplomacy because it's going to continually happen?
Farai Chideya:
Well, I could keep going here, but we're going to have to wrap up. Kimberly, thanks so much for joining us.
Kimberly St.Julian-Varnon:
Thank you for having me.
Farai Chideya:
And Melissa, I'm really grateful to have you. Thank you.
Melissa Murray:
Thank you for having me.
Farai Chideya:
That was Penn State PhD student, Kimberly St. Julian-Varnon and Melissa Murray, the Frederick I. and Grace Stokes Professor Of Law at New York University with the latest on WNBA player, Brittney Griner.
Farai Chideya:
Thanks for listening to Our Body Politic. We're on the air each week -- and everywhere you listen to podcasts.
Farai Chideya:
Our Body Politic is produced by Diaspora Farms. I'm the executive producer and host, Farai Chideya. Nina Spensley is co-Executive Producer.Bianca Martin is our senior producer. Traci Caldwell is our booking producer. Emily J. Daly and Steve Lack are our producers. Natyna Bean and Emily Ho are our associate producers.Also producer Teresa Carey contributed to this episode.
Farai Chideya:
Production and editing services are by Clean Cuts at Three Seas. Today's episode was produced with the help of Lauren Schild and engineered by Mike Goehler [GAY-lur] and Archie Moore.
Farai Chideya:
This program is produced with support from the Ford Foundation, Craig Newmark Philanthropies, the Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Philanthropies, Democracy Fund, The Harnisch Foundation, Compton Foundation, the Heising-Simons Foundation, the BMe Community, Katie McGrath & JJ Abrams Family Foundation, and from generous contributions from listeners like you.