Luna Malbroux (00:02): Grab you a cup of tea and get comfy, baby, because this is season two of the South has the answers. And this season your host, AJ Haynes and Eric Fleming will be speaking to reproductive justice leaders across the country, specifically those who are working in the deep south. A.J. Haynes (00:22): Welcome back to season two of the South has the answers. We are elated to have Tyler with us again. This is our second interview. Thank you for being here. Thank you for all you are and all you do. So before we get into our questions, just a quick little snapshot. Who are you for folks that are less familiar with you and your work, a bit of your background, what are some of the worlds you inhabit right now? Tyler Barbarin (00:49): So thank you. And this is always an awkward question for me because I never know where to start, but my name is Tyler. I am the director of grants and development for the Louisiana Abortion Fund. I am a sister, a td. I am a Philly born, now southern loving girl myself, and I'm very excited to be here today. A.J. Haynes (01:18): And also you have family from the south, right? This is where your roots are. So born in Philly and also Louisiana is a long home for you. Tyler Barbarin (01:27): Yeah, my dad is born and raised. New Orleans man will tell you, he went to St. OG probably within the first 10 minutes of meeting him. And my family traces back to 1806, I want to say, in the what is now known as Louisiana. So yeah, definitely feel like I am where I'm supposed to be and where my people are from. A.J. Haynes (01:49): Yes, I love that context. Okay, so the first question is, what is sustaining you through this f*****y? Woo. Tyler Barbarin (02:00): Starting off easy. Yeah, so I guess what sustains me most is definitely the next generation. I am a bonus care person for young ones myself. I also have two nephews that I love very deeply, and a lot of the people that I interact with on the daily have children. And I think seeing them get to inhabit little bits of the world that are more free and more accepting and more loving and more tender definitely keeps me going. I think, yeah, even when we lose in the polls or we lose at the ballot box, knowing that there are black kids growing up in softer, more tender existences and being freer at a younger age, it definitely sustains me and makes me feel like we're doing something right. A.J. Haynes (02:54): I love that. That just brought the biggest smile to my face. So thank you for that reminder of who we're doing this for. We've had conversations before about principled struggle and actually you're the first person that introduced me to that phrase, so I wanted to dig into that. So how do you define principled struggle? Tyler Barbarin (03:16): Yeah, I think for me, principled struggle could be a number of things, but most frequently, what I mean when I'm talking about it is we inhabit these movement spaces and there's people that are in it for various reasons. Some people are in it because it's a buzzword, especially when we're talking about reproduction justice. It's a buzzword. It's a term that is in the news a lot, and we're kind of in this moment where people are caring about our issues, social justice issues. But for me, principled struggle is people that really are trying to transform the world. They're not in it for selfish reasons, they're not, I mean, maybe a bit selfish because we all want to inhabit the world that we're co-creating together. But people that are really determined to see the world become a better, more loving place overall, I think that it's easy to get wrapped up in this premise that this is just a job or this is work to be done Monday through Friday. But I think that people are engaged in principled struggle view, social justice, reproductive justice, our movement spaces as sites for co-creating the world we hope to inhabit in the future. I hope that's a good definition. A.J. Haynes (04:33): Yeah, no, it feels really honest and hopeful, which is what I need right now. So thank you for providing that. So to expound on that, how do you personally move through principled struggle, especially as an organizer here in the context of the deep south south and especially in the microcosm of New Orleans where the culture is so relational, everything is so relational. Tyler Barbarin (04:58): I think that that's the unique part about the South for me, is we are really a community. I think here, unlike other places in the United States that I've lived, you need other people to survive. You need them in different ways, be it help with childcare or help with transportation or financial support, whatever it is, because our systems have strategically abandoned us. In the south, you just need people. And so I think being in principled struggle for me is a commitment to not only the good moments, not only the abundant, happy, joyous moments, but also some of the more difficult components of it all. Accountability, which doesn't always feel great, or as a trying to be reformed, people pleaser, asking for help, showing vulnerability. To me, those are sites of principled struggle because I want to really be in community with the folks around me, and I really want for New Orleans, the Gulf South, the region to become stronger. And part of that is holding my weight and holding the things that I say I'm responsible for, but also letting my community help me hold it, letting people be there for me, et cetera. A.J. Haynes (06:21): I love that. You can't hear this, but I'm just furiously shaking my head and making faces. Yes, exactly. The personal is political, right? Our relations are how we build worlds. Our relationships are how we world build. So let's move to, you've been in this movement work for a substantially long time. From your perspective, where are we now in the world of reproductive justice? Tyler Barbarin (06:48): So I think we're in a bit of a reckoning moment when it comes to reproductive justice. I think that justice, it's become really popularized. So many people care about abortion care, about maternal mortality in ways that they didn't previously. But I really want for people to hold onto the fact that reproductive justice is an organizing framework. It's a theoretical framework, it's theory as much as it is praxis, and what that looks like is not abandoning people in their weakest moments. It's not abandoning the south because it's super red and because abortion access is gone from here, it's not leaving movement spaces because the money is leaving or leaving whole swaths of the country alone because of who's in charge. And I think that we're in a moment where I love that there are a lot of people who are excited and want to tap in, but I also just want folks to do the research and learn the theory and commit themselves to acting in a way that's in alignment with this beautiful theoretical framework that we were gifted by the foremothers of reproductive justice. I think it will take people unlearning classism, unlearning anti southern sentiment, unlearning racism, even within the movement. Just because you're in the movement space does not mean you're free from some of these problems. And so yeah, I think I'm excited for critical mass. I'm excited for what so many people being activated means for our organizing power. But yeah, just want to see more doubling down on the blueprint that was laid out before us. A.J. Haynes (08:28): Yes. So there's something you said about critical mass and it brought to mind was it Grace Lee Boggs, and I think Adrian Marie Brown also talk about critical connection first and then building the critical mass. And from my experience, I see that happening in a really fruitful way in this region. So I would like you to speak more about what are you noticing about organizing in the South at large? What is unique? What is creative? What's adaptive about it? Tyler Barbarin (08:57): Yeah, I think the South is a really unique place to organize in because there's a lot of ills, there's a lot of symptoms of larger systems of oppression that you can't look away from in the south. You are not removed from them. When we talk about lack of educational opportunity, when we talk about economic disempowerment, when we talk about disenfranchisement, when you talk about unsafe housing or climate change, those things are in your face in the south in a way that other parts of the country might have themselves fooled and feel more removed from. And so to me, the south is where you need to organize. The south is where you need to figure out answers to questions about why should I care about reproductive justice? If my housing is insecure, why should I care about reproductive justice if every year I have to leave for a hurricane that rips apart my house, and then I have to think about rebuilding, why should I care about it when my kids aren't getting a quality education? (10:04) And once again, I think that that's the beauty of reproductive justice, the fact that it is an actual framework that has an answer as to why you should care and as to how reproductive justice will get us all free. And I feel like in the South is where we need to make the case, where we need to make good on promises to folks where we need to be really doing the bulk of our organizing work. I also think that because the south, the priorities are family, food, fun, and I was told recently to add football to that list. I think that right, right. (10:42) It's a beautiful thing. I think that that is something to be modeled by other parts of the country that people want to say that we don't have our priorities straight down here or we're backwards or we're country or whatever down in the deep south. But I actually think that's the way we need to all be moving. That's a template for freedom. I would rather be worried about family and fun than worried about a roof over my head or worried ab
