tasha reagon

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tasha reagon ~

How can I make sure that I'm not gonna experience the powerlessness that comes along with this body, but instead, power, light, freedom, all the things that my people want from me?

My name's Tasha Fletcher. I am a Nashville native and at the end of all my emails, I just say "facilitator and advocate." That's really how I show up. I realized a little while ago that some folks needed interpretation for things that a lot of folks in our community know and understand very organically and can have conversations about very fluidly. Those on the outside that don't really have those conversations regularly or need to start having those conversations, needed some interpretation. and so in my facilitation and advocacy role, I found ways to interpret the needs of marginalized communities to folks in power who can make a difference.

how do you show up in community?

Currently, I am the middle school coordinator with Salama Urban Ministries. So just taking a look at the program from a more social emotional learning perspective. Our program serves students that either live in or go to school in the Edgehill area. And as we know, that area's changing a lot. And so what does it look like for us to make sure that there's always space for the kids and the families that live there and go to school there? And also, how do we let people know that that space is sacred in that way? So it's been a really interesting new position to flex my skills.

how does your identity inform and impact your work?

So for a while I was working in an organization that I didn't realize was tokenizing my identity and place in the world as a Black woman, as a millennial Black woman, and I thought that there was a positive way or a rewarding way to be exploited. And that's just not a thing; exploitation is what it is. And so at some point, you have a moment, right? I was like, "I'm a real ass nigga ,and I ain't gotta put up with shit that ain't real nigga shit. I just don't have to. And if real niggas can't be in here, then we have no credibility and I don't want to be nowhere where real niggas can't be." So I stopped being there and I think that our commitment to, you know, the things that we've been socialized to want, houses and titles and labels and esteem and status and those sort of things, cloud our internal song, our ancestral purposes, our overall reasons for actually being here. So I thought to myself, "What does my Black ass self want? Like for real? Like if I could really just craft it and draft it, where would I be? " And I hadn't even really fully gotten to the answer, but I knew I wanted to be around people that weren't just willing to have conversations about what it looked like to create and share power, but were ready to actually move that power around and didn't need a model or a structure that reflected whiteness to do it. People who were willing to do it in the natural flow that Black folks have. And before I could even, like I said, name it or picture it or, or see what it was, I was invited to work at Salama and it's a Black organization serving Black families. And I was like, "oh yeah, that!" It really becomes a question of what would you rather have, you know? A plan informed from top to bottom by whiteness and capitalism? Or would you rather be a little uncomfortable until you figure those things out? And so I was lucky enough to be invited into a place that let both happen, allowed me to like pay my bills and feed my family, and still be authentic in my skin.

When I think about being a Black and being a woman and how I show up in my work and how I show up in community and allow that to be informed by my identity, the first thing that comes to mind is safety. And how can I make sure that I'm not gonna experience the exploitation, I'm not gonna experience the violence, I'm not gonna experience the powerlessness that comes along with this body, but instead, power, light, freedom, all the things that my people want from me.

tell us about your happy place?

I have a happy place in my purse right now. Carry it around with me. You never know when a happy place mood might strike. My happy place is at 4:20 on the dot, in the bed with my partner, with my dude, and in our space that we've created. Now I live with him and his daughter. And being with them, like sharing with them, creating a life with them, that's one of the things that's actually created this interrogation that I have now of how I show up, and what I ask for when I do show up. Because I do want us to have, you know, some nice things and I want us to feel comfortable and at ease. And I'd also like for her to be exposed to things outside of our bubble, outside of the things that she typically gets to experience. And so about an hour and a half before I get off work every day, I'm a little bit like, "okay, it's been a long day. I'm ready to get off work right now." And then I remember that I'm going home to them. Like, "okay, it's cool. It's gonna be a good day." I'm happy. Yeah.

what do you love about collaborating with Black women?

I need to name it. It's like this fiery, but very casual, entitlement to the things that we know and when we're together that gets to live and breathe. That is the conflict with other folks in other spaces. Like we know what we know, you know, and feel very confident in those things and don't need to blow hot smoke for those things to be true about ourselves. And often it's met with frustration and jealousy in other spaces. But when it's us, when we're together, it's like met with more fire and more fanning and fueling of it. And so that's my favorite part, is that like we get together, put our heads together and no one is shocked by what we're able to accomplish or create, like within the group. The world is like, "oh my God, y'all did that?" And we're like, "hell yeah, what? Yes, we did. What y'all think we was doing this whole time? Like, yes, we've been working."

are there any missed opportunities?

And so I think that the missed opportunities end up being, again, that socialization around the things that we end up caring about that we shouldn't, or that we don't need to care about. And then there's still a little bit of us that have an idea of what professionalism means or how we should show up in spaces and play certain roles so that we can get certain things. And that ends up kind of stalling, to me, the work, and stalling what we're able to accomplish and create. And anytime we buy into what the system has deemed a requirement to be a part of this work, you know, hearing other Black women tear other Black women down who are non-degreed or who, you know, have made the decision have children alone or who don't abide by whatever, like "standard Black woman manual" some other person wrote for us. Folks who still uphold those historical traditions end up adding to some of these missed opportunities I think we have.

The other part of it, I mean, especially in Nashville, is that our city is just siloed off and it is not built for us to know each other, collaborate with each other, create space with each other. We gotta find each other so that we can be more impactful and creative.

what role do our allies play?

Get out of the way. Just like, shut up already. You know? And I know folks, and, and we say "allies," we tell my white people. I know that. And men. Yawn. Don't edit that out. I meant that shit.

We're in this weird, very interesting time that, I have to be honest, I probably helped play a part of how we got here, right? Led a lot of ally type conversations and circles and "let's all get to know each other." And I still to think, I still think that work is valuable. I'm not trying to like downplay or trivialize that work cause it's still a part of my work. I, I think it is still valuable. But I think we've gotten to this place where we've trained people who are, who we've deemed or labeled allies to participate in the conversation a particular way. You sit, you listen, you ask evoking questions, but you don't put your own stuff out there. You don't share how this has affected you. You just kind of, you listen to a marginalized person, you just kind of take it all in. And those of us who are in community work, who have facilitated these conversations, have trained folks to do this. It's like "white people, you taking up too much space in a race conversation. Shut up." Right? Like "men, you've never experienced sexual assault, you've never been socialized as a woman. Be quiet and just listen."

And that, phase one, important. I think phase two, or the next part of this, is gonna need to be for those people, internally, to talk about how these things affect them. And not like, "oh, I never knew about whiteness. Now my eyes are open to it." It's like, go deeper than that. Doesn't it hurt you that you can't fully express and be yourself too? Because of this cloud of whiteness that we gotta live in. Like as a man, it's like "yeah, I heard you, I listen, I uphold my sisters blah, blah, blah." It's like, yeah, but doesn't it hurt you that when you want to cry, sometimes you can't cause somebody will call you a bitch? Like think about within your own group how these things are limiting you.

I would go so far as to say oppression affects all of us. And if you keep trying to separate out like, "oh, I played a part in your oppression," it's like, and your own. Do you realize that you've also played a part in your own oppression? In your own separation? In your own devaluing of our sameness, of our humanness? And I need people to do that work while we build. I don't want to do that work with you. I don't wanna do that work for you. I'd love to hear about it when you're done, but go over there, do that, and let us build.

how do Black women impact political ethos?

Let's talk about Black Twitter for a minute, because when we turn on shows like The Daily Show, or Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, or even the Colbert Report or his, his late night TV show, whatever it is that he has now. A lot of, their one liners and quick wit, snapshots of what's going on are verbatim tweets from Black folks, oftentimes Black women, who have, for a long time, even before Twitter, had a pretty sophisticated, kind of savvy lens to understand and decrypt our political climate. And so I think that just in terms of understanding it and how it affects people, Black women have a pretty good handle on how this thing is operating and not operating. And that's just from my timeline that I've noticed. In terms of like active, like out here in the world, it feels like this surge of Black women, and not just in political spaces, but also in religious spaces and education spaces. I think Black women have gotten to a point where like, "Okay, I am tired of not seeing me. I'm tired of not seeing the person that I need to talk to, the person that represents my needs and my interests. So I'm just gonna go be that person."

And the first like pull or tug of that I saw was a few years ago when Maxine Waters was like up in arms about the Trump election and she wasn't being this whitewashed, code switching Black politician. She, like, Black- lady got in that ass and I was like, "that right there reminds me of auntie, mama, granny," and I was a little nervous for the people around and that made me excited. I was like, "y'all ought to be scared. Like she 'bout to get in y'all ass." And so knowing, seeing authenticity in that space, I think definitely encouraged quite a few of us to show up differently to these spaces. And, and again, just related to the last question, to my other answer, I think we know what's up and I think we always have, and that this is a really great opportunity for folks to stop just wearing a t-shirt, but actually get out of the way and let, and let someone else try. Okay?

White men have tried, a few Black men have tried, white women have tried, let us try. Let's see what happens this time.