Parenting is Political Interview
Today on the blog is an interview with Mo from podcast Parenting is Political. It is a podcast of conversations between Mo (they/them) and their partner Jasmine (she/her) about their core beliefs they parent by. Let’s jump right into it.
This interview is between Tabatha (designer+coparent of Velocitoddler) and Mo (founder+coparent of Parenting is Political).
VELOCITODDLER:
Hi Mo,
I [Tabatha] own Velocitoddler; it’s a unisex kidswear brand. I started my business as “Very Small Shoes” back in 2012 when I was looking to find a way to quit working at Starbucks because the stress was making me sick. My partner was like, “How can we change how you are feeling?,” so I started creating. My mission was simple: “Stop throwing up at work.”
PARENTING IS POLITICAL: lol same!
V: So, I stopped getting sick by sewing cute cloth baby shoes. It was okay until I felt like I was never having the conversations I wanted to be having with people. It was okay until I felt like I was another stay-at-home-mom focused on something cute and not something substantial. I started feeling like my actual self, my heart, was unseen and unheard because I wasn’t speaking up; yet, I was afraid there weren’t people out there who wanted to listen.
It has taken years to accept myself, love what I believe in, and commit to creating for those of us who aren’t represented by mainstream culture. You have said that you started Parenting is Political because you couldn’t find a podcast out there that was a relatable, helpful resource for your family--that a lot of the parenting podcasts out there were for cisgender, heterosexual, white families. Your courage to be a resource for those who weren’t represented was influential in my own dive into my kidswear line. For everyone who isn’t familiar with Parenting is Political, could you let us know what you do? Who is your work is for?
PiP: Parenting is Political is a podcast, and by extension an online community, for families whose stories are often misrepresented or not represented at all in mainstream society. We exist to tell our story and the story of other families. Creating space for our stories to be heard creates conversation, which is where we believe change occurs. We center Black and Brown voices. Queer voices. Trans voices. We aren't interested in catering to an audience of all white, cisgender, heterosexual people. Our podcast doesn't follow one specific model. We are not a shiny production. We are often sporadic in when we record and release new episodes. We have 4 kids and a life we are trying to live, and our listeners seem to be ok with that (for the most part, lol). What you can expect from our podcast and the things we post on our social media pages is REAL life. Nothing sugar coated. Just honest conversations. We talk a lot about the characteristics of white supremacy culture on our podcast. We think it's important as parents and caregivers to be incredibly introspective of the ways in which we perpetuate prejudices on to our kids.
V: For me, there are two ideas from your conversations that have really dug themselves into my brain. These ideas have affected how I create as a person who has a “product,” a small businessperson, a person participating in our capitalist economy, as well as how I parent.
1. Embracing the idea of quality over quantity.
PiP: Yes!! I love hearing which episodes resonate with folks. The concept of quantity over quality is deeply rooted in white supremacy and capitalism. It destroys us as we run ourselves into the ground trying to produce, produce, produce. We are not meant to live this way. I love the examples you provided of how you are trying to value quality over quantity. It isn't easy as a small business owner living in a capitalistic society. I'm sure you feel that pressure every single day. I catch myself in the same mindset of "Ok, I could rush out more episodes or create content online just to get more numbers and a bigger following." Slowing down and realizing that's not what's important is what I actually love about Parenting is Political. We create episodes when Jasmine and I feel inspired to. We don't force them. We want to create things that are worth people's time. Things that are meaningful. Things that actually matter. Not just check a box off to meet arbitrary quotas.
I also love when folks relate this concept back to parenting. I 100% understand that balance of figuring out what is important for our kids to learn and develop, and what is just super unnecessary.
V: There are a million business rules out there about stirring up excitement, having product launches, withholding collections, having secret sales--all sorts of mindfuckery that goes into making money. As a homeschooling parent, there is also so much information that comes with lesson plans, so much information to be processed at a single time. The idea of saying “fuck you” to quantity and just focusing on quality has been transformative, from doing things in my shop like putting items in the webshop before my collections are complete to taking a look at eight pages of math homework for a single lesson and just asking myself, “What is the most important here? What is important, how much do we need of this to foster patience and endurance and how much of this is just unnecessary for a 1st grader?”
2. The importance of visibility as a parent. This idea is something that I felt a sense of shame around--I do my work for kids, I create for children, I am a parent, yet--I didn’t want to embrace that identity as “parent” because of what I thought it meant, the idea of “momhood” as defined by our culture. For this reason, I wanted to separate my kids from my work in a sort of fear that I would be seen as a caricature of what a “mother” is supposed to be. I didn’t realize that embracing my parenthood and embracing the fact that my kids are with me all of the time, my kids are with me on my lap while I sew, my kids are at my feet while I cut out garments, they are tied to my back when I hustle markets--that making sure that I not just acknowledge their existence and my identity as a parent but really celebrate that is something your podcast has encouraged me to do. My hours range from part-time to over-time, and my work gets done regardless with my babies at home, while homeschooling my 1st grader, while taking breaks to hit a coffee shop or a museum or the library or nap for three hours in the middle of the day with our 10-month-old. My kids are part of my work, and I want to thank you for stressing the importance of normalizing children as being present in every part of our lives.
PiP: I feel this big time. I used to be so afraid of having our kids in the background of our podcast episodes. Or I would stress about having a conference call and our baby crying during the middle of it. But we absolutely want to normalize having children in the work place.
V: It’s been a minute since I heard from ya’ll on the podcast. I miss you but I love relistening to what you have shared, you cover so much that there is always something new to discover when I hit play again. Do you plan the topics of your episodes ahead of time, or do you talk about what needs to be addressed in the moment? What are some other ideas that you have yet to touch on (even if they never get an episode!) that stick with you as you parent? Can you speak a little about your family structure and who your listeners are?
PiP: We are a queer, interracial, trans, blended family with disabilities. I identify as trans non-binary, and our daughter is a pre-teen trans cutie. My wife and I are both identify as queer, and one of our daughters identifies as pansexual. I am white and my wife and all four children are Black. We are a blended family, and I became an instant parent when I fell in love with this beautiful woman who already had 3 children. We had our 4 child together, and I had the pleasure of adopting all the children in 2018. We have a wide spectrum of disabilities throughout our family and are very open on the podcast about our mental health.
Our audience are folks who are like us. Lots of queer folks, trans cuties, people with disabilities, Black and Brown families, instant parents, childless parents, people who aren't caregivers or parents at all and are just trying to figure out how to reparent themselves because of their own relationships with their parents. We have people who are white, cisgender, and heterosexual with 2.5 kids or whatever who are listening and trying to figure these things out too, whether for themselves or so that they can be better community members and advocates. Our heart at Parenting is Political is to center the stories of families who don't regularly have a place to tell their stories in a way that isn't extractive.
V: You have talked about not seeing your own family in the blogs out there, and that advice about how to get your kid to take a nap just feel non-applicable in your own life because frankly. . .there is heavier stuff to deal with. The thing is, I feel like that sort of clickbait material isn’t really appreciated by any families out there; I do a series about Jobs for your Kid that has a similar ring, but the irony in this series is that I am actually writing with helpful information, not to ultimately pitch a product. My blog on the site isn’t to loop people back around to a thing that I sell; its intention is to dive into the underbelly of parenting and share my most vulnerable moments as a parent and human. In Parenting is Political, you transcend even that and dive into core beliefs about parenting and helping inform us and encourage discussion around what it means to be a parent in our culture. Go ahead, tell us why parenting is political.
PiP: Parenting is political because for some of us, our very existence in this world is political. My family cannot simple exist or breathe in this world without it being political. We often forget that the personal is political. The ways in which we exist, our overlapping identities, the choices we make, how we show up in this world is an act of political resistance or a chance to co-sign the status quo. We are no longer interested in maintaining the status quo. Fuck the status quo. We are inviting everyone who stumbles across out podcast or our social media pages to join with us in our resistance. Those of us who are parents have the immense responsibility of raising young folks who will eventually grow up to be adults. Parenting is political because how we interact with our children, the things we teach them, whether we realize we are teaching them or not, will DEEPLY impact our society. We have the chance to do our work NOW so that what we teach our kids will help create a society in which we collectively say "fuck you" to the status quo instead of upholding it.
V:
All my love for what you do,
Tabatha
You can find parenting is political at parentingispolitical.org, on instagram @parentingispolitical, and on facebook at parentingis political. their conversations are free to listen to, but they have a subscription on their site for you to support their work with dollars.
The best time to listen is anytime. Their insta+fbook is filled with powerful quotes that I like to set as a tone for my day. I’m not a fan of inspirational memery, but I am a fan of words that move and oh buddy theirs do. Let them.
