In this first of our bonus episodes, the team discusses the American church’s unfortunate tendency to consume and exploit the trauma of other people for purposes of entertainment, fundraising, politics, cheap spiritual edification, and more. They also talk about how to avoid using people’s experiences in this way. Thanks for subscribing, and we hope you enjoy!
Shake the Dust is a podcast of KTF Press. Follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Find transcripts of this show at KTFPress.com.
Hosts:
Jonathan Walton – follow him on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.
Suzie Lahoud – follow her on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.
Sy Hoekstra – follow him on Twitter.
Our theme song is “Citizens” by Jon Guerra – listen to the whole song on Spotify.
Our podcast art is by Jacqueline Tam – follow her and see her other work on Instagram.
Shake the Dust is produced and edited by Sy Hoekstra.
Questions about anything you heard on the show? Write to shakethedust@ktfpress.com and we may answer your question on a future episode.
Transcript
[00:00:00] Suzie Lahoud: I had a pastor who used to talk about how we tend to demonize the people that we most idolized. And so I think a lot of times too, it becomes this vicious cycle where you have folks who have been through a lot and it's really moving to hear about their experiences and their journeys, but they're also then dealing with a lot. They have a lot of healing to do. They have a lot to work through and that can come out in the messiness of their lives, but there's no grace for that. We don't make space for that. And once those things start to come out, they get written off by, you know, whatever church or organization they were then leading in. And I think that's on us.
[The song “Citizens” by Jon Guerra fades in. Lyrics: “I need to know there is justice/That it will roll in abundance/ And that you’re building a city/ Where we arrive as immigrants/ And you call us citizens/ And you welcome us as children home.” The song fades out.]
Sy Hoekstra: Welcome everybody to our first bonus episode of Shake the Dust, leaving colonized faith for the [00:01:00] Kingdom of God, a podcast of KTF Press. I'm Sy Hoekstra here with Jonathan Walton and Suzie Lahoud. This is one of the occasional bonus episodes that we're going to do on this subscribers only feed. Welcome, and thank you so much for subscribing. We really, really appreciate it.
Today, we're just going to have a little bit of a conversation about the ways in which Christians consume trauma as a product. It started from just a brief joke that Sandra Maria Van Opstal made when we were interviewing her about the different ways that we were asking her about all the kinds of trauma that she's had as a woman of color leader in the church, but it got us on actually kind of a serious conversation that we decided to stop and have on mic.
So we're talking about Christians, like I said, consuming trauma as a product. Like it's something that we commodify and use for entertainment, and we want to talk about how we do that and the ways in which we can sort of get out of that cycle. So Suzie, I think you kind of started off our conversation by talking about the [00:02:00] perspective of Middle Eastern Christians that you interacted with when you were living in Lebanon. Could you just tell us a little bit about what you heard while you were over there about how American Christians treat trauma?
Suzie Lahoud: In the interview with Sandra Maria Van Opstal, I was the one who sort of asked her if she would be willing to expand a little bit on some of the trauma and difficult experiences she’d alluded to earlier in the interview. And then, like Sy said, she kind of made a joke about how we were digging into all her trauma and, uh, she was very gracious about it, but it suddenly hit me, oh my gosh, in the professional context that I come from in the humanitarian space, you don't ever ask someone directly to go into all of that, and if you know you're going to touch on it, you need to have a trained mental health professional on site because you're really asking someone to dig into painful areas of their lives that manifest in so many complex ways. [00:03:00] And you need to take that seriously. That is sacred ground that you don't have the privilege to have access to unless that person graciously decides to give you that access.
And so that was where we got onto this kind of more serious conversation after finishing up the podcast. And yeah, so one experience I had in Lebanon while I was living there, was at a conference, I want to say around eight years ago, and it was, the speaker was a man who had come to faith in Christ. He was born into a Muslim family, grew up in the Muslim faith and then came to faith through missionaries from a big kind of Christian missions organization, and then had to leave his country of origin because of death threats and really serious persecution that he was facing and went on to become an academic who specializes in sort of religious conflict around the world.
And he shared [00:04:00] about how Christians, particularly evangelicals, particularly in the United States, we have this sort of obsession with the trauma that Middle Eastern Christians face. And we want to hear their stories. And we want to hear about all of the gritty details of the things that they've experienced, but then we don't want to deal with the fallout of that.
So we're not prepared to deal with challenges that they're now facing physically or mentally or emotionally. We're not prepared to offer them the services that they need, to even offer them the grace that they need. We just want their stories and then to be able to say “hallelujah” over it. And so he said that, and it just really struck me.
And I know even in my sort of close circle of folks that I'm connected to in Lebanon, there's one individual I thought of in particular who was tortured for his faith as a young man and [00:05:00] never fully recovered from that. I mean, he sort of, um, he's a very different person today than he was then, mentally and emotionally. And that's something that, you know, his family has had to deal with. And I just think that we don't talk about that enough. We don't talk about the fact that these are real people with real lives, and we need to see them as whole human beings. I think we want to just put them on a pedestal and to benefit from what they have to share, but are we willing to embrace them in all of their humanity?
Sy Hoekstra: Can you, you had also talked about ways in which your parents experienced this kind of commoditization of trauma when they were fundraising in the US for their, I guess, were they evangelistic efforts in Lebanon? I'm not sure actually what your parents were… no, sorry. Not in Lebanon, in Uzbekistan.
Suzie Lahoud: Yeah. So, I know I mentioned this in our first podcast, but I grew up in Uzbekistan. I lived there from age 8 to 18 [00:06:00] with my family. My parents were missionaries doing sort of underground church planting there. It’s a country where it was illegal at the time to be doing any sort of work like that.
And so we had a really traumatic experience where, I won't go into all the details, but essentially what happened was our home was broken into in the middle of the night by masked men with hatchets and they really severely beat my parents. My mom almost died. Thankfully they were using the blunt end of the hatchet, but yeah, I don't think I need to go into much more detail to give a sense of just how horrific and scary that was. And after that, it was interesting, we had to come back to the States for my mom's medical treatment and folks in the US and in churches just wanted to hear the story of what we'd been through.
And this continues to this day. A lot of times when my folks get invited to speak [00:07:00] places, I feel like sometimes that's almost all that people want to hear, which upsets me cause I think, you know, they have so much more to offer than just that. But it's not just that it's, you know… Immediately after that happened, I remember my mom sharing and she was still recovering at this point. I mean, she had some pretty serious brain, she had a brain injury that she was recovering from. Her arm had been pretty badly broken. I mean, miraculously, she survived, but she was sharing at this one Christian event and a woman came up to her afterwards and said, “You know, I was just so relieved hearing your story. It wasn't as bad as I thought it was.”
And I just thought, “That's not something you say to someone who's been through something like that, even, especially recently, and is still recovering.” But also, I think it just speaks to this broader culture that we see, again, particularly in white American evangelicalism, where we want to get into all of the gruesome details and we want that, almost [00:08:00] sort of shock value, and we judge and compare different people's stories of suffering and persecution. And like Sy was saying, we just sort of consume that for our own sort of, you know, we claim spiritual edification and benefit.
And what was striking to me in contrast was that when we went back to Uzbekistan a year later, the folks in the church there, they never asked us to tell them the story of what happened. They never asked us for the details. They didn't need to know. It was enough that they knew that it happened. And for them, it was also kind of like, well, welcome to the club. Because all of them had some sort of story of, you know, suffering, physical persecution, you know, rape, violence, being arrested. All of them had, you know, at some point lost family members. So it just, they knew that they didn't need to dig into that for it to be valid and to be important. But also they just wanted to [00:09:00] support us. And I think that, that again, that just speaks to the fact that we need to embrace people in those moments and not make it about us and what we want to get out of their stories.
Sy Hoekstra: I think that that last point is really important because I do think that there's a weird tendency among American evangelicals to identify with Christians who are being persecuted around the world, even though we are not being persecuted to, arguably any degree, but certainly to, not to any degree that they are. And it sort of benefits us, politically speaking, to identify with those people because it sort of reinforces our sense of embattlement, right. That we're being sieged by the culture around us, and that we too, like all these Christians around the world, are being persecuted and need to fight back against the forces that are trying to harm us. Even though the forces that are trying to harm us, you know, an atheist professor thinks [00:10:00] you're sort of backwards and uneducated or whatever, you know what I mean? Like it just isn't remotely comparable, but because that's the narrow lens through which we're seeing a lot of this persecution, we don't then identify or seem to have a lot of empathy for the type of persecution that isn't strictly because you're a missionary or because you're a Christian, and a lot of that persecution that happens to Christians around the world, that just happens because they are part of some ethnic group or existing under some dictatorial regime or whatever, a lot of that is caused by us, right. By the United States and by the policies that American evangelicals support. And so I just, it's all tied up in our political idolatry in a way that's kind of gross.
Jonathan Walton: Yeah. I think the, well, what stands out to me is, it is this trauma as a product that's marketed, right? And many churches, like it's a big-time Sunday when you bring somebody in who's been through something to give a testimony, right? [00:11:00] For Christianity to maintain its attractiveness, it latches itself onto, uh, latches itself onto an identification with oppressed people. Because if we're not identified with oppressed people, then we have to be identified with the oppressor, which means we can't be identified with Jesus. And I think there's extreme resistance in Christianity, at least American evangelicalism right now, and I would dare say like colonial Christianity in general, to say, “No, we are Babylon.”
Sy Hoekstra: That also plays heavily in general into how white Americans think of ourselves, right, as the underdog who revolted against the King of England, right. As opposed to the massive slave society that displaced an entire race of people, and then, you know, made all of our fortune on the backs of people that we were oppressing. We obviously prefer the underdog narrative and we always have.
Jonathan, you had told us about a [00:12:00] survivor of sex trafficking, who you know who goes around talking about the ways that her trauma is commoditized. Can you talk a little bit about that too? Because I think this is maybe something that people will be familiar with.
Jonathan Walton: Yeah, absolutely. And I, I'm having like flashbacks as we're talking, because I, being, you know, on staff with a campus ministry, operating in evangelical spaces, operating and partnering with evangelical nonprofits that are actively raising money for people who are suffering, the testimony is the thing that we all quote unquote want, right? We want the person that went through it, even so much to the point that people are willing to lie about it. To create stories and narratives, write books, get contracts, speak around the country because there are millions of people in the United States right now with their book clubs and organizations that are willing to put somebody up front and say, “Tell us a terrible story.”
Sy Hoekstra: Has that happened in the space of sex trafficking?
Jonathan Walton: Yes, [00:13:00] absolutely. Yes it has. And so, um, there's no need to name names about these people, but basically, one of the people that I'm, you know, very close friends with and because of COVID and circumstances, I haven't talked with her in a long time, but we talk online and her name is Shandra Wowowruntu. She started an organization called Mentari. She's a wonderful, wonderful woman of God. I share about her story in my book, 12 Lies.
And I distinctly remember she and I having a conversation one day where she said, you know, “I'm going to be paid $200 to come and share, and I'm sitting next to a professor who is going to get $1,000 or $2,000 to share,” right? And she goes like, “Whose message is more important in this conversation?” Like, you know, what do people need to hear and want to hear and need to understand about, you know, what she would say was her situation. And that stuck with me because I've [00:14:00] been in these spaces where we're just like, “Can we get a survivor?” and then we take her or him around like, to all the different spaces so that people can, so that the people sitting in the room can actually understand that the thing is real for this person, like, this happens to real people.
But the flip side of that I think is we don't put this person up front to be empowered and to be loved and to be seen and heard and understood and walk them into community. We put them up as a tool to get the people in the room to respond to something. And that's where I think the commodification happens.
It's the consumption of this person's story. There's a financial transaction that happens. There's exchange of money. And then we go on to the next thing. And I distinctly remember- and I think I carry some guilt about this- during, we had a series of events in New York city. [00:15:00] There were 116 events over two weeks on 18 campuses in New York city, North Jersey, and Long Island to fight sex trafficking and labor exploitation and raise support for organizations locally and globally that were engaged in, quote unquote, like setting people free from physical and spiritual oppression. Just this big, this big campaign. Bloomberg gave us an award and all these different things. And, but there was one young woman who is an activist and a survivor. And there was a pretty intense experience after she shared at one of our events. And I asked if anyone wanted to pray for her. And everyone decided to pray for her.
Sy Hoekstra: And she hadn't asked for prayer.
Jonathan Walton: No, she, she did. She said yes. Now granted, could she have felt pressured to say yes in that moment? It's very much [00:16:00] possible. She asked, we asked, we agreed that there's, there's going to be a prayer time and she is weeping.
And at the end of the talk, she said, “You know, Jonathan, is this is how you get down?” I was like, “Absolutely. Like, we just, we want to be able to support the people who are out there actually doing the work.” And I said to her, I said, “You know, if you ever, you’re ever traveling somewhere,” I said, “I know people all over the world.” I said, “If you're ever traveling somewhere and you want people to support you, to be there for you, like I will call people and make sure folks are there to pray and there to support.” And at first, like I thought that was a good thing. You know, she was responsive and things like that. But whenever I saw her in person after that, it felt like there was a guardedness, because something had been shared that was vulnerable, that wasn't necessarily supposed to be, or needed to be shared.
Sy Hoekstra: And then a lot of people fixated on it.
Jonathan Walton: And then a lot of people fixated on it. So the reality is, [00:17:00] there are people from that campaign of work that we did, and then the subsequent work that I did through our program, that are doing transformative, sustainable work against sex trafficking and labor exploitation, like all over the world. Like that's true.
At the same time, I, as we have these conversations about the commodification of trauma and trauma as a product and all of that, I can't help but ask, like at what cost did that come? Even to the point of, there was an activist that I knew from Zambia. And in Zambia, they do not speak with clicks. It's Xhosa in South Africa where they speak with clicks. But someone came up to him at an event and was like, “Can you do the clicking thing? Can you do that?” And so he said, sometimes he's tempted to do it, just to like, you know, make sure that people give more money. Like, what will the effect be there, right? It's like, you know, [00:18:00] here you have like a man made in the image of God from Zambia, like performing for white evangelicals in the United States in suburban New Jersey, right? For money, right?
It's just… so I, you know, as I'm talking, I realize my, you know, complicity and my part, as I'm talking, I'm reflecting on like my, you know, sometimes it'll happen to me, “But like, Jonathan, tell us that story of like, how you grew up!” right? Like, “What's it really like to be Black?” And like that happens over and over again. And so it's one of those things where like, you know, I wonder at what cost to the people who are sharing. Is it worth it for that, for the resources and for whatever you know, is supposedly supposed to come from it? And that's something I think I'm asking myself and I was asking myself that day after we talked with Reverend Van Opstal.
Suzie Lahoud: Yeah, I mean, Jonathan, I feel like you [00:19:00] really highlighted something that I think is important to clarify, because when we talk about commodifying something, it, really, a good way that you can see that that's what's happening is that it is for, ultimately, money. To raise money, to gain funds.
And I think that's important to clarify just because it's not that folks shouldn't feel free to have the opportunity to share their stories. I think that there are a lot of folks out there who do want to be able to share their stories and know that there's power in that. I mean, you know, each of us, we have the stories that we've been given and that's something that we're called to steward and steward well. But at the same time, I think it's very telling that a lot of times where this happens is at, you know, fundraising events, is at missions weeks at churches, you know. It's organizations that are raising money for different causes and interest groups. And I [00:20:00] think that's where we need to be very careful that one, it's not just manipulative to the audience, and two, that it's not exploitative of the person who's sharing.
And I think it starts with first that awareness that there is a danger there that you're not going to do it well. And you need to be very careful because again, that's holy ground. That's someone's life. And you need to handle that with great reverence.
Sy Hoekstra: And I think just to lay everything out on the table, we're sitting here talking about our, well, mostly the two of your trauma, in various ways, you know, in a podcast that we're doing for our company.
So, but I think that means that the point you just made is important, right? We're not saying don't ever talk about your trauma. Like testimonies, testifying to what Jesus has done in your life, or, you know, discipleship, whatever, that's going to involve learning about some hard things that have happened to people, right. And we shouldn't [00:21:00] like paint over those things or, you know, try and make things, you know, flatten people's experiences.
I think the point that you're making is basically the difference between doing it well and doing it badly is pretty nuanced and subtle. And it's, you know, it's a lot about where your intentions are and what you're using people's stories for.
So I think that brings us into then talking about how we can avoid doing this badly. So, what are some thoughts that you all have on that?
Jonathan Walton: I recently had a conversation about, in a conference that we're organizing and someone shared that they did not want to be recorded. And the reason was that as an indigenous leader, knowledge is sacred to share with someone else, like a story is sacred. And so the thought of it being consumed later, and they're not even a part of it, like just [00:22:00] violated so many values for that person. And I wonder to myself, you know, as we're on this journey, I think we have to hold in tension how do I tell the story while honoring this person who’s sharing the story. And honoring the person who’s sharing and honoring the image of God and the dignity of the person that is bearing their soul to me is more important than what I want to do with that story.
And I think I experienced this as I wrote. I remember Jesus did something transformative in me when I would write the story of like Jacob, the child soldier from Invisible Children or Simon, a human trafficking survivor from the Sudan. And Jesus did something in me as I wrote their stories, but I was doing what they asked me to do with their stories.
Yeah, so at the end, at the end of every day, and [00:23:00] like the bottom line, I think is like, it is more important to honor the image of God and the intentions and desires of the person who is being vulnerable and allowing us into their world than it is for me to get the product that I want, the outcome that I want. Because the outcome that I actually want is for this person to feel loved, cared for cherished, treasured, all of that. Like that should actually be the goal that I would love my neighbor. Cause that's the commandment: to love my neighbor, not love the crowd. Because I do think when we're building something or when one is building an audience or a company or whatever the thing is, the next customer is more important than the one that you have. The next subscriber is the one you're looking at. The next interview is the person you're focused on. And I think so for us, there's a, I think there's a radical slowing down that has to happen.
Sy Hoekstra: I think another good point from what we've talked about is just being very [00:24:00] clear on what you value by thinking about where you're putting your money. So, you know, with Suzie saying like, or all of these examples of people who have to tell their traumatic stories because the more terrible the story is, the more money they get, right. I think as people, if you're someone who has the privilege of being someone who gives out the money to those, you know, to the causes that you appreciate, you need to be willing to do it to someone who's just doing good work, regardless of whether or not they are, you know, sort of dehumanizing themselves to the point where they are telling you this story in order to get your money.
Related to that too then I think, you know, having a very good, clear-eyed, realistic view of our privilege as Western Christians is also important and not, like I said, overestimating how much we're being persecuted or not, you know, failing to understand what it is that [00:25:00] our country and our politics do to contribute to other people's persecution so that, you know, just being able to have a clear picture of that, I think then will help us to, will just help us to fix our view of ourselves as being marginalized or persecuted because of our faith, when that is not in fact what happens in the ordinary course of things to American Christians.
Suzie Lahoud: I think too it's so much wrapped up in the decolonization of our faith in that it's moving away from this transactional view. I think what happens a lot of times is folks show up at these events and it's almost like you, it does sort of end up feeling a little bit like you're paying for an experience in that you choose to give because you are emotionally moved by something in the same way that you give money to go to see a movie that you expect will emotionally move you in some way.
[00:26:00] And you know, whether it's through shock or, you know, compassion or whatever, you're looking for something inside you to shift, but that's so self-centered. And so I think it's also moving away from this individualistic experience of our faith towards a communal, holistic, collective view of our faith, where it's not just about me and what I learned about God in this situation, because then it almost becomes a trade-off of this person is giving of themselves emotionally, they're pouring themselves out in a way that can actually be really painful so that you can receive emotionally, instead, it becomes about- I feel like I keep saying this over and over again- but really embracing that person into the community in a genuine way. So it's not just a one-off like, “Oh, that was great. Let us pray for you.” like Jonathan was sharing, but so it's really entering into relationship with that [00:27:00] person.
And I'm not saying, I realize that's not a realistic expectation that every time someone gets up in front of a crowd everyone's going to become their best friend. But just, you know, asking the question, “Does this person have the support that they need in the long run?” and not expecting them to be perfect just because they've been through some really hard things and have a powerful story to share. Because I think that's also what happens.
I had a pastor who used to talk about how we tend to demonize the people that we most idolized. And so I think a lot of times too, it becomes this vicious cycle where you have folks who have been through a lot and it's really moving to hear about their experiences and their journeys, but they're also then dealing with a lot. They have a lot of healing to do. They have a lot to work through and that can come out in the messiness of their lives, but there's no grace for that. We don't make space for that. And once those things start to come out, they get written off by, you know, whatever church or organization they were then leading in. [00:28:00] And I think that's on us. That's not on them.
Sy Hoekstra: I think that the last thing that I would say is probably making sure that our political advocacy involves advocating for people who are victims of harm, regardless of what type of harm that is; regardless of who caused the harm or how, whether or not that fits in with our, you know, preferred party’s agenda or whatever that is. That is a both sides of the aisle thing by the way. I know we talk a lot about conservatives or Republicans on this show, but anybody can do that. Anybody can ignore the harm of the people whose victimhood doesn't kind of fit with their narrative.
Suzie Lahoud: Sy, I think that's such an important point and the fact that yes, this is across the aisle. I just can't help thinking with everything, you know, going on in Israel and Palestine today, you know, it's so hypocritical of our government and [00:29:00] again, it doesn't matter what administration, that we, you know, call out that the persecution of the Uyghurs in Xinjiang, we talk about the Rohingya in Myanmar, but we're not willing to call out the ethnic cleansing that is currently happening in the Occupied Territories. So I think, yes, absolutely. That is across the board, something that we need to do better in.
Sy Hoekstra: Yeah, I'm always reminded of, in our book actually, I can't remember if it's Jessie Wheeler or MJ Bryant who just said like, to people in the Middle East, a Republican drone and a Democratic drone is still a drone, right. It's not different.
Okay, so we are going to end this kind of intense conversation with, I think, something that will probably help people process things a little bit. We're going to hear Jonathan Walton perform one of his poems that he does, although doesn't do as much anymore. This is not something that it's as easy to hear as it was, you know, ten [00:30:00] years ago.
But, so I guess just before we go again, thank you so much for listening. Thank you to you all who are hearing this for subscribing. Please remember to follow us @KTFPress on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. And our theme song is “Citizens” by Jon Guerra. Our podcasts art is by Jacqueline Tam, and we will see you on Friday with our next episode.
So here's Jonathan's poem, it's called “River of Currency.” It was commissioned and written in 2007; commissioned by a group called Poetic People Power. Enjoy.
Jonathan Walton: I’m writing this poem for my momma
the public school teacher in LaCrosse, Virginia
who chose to teach kids, reach kids,
hold kids and mold kids into productive members
of a broken society while surviving on a salary below the line of poverty
I’m inscribing these lines for the
17 students at UVA who were
arrested for protesting for a living wage
not for themselves but for the workers who clean their dormitories
workers that aren't paid enough to be neighbors
when they [00:31:00] work at one of the richest schools in the state
All they were asking for, in 2007, was for 10.72
that’s ten dollars and seventy-two cents
so that after taxes
they can barely break twenty thousand
I’m writing this poem for that dude
in the Merrill Lynch mailroom
who knows he’s bringing home
300 times less than the reigning CEO
I’m writing because there is a guy riding a bike
right now trying to get that Chinese food to the right place in less than 15 minutes
a pregnant woman bringing groceries up as fast as she can
because she has no money for a medical plan
the man throwing dough to make your personal pan
I’m writing to give a voice to the American worker
who is being broken and bent over by the forever responsible Man
I’m writing this poem
because capitalistic individualism is killing individuals with minimum capital
as the individual seeks to maximize his capital, killing individuals less fortunate than
himself…
I’m writing because I’m upset with our supposedly elected president
who looks down on a grossly misrepresented Senate and House of Representatives
to raise his salary to four hundred thousand [00:32:00]
Capitalism is cracking crippling whips on the backs of the working class but we’ve been
beaten for so long, we are immune and walking wounded …swept up in an invisible
river bigger than the Mississippi, slicker than the Harlem and less swimmable than
the Hudson…
This is the river of currency
and currently the current is so strong
that the working class is riding the riptide
far out into sea, too far to see land
but hoping that if we keep working someday we’ll reach the beach…
I’m writing this poem, and I’ll keep writing this poem, binding and refining the lines of these poems until my momma can teach kids to read and be able afford her mortgage, eat out every once in a while and drive the car she’d like to, to work. [00:33:00]
[The song “Citizens” by Jon Guerra fades in. Lyrics: “I need to know there is justice/That it will roll in abundance/ And that you’re building a city/ Where we arrive as immigrants/ And you call us citizens/ And you welcome us as children home.” The song fades out.]
