What Have You Changed Your Mind About?

Because admitting we got it wrong is the worst, right?

Feb 3

I’ve been thinking some more about yesterday’s conversation with Dominic Bradley, and about the power of sensitivity reads in general, to help authors name and unlearn our own biases. (Here’s author Bethany Brookshire talking about how she involved seven different sensitivity readers in her book! I’m in awe.) It truly is a gift to have that feedback—but, of course, requires sitting in a lot of discomfort to take and use said feedback. So I’m curious to hear about a time you’ve changed your mind, based on feedback (about bias, but also I guess, about anything you now know you’ve gotten wrong). What did that look like? How did it feel? How did you help yourself to sit in the suck of it, do the unlearning, and get to a hopefully better place?

Feel free to take this in a lot of different directions. (I suspect an awful lot of people reading this newsletter would name some level of divestment from diet culture and anti-fat bias and that’s awesome, but don’t feel like we have to keep the conversation there and there alone.) Please do be mindful that sharing explicit details of past harm can be harmful to folks reading now, so feel free to summarize/skip the finer points of something you did or said in your bias and focus more on what you’ve learned and how that learning has been helpful.

And, remember to keep things friendly and follow my Thread Ground Rules.

PS. Also! Last call if you have a response to the AAP Guidelines that you’d like to share in our upcoming community episode. We’re especially eager to hear from healthcare providers who are frustrated by the guidelines (you don’t have to use your name), and parents of kids who will be potentially impacted.

You can email your thoughts, but we really love to hear your voices! Record a voice memo and email it to us at virginiasolesmith.assistant@gmail.com. (Here’s how to do it whether you have an iPhone or an Android.)