I'm Bill Hammack. And I'm Don D'Cost. And this is a commentary version of lecture five of Michael Faraday's The Chemical History of a Candle. We created this series with Alex Black, a chemistry undergraduate at the University of Illinois. And so this commentary is designed to enhance and enrich the lecture. So in this lecture, Faraday really drives home his point that science gives us a unified description of the world. So a naive person would see multiplicity or many different things. And Faraday and his scientific view see unity. And that's illustrated very deeply in this lecture by the connection between the burning of a candle and human respiration. And so this is the capstone to all the lectures. And recall that he started his first lecture. He claimed, I will teach you all you need to know about science from a candle. And I'd say he does pretty well. Yeah. And what he's doing at the beginning here, he's kind of reminding us of what's going on, especially, you know, here he's telling us about the water that came from the candle. He tells us about the carbon dioxide as well. And since we could take apart water, he then says, well, can we take apart the carbon dioxide and figure out what its nature is? And so that's one of the things that we're going to do. Notice he doesn't really talk about atoms. He talks more about real things, the carbon and oxygen gases. And it might be a little different if he did that today. So it might seem like he's doing through a whole bunch of convolutions coming up to show us that carbon dioxide contains carbon and oxygen. But we did change the language in his lecture at the time he would have called carbon dioxide, carbonic acid. Now this is an interesting demonstration that he's going to show us.  And now he's going to say that, you know, we should see that as well. We're going to see these carbon particles in the flame of the candle. And we can see here the black smoke. Why don't we see this in a candle? Because, as he said, there was a different ratio of oxygen. In this case, the flame is too big. When he places this in pure oxygen, we see that the black smoke goes away. And so this is an analogy then to a candle. We can see this flame here. We don't see the black smoke because we have plenty of oxygen. And this is another example of where he does not anticipate. He actually shows us before he tells us, which is really good. He does this one as a reminder because we're going to need this idea later in the lecture. But it's also really great because he shows us this in a different way. Before he showed us the black smoke, but he didn't add the extra oxygen. And by doing so here, we get the point in a different way. So now let's let Michael Faraday explain what he's going to do with carbon dioxide. Being a compound body consisting of carbon and oxygen, carbon dioxide is a body that we ought to be able to take asunder. And so we can. As we did with water, so we can with carbon dioxide. Take the two parts asunder. The simplest and quickest way is to act upon the carbon dioxide by a substance that can attract the oxygen from it and leave the carbon behind. You recollect that I took potassium and put it upon water or ice and you saw that it could take the oxygen from the hydrogen. Now, suppose we do something of the same kind here with this carbon dioxide. So this is another example of why we kept the language. I really like that word asunder. He's used it a couple of times. He's used it twice before, I believe, once with the ice bomb and once when he originally took water apart. But what's the really big point here? I think a big point here is the analogical thinking that he's using. He reminds us that he used potassium to remove oxygen from water and he's going to do the same thing here. He's going to use the magnesium to remove the oxygen from the carbon dioxide. And there's kind of a subtle point here that I don't think he makes directly. But there's a unity here. Again, there's a common set of principles that guide all chemical reactions. So if we could take a metal and remove oxygen from one compound, maybe we can take a different metal and remove oxygen from a different compound. You know, I recall doing this. You'll see here in just a second that I really jump back because you heat up the magnesium quite a bit and then the whole thing fumes or reacts for, I don't know, two, three minutes, five minutes? Yeah, it takes several minutes. And especially when we put the top on, we now have surrounded the burning magnesium with carbon dioxide. And of course, given it a lot of oxygen to react with. And there you see me moving backwards. I'm never quite sure. I'm a little further here, right? It's very, very bright. Yeah. And if I remember right, we're going to see the part where we kind of condensed the time. So what is the chemistry that's going on here? So in this case, it's like Faraday says, what's going on is that magnesium needs oxygen to burn and it finds the oxygen from the carbon dioxide. And so it's removing the oxygen from the carbon dioxide. It's actually then going to give us some products here that we're going to see in a minute. We're going to actually see the magnesium oxide with the magnesium reacting with the oxygen and we'll see some carbon as well. So probably useful to just remind people that dry acid, of course, is just pure CO2. And now when I lift the lid off, then we see there's the magnesium oxide. There's the white powder. Yep. And the carbon. So next Faraday gives us a truth about how carbon burns. And then he's going to use that truth in order to make an observation in the next section of the lecture. And now I may tell you that whenever carbon burns under common circumstances, it produces carbon dioxide. So now he's going to show us exactly that the carbon dioxide is produced when burning carbon. And kind of interesting to me here is that he uses wood. He's used candles and other things in the past, but he's making that statement at any time, carbon burns or whatever form it is, it's going to produce CO2. And this is also nice because it has a little bit of, it illustrates a control and experiment. He takes just a pure piece of wood, unburned, shakes it up in his lime water solution, which we know turns cloudy when you have CO2, shows nothing happens. And now he takes the piece of wood and he's going to capture the emissions from that, the gas that comes off it, which of course we know now is CO2, but he's going to prove that to us by having the solution turn cloudy. And it was nice at the beginning of the lecture. He kind of reminded us of the lime water again. So it wasn't something he expected us to remember from our previous lecture without telling us something about that. It's kind of interesting here as he also uses this in a way to prove that there is carbon in wood, right? Yes, yeah. I mean, that's something that is not necessarily obvious and he actually shows us this then in a little bit with the burnt piece of wood showing us that because it's incomplete combustion, it doesn't turn the wood completely into carbon dioxide, but there's some carbon left over as we can see here. And then what's very nice is that he brings this observation back to the candle in the Bunsen burner. In fact, you might ask, why don't I see carbon in there? And remember that he has said that if I get enough oxygen, then I'm not going to get any carbon.  Now, Faraday next makes a very important point about carbon and as that is that it burns to a gas. And as we'll see later in the lectures, this is absolutely critical for respiration. I have shown you that the carbon in burning burns only as a solid body and yet you'll perceive that after it is burned, it ceases to be a solid. And it's critical because of the analogy between combustion and respiration. We need to be able to get rid of the waste, the carbon dioxide, which is a gas, and we need it to be able to move around the atmosphere and as we'll see, get to the plants, which need the carbon dioxide to survive. So let's now return to Michael Faraday because he's now going to bring everything together that the lectures have been aimed toward, which is the analogy between the burning of a candle and human respiration. Now, I must take you to a very interesting part of our subject to the relation between the combustion of a candle and that living kind of combustion which goes on within us. In every one of us, there's a living process of combustion going on very similar to that of a candle. And I must try to make that plain to you for it is not merely true in a poetical sense, the relation of the life of humans to a candle. And if you follow, I think I can make this clear. So over the course of the next five minutes, Faraday is going to bring together everything that we've seen previously in the lectures or not everything, a lot of it and demonstrate to you that what is coming out of our bodies when we exhale is CO2. And so he wants you to recall right now that a candle can't burn in CO2. So he's going to exhale into this pipe, cover the candle with whatever comes out of our lungs.  Now, it's important to note that he's not blowing out the candle. I guess we call it mechanically. Yeah, and he showed us that earlier when he had the products of the candle putting out the flame. And this is what he's reminded us about. Oh, yeah, here it is from lecture four. So this didn't blow it out in a conventional sense, but it blowed out by it smothered the combustion by surrounding it with CO2. Which he kind of showed by putting his thumb over that as well. If CO2 is a product of the candle, the CO2 will fill that vessel and then smother the candle, the flame. So this is actually a stunning set of experiments and I think unexpected from where he starts with the candle. I guess let's watch him exhale here, see what happens. And we can see when we do this, there's a close-up of the flame so that you can see that the flame isn't, you know, a little bit of motion obviously because of the exhaled air or the carbon dioxide. But it's not getting blown out. And it's useful to note that he covers up the top partly to be sure the CO2 will build up inside. Otherwise air could re-enter and keep the candle burning. And what he needs to do is displace the air. And it's interesting again to see how he does this. What he doesn't do is to say, I exhale carbon dioxide. He actually starts with an observation. And he reads us really logically through this. He knows that a flame will go out if there's not a fresh supply of oxygen. It'll go out with the products of a burning candle. I know the products of a burning candle, one of them is carbon dioxide and I know the flame goes out with my breath. So what could we conclude? Well, it might be that our breath has carbon dioxide in it but we can look at this with other tests and here's one of them. Now Faraday did use the phrase again of bad air which in lecture four I think it was. Yes. We chastised him a little bit for. But I think it's useful to note that neither Don nor I or trained scientist, engineers, didn't notice that until we were reviewing the lectures. So I suspect that we heard what we wanted and I kind of suspect Michael Faraday heard what he wanted. Yeah, it would be really clunky. You know, if he said things like, I exhale the products of my combustion as opposed to bad air. And so he used that type of language. He used a little bit of colloquial language, I think, to help people to understand. I mean, there's sometimes precision obscures within help. So this apparatus now is a little hard to understand but to keep the point, note here is that the pipe on the left in this drawing doesn't touch the water. The other pipe does touch it. So he's able to draw in air as he just did and then flip it around or he flips it around so that the long end is now in the water and that way that the gases that I'm exhaling here, the Faraday exhales will bubble through the lime water. And if you watch what happens, it takes a little while here, it turns cloudy and then we know that it has CO2. And notice, he did this again kind of as a way of control but also to show that there is something going on in their breathing by inhaling the air from the outside first and showing that nothing went on. He can show that it must be that what he's calling the bad air or our exhaled air, the carbon dioxide. Yeah, and it's interesting that that highlights that there's a change, that we breathe in air and we breathe out something and naively and not unreasonably we would think that would be air also and so he's showing here that a chemical reaction has happened. At this point, Faraday used an interesting phrase. He said that the atmosphere is spoiled by us breathing, kind of like saying bad air. He doesn't really explain what this means yet. He will later and we'll see that it's spoiled for us but not for the plants. So now, what comes up next is really a key section of all five lectures and it's his big unity of science moment. He shows us the analogy really deeper than that between respiration and the candle. We consume food, the food goes through that strange set of vessels and organs within us and it's brought into various parts of the body, into the digestive parts especially. The air that we inhale is drawn into the lungs, absorbed into the bloodstream and transported throughout the bodies of the oxygen and the food come close together. In the body, a curious wonderful change takes place. The oxygen combines with the carbon, not carbon in a free state, but is in this case placed ready for action at the moment and makes carbon dioxide and is so thrown out into the atmosphere and thus the singular result takes place. The oxygen can thus act upon the food producing precisely the same results in kind as we have seen in the case of the candle. The candle combines with parts of the air forming carbon dioxide and evolves heat. We may thus look upon the food as fuel. So a great point that Faraday just made here is that we as humans rely on chemical reactions to survive and that's something that's not really an obvious point. And these chemical reactions, of course, he's discussed at length and he's differentiated from physical changes. He also then, as Bill mentioned earlier, he's making a nice analogy here between our respiration and then the combustion of a candle. And it's a very nice, simple analogy of we're taking in fuel and he uses food as a fuel and of course the fuel of a candle is its wax. So what's coming up then next is a really stunning and vivid demonstration of how sugar is like the fuel of a candle, well almost at least. He's going to show in a moment that the respiration produces CO2 but for now what he wants to do is just show that sugar contains carbon which we know is necessary for a fuel. He's made that point earlier. In fact, we know from his many demonstrations and comments so far that carbon is produced when a candle is burned. It goes off as CO2. Although we call with a piece of wood, we also made carbon in that way. And here what we see, we're going to see clearly here is that carbon is produced when sugar is and I'll put it in quotes here burned although it's a chemical reaction happening here not really strictly combustion. Yeah and we can see here we have some time lapse going on. It takes a few minutes but what's happening here is that the sulfuric acid removes the oxygen and the hydrogen from the sugar and it leaves only carbon. Now the analogy here is really deep. To bring these two processes together calls for a sophisticated theory of chemical reactions. So his discussion is part analogy that humans and candles make carbon as a byproduct and this produces heat. But it's part exact as well once we have a theory of chemical reactions. It's not merely an analogy although you have to dig really deeply into the chemistry to see how the combustion of the candle and the reaction of the sugar and the sulfuric acid are deeply related. So what's coming up next is Faraday is going to remind us of when he added the potassium to water. And his point here is that a candle doesn't always burn even though we know that it will burn if we start the wick on fire. Just being in contact, the wick in contact with the air won't have it burn. But if potassium is in contact with water it happens right away. And he mentioned a phrase earlier. These reactions are different in form but not in kind. So he's again bringing this unity to chemistry to chemical reactions and he told us early in the lectures that there's no better window into science than studying the candle. And notice what he's doing now. He's kind of getting into kinetic something that wouldn't be obvious in studying a candle. As he mentioned, potassium reacts at once if it's with water but carbon in a candle can wait as he said days, months, weeks, years before it reacts. So I think it's worth noting that when we showed sugar we showed the formula for sucrose which is how table sugar and other sugars are. There's lots of their kinds, glucose and fructose and other kinds of sugars. But they all do about the same thing. I think another point to make is Faraday reorganized the chemical formula for sugar to show these waters and you shouldn't view the waters tucked around the carbon. It's actually just carbon, oxygen, hydrogen all bonded together but it's a useful fiction though. In fact, we often call sugar carbohydrates because of this way to represent them. In fact, in biochemistry the reaction of sugar with sulfuric acid is often called a dehydration reaction. And so here Faraday does another wonderful demonstration one that we still do and this cotton here is actually gun cotton and he has gun powder next to it. And again, what he's going to do with these is kind of show the difference between a reaction that happens right away and a reaction that doesn't. And in both of these cases they're stable enough to not just react with the air but by applying a little bit of activation energy. So he gets into this idea of an activation barrier. The gun cotton has a smaller activation barrier and we can see he's just heating up the glass rod, touches it, there it goes. When he does the same thing with the gun powder it's not reacting. Even though he's using the same amount of heat in both cases. Now this is a little bit surprising because gun powder we know is not stable. This is why we use it in guns. But there is a stability to it. There's a kinetic stability. It has a higher activation barrier than the gun cotton does. So again, Faraday talks about this idea of there's no better window into science and here he's getting into a pretty deep discussion of kinetics versus thermodynamics. And gun cotton is something that's probably familiar with us today. It's nitrocellulose. It's what they make flash paper out of that magicians use. And it was also used for a film base or film stock in the first part of the 20th century. But of course the films were very flammable. It's very dangerous and in the 1930s they changed to a nitrate based film that was much less flammable. In these final sections, Faraday turns his attention to carbon dioxide that's emitted by humans and as we'll see as well other mammals. And he makes his points very clearly. First of all, he notes that respiration in mammals will happen at any temperature as long as it's above freezing. And he also then, you know, looks at how it scales with different kinds of animals and he all does this very vividly. Maybe it's useful to point out here the things that Faraday doesn't discuss and that were really not part of his 19th century science. He doesn't really go into why reactions occur. That took a detailed atomic level understanding of the second law of thermodynamics something that came across with Boltzmann. Faraday doesn't talk about what initiates a chemical reaction. We talked a little bit about activation barriers there and he alluded to it. But again, that's a detailed kind of atomic level description to really understand that. And of course he didn't discuss how reactions occur, how molecules come apart and how they go back together. And so he didn't understand, you know, the steps or the mechanisms by which they happen. So at this point Faraday is now going to link us as humans with what he calls our fellow creatures or our fellow existers. He's already made the point and we've mentioned a lot this unity idea, this analogy that we are essentially like a candle. We take in fuel, we give off carbon dioxide and he's used the phrase spoiled air, exhale there and that we can't breathe the same air twice over. But that's because the plants take in the carbon dioxide. The air is spoiled for us but as he says, what's diseased to the one is health to the other. So while we spoil the air for us, the plants need that quote unquote spoiled air and then they spoil the air for themselves by giving off oxygen, which we then of course need. And I recall when recording this last section that as I was saying the words that it felt very much like a sermon and he has a lot of words in here like live and rejoice if I recall, right? And indeed Faraday was a very religious man and it may be that his religious beliefs were coming through in the language that he chose to use to sum up the lectures. So here at the end of the lecture let's give Michael Faraday the last word. And one of the reasons we kept his original language as much as we could is just how poetic he is. So let's listen to how beautifully Michael Faraday just sums up everything we've learned in these lectures. Indeed, all I can say to you at the end of these lectures where we must come to an end at one time or other is to express a wish that you may in your generation be fit to compare to a candle. That you may like it shine as lights to those about you that in all your actions you may justify the beauty of the taper by making your deeds honorable and effectual in the discharge of your duty to humankind. And so too these commentaries must come to an end. Thanks for listening. I'm Bill Hammack and I'm down to cost.


Thanks for joining executive director's chat with TechSoup. We call this ED Chat. And I love this platform because I get to see your faces. I love this. So I hope you bought notes. You can screenshot the chat room. But I hope you bought pen and paper to take notes. Today's topic is employee resource groups. Now, this was new to me. It may be new to many of you. But I'm hoping you're going to get some takeaways and get some ideas for your community engagement, business needs, social networking, and professional development as it pertains to your nonprofit. My name is Aretha Simons. I'm the webinar producer here at TechSoup. And this is being recorded. And everyone will get the replay within 48 hours. We try to get it to you right away. So look for that in your email. If this is your first time here and on Zoom meetings, here's how you can gauge so that everyone can participate. We would love for you to keep your microphone on mute for the quality of the recording. If you'd like, you can keep your video on. And so that everyone is not speaking over each other. If you have a question, please use the reaction button over there on the side and use the raise your hand option. If you need the CC button, the closed caption is available. All you have to do is click on that closed caption button right here in the Zoom options. So I got a couple of announcements that I'm so excited. I rarely get to do announcements, so bear with me. We are inviting everyone here. I know there are people who have different topics that they are experts in. I would love for you to become a feature speaker here at TechSoup. Email me at asymonds at TechSoup.org. When I say at TechSoup, excuse me, on ED Chat or a faith-based chat. And if you are having an event and you would like someone from TechSoup to come and talk about the TechSoup offers, please email Felipe Reyes at techsoup.org. I got one more quick announcement. We have some exciting news about a new course here. I looked at this course, and I'm gonna take this course because I think I need it because I'm always talking about funding. It's called Accidental Techie Director, excuse me, Development Director, got it. A lot of tongue twisters. But this course is designed for nonprofit development directors or fundraising staff. So I'm gonna put the link in the chat. If you click on the link, it'll just open up a different window. You won't leave this session. And I would like to introduce Quad to you. This is something new and exciting here at TechSoup. We launched a new part of TechSoup. It's a members-only community. And I saw Aaron in the chat room. So maybe he'll tell us a little bit later. So we're gonna do a deep dive into organization that provides food security. So we'll focus on organizations that provide meals, food pantry, food banks, and all type of food service to the nonprofit community. And with Quad, you can get access to community discussion forms, members-only events, articles, free courses, and so much more. I'm gonna put the link in the chat room and you can click on that and it'll open up a separate window and you'll find out more about Quad. Also reach out to us if you want a 101 conversation with Aaron about Quad. So now, getting into today's discussion, employee resource group. Before I do that, put in the chat room if you are a part of employee research group or an affinity group or if you don't even know what I'm talking about. Put a one in the chat room if you're part of employee resource group or you know about it. Put a two in the chat room if you have no idea what I'm talking about. Today, we have Jasmine Malone. She is the EIDC intern here at TechSoup. And I wanna give a shout out to Jasmine and Lashika Philip because they came to me with this topic. They said, you know, this is something we wanna talk about and let's do it on EID chat. I was like, let's go. And then Laura Ross Perry, she's a program manager, development manager for our global network and she's gonna share with us about affinity groups. And then I met a young lady called Mariah Butler in a separate meeting. She is a global talent analyst with AIG and she's gonna tell us about employee resource group as relates to AIG. So I'm gonna turn it over to Jasmine and you and Lori can bounce back together and share with us about affinity groups and you can let me know when you want me to share the screen. So over to you, Laura. So thank you so much for having us and hi to everybody from all over the country and perhaps all over the world. I saw Australia there in the chat somewhere. It seems really early for you. So really happy to have you here too. So as Aretha said, my name is Laura Ross Perry. I have been working at TechSoup for about two and a half years now. I'm a program development manager and I work with our global network of nonprofits. So these are nonprofits that help to deliver our discounted and donated technology programs and support and training to other nonprofits all over the world. So a little bit about how employee resource groups started at TechSoup. So I will just, I'll start talking a little bit about the background of affinity groups or employee resource groups and how those started at TechSoup. And I think the most important thing for me when I think about our journey is that it was incredibly organic. So we didn't have a diversity, equity, inclusion program whatsoever at TechSoup. We didn't have anybody who was officially in a position there either in our people and culture team or otherwise. So Lashika Phillips who is on the call here as well. She is now the director of our equity, inclusion, diversity and culture program. But back in October, 2019, we didn't have that program at all. She held a completely different role at TechSoup and she took it upon herself to for TechSoup to run a diversity month in a global diversity month in October of 2019.  And that was actually my very first month at TechSoup ever. So that was a great time for me to start. Since that global diversity month, they're garnered some more interest from different people at TechSoup, all not working in equity, inclusion, diversity, but all passionate about that type of work, passionate about bringing in different voices, highlighting different communities within TechSoup and within our nonprofit network and bringing that into TechSoup and having more of a program. So from there, we kind of formalize what we now consider a diversity council at TechSoup called BRIDGE. And our diversity council stands for belonging, respect, inclusion, diversity and global equity. So from that kind of large diversity council, we started running different events, highlighting different communities, bringing different speakers on, but organically from that, we kind of grew a need to focus on different areas. So there was parts of the diversity council that were really focused and interested in issues that relate to the LGBTQ community, some that were really interested in issues that relate to racial justice and anti-discrimination work and so on. So actually I am a member of the racial justice allyship group, but I can tell you a little bit more about how that started. It actually didn't start as a racial justice allyship group. We broke off initially from BRIDGE to be just an allyship group. So that was our first kind of affinity group there. We wrote a mission statement and we decided that we were going to be a group that focused on being allies. As we kind of went on and as the months progressed, we realized that that was also too large for us. That was also not focused enough for the interests of the particular people in the group. And so we kind of got together and we said, okay, we can be allies for many different things, but how can we be most useful? How can we bring most visibility to a specific community, both within the nonprofits that we work with and within our own organization? And we decided to focus specifically on racial justice, especially after the George Floyd murders and every murder and everything that came after that, we thought that highlighting racial justice within TechSoup as well as within the network was the most important thing for us right now in our priority. So that's kind of the genesis of the racial justice allyship group, which is one of four groups that we have at TechSoup right now. And I'll just give another, a couple of examples of what our group does. So we really wanna focus on racial justice and anti-discrimination, not only within TechSoup internally, but externally. I've mentioned that several times, but for TechSoup, it's really important for us to think about how we can integrate affinity groups in this type of work into our internal programming, our internal culture, our retention rates, our diverse recruitment, things like that, but also to take it externally and think about the communities that we work with, think about the funders that we work with, the nonprofits that we serve. So it's really an internal and external thing at the same time. So for the racial justice allyship group, one of the things that we did was to work with our people and culture team to update a document that we have called Help Me Hire. It's a document that was developed probably back in 2014, 2015 and hadn't really been updated since and it's meant to guide hiring managers through the hiring process, through writing job descriptions, posting on different sites, holding interviews and such, but there wasn't enough information in there focused on embedding equity, embedding diversity, inclusion and culture elements into all steps of the recruitment process and the retention process. So the people and culture team actually reached out to the racial justice allyship group and a couple other affinity groups to say we want to update this document and you are valued resources that will be able to help us do this in an equitable way. So for the past few months, we've been holding several different meetings and we have finally gotten to the point where we have an updated document that really embeds elements of EIDC, which is what we call our program, EIDC into that whole process and so then we're gonna be rolling that out to hiring managers. So that's one example of how we are working with our people and culture team and how affinity groups are integrated into potentially changing the culture within TechSoup. And then externally, we have also been doing direct outreach to nonprofits that are focused on racial justice and focused on anti-discrimination. We've been inviting them to come and speak at TechSoup. We've been asking if there's volunteer opportunities that our staff can come and support. We've also been asking about their technology needs because that's what TechSoup does and thinking about ways that we can support them more and also considering a larger kind of cohort and funding model where we fund specifically nonprofits that are focused on this work so we can really help raise their voices and help create more impact for the work that they're doing. So with that, I'm gonna pass it over to Jasmine to talk a little bit about how I mentioned that this is all kind of grown organically at TechSoup but in the past few months and really spearheaded by Jasmine, we've been able to operationalize some of our affinity group work. So Jasmine, take it away. Thanks, Laura and thank you, Aretha. And then again, a huge shout out to my supervisor, my boss, Alicia Phillips who runs the Equity Inclusion Diversity and Culture Program. Hello, everyone, I'm Jasmine, my pronouns are she and her. I am the Equity Inclusion Diversity and Culture Intern at TechSoup and I have been at TechSoup since June of 2021 and so I've been doing this work since then. And what I want to highlight here is before we go before I go into a little more descriptions about alphabet super LGBTQ plus affinity group, junior professionals and black allies, I saw that some folks said that you don't have an affinity group or you don't have an ERG and you're not really sure what that is. There was a link shared in the chat that goes to an article that we posted earlier this year that kind of defines and goes over the history of what an affinity group is but for folks to know when you're talking about affinity groups, we're talking about affinity as in folks who identify within a certain part of their identity, right? So we're talking about junior professionals. Early career professionals, mid-career professionals who are doing professional development work together. We're talking black allies. It's folks who identify as black, identify as African or part of the diaspora who are coming together with our allies, with our accomplices to focus on issues or initiatives that help heighten the voices of black folks across our organization and our network and the communities that we serve. And the same thing for LGBTQ plus, for alphabet soup, to talking about folks who identify within that as well as those allies to come together and educate the community of tech soup and externally to highlight other issues and observances and tell these stories in different ways and to bring positive effect as Laura mentioned with racial justice allyship to these communities and directly help them with the resources and programs that tech soup has available. So I'm thinking about affinity groups in that way and employee resource groups, how taking that the idea of affinity group, how can these resource groups be resources to the organization? And that is what I want to highlight just before I get into these notes. Actually, let me do this first so that we can get rid of the slides before our conversation. So going back a little bit, as Laura mentioned, talking about bridge in the Beverly City Council and then alphabet soup, which is again the LGBTQ plus affinity group was kind of the first one to grow organically out of the bridge. And then after that came racial justice allyship and we've heard about those two a little bit. And alphabet soup within our organization from what I've seen for being here since June has posted, provided slide deck resources about pride and the history of pride has hosted events educating us about what LGBTQ issues and advocacy looks like within the United States and within other parts of the world and continuing to be a resource to us to make sure that we are not, and we are including those voices within the work that we do. So moving on to junior professionals that started actually, we're about to back. So I'm gonna talk to you a little bit about how we formalize the program. And by formalizing it, what do we mean here is just creating a more formal way of creating affinity groups at TechSoup. Yes, and also Erin is here. So Erin, a huge shout out and thank you for the work that you do with this affinity group and all of the other work that you've been doing at TechSoup. So what it means to when we're talking about formalizing the program was creating an affinity group policy. And what that policy highlights is the purpose of affinity groups at TechSoup, the procedure for forming an affinity group which I'll talk about in a second but mostly is submitting or request form. And then we recommend meeting with the equity inclusion, diversity and culture team for ways of gaining support. And then we also include the discrimination and harassment policies within TechSoup and the resources that TechSoup will allocate to affinity groups, which at this time is virtual tools, our meeting softwares, things like that. And then it also talks about the details of what activities affinity groups, what are activities that we can approve for affinity groups which would be internal networking, internal or and external events, being a resource for business needs and then community engagement. So with that, we've also created a affinity group request form and that form identifies who the founding members are, what the mission statement is for the affinity group and its intended activities, again, which would be internal networking, internal, external events, business needs and community engagement. And that form is reviewed by the equity inclusion diversity and culture team, the EIDC team and some folks with people in culture. So with that, going back now to talk about junior professionals, junior professionals came about and was the first group to use this process formally. And again, that group is for folks who identify as early or mid-career professionals and one of the big events that they hosted was a brown bag event that talked about career growth which is a professional development opportunity that we were able to have within TechSoup for these junior professionals as well as hosting some networking opportunities throughout the year. And then lastly, talking about Black Allies. Some of the, this really came about because we want to again highlight these voices of Black folks, African folks and the different folks within the diaspora and our allies to work on funding research and opportunities to build programs for Black led nonprofits. And we're also working on a cross collaborative event with AlphabetSoup for June that highlights both June team and crime. And we're very excited about that because we want to acknowledge the intersection of this identity and give voice to it as well. So with that, and if you have questions for me for anyone who's spoken already, please put that in the chat. Thank you all for letting us talk about what it looks like at TechSoup and I'll pass it back to you. That was amazing. And I love that you stopped into the town to explain what affinity, because a lot of people said they didn't know why they were here, they're just here to learn. And I love that you all are here to learn because as you can see, you can start affinity groups in your nonprofit to find out what your community need. Oftentimes we as organizers or founders, we're busy doing the work, but we have to bring the people from the outside in so they can tell us what they need as well. So with that being said, I wanted to introduce Mariah Butler. I was in a meeting, a separate meeting from TechSoup with Mariah present and she works for a for-profit company, but she can tell you more about it. Mariah, go ahead and unmute yourself and you tell the story about how you started Employee Resource Group at your company. So my name is Mariah Butler. I am a Global Talent Analyst at AIG and one of the things I was able to start while I was at the company is another, as Jasmine said, could be called Affinity Group, could be called Employee Resource Group. There's many names, could be called Employee Business Group. There's a lot of names, but I was able to start an Employee Resource Group called an Interfaith or Faith-Based Employee Resource Group. And I'll just talk a little bit about what it is first. Faith is obviously something that's not naturally talked about necessarily in the workplace and so I'll kind of break it down a little bit and then if there are any questions I'll be happy to take any questions. So first and foremost, what is a Faith-Based or what is the Faith-Based Employee Resource Group at AIG? It's an Interfaith Employee Resource Group and really our main pillars. So our mission is on the left-hand side really about building a culture of inclusion and serving as an internal resource to our employees whether whatever faith you're coming from, whatever background you're coming from. And really we have four essential pillars or building blocks. They build on top of each other and what they are is to inform people of the foundations and the basics and experiences of their neighbor's faith to develop a greater understanding and really where that came from is, I don't know if anyone remembers back in I believe 2019 there was like a bombing on a mosque in New Zealand and I remember sitting in my desk and I was just really heartbroken by it but I felt like I really couldn't really talk about it, right? You don't really talk about faith in the workplace and certain news maybe you don't talk about in the workplace and so I felt a little bit, one, I couldn't talk about it but also I felt for my Muslim colleagues, maybe they didn't feel like they could talk about it either and so I started kind of just writing things down about what I can do to help bring faith and to help people who wanna talk about faith bring it to work. So first, informing people about the foundations like I said, basics experiences. So really thinking about how you experience work as a person of faith, whether you're Christian, Muslim, Jewish, et cetera and again, how you can bring that to work. So informing people of your neighbor's faith, that's the key. So learning about someone else, whether that be in your faith but they practice it a little bit differently or completely outside of your faith. Secondly, we're hoping as a building block that as you begin to inform people about faith about your neighbor's faith that begins to mitigate any religious bias or discrimination within the workplace and encourage intellectual curiosity. The next building block is to empower folks and empower employees to be able to discuss their ideas and beliefs about faith. So really when it comes to these identities within any kind of diversity dimension, you really want people to be able to bring their whole selves to work, whatever that is and as appropriate of course but really being able to have people talk about things that they do in their daily lives. So when you're kind of at the water cooler and I know we're in the remote workforce but when people do get back to work, when you're at the water cooler or when you're talking to someone, being able to say, hey, what did you do this weekend? Maybe you went to the synagogue, maybe you went to church. Maybe you did a faith-based activity. So empowering people to have those kinds of discussions and then next, which I think will be helpful for those on the call is connecting faith and work together and we've been able to kind of impact the business in this way. So one way to connect faith and work is one for employees to be empowered by bringing kind of those good faith principles that are similar among the faiths to be able to have an engaged and purpose-driven workforce, right? And that could be applicable to your nonprofit, right? How can people to be more engaged? Secondly, from a for-profit business, being able to connect faith and business together. So what that may look like. So just tangibly, one, within AIG, it may mean that maybe because we're not talking about faith, we are not thinking of opportunities in the faith-based market. So ensuring faith-related organizations, connecting with faith-related organizations or faith-based markets, maybe we're just completely missing that because faith is sort of a taboo in the workplace. And so that's one aspect. Another aspect that I think some of you will be interested in as well is one of the things that we got to do is what some for-profit companies do is they are able to match a two-to-one match, provide a matching grant to any nonprofit that one of their employees give to. And so one of the things that we were able to influence is a policy that we had at our company. And that particular policy, it was a little confusing in terms of could we, as an employee, if I gave to a church or a synagogue or a mosque or what have you, could I ask for a two-to-one matching grant? So can I go to the company and ask for that matching grant? And so the policy was a little bit confusing as to whether we can do that or not. And so we worked with the company and we were actually able to change the policy and make it clear that employees can actually, if I were to give $2,000 to XYZ nonprofit, the company can then match that $4,000. And so that was nice to do. And one of the things that we're accomplishing and moving forward with. And so I'll pause there. I'm sure that there are questions and I'm sure I'm happy to answer any. Well, and I know we're in the tech space. So I don't know if this is actually something that is done in tech areas as well. So there are some companies that have it. Let's go to that slide really quick. I'm sure you're probably thinking who has this. There are companies that do have faith-based Employee Resource Group. And it is a growing area. So I'll pause it here. Wow, that was awesome. Thank you, Mariah. So we wanna open it up to everyone. If you have a question, go ahead and use the raise your hand option. You can ask Mariah. I saw Erin in the chat room, Jasmine. Mariah, would you stop sharing your screen? And also Laura, she's only gonna be here for a few more minutes. So you have a question of either one of them. Or if you just wanna say, hey, I just learned something new today because I certainly did. Feel free to unmute yourself. I actually use the raise your hand option so everybody don't unmute at the same time. Okay, Terry, Terry, Alrid. Hi, everybody. So I run a nonprofit consortium in Rochester, Minnesota. And we have about 90 members. And many of our nonprofits are so small that they can't actually sustain affinity groups within them. And so the consortium has been talking about the possibility of setting up some affinity groups that would be cross-organizational. So that way, I mean, it's all within the nonprofit ecosystem, but it would be for the community as opposed to any individual nonprofit. And we, as the consortium could resource those groups. But I just am wondering, do y'all have any thoughts about that? Any things we should be considering prior to setting up any just words of wisdom in that scenario? Excellent question. I would like all three of you to answer. Laura, if you have Mariah and Jasmine, we'll start with Laura, if you have any comments for Terry. I mean, my initial reaction is that that sounds like a great solution to the issue of not having enough staff at each nonprofit to maybe make up a substantial affinity group or ERG. And I do know, I haven't experienced it personally, but I do know there are some larger tech companies where, for instance, the women affinity group at Facebook partners with the women's affinity group at Google or something like that. So I know that that is something that happens cross company or cross-organizational in the tech space. So I don't have any personal experience, but my initial reaction is I think that it is a solution that seems like it could work. Well, I think the important thing would just be to make sure that what the people who are part of that affinity group at one nonprofit bring back to their nonprofit is relevant, specifically, like that they get value out of it, specifically for the culture and community and staff that they work with at the nonprofit. So making sure that all of those voices are heard and that there's value in it for everybody because all, you know, the nonprofit ecosystem is similar in a lot of ways, but all nonprofits are very different as well. So that would just be my one thought, but I'd be interested to hear what anybody else has to say. Well, I thought, go ahead, Jasmine. I was just going to say quickly to Laura's point and also with being so small, one thing that could be beneficial is to start out with something like what we have as bridges of diversity council where folks from the different affidavits can come together and then have DEI specific or equity specific goals that can be embedded into the work that is being done with your nonprofit. That may be a good place to start as you continue to grow. Mm-hmm. Thank you. I should have mentioned, we host a city-wide commitment to racial justice that has a bunch of programming already involved. And so all these nonprofits are already involved with this umbrella project, the commitment to racial justice for our city. Yes, that's good. Thank you for sharing that. I saw someone else raise their hand, but they put it down when I called on Terry. I don't wanna miss you because every question is important. Okay, while you're still thinking about whether you wanna ask that question, I do have a question and this is for anybody, Jasmine Mariah could answer this. What's the best way to start an ERG or an infinity group? Jasmine, you gave some highlights, but what's the best way to start one? For everybody here to say, hmm, I just learned something new today. I think I'll do that. What's the best way to start? For my experience, I'd say find someone who is really passionate and can sell why the affinity group or ERG, whatever, your organization wants to call it, why it's important to the organization and can share that with other people and can do so pretty rapidly, depending on your timeline, but I would say that definitely from my experience, I think bottom up is key. Although top sponsorship from the top and the house is important as well, I think personally it's important for folks to have kind of that fire on the bottom, the leaders and the members to have a lot of energy to get it going. Well, I think you answered the second question I was gonna ask, how do you get the executive to support you in that you said start from the bottom and have that fire going, so that was really good. I do have a question, because that was posted in the chat room about, from Molly, do you pay staff where their time spent in affinity groups and that's how do you balance that staff work versus your paid job? Anyone can answer that question, Jasmine, Mariah, Laura. Laura, I see you went into more detail in the chat about what we're talking about if you wanna chat about that just a little more. Yeah, absolutely, so Jasmine mentioned that we don't currently compensate affinity groups, although I do know that the larger that affinity groups get and especially in non-non-profits, but in for-profit companies where they have larger budgets, they do really focus on compensating affinity groups. So I think that that is kind of the gold standard and is where, if there is budget for that is where we should all be trying to get to because it's something that the people who are part of these groups are passionate about but it's also work that's in addition to the full-time job that they already have. So we don't currently do it but it is something that is definitely top of mind for us and one of the things that we are starting to do to help us get to that point is for affinity group members to track their time. So how much time are you spending in meetings? How much time are you spending on projects? How much time are you spending collaborating with different teams all focused on affinity group work? That will help us understand, okay, this is how much staff time is spent in these affinity groups. Here's how much value these groups are adding to the organization and to staff retention and staff culture and then from there we can figure out, okay, how much do we need to budget within our EIDC program? How much do we go to the executive team and request? How much do we need to fundraise for because we're a nonprofit? So that type of thing. And from my perspective, oh, go ahead, Jeff, I'm sorry. Usually, and from what I've seen, folks who run affinity groups from resource groups are generally not paid. It's something that you do of your own time and I see another question is kind of why would you do it? What is the motivation? Especially if you're not getting paid to do it? One, it can help you if you wanna lead a team and influence the business. It's a way to do it and kind of show people within the company higher up that you can do that. So it's something that you can put in your goals. We are encouraged to put it in our goals, although it's not paid for specifically or we're paid to do it. But I think also just hearing Jasmine and how they got started at TechSoup, it's something that's personally fulfilling as well. You see a need and you wanna fulfill it and so it's helpful for folks who are in that position to push the company forward because it's better for everyone. Thanks, Mariah. And I'm going to go ahead and read the next question here from Annie Marie. And it says, what is the motivation for the employee to be a part of this versus the organization's commitment or for the org's diversity? Diversity equals a good thing for the employee to be heard. Is there any other factors that commonly arise and expectations of the group, for instance? And I'm gonna try to answer this as best I can to make sure that I understand the question. But to start off with that first part, what is the motivation for the employee to be part of this versus the organization's commitment to diversity? From my perspective, and it kind of speaks to what Mariah was just saying as well, from my perspective, the two are not mutually exclusive. They can exist together. The organization can have a commitment to diversity and an employee can have a desire to have a space that is created that allows them to bring more of themselves to work, if that makes sense. And in an organization supporting that, and as we talked about executive sponsorship or at least executive involvement and appreciation for the kind of ideas and how the different employees show up to work, that should align with what the org plans to do in terms of diversity, equity and inclusion. So as an employee, and for myself, because I am one of the founders of Black Allies, to start an affinity group and my motivation for being a part of it, what I've seen from other folks, newer employees who have reached out to me and said, I just heard about this, I just got here, I wanna be a part of it. These initiatives sound great. Let me help out is to, again, it is the person who identifies with the affinity, bringing themselves to work holistically and that applying to the work that the organization is already doing or already plans to do. And I hope that that answers your question, but Mariah, if you also wanna tackle this question, please do. Yeah, I think influences, it really doesn't set it. Someone comes to the company and they reach right directly to you, Black Allies. Hey, I saw that you have this affinity group. I wanna join. Influences is a big thing. Obviously influence is a big thing whether it be within the company or just generally speaking, you hear of influencers. You can influence the company and when you can influence the company for good, that's a plus, right? And so I think Jasmine hit it on the nail. Awesome, anyone else have any questions? Please use raise your hand option or comments. I have a question actually for Mariah. I know you talked a little bit about the two to one matching that the Interfaith ERG has the policy that the Interfaith ERG has helped create an AIG. But I'm curious about if your ERG has a budget or funding and what that looks like and how that's applied to the work that you are doing. Yeah, so thankfully we do. I think this is obviously dependent on where your company is at if they can provide budget for you, but we do have budget in terms of numbers. I won't get into details unless you really want to know but we do have budget. So if we want to bring in an external speaker or if we want to partner with, let's say a nonprofit which I think a lot of ERGs do because we're not getting paid for this so it's good to have these partnerships but we do have budget and that helps us to kind of move along with our programming and so it's super helpful. Excellent, that's a question from walking anew. Can you unpack, I think Jasmine you said it, the idea of having a passionate person, what if their passion can derail the efforts? Who vets that person? That's an interesting question because yeah, when talking about what does passion mean, what is motivation in terms of affinity group, right? And the kinds of things that get brought up and how that, you know, that is a really excellent point and I think what is good about the way in which the affinity groups are being flown now at TechSoup is just that we are starting off with a mission statement or starting off understanding what kinds of activities and how we want to engage the TechSoup community and how we want that to grow. So if even passionate folks or anyone who comes with an idea, all ideas are heard in value but we as a group decide what initiatives we want to be spending this extra time on. What initiatives is it that we want to bring to the greater organization that we want to reach out to our executive leadership about? And so it is, I wouldn't say that there is a vetting process because, but I would say that there is a way in which the community within the affinity group determines how that time is spent. And do you mind if I add on to that? Yes, and then Alicia will ask your question. Go ahead. Yeah, I think passion too, just I would say willing to execute and follow through. So I think anytime you try to bring something new to anything, organization or whether whatever it is someone who's willing to move forward and has enough energy to sustain them is how I would frame it as well. Thank you. Alicia? Alicia? Well, she kind of answered it in what I was going to rephrase myself. And in my opinion, the shortest way I can say this is like having a buddy system. And what I mean by that is you got somebody that when you do step into said meeting because I'm derail with you constantly I'm deemed a derailer. I'm constantly, I was hurt when I saw this question. But if you have a buddy system, that means that somebody that they can look to within said meeting and never like, oh, we're on the same page as far as ABC and D, let's get her done type of stuff. To kind of keep the meeting on rail on track. Would you like me to use that? Sentimental, sentimentology? Sentimentalogy? Just saying, yo. Now was that a comment or a question? More so to piggyback off of that last statement. If I had to answer the question, let me say that. If I had to answer the question. Okay, all right, excellent, excellent. So Jasmine, can you answer Terry's question here? Yes, for, so Terry, I see your question. And for those of you, I'll read it out loud. What is the role of racial justice allyship group and black allies at TechSoup in the overall organization's conversations and actions about racism, white supremacy, and other race, white supremacy culture or other initiatives for racial justice allyship. I cannot speak too much to that because I'm not a member of that group. What I will say from what I've seen is that a lot of their initiatives that I have seen, especially like working with the Help Me Higher Doc as Laura had mentioned at the top of this meeting and being a part, then that was actually cross group too. So members of junior professionals, like allies in AfBetSoup participated in that. But in terms of talking about racism and white supremacy culture, combating those things includes bringing in the mindset or bringing in the vision and the mission of the Equity Inclusion Everstand Culture Program. So if we're doing that by embedding that framework into the Help Me Higher Doc, for example, to give a guiding point for hiring managers at TechSoup to consider cultural belonging, consider implicit bias when they're participating in the hiring process, then that is going to speak to these things as well for Black allies because we are so new. One of the major ways that we would start having this conversation is by creating programming that is specifically designed and created for Black-led non-profits. But in terms of having, so that's how I would answer that question in terms of overall organizational conversations about what this looks like, but we have these conversations at TechSoup outside of these affinity groups as well. And in different ways that align with the work that we do, for example, we had a conversation during Global Diversity Awareness Month about data ethics, which can include this topic. Or we had a conversation about decolonizing humanitarian aid, which conveys this as well. So seeing how the members of these groups can definitely inform how we have these conversations at TechSoup, but the people at TechSoup inform how we have these conversations as well, whether or not they are members of these particular groups. And I hope that answers your question, Terri, but I'll also put my email in the chat if you want to follow up. And I'll also add that the Racist Justice Ally Group, we also identify organizations doing racial justice work for TechSoup's digital resilience program and other TechSoup offers as well.  Thank you for everything that you do in the community. We appreciate you. Come back to our other webinars. We're gonna send this email to you within 48 hours.


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But these are times when tensions between supporters and non-supporters of, you know, LGBT communities can escalate. However, in order to prevent this video from being banned on YouTube, I would like to emphasise that it is important for everyone to respect people's opinion. Nobody is requesting the LGBT community to seize their advocacy and evangelism. All that others on the opposing side, including me, ask is that they refrain from imposing their beliefs on others considering the mis-treatment they themselves have endured. It is crucial to allow people to disagree with their advocacy, that's democracy obviously. Since the start of the month, verbal disputes have arisen between conservative Muslim families and schools across the United States and Canada. The conflict revolves around the opposition of some parents to the inclusion of LGBT-related curriculum in schools. These parents argue that such measures would undermine their spiritual and religious principles as they believe it would erode the religious values they instill in their children. Conversely, schools insist that children must be educated about diversity and the evolving realities of modern Western societies. However, these parents, predominantly from Islamic communities and sometimes from Christian communities, stand firm in their stance of setting their children should be shitted from such exposure until they are owed enough to make their own informed decisions. This video is gaining attention as Muslim parents and communities organise protests to advocate for the protection of their children from LGBT-related activities and invocations. Reports indicate that these protests have become a frequent occurrence in several schools as the prime month progresses. However, I came across an online voice clip in which a teacher purportedly asks Muslims in a class to demonstrate tolerance towards LGBT-related activities, in a parallel to the respect they seek during their Ramadan festivities. I found the teacher's arguments surprising because at first glance, they appeared shallow and inconsistent, however, as the various pieces are assembled, the position becomes increasingly ambiguous. Well, I'll tell you, you were out to lunch if you think it's acceptable to not show up because you think there's some pride activities going on at school, right? Oh, that's fine, you know, because I'm going to show my opinion by hanging out at the mall, but meanwhile, all those kids who are, you know, involved in, say, the peace treaty alliance or whatever, I don't even know if we have that anymore in our school, but they're here when we did Ramadan for lying time, and they're showing respect in the class for your religion, right, for your beliefs, respected for who you are, if you don't want to suffer prejudice for your religion, your color of skin, your whatever, then you've got to give it back to people who are different from you. That's how it works, it's an exchange, and it isn't like that in all countries.  If you believe that kind of thing, then you don't belong here, because that is not what Canada believes. We believe in freedom, we believe that people can marry whomever they want. That is in the law, and if you don't think that should be the law, it's not a joke, Mansour. I said back and forth, you want it, you've got to give it. Brothers and sisters, please share your honest thoughts in the comments about the teacher's viewpoint. Do you believe she is correct in suggesting that Muslims shoot this play unwarranted tolerance towards actions that contradict their religious beliefs, like giving the demand respect for the religion during Ramadan? This is a challenging question, and I invite your input. Upon reviewing the comments as well, I discovered that there were numerous anti-Islamic rants on the comments section of that video. Some individuals expressed the opinion that LGBT and Islamic communities are alike in the lack of tolerance for anything that contradicts their faith. Here are a few examples of some of the comments. Teachers need re-education, well done, that key for sticking up against this indoctrination.  Another guy said those who are not supportive of same-sex relationships shouldn't be forced into supporting them, irrelevant of the culture or religion. Another one, that's a very valid point. Another guy said no matter who loses in this particular situation, we win. I think some guys here are both Christian or people who are against Islam and the LGBT ideology. So obviously, they are saying if the both sides fight themselves, they win. Another one here is, so they believe in freedom but not of freedom to not participate in Pride Month? That's a free society right there. It wasn't for the LGBTQ court she's writing about, she's right, respect goes to ways, give and get it back, which neither do. That's what Islam doesn't, you know, that's what I mean. These people believe in freedom so as long as it is the version of freedom. Another one said this isn't going to end well for the teacher. In the old days, if a teacher went on a ride like this, she could always deny, she said anything offensive and people would take her word over the student's word. Now, students are recording teachers overtly and covertly and there is no room for deniers. Just tell me on the comment below what you feel or think about this situation. Let's leave it right there, open-minded people. Until next time. Assalamu alaikum.


We have forty-four thousand temples in the government's hands. There are just eleven thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine temples in Tamil Nadu alone, which have no prayers being performed. They are saying these twelve thousand temples will die in the next few years. The government has submitted in the High Court that twelve hundred deities have been stolen. Officially, it just simply amounts to apartheid, if you ask me. That a certain community cannot keep their own places of worship. This is the soul of the community. They can only be done with tremendous involvement and devotion. Hello and welcome to this very special episode of Frankly Speaking. And tonight, my guest is the one and only Sadguruji. Sadguruji, Namaskaram. Many people have written in to me wanting to hear from you. We had a regular interaction during the Covid period, during the lockdown. Right now, the country seems to be going through turmoil. At least it appears so when you open the newspapers and look at news channels every morning. But in the middle of all of this, you've raised a very important issue, Sadguruji. And that is the issue that binds Indians together, that binds the majority of Indian citizens together, which is the issue of Indian temples. Spirituality, religion, faith have played a very important role in every Indian's mind. And when you say that there are just eleven thousand nine hundred and ninety nine temples in Tamil Nadu alone, which have no prayers being performed, it's clearly something that worries people, not just in India, but even Indians living abroad. I want to ask you, are you serious about these numbers, Sadguruji? These numbers are not my numbers. The HR and C Ministry has submitted this in the Madras High Court. So there have been various kinds of numbers flying around, but now they have submitted in the Madras High Court that this is a fact. And the other facts also about thirty-four thousand temples has only one person who is there to take care of the entire temple, from puja to cleaning, to security, management, everything is his one person. And I happened to be, you know, this was in Karnataka. I was in Karnataka Andhra Pradesh border in the Lepakshi temple recently, because this is connected to our forefathers. I had been there over fifty years ago, which was a vibrant temple. Built by, during the Krishnadevaraya's era, fantastic stone monument, all right? And it was a vibrant living temple. Now when I went there, hardly there's anybody, only one man. I asked this one pujari, how much do they pay you? He says thirty-two thousand rupees. I said, not bad per month. He said, no per annum. For a year, they pay him thirty-two thousand rupees. What kind of management, what kind of service, what kind of atmosphere is that man able to create? So like this it is going on everywhere. First of all, see temple is a subjective affair. Unless somebody feels strongly in their heart, it cannot be done as an employment. You can't run temple with an employee, you need passion, you need devotion for that. And there was a time in this country when kings mainly built these temples. Many of them held the deity as the king, and king himself is the servant of the deity. This is how they established the kingdoms. So that is the level of devotion that was there behind this. Without that subjectivity, a temple is just a stone, all right? And that's what they're making it to be. I'm telling you, if somebody had demolished these temples, people would have built it back because that's how they would feel. Now it is being slowly suffocated and nobody notices what's happening. So if this doesn't take shape, now you said all this turmoil in the country, now do I have to raise this issue? Well, this issue is being raised because there is an election in Tamil Nadu. I have raised not just the temple issue, I raised five issues, one about Kaveri, one about the condition of our education in Tamil Nadu. And another is about bringing investments, another is about training the youth of Tamil Nadu. And temple also is one of the issues. Well, this has got a certain level of attention and rest of the things, we will slowly bring it into thing because I firmly believe that in a democratic country, before the election, every citizen of this country, if they consider themselves residents, they must clearly articulate what are the few things that must happen in their country or in their state. Now they don't say anything. After the election is over, then you protest, you cry, you make comments. This is irresponsible citizenry. I'm telling all the Tamil people, this is the time in the next two months, don't go by my five point, you tell what are the five things that you want in this state, what are the five things that must happen in this state. Everybody must articulate. Now political parties must know this is what the people want and they must make their manifestos based on that.  You've been in the state for many, many decades. Why raise the issue now?  What about some people who always look at these issues through a political prism and will say that Satguruji is supporting one side of the spectrum simply because the AIA DMK, late leader Jai Lalita and now the BJP are on one side and the DMK which is an atheist party is on the other side and therefore you're putting pressure on the atheist party, the DMK. How would you respond to that criticism?  I am also not a daily temple going person, but temple is not only about a certain religion. Temple is about art, temple is about history, temple is about culture. It is the soul of this community in many ways. But we have been noticing, we have been taking action about this, our volunteers have been trying to maintain many temples but in 2020 the government presented, you know, in the Madras High Court that these statistics that I'm saying that, you know, 11,999 temples, no puja happening because there is no revenue, 34,000 temples, there's only one person and 37,000 temples, less than 10,000 revenue. So all these they're saying these 12,000 temples will die in the next few years. That's what they're saying, all right, literally. So they've committed in the High Court. So it is not that these facts are made up by somebody, this is not a social media, you know, like sensationalism. This is a reality that we are facing. I'm telling you, if we go like this, in another hundred years, except a few major temples, all of them will be extinct. Already it is happening, stones are being taken away. Government has submitted in the High Court that 1,200 deities have been stolen officially. This is an official statement by the government to the High Court of Madras that 1,200 deities have been stolen, they're gone missing. And so many people are saying, some police officers have written books saying that thousands of deities have been stolen but replaced by fake deities in the last 25 years. We don't know about that which is fake, which is real, but we know there is a dilapidation happening all over the place. And I must tell you this, we have 44,000 temples in the government's hands. And we have over half a million acres of land in these temples and we have 2.33 crore square feet of built area. With this, we are getting a revenue of 128 crores. How's that? For example, the SGPC, the Gurdwara committee has 85 Gurdwaras in their hand. Their budget is over 1,000 crores for 44,000 temples with 87% of the population which belongs to the community. You get 128 crore revenue. Is that it? I mean, this is great management. So are you saying this pilferage that is happening when governments manage temples? Is that pilferage? Is that lack of attention? Is it really, in a sense, everything is Ram Bharose? See, essentially, as I said earlier, somebody who has no feeling for the temple is managing it. As you said, somebody is atheist. If you're an atheist, what's your business with the temple, I'm saying? If you're an atheist or a theist, that's not the point. You have no strong feeling for the deity, then you will not keep it well. This is not a business. This is the soul of the community. This is something that... this is the subjectivity of human beings. This can only be done with tremendous involvement and devotion. You can't run it just like an affair. Do you find it surprising, Sadguruji, the fact that our constitution lays so much emphasis on the word secular? And secular in the constitution means that governments do not have to participate in anything that has anything to do with any religion. Yet, 75 years after independence, we are sitting and talking about governments managing temples, virtually owning these temples. Isn't this irony of the highest order? See, if you read the fundamental rights that are given to every Indian citizen in the constitution, and if you look at this HR and the CE laws, it's absolutely ridiculous. It just simply amounts to apartheid, if you ask me, that a certain community cannot keep their own places of worship. So what they are saying is, many people's argument is, oh, if you give it to these people, will they manage better? Maybe they will do worse. So essentially what you're saying is, in eighty-seven percent of the population, you can't find a handful of people who have the necessary competence and integrity to manage the temples. Government has to manage the temples for us. Then if you don't have integrity and responsibility to manage what matters to you so much, it is best the government manages our children, it is best the government manages our family, maybe we are not responsible at all. Ridiculous. For all these years, Sadhguruji, the fact is that all other religions, whether it is the Sikhs, whether it is the Muslims or the Christians, they have private bodies managing their places of worship. It is only the Hindus and their temples, their places of worship that have government interference. Do you see this as a design because, you know, this started in the British era. Do you think this divide and rule policy is something that's continued with governments right up until now? See, definitely by design, but whose design? You said British era, well, Her Majesty's service did not do this. In eighteen-seventeen, the first Madras regulation was passed by East India Company, a corporate. What was their business with the temple? You think out of devotion they took it over because there was mismanagement? No, just wealth. Their idea of a temple is land, gold, diamonds, wealth. Everything that they can transport, they transported. What they cannot transport is here. I am not interested in the wealth of the temple. This is the subjectivity of the largest community in the country. Now, this whole legacy is like this. In eighteen-seventeen, the first Madras regulation happened. In eighteen-forty, there was a directive that you must release the temples back. You know why? Because the Christian missionaries protested that how can Christian men manage pagan temples? It's a disgrace. So give it back to them. Because anyway the gold was taken, after that what is our business, they gave it back in eighteen-forty. In eighteen-forty-five, they handed back most of the temples, but by then, in many small temples, managements were destroyed, so they were left just like that. Whoever couldn't take it over, they were doing it. And then in eighteen-sixty-three, they again brought back the religious endowments act. Because then they saw it is not just about gold and wealth, but there was also land. So they came back again. And then they saw by nineteen-twenty-five, temples were becoming the hubs of organizing freedom movements. So they brought back Madras religious and charitable endowments act in nineteen-twenty-five. And again there was opposition and it was converted not to Madras religious, but it became Hindu. Only the Hindus were targeted. That is because the minorities strongly protested, they released them and only the Hindu temples were held. And later on in nineteen-fifty-one, Hindu religious and charitable endowment act was passed, which was a serious draconian law and that was struck down both by Madras High Court and Supreme Court. And then they came up with another compromise. Tamil Nadu religious and charitable endowment act was passed in nineteen-fifty-nine during the Kamaraj era. So it's got nothing to do with eighties' belief and nothing to do with the present two parties which are either in power or, you know, weighing for power. Nothing to do with any of them. It is way beyond that. It is just apathy which has left it just like that. It's time to fix it. I want to ask you, Sadguruji, just recently there was a controversy regarding five crores from the Guruvayur temple donation funds which were given for COVID relief and the government, the left government in Kerala had allowed that, but the High Court in Kerala struck this decision down. Now I want to ask you, on the one hand you have the left government in Kerala doing what it wants with the donations that come to these temples. And on the other hand we have an ordinance that is being proposed in Uttar Pradesh where all temples, instead of being given back to Hindus to run them themselves, even in Uttar Pradesh, we are, you know, at the moment talking about an ordinance which could bring temples under the control of the government. Do you think on one issue control over temples, political parties from the far left to the far right are on the same page? See that is why the initial question that you asked is this, are we taking sides in terms of political parties? Is this against an atheist belief versus AI, DMK and BJP? No. I am saying all of them are doing the same thing. Whether it's AI, DMK or BJP or any other party, everybody when they are in power they are doing the same thing. So I am saying why cannot we run these temples? The community should run because this is a fundamental right and you thinking unless government runs the temples, it will not be run well is simply because you must understand the previous management broke down when the country was in occupation. And whoever was working there became the managers and slowly like owners. So there was lot of mismanagement but temples were a vibrant places of this culture. People, especially in Tamil Nadu, we call many of our towns temple towns because the core of the town is the temple. Because of the temple, there is a town. It's not the other way around. There was a town and then they built a temple. It's not like that. Only because of the temple there is a town and the amount of work that's been done is absolutely incredible both in terms of architecture, in terms of sculpture, art, engineering. There is no such thing anywhere in the world. That kind of stuff is there. But we are just letting it languish because without people's involvement this is not going to happen. Temple is not a monument to be preserved by ASI as it is being done in many places. If you leave it to the people, they will manage it in a vibrant way. Why Gurudwara's or an example right now, how they're being run and the amount of food they provide to the people, the langars that are going on and in any disaster or whatever happens, how they reach out and do work for their people, much, much more can be done by temples because if you just look at this half a million acres of land, anywhere in Tamil Nadu, the normal rent per one acre of land is approximately minimum level is ten thousand. Just imagine what is the budget that is there for the temples. With that kind of budget, you can make it a very vibrant place. You can take care of pandemics, disasters, whatever it happens in that region they will attend to it. Above all, because they're connected with the community, they can attend to it in a very effective way using the money effectively, unlike government that it has to go through a filter of a whole system. By the time it comes down to the ground, what comes down is a few drops most of the time. Sadguruji, you know, Sanjeev Sanyal in his book has written every temple had charitable endowments, including property that was given and these were the hallmark of places where dance, art, trade, even, you know, general community living really came alive. I want to ask you a party like the BJP which made its political debut or its political muscle flexing on the basis of the Ram temple movement and finally gets a court order and you know is in the process of building a Bhavya Ram Mandir. Uttar Pradesh is planning to bring in an ordinance in Uttarakhand already has brought in 51 temples under government control and in Kashi is opposing any such development or making of a Bhavya temple in Kashi itself. To what do you put this kind of obstinacy despite the fact that some members of parliament have brought in private members bills? It still hasn't become an issue within the BJP which is supposed to be a champion party of the Hindutva. See, allowing a certain amount of margin for this, political parties have their own compulsions. Variety of compulsions of their own, I don't want to get into that. All I am saying after 74 years, before the 75th freedom independence day happens, let in the center and in the states, because largely many of these are state laws, that's why I am focusing on Tamil Nadu, they must come in. How to, you know, hand over the temples to the community? You know, it need not be just done in one shot and let it collapse. It can be done properly, at least appoint a commission. Maybe a couple of Supreme Court judges can sit on it and see how it can be done. When everybody else can manage their affairs, why is it that one community, which is the majority community, cannot manage? So people will say caste, this, that, well, there are solutions for all that. First of all, show the intent. Whatever your political compulsions are, you have to do your politics, I agree with you. But this is an express concern after 75 years of pre-India, if the freedom to practice one's religion the way they want doesn't exist, what kind of freedom is that? Satguruji, you're talking about bringing in former justices of the Supreme Court in a commission. So how do you think a solution is going to come out of a commission having former judges? No, no, I'm talking about a commission with judges, not for them to take the decision, for them to evolve a process of devolution. The decision of whether it should come to the community or not doesn't arise, that we must decide in the elections. This is why I'm pitching it up now. If the people of the community should stand up and say that if you do not hand over the temples to community, we're not going to vote for you. This must be clear to the political parties, whoever they may be. I said Supreme Court judges so that they interpret the law properly. I don't want this to go to the court because if you go to the court as you said, one judgment will come this way, another will come that way based on the intricacies of law. No, I want a legislation. It is important the legislation happens because the democratically elected government means they must respond to the needs of the people and the emotions of the people. This has to happen by legislation, not by court ruling, not that Supreme Court judges should take a call on this. They must just evolve the process. Satguruji, you know, I want to ask you, Stephen Knapp, a western Vedic scholar and author of Crimes Against India and the need to protect its ancient Vedic tradition had said, government officials have taken control of Hindu temples because they smell money in them. They recognize the indifference of Hindus. They are aware of the unlimited patience and tolerance of the Hindus. Many Hindus are sitting and watching the demise of their culture. Do you think Hindus are indifferent and that is why governments do this to us? See, somewhere, if I have to elaborate on this, we have been raised, generally this entire culture has been raised. As a... this is controversial, but let me tell you, as a godless culture. We are not a culture which we believed. There's one power up there and he manages everything from there. There's one man sitting up there and he manages everything. Here we are always told your life is your karma. The way you do it is the way it happens. Right things happen, wrong things happen, it's your business. But you can empower yourself with your spirituality. The religious processes, the rituals, the devotion, all these things empower you to create your life the way you want. But the way... when you say life is your karma, we are saying your life is your making, 100%. So this is a very different kind of culture and I'm saying this is a culture which is ancient, but will be the only culture relevant for the future, believe me. Because the young people in this world, everywhere in the world, irrespective of... irrespective of geography, culture, race, religion, everywhere in the world, young people in the world want to take charge of their lives. They don't want life to be managed by heaven. So that was never so in this culture.  But this karma business which is the most dynamic way to handle your life, unfortunately, a certain amount of apathy and particularly invasions, you must understand innovation is not just a word. It is a... such a brutalization of generations of people that you lose your survival. Simple survival becomes your mode. You don't want to raise your head anywhere. You don't want to talk about anything. This has happened to India in a big way. For generations of people in the last 400 to 500 years, we have understood one thing, the wisdom in the Hindu communities.  To put your head down and walk. So that culture has made us extremely submissive, extremely passive. But that is going away now. The new generation which is born in free India is not thinking on those terms. They want to take their life into their hands. So when people... when youth want to take their life into their hands, the only relevant structure of how life should be handled is the way this land has espoused. Because you can... you can believe something. You can disbelieve something. You can worship them something, not worship something.    You clearly identified we do not know too much of this creation. We have to search through our life. Everywhere else it's clearly stated everything from A to Z, everything is written down and that's it. Everything we ever wish to know is all written down and that's it. This is a culture which is always of questioning, always of debate. Even when the so-called divine entities came, all they got was freaky questions, hundreds of questions. They never got around to give us a commandment. Well, very well said, Sadhguruji. It's always a pleasure talking with you because there are certain truths that we can realize only when we look into the mirror and it is almost like the mirror when we speak to you, the mirror speaking back to us on what needs to be done, what we are seeing, whatever is wrong and what we need to do so that the reflection in the mirror becomes better. First thing is we must free Tamil Nadu temples. Absolutely, absolutely. Namaskaram. Thank you for joining me.