New Podcast Examines the Lesser-Known History of Racism in America

On September 15, 2020, Ben & Jerry’s, Vox Media, and The Who We Are Project will launch a podcast examining the lesser-known history of racial injustice. “Who We Are: A Chronicle of Racism In America” will show the hidden ways legal discrimination and state-sanctioned brutality continued long after slavery ended, profoundly limiting Black Americans’ ability to gain access to jobs, housing, education, and health care; or to create and accumulate wealth.

The podcast, based on Jeffery Robinson’s acclaimed presentation of the same name, will look at a history written from the perspective of those who sought to justify owning other humans as property and then treating them as inferior after the enslaved humans were “freed.” As executive producer and legal authority, Robinson will provide surprising insights for the 6-episode podcast. Robinson is a deputy legal director of the ACLU and the director of the ACLU Trone Center for Justice and Equality. He spent nine years researching his multi-media “Who We Are” presentation, which will soon be released as a documentary.

The “Who We Are” podcast will be hosted by New York Times bestselling author Carvell Wallace, a regular contributor to the New York Times Magazine, memoirist and award-winning podcaster. Carvell covers race, art, and culture for a variety of news outlets. His podcast “Finding Fred,” about the magic and ministry of Mr. Rogers, was recently nominated for a Peabody.

The goal of “Who We Are” is to educate and encourage audiences to dismantle systemic racism. Ben & Jerry’s has been working on implicit bias, the school-to-prison pipeline, and criminal justice reform as part of its Justice ReMix’d campaign.

“Economic and social justice has been a part of Ben & Jerry’s mission since our founding 42 years ago,” said Jabari Paul, Ben & Jerry’s US Activism Manager. “We now sit at a critical inflection point in our nation’s history. If we are to seize the opening that this moment presents, we must be willing to acknowledge the sins of our past so that we move together toward a future of justice and equity.”

Each 30-minute episode of the podcast will focus on a different period in American history and its link to modern-day systemic racism. Each will end with a call-to-action. Listen to the trailer here.

The podcast is produced by Vox Creative, Vox Media’s award-winning brand studio, and is Vox Media Podcast Network’s first original series produced in partnership with a brand.

About Ben & Jerry’s

As an aspiring social justice company, Ben & Jerry’s believes in a greater calling than simply making a profit for selling its goods. The company produces a wide variety of super-premium ice cream, yogurt and sorbet using high-quality ingredients. Ben & Jerry’s incorporates its vision of Linked Prosperity into its business practices in a number of ways including a focus on values-led sourcing. In 2015 the company completed its transition to using entirely non-GMO (genetically modified organisms) ingredients by source as well as to fully source Fairtrade-certified ingredients wherever possible, which benefits farmers in developing countries. Ben & Jerry’s products are distributed in 35 countries in supermarkets, grocery stores, convenience stores, franchise Ben & Jerry’s Scoop Shops, restaurants and other venues. Ben & Jerry’s, a Vermont corporation and wholly owned subsidiary of Unilever, operates its business on a three-part Mission Statement emphasizing product quality, economic reward and a commitment to the community. Ben & Jerry’s became a certified B Corp in 2012. The Ben & Jerry’s Foundation’s employee-led grant programs totaled $3MM in 2019 to support grassroots organizing for social and environmental justice around the country.

The Who We Are Project

The Who We Are Project is a non-profit organization founded by ACLU Deputy Legal Director Jeffery Robinson to reveal the truth about America’s true history of racism and white supremacy. The goal of the Project is to educate Americans on the history of anti-Black racism in the United States. Over the last ten years, Mr. Robinson has spoken around the country, sharing a three-hour presentation entitled “Who We Are: A Chronicle of Racism in America” that shares the “hidden history” of America’s ties to white supremacy from 1619 to the present. Mr. Robinson’s talks are powerful and compelling; a 7-minute clip of one of his presentations dealing with Confederate monuments has been viewed over 12 million times. The Who We Are Project is working with Off Center Media, a documentary production company run by Sarah and Emily Kunstler, to release a documentary film based on Mr. Robinson’s presentation. For more information visit www.thewhoweareproject.org.

About Vox Creative

Vox Creative is Vox Media’s award-winning brand studio. Vox Creative’s team of strategists, writers, storytellers, and analysts create original content and experiences that connect brands with influential audiences across Vox Media’s editorial networks and beyond. Vox Creative’s work spans short and long-form video, podcasts, explainers, experiential, shoppable content and more. They’ve built houses, invented cocktails, produced documentaries, traveled inside companies to uncover untold stories, and, on rare occasions, have gone to the moon.

About the Vox Media Podcast Network

From daily news and tech, to culture and sports, and from talk and interview shows to news and rich narrative storytelling, the Vox Media Podcast Network is one of the largest, fastest-growing, and most topically-diverse collections of premium podcasts. Named by Adweek as “The Hottest Podcast Network of 2019,” VMPN has over 200 active shows featuring industry-leading editorial voices and storytellers from Vox Media’s networks and beyond. Learn more about the Vox Media Podcast Network here.

SOURCE Ben & Jerry’s