Hello, and welcome to Bad Community Advice. This is the show with terrible tips and toxic takeaways. I'm your host. My name is Seth Resler, and I'm thrilled with the absolutely terrible advice that we have for you today because this is something that I think a lot of new community builders believe. It makes sense, it sounds logical, and yet it's absolutely the wrong thing to do. And to bring us that bad advice. We have two guests today. My first guest was a senior producer with NBC News for nearly a decade. She has also produced for HBO, vice Al Jazeera, a and e and V's.
Netflix show. Explained. Her brother, who's also gonna be joining us is the author of Dedicated The Case for Commitment in an Age of Infinite Browsing. And he's the co-founder of the Democracy Policy Network, which raises up ideas that deepened democracy together. They produced a film that I absolutely love. It is called Join or Die, and it's a documentary about why you should join a club and why the fate of America depends on it. Please welcome Rebecca and David.
Hi guys. How are you?
Hello.
Doing great. Excited to be here. I am so thrilled that you could be here because first and foremost, I, I love this documentary film and for anybody who hasn't seen it, I cannot encourage you to go see it, uh,
strongly enough. Let's talk a little bit about what it is, um, starting with the concept of Bowling alone. And, and I know Pete, uh, why don't you kick us off here. What is Bowling alone and and who is Robert Putnam?
Yeah, you know, Robert Putnam is probably one of the most impactful, uh, political scientists in America today, living today. Um, he wrote a book 25 years ago based on an essay, uh, 30 years ago of the same name called Bowling Alone, where he found that over the last 50 years,
even though bowling
is, has remained steady as a sport, the amount of people bowling in clubs, bowling in leagues has declined over the last 50 years. And then he followed that thread and discovered that bowling is not alone.
All of the ways that we are associating clubs, neighborhood organizations, picnics, um, meeting, you know, meeting up with people around town, friendship, all these things have been in decline over the last 50 years. And that is huge consequences for our democracy when there's been such a decline in community. And he spent the last 30 years raising the alarm about this. And most importantly, encouraging people and especially young people to work to turn this around and see if we can have another upswing in community connection over the coming 50 years like we've had in the past when we've had other times when there's been a decline in community engagement.
Yeah, and I will make a confession. I actually knew what alone was before this documentary film came along. I, I am actually a political science major in, uh, college. I have never used my degree in my career. 'cause I chose to do what what you did, Rebecca, which is that I chose to go into a career in broadcasting. Uh, I went into radio, not not television news like you did, um, but I remember reading, and this is gonna give away my age, an essay called Bowling Alone, my senior year of college. It was not yet a book. And I was so intrigued by it that, uh, I, I bought a copy of the book when I, when it came out. I, I mean, I still remember the cover and, and reading it and it, it being on my bookshelf. And so when I heard about this film, I was like, really?
Because this is not a natural book. Like, you don't look at the read this book and go, oh,
the visuals, the story. This belongs up on the, on the big screen. Rebecca, talk to me a little bit about the process of turning this into a film.
Yeah, so I think our hope and our challenge with the film was how do we take, I think the book clocks in at like just under 500 pages or so. Um, you know, how to take a 500 page, you know, uh, book that's dense with social science research also to Robert Putnam's credit very well written and, you know, pretty propulsive to read, uh, for those, uh, watching that are still readers at home. I do definitely recommend picking up the book,
but, you know, there is a larger audience out there who maybe wouldn't curl up on a weekend with a 500 page, uh, social science book. And so, uh, what Pete and I, you know, attempted to do with the film was say, you know, how do we translate the very important information that is in this book,
um, to an even bigger audience, um, and also to a younger audience who maybe wasn't even alive.
Um, you know, when Bowling Alone, the book came out in 2000, um, so we embarked on this journey. Uh, my brother Pete actually had been a student of Robert Putnam, so he had a personal connection and we approached Robert Putnam the year he was retiring from teaching about the possibility of a documentary film, you know, that would address his famous work in bowling alone. But, you know, also look beyond that to, um, you know, his, his career in research and, and also look at this moment, you know, now 25 or so years later, after the book came out of, um, you know, where, where are we on our, on our social connections, on the strength of our democracy, all of the things this book was looking at. Um, and so we produced and released this film, join or Die is the title of the movie. It came out in 2023. Um, and we've been touring that film to communities, um, around the country and some international audiences as well, um, as this is certainly not just a phenomenon that's happening in the us, um, for, you know, full time for the last, last three years now. Um, and,
you know, it's, it's been a, a joy for my brother and I to, you know, connect with, uh, so many Americans that really want to, um, heed the call of, of this, this research and try to turn around some of these, um, trends of our civic decline.
You know, as you point out, the book was written in the year two thou, I mean, it was a quarter of a century ago. And at the time he said, if you look at Americans participation in clubs and groups, it is declining across the board regardless of, you know, whether it's going to church or just hosting a poker game at your house, or boy scouts or sports leagues or whatever. Yeah. People are just hanging out less than they used to.
And he said at the time, if this continues American democracy is in trouble.
That was
25, 26 years ago at this point. Um, and
some, you know, big things have happened in that time, you know, I mean, when he wrote about it, there was no Facebook, there was no Twitter or X, there was no, you know, I mean, we didn't have people on dating apps. There wasn't any of this. I mean, all this stuff with that came along with the internet to the point where he's, he's put out a, a, a new edition during the pandemic, which kind of addresses some of those things. Can you talk about, uh, you know, what you think the impact of just kind of all this online stuff has been since the book originally came out? Yeah. You know, one of our goals was to show people that this isn't just an online story, you know, the book, you know, he wrote the article in 1995,
you know, prob the same year when The Today Show, you know, ran a segment on the Newfangled thing called the internet. And I remember there's a fun clip online where the host says, what is that app symbol with the a with the squiggle around it? And, and what's an email address? So, you know, this decline was happening, the decline started happening in the early seventies way before, um, the internet, way before Facebook, way before smartphones. And the thing that has happened though is the internet and smartphones and social media have accelerated this decline. Um, and so we, you know, one of the things of reasons it might be accelerating this decline is because the internet draws us out of the real world connections with our neighbors and feeds that community sized whole
a little bit to make us feel for a while that, oh, I'm getting some of the stuff I get from community from online. I'm kind of entertained, I'm kind of informed, I'm kind of affirming some of my identity when I'm online. But what everyone's been waking up to in the last few years and why a lot of people have been turning to the film and to Bob's work is that we are coming to an awareness that this is not enough,
a club online,
um, that doesn't have a real world connection, that doesn't lead to real longstanding individual relationships, though it can achieve some of the goals of community is not achieving all the goals of community, and so are looking for something deeper.
Yeah, yeah. Uh, I feel like, and maybe it's just me, but it feels like more and more people are starting to notice this, starting to wake up to this, and there's just more conversation around this. And I wanna, I mean, just anecdotally, one of the things I noticed is that, um, you know, I went and visited, uh, my parents over the Christmas and, and their big PBS watchers, and Judy Woodruff has been doing this series all year long where she's been talking about, uh, the issues that face democracy. But she has been talking about a lot of the same issues, for example, that you talk about in the film. Are you feeling like this is something that people are talking about more and more people starting to realize
kind of the conclusions that you came into the film, Rebecca?
Yeah, I mean, you know, I think another thing that happened, which is always interesting when you take on like longer, more ambitious, um, projects, uh, is, you know, you start them in one version of the world and the world changes over the course of the time that you're working on the project, you know, in ways that you can never anticipate. And so, you know, for us, that that big surprising moment was, um, having a global pandemic hit in the middle of our production. So, um, you know, as I mentioned, we started filming in 2017, um, and, uh, got funding for the film in January, 2020. So we, you know, really kicked it up a a year in, in January, February, 2020, and then of course had to fully shut down, um, you know, our production at least that we were doing out in the real world for, for a year, um, because of the pandemic. And, you know, as I looked to that kind of coming into awareness, um, you know, I think we all lived through this social experiment of seeing, oh, is it the same to celebrate, you know, my parents' birthday online as it is in person? And we didn't need any data to tell us that it doesn't feel the same. So, um, I think what's an open question that we're now trying to navigate, and we are still kind of just coming out of, you know, this, these wild few years that we lived through, is what is this new world that we're building going to look like? Um, you know, every other person I talk to has kind of a different way that their professional life is kind of figuring out virtual, um, you know, work versus in-person work. Um, certainly these conversations about AI that were not so much in the conversation, you know, when Pete and I first released the film in 2023 that are now, you know, very front of mind as we're talking to folks. Um, I think all of those things have definitely brought the conversation front of mind As far as change though, um, you know, that is the harder challenge. Um, and as far as kind of recent data around time spent consuming media, your average American spends 10 hours
a day consuming media. So about half of that is television based media, even if it's coming in, you know, on a streamer. The other half is other types of media, so like social media, podcasts, video podcasts, YouTube.
Um, so that's a lot of time. We're still online, so, and the forces pulling our attention into that virtual world,
um, are strong. So that is the challenge we face right now as we are asking ourselves what do we want our lives to look like?
Yeah, yeah.
Um, let me ask you about the project that you're working on now, which, which I guess is kind of a phase or an an outgrowth of this project, which is, uh, there's a lot of words here. What are you doing alone that you could be doing together? Tell me a little bit about that.
Yeah, you know, everyone is all, every time we tour the film,
we often get the question,
uh, what do we do if we don't have time for community?
And we wanna be, you know, we wanna face the sober reality of the time crunch. Everyone is in. A lot of people are forcibly in a time crunch because of job situation or money situation. So we wanna respect all of that,
but we also want to ask that critical question, which is,
you don't need to find extra time to do community. You just need to replace things that you are already doing alone together. And not only will that, you know, make the time more fun and build community, it also might create more time if you do things alone together. And so we found that that question, what are you doing alone that you could be doing together, was a really effective question in getting people to think about places where they could have more community. So, you know, are you going on walks after dinner alone? Is there a way you can make that together? Are you having, you know, watching TV alone? Could you watch TV together? Are you cooking alone? Could you cook together? Are you solving all your childcare issues alone? Could you solve this together? Are you fighting city hall alone because of issues in your city? Could you be doing that together as a neighborhood improvement association instead of just as an individual complaint? Um, all. And so we wanted to really embody that by every, so every, in a routine way, sharing stories of people who asked themselves that question and then answered it, uh, with a new community group. So we had, um, this wonderful guy, Tony Bocce, gall Lupo, and nor Norwalk, Connecticut, who decided to, instead of be new in town alone, he decided to start a new in town club when he first moved to town. And then that has led to all these welcoming initiatives. We just did an episode with a guy, David Osorio, who love, who likes exercising and exercises every day, but he decided to do it together, eventually founding a gym and making that gym, not just a gym, but a community hub where they don't just have workout classes, but have standup shows and art shows and recovery groups and the like. And so we wanna every so often show stories of, uh, people who have asked that question from the smallest things of, we cooked alone, now we cooked together. These are the biggest things of, we fought a battle alone, and now we're fighting it together. Yeah.
I love that idea of a club for people who, uh, are new to a place or have moved to a new place. You know, just as a radio broadcaster over the years, I, there was a period in my life where I was moving to a brand new city every three years, and that was the hardest thing
I think I've ever done,
is, is when you get to, that's probably why I bought the, the full put Putnam book, is because I didn't know anybody in town. And so I was like, I'll, I'll sit down and, and, and read this. But, um, that's so great to see people
come together like this. Uh, and and this really, you know, I, I wanna mention something else you, you, you talked about, which was this idea of, you know, we don't have time for it in our lives, or we think we don't have time for it in our lives, because that kind of leads into your bad advice that you brought with us. So let's take a look.
I asked you for terrible advice, and you said this, you said, terrible advice is make it easy for people to join your club.
And that seems a little counterintuitive because if people are sitting there going, you know, I'm really busy. I, I got all these things going on, uh, you know, as a somebody who's organizing a community or organizing a club, you would think you would want to go, oh, we're gonna make it really simple. You don't have to do a lot to be a part of our club. And yet you are saying, no, it should be the opposite,
Rebecca, why is that?
Yeah. So there's actually some really fascinating research. So there's also data to back this up too, that the best way to get people to continue coming to meetings after the first meeting
is to give them an ask and ask them to participate in a certain way. And so, you know, if someone's coming to your book club meeting and they're the, uh, first per, and they're like a new member to the club, asking that person to say, Hey, new member, you're gonna pick the location next time, or you're gonna host at your house and you know, you're gonna prepare the dinner that we're gonna have, uh, you know, while we discuss the next book. Um, because what that does is it helps that new member actually be a participant in the work and not just a passive receiver. And, you know, I think we're all looking for ways, um, you know, that we can really feel that we're shaping our lives, that we're contributing to our communities, that we're pushing the world in a better direction. Um, and a lot of people are waiting for that call. Um, and so, you know, one thing Pete and I hear a lot, uh, from organizers right now, and, and I, I feel this pain of our organizers, you know, they're telling us, you know, they're feeling burnt out. Um, they're trying to do all the work themself. Um, and what Pete and I, you know, wanna tell them is, stop doing that. Uh, start asking for other people to help out, start delegating, um, and help raise up new leaders. I think one thing we're really at risk right now is not passing along this really important generational knowledge
around how to do community building work, because it is a skill. It is not something we are born with. And so, you know, if you are listening out there and you're, you know, running a club or starting a club, really thinking about ways that you can develop new leadership kind of from day one, that's gonna be what's gonna help sustain, um, the group.
You know, this is something that I think is particularly hard for people who are content creators and used to building audience to wrap their head around. And, and you guys are, are both, I mean, obviously filmmakers and authors and, and news producers and and so on and so forth, that you kind of, with that content, you just wanna make it easy for people to consume. They don't have to jump through a lot of hoops and hurdles to get involved. And you are the engine. You create the content, you produce it, you publish it out, and the moment you stop pushing it out,
people stop coming back, the audience stops coming back. That's not the way a community works. And if you walk into building a club or building a community thinking that you have to do everything and everybody else just, we're gonna make it as frictionless and easy as possible for them, um, yeah, it, it actually can, can backfire that you actually do want them to step up and that they are in fact willing to do so. So you're finding that as you're out there. Yeah. One thing I'll add, and then I'll kick it over to Pete, I mean, I think this language is really important, right? Audience versus community. Audience is a one-way conversation. One person is speaking, and then other people are receiving community is a two-way conversation. And if you aren't building that two-way conversation, that two-way participation, um, you are not building community and, and you can't, you know, use that word. Um, and so I think that distinction is really important there.
Yeah. You know, the, the reason that that data shows up, that when you give people an ask and invite them to participate, co-lead, co-create your organization when they join, the reason they stick around a year later is because the group transforms them by being part of it. It's not just another thing that fits into their current organization of their life. The group takes them for a ride and they end up in a different place and as a different person a year later because they joined it maybe in a tiny way, but there's a moment of transformation and the group weaves its story into each individual story. And so they wanna keep being part of the group because the group is part of their life. Um, and so, um, so what we always challenge
online first groups is just find ways to go deeper and deeper of becoming an actual community all the way towards the ultimate way an online group can become an actual community is, you know, eventually start having your audience meet up with each other and, you know, um, be in chapters together. And there are great examples of that. Like, there's a group called Strong Towns that's all about urbanist ideas. It has a huge audience, but then they encourage people to start strong towns, chapters of the readers, and then the readers become members by, you know, eventually capitalizing. And you can kind of go on a spectrum down that path. So a very light example, you know, I used to be a reader of The Daily Dish by Andrew Sullivan, you know, a huge blog back in the two thousands, 2010s.
And he even just started with a tiny thing. He had a thing called the View from Your Window contest, where you could submit a picture of where you were reading the Daily Dish. And one week I submitted that we were in a very interesting place as my family and my sister was there too. It was, we were traveling in Guatemala looking at a mountain in Lake Atitlan. And I remember being like, oh, I'm reading the Daily Dish here. I should send that in. And he had a way you could send it in. And then he posted it. One of our readers, Peter d, is reading at Lake Ton. And that made me feel like I wasn't just a reader of something, it made me feel I was part of something. You know, there's only so far you can go just online. But that made me feel a little bit closer to being a member than being, um, a passive reader. 'cause I was partially in a very tiny way co-creating that, you know, uh, that thing together. And so, um, you know, it's the same case with all clubs. What are moments where you can invite your membership to have more and more and more participation to the point that you can't even tell the difference anymore between who's at the center of this club anymore? Um, 'cause everyone is participating. That's, that's kind of the maxing out of the healthiest possible club.
Can I pick up on that word that you used there, that co-creation,
uh, and Rebecca, you're talking about the difference between an audience and a community. And I, and I think co-creation is a big part of that difference, that when we are creating this, you know, this video or this, uh, documentary film or this book or this, you know, whatever it might be, we have total control over it until the moment it goes out and we hit publish and, and then we release it and it's in the audience's hands and we, okay, we're onto the next one.
Yeah. That's not the case when you're creating a club, when you're creating a community, it is this act of co-creation where you're not creating it, you're doing it right for your members, you're creating. So talk a little bit about that, because,
because you're right, if you're doing it right, can you, can you talk a little bit about what it means to do it right, Rebecca?
Yeah. I think being willing to experiment and see where the group wants to take that work with you. So, you know, Pete mentioned this, this gym owner of CrossFit South Brooklyn that we, we interviewed just in the past couple weeks. Um,
you know, and he, uh, some of these events that have happened at his gym, like the comedy show that Pete mentioned, it wasn't that David decided what my gym is missing right now is a standup comedy show. A member of his gym approached him who did stand up comedy and said, I would like to try. And, uh, his response was, why not?
Um, and I love that. And I think, you know, our for, for club leaders that are watching or people starting clubs, I think having that why not attitude and being ready to try stuff out if you do it once and it ends up not working out, um, you know, so what, try something else out. But, um, I think, you know, that environment of experimentation is really important and I think it's that much more important right now. 'cause there are fewer and fewer spaces in our towns and in our professional life where we have a chance to really be civically creative. Um, you know, which is another realm that Pete and I would love to see, you know, more Americans kind of flexing their creativity and civic spaces. Um, you know, and I tell folks, you know, if a new coffee shop is opening in your town, let's say, and it is not a coffee shop where open mic nights can be hosted, where a local photographer can hang their photography on the wall and have a gallery show, you might wanna think twice if you want that coffee shop coming to your town. Um, 'cause it's gonna be a less pleasant place for the workers to work at if it's not a space where they feel like, um, you know, civic creativity can thrive. Um, and it's gonna be a less significant place, you know, for the folks, uh, in town as well. What I, what, you know, I think my sister's partially getting at here is like,
the question is are, is the world that we're all building together, are we gonna think about it only in one paradigm where it's just you put out consumer products that are static and rigid, that meet consumer needs, that are static and rigid. That's one way of thinking about things. That is not how clubs work, and that is not where the joy of clubs come from. It might work for a while. You know, there are, there are, you know, it might work at the start where, you know, um, there, you know, there's not a piece of content to serve, you know,
moms who live in Georgia or something. I'm gonna create the content for moms who live in Georgia for a while, that might work. But the thing that creates transformative, longstanding things that become iconic and create joy is both sides of this equation are not rigid and static. They transform each other. You know, you as the entity that you're creating is open to the ideas of the people you're willing to have your readership co-create your thing together, and you're willing to be transformed. And then in exchange, the readers are, and participants are willing to be transformed by participating in the club. And there's a, it's, it's much less like Tetris where you're trying to fit perfect blocks into perfect gaps. And it's much more like a garden where, you know, uh, there's organic creation sprouting up everywhere and you as the creator is tending to that garden of and seeing where it goes. It's a little bit in your control, but a lot of it is also just the natural organic processes of people working together and creating things together. Yeah, I love that garden analogy. And, and, and I'll even give you another one. 'cause you had mentioned standup comedy and, and in a past life I had a standup comedian and, and I'd also done improv comedy. And when you're a standup comedian, you're the one on stage and you have control over it. And, and that's much like being a content creator, building an audience. Mm-hmm. When you are doing improvisational comedy, it's you with some other people or, uh, you know, on stage,
and it's really about what exists between the players on stage. It's not the thing that comes out of either particular person's mouth, it's sort of where they meet and they connect and you don't know where it's going. It's exactly what you're saying is that, you know, the community or the club that you think you're starting may not be the community or club that you wind up with because it evolves over time.
And I'll add a fun rabbit hole to go down on that exact theme. The creator of short form improv comedy in the United States, and Chicago was also a community organizer. So, uh, the proof of the skill, um, of being a good imp improv is also, uh, the a good community organizer.
Who is that? Is it, is this Del Close that we're talking about? Del Close? Yes. All right. Yes. Yes. That is a, I have been down that rabbit hole. It's a fun rabbit hole, but we, it's an amazing rabbit hole, but we cannot go down that rabbit hole here. Do you mind if I, can I add one more thing that Yeah. Just because it's an audience of fellow kind of creators of content, um,
um, one of the things my sister and I have discovered on this journey of making this film, um, is we've even felt
that there's, you know, my sister turned on, uh, turned, uh, me onto this idea of social, is it called socially engaged art? SEA Yep. Yeah. Which is the idea that even if just at the micro level of putting a piece of creative work out into the world, even if it's just fully your creative work, it's fully your vision and you put it out in the world and no one else got to co-create that part,
there still is a co-creative element to it, which is the way the audience reacts to it and how you approach their reactions to it is itself an opportunity for community building. So I used to think before we got into these ideas that you make a work and then people like it, which means it was successful, or people dislike it, which means it wasn't successful, or they got what you were going for and that's successful, or they didn't get what you go are going for. And that wasn't successful. And now I think, you know, as my sister taught me with her research into socially engaged art, um, you put something out there that's only half the journey and the other half is what everyone else brings to how they experience it, and all the ideas that it sparks and all their responses, positive and negative, saying it changed their life and yelling at you because you missed something, is all the co-creative work holistically. And, um, I, it's even changed the spirit of, uh, having a communal spirit of even putting stuff out there, which, um, with just a creative work is, is very exciting. And I, I think that's exactly what happens with the club. Everyone brings their own experiences to what you're making together, and then what comes up comes up and, um, and that's it. And even in standup, which we used as the negative, um,
uh, contrast to improv in this, the best standup comics even understand that the audience's responses in the room of what they're bringing to the room too is also part of the show as well. Um, so, uh, it's kind of a way to approach life as a whole, um, which is really trippy and exciting.
Well, and this is sort of the phase that you guys are at with this film, right? I mean, it's, it wasn't just, Hey, it came out in 2023 and we let Cisco and Ebert just do whatever they wanna do with our thumbs, and we're done. We're onto the next one. You guys are really using it as a starting point for these conversations that you've been having all over the country, right?
Yes. We've been on a big community screening tour with the film, um, since we launched in 2023. Um, as of last month, we hit just around 500 community screenings. Um, I will say the majority of those have been for groups of 25 people or less. So we've tried to keep the barrier to entry to hosting, you know, as low a bar as possible and just, you know, move through this country rooms of 25 people at a time, um, with the film. And, you know, we've really been trying to bring this socially engaged art, um, frame to the work we're doing where we see the film as 50% of the puzzle. So we're facilitating these screenings happening, and then what we're calling on our audience is to say, you know, fill in the rest of this, this pie with whatever you come up with in that room. Um, you know, when you watch the film as you look to kind of think of creative products, um, and projects that want to, you know, address, um, you know, all the issues that, that the film brings up. And so we've been, you know, excited to see a lot of folks launching, you know, civic development projects. There's a group called Join Philly that launched, uh, out of a screening of the film, um, that's been trying to, you know, create a, a directory and kind of a civic organization of, you know, all the vibrant club life in Philadelphia. And then a, a project launched off of their project called Join a TL. Um, and then a lot of kind of smaller initiatives. There was a group of, um, folks out in Colorado that screened the film that afterwards decided to start a men's group to kind of have men checking in on, you know, each other's health, uh, on a monthly basis to kind of meet up and make sure everyone was going to their doctor's appointments and, and doing screenings,
um, you know, for health causes, um, you know, walking clubs, uh, climate action groups, um, you know, all sorts of stuff. And so, um, you know, it's been been a real joy to kind of connect with so many creative Americans. And, and the last thing I'll add to that is, you know, Pete and I have gotten to live in this real alternative, um, media bubble then your average American is getting these days. And I don't wanna downplay any of the, you know, serious things that our country, you know, is needing to address right now, um, as far as crises we, we face economically, uh, you know, environmentally politically threats to our democracy. Um, but, um, I think it's a lot easier to inspire people to action, um, from a place of inspiration than from a place of despair.
Um, and so for, for folks watching, you know, what we'd also like to tell people is like, we need to be working on not just amplifying stories as we go to our social media, you know, of what awful things maybe happened in our country today, but also look, you know, what happened down the street from you? Did someone launch, uh, you know, a new initiative to help, you know, unhoused members of your community? Is someone launching an initiative to clean up a local park? Let's make sure those stories are getting into people's feeds as well. Um, 'cause that's gonna be how people can actually plug in and not just sit at home, um, you know, feeling overwhelmed by how big, um, uh, and very real, you know, a lot of the crises that we face are, well, and let me say this is somebody who spends way too much time on my phone, doom scrolling and, and being concerned about the news and all the different things that are going on in the world, um, because I even watched how you did this in the film, and I thought you did this really well, where,
you know, Putnam is issuing a dire warning and and he's saying, this is gonna be bad if, if we go on this. And, and there's a point at the film where you're just, you, you know, I'm remember watching we're screwed.
Like, we're in a lot of trouble, but you didn't leave it there. I mean, you actually, and, and, and Putnam doesn't leave it there. I mean, he's got a book called The Upswing that talks about how, uh, you know, we can, um, you know, create this social capital, we can build clubs and, and communities and rebuild the things that we're missing, and the film dives into that as well. Uh, now that you are going around and talking to people all over the country, are you
optimistic even with all the issues that we're facing these days?
Pete, I'll start with you. You know,
I, I had an old professor that ended all of his classes with
Aristotle once said, A single sparrow does not make spring. He was mistaken.
Um, and what I liked about that is that a single alternative way of living is not a small thing. It is everything.
You know, somewhat, you, you can have a institution that is rusted and no one believes in it anymore, and it's all cynical. But if one person or one group inside of that is lighting a spark of an alternative, um, that has the potential to change things, that has, that is a spark that you can blow on, and you don't know how quick it could become a wildfire. And that's what we're seeing. You know, there are people in cities all across the country, just the people we've seen from this film, just people who've screened this film. Of those 500
all different types of communities, north, south, east, west, all different type of ethnic backgrounds, all different type of political backgrounds where you're seeing people that are coming together and saying, we're gonna be that light in the darkness. Um, we're gonna be that single sparrow that makes spring. Um, and we are also seeing the method by which those scale in a healthy way, which is not scaling by becoming bigger and thinner, but scaling through replication through people in other places, seeing the depth of the work that they're doing in some other place, and then saying, we should try that here. And getting a group of people together to try that here. That's how the civil rights movement spread. That's how the women's rights movement spread. That's how the environmental movement spread, the abolitionist movement spread. That's how the we're celebrate what we're celebrating in these 250th year right now of America. That's how the revolution spread, which was groups of people deciding to come together and try something new.
Um, and, uh, showing up to do that. And anyone can start that today. Um, and so we're ve we're very hopeful, you know, I don't think, uh, it's inevitable the way things are headed. I think we can turn it around.
Uh, Rebecca, let me ask you one last question. This is, uh, the last question that I ask everybody, which is make a prediction.
Uh, and, and you started this film 10 years ago, so I'm only gonna ask you to look five years in the future, five years from now. What do you think we're gonna be talking about when it comes to community?
Yeah, one word that comes to mind, I think is the word attention.
Um, so a, a group I've been following closely right now and getting a lot of inspiration from outside the 500 groups Pete and I have encountered on the film tour, um, is this, uh, group called The School of Radical Attention. Um, and they're starting little attention activists, um, pockets of, um, you know, folks around the country that really wanna take back those hours of the day, those 10 hours of the day that the average American is spending consuming, um, media right now. And, um, you know, I think, you know, that that idea of where we are putting attention, um, what we are loving, what we are looking at, what we are noticing,
um, is just going to, you know, increasingly, um, really be the, the, the call, um, I think for our culture and, and a big part of turning these trends around.
Yeah,
I love that. Uh, Pete, Rebecca, thank you so much Again, I love the film. It is called Join or Die. Uh, go find it on the streaming services, please watch it, watch it with people even better, and people can still, uh, organize a community screening, right? If somebody wants to do that, how do they do that?
That is our preferred way of your folks to watch. So if you head to join or dive film.com, there's a host a screening button in the upper right hand corner, and there's also a, a list of all the upcoming, um, screenings that are happening all over the country. So you can also head there and see if a community screening's happening, uh, near you. So join or dive film.com
and then also join 1 0 1 is the Substack, and that's where people can, among other things, read about. Yeah, join one oh one.org, join one oh one.org. Uh, so what are you doing alone that you could be doing together? You can read about that and find out all about that there as well. So, um, thank you guys so much and congratulations. I, I, I, you should be really proud. I mean, it really is an amazing film and is such an important topic and, uh, I, I am so glad that you did this. So thank you for taking the time today. Thank you. Thank you so much. Join a club.
