How to Stay Politically Engaged When You Feel Like Giving Up – Jennifer Walker Thomas

 

Airdate: March 5, 2025

Jennifer Walker Thomas: So, if you have done this job well as a citizen, if you have reached out in peace, if you have reached out in thoughtfulness, I would just want to remind you that you have exercised muscles and you are more prepared to actually meet this really tremendous challenge that we're facing.

Julie Rose: Hey, it's Julie. Welcome to Uncomfy, a show about sticking with moments that challenge us. It seems like every single day I get some feedback that's tough, or I hear a perspective I disagree with, or I just find myself outside my comfort zone, and the natural reaction is to bail or lash out. You know, it's fight or flee. But if we do that right away, we might miss a chance to learn something, or feel new empathy, or deepen a relationship. So, the question's, "How," right? How to stick with that discomfort just a little bit longer? Well, that's what this podcast is about: real people telling real stories of choosing to stay open and curious in challenging moments. I'm glad you're here. Now, let's get Uncomfy.

I'm joined by Jennifer Walker Thomas. She's co-executive director of the nonpartisan, nonprofit group, MWEG, a faith-based community of women dedicated to advocating for ethical government and preparing women for civic engagement. It's a group I've personally enjoyed participating with, and Jen is also co-host of the Proclaim Peace podcast. Jen, what a treat. Thanks for joining me today.

Jennifer Walker Thomas: Thank you for having me. I was, um, thinking as when you asked me to join that I spend most of my life uncomfortable, so I'm a pretty good, I'm pretty well qualified to participate in this podcast, probably more qualified than about anything I do.

Julie Rose: That's great. It was tailor-made for you. And I feel lucky to even catch you for a moment because I know that you have been full tilt doing advocacy work and education work since the new administration took office and just kind of thrown a lot of stuff out there to respond to. Um, have you been outside your comfort zone lately in the last week?

Jennifer Walker Thomas: Yes, I actually can. So, I, um, was attending a gathering that was focused on, um, foreign relations and particularly talking about changes in international aid and the position of the United States abroad. And I just want to qualify, um, for anyone listening that my academic training, which is my fancy way of saying my undergraduate degrees, um, were in Italian and art history, and I was surrounded in this room by, um, people who were professionals, either they had worked for the foreign service or they, um, had PhDs in peace building, or, you know, had worked deeply in foreign affairs, and I kept asking myself over and over, over the course of the two days, "What do I have to add to this conversation?" Um, and, and that is an uncomfortable place to be, to not exactly know how and where you fit into a conversation and what you have to add, and that is something that I find myself doing on a regular basis, and the good news is I think I can tell people is that if you sit with that discomfort long enough, you actually find that you really do have something to add.

Julie Rose: So, I mean, can you give me, like, how do you, how do you do that? So, in that case, then, you know, are you thinking to yourself, um, one response I would have would be, "I'm just going to sit and listen. Like, I got nothing to add here. I'm just here to learn, keep my mouth shut."

Jennifer Walker Thomas: That is absolutely the best place to start, but let me just say one thing that I have found is when you find yourself in a situation where you are sort of the odd person out and you feel least like the other people in the room, the default, our sort of human default is to say, "I do not belong. I don't have anything to contribute here." And what I would, um, suggest to your listeners is that's actually the moment in which you are most needed because by definition you are sitting in a place where you have a perspective that absolutely no one else in that room has, that you are thinking about things as an outsider or thinking about maybe, uh, a demographic that isn't being consulted or impacted. And so, sometimes the very things that make us feel most uncomfortable are the things that qualify us to sort of lead out.

Julie Rose: What you're describing about feeling like, "I think, I hope I have something to offer here. It feels like it's important that I be in this room, but also I really don't know what the next step is," um, sounds to me like something that I bet a lot of women who participate in MWEG feel on a regular basis. So, maybe you could just describe for us, um, kind of how MWEG operates in order to help because I know you've been getting a lot of national attention, like, national media outlets covering this organization of thousands of women who, I guess the world finds it kind of unusual that women of faith would, like, want to be engaged in politics and peacemaking.

Jennifer Walker Thomas: Yeah, I think it is unusual, and so I think we started getting attention because we were sort of an anomaly. We were sort of a new, a new kid on the block doing things a new way. But one of the things that we found is by leaning into that difference, um, bringing the perspectives of women to the table, um, we find that, over and over again, whether it is on panel discussions at conferences, or sitting with legislators, or with opinion pieces, the perspectives that those women have brought to the table are unique and have something fantastic to add. But I will say to you that we have to scaffold women a lot to help them get past their own discomfort and help them believe that they are capable of adding something to the conversation.

And if you don't mind, I'll give a very specific example. In the last, if you look back five, maybe even 10 years ago, there weren't a lot of, in the Intermountain West, opinion pieces from women in papers, and the opinion pieces that were there were often coming from women who had professional qualifications or credentials, and that qualified them to sort of put their words out there. And MWEG created an opinion lab, an op-ed lab, where we scaffold women and help them. They come to us with an idea, they draft a piece, we can give them suggestions, give them professional editing advice, and then help them try to get those opinion pieces posted. And you would think that that was just us helping women get their ideas out there, but it turns out that those op-eds have been extraordinarily successful. Sometimes, they have been picked up by syndicate, syndicates and picked up by newspapers six, seven, eight times across the country because those women had something unique to add, but they didn't know it, and we had to help them get to a place and give them the assistance that they needed to get their voice out there. But once it was out there, it turns out it had something significant to add to the conversation.

Julie Rose: Yeah. What do you hear from, uh, elected officials, um, because I know one of the things the organization does is calls to action. "Hey, here's this thing that's happening. You don't tell people which side to take, you say, "Hey, here's a way for you to get involved in a moment that matters." What do you hear from elected officials? And I know right now we've recently been hearing that, you know, that they've been getting swamped with calls and with letters.

Jennifer Walker Thomas: Yes, so I will actually tell you, counterintuitively again, you would assume that legislative offices are completely swamped, that they have their positions fixed, and they know how they're going to act, and they don't want to hear from their constituents. That's a narrative we hear over and over again. We actually, in the last 10 days, have been hearing repeatedly from staffers that the letters that are coming from the women in our organization are helpful, they are clarifying, they give them new perspectives, and they are regularly encouraging us to make sure that we are seeing more of, we are sending more of them. So, that's sort of counterintuitive. You wouldn't think. I mean, like I said, the narrative out there is that, "These, these people don't care. They don't want to hear from you. What you say isn't going to matter." But the messaging that we're getting from legislators is the exact opposite, that thoughtful, considered, respectful, peaceful, and that doesn't mean that they can't be assertive or clear in their opinion, which all of our women are, but they're not personal attacks. They're not, um, steeped in partisan language, and, and those kinds of letters not only get through, but actually have an impact.

Julie Rose: How do you respond to, um, those uncomfortable moments where people say, "Being nice isn't going to get you anywhere, you know, and, and being a peacemaker is not what we need. What we need right now is people to stand up and fight."

Jennifer Walker Thomas: Well, I'm going to give you a New Englander response. I live in New England. I've lived here for almost all of my adult life. And, um, one thing that you will find out about New Englanders is they are not very nice, but they are actually extraordinarily kind, which means that they don't necessarily do performative niceness very well, but on the merits of the thing, they will have your back. And that is kind of what we are asking our women to do is to be kind in the best sense, which is that we want them to be clear, we want them to be honest, we want them to share letters that, um, have their strong opinions and can even indicate when they think that legislators are falling down or when they're not meeting the moral need of the moment, but that doesn't mean they have to have personal attacks or call into question that person's intelligence, you know, and, and letters that are, um, that are peaceful, and I do not mean peacekeeping, I mean peacemaking, that are seeking to cross a divide and trying to find a place of common ground and to help people see a better future, are always effective. I just really believe that. They always help change the moment and they certainly can change the way a legislator is thinking long-term.

Julie Rose: So, can you be peacefully angry?

Jennifer Walker Thomas: Absolutely. Yes, I absolutely think. Um, um, I think, but there is a difference with what you do with that anger, right? And I mean, anger is a perfect example of discomfort, if you want to talk about being Uncomfy, right? Um, and sometimes we try to resolve that anger by lashing out or being hyper-emotive or being super aggressive, and we think that that kind of will ease our discomfort and resolve it, and it might for a moment, but I don't know that it gets us anywhere productive. But if you take your anger and you're willing to sit with yourself and say, "Why am I angry? What is, what do I feel like is being violated? What do I feel like is wrong here? What do I actually want to to see be different, and what is the most productive path to getting myself and the people around me there?" You can channel that anger to action and to productive change.

Julie Rose: There's so much public frustration and anger toward elected officials, you know, across the board. Um, and I know that you sit in rooms with these elected officials, um, you know, bringing messages from the women that are part of your organization and sometimes also, you know, expressing your own desire for them to, to, to behave a certain way or to vote a certain way, right? Um, how, like, how do those conversations go? I've actually never sat down with a member of Congress and asked, you know, as I've never had the chance to ask my senator or tell my senator, "I am really frustrated with the way that you're behaving on this issue or the way you're voting on this." Um, how do you express that, and, and how did, how do they receive that?

Jennifer Walker Thomas: I will say, um, that one of the real problems with this hyperpolarization and this cycle of attack is that even when you sit down to talk to someone, you can almost always sense that they're, that those conversations start from a position of guarded fear of the other person in the room, right? There's almost always a sense of, "I, I, I know that this person isn't clearly on my team." We've sort of signaled to each other, "This is my team, this is not my team." And MWEG, because we are nonpartisan, I think almost every conversation we go into, there's an element of, "I don't know what team you're on," and that makes people, um, anxious. And sometimes it makes them aggressive. And it is always our inclination, and what we've trained women to do, is to deescalate that situation because we already know if someone started with an attack, if we attack back, nothing is going to get done, um, and so try to deescalate that situation, try to find common ground and remind the person that almost in every situation we have come into the room with members of both party constituents of both parties, um, and, and then try to articulate our position and explain why we think also often that it is in, to their advantage to to kind of consider embracing this position.

And we have never had a situation, and I can say this with great honesty, where we have left not being (a) welcomed back, said, "Please reach out again." Um, it doesn't mean the staffer or this, the legislator has done what we wanted to, but they have always wanted more dialogue and they have often thanked us for actively that the meeting didn't go the way they expected it to, and in many cases, they've apologized. And so I, I guess what I'm saying to people is, I know that we want, we're right now in a position where we feel a lot of disdain for those that are in public service, and I guess a couple of things that I would remind people of, they're under extraordinary pressure right now that many of us can't really imagine. They have taken on a responsibility, and we should hold them to that responsibility. I'm not saying we let them off the hook, um, but the mechanisms and ways by which we do that are, um, have the potential to be more successful or less successful. And I guess we have to decide what outcome we want, whether we just want to emote to them or whether we want to actually make progress, and making progress is often going to require that we ourselves manage our emotions.

Julie Rose: Okay. So, but what if, what if you don't see the progress, right? So, your call to action, you know, you're trying to, you write this respectful letter to your member of, to your Senator about, "Please vote this way on this particular nominee," you

Jennifer Walker Thomas: And they

Julie Rose: cabinet, and they don't, and you just feel like, "What was the point? They didn't listen to me. I should have just vented at them."

Jennifer Walker Thomas: Yes.

Julie Rose: "Next time, I'm going to really give it to them." I mean, what do you, what do you think about that? Like, what's, what's the point of even doing it when it feels like so much of the timethey did what they were going to do anyway, it seems like.

Jennifer Walker Thomas: I one hundred percent hear you. I want to validate that because that is the way I often feel just deep, profound disappointment in the people that, um, that, that make the decisions that they make. Um, a couple of things that I would say, and I really hope these don't sound super Pollyanna because I, I do believe that advocacy is a long game. First, I believe in democracy, and I believe that, um, democratic governance, um, is a representation of who we are, so that doesn't just mean it's a representation of who my legislators are, but it means it's also a representation of who we as citizens are. So, if you have done this job well as a citizen, if you have reached out in peace, if you have reached out in thoughtfulness, I would just want to remind you that you have exercised muscles and gained your capacity to better meet the moment at hand. You are a better citizen than you were before you went through that exercise, and you are more prepared to actually meet this really tremendous challenge that we're facing. It also lets you signal, it signals, "Who are the people that are doing this the way I want to do this," and then you can find them and work with them.

If we want to participate, and if we want the world to be the world that we envision, we have to be willing to do the hard work repeatedly over and over and over of being the people that create the society that we want. And that, it's not an easy answer, but I have found extraordinary comfort being in community with people who are doing this work this way. It's comforting, it's sustaining, it makes me a better person, not a worse person, and it allows me to, to have a group of people that I can talk with and conceptualize a better future with. And I think those are the kind of people we need right now: people who can conceptualize something different and better and are willing to act for it.

Julie Rose: That's just so profound, Jen, because I, um, you know, this, this idea that, that, that the answer to feeling discouraged is to, could be to lean in a little further and say, "Well, I'm not going to let that push me away.

Jennifer Walker Thomas: I am not letting that push me out."

Julie Rose: Yeah, I mean, I have to admit, perhaps with a bit of, um, embarrassment, that, you know, I've, I've been in the position of writing to a city council person, and I'm like, "Please don't vote this way on this particular thing" and then I read, and then I'm like, "Oh, surely they're gonna read my beautiful letter and they're going to, you know, understand and change their mind," and then I see, like, they all voted the other way, and I'm like, "Well, that was pointless.

Jennifer Walker Thomas: That was a waste of my time.

Julie Rose: Now I feel kind of stupid," and I mean, I haven't written that council person again, right? Like, immediately, my, I guess it's my self-preservation is to kind of go to, go to the safe place, go to the more comfortable place, which is like fatalistic, you know? "Whatever's happened, it's going to happen. The world, they don't pay attention," and I do think that's part of, but, part of this disengagement that I'm hearing you say that, like, that that's, that's exactly how democracies get weaker is when, when people get so frustrated that we disengage, and we don't vote, or we don't pay attention, we don't follow, you know, what's going on, and we allow that to push us out of instead of leaning into it.

Jennifer Walker Thomas: And, and I just want to, like, point out something that I am super guilty of. So, I just am going to say, but your expectation was that you would write this letter and then you would get what you wanted, right? And, and sometimes I think that we tend to think of politics, we, we live in a society that is so based on instant gratification. We can Amazon all of our needs. We can scroll to self-soothe. We can, there are just all these ways that when we are uncomfortable, we have absolutely instant solutions. And we actually, I think sometimes, have a disproportionate amount of anger and frustration when systems don't immediately meet our needs.

And I, again, I realize that people are probably saying, "Hey, Jen, massive needs are not being met." I will stipulate to that, and we need to work as hard as we can for that, but the work is exactly what we have to do. We have to repeatedly and, and now, so then you need to say, "Okay, so turns out my city council is not working the way I want it to work. Do I know people who think the same way I do? Do I find five of them to go together to meet with someone? Do I conceptualize what within my city is within my change as a group?" There are other avenues, but that requires thought and persistence and discomfort.

Julie Rose: Jenn, I just have to ask you finally, um, you know, I'm sure a lot of people are, like, listening or watching and being like, "Well, that's great."

Jennifer Walker Thomas: I know they're thinking I'm nuts, we're, or, or they're just like, "Well, this is a lady who's got it figured out." Was this always going to be your path? No, um, I, um, I studied, like I said, art history and Italian as an undergraduate. Um, I, um, worked in, um, major gifts fundraising as a, uh, you know, an adult, and then I stayed home and raised my kids. But, um, I was always interested in politics. I participated in local government in my tiny little town, um, in various ways. Um, I ran for office. I served on our, um, our, it's called “town meeting” in New England but is essentially our town legislature. I participated in that. I've worked on, um, getting particular initiatives passed. I served as a PTA president, you know, all sorts of local, um, and civic leadership positions, but, um, MWEG has launched me into a whole different space. It's outside of my comfort zone. It's outside of my town.

So, I just want to say that I, to anyone listening, um, I've been doing this now for several years. I feel like I have a strong sense of purpose, a clarity of vision of what we need to do, and yet every single day, the doing of it leaves me uncomfortable. It means I have to, every single day, push out of my comfort zone, do things that I thought I would never have done, ask people for things that I thought I would never ask people for, um, argue for positions that are, um, complicated. But I will say there is extraordinary, um, there's actually, and this is a funny word to use at a time like this, joy. There is, even in dark times, there is extraordinarily, extraordinary joy to be found working with good people in a common cause, and I think that the forces that are sort of pushing at us right now are trying to fracture us, to pull us in a way that we sit in our discomfort alone. And I would just urge people to decide what matters to you, to turn toward it, to find people to work with alongside as you kind of find that purpose and work towards it, and make sure that in that process, you are finding joy, and I really would argue that it's possible and kind of want to promise that it is.

Julie Rose: Jenn Walker Thomas is the co-executive director of MWEG and co-host of the Proclaim Peace podcast, which you can find anywhere podcasts are available. You'll want to check that out. And you can find out more about the work of MWEG on Instagram, @mormonweg, or on their website, mweg.org. Jenn, this has been a really, just a pleasure. Thanks for your time today and for the work you're doing.

Jennifer Walker Thomas: Thanks for having me. I appreciated the opportunity to talk about it.

Julie Rose: And thank you for getting Uncomfy with us today. I'd love to hear your thoughts on our conversation today. You can reach me at uncomfy@byu.edu. If you've been outside your comfort zone recently or had an opportunity to get involved in some political advocacy, I'd love to hear how it's gone. Again, our email address is uncomfy@byu.edu, or you can connect with us on social media, and I'd love to have you share this episode with someone in your life who you think might also enjoy it. Let's keep this conversation going.

In the meantime, if you love diving into thought-provoking discussions, check out my other podcasts, Top of Mind with Julie Rose. Jen had a small role in an episode we did several years ago about the many forms that activism can take, so we'll put a link to that in the show notes.

Uncomfy is a BYUradio podcast. Samuel Benson produces it, and the team includes Henrique Prado, James Hoopes, and Sam Payne. Our theme music was composed by Kelsey Nay. I'm Julie Rose. Can't wait to get Uncomfy with you again next week.