How to Be an Actionable Ally (Feat. Topher DeRosia)

Allie Nimmons:
Welcome to the Underrepresented in Tech Podcast, hosted by Michelle Frechette and Allie Nimmons. Underrepresented in Tech is a free database, but with the goal of helping people find new opportunities in WordPress and tech overall.
Hi Topher. Good morning.

Topher DeRosia:
Good morning.

Allie Nimmons:
Hi. So cool to have you on the podcast.

Topher DeRosia:
I’m really excited to be here. I’ve been looking forward to this ever since you picked me.

Allie Nimmons:
Yay. Well, today it’s just me. Michelle is not here today, but it’s me and Topher DeRosia, who among many, many, many other things runs HeroPress. Topher can you tell us a little bit about what HeroPress is for people who don’t know?

Topher DeRosia:
Sure. At its simplest HeroPress is a collection of essays. It’s like a blog, but with multiple authors, and people just write about how they’ve leveraged WordPress or it’s community to improve their lives. And that improvement could be anything. Some people, they just are happier that way. Some people it’s the best job they’ve ever had and they can support their family better than they ever have. Some people like to live nomadically and WordPress can help them with that.

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah.

Topher DeRosia:
The topic’s really varied. I started because one time a young man from India asked me … He was frustrated. He asked me about how to get good contracts from America. He wanted business advice and I didn’t have any idea. I’m not a business guy. I’m not Indian. I don’t know any of those things. And so I went out and found some successful Indian WordPressers and connected them.

Allie Nimmons:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Topher DeRosia:
And they were able to help him out. The mission of HeroPress has always been to connect people with the resources they need, whether that’s other people via essays, or just pointing out good resources, like where to learn more and things like that.

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah. That’s so cool. I don’t think I’d heard that story before of why you started it and-

Topher DeRosia:
Oh.

Allie Nimmons:
… That is-

Topher DeRosia:
It’s a much longer story than fits in this podcast. It’s a good one.

Allie Nimmons:
Even that bite size piece, that’s an exceptional story. And it’s such a reflection of, I think our community in general, that you can walk into the room and say, “Hey, does anybody know how to X?”

Topher DeRosia:
Yeah.

Allie Nimmons:
It’s such a global and community, that chances are you will find somebody who knows how to X, and you’ll find people who will teach you how to do things you didn’t even know you were interested in doing.

Topher DeRosia:
Yeah.

Allie Nimmons:
What I really love about HeroPress and the reason primarily that I wanted to have you on is, HeroPress is one of the only resources that I know of in the immediate WordPress community that I would feel confident saying is really and truly a global resource that people from all over the world are represented there. I know sometimes you have people who … It’s not just in English. Right? Sometimes you have people who you will publish their story in their native language.

Topher DeRosia:
Yeah.

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah.

Topher DeRosia:
It’s funny because I’ve learned that, that actually hurts my SEO, because-

Allie Nimmons:
Oh man.

Topher DeRosia:
… Google doesn’t handle it well, the way I’m handling it, the way I’m doing it, multilingual is not bad. But the way I’m doing it is bad for SEO. But I have heard from people that have said, “You know I do speak English and I could have read it in English, but this makes me feel at home. This makes me feel welcome.”

Allie Nimmons:
Yes.

Topher DeRosia:
And that’s good stuff.

Allie Nimmons:
That’s such good stuff. I absolutely love that. It’s, it’s such a great way to honor the writer and the reader’s identity and-

Topher DeRosia:
Yeah.

Allie Nimmons:
… because our language shapes the way that we view the world. And for so many people having had to learn English in order to assimilate to the Western way of things, you lose a little bit of that when you leave your native language behind.

Topher DeRosia:
Yeah.

Allie Nimmons:
That is such a special thing. I don’t know of anything else in our community that allows people to maintain their language that way.

Topher DeRosia:
I’ve learned some really fascinating things about how people relate to their own language.

Allie Nimmons:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Topher DeRosia:
I’ve had a number of people say, “Well yeah, I could write it in my first language, but I don’t really know how I would express it the same way.”

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah.

Topher DeRosia:
I’m, I don’t understand that. I don’t speak into the language. I can’t even conceive of that.

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah.

Topher DeRosia:
This week’s publishes tomorrow, so by the time people are listening, it will be already out. The woman is from South Africa and her first language is Afrikaans.

Allie Nimmons:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Topher DeRosia:
She said to me, thank you so much for having me write it in Afrikaans. Also, I had forgotten what a cool language it is.

Allie Nimmons:
Wow.

Topher DeRosia:
She speaks English so much. She said she really only speaks Afrikaans at home.

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah.

Topher DeRosia:
Her English is so much, that it’s English has become her first language now.

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah.

Topher DeRosia:
But she forgot how cool her own language is and made me feel really happy.

Allie Nimmons:
That’s incredible. Yeah. I’ve heard a lot of … I mean, this is my experience. I’ve heard a lot of Latin American in the visuals say, “I grew up speaking Spanish and then moved to America and now I only really speak Spanish, maybe with my parents or my grandparents.” They begin to lose their Spanish. They begin to forget it.

Topher DeRosia:
Yes.

Allie Nimmons:
It’s a huge cultural upset and identity shifting thing to feel like I’m losing this part of me that I’ve had since I was a baby. Yeah, I really only speak English. I know very, very basic conversational Spanish that I got in school.

Topher DeRosia:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Allie Nimmons:
I cannot imagine seeing the world in these two different lights and having one of them start to kind of go away.

Topher DeRosia:
Yeah.

Allie Nimmons:
I love that particularly for this podcast because, Underrepresented in Tech, we focus on those folks that are underrepresented this world.
What I find to be such an irony with WordPress is that even though it is a global project and a global software, I really only get English speaking content, and North American content creators. That might just be the way that the internet feeds me information. It feels a lot of time like those are just the people that get a lot of uplifting. I don’t know what the truth is.

Topher DeRosia:
Right.

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah, I’ve always really loved HeroPress for that, where you don’t get any preference for being an English speaker or living in the Western part of the world. Everyone is given that spotlight to tell their story. And I think that’s really cool.

Topher DeRosia:
It is cool.

Allie Nimmons:
I’m really curious. You are, correct me if I’m wrong, a straight, white, Midwestern dude.

Topher DeRosia:
I am.

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah.

Topher DeRosia:
I am white bread.

Allie Nimmons:
But you are one of my favorite allies in this community. You are somebody that has always supported me.

Topher DeRosia:
Oh, thank you.

Allie Nimmons:
Always had my back, always cared about the way in which you can do things properly. One of the other reasons I really wanted to have you on is because I think that as an underrepresented person, sometimes we would like the straight, white, Midwestern guys to butt out and let us have our moment, and let us have our conversations, and tell our stories, but that does not mean that allyship is not absolutely essential to growth and development and progress. I’d really love for you to talk a little bit about what you feel like other straight, Midwestern dudes in the community could be doing right now to be better allies to people like myself, and people like Michelle and all of the other underrepresented people in our database. What do you see that next step for the WordPress community to be?

Topher DeRosia:
The thing that really did it for me, was simply becoming aware of how other people live. What life is like. And to a certain extent, it has to matter to you. If it doesn’t matter to you, it’s never going to happen. I mean, you can learn all you want. You Allie can tell me all day long about how you get treated in a certain environment at a certain store, and if I don’t care, then I don’t care.

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah.

Topher DeRosia:
But I do care, and I’ve always cared, but I didn’t know those stories. I didn’t know how you get treated at a certain store. I saw a Tweet several years ago that said, if you’re not following any black women on Twitter, you’re doing it wrong. I thought, that’s interesting. I wonder why they would say that. Why would I follow a random black woman that I don’t know?

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah.

Topher DeRosia:
How do you pick? Why does that matter? I do follow some now that I didn’t know at the time, but I follow a lot more that I do know. I have learned the value. And people say all the time, if you want to be an ally, shut up and listen. I struggled with that for a while, too. If I’m just listening, I’m not doing, if I’m not doing, how am I being an ally. But what I learned is that just following underrepresented people on Twitter, every now and again they’re going to get frustrated and go off.

Allie Nimmons:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Topher DeRosia:
They’re going to say, “This is a horrible thing that happens to people like me. Don’t do that.” I have no idea that stuff happened. I don’t do that. I’ve never seen it happen because I only hang out with white people.
But now I know, and it’s things I can avoid. It’s things I can talk to other white people about avoiding, and it’s everything. It’s everything that every Asian person has ever said. There’s a whole Twitter feed called, I think Asian Woman. It’s just story after story of things people say. “Oh, your English is really good. Where did you come from?” All that crap.

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah.

Topher DeRosia:
And so two things. First you have to care. Second of all, do the listening thing. If you’re not online, go to a black barber shop and ask if you can sit in the corner for five hours and just listen. Listen to the conversation. Listen to what matters to people. You will hear things like, “I got stopped by a cop for no particular reason.” Then you’ll start to realize how often that happens. You’re, “Wow, I had no idea that this was so common.” You just pick up things.
That listening thing is way more significant than I thought. I don’t have to do, while I’m listening. I’m not listening in order to do. I’m not helping you. If you tell me a story. If I tell a story on Twitter, I’m not going to jump in and give advice. I’m going to take that story away, and I’m going to use it a week or a year from now to not do that thing, or to tell my buddy, “Hey, you know what, that’s rude. You shouldn’t be doing that,” or something. That’s how I would recommend you start down the road of being an ally.

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah. That’s very meaningful and that’s really helpful. It’s such an underrated thing to learn how to listen. They say, listen without the intention of responding. I think they call that active listening. Right? Where you’re just-

Topher DeRosia:
Yeah.

Allie Nimmons:
… listening without the intention of, “What am I going to say next?” That can be really hard for a lot of people. That’s hard for me.

Topher DeRosia:
Everybody.

Allie Nimmons:
As soon as you started talking about that, it immediately brought me to that troupe of a husband and a wife, and the wife comes home and she just wants to vent about her day, and the husband is looking for solutions-

Topher DeRosia:
How can I help you?

Allie Nimmons:
… solve the problem. Yeah. She’s just, “I just need you to listen.” And sometimes that is incredibly helpful, is we just need somebody to listen. We just need somebody to acknowledge that what we’re saying is important, because there is a consistent feeling, being an underrepresented person, of being silenced or having your thoughts or feelings matter less than other people’s.

Topher DeRosia:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Allie Nimmons:
The simple act of being listened to, and just to say, “That sucks, and it never should have happened to you, and I’m sorry is so meaningful.” That is something I can attest you have for me in many cases where someone’s being a dick to me on Twitter, and I’ll get a DM from Topher, and he’s, “Man, I’m real sorry. You shouldn’t have had to experience that.” I’m, “Thank you.” That does make me feel better.
Yeah, I really appreciate when people do things like that for me, so if you’re out there and you’re listening and you’re thinking to yourself, how can I be more like Topher? Be more like Topher. Listen to people.

Topher DeRosia:
I’m going to get little bracelets. What would Topher do?

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah. What would Topher do? That’s actually a really good idea. Then I feel like the next step to that is doing something like Topher does, as far as, highlighting those voices. Right? Amplifying those voices. I should say, as far as I know, you don’t get paid for HeroPress. This is, this is not your job. This is a passion project for you. Right?

Topher DeRosia:
It is. I was just telling somebody the other day about all this stuff, and she’s, “That sounds like so much work.” Yeah. That’s why we want to get somebody full time.

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah. That is really exciting.

Topher DeRosia:
You’re right. I’ve been doing it for six years now without pay because I love it. It feeds my soul, but we really want to grow and expand and offer more things to the world and help more people.

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah.

Topher DeRosia:
We’re mostly avoiding sponsorship from companies, and would really like grass root support from everyone in the world. We’ll see how it goes.

Allie Nimmons:
I think it’ll go pretty great. I have high hopes. Yeah. Definitely let us know if Michelle and I can do anything to help promote, or spread the word, share information about all the stuff that you’re doing because it’s super important and it’s super helpful.
I remember back in, gosh, I don’t even know how long ago it was now, when I got my essay on HeroPress. Yeah, it was July 2019 is when my essay went up, and I was so proud of it and I felt so seen and so heard. If you are an underrepresented person and you are interested in sharing your story on HeroPress, how could that person get in touch with you about that Topher?

Topher DeRosia:
If you go to heropress.com, there’s a link in the nav to contribute. You just fill out a little form to tell me who you are and stuff like that. Or you can reach out to me on Twitter, or Slack, or anything like that.

Allie Nimmons:
Cool.

Topher DeRosia:
There’s another Allie on heropress.com. And she told me that when I first pinged her about doing an essay, she felt like she got her Hogwarts letter.

Allie Nimmons:
Is that Allie Dye?

Topher DeRosia:
Yeah.

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah. We had her on a couple of weeks ago, and she’s amazing.

Topher DeRosia:
Yeah.

Allie Nimmons:
Cool. Well, thank you so much Topher for being on the podcast, for sharing this story with us.

Topher DeRosia:
You’re very welcome.

Allie Nimmons:
I really hope that everyone out there listening, if you’re an ally that you think you [inaudible 00:17:17] from this conversation, if you are an underrepresented person that you will go visit HeroPress, and the flip of that too. If you’re an underrepresented person, you can also be an ally. And if you are an ally, I hope you visit HeroPress as well.

Topher DeRosia:
Yeah.

Allie Nimmons:
Yeah, that’s all we’ve got for you for today. Thanks again Topher.

Topher DeRosia:
Yep. Thank you. Bye.

Allie Nimmons:
Awesome. Bye.
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