The Kokoro Book Club

How do we start creating change with the people we’d rather cancel?

“Calling In” is the next book we’re taking on in the Kokoro Book Club.

We live in a world where algorithms amplify the loudest voices, where we increasingly curate our relationships based on beliefs, style, and social appearance. AI systems make everything smoother and more efficient — but sometimes they remove the frictions that help us grow, understand, and make sense of the world.

In uncertain times like ours, it’s only natural to long for connection and belonging. It might even be the whole point of our lives.

But is our desire to belong to a certain group making us lose the ability to connect with others?

Disagreement — even painful, difficult conversations — is part of any living relationship. We disagree so we can connect. And if we want change to happen beyond our echo chambers, we need those connections.

So choosing Loretta J. Ross’s Calling In for our next Kokoro Book Club was an easy decision after Alejandro Martinez recommended it. Truly grateful - and looking forward to the conversations ahead!

When? Thursday 5th of February at 19:00
Where? @Bar Olinda in the Schönbrunnerstrasse 23, 1050 Vienna

About the book:
From a pioneering Black feminist and MacArthur “Genius” Fellow, this urgent and exhilarating memoir-manifesto-handbook provides bold, practical new ways to transform conflicts into connections, even with those we’re tempted to walk away from.

In 1979, Loretta Ross was a single mother in Washington who’d had to drop out of Howard University. She was working at the DC Rape Crisis Center when the organization got a letter from a man in prison saying he wanted to learn how to not be a rapist anymore.

At first, she was furious. As a survivor of sexual violence, she wanted to write back pouring out her rage. Instead, she made a different choice, a choice to reject the response her trauma was pushing her towards. This choice would set her on the path towards developing a framework that would come to guide her whole career: Rather than calling people out, try to call even your unlikeliest allies in. Hold them accountable—but with love.