Don't call people out -- call them in

In her 2021 TEDMonterey talk, Black feminist and human-rights activist Loretta J. Ross proposes “calling in”—inviting someone into a conversation—as one strategy alongside public call-outs. She is not saying that discriminatory speech is harmless or that people who are hurt must forgive those who harm them. Her question is more tactical: when the aim is to change someone’s conduct or understanding, will public humiliation always achieve it? Blame can prompt defensiveness and shift attention from the harm to the speaker’s feeling of being rejected; an invitation can instead keep the conversation focused on what was said and what it did.

Ross does not begin from abstract etiquette. She recalls monitoring hate groups in her work with the National Anti-Klan Network, and describes misgendering a student in class, expecting public condemnation but receiving grace instead. These examples are not equivalent: the first concerns organized white supremacy, the second an individual classroom error. Together they help explain why she values conversation, but they do not mean that every harm should be handled privately. Smith College’s profile also places Ross’s teaching in human rights and her long organizing history across anti-racist work and reproductive justice. Her invitation is a movement strategy, not a neutral courtesy detached from power.

The talk’s most important qualification is Ross’s acknowledgment that call-outs can be necessary to hold powerful people accountable. Whether someone can be “called in” depends on relationship, safety, power and whether the person harmed is willing to spend time on the conversation. If an organization assigns the work of repairing relationships to those who experience discrimination, or invokes “civility” to make them swallow harm, calling in becomes another form of discipline. It is better understood as a possible intervention: when dialogue has a real chance, invite someone to see the effects of their behavior; when power needs to be exposed publicly, naming the harm remains essential.

The TED format also compresses the idea: Ross offers an ethic and a set of conversational tools, not a procedure that can automatically undo structural racism, sexism or institutional harm. Viewers can take the proposal back to a concrete question: who is responsible for opening the conversation, bearing its risks and deciding when it must end? To see how Ross connects human rights, race and collective action in another context, read her paper on intersectional feminist activism and reproductive justice.

Talk and further reading

• Official TED talk and transcript
• Loretta J. Ross at Smith College
• Further reading: Ross’s paper on intersectional feminist activism