Recording

This is a podcast called Dominating Diversity, hosted by Brooke Tahir. The podcast focuses on equity, inclusion, and diversity, creating spaces where everyone thrives. Brooke shares her personal experiences growing up in a small town affected by drug addiction and struggling with poverty. She was bullied in school and dealt with mental health issues. She pursued a career in the Air Force but was discharged due to PTSD. She traveled and learned about different cultures. She now works in education and is passionate about equity, diversity, and inclusion. The podcast will feature storytelling, expert interviews, and audience engagement, discussing topics such as cultural identity, inclusive education, workplace equity, and representation in media and science. The format will be weekly or bi-weekly, depending on Brooke's schedule. The goal is to have open and honest conversations, create a community, and give voice to marginalized groups. Hi, welcome to Dominating Diversity. My name is Brooke Tahir and let me tell you about why we're here. So, this is a podcast where we dig really deep into equity, inclusion, diversity, just creating spaces where everyone thrives. This podcast will be hosted by me, but of course we're going to have some guests on board and a lot of different expert opinions. So, I grew up in East Switzerland, that's home for me, then I turned the country, in a little town called Bentzdale. It's a community where everyone knows everyone and the town that's sadly affected by the ice epidemic at the moment, it wasn't always like that. I grew up with a single mother who did her best, but sadly she couldn't always make ends meet. With four kids, including two older boys, they probably ate her out of house and home. I grew up without a lot of things that other kids had and experienced things like sexual trauma very, very early on in life, which impacted me in ways I never knew growing up. You don't realise those things until you get to an age where you're learning about it and those memories arise. So, we are going to touch on those really touchy things in this podcast. I want this podcast to be open, honest conversation. So, growing up I went to a small primary school that was riddled with children coming from a low socioeconomic background and that was probably due to the little amount of paying jobs within the community. I was bullied pretty significantly for being different, I assume. Well, that's how it felt anyway. I had ASD, I have ASD and ADHD and I guess I was dealing with PTSD at the time unknowingly. So, I was bullied to the point where I bought extra children from my primary school that probably didn't even consider themselves being a bully. I was probably forgotten. Now, versus me, I still look back at that and feel a lot of pain. This carried on to high school and I started masking a lot. Trying to be one of those cool popular kids to sit in at times was really hard. I was a floater, I floated around groups. Maybe I didn't feel like I belonged anywhere. I feel like I would have done anything to fit in and I did things to show that. Things I'm not so proud of after reflecting on myself later in life. I was only probably around 16 when I left home. My mum suffered with mental health and I wish I could go back in life and stay with her and help her fight, but sometimes you have to not look back at those things because it does hurt. Once I left home, I left and I stuck to my independence. I moved from Bernesville, countryside, right into the heart of Melbourne City into a really dodgy apartment. I dreamt of being a doctor or going in the Air Force and since my doctor dream broke early due to not being able to manage school and a junior paying wage and having to pay rent after moving out for early, I took the Air Force route. Due to PTSD, I was discharged and I lost my dream and I took my childhood perpetrator to court where finally he was charged. I still didn't feel free though. I went travelling and this turned out to be an amazing thing because I learnt so many cultural customs and traditions from all over the world. I came home after meeting my husband in Indonesia. He is Indonesian and I ended up falling sick. I've been diagnosed with so many conditions now. Addison's disease, a brain tumour, epilepsy, fibromyalgia, lung problems, pot heart disease and the list just keeps going until I feel unlike any other person in their 30s with two kids that want to be active with their mum all the time but I'm struggling with a disability and a lot of people in my life still don't understand that but a lot of people out there including you will feel that. I then went and studied biomedical science to pursue my other dream and I've somehow now landed in education which I've become very passionate about. I dedicate a lot of my time to work in EDI, equity, diversity and inclusion, trying to make an impact for others who deserve equality but society becomes a barrier. This is fuelled by my own experiences and I know that I can't change the world but I'd love to do whatever I can to play a part in that. So what is dominating diversity? Well, in my context, we're not just talking about diversity but we're actively transforming spaces and we're having talks about that and we're opening up honest conversation and eye-opening conversation for people out there who still don't get it, for people out there who do want to do more but they want to open their eyes up more. So I want it to be a space for honest conversations, practical insights and voices that are often left unheard from marginalised groups and even people out there that haven't gotten justice that they should have. So it'll be a mix of storytelling, expert interviews, reflective solo episodes and audience engagement. Of course, you are the people who matter as well. So by having my audience engaged and having open and honest conversations on podcasts, that's what I want. I want to create a community here as well, a community of people who really understand what this is all about. So some themes that I'll be exploring, this is not exhaustive though, but could be cultural identity, inclusive education, workplace equity, representation in media and science, intersectionality, real experiences from people and modern equity for Aboriginal people and their rights. So it's the format I'm looking at weekly but it could end up being bi-weekly due to my crazy life. I do expect to have many guest interviews and Q&A segments and reflections.