Unpopular Facts (+ Opinions and Questions)

My life presage from 25 years ago

My life presage from 25 years ago

As a memento of elementary school, my 5th grade class was asked to submit two writing pieces for a 5th grade anthology.

One about a field trip.?The other about anything of our choice.

The "paper" above is what I chose to submit.?It's about Susan B. Anthony, equal rights, women's voices, and “the confidence to speak out.”?And it sits today as one of the only two framed photos in my home.?

Indeed a memento.?And a presage.

If you know me, you'll be struck that, even then as a ten year old, I felt intrinsically such principles and values, and they’ve remained the ones that move me today.

A thread connects that "paper" to my educational, social, and professional pursuits, to Andav Capital , and to announcing today -- on this first day of women's history month 2023 -- a new and dutiful memento and presage: writings and thoughts, which -- in an absolute departure from the past 25 years -- I will be publishing in my most public, uncomfortable, unadvisable, assailable way, here on LinkedIn, in a collection called "Unpopular Facts +" aka "Unpopular Facts (+ Opinions & Questions)" aka Unpopular+.

Why? you may ask.

For years, colleagues, business peers, and classmates have implored me, "you need to write," "you need to speak about these issues,"?"you need to tell your story."

I assured them that, sure I could but was smart enough to know that in American society, there would be little upside to doing so, because who I am and what I believe is paradoxical and inconvenient for today's polarized society, unable to engage in civil discourse.?

Yet, at the same time, as a true lifelong student of political science, I know the very absence of that civil discourse engenders further societal strife and the demise of nations.

You see, there's a significant gap in my 1-on-1 and small group civil discourse versus what I share publicly or on any social media, precisely because of the devolution of constructive civil discourse and its villainization in the rooms and among the very groups that would benefit from embracing it.

100 years ago Americans fought for the "confidence to speak out" but today we waste that tool, we have blunted it, weaponized it, and used it to tear down the diversity of thought, paradoxical lived histories, and dutiful civil discourse that motivated this country into being.

With trepidation and necessity, alea iacta est and welcome to "Unpopular Facts +."

Nisha Desai?

March 1, 2023

New York, NY