Quality Production Is A Justice Issue

Rohini Drake

There was a moment early in the Phygital Fellowship that I haven’t been able to shake. We were on a Zoom call, meeting each other, sharing a bit about the work we care about. That’s when I first heard Tamice Spencer-Helms talk about hush harbors—spaces of hidden, sacred gathering created by enslaved Africans, where faith could be practiced outside the control and surveillance of white Christianity.

I have spent a lot of time in church and work in a rather large one. A well-resourced one. The kind many people would recognize as “mainstream.” And I had never heard of hush harbors. I did what most of us would do. I went looking.

I searched YouTube. I searched Google.

I tried to find something that would help me understand the work of my new colleague. What I found were grainy videos. Zoom recordings. Clips that felt unpolished and hard to follow. And somewhere in that moment, something subtle happened.

My brain told me: maybe this topic of hush harbors isn’t that important.

Not because I believed that. Not consciously. But because most of us have been trained by a culture where:

• clarity signals authority

• polish signals credibility

• High-quality production signals importance

So we begin to trust what looks good and question what doesn’t. That realization unsettled me. Because I noticed how easily I had almost overlooked something deeply meaningful simply because I hadn’t been trained to recognize it.

What We Fund, We Believe

The more I sat with it, the more I began to see the pattern: the ideas that feel safe or sellable get funded. The ideas that get funded get produced. The ideas that get produced get attention. And the ideas that get attention start to feel like truth.

And the ideas that don’t get funded or produced?

They remain harder to find. Harder to engage. Easier to overlook. Not because they lack truth. Not because they lack depth. But because they lack resourcing. That’s when it clicked for me:

Production quality is not just an aesthetic issue. It’s a justice issue.

Because when certain stories don’t get produced, they don’t get heard. And when they aren’t heard, they aren’t valued. In many of our spaces, especially in the church, we’ve come to trust what looks official, credible, professionally produced. Well-designed Bible studies. Polished websites. High-quality video series.

And if I’m honest, those platforms often elevate the same kinds of voices, the same kinds of perspectives, the same kinds of ideas. Not always because they are the most faithful. But because they are the most fundable. The most marketable. The most familiar.

Over time, that shapes what we assume is central. It starts to feel like: this must be what matters most. But what if that’s just what’s been most sellable?

What Gets Left Behind

What I encountered in that first search for an explanation of a new topic wasn’t a lack of substance. There were stories. There was scholarship. There was a lived experience of deep, embodied, and real passion. What was missing was investment in how those stories were shared.

And that matters more than I realized. Because when something is harder to access, the burden shifts. Instead of the system making the story available, the audience has to do the work to recognize its value. Most of us don’t. Not because we don’t care but because we’ve been trained to trust what’s easy to find and see.

This is where something shifted for me. I’ve always cared about creativity. About making things and how something looks and feels. But I hadn’t fully named it as part of justice work.

Now I do.

Because production is not just about aesthetics. It’s about access. It’s about removing distractions so people can actually hear what’s being said. It’s about honoring someone’s voice by presenting it with care. It’s about making space for stories that might otherwise be overlooked.

When something is thoughtfully created, when the audio is clear, the visuals are intentional, the experience is considered, it signals to the audience: this matters.

And I want more of these often overlooked stories to be received that way.

A Different Kind of Calling

I’ve also started to think differently about calling. Some people are called to preach. Some are called to teach. Some are called to organize, to lead, to build. And some of us are called to make things clear. To tell stories that shape experiences that help others see and understand. For a long time, I think I saw that as secondary.

Now I don’t. Because without that work, so many important voices never reach the people who need them.

In that moment, searching and almost dismissing something changed for me. I can’t unsee how much production shapes what we believe. I can’t unsee how credibility is often assigned before content is even considered. I can’t unsee how many important stories are still sitting just outside of what feels legitimate.

And I can’t unsee my role in that.

I don’t think the answer is complicated, but it is costly. We have to start naming that production is not neutral. It never has been. And then we have to decide what we’re going to do about it.

What are we willing to invest in? What stories are we willing to elevate?

What would it look like to bring the same level of care and attention to voices that haven’t historically been given space or funding?

Because justice is not only about what is said. It’s also about what is seen. What is heard. And what is given the chance to be received.

Now, thanks to Tamice, I know all about Hush Harbors and their importance. And because of the work we are doing together producing their podcast, so many others will too. They are a part of our history and Tamice’s work in the world. And both are so important that it needs the highest level of production and care.