Karen Hawkins

I’m Karen Hawkins, a lifelong journalist, serial entrepreneur and mouthy Black lesbian feminist of the Gen-X variety. I’m the founder of Rebellious Magazine for Women and co-host of Of Course I’m Not OK: The Podcast.

I’m making a purposeful pivot to life and leadership coaching, and I’m here to help journalists get and stay grounded, reconnect to their why and people better.

My business tagline is: “Empowering journalists. Detoxifying journalism.”

What do I mean when I say, “detoxifying journalism”?

I mean disrupting the parts of the industry that denies journalists’ humanity, that cares more about stories than the people who produce them.

When I say detoxifying, I mean: No. More. Yelling. I’m a peaceful person, but if one more coaching client tells me their boss yells at them, I’mma throw hands. If you can’t communicate to your staff at the volume you’d talk to your Momma, stop talking and please, go calm down.

No more gaslighting.

An end to corrosive competition.

I’ve worked in newsrooms big and small, in person and online, as a reporter and as The Boss. I’d love to tell you I found all of those experiences nurturing and respectful, but, welp, not for nothing is my magazine called Rebellious.

Journalism is my first love, and I want it to do better. I want it to treat the people I love better. I want people who choose to leave to do so with their heads high and their hearts full, not beat down and more than a little bitter.

I can’t change journalism, but I can support the people who do it. I put “empowering journalists” first in my tagline because that’s where I’m starting.