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By Zerline Hughes Spruill

Fifteen months into this nomad life, you would think I’d have moving down to a science by now. I’ve been on the go this whole time, picking up, packing up and caring for 27 pets during 13 pet sits across four Mexican states, and one in the U.S. right now in Santa Monica, CA, where three Staffies are supervising my typing. All the while, Sojournalisms — my personal hot takes for public consumption — has stayed put since I published my first post here on Substack in February. But, Sojournalisms had to move, too — here on beehiiv.

Leaving was harder than it sounds, because everyone seems to be in the Substack sphere — my editor and writer friends, the journalists whose bylines I’ve clipped since clipping meant cutting actual newsprint pages with scissors. While I’m a beginner, posting on these platforms with a following that could be seated around a generous dinner table (very generous, extra leaf in), and I rarely hear anyone talk about beehiiv, I had to do it. Maybe after reading this, you, too, may consider coming on this side.

The main reason: politics. In late 2023, The Atlantic reported that 16 newsletters on the platform displayed overt Nazi symbols and that Substack was profiting from some of them. The company removed a handful without changing its policies, and Platformer, one of its biggest newsletters, walked out over it. In July 2025, Substack’s own app sent users an alert encouraging them to subscribe to a Nazi newsletter, which the company later called an error. Hosting is one thing. Helping extremists build a following is another. How many errors before it’s a business model?

As a journalist, I am a First Amendment champion; as an advocate for racial justice, I also believe that when a platform knowingly helps put people in jeopardy, the plug should get pulled. Substack has had years to pull it. I learned this and more during the Institute for Independent Journalists conference this past March (attended from my very first Mexican apartment in La Paz, in leggings, a T-shirt and flip-flops).

Uniform vs. Bespoke Formatting: Substack’s design leaves every newsletter looking like a cousin of every other one, while beehiiv lets me decide what mine looks like. Followers aren’t transferable — subscribers can come with you, followers can’t. The metrics are passive, making you feel successful without translating into actual success.

Money Honey: Substack takes 10% of every paid subscription dollar, while beehiiv takes nothing. I pay a flat plan fee instead, plus Stripe’s 2.9% and 30 cents per transaction. When times are this hard, every penny counts, especially for journalists.

I want this writing read, digested, argued with, and (modest goal) I’d like it to help save the world. A few of you subscribed because friends nudged you, and I don’t want to lose a single person who is genuinely interested in what I have to say.

On Sojournalisms, you'll read unassigned work by a journalist living life haphazardly as a Black woman sojourner. That means my observations as an immigrant (not expat) in Mexico, my experiences seeking racial justice and my desire to live simply while freelance writing and pet-sitting my way around the world with my husband. I'll write about my former lives and careers, how we travel on zero budget, the people we meet, what it means to be a journalist in this economy and what it's like trying to parent two 20-somethings, including a transgender kid, while also caring for my 78-year-old mother. I'm sure I've left something out. There's always more."

To my fellow writers and editors: read the fine print, run the numbers and consider who your subscription fees help keep in business, and who you’re sharing a platform with. Then come find me at Sojournalisms: sojournalisms.beehiiv.com. There’s room for all of us here telling and seeking the truth.