Speaker 1: Broadcasting from the Hip Hop Weekly Studios. I'd like to
Speaker 1: welcome you to another episode of Civic Cipher, where our
Speaker 1: mission is to foster allyship empathy and understanding. I'm your host,
Speaker 1: Ramsey's job.
Speaker 2: He is Ramsey's job. I am q Ward. You are
Speaker 2: listening to Civic Scitem and.
Speaker 1: We appreciate that we have a very special show in
Speaker 1: store for you. We're going to be discussing some things
Speaker 1: that have been coming up a lot lately. You know,
Speaker 1: we're watching Fox News discuss the uh shift away from
Speaker 1: Joe Biden in terms of black voters in favor of
Speaker 1: Donald Trump. And it's greatly exaggerated by the way, but
Speaker 1: you know it's it's not nothing. It's something we're talking about.
Speaker 1: And you know, Q and I got to talking, and
Speaker 1: you know, there's this question that exists in the world.
Speaker 1: Are black people a monolith? And often it's used to
Speaker 1: like be very critical of black people and our votes
Speaker 1: and so forth. But today we're going to kind of
Speaker 1: answer that question and give our thoughts into kind of
Speaker 1: the value of being on the same page and how
Speaker 1: that works as a strategy, because there's certainly some other
Speaker 1: folks that adopt that strategy. For long term games rather
Speaker 1: than short term games, and so there's definitely something to
Speaker 1: talk about there. In addition, we are going to take
Speaker 1: the second half of the show to distinguish between Republicans
Speaker 1: and conservatives. I feel like I'm guilty of this, but
Speaker 1: a lot of people are guilty of kind of conflating
Speaker 1: the terms. And there are some people who are conservatives
Speaker 1: that would not fit into the Republican party. And perhaps
Speaker 1: there are even some Republicans that really don't qualify as conservatives.
Speaker 1: And so we're going to take some time to discuss
Speaker 1: both of those and a lot more on today's show.
Speaker 1: But before we get there, as always, let's start off
Speaker 1: the show with some ebony excellence, shall we? I think
Speaker 1: we shall.
Speaker 2: Today's Ebony Excellence sponsored by Actively Black. There is greatness
Speaker 2: in our DNA. Visit actively black dot com. This is
Speaker 2: from the BI in Georgia, Institute of Technology's first black
Speaker 2: graduate handed his granddaughter her diploma during her graduation from
Speaker 2: the school, decades after his historic achievement, and the video
Speaker 2: posted on Instagram, Georgia Tech graduate Deanna Yancey hugged her grandfather,
Speaker 2: Ronald Yansey, the school's first black graduate, for he gave
Speaker 2: her her degree during a commitment ceremony earlier this month.
Speaker 2: The recent graduate earned a master's degree in Electoral, electrical
Speaker 2: and Computer engineering. Dana's achievement comes after her grandfather graduated
Speaker 2: from Georgia Tech in June nineteen sixty five. According to
Speaker 2: the university officials, Georgia Tech was the first college in
Speaker 2: the Deep South to integrate amicably and without a court order.
Speaker 2: Welcoming black students began in nineteen sixty one. However, Ronald
Speaker 2: Yancey previously said his role to getting accepted into the
Speaker 2: university was not easy. Yancey said he was told not
Speaker 2: quote he did not fit the Tech model for success
Speaker 2: end quote, after he wasn't admitted into.
Speaker 3: The school twice in the nineteen sixties.
Speaker 2: A sculpture was built in twenty nineteen in honor of
Speaker 2: Yancey's historic achievement as the first black graduate in school history.
Speaker 2: Earlier this month, Yancey and his granddaughter smiled for pictures
Speaker 2: after he handed her her diploma. Hashtag we can do
Speaker 2: that quote, the university captioned a video for this full
Speaker 2: circle moment. We spoke recently about looking forward to the
Speaker 2: time where first black will stop being a thing. But
Speaker 2: here we are celebrating once again the first black to
Speaker 2: achieve something.
Speaker 3: Well.
Speaker 1: I love the fact that there's some legacy in this
Speaker 1: sty Oh no, I mean yeah, it's very special. Now
Speaker 1: our black people a monolith.
Speaker 3: Go. I've noticed something.
Speaker 2: More in the last let's say decade than at any
Speaker 2: point in my life prior, and that is the need
Speaker 2: for black people specifically, I'll say minorities in general, but
Speaker 2: black people specifically, to distinguish ourselves, to point out the
Speaker 2: diversity and our experience, the diversity and our talents, the
Speaker 2: diversity and our thoughts, the diversity and our intellect, and
Speaker 2: the diversity in our position. With regard to politics, I've
Speaker 2: seen those who have a desire to stand up part
Speaker 2: rather than be seen as followers or sheep or taking
Speaker 2: part in group think. Not just exclaim that we are
Speaker 2: not aman the lith but try to urge or divest
Speaker 2: us from things that in some cases would be in
Speaker 2: our benefit, just for the sake of not subscribing to
Speaker 2: group think, just for the sake of not following what
Speaker 2: seems to be a trend. Mean most notably those of
Speaker 2: us calling for black people to stop being so loyal to.
Speaker 3: The Democratic party.
Speaker 2: I don't like to speak about that and then just
Speaker 2: move on, because there's definitely some merit to the position
Speaker 2: that they take. But I think it's irresponsible to not
Speaker 2: have a suitable replacement in a zero sum game. To say,
Speaker 2: let's divest from the Democratic Party and go over here
Speaker 2: to this other party as if they've done tremendous amount
Speaker 2: of things that are to our benefit. I think is irresponsible,
Speaker 2: And in a lot of cases, that's the solution. They're
Speaker 2: not coming to us saying no political party should just
Speaker 2: have our support forever, while not doing anything to move
Speaker 2: our agenda forward. They are saying, don't give it to
Speaker 2: that party, give it to this one. And in this
Speaker 2: country where the other choice has now become the Maga party,
Speaker 2: what is it that you're suggesting? Right, so, we have
Speaker 2: now created a subgeneration of contrarians with no actual cause.
Speaker 2: There's not something that they actually support. It's just let's
Speaker 2: not do the thing that everybody else is doing. Okay,
Speaker 2: I feel you, Okay, So what should we do instead?
Speaker 2: And that's that question is typically followed up with a
Speaker 2: bunch of straw men, not just straw man, but almost
Speaker 2: ridiculous counter objectives. There's no direction to point us to
Speaker 2: that's better. Let's just not do that because we've always
Speaker 2: done it right. And as much as I think that
Speaker 2: because we've always done it is not a reason to
Speaker 2: continue to if you're suggesting we do something different, point
Speaker 2: us towards something that's better. You know, the strength of
Speaker 2: black people in this country always came from us having
Speaker 2: the same agenda, and I think that that's why post
Speaker 2: civil rights movement you've seen a lot of progress, because
Speaker 2: there is this need to prove how diverse we are,
Speaker 2: and I think it's necessary. It's the reason why this
Speaker 2: conversation is so complicated is because we don't want to
Speaker 2: be lumped together always. We don't want for there to
Speaker 2: be people who feel like they speak for all of us.
Speaker 2: But in certain instances, especially with regards to politics in
Speaker 2: this country, there needs to be an agenda that we
Speaker 2: all kind of take up arms and support because those
Speaker 2: that oppose us are very, very singular in their thought
Speaker 2: and if you're paying attention at all, which is which
Speaker 2: makes this so frustrating to watch what the other side
Speaker 2: of the aisle is doing legislatively, because they're not sneaking
Speaker 2: around anymore.
Speaker 3: They're doing these things right.
Speaker 2: In our faces, with regards to women's rights, with regards
Speaker 2: to diversity, equity, and inclusion, with regards to their rebranding
Speaker 2: and stealing of the idea of critical race theory. UH
Speaker 2: seeing what they're doing with actual American history to whitewash
Speaker 2: and get rid of things that make them uncomfortable or
Speaker 2: that hurt people's feelings. We are watching a party try
Speaker 2: to erase us from history and the future and the future,
Speaker 2: to perpetually subjugate, to perpetually step on everything that's progressive
Speaker 2: for us. And those that we look to, those that
Speaker 2: we celebrate, those who we support, are now taking up
Speaker 2: a stance of endorsing even one of the worst people
Speaker 2: in the history of our political system, excluding no one.
Speaker 2: I'm saying the worst, knowing how things were one hundred
Speaker 2: years ago. I still consider him one of the worst,
Speaker 2: even in comparison to those who came long before him.
Speaker 3: And and and thought leaders, cultural leaders take up.
Speaker 2: A position of I'm just not going to endorse anyone again,
Speaker 2: something that I consider irresponsible because we are not at
Speaker 2: a place we're abstaining has any benefit, you know. I
Speaker 2: wish that we could wave a magic wand and fix
Speaker 2: our political system I do. We unfortunately do not have
Speaker 2: such a magic wand and by abstaining, by just throwing
Speaker 2: up our hands, a person like Donald Trump can become
Speaker 2: the president of the United States. A person like Donald
Speaker 2: Trump can appoint multiple lifelong Supreme Court justices to support
Speaker 2: his agenda. A person like Donald Trump, while being on trial,
Speaker 2: while being indicted, while being charged in both criminal and
Speaker 2: civil court, can be on the cusp of becoming the
Speaker 2: president again while saying out loud that he wants to
Speaker 2: be a dictator, and while so called patriots are showing
Speaker 2: up to his rallies saying they're okay with that too,
Speaker 2: while saying that he feels like as president he should
Speaker 2: have full immunity to do whatever he wants, and saying
Speaker 2: open eyed adult Americans are on camera and otherwise saying yeah,
Speaker 2: I'm okay with that. It is a very very scary
Speaker 2: time to be in a position where I'm a part
Speaker 2: of a group that our political system does not serve.
Speaker 2: That's the part that's important to say, and that makes
Speaker 2: the conversation so difficult to have everybody who wants to
Speaker 2: throw up their hands and just say I'm done with this.
Speaker 3: Like you get it.
Speaker 2: You can't trying to make the argument against why they
Speaker 2: feel that way as a A p flub is what
Speaker 2: we used to call it when there's no solution to
Speaker 2: a problem. They are voting for a party that makes
Speaker 2: promises that it doesn't deliver on. They are participating in
Speaker 2: a system that that doesn't serve them. They are being
Speaker 2: lied to every cycle by candidates who don't deliver on
Speaker 2: their promises. People are not It's not their imagination. They're
Speaker 2: not making up these slights. They are participating in a
Speaker 2: system that's rigged against them. That's true with both sides,
Speaker 2: except one side makes it not worse for all of us,
Speaker 2: and the supporters on that side a delusion, Okay, they
Speaker 2: don't understand that the system is working against them.
Speaker 1: They can conceive of it somehow working for them.
Speaker 2: Ultimately, the group that I'm speaking of has been participating
Speaker 2: in favor of a group that is not doing what
Speaker 2: it said it would do to help and support them,
Speaker 2: and they're they are now saying, either I won't participate,
Speaker 2: or I'll participate for the side who's going to make things.
Speaker 3: Way worse for me.
Speaker 1: I want to I want to jump in here if
Speaker 1: I can. I don't want to be disingenuous, because I
Speaker 1: know that there are people that will listen and say,
Speaker 1: you know, like I was saying that, well, no, that's
Speaker 1: true of both sides. You know, both parties do that,
Speaker 1: and you know, fair point point taken. The thing is
Speaker 1: is that we're going to be able to make this
Speaker 1: point a lot more clearer in the second part of
Speaker 1: the show, where we will uh run through a thought
Speaker 1: experiment and we'd love for you to participate. But I imagine,
Speaker 1: you know, the country was divided into two parts, and
Speaker 1: which part would do better and which part would not uh,
Speaker 1: And then you'll be able to see the point that
Speaker 1: Q is making here, which is that there's a there's
Speaker 1: a particular group of this people on the right, I'll
Speaker 1: say it, that is a lot more convinced that things
Speaker 1: could work for them maybe one day and it just
Speaker 1: won't versus folks on this side who really feel, like, sincerely,
Speaker 1: like it's the lesser of two evils in doing this.
Speaker 1: Things don't get worse. Maybe we can take a baby
Speaker 1: step here and there. And that's kind of.
Speaker 2: What's even more sad, is that things could get worse
Speaker 2: in both cases.
Speaker 3: It's just extreme.
Speaker 2: Yeah, any other a lot more extreme. That's the that's
Speaker 2: the sad part. We can't even we can't even get
Speaker 2: on here because we want to rams and I would
Speaker 2: love to get on here and tell you that you
Speaker 2: have one option that's excellent or that's even or that's
Speaker 2: even good, and we can't. Now, there is data that
Speaker 2: supports very clearly. It's not even subjective. There's objective data
Speaker 2: that shows one side is better than the other. Yeah,
Speaker 2: that means great for us, that mean great in general.
Speaker 2: But it's great for democracy. Yeah, I don't even know that.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's democracy still, it's still democracy. Yeah, I
Speaker 2: don't even know about great for democracy. But it's democracy.
Speaker 1: That's what that's what we're not.
Speaker 2: We're not saying get rid of the Constitution because it
Speaker 2: doesn't serve me, and then having millions of Americans say, yeah,
Speaker 2: let's do that to support our guide like it's really
Speaker 2: turned into something.
Speaker 1: And that's and that's that's the funny part, because these
Speaker 1: are the people that you know, love to bring up
Speaker 1: you know, the intention of the Founding Fathers and you
Speaker 1: know the Second Amendment. They don't know, you know, the
Speaker 1: Bill of Rights, they don't know the Preamble to the Constitution,
Speaker 1: they don't know all that sort of stuff, but they
Speaker 1: know Second Amendment, they know you know, founding Father the God. Yeah,
Speaker 1: now I know all this stuff by heart because I
Speaker 1: went to fourth grade. But but but a lot of
Speaker 1: these people that goes right out the window as soon
Speaker 1: as they start talking about you know, their their candidate
Speaker 1: that they're running right now. So I know what you're saying.
Speaker 1: First thing, though, I want to kind of respond.
Speaker 3: We had a.
Speaker 1: Message and a donation from a listener because of your
Speaker 1: thoughts last week. They were brilliant and masterful.
Speaker 3: I think that's a stretch.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, according to the listener, they were, and then
Speaker 1: he was very moved by that. He listens to us
Speaker 1: on will f M Black Black Sheep Radio, and I
Speaker 1: think that you had another run today. It's just you
Speaker 1: kind of nail it to the wall. One of the
Speaker 1: things that I want to feed you, just to kind
Speaker 1: of see what else comes from this moment, is that
Speaker 1: I think that if we were to think about black
Speaker 1: people in the whole country at some point in the future,
Speaker 1: thirty fifty years in the future, right, the population has
Speaker 1: shifted in an optimal scenario where all of the time
Speaker 1: that we need for all the progress that we want,
Speaker 1: or a good amount of the progress that we want
Speaker 1: has come to pass, and now we're in this more
Speaker 1: utopian society where everyone is just doing better and everyone
Speaker 1: has a better go at things. At that point, it
Speaker 1: might make more sense for people to have black people
Speaker 1: in particular, to have to lean into their they're different experiences, right, Well,
Speaker 1: I grew up this way, Well, I believe these things. Well,
Speaker 1: I like this candidate, right, And there's a little bit
Speaker 1: more diversity in terms of your political persuasion because a
Speaker 1: lot of the foundational boxes that we need checked have
Speaker 1: been checked in this ideal scenario right now. However, we're
Speaker 1: still traveling towards that reality, and so having a singular
Speaker 1: vision and a singular focus makes more sense until we
Speaker 1: get to that point in the future where we can
Speaker 1: be more nuanced in terms of our experience in these
Speaker 1: United States of America. Right now, one of the things
Speaker 1: that we need to come to terms within this country,
Speaker 1: it comes to terms with the fact that we're black.
Speaker 1: And statistically, a lot of stuff, bad stuff affects black
Speaker 1: people more. And it's not because black people are bad
Speaker 1: because of circumstances, systems, stories, etc.
Speaker 3: That have privileged white.
Speaker 1: People and have harmed black and brown people, all of
Speaker 1: which we've delineated and explained on this show. So with
Speaker 1: that in mind, what do you think.
Speaker 2: It's very difficult not to be discouraged about the possible utopia,
Speaker 2: right like it seems no, no, yeah, And I understand
Speaker 2: it seems to be something that's unrealistic, and that's kind
Speaker 2: of where this splintering happens. And again, I think we
Speaker 2: think there is power and not participating. I'm not going
Speaker 2: to keep giving my support to these people who are
Speaker 2: not going to do for me. And what we don't
Speaker 2: understand is that we have to survive. Even times like
Speaker 2: this where there seems to be no solution that's great
Speaker 2: for us, we have to survive it. Participating makes that
Speaker 2: very difficult.
Speaker 3: That the the.
Speaker 2: A lot of the narrative and a lot of the
Speaker 2: kind of out loud logic that I'm hearing now is
Speaker 2: similar to the first time Trump ran for president.
Speaker 3: I hear people.
Speaker 2: Saying out loud, almost dismissively, like he doesn't have a
Speaker 2: chance to win this thing again, and it's like, Yeah,
Speaker 2: what world have you guys been living in? Sure, he's
Speaker 2: always had a more inflated ego and a grander, you know,
Speaker 2: delusion of himself than what's actual. But what is actual
Speaker 2: is that that man ran for president and became president
Speaker 2: for four years, and.
Speaker 3: He was an awful president. People like to throw.
Speaker 2: Political victories at us, all the great things he did
Speaker 2: for black people in for the country.
Speaker 3: There aren't many.
Speaker 2: Things that yeah, yeah, things that happened while he was
Speaker 2: the president that benefited anyone that wasn't rich, wasn't on purpose.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 2: It's like someone's in your house and it catches on
Speaker 2: fire and you put it out. You put it out
Speaker 2: to save your house. You didn't put out to save
Speaker 2: that person. That person might feel like you're their hero,
Speaker 2: and it's like it didn't have nothing to do with you. Yeah,
Speaker 2: you benefited from that by mistake.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah.
Speaker 2: There was nothing I could have done to just let
Speaker 2: the whole thing burn down. So yeah, you live here,
Speaker 2: so yeah, I guess that thing helped you. But there
Speaker 2: was nothing that that man did intentionally to help you.
Speaker 2: And by you, I mean anyone who's listening, no matter
Speaker 2: how you vote, no matter where you're from, no matter
Speaker 2: your status, there's nothing he did to benefit you. He
Speaker 2: did things to benefit himself, his friends. He didn't even
Speaker 2: do things to directly benefit his base on purpose. So
Speaker 2: it's you know, we need some munity and thought. We
Speaker 2: need some unity and intention. We need some unity and action.
Speaker 2: And right now is not the time to flex how
Speaker 2: diverse we are. Right now, it's not the time to
Speaker 2: show how much of a follower you aren't and how
Speaker 2: much of an individual.
Speaker 3: Thinker you are.
Speaker 2: That's just a flex that you get to look like
Speaker 2: the cool person in your social group, and you don't
Speaker 2: look cool. Collectively, we need to do something together, even
Speaker 2: if that's just survive another four years while we keep
Speaker 2: trying to figure this thing out. But not participating and
Speaker 2: or going to the other side is not the answer.
Speaker 2: I don't know how to say it more plainly than that,
Speaker 2: even I don't even know how to like sound motivating.
Speaker 2: The alternative is bad, like historically bad, like no more
Speaker 2: democracy bad.
Speaker 3: I'm not being hyperbolic.