WEBVTT - Part One: Black Antifascists In the Spanish Civil War 0:00:01.680 --> 0:00:06.640 Cool Zone Media. Hello, and welcome to Cool People Did 0:00:06.640 --> 0:00:09.119 Cool Stuff. You're a weekly reminder that when there's bad 0:00:09.160 --> 0:00:12.640 things happening, there's good things happening too. I'm your host, 0:00:12.720 --> 0:00:17.160 Margaret Kiljoy, and this week is different. Well, every week's different. 0:00:17.200 --> 0:00:19.400 Every week is a completely different thing. That's the great 0:00:19.400 --> 0:00:22.200 thing about having this podcast is that it's different every week. 0:00:22.400 --> 0:00:25.800 But this week is even a different format because instead 0:00:25.840 --> 0:00:28.280 of me being the podcast expert, I'm gonna be the 0:00:28.320 --> 0:00:31.960 podcast idiot. Because the podcast expert this week who's gonna 0:00:31.960 --> 0:00:35.840 explain some stuff to me is my friend Jordan from 0:00:36.240 --> 0:00:41.400 the Dugout, a Black anarchist podcast. Hi Jordan, Hello, how's 0:00:41.520 --> 0:00:44.559 your week? Everything's fine, right. 0:00:45.479 --> 0:00:47.519 Yeah, I mean it's been about the same. I think 0:00:47.560 --> 0:00:50.000 I've been on this earth around twenty three years and 0:00:50.080 --> 0:00:53.720 not honestly, not much has changed, you know, patriarch baby, 0:00:53.880 --> 0:00:56.160 But you know, other than that, we're still out here. 0:00:56.560 --> 0:01:01.000 Yeah. The other voice you're hearing is Sophie producer. Hi Sophie. 0:01:01.120 --> 0:01:04.600 He I'm Magpie. Hi Jordan, Sophie. I'm glad to have 0:01:04.640 --> 0:01:05.000 you back. 0:01:05.600 --> 0:01:06.039 Missed too. 0:01:06.360 --> 0:01:11.319 I think everyone else is too, And if they're not, 0:01:11.600 --> 0:01:15.560 they can stop listening right now. As a podcast for 0:01:15.600 --> 0:01:18.120 Sophie fans only. Don't, but don't because this is a 0:01:18.120 --> 0:01:22.600 really good topic that's true, very important. So what happened 0:01:22.720 --> 0:01:26.720 was I was like, there's this stuff I want to 0:01:26.760 --> 0:01:29.040 know about, and Jordan was like, I've been reading an 0:01:29.040 --> 0:01:31.720 awful lot about that stuff. And I was like, you 0:01:31.720 --> 0:01:37.000 should tell me that's that's what happened. But Jordan, who 0:01:37.080 --> 0:01:40.440 are you and what are you an expert that you're 0:01:40.440 --> 0:01:41.200 going to explain to me? 0:01:41.840 --> 0:01:46.320 Uh? Yeah, I'm Jordan. I am a archivist and queer 0:01:46.360 --> 0:01:51.480 organizer and a Midwest and yeah, I'm going to talk 0:01:51.520 --> 0:01:55.200 today about black anti fascists in the Spanish Civil War. 0:01:55.440 --> 0:01:59.320 This is something that I've been researching for honestly a 0:01:59.360 --> 0:02:01.480 couple of years loose sleeve, but I've been really trying 0:02:01.480 --> 0:02:04.160 to get the fire in my belly for it, and 0:02:04.320 --> 0:02:07.440 having this conversation with you is able to actually help 0:02:07.520 --> 0:02:10.200 my me and my ADHD brain sit down and actually 0:02:10.240 --> 0:02:14.079 finish a book, which I possibly finished too many books 0:02:14.080 --> 0:02:16.080 for this. But the love of the game. 0:02:16.200 --> 0:02:19.520 Love of the game we were talking earlier about, like 0:02:20.120 --> 0:02:23.800 Jordan was like, how do you stop with each topic? 0:02:24.960 --> 0:02:28.359 And the answer is that time deadlines are the only 0:02:28.400 --> 0:02:29.399 reason I stop each stop. 0:02:29.520 --> 0:02:33.320 Why do you think there's always like an entire context episode. 0:02:33.639 --> 0:02:37.600 Yeah, but before we talk about all of that, we 0:02:37.639 --> 0:02:40.560 should talk about the fact that our audio engineer is 0:02:40.639 --> 0:02:42.720 named Rory. Hi. Rory Hi Ri. 0:02:43.840 --> 0:02:45.320 I've been waiting to do that for so long. 0:02:45.800 --> 0:02:48.240 I know. I'm excited that you get to and also, 0:02:48.320 --> 0:02:51.160 dear listener, you get to say hi Rory wherever you are. 0:02:51.520 --> 0:02:55.120 It's always fun to do that in public. And our 0:02:55.160 --> 0:02:58.760 theme music was written forced by own woman. Okay, so 0:02:58.760 --> 0:03:01.680 we're gonna talk about black anti fascists in the spanishivil War. 0:03:02.400 --> 0:03:05.280 Yeah. Absolutely, this is my takeover of cool people. I 0:03:05.320 --> 0:03:09.359 finally get to be the person who tells you who's cool. Yeah. 0:03:09.560 --> 0:03:13.000 I do a lot of researching a lot of black history, 0:03:13.040 --> 0:03:16.480 a lot of black anarchists or black liberation history, and 0:03:16.560 --> 0:03:20.880 in doing that, I have found that there's so much 0:03:21.600 --> 0:03:26.600 like bottom up approaches to fighting against oppressive institutions that 0:03:26.680 --> 0:03:30.400 don't get called anarchists throughout history, and I actually love it. 0:03:30.400 --> 0:03:32.800 It's part of what drives me to my politic in 0:03:32.840 --> 0:03:35.960 and of itself. And in doing a lot of research 0:03:35.960 --> 0:03:40.000 for this episode, there's just a lot of like black 0:03:40.040 --> 0:03:44.080 resistance that is so bold, very beautiful and brilliant, and 0:03:44.320 --> 0:03:47.600 a lot of it gets erased, especially anti fascist history, 0:03:48.160 --> 0:03:51.160 because fascism as we know it right now wasn't really 0:03:51.360 --> 0:03:55.520 named until like nineteen twenty twentieth century. European fascism is 0:03:55.560 --> 0:03:58.320 kind of where we get some of our understandings. 0:03:59.080 --> 0:04:02.600 Yeah, that's a europe problem, right, Like only Europe had fascism, 0:04:02.600 --> 0:04:05.320 and therefore that only affected other Europeans. I think Europe 0:04:05.400 --> 0:04:07.880 historically only affects Europe, isn't it. 0:04:08.600 --> 0:04:11.200 Yeah, they never left the continent. You know, every bloody, 0:04:11.280 --> 0:04:15.080 terrible war was totally absolutely insular, which was great for 0:04:15.440 --> 0:04:19.000 something we might call internal colonizing or I think there's 0:04:19.000 --> 0:04:21.560 this one phrase I love that's like before Europe colonized 0:04:21.600 --> 0:04:24.599 the world, they had to colonize themselves. And I think 0:04:24.680 --> 0:04:30.920 it's a really then truer like exposing like oppressive, violent 0:04:30.920 --> 0:04:38.680 institutions and in exposing like fascism or like othering and 0:04:38.920 --> 0:04:43.800 having that sort of out group to define your terror 0:04:43.839 --> 0:04:49.640 on and build fear around to kind of not sometimes 0:04:49.720 --> 0:04:52.359 control a population, but more control what they think is 0:04:52.440 --> 0:04:56.839 possible and what they think is a reason for certain 0:04:56.839 --> 0:05:01.880 downturns in the economy or certain downturns in social life 0:05:02.240 --> 0:05:03.279 and right. 0:05:03.160 --> 0:05:05.080 So like they have to blame the other in order 0:05:05.120 --> 0:05:07.640 to build the authoritarian state inside. 0:05:08.040 --> 0:05:11.240 Yeah, absolutely, and that kind of displacement of fear and 0:05:11.279 --> 0:05:14.360 displacement of responsibility. Then to then put all of our 0:05:14.400 --> 0:05:18.800 problems onto typically like strong man authoritarian type leadership to 0:05:18.839 --> 0:05:20.600 be like, well, I will solve it. I will give 0:05:20.640 --> 0:05:24.520 you quick and easy solutions, quote unquote quick and easy solutions, 0:05:24.600 --> 0:05:30.040 which are typically just disappearances and the status quo governing 0:05:30.080 --> 0:05:34.840 body going forward. And typically also like capitalists and the 0:05:34.920 --> 0:05:37.480 old power structures, it could be it will see in 0:05:37.520 --> 0:05:42.440 Spain feudal structures alongside capitalist structures that are vuying to continue, 0:05:43.040 --> 0:05:46.880 like their sort of control over the economy, people's labor, 0:05:47.080 --> 0:05:50.920 and the international relations. And in doing a lot of 0:05:50.920 --> 0:05:53.919 this black anarchist research, I found a lot of anti 0:05:53.960 --> 0:05:58.000 authoritarian and communist histories, many that have lived lives of 0:05:58.080 --> 0:06:02.479 resistance without calling themselves. And something in my work is 0:06:02.480 --> 0:06:04.640 that like, I'm not here to label any of these ancestors, 0:06:04.640 --> 0:06:09.200 but drawing a lineage an anti authoritarian thought that reminds 0:06:09.279 --> 0:06:12.279 us how and why folks have fought and why they've 0:06:12.320 --> 0:06:16.920 fought in certain ways because anti fascism and fascism isn't 0:06:17.080 --> 0:06:21.560 something abstract or academic. It's intensely real for a lot 0:06:21.600 --> 0:06:25.240 of folks. And that violence comes through the history and 0:06:25.320 --> 0:06:29.560 legacy of imperialism and colonialism of when Europe especially Europeans, 0:06:29.600 --> 0:06:31.760 were like, well, let's go down to the continent of 0:06:31.760 --> 0:06:34.040 Africa and take over norther theft or even just like 0:06:34.080 --> 0:06:38.200 this whole history even back through the romans of taking 0:06:38.680 --> 0:06:43.040 over in like colonizing other places, and eventually the through 0:06:43.040 --> 0:06:45.400 line of what we see now is like these large 0:06:45.440 --> 0:06:49.400 settler colony societies in which the whole purpose of it, 0:06:49.480 --> 0:06:53.040 the whole foundation of their societies is based on the 0:06:53.120 --> 0:06:58.080 violence of erasure and displacement and stolen labor and forced labor. 0:06:58.600 --> 0:07:04.080 And to keep that sort of control going, one has 0:07:04.120 --> 0:07:07.680 to not recognize it as a fault. And that's where 0:07:07.680 --> 0:07:10.520 we are in America is we've never recognized any of 0:07:10.520 --> 0:07:14.800 our faults or any of our contradictions and our foundations. 0:07:15.160 --> 0:07:17.280 Right, so it's like we can end up fascist in 0:07:17.360 --> 0:07:19.760 part because we don't acknowledge the fact that we started. 0:07:21.000 --> 0:07:23.400 Let's go with real bad fascism is obviously like a 0:07:23.520 --> 0:07:26.000 unique political ideology, and we can't just apply it to 0:07:26.000 --> 0:07:30.360 everything in the past, but obviously, like the horror mess 0:07:30.360 --> 0:07:32.920 we're dealing with now with rise of fascism is obviously 0:07:32.960 --> 0:07:35.320 like and I was like talking to my friend about this 0:07:35.360 --> 0:07:38.160 the other day where I was like, well, it's like 0:07:38.360 --> 0:07:41.240 we're dealing with something really, really horrible right now, it's 0:07:41.240 --> 0:07:45.160 still better than eighteen fifty in America. Like, even though 0:07:45.160 --> 0:07:47.680 what we have now we could call fascist, it you know, 0:07:47.800 --> 0:07:50.680 derives from the fascist ideology, don't. 0:07:50.720 --> 0:07:54.920 And the fascist that we used to coin the name 0:07:55.000 --> 0:07:59.880 like Hitler and Mussolini and Franco. These are people who 0:08:00.120 --> 0:08:05.880 quoted the US, quoted and cited Jim Crow laws in 0:08:06.200 --> 0:08:09.560 our use of gas chambers in their reasoning and using 0:08:09.560 --> 0:08:11.680 it as like well, if the US did it, and 0:08:11.720 --> 0:08:13.920 actually if you make people second class citizens, it's so 0:08:14.040 --> 0:08:17.160 much easier to actually just erase them and do a 0:08:17.200 --> 0:08:21.760 genocide that this is the model that then Germany tries 0:08:21.800 --> 0:08:24.080 to use. And there's something that I talk about and 0:08:24.120 --> 0:08:27.880 I was like, it does look kind of nineteen thirties 0:08:28.040 --> 0:08:31.160 Germany and America, but it more looks like still eighteen 0:08:31.240 --> 0:08:35.120 nineties America. It looks like a post reconstruction America more 0:08:35.120 --> 0:08:37.440 than it does like we have like our Gilded Age 0:08:37.480 --> 0:08:40.520 or oligarchies, and we have the people. We feel like 0:08:40.559 --> 0:08:44.720 we're on the precipice of something and the ruling class 0:08:44.760 --> 0:08:48.480 is coming in very very hard to maintain its power structure, 0:08:48.880 --> 0:08:51.120 and they know how early they have to get on this. 0:08:51.120 --> 0:08:55.000 This is the basis of like counterinsurgency work, as being 0:08:55.080 --> 0:08:58.040 so preemptive that you end up just creating a police state, 0:08:58.640 --> 0:09:02.040 which in America we've been kind of fine with that 0:09:03.480 --> 0:09:05.200 for the most part. 0:09:05.760 --> 0:09:07.679 Okay, when I derailed us, we'll talk about history part. 0:09:07.760 --> 0:09:08.320 Sorry about that. 0:09:08.880 --> 0:09:12.680 No, you're good. It's a good little conversation. But yeah, 0:09:12.720 --> 0:09:14.920 today I'm going to talk a lot about going into 0:09:14.960 --> 0:09:17.679 the lives of black anti fascists, especially from America, who 0:09:17.840 --> 0:09:21.520 volunteered to participate in the Spanish Civil War, and especially 0:09:21.520 --> 0:09:25.640 those who joined the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, those that came 0:09:25.679 --> 0:09:28.600 to see fascism as a threat to their lives, freedoms, 0:09:28.840 --> 0:09:31.959 how they got suspain, and what they experienced there, kind 0:09:32.000 --> 0:09:35.280 of what happened after the war, and including somehow some 0:09:35.360 --> 0:09:39.319 of them went on to work to protect one of 0:09:39.360 --> 0:09:42.120 the greatest culture icons of the twentieth century, Paula Robinson, 0:09:42.320 --> 0:09:46.360 my opinion, love the man. But one thing to kind 0:09:46.400 --> 0:09:49.280 of talk about before is like, for me, this episode 0:09:49.280 --> 0:09:52.040 and other things is a context episode. I'm not really 0:09:52.040 --> 0:09:55.600 going to start getting into the war until the second episode. 0:09:55.720 --> 0:09:58.800 And for folks who haven't heard more about this before, 0:09:58.840 --> 0:10:01.520 we've done a fair number of pisodes on this, possibly 0:10:01.559 --> 0:10:03.760 too many episodes about it. But why not always talk 0:10:03.760 --> 0:10:05.920 about the Spanish Civil War because it's the war that 0:10:06.080 --> 0:10:08.400 started World War Two in a way, you know, it's 0:10:08.440 --> 0:10:11.880 the mini war before it. This was the first showdown 0:10:11.920 --> 0:10:15.800 between fascist and you would say republican or leftist forces 0:10:15.840 --> 0:10:19.760 that happened in the World War II era from nineteen 0:10:19.800 --> 0:10:22.480 thirty six to nineteen thirty nine, and it started with 0:10:22.840 --> 0:10:27.600 Franco a fascist, a Catholic fascist, attempting a coup, and 0:10:27.600 --> 0:10:31.040 then that coup failed because people resisted it, and instead 0:10:31.080 --> 0:10:33.080 it turned into the Spanish Civil War. All of the 0:10:33.120 --> 0:10:36.520 other powers of the Western Powers, like sat aside while 0:10:36.520 --> 0:10:41.800 the fascists basically Germany and Italy helped Franco win. And 0:10:42.960 --> 0:10:46.079 it was a long, bloody, drawn out fight and also 0:10:46.200 --> 0:10:48.480 one of the most fascinating periods and one of the 0:10:48.520 --> 0:10:51.320 most utopian periods in some ways that has ever happened 0:10:51.360 --> 0:10:54.360 with people experimenting with whole new ways of being, and 0:10:54.640 --> 0:10:57.839 so there's a reason everyone's obsessed with it. And if 0:10:57.840 --> 0:11:00.480 you want to know more about it, check out roughly 0:11:00.760 --> 0:11:03.040 a quarter of our episodes. And I'm sorry about that, 0:11:03.080 --> 0:11:04.960 but this one's good. I've been wanting to hear more 0:11:04.960 --> 0:11:07.079 about this particular aspect of it for a long time. 0:11:07.520 --> 0:11:10.680 Yeah, this I think is a very beautiful time in 0:11:10.880 --> 0:11:14.960 history for anti authoritarians, especially now. But any folks that 0:11:15.000 --> 0:11:19.760 are organizing against fascism, against authoritarianism, against patriarchal violence, and 0:11:19.880 --> 0:11:25.200 are understanding their relationship to violence, their relationship to what 0:11:25.280 --> 0:11:29.520 different roles in organizing against authoritarian structures look like. I 0:11:29.559 --> 0:11:33.240 feel like this little time capsule in history lets folks 0:11:33.360 --> 0:11:36.200 know that there are ways to move through, even like 0:11:36.280 --> 0:11:39.960 military discipline. Like there's a lot of really good essays 0:11:40.000 --> 0:11:44.680 and articles about how anarchists in the time period experimented 0:11:44.679 --> 0:11:47.520 with different levels of military discipline and what that meant 0:11:47.559 --> 0:11:51.320 for them and how that was up versus a lot 0:11:51.360 --> 0:11:54.560 of the machismo that comes with anti fascism in the 0:11:54.640 --> 0:11:58.600 day and age. And one thing I think is also 0:11:58.720 --> 0:12:00.400 very interesting about the time period is I think it 0:12:00.440 --> 0:12:04.440 was only the USSR in Mexico that were supporting the republic. 0:12:04.760 --> 0:12:07.319 There are Republican sides at the time, and Mexico even 0:12:07.640 --> 0:12:10.439 allowed near the end of the war folks to repatriate 0:12:10.559 --> 0:12:13.080 to the area. So a lot of Spanish ANDCI fascists 0:12:13.080 --> 0:12:16.480 went to Mexico, and a lot of people in the 0:12:16.520 --> 0:12:19.400 Internationalist forces as well went to Mexico after the war. 0:12:19.960 --> 0:12:22.760 Yeah, and when we talk about internationalist forces again, for 0:12:22.800 --> 0:12:27.080 folks who were listening while the governments besides Mexico and 0:12:27.240 --> 0:12:30.840 USSR sat aside and didn't help the left in the 0:12:30.840 --> 0:12:34.000 Spanish Civil War, a lot of individuals from the United States, 0:12:34.040 --> 0:12:37.719 from France, from England, from other places Italy went to 0:12:38.720 --> 0:12:40.240 Spain and fought. And that's what we're going to be 0:12:40.240 --> 0:12:40.760 talking about. 0:12:41.000 --> 0:12:43.920 Yeah, I believe there were fifty two different nationalities and 0:12:43.960 --> 0:12:48.240 countries represented in the Internationalists brigades. And it really shows 0:12:48.280 --> 0:12:53.520 like people showed up the attack started happening. And I 0:12:53.600 --> 0:12:55.040 get into this a little bit more, but there were 0:12:55.120 --> 0:12:57.800 very interesting ways in which they used newspapers and media 0:12:57.840 --> 0:13:01.160 to call for people to come and support their struggle. 0:13:01.320 --> 0:13:06.640 But people came. But before there was Spain, there was Ethiopia. 0:13:07.160 --> 0:13:11.040 There was the violence in Harlem in the Deep South, 0:13:11.480 --> 0:13:14.839 and it was a long battle for black dignity and survival. 0:13:15.480 --> 0:13:18.240 And this is about people who refuse to just wait 0:13:18.280 --> 0:13:21.240 for justice, people who saw anti fascism as not just 0:13:21.280 --> 0:13:24.480 a political stance, but a moral one, a spiritual one, 0:13:24.559 --> 0:13:28.480 and a very very personal one. Hell yeah, yeah. The 0:13:28.520 --> 0:13:31.480 paths to Spain didn't start in nineteen thirty six. To me, 0:13:31.600 --> 0:13:33.679 it kind of starts with World War One and how 0:13:33.720 --> 0:13:36.959 we understand some of the concepts and how black veterans 0:13:37.240 --> 0:13:40.840 came home after this quote war to end all wars 0:13:41.160 --> 0:13:46.200 and were still met with extreme racism, poverty, vigilante terror. 0:13:46.960 --> 0:13:50.480 There was in nineteen nineteen the Red Summer, which was 0:13:50.679 --> 0:13:55.600 a blood soaked welcome that sparked something deeper into a 0:13:55.600 --> 0:13:58.080 lot of folks. So when you say the Red Summer 0:13:58.679 --> 0:14:02.599 of nineteen nineteen, what's that about? Is that the like 0:14:02.600 --> 0:14:05.240 like the bombing of Black Wall Street and stuff like that, Like, 0:14:05.280 --> 0:14:08.280 what's the what's the red Summer? You know, I actually 0:14:08.360 --> 0:14:10.760 can't remember if the Tulsa thing happened in the Red Summer, 0:14:10.920 --> 0:14:14.320 but it was a bunch of white supremacists terror and 0:14:14.440 --> 0:14:18.520 race riots that happened, and dozens of cities across the 0:14:18.640 --> 0:14:23.240 US and some rural counties as well. There was a 0:14:23.280 --> 0:14:26.880 lot of civil rights activists that coined the term, and 0:14:27.440 --> 0:14:30.920 they had organized a lot of peaceful protests against racial 0:14:31.000 --> 0:14:35.800 violence in that summer, and they were attacked by racial 0:14:35.960 --> 0:14:38.480 terror by folks who were in their communities and did 0:14:38.480 --> 0:14:42.240 not want to stand for that sort of racial equity. 0:14:42.880 --> 0:14:44.120 In that kind of talk, there was a lot of 0:14:44.120 --> 0:14:47.320 white on black violence. There was a lot of race 0:14:47.440 --> 0:14:52.240 riots in Chicago, Washington, d c. And then it was 0:14:52.360 --> 0:14:56.360 kind of related to the demobilization of folks coming back 0:14:56.400 --> 0:14:58.400 from World War One and kind of the economic downturn 0:14:58.480 --> 0:15:00.560 that the US was kind of starting to ben and 0:15:00.600 --> 0:15:04.840 folks were still coming through too on and there was 0:15:04.920 --> 0:15:08.040 a lot of labor unrest happening in that time and 0:15:08.120 --> 0:15:12.360 a lot of labor organizing that, especially in America, still 0:15:12.400 --> 0:15:15.000 had a lot of racial undertones. So there was a 0:15:15.000 --> 0:15:17.960 lot of folks that came back from the war. They 0:15:18.000 --> 0:15:20.400 came back, they tried to get different jobs. Some of 0:15:20.440 --> 0:15:24.040 them started organizing, but black folks weren't let into the unions, 0:15:24.040 --> 0:15:27.040 they weren't let on shop floors. There was organizing against 0:15:27.040 --> 0:15:30.360 that with the long shore Men's and in the IWW. 0:15:29.800 --> 0:15:32.360 When you're saying that, when you're saying organizing against that, 0:15:32.400 --> 0:15:35.040 you mean not organizing against black people joining, but rather 0:15:35.200 --> 0:15:38.120 organizing against the racism that was preventing black people from joining. 0:15:38.360 --> 0:15:42.000 Yeah. Absolutely, absolutely cool. And this is sort of one 0:15:42.000 --> 0:15:45.760 of the motivators for what was called like the Great Migration, 0:15:45.800 --> 0:15:48.480 which has went around like half a million African Americans 0:15:48.720 --> 0:15:52.360 left the southern United States and started going north and west. 0:15:52.600 --> 0:15:56.320 And this is also a time like to recognize that 0:15:56.360 --> 0:15:58.560 like the South wasn't I don't know if it still is. 0:15:58.600 --> 0:16:00.800 I don't think it is is a majority blo space, 0:16:01.120 --> 0:16:04.800 and especially was in the twentieth and eighteenth century, which 0:16:04.800 --> 0:16:08.160 is one reason when I look when fascist dictators, look 0:16:08.280 --> 0:16:13.160 at how the US appropriated violence against black citizen injury, 0:16:13.200 --> 0:16:16.320 a majority citizen injury to have a white rule, a 0:16:16.360 --> 0:16:21.920 white minority rule, it's very influential to the foundations of 0:16:22.040 --> 0:16:26.600 a lot of internal fascist violence or internal violence. Okay, 0:16:27.520 --> 0:16:31.720 but yeah, the black anti fascism is in my opinion 0:16:31.800 --> 0:16:35.320 also it goes back to colonialism. It goes this black 0:16:35.440 --> 0:16:42.240 anti authoritarian urge, goes back to indigenous Africans being stolen, propertied, 0:16:42.360 --> 0:16:45.680 sold into slavery and their descendants and those who immigrated 0:16:45.680 --> 0:16:50.120 here fighting back against that colonial violence and against that 0:16:50.200 --> 0:16:54.160 repatiation is older than the country itself, with the first 0:16:54.160 --> 0:16:59.760 slaver volts, maroon societies, insurrections happening since we landed here. Yeah, 0:17:00.280 --> 0:17:01.640 kind of one of the first things I want to 0:17:01.640 --> 0:17:05.119 give some examples of that is in the Palmarras area 0:17:05.280 --> 0:17:08.560 of Brazil and around sixteen oh four, a republic of 0:17:08.720 --> 0:17:12.720 mainly free Africans and indigenous societies made villages, war camps, 0:17:12.880 --> 0:17:18.840 formed republics to fight off Portugal armies for decades, raiding plantations, 0:17:19.000 --> 0:17:22.920 maintaining agriculture using the forests and like guerrilla tactics and 0:17:23.000 --> 0:17:26.119 knowledge of the land to survive and grow and oper 0:17:26.359 --> 0:17:30.240 in like indirect opposition to colonial slavery. 0:17:30.520 --> 0:17:33.800 Yeah, they like literally had their own basically country going on, right. 0:17:34.480 --> 0:17:38.800 Yeah. Absolutely, it was like the name itself for the 0:17:39.720 --> 0:17:43.440 I think it's Colombos. Colombos it means like I think 0:17:43.440 --> 0:17:46.760 it means like war camp and village. And so they 0:17:46.760 --> 0:17:49.080 were like a bunch of federated war camps and villages 0:17:49.119 --> 0:17:53.200 that were there as both defensive outposts to like very 0:17:53.240 --> 0:17:58.359 purposely maintain the society outside of colonial violence, and also 0:17:59.080 --> 0:18:01.600 I would love to do more research into the race relations. 0:18:01.600 --> 0:18:05.359 But they were very much against the sort of the 0:18:05.400 --> 0:18:08.159 sort of racial hierarchy and cast hierarchy that Portugal and 0:18:08.240 --> 0:18:12.480 the Dutch were trying to implement in that region, though 0:18:12.720 --> 0:18:14.800 they still at some points worked with the Dutch to 0:18:15.080 --> 0:18:19.800 fight off Portugal advancements. But that's what alliances are for. Yeah. 0:18:19.840 --> 0:18:21.800 No, it's like some of that stuff is so interesting 0:18:21.800 --> 0:18:24.080 because even some of the Maroon societies, like I don't 0:18:24.080 --> 0:18:26.240 know about specifically about the Columbos, but some of them 0:18:26.280 --> 0:18:29.080 even like had slavery within them, but they were still 0:18:30.440 --> 0:18:33.560 like they were They're just separate societies that were on 0:18:34.160 --> 0:18:37.320 I don't know, they're fascinating. I always want to know 0:18:37.359 --> 0:18:38.320 more about them, you know. 0:18:39.080 --> 0:18:42.040 I know that's one of those things I found right before, 0:18:42.280 --> 0:18:43.760 like a couple of days ago, and was like this, 0:18:44.000 --> 0:18:48.560 I wanted to put more information on in here. And 0:18:48.600 --> 0:18:55.320 then those Palmara's societies lasted about ninety years, and even 0:18:55.400 --> 0:18:58.000 after that, there was the Haitian Revolution in the late 0:18:58.040 --> 0:19:02.439 eighteenth century that I think some people forget, like I 0:19:02.440 --> 0:19:04.760 think they had like over one hundred and forty revolts 0:19:04.840 --> 0:19:09.800 before they finally had a revolution, and that in and 0:19:09.840 --> 0:19:13.400 of itself, the consistent strikes and then the eventual overthrow 0:19:14.160 --> 0:19:18.000 struck the heart of enslavers across the Western hemisphere. 0:19:18.119 --> 0:19:20.200 Yeah, it'scared the shit out of them. It was so good. 0:19:20.920 --> 0:19:24.639 Yeah, they were terrified. They were terrified for so many reasons, 0:19:24.720 --> 0:19:27.560 and so many good reasons because it also they were 0:19:27.560 --> 0:19:32.200 scared of it inspiring folks in like the American South 0:19:32.480 --> 0:19:35.200 and and I believe also in around Brazil because it's 0:19:35.280 --> 0:19:38.640 one of the still like the second largest slave society 0:19:38.640 --> 0:19:42.800 outside of the US at the time, and it did 0:19:43.119 --> 0:19:45.760 it kept the flame of freedom strong and the heart 0:19:45.800 --> 0:19:48.200 for rebels for generations to come. It is a struggle 0:19:48.280 --> 0:19:51.639 that I still really would love for people to study 0:19:51.680 --> 0:19:54.919 more of because it has so much, so much history 0:19:54.920 --> 0:19:57.919 and nuances and how things played out and how different 0:19:57.960 --> 0:20:03.840 relationships were built through. But it inspired folks like Gabrielle Prosser, 0:20:04.200 --> 0:20:10.000 who was in enslaved literate blacksmiths from the plantations near Richmond, Virginia, 0:20:10.640 --> 0:20:14.119 and they organized a massive, massive slavery vault with one 0:20:14.160 --> 0:20:17.040 hundreds of enslaved folks and their goal was to seize 0:20:17.119 --> 0:20:21.720 control of Richmond and to take the governor hostage, negotiate 0:20:21.760 --> 0:20:25.240 the end of slavery, create a more egalitarian society, whole 0:20:25.359 --> 0:20:30.000 nine yards. And they were very influenced, interestingly by American 0:20:30.080 --> 0:20:33.720 revolutionary libertarian language and equality, and they were like, well, 0:20:33.760 --> 0:20:37.760 why can't this be true? And one thing they wouldn't 0:20:37.800 --> 0:20:38.960 be inspired. 0:20:38.480 --> 0:20:41.560 By, Ah, you did it before I got to do it. 0:20:41.640 --> 0:20:44.760 This is a takeover. You took away that my only 0:20:44.880 --> 0:20:48.640 joy in life of now go ahead. What is inspired 0:20:48.680 --> 0:20:50.080 by these things? I don't know. 0:20:50.840 --> 0:20:54.040 Well, Gabriel was inspired by the American Revolution. And you 0:20:54.080 --> 0:20:57.000 know who else was inspired by the American Revolution? Probably 0:20:57.000 --> 0:20:57.960 our advertisers. 0:20:58.640 --> 0:21:04.320 That's right, all of them. Sorry, I just got really 0:21:04.320 --> 0:21:05.400 excited at the producer. 0:21:08.080 --> 0:21:09.600 Now. For the past two years, I'm trying to think 0:21:09.600 --> 0:21:11.080 of things to say to get that kind of reaction 0:21:11.080 --> 0:21:13.280 out of all if an effort. I am on the. 0:21:13.240 --> 0:21:26.080 Show, and you did it, Andrew back, I got to say, 0:21:26.080 --> 0:21:26.720 Andrew back. 0:21:29.960 --> 0:21:33.400 So there was also so many more rebellions that were 0:21:33.760 --> 0:21:38.359 directly influenced by the Haitian Revolution itself, like Denmark Vessi, 0:21:38.440 --> 0:21:41.120 after buying his freedom after winning a lottery he plotted 0:21:41.160 --> 0:21:44.000 one of the most sophisticated and well organized slaver vaults 0:21:44.040 --> 0:21:48.000 in the US history. In Charleston, South Carolina. He mobilized 0:21:48.119 --> 0:21:51.520 thousands of black people, including both enslaved and free, to 0:21:51.560 --> 0:21:55.000 seize weapons, kill slave holders, and burn Charleston to the 0:21:55.040 --> 0:21:59.960 ground and set sale to Haiti for freedom. Deeply deeply religious, 0:22:00.119 --> 0:22:03.440 Vessi saw slavery as a sin against God, and Haiti's 0:22:03.480 --> 0:22:07.280 successful Black Revolutionaris heavily influenced this thinking, especially a lot 0:22:07.320 --> 0:22:09.200 of the voodoo that was going on at the time 0:22:09.400 --> 0:22:11.480 that it was like faith respects faith. 0:22:11.960 --> 0:22:12.680 Yeah. 0:22:12.880 --> 0:22:15.879 The sad part about it though, is that some of 0:22:15.920 --> 0:22:18.639 the co conspirators I believe they got rained out on 0:22:18.680 --> 0:22:22.199 the day of their action, and two people snitched and 0:22:22.240 --> 0:22:25.560 told their slave masters, and Vessi and I believe at 0:22:25.600 --> 0:22:27.639 least over thirty other people were executed. 0:22:28.400 --> 0:22:31.360 You know what I think about this sometimes is one, 0:22:31.480 --> 0:22:33.720 it's really sad how many of these got shut down 0:22:33.760 --> 0:22:37.560 by snitches, right, But also how many more we never 0:22:37.640 --> 0:22:40.320 heard about because like, in some ways we hear about 0:22:40.359 --> 0:22:43.560 them almost because they got caught, you know. I mean, 0:22:43.600 --> 0:22:45.639 obviously if they've been super successful and burned down all 0:22:45.640 --> 0:22:47.600 of Charleston, we would have heard of it. But it's 0:22:47.600 --> 0:22:49.760 like so many people ploted these things and probably were 0:22:49.800 --> 0:22:51.800 even kind of punished, but in like a low key way. 0:22:52.440 --> 0:22:52.800 I don't know. 0:22:52.840 --> 0:22:55.040 It's just like the more I read about this history, 0:22:55.040 --> 0:22:58.120 the more I'm like, there's so many were never gonna 0:22:58.200 --> 0:23:00.760 learn about, and there's still so many that we can 0:23:00.840 --> 0:23:02.960 learn about, and they're all so fucking cool. 0:23:03.480 --> 0:23:07.480 Yeah. Yeah. That makes me think about like my whole 0:23:07.520 --> 0:23:09.920 history of like Roanoke, and it was a lost city, 0:23:10.000 --> 0:23:12.080 lost people when it was like, okay, actually folks just 0:23:12.160 --> 0:23:15.199 left the colony, like the historians now are just like okay, yeah, no, 0:23:16.359 --> 0:23:18.800 But then there's still so many different things that we 0:23:19.000 --> 0:23:24.880 can just enjoy and learn from so deeply. Even more 0:23:24.920 --> 0:23:29.639 rebellions from black anti authoritarians is like Robert Smalls during 0:23:29.720 --> 0:23:33.040 the Civil War in like eighteen sixty two, hijacked a 0:23:33.080 --> 0:23:36.520 Confederate ship, the Planter, and disguised himself as the captain, 0:23:37.040 --> 0:23:39.560 picked up his family and other enslave folks along their way, 0:23:39.600 --> 0:23:43.720 and then surrendered the ship to Union forces. After the 0:23:43.760 --> 0:23:47.040 Civil War, Smalls built a small public education like he 0:23:47.080 --> 0:23:51.160 built and worked around public education, protecting black rights and 0:23:51.280 --> 0:23:55.000 resisting the reimposition of white supremacy during Reconstruction. I believe 0:23:55.040 --> 0:23:58.800 he was elected to office at least five times during 0:23:58.840 --> 0:24:02.199 that like reconstruction period in which that was allowed in 0:24:02.240 --> 0:24:04.120 the early nineteenth century in America. 0:24:04.800 --> 0:24:07.000 He was fucking cool. We covered him a little bit 0:24:07.040 --> 0:24:10.520 on the Civil Civil War war, maybe like the second 0:24:10.520 --> 0:24:11.520 episode we ever did of. 0:24:11.560 --> 0:24:13.639 This show, Okay, because I knew I had heard that 0:24:13.680 --> 0:24:17.840 story before when I had found am And there was 0:24:17.920 --> 0:24:21.680 like even more organized efforts to fight against the sort 0:24:21.720 --> 0:24:25.399 of racialized violence that was happening in the States, with 0:24:25.560 --> 0:24:29.359 Marcus Garvey being a big inspiration for Pan Africanism, the 0:24:29.400 --> 0:24:33.879 Back to Africa movement and establishing the UNIA, the Universal 0:24:33.920 --> 0:24:37.760 Negro Improvement Association. There was also this a little lesser 0:24:37.840 --> 0:24:41.960 known communist group called the African Blood Brotherhood founded by 0:24:42.000 --> 0:24:46.240 Cyril Briggs, a black journalist around lasted around nineteen nineteen 0:24:46.320 --> 0:24:47.440 to twenty twenty. 0:24:47.200 --> 0:24:51.479 Five, which is a sick name. I'm just gonna Zeril Briggs. No, No, 0:24:51.720 --> 0:24:56.639 well that too, but no, the Blood Brotherhood, what was it. 0:24:57.000 --> 0:24:59.720 Yeah, the African Blood Brotherhood. They were inspired by a 0:24:59.720 --> 0:25:05.199 lot of like traditional African Blood Brotherhood rituals that are 0:25:05.280 --> 0:25:07.320 kind of like a coming of age sort of thing. 0:25:07.560 --> 0:25:10.800 And then also they were heavily inspired by the Irish 0:25:10.800 --> 0:25:15.840 Republican Brotherhood at the time. Cyral Briggs was a Black 0:25:15.880 --> 0:25:19.480 journalist and socialists from the Caribbean islands around like the Nevies, 0:25:19.840 --> 0:25:23.040 and they were like a semi secret, super hierarchical but 0:25:23.119 --> 0:25:28.640 semi secret radical organization promoting black self determination, armed self defense, 0:25:28.960 --> 0:25:32.840 anti racism, and anti capitalism. They were heavily inspired by 0:25:32.840 --> 0:25:36.000 the Russian Revolution that had just happened in nineteen seventeen 0:25:36.240 --> 0:25:39.200 and the failures of American democracy to deliver any sort 0:25:39.200 --> 0:25:43.680 of racial justice. They advocated for self defense, organized self 0:25:43.720 --> 0:25:47.359 defense classes against racial violence, especially after that Red Summer 0:25:47.400 --> 0:25:50.400 of nineteen nineteen when a bunch of white mobs attacked 0:25:50.400 --> 0:25:53.880 Black communities and they urged for the overthrow of white 0:25:53.880 --> 0:25:59.119 supremacist capitalism, solidarity with revolutionary movements globally like they were 0:25:59.160 --> 0:26:02.800 really big into like early Black internationalism outside of just 0:26:02.840 --> 0:26:05.760 doing like a Pan African kind of scheme, and they 0:26:05.920 --> 0:26:08.640 leaned a lot of their roots in media and published 0:26:08.680 --> 0:26:12.480 the Crusader Magazine. They can be quoted in their pamphlets 0:26:12.520 --> 0:26:16.320 saying in like their Principles of the African Blood Brotherhood 0:26:16.359 --> 0:26:19.240 that was published in the Crusader Magazine saying quote we 0:26:19.320 --> 0:26:22.000 must offend ourselves with arms in hand whenever the lynchers 0:26:22.080 --> 0:26:25.199 or mobs invade our homes or threatens our life, with 0:26:25.440 --> 0:26:29.200 their founders going on to continue saying, quote without arms, 0:26:29.280 --> 0:26:31.560 there can be no power. Without power, there can be 0:26:31.600 --> 0:26:34.880 no freedom. The African Blood Brotherhood stands for the organized 0:26:34.960 --> 0:26:38.000 might of the Negro worker end quote, which Briggs wrote. 0:26:38.080 --> 0:26:40.240 Kind of he did a lot of like the editorial 0:26:40.320 --> 0:26:42.919 and writing for The Crusader, and was like the point 0:26:42.960 --> 0:26:45.439 person for it, which is why folks like tend to 0:26:45.440 --> 0:26:48.280 look back on it as super hierarchical. But they were 0:26:48.320 --> 0:26:52.919 like an explicit workers association trying to organize unions for 0:26:52.960 --> 0:26:55.680 people that would be normally excluded, which for them was 0:26:55.720 --> 0:26:58.200 also people who were not considered white at the time, 0:26:58.600 --> 0:27:02.119 and trying to build that bridge the gap between class 0:27:02.160 --> 0:27:04.960 conscious white people and Irish folks and people who were 0:27:04.960 --> 0:27:08.320 like newly immigrated and black folks, especially during the one 0:27:08.359 --> 0:27:11.159 of the Great migrations when folks were going north. So 0:27:11.280 --> 0:27:14.199 they advocated a lot of alliances with communist movements and 0:27:14.240 --> 0:27:17.000 with the Party itself eventually dissolving into the party. 0:27:17.600 --> 0:27:19.280 And I think one of the things that's so fascinating 0:27:19.280 --> 0:27:21.480 to me about this. I hadn't heard as much about this, 0:27:21.600 --> 0:27:24.919 and that's I'm really excited about it is that I 0:27:24.920 --> 0:27:28.919 think we get presented this idea that like Black American 0:27:29.000 --> 0:27:33.280 radical history and then like the labor movement and you know, 0:27:33.640 --> 0:27:38.879 sort of named ideological positions are just completely separate things, 0:27:39.240 --> 0:27:43.320 and it like ignores this incredible amount of overlap between 0:27:44.080 --> 0:27:48.840 you know, leftism and black politics in America. I mean, 0:27:48.880 --> 0:27:51.159 obviously in the by the end of the twentieth century, 0:27:51.200 --> 0:27:53.720 we that's less seen as the case. But when people 0:27:53.720 --> 0:27:57.040 talk about the sort of early legacy of fighting against racism, 0:27:57.359 --> 0:27:59.800 I feel like the like class consciousness part of it 0:27:59.840 --> 0:28:00.760 is left out. 0:28:01.720 --> 0:28:04.840 Yeah, I've always loved telling people that Lucy Persons was 0:28:04.840 --> 0:28:07.679 a part of founding the IWW here in America. Like 0:28:07.760 --> 0:28:12.960 this has been something very integral to black autonomous politics 0:28:13.200 --> 0:28:16.639 and scenes for a really long time, and something we 0:28:16.680 --> 0:28:19.199 see a lot in Black communities is like this, some 0:28:19.240 --> 0:28:21.520 of the stuff for like the sense of safety is 0:28:21.920 --> 0:28:25.160 still kept insular. Your politics is kept insular. You will 0:28:25.160 --> 0:28:29.080 tell your family, your kid, like people at the cookout. 0:28:29.119 --> 0:28:30.520 We know what to talk about and how to talk 0:28:30.560 --> 0:28:32.720 about it. But when it comes to being out in 0:28:32.800 --> 0:28:36.719 a very above ground organization. There's so many risks that 0:28:36.760 --> 0:28:39.800 come with that that, yeah, and also so many different variations. 0:28:39.840 --> 0:28:42.680 This is also how like after the nineteen sixties, they 0:28:43.280 --> 0:28:46.920 stopped killing black leaders because folks started keeping their really 0:28:47.000 --> 0:28:50.160 radical politics insular. Again, can also shift to like the 0:28:50.200 --> 0:28:53.760 sort of black excellence that's like black without others, so 0:28:53.960 --> 0:28:57.520 like blackness but no solidarity, which still having some sort 0:28:57.520 --> 0:29:04.200 of principles there that don't really reach towards liberation in 0:29:04.280 --> 0:29:07.600 my humble opinion. And that's also something that the African 0:29:07.640 --> 0:29:11.200 Blood Brotherhood kind of had in their mode of organizing 0:29:11.200 --> 0:29:14.720 as well, because they had a big distaste for Garvy, 0:29:15.480 --> 0:29:19.120 especially at the time because he won. Actually I don't 0:29:19.120 --> 0:29:20.959 know if they had the issue with his misogyny. I do, 0:29:21.320 --> 0:29:24.800 but they had an issue and I have an issue 0:29:24.800 --> 0:29:26.560 with this too, is because he I believe it was 0:29:26.640 --> 0:29:29.640 him that said Franco can't be a fascist. I coined 0:29:29.680 --> 0:29:34.080 the word fascism and quite literally worked with the KKK 0:29:34.360 --> 0:29:36.920 and would have meetings with people like legal Clerk of 0:29:37.080 --> 0:29:39.960 the Ku Klux Klan. Because it's kind of this mentality 0:29:40.000 --> 0:29:42.880 of all right, separate but equal, How do we really 0:29:42.920 --> 0:29:46.360 stay separate? What does that mean? How do you want 0:29:46.400 --> 0:29:48.280 us over here, Fine, we want us over there. Y'all 0:29:48.280 --> 0:29:49.040 got to stay over there. 0:29:49.080 --> 0:29:52.200 Then, Yeah, nationalism is a thing. 0:29:52.720 --> 0:29:56.160 Yeah, it's one hell of a drug. And the beef 0:29:56.200 --> 0:29:58.960 got so heated that Garvy and their meetings. Actually this 0:29:59.360 --> 0:30:04.240 instructed p to disrupt the African Blood Brotherhood meetings and activities. 0:30:04.760 --> 0:30:07.280 But then like by like the mid nineteen twenties, many 0:30:07.400 --> 0:30:11.000 of the African Blood Brotherhood were already members of the 0:30:11.000 --> 0:30:14.040 Communist Party. And I want to look more into this history, 0:30:14.080 --> 0:30:16.000 but it's kind of like seems like like the Central 0:30:16.040 --> 0:30:19.440 Committee inside of the Communist Party absorbed and it was 0:30:19.440 --> 0:30:21.520 like y'all got to shut down. The ABB just become 0:30:21.560 --> 0:30:25.160 like an auxiliary council inside of us. 0:30:25.520 --> 0:30:26.960 Which there was a lot of that going on with 0:30:26.960 --> 0:30:29.880 the American Communist Party around that time. They tried to 0:30:29.920 --> 0:30:32.120 do it to a bunch of unions and stuff too. 0:30:32.240 --> 0:30:33.680 I'm sure they succeeded with some. 0:30:34.480 --> 0:30:37.080 Yeah, and then kind of to put a chef's kiss 0:30:37.120 --> 0:30:41.360 on the history of black resistance and oppressive institutions and 0:30:41.360 --> 0:30:43.800 like the violent societies that they inhibit. I want to 0:30:43.840 --> 0:30:46.560 read Claude Mackay's poem If I Must Die, which has 0:30:46.600 --> 0:30:49.600 been reprinted an uncountable amount of times, and through doing 0:30:49.600 --> 0:30:53.760 this research, I have seen mentioned and cited like by 0:30:53.800 --> 0:30:57.600 almost every person that that I've read through, either whether 0:30:57.640 --> 0:31:00.000 they talk about Claude Mackay themselves as an anti fashion 0:31:00.600 --> 0:31:04.400 or antiasis writer, or people like James Yates and Salary 0:31:04.400 --> 0:31:07.080 a key that we'll talk about now or later on 0:31:08.800 --> 0:31:13.320 adoring and using as a kind of mantra. So quote, 0:31:13.920 --> 0:31:16.760 if we must die, let it not be like dogs 0:31:17.200 --> 0:31:21.000 hunted and penned in an inglorious spot while round us 0:31:21.080 --> 0:31:24.160 bark the mad and hungry dogs making their mock at 0:31:24.160 --> 0:31:27.840 our accursed lot. If we must die, Oh, let us 0:31:27.880 --> 0:31:31.040 nobly die, so that our precious blood may not be 0:31:31.160 --> 0:31:35.040 shed in vain. Then even the monsters we defy shall 0:31:35.080 --> 0:31:39.360 be constrained to honor us through dead. Oh, kensman, we 0:31:39.440 --> 0:31:42.800 must meet the common foe, though far outnumbered, let us 0:31:42.840 --> 0:31:46.960 show us brave and further thousand blows, deal one death blow. 0:31:47.760 --> 0:31:51.120 What though before us lies the open grave like men 0:31:51.200 --> 0:31:54.840 will face the murderous, cowardly pack, pressed to the wall, 0:31:55.160 --> 0:31:58.800 dying but fighting back. End quote. 0:31:59.080 --> 0:32:00.800 That's fucking metal, Yeah. 0:32:00.760 --> 0:32:03.600 It really really is. I'm like, Oh, I could put 0:32:03.640 --> 0:32:07.120 that through a little diy punk songe real quick yeah yeah, 0:32:07.120 --> 0:32:09.840 and many people, many of the people we will talk 0:32:09.880 --> 0:32:12.640 about in the future, know the levels of fascism and 0:32:12.680 --> 0:32:16.520 what resisting sort of violent colonial and racial violence and 0:32:16.640 --> 0:32:20.760 terror means. James Yeates, who I will be hooting heavily 0:32:20.920 --> 0:32:24.800 in this episode, describes kind of the conditions of Mississippi 0:32:24.880 --> 0:32:29.280 during his upbringing. Quote. There was a mass lynching near 0:32:29.320 --> 0:32:32.640 the town of Shibudah where the highway and railroad across 0:32:32.640 --> 0:32:36.160 the Chickasaio River. Some parts of the incident were written 0:32:36.240 --> 0:32:38.920 up in northern newspapers. No one ever is charged with 0:32:38.920 --> 0:32:41.440 the crime, although the local members of the klu Klux 0:32:41.480 --> 0:32:44.440 Klan were well known. Five men and four women were 0:32:44.520 --> 0:32:48.560 hung their feet dangling just inches above the river's muddy waters. 0:32:49.440 --> 0:32:52.240 Such was Mississippi in those times. The only thing a 0:32:52.280 --> 0:32:54.240 black man or woman had to do to get lynched 0:32:54.360 --> 0:32:56.400 was not move off the side work for miss Ann 0:32:56.520 --> 0:32:59.560 or mister Charlie. A black must never be caught drinking 0:32:59.560 --> 0:33:01.920 from a white only fountain, or making the mistake of 0:33:02.000 --> 0:33:04.640 using the front door instead of the back door. Stealing 0:33:04.640 --> 0:33:07.880 a chicken or a pig was very dangerous. Being caught 0:33:07.920 --> 0:33:09.920 at this could get you twenty years on the chain gang. 0:33:10.400 --> 0:33:13.080 If you were black in Mississippi, lightning would surely strike 0:33:13.120 --> 0:33:15.560 home sooner or later. Here's an example of how it 0:33:15.600 --> 0:33:19.440 struck equipment. Around nineteen eighteen. My uncle Willy, while working 0:33:19.440 --> 0:33:21.920 in the sawmill one day, accidentally hit a white man 0:33:21.960 --> 0:33:24.479 with a piece of lumber he was carrying. He managed 0:33:24.520 --> 0:33:26.800 to make it home before being chased away from the mill. 0:33:27.360 --> 0:33:30.840 The news spread like wildfire all throughout town, passing word 0:33:31.160 --> 0:33:35.080 lynching tonight. I can remember Grandma Lizzie pacing the floor 0:33:35.120 --> 0:33:38.400 all throughout the afternoon. Aunt Bell, my uncle's wife, was 0:33:38.440 --> 0:33:41.520 almost speechless. He would die fighting rather than be hung 0:33:41.560 --> 0:33:44.920 by the clusters. The only problem now was a supply 0:33:44.960 --> 0:33:48.480 of ammunition. That day, the town merchants had stopped selling 0:33:48.520 --> 0:33:51.600 shells to black folks. Living almost next door to my 0:33:51.720 --> 0:33:54.840 uncle Willy was a white family, the Linens, a husband, 0:33:54.880 --> 0:33:58.120 a wife, and three daughters. We call the man mister gus. 0:33:58.760 --> 0:34:00.720 He had an unusual way of speak, teaking English, I 0:34:00.760 --> 0:34:02.680 could only catch one or two words out of ten. 0:34:03.200 --> 0:34:05.720 Mister gus knew more about lumber than anybody in the 0:34:05.720 --> 0:34:09.800 sawmill equipment. Still, he was an outcast, quote white trash 0:34:09.880 --> 0:34:12.440 to most white people. It was said he came from 0:34:12.520 --> 0:34:14.960 up north, but I still often heard him talk about Ireland, 0:34:15.120 --> 0:34:17.920 a place I had never heard about before. Mister Guss 0:34:18.000 --> 0:34:20.520 was a small in structure but big in heart. He'd 0:34:20.520 --> 0:34:22.880 heard the news about the klu klutz Klan was coming 0:34:22.920 --> 0:34:26.280 to lynch my uncle. That night, Uncle Willy heard a voice, 0:34:26.440 --> 0:34:29.839 Willie Willie. Mister Guss wanted to make sure my uncle 0:34:29.840 --> 0:34:33.799 wouldn't start shouting. Mister Guss asked, my uncle, what can 0:34:33.840 --> 0:34:36.399 I do to help you? Uncle Willy told him about 0:34:36.440 --> 0:34:38.799 how the white merchants even refused to sell rabbit shot 0:34:38.840 --> 0:34:42.080 to blacks. Mister Gus walked away without even saying a word. 0:34:42.560 --> 0:34:45.400 He made his way to equipment and bought ammunition and 0:34:45.440 --> 0:34:48.560 then returned to my uncle's house with it. Here he said, 0:34:48.719 --> 0:34:50.880 defend yourself. And then he went back to town and 0:34:50.920 --> 0:34:52.960 told the whites, some of y'all are going to get 0:34:53.000 --> 0:34:54.640 killed by those niggers if you try to lynch that 0:34:54.719 --> 0:34:59.200 Willie end quote. And this is like a kind of 0:34:59.239 --> 0:35:01.359 like really long part of the text that I pull 0:35:01.400 --> 0:35:04.359 a lot from James Yate's memoir Mississippi to Madrid, which 0:35:04.400 --> 0:35:06.600 I highly recommend folks check out. It's really beautiful and 0:35:06.680 --> 0:35:08.400 hits a lot of the points that I really wanted 0:35:08.440 --> 0:35:09.440 to hit in this piece. 0:35:09.560 --> 0:35:11.959 But okay, so this person who's quote this is from 0:35:12.080 --> 0:35:13.680 is one of the people who later went and fought 0:35:13.719 --> 0:35:16.759 in Spain. Yes, absolutely, yeah, fuck yeah, okay. 0:35:16.560 --> 0:35:19.160 And this is kind of his kind of understanding of 0:35:19.200 --> 0:35:23.160 like this is what racial terror and what living in 0:35:23.200 --> 0:35:26.920 Mississippi kind of was at the time. And to me, 0:35:27.000 --> 0:35:28.719 one of the big lessons around this is like, you 0:35:28.800 --> 0:35:31.799 never know who your neighbor may be, or those like 0:35:31.840 --> 0:35:35.160 those with conviction around you will let themselves be known. 0:35:35.520 --> 0:35:39.000 And the answer isn't always to react immediately, but always 0:35:39.040 --> 0:35:42.680 to prepare as soon as possible. And one thing I 0:35:42.800 --> 0:35:47.960 read from this text was like one like the intricacies 0:35:48.080 --> 0:35:51.720 of race even in Mississippi itself, with like this obviously 0:35:51.719 --> 0:35:54.200 outcast Irish man being like what can I do to 0:35:54.239 --> 0:35:59.719 help you? As well as like folks their relationship being 0:35:59.760 --> 0:36:02.640 base on the shop floor in the lumber yard, and 0:36:02.719 --> 0:36:05.799 how they're also your neighbor, and like these are the 0:36:05.880 --> 0:36:10.200 spaces of organizing against racial terror, against patriarchal violence that 0:36:10.880 --> 0:36:13.640 organizers all around the world do a lot of brilliant 0:36:13.640 --> 0:36:15.960 work in that I wanted to highlight as well that 0:36:16.120 --> 0:36:18.640 there's a lot of life saving work that happens just 0:36:18.760 --> 0:36:21.640 on your shop floor and in your neighborhood that we 0:36:21.640 --> 0:36:23.920 could be extending and organizing so that we are more 0:36:23.960 --> 0:36:27.160 prepared for the levels of increasing violence that Americans face. 0:36:27.920 --> 0:36:30.280 No, that makes sense. It's like like just literally finding 0:36:30.320 --> 0:36:33.640 ways to make sure that well we have class solidarity 0:36:33.680 --> 0:36:35.880 with each other, you know, like realizing like, all right, 0:36:35.880 --> 0:36:37.480 we're all dealing with a bunch of different shit, but 0:36:37.520 --> 0:36:39.279 like at the end of the day, here we are 0:36:39.320 --> 0:36:44.000 on the like fucking shop floor. No that that's cool. Yeah, 0:36:44.040 --> 0:36:46.120 but you know what else is on the shop floor? 0:36:46.160 --> 0:36:48.719 I'm coming in before Jordan has a chance to do it. 0:36:48.719 --> 0:36:50.239 But now I'm messing it up because it's not the 0:36:50.239 --> 0:36:51.720 best transition I've ever done. 0:36:51.920 --> 0:36:53.440 I was gonna say, you know what's not on the 0:36:53.440 --> 0:36:57.600 shop floor? Solidaire Wait, solidari is actually I don't remember. 0:36:57.680 --> 0:36:59.120 I was gonna say, well, this usually adds on that 0:36:59.120 --> 0:37:01.520 because it listen to the radio while you're working and stuff. 0:37:02.080 --> 0:37:04.440 Maybe you're listening to this while working right now. And 0:37:04.520 --> 0:37:07.600 if so, well, even if you're not working, here's ads 0:37:07.680 --> 0:37:09.280 I don't know here they are. 0:37:16.800 --> 0:37:21.480 And we're back. You can stop it skipping unless you're 0:37:21.520 --> 0:37:23.600 a cool Zone Premium member or whatever that means. I 0:37:23.640 --> 0:37:24.600 don't know if that's still a thing. 0:37:25.200 --> 0:37:28.239 Cooler Zone Media, Cooler Zone Media, then you didn't have 0:37:28.239 --> 0:37:29.000 to listen to ads. 0:37:29.800 --> 0:37:33.200 Is that available and Android yet? Nope? Yeah, I'm gonna 0:37:33.200 --> 0:37:35.959 say I wouldn't know. I'm purely an Android user. 0:37:37.440 --> 0:37:40.800 Yeah, fair, I have no excuse. I'm on an iPhone 0:37:40.800 --> 0:37:43.719 and I still end them out. I don't even know. 0:37:43.920 --> 0:37:45.560 I haven't even signed up for it, and all I 0:37:45.600 --> 0:37:48.000 listened to is school Zone Media. That's why haven't I 0:37:48.040 --> 0:37:51.920 done it. It makes no sense I should do it anyway. 0:37:52.800 --> 0:37:54.600 Yeah, for the past five years, I think Cool Zone 0:37:54.600 --> 0:37:57.319 Medias have been in my top five podcasts every year. 0:37:57.960 --> 0:38:01.280 So yeah, we make good stuff, cool. 0:38:01.040 --> 0:38:01.840 Stuff even. 0:38:03.160 --> 0:38:03.759 We're all right. 0:38:07.920 --> 0:38:10.160 So in this time in America around like nineteen ten, 0:38:10.320 --> 0:38:14.080 nineteen twenties, even with the Great Migration happening and before then, 0:38:14.840 --> 0:38:18.880 especially during like James Yates' upbringing, it's important for me 0:38:18.920 --> 0:38:22.000 to remind folks that the South was a majority black 0:38:22.200 --> 0:38:26.400 and that the apartheid progressiveness of American liberty was in 0:38:26.680 --> 0:38:30.640 full force towards its black residence, with both secret and 0:38:30.680 --> 0:38:36.480 open organizing collectives for land, economic stability, and education forming 0:38:36.520 --> 0:38:39.399 in many communities. It's where like a lot of where 0:38:39.400 --> 0:38:41.680 snit comes from, Like when we think about like a 0:38:41.680 --> 0:38:43.960 lot of revolutionary stuff that came out of like the 0:38:43.960 --> 0:38:47.520 sixties and thirties. Ella Baker like these anti authoritarian traditions 0:38:47.520 --> 0:38:50.680 as well, and that black anti fascist urge to drive 0:38:50.760 --> 0:38:54.360 for communal institutions in which participants were valued and relied 0:38:54.400 --> 0:38:56.960 upon was not just the tools that they used, but 0:38:57.000 --> 0:38:59.719 it was like the motives for how they viewed leadership 0:38:59.760 --> 0:39:00.640 and of itself. 0:39:01.600 --> 0:39:04.440 That makes sense to me, I haven't. I've read a 0:39:04.440 --> 0:39:07.640 lot about like black cooperative stuff and especially like, uh, 0:39:08.320 --> 0:39:10.279 there's a lot of like black cooperative farming that came 0:39:10.320 --> 0:39:12.880 out of the South and stuff that that that's cool, 0:39:12.920 --> 0:39:14.719 that tracks that, that's interesting to me. 0:39:14.960 --> 0:39:17.680 Yeah, Ellen Baker, who came up during this period and 0:39:17.719 --> 0:39:21.719 in this area down South, was very much a They 0:39:21.719 --> 0:39:25.480 were big on doing leadership training so that everybody could 0:39:25.560 --> 0:39:29.920 see leadership, call out terrible leadership and be able to 0:39:29.960 --> 0:39:33.399 take it upon themselves, to have the reins, to feel 0:39:33.440 --> 0:39:37.239 their own power to make decisions and have those decisions 0:39:37.280 --> 0:39:41.480 be valued, and to see bad decisions and authoritarian leadership 0:39:41.640 --> 0:39:46.480 and cut that shit off. Hell yeah yeah, And so 0:39:46.719 --> 0:39:49.200 by around like the nineteen thirties, the Great Depression had 0:39:49.440 --> 0:39:54.080 deepened economic disparities. Black activists were organizing, and the beatings 0:39:54.120 --> 0:39:56.720 that they took for protesting unemployment, both in the South 0:39:56.880 --> 0:39:59.880 and the north, helped them see repression at home as 0:40:00.160 --> 0:40:04.640 part of a global authoritarian surge. Groups like the Unemployment 0:40:04.680 --> 0:40:07.439 Councils and the League of Struggle for Negro Rights began 0:40:07.520 --> 0:40:12.200 tying local conditions to international fascism. The state's brutal crackdowns 0:40:12.280 --> 0:40:16.000 mirrored what was happening both at home and abroad. And 0:40:16.040 --> 0:40:19.520 then there was the invasion of Ethiopia by Mussolini in 0:40:19.640 --> 0:40:22.520 nineteen thirty five that really lit a fire under a 0:40:22.520 --> 0:40:25.840 lot of black activists and under a lot of internationalists 0:40:26.239 --> 0:40:29.759 as well. From about nineteen thirty five, the invasion of 0:40:29.760 --> 0:40:33.680 Ethiopia began, ending in February of thirty six. There was 0:40:33.680 --> 0:40:36.800 still a lot more going on there, but italiand forces 0:40:36.840 --> 0:40:40.919 invaded with over two hundred thousand soldiers, utilizing tanks, firearms, 0:40:41.040 --> 0:40:45.120 aerial offenses including poison gas, mustard gas, and bombing civilian 0:40:45.160 --> 0:40:49.040 and military positions, both to deter resistance and also to 0:40:49.080 --> 0:40:51.040 just destroy and be able to use the land as 0:40:51.080 --> 0:40:55.080 they needed. They were also, as they even claimed, practicing 0:40:55.160 --> 0:40:57.480 what they wanted to do, which is like this extension 0:40:57.480 --> 0:41:00.719 of this colonial imperial violence being the this for how 0:41:00.760 --> 0:41:03.880 they would do what we see now as colonialism. 0:41:04.200 --> 0:41:06.680 Oh okay, so we're going to go practice on these 0:41:06.719 --> 0:41:08.680 people who don't have any kind of munitions to fight 0:41:08.760 --> 0:41:10.600 us back as equals or whatever. 0:41:11.160 --> 0:41:13.200 Yeah, I mean, And they also just like something we 0:41:13.239 --> 0:41:15.680 see now in Gaza as well, like international medical units 0:41:15.719 --> 0:41:18.520 were bombed, killed discriminately, even though there was no way 0:41:18.520 --> 0:41:21.600 to not know they were medical units, but they didn't 0:41:21.640 --> 0:41:25.560 really care. That was kind of their point. Yeah, because 0:41:25.560 --> 0:41:28.759 for many black folks at the time, Ethiopia represented hope, 0:41:29.239 --> 0:41:32.799 pride in resisting all sort of colonial advances. It's still 0:41:32.880 --> 0:41:35.040 kind of known as this place in the black community 0:41:35.040 --> 0:41:38.759 as like Ethiopia was never colonized. It's like a really 0:41:38.760 --> 0:41:42.160 big phrasing. Whether that's what people consider true or not 0:41:42.440 --> 0:41:44.719 is a different thing in my head. But like there 0:41:44.800 --> 0:41:48.719 is a history and really long resistance because this is 0:41:48.760 --> 0:41:51.200 not the first time Italy had advances in the region 0:41:51.320 --> 0:41:53.640 at all, especially if you know about the history of Rome. 0:41:54.239 --> 0:41:56.839 Well, okay, so this is really fascinating to me because 0:41:56.840 --> 0:42:00.560 I hadn't. This means that those are like literally the 0:42:00.600 --> 0:42:04.200 first anti fascists, the first people fighting a war against fascism. 0:42:05.160 --> 0:42:07.400 Maybe I'm missing something, but I don't think Italy invaded 0:42:07.440 --> 0:42:10.080 anyone prior to that, right, I mean you have, you 0:42:10.160 --> 0:42:13.120 have anti fascists in terms of people fighting within Italy 0:42:13.200 --> 0:42:18.120 and within Germany. But the first like war against fascism 0:42:18.160 --> 0:42:18.880 is in Ethiopia. 0:42:18.920 --> 0:42:22.160 Then, uh yeah, like the by the fascists who want 0:42:22.160 --> 0:42:25.080 to name themselves absolutely, yeah. 0:42:25.120 --> 0:42:28.960 Shit, So like black folks are literally the original anti fascists. 0:42:28.600 --> 0:42:31.080 In this context, and that's cool. We do it good, 0:42:31.120 --> 0:42:33.919 we do it best. Well best we do it first. 0:42:33.960 --> 0:42:34.959 I don't know if we do it best. 0:42:35.480 --> 0:42:37.279 Oh whatever, yeah, you fuck it. 0:42:38.480 --> 0:42:40.560 But it was very much like Ethiopia, especially at the time, 0:42:40.640 --> 0:42:43.799 was seen as a place for European domination was not 0:42:43.920 --> 0:42:47.160 taking its rain on the afternitt continent, and with the 0:42:47.280 --> 0:42:50.840 rising authoritarianism after a bunch of tumultuous years of the 0:42:50.840 --> 0:42:54.319 First World War led a lot of world leaders and 0:42:54.440 --> 0:42:59.960 especially America into like their isolationalists kind of vibe at all. 0:43:00.120 --> 0:43:05.880 So with the rising authoritarianism led for like these strong 0:43:06.000 --> 0:43:10.000 man type leadership narratives to be built by people who 0:43:10.000 --> 0:43:14.280 were already had access to material into things that moved 0:43:14.280 --> 0:43:18.520 the political scenes. So they relied on like rising nationalism 0:43:19.080 --> 0:43:23.000 and like the same collapse of economic conditions that social 0:43:23.120 --> 0:43:28.279 justice advocates and revolutionaries built communal campaigns of economic emancipation on. 0:43:28.800 --> 0:43:33.000 Authoritarians then went around and built nationalism through alleged quick 0:43:33.040 --> 0:43:37.360 and easy solutions just founded in fears, enophobia and terror 0:43:37.480 --> 0:43:38.760 and violence through. 0:43:38.719 --> 0:43:41.280 Okay, so the same shit that nothing changes, that's what you're. 0:43:41.239 --> 0:43:44.200 Yeah, no, no, yeah no. And then they used technological 0:43:44.200 --> 0:43:47.280 advances that become very accessible at the period, like radio 0:43:47.360 --> 0:43:51.440 and film to kind of bolsterrough this imagery of strong 0:43:51.560 --> 0:43:58.160 leadership and of their imagination being worked through. And it's 0:43:58.200 --> 0:43:59.800 kind of like the saying that we're living in somebody 0:43:59.840 --> 0:44:02.200 else is dream. It's just our nightmare, so we should 0:44:02.200 --> 0:44:05.360 be able to build our dream reality right now as well. 0:44:05.880 --> 0:44:08.640 And like somebody dreamed of this system that we're living 0:44:08.640 --> 0:44:11.440 in and they think it's hunky dory and it's actually not. 0:44:13.120 --> 0:44:16.360 But yeah, there were groups in different formations of communists, anarchists, 0:44:16.360 --> 0:44:19.279 and social reformers alike, that we're organizing to unite the 0:44:19.320 --> 0:44:22.560 working class away from capitalist based solutions and to look 0:44:22.600 --> 0:44:26.080 towards each other for even just figuring out new solutions. 0:44:26.560 --> 0:44:28.040 What are you talking about now, you just talk about 0:44:28.040 --> 0:44:29.240 globally or is this really. 0:44:29.120 --> 0:44:31.360 Oh yeah, kind of globally like around like the nineteen 0:44:31.400 --> 0:44:35.719 thirties and like with this rise of fascism. And I 0:44:35.719 --> 0:44:38.520 don't know who coined this phrase, but there's like this 0:44:38.640 --> 0:44:41.600 real idea that fascism is always writing the tales of 0:44:41.600 --> 0:44:42.840 a failed revolution. 0:44:43.360 --> 0:44:44.479 And yeah, that makes sense. 0:44:44.560 --> 0:44:48.160 I kind of. It gives that aesthetic of dealing with 0:44:48.239 --> 0:44:51.520 social and economic problems, and it can sell that aesthetic 0:44:51.560 --> 0:44:55.200 to you without selling you material conditions or actually changing 0:44:55.200 --> 0:45:00.120 your material conditions. So as this invasion of Ethiopia uful, 0:45:00.160 --> 0:45:02.520 it was a clear escalation for folks in the States 0:45:02.680 --> 0:45:08.080 about the escalation in world authoritarian violence, and across the 0:45:08.200 --> 0:45:12.320 nation of the US, people erupted on protests signs reading 0:45:12.360 --> 0:45:16.880 hands Off Ethiopia, and the organizing to expose the links 0:45:16.920 --> 0:45:20.920 of anti colonial resistance abroad to the anti lynching campaigns 0:45:20.920 --> 0:45:23.759 at home became even stronger, and it all kind of 0:45:23.800 --> 0:45:27.960 became part of the same struggles there is Salary a key. 0:45:28.160 --> 0:45:30.480 Who is someone else I'm going to talk about a 0:45:30.480 --> 0:45:32.920 lot more. Who's a black nurse and anti fascist that 0:45:32.960 --> 0:45:37.120 went over to go lend aid to the Spanish Republic. 0:45:37.320 --> 0:45:40.719 They were at this time still in the south end 0:45:40.760 --> 0:45:41.960 of that, I believe at this point they were in 0:45:41.960 --> 0:45:44.600 the Midwest, and they were helping raise funds for an 0:45:44.760 --> 0:45:47.600 entire seventy five bed hospital to be built in Ethiopia. 0:45:48.560 --> 0:45:51.440 And Yates goes on to describe some of the organizing 0:45:51.480 --> 0:45:54.560 that they saw in their book Mississipia Madrid as quote. 0:45:55.120 --> 0:45:58.920 As Mussolini's massive attacks against Ethiopia continued, we focus all 0:45:58.920 --> 0:46:01.560 of our energy in to stop the fascists. We roamed 0:46:01.600 --> 0:46:04.200 the cities collecting food clothing to be sent to the 0:46:04.280 --> 0:46:07.120 victims of the bombs. In addition to passing out leaflands 0:46:07.160 --> 0:46:09.759 denouncing the war, we gathered signatures and sent them to 0:46:09.800 --> 0:46:13.440 President Roosevelt and treating him to stop Mussolini end quote. 0:46:13.640 --> 0:46:16.480 So it really like this beginning of these like people 0:46:16.560 --> 0:46:20.480 recognizing the global fascist and authoritarian threat and doing like 0:46:20.520 --> 0:46:23.319 the on the ground at home grassroots organizing to talk 0:46:23.360 --> 0:46:25.480 to your neighbors about it. See if we can talk 0:46:25.480 --> 0:46:27.719 to any of our politicians who have way more sway 0:46:27.760 --> 0:46:30.520 when it comes to other world leaders, unless well, I'm 0:46:30.560 --> 0:46:34.640 not gonna get into that. And then there were street 0:46:34.800 --> 0:46:39.360 demonstrations and riots over the invasion in most large cities. 0:46:39.880 --> 0:46:43.120 There was like a minority of black folks looting a 0:46:43.160 --> 0:46:45.640 lot of Italian shops at the time, Like there's a 0:46:45.640 --> 0:46:49.880 lot of horizontal racial violence happening. Well horizontal weird to 0:46:49.920 --> 0:46:53.960 say for me, but yeah, groups ended up organizing and 0:46:54.000 --> 0:46:57.799 putting out statements that Italians themselves did not agree with Mussolini, 0:46:58.080 --> 0:47:00.520 which to a lot of folks that went over to fight, 0:47:00.600 --> 0:47:04.040 which they were about ninety black anti fascists from America 0:47:04.120 --> 0:47:06.399 that went over to go fight. It became even clear 0:47:06.440 --> 0:47:09.360 to them with how many Italian soldiers ended up joining 0:47:09.400 --> 0:47:12.759 the internationalists brigades in the Spanish Civil War. 0:47:14.040 --> 0:47:16.399 Yeah, it's a kind of a good moment to be like, oh, yeah, right, 0:47:16.400 --> 0:47:19.840 there's internationalists and anti fascists in every fucking place. Is 0:47:19.920 --> 0:47:23.719 like all going over there together, that's beautiful. 0:47:24.360 --> 0:47:27.319 Yeah, And as most people listening now may know, protesting 0:47:27.360 --> 0:47:30.560 and urging your state to change foreign policy decision on 0:47:30.600 --> 0:47:32.920 an ongoing war that the state has already deemed its 0:47:32.960 --> 0:47:35.840 response to it's very hard, tiring, and a lot of 0:47:35.800 --> 0:47:39.160 the times some consider fruitless, but it's not. There are many, 0:47:39.200 --> 0:47:41.640 many things to do, and this is a constant in 0:47:41.800 --> 0:47:45.480 US history that leads every generation of protesters to advance 0:47:45.520 --> 0:47:48.359 their tactics and develop and reimagine what goals they have, 0:47:48.520 --> 0:47:52.239 to reconsider what is a winning campaign, and for folks 0:47:52.280 --> 0:47:55.839 in the early twentieth century, especially black people. Yeates talks 0:47:55.880 --> 0:47:58.239 about what it feels like or what it felt like 0:47:58.280 --> 0:48:02.759 to decide to start getting engaged, and a lot of 0:48:02.760 --> 0:48:06.719 that came when Republican Spain itself started to come under 0:48:06.760 --> 0:48:12.200 attack after the invasion of Ethiopia. And read the decision 0:48:12.320 --> 0:48:16.719 that James Yates in their affinity group with were just 0:48:16.760 --> 0:48:18.600 like they were living with a bunch of artists in 0:48:18.719 --> 0:48:21.160 New York at this time, or maybe it was Chicago, 0:48:22.200 --> 0:48:27.160 just being around, organizing scenes, going to rallies, train hopping, 0:48:28.360 --> 0:48:29.000 just doing the thing. 0:48:29.320 --> 0:48:33.279 Yeah, same shit, yeah, uh huh, he said. 0:48:33.400 --> 0:48:37.480 Quote. The loft had become a very gloomy place. Then 0:48:37.520 --> 0:48:40.240 one day Hermann rushed in with an armful of groceries 0:48:40.280 --> 0:48:43.080 and newspapers. He held five different papers in his hands 0:48:43.080 --> 0:48:46.920 and all of them read in effect Republican Spain under attack. 0:48:47.400 --> 0:48:50.360 The headlines screamed out at us and the fascist collaboration 0:48:50.440 --> 0:48:53.400 in Spain seemed to jump off the pages. One paper 0:48:53.440 --> 0:48:57.480 boldly announced Mussolini pledges the support of his troops. The 0:48:57.600 --> 0:49:01.880 article concluded by saying that Spanish Republican government, democratically elected, 0:49:02.040 --> 0:49:04.560 was asking the entire worlds for volunteers to come to 0:49:04.600 --> 0:49:08.120 Spain and aid in his fight against Mussolini, Hitler and 0:49:08.160 --> 0:49:12.000 the fascist generals. Hermann shouted at no one in particular. 0:49:12.560 --> 0:49:15.080 Now you see what did I tell you? I've been 0:49:15.120 --> 0:49:18.000 saying for three years that Hitler would move. First he 0:49:18.160 --> 0:49:20.759 tightened his Nazi grip on Germany, and then he'd look 0:49:20.800 --> 0:49:23.880 around the rest of Europe. Such a maniac cannot be appeased. 0:49:24.040 --> 0:49:26.480 I've said it over and over. But who will listen? 0:49:27.320 --> 0:49:30.520 Alonzo didn't look up. He stared silently at his paper, 0:49:30.680 --> 0:49:33.360 and then he said, in his typical quiet manner, I'm going. 0:49:33.960 --> 0:49:37.480 I'm volunteering. The time for talking is over. You've got 0:49:37.520 --> 0:49:40.440 to put your convictions where your mouth is. I was 0:49:40.480 --> 0:49:43.319 silent with the question pressed upon me, Am I ready 0:49:43.360 --> 0:49:45.680 to go to Spain with Alonzo? I had been more 0:49:45.719 --> 0:49:49.080 than ready to go to Ethiopia, but that was different. Ethiopia, 0:49:49.239 --> 0:49:51.840 a black nation was part of me. I was just 0:49:51.880 --> 0:49:54.560 beginning to learn about the reality of Spain and Europe, 0:49:54.600 --> 0:49:57.040 but I knew what was at stake. There was the poor, 0:49:57.239 --> 0:50:00.239 the peasants, the workers, and the unions. The socialists and 0:50:00.280 --> 0:50:04.120 the communists together had won an election against the big landowners, 0:50:04.160 --> 0:50:07.120 the monarchy, and the right wingers in the military. It 0:50:07.160 --> 0:50:08.799 was the kind of victory that would have brought black 0:50:08.840 --> 0:50:10.880 people to the top levels of government if such an 0:50:10.920 --> 0:50:13.600 election had been won in the US. The new government 0:50:13.600 --> 0:50:17.000 in Spain was dividing its wealth with the peasants, Unions 0:50:17.000 --> 0:50:20.360 were organizing in each factory, and social services were being introduced. 0:50:20.840 --> 0:50:23.400 Spain was the perfect example of the world I dreamed of. 0:50:23.719 --> 0:50:28.720 And that's fucking cool. I was just gonna like that moment. 0:50:29.480 --> 0:50:31.440 I don't know, I know, I know that most of 0:50:31.440 --> 0:50:33.600 my response to the script so far as that's fucking cool, 0:50:33.760 --> 0:50:37.400 but like that moment of like, no, we just got 0:50:37.440 --> 0:50:40.040 to do it, yeah, and being like oh shit, yeah, 0:50:40.040 --> 0:50:43.200 you're right, this is the same struggle in a different place, Like, 0:50:44.040 --> 0:50:45.320 I don't know, it's cool. 0:50:45.560 --> 0:50:47.200 Yeah, And I think it's a lot of to me. 0:50:47.600 --> 0:50:50.040 Something in the beauty of this that I see is 0:50:50.280 --> 0:50:52.600 it's kind of also some of the beauty I see 0:50:52.640 --> 0:50:55.960 in snick the oh what is their actual name? 0:50:56.040 --> 0:50:57.719 Student Onnviolent Coordinating Committee? 0:50:57.800 --> 0:51:01.880 Yeah, Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. And with Martin Luther King Junior, 0:51:02.719 --> 0:51:06.040 my coast and I print Secure talk a lot, especially 0:51:06.080 --> 0:51:08.680 during the election, around like what voting means to us 0:51:09.520 --> 0:51:13.520 and what especially as black anarchists, and what voting that's 0:51:13.560 --> 0:51:17.000 respected by the state means. And there's these beautiful speeches 0:51:17.080 --> 0:51:20.880 of Martin Luther King very early on, being like, we 0:51:20.960 --> 0:51:24.040 will have our black judges, our black cops, our black 0:51:24.560 --> 0:51:26.960 lawmakers will be at everywhere. If they just give us 0:51:26.960 --> 0:51:29.080 the vote, we won't need to even hear from the 0:51:29.080 --> 0:51:32.319 white oppressors anymore. And I know, damn well, even as 0:51:32.320 --> 0:51:34.000 a black anarchist, if I had heard that one hundred 0:51:34.040 --> 0:51:36.600 years ago, I'd be in the back like, yeah, let's 0:51:36.640 --> 0:51:39.480 get our thing on. And because it's one of those 0:51:39.560 --> 0:51:44.399 fundamental human urges that folks see something being denied them, 0:51:44.440 --> 0:51:47.560 something granted access to others, and they're like, well, why 0:51:47.600 --> 0:51:55.040 not us, And the imagination of being able to think, 0:51:55.200 --> 0:51:58.879 oh well, if we were able to, especially post reconstruction 0:51:59.520 --> 0:52:04.279 actually have a black republic outside of that that was 0:52:04.920 --> 0:52:07.719 like based on the majority and based on how things 0:52:07.760 --> 0:52:09.479 were going, they would be the government of the South 0:52:09.480 --> 0:52:11.799 would be a lot blacker than it is now and 0:52:11.920 --> 0:52:13.799 has ever been post reconstruction. 0:52:14.320 --> 0:52:16.160 I think about this constantly. As soon as I learned 0:52:16.160 --> 0:52:19.839 about how terribly you know, the Ku Klux Klan came 0:52:19.880 --> 0:52:22.560 in and was like, we're going to fuck this up 0:52:22.640 --> 0:52:26.160 through random, non legal violence. But then instead they just 0:52:26.200 --> 0:52:27.960 came in with Jim Crow and were like, actually, we're 0:52:28.000 --> 0:52:32.080 gonna put this down legally, and like, yeah, how completely 0:52:32.280 --> 0:52:35.080 fundamentally different the United States would be without Jim Crow. 0:52:35.320 --> 0:52:37.040 It wouldn't just be like, oh, we had reached a 0:52:37.160 --> 0:52:40.680 quality sooner or whatever, but like just literally it would 0:52:40.680 --> 0:52:45.200 be a different country, and a almost certainly substantially more 0:52:45.320 --> 0:52:46.399 interesting and good one. 0:52:46.920 --> 0:52:52.320 Yeah, like extremely interesting. And that's something that even now urges. 0:52:52.600 --> 0:52:55.279 There's efforts for like the Republic of New Africa, which 0:52:55.320 --> 0:52:58.240 is like the combination of like the Deep South states 0:52:58.320 --> 0:53:01.640 into being formed of public and even through to the 0:53:01.680 --> 0:53:05.560 Black Panther parties kind of held this this political line 0:53:05.560 --> 0:53:08.480 that I still love, which is we still haven't got 0:53:08.520 --> 0:53:11.000 to decide whether we wanted to be US citizens or not, 0:53:11.400 --> 0:53:15.200 and we should have a referendum on that because I mean. 0:53:15.600 --> 0:53:17.720 Yeah, like all right, we got we get to choose, 0:53:17.760 --> 0:53:19.840 and we're going to try and choose. Yeah, no, it's interesting. 0:53:20.640 --> 0:53:25.000 Yeah, And with that conviction, they had decided they were 0:53:25.040 --> 0:53:28.319 going to travel to Spain. And that is a kind 0:53:28.320 --> 0:53:32.040 of conversation that happened with a lot of folks, with 0:53:32.800 --> 0:53:36.040 some folks lying to their family about where they were going. 0:53:36.680 --> 0:53:39.520 And one thing before in this off like to talk 0:53:39.560 --> 0:53:43.400 about how isolationless the US was at this point and 0:53:43.480 --> 0:53:46.720 how they very much I think, as you said earlier, 0:53:46.760 --> 0:53:50.200 they were like, we're not picking a side, which usually 0:53:50.280 --> 0:53:53.879 means neutrality usually means you're never fully neutral. Like they 0:53:54.400 --> 0:53:57.240 stopped people from getting passports to go over to Spain 0:53:57.320 --> 0:54:00.759 to go and try to actually participate. So a lot 0:54:00.760 --> 0:54:03.760 of folks had to go directly to France and cross 0:54:03.880 --> 0:54:08.120 the Pyrenees mountain range, and like all these different ways. 0:54:08.120 --> 0:54:10.040 It was not a straight shot for anyone to go 0:54:10.160 --> 0:54:13.640 straight to Spain unless you were already over there. There's 0:54:13.680 --> 0:54:16.279 like a combination of boat, train and hiking through these 0:54:16.360 --> 0:54:17.200 mountain ranges. 0:54:17.840 --> 0:54:21.240 Yeah, yeah, the whole like isolation has just mean deciding 0:54:21.280 --> 0:54:26.200 with the oppressor, like the US, France and England, we're like, oh, 0:54:26.200 --> 0:54:27.920 we're staying out of it. And by that, I mean 0:54:27.960 --> 0:54:33.240 we're putting an embargo on arms for either side to Spain, 0:54:33.480 --> 0:54:35.920 whereas like Germany and Italy like sweet, we're gonna send 0:54:36.120 --> 0:54:39.080 fucking munitions to the fascists. That's great, you know, and 0:54:39.480 --> 0:54:42.880 leaving you know, the overwhelming majority of international munitions came 0:54:42.880 --> 0:54:44.600 in through the USSR, which of course has its own 0:54:44.640 --> 0:54:46.120 mess because then they were like and now we're in 0:54:46.200 --> 0:54:46.920 charge of everything. 0:54:47.640 --> 0:54:50.360 Yes, absolutely, And I think there's there's a lot of 0:54:50.440 --> 0:54:53.320 stuff written about, like the Communist Party and how the 0:54:53.480 --> 0:54:57.080 USSR engaged in the SPANISHI War, which is not something 0:54:57.160 --> 0:55:00.160 I get too into in these next couple episodes, but 0:55:00.640 --> 0:55:04.680 it is a very interesting way to see international relations 0:55:04.719 --> 0:55:08.080 be played out, and how the USSR took that mantle 0:55:08.160 --> 0:55:10.919 up when it came to other revolutionary causes, something even 0:55:11.040 --> 0:55:12.400 Sha Gavera had issues with. 0:55:13.920 --> 0:55:16.080 Oh shit, I need to one day, I'll read more 0:55:16.080 --> 0:55:19.960 about that whole thing. That's the infinite onion of history. 0:55:20.280 --> 0:55:23.800 Yeah. Fun fact Shay went and fought in the Democratic 0:55:23.880 --> 0:55:26.960 Republic of Congo after he yelled at the USSR for 0:55:27.000 --> 0:55:31.319 having terrible revolutionary politics with other international brigades, and went 0:55:31.320 --> 0:55:33.080 over there to go try to help them before he 0:55:33.160 --> 0:55:37.000 went over to more South and Central America. Yeah, yeah, 0:55:37.040 --> 0:55:42.479 it's very very interesting, And yeah, travel wasn't a straight shot. 0:55:42.480 --> 0:55:45.319 It was a combination of boat train and hiking through 0:55:45.360 --> 0:55:49.560 treacherous mountains. James Yates describes one of like the last 0:55:49.600 --> 0:55:53.520 moments of their climb as quote, Within minutes of beginning 0:55:53.560 --> 0:55:55.680 the second lap of the climb, we tossed away most 0:55:55.719 --> 0:55:59.799 of our possessions. Men threw away their knapsacks, coats, blankets, 0:56:00.040 --> 0:56:02.440 anything to lighten the load. They even took off their 0:56:02.480 --> 0:56:05.440 socks and flung them into the darkness. I kept my shoes, 0:56:05.440 --> 0:56:08.160 but threw away most everything else. When it came to 0:56:08.200 --> 0:56:10.360 my books, I tried to fit them into my pockets, 0:56:10.360 --> 0:56:13.560 but they felt like pieces of lead. I fingered them regretfully, 0:56:13.760 --> 0:56:16.919 then pulled too out, letting them drop. They flittered down 0:56:16.920 --> 0:56:19.440 through the blackness. It was a part of me falling. 0:56:20.239 --> 0:56:22.040 Later I found the books I still had was the 0:56:22.080 --> 0:56:26.880 one by Lynston Hughes end quote. And then when arriving 0:56:26.960 --> 0:56:30.959 I really love how Yates describes their first contact after 0:56:31.040 --> 0:56:34.120 these like the Pyrenees mountain range is like they went 0:56:34.200 --> 0:56:37.799 up one mountain, then down another steep, steep mountain, and 0:56:37.840 --> 0:56:41.480 then up another steep, steep mountain, and then down another steep, 0:56:41.480 --> 0:56:44.040 steep mountain, and then the second lap was up Another's 0:56:44.320 --> 0:56:46.680 like it was a lot of up and down And 0:56:46.880 --> 0:56:50.319 it's to me one of those convictions because a lot 0:56:50.320 --> 0:56:54.160 of folks died just getting to Spain and specifically on 0:56:54.239 --> 0:56:59.280 that mountain range, and it kind of to me colors 0:56:59.400 --> 0:57:02.560 some of the approach of this is something that I 0:57:02.560 --> 0:57:04.640 didn't really mention it, but like Yates talk about, like 0:57:04.680 --> 0:57:07.680 it didn't really hit James what they were really going 0:57:07.760 --> 0:57:10.160 to do until they were on the boat to France 0:57:10.560 --> 0:57:15.960 and they were like, crap, I might die. Yeah, And 0:57:16.040 --> 0:57:18.520 I think that's also something that really shows how little 0:57:19.000 --> 0:57:21.200 society back then, even kind of now we have an 0:57:21.200 --> 0:57:23.840 issue with it. But talked about war, the trauma of war, 0:57:24.080 --> 0:57:26.720 what it means to like engage in violent acts, but 0:57:26.760 --> 0:57:30.120 then also what it means to take those violent acts 0:57:30.120 --> 0:57:32.480 that are being disposed onto you and do something to 0:57:32.520 --> 0:57:36.280 dismantle the system that is making that systemic. 0:57:36.880 --> 0:57:37.360 Yeah. 0:57:37.880 --> 0:57:40.280 But yeah, and then the kind of through lines that 0:57:40.400 --> 0:57:43.640 in also highly recommended like folks read this Mississippi to 0:57:43.680 --> 0:57:48.320 Madrid because they bring so many beautiful comparisons between Spanish 0:57:48.360 --> 0:57:52.440 culture and Black American culture that kind of struck me, 0:57:53.000 --> 0:57:54.880 which I guess I'll just end some of this off 0:57:54.920 --> 0:57:58.280 by saying another quote from James Yates book is quote 0:57:58.800 --> 0:58:01.360 around five in the morning, we arrived at our first 0:58:01.360 --> 0:58:05.040 Spanish outposts, a monastery. It was midway down the mountain 0:58:05.080 --> 0:58:06.760 and served as a way station for those who have 0:58:06.840 --> 0:58:09.520 been forced to take this route into Spain. No monks 0:58:09.560 --> 0:58:12.520 were there. A few Spanish loyalists guarded the posts, receiving 0:58:12.520 --> 0:58:15.840 and dispatching volunteers. It struck me that this monastery was 0:58:15.920 --> 0:58:18.760 much like the places used by abolitionists who temporarily house 0:58:18.840 --> 0:58:22.840 slaves escaping the plantations of the South in America. 0:58:23.960 --> 0:58:26.840 That's cool, I mean, sorry, I keep fucking saying that, 0:58:26.920 --> 0:58:29.440 But like this idea of the through line that they 0:58:29.440 --> 0:58:32.560 don't see this as a separate thing, and I don't know, 0:58:32.760 --> 0:58:33.800 sometimes it's interesting. 0:58:33.960 --> 0:58:36.440 Yeah, And this was only the beginning of their journey, 0:58:36.520 --> 0:58:39.240 and one that was mirrored by many anti fascists and 0:58:39.280 --> 0:58:42.600 black anti fascists alike that had to go through these long, 0:58:42.800 --> 0:58:47.120 long tracks. Yeah, and there's even more to come, and 0:58:47.160 --> 0:58:49.320 I hopefully I'm going to tell you even more about 0:58:49.360 --> 0:58:54.120 the specific anti fascists that came through next episode. 0:58:54.720 --> 0:58:58.320 Hell yeah, I am impressed that you managed in true 0:58:58.360 --> 0:59:01.120 cool people who did cool stuff style. One half of 0:59:01.160 --> 0:59:04.560 the podcast is to get you to where the thing happens. 0:59:05.200 --> 0:59:05.919 That's what we do. 0:59:06.480 --> 0:59:06.760 Yup. 0:59:07.000 --> 0:59:09.000 I'm making fun of myself when I say this, but 0:59:09.000 --> 0:59:11.080 it's like, it makes so much sense with this because 0:59:11.080 --> 0:59:14.320 it's like, yeah, the whole point is that this connection 0:59:14.480 --> 0:59:17.680 between these two struggles is so often ignored and so 0:59:18.600 --> 0:59:22.280 showing the connection directly, Fuck yeah, I'm excited to find 0:59:22.280 --> 0:59:22.960 out what happens. 0:59:23.320 --> 0:59:25.480 Yeah, And there's so much more history for folks to 0:59:25.520 --> 0:59:29.480 delve into in context of anti racist and anti oppressive 0:59:30.000 --> 0:59:35.560 organizing that drove fifty two different nationalities to come to 0:59:35.640 --> 0:59:40.160 Spain and fight some fascists and yeah, yeah, I think 0:59:40.240 --> 0:59:44.360 it's a really beautiful context for folks to look into, 0:59:44.520 --> 0:59:46.400 or like point of history for folks to look into. 0:59:46.520 --> 0:59:49.200 I think there's a lot of really dopeap like organizing, 0:59:49.320 --> 0:59:52.960 especially like black autonomous and cooperative organizing that happened post 0:59:53.000 --> 0:59:55.880 reconstruction that is rarely rarely talked about. 0:59:56.960 --> 1:00:00.000 Well, we're gonna hear more about what happened in Spain 1:00:00.120 --> 1:00:03.800 with it on Wednesday. But in the meantime, what if 1:00:03.800 --> 1:00:07.360 people are like, wow, I sure liked hearing Jordan talk 1:00:07.400 --> 1:00:10.200 about a thing. If only there was another podcast where 1:00:10.240 --> 1:00:13.000 I could hear Jordan talking about a thing. What could 1:00:13.000 --> 1:00:13.360 they do? 1:00:14.160 --> 1:00:18.040 Well? They could hop over to anywhere that they listen 1:00:18.080 --> 1:00:22.520 to podcasts and look up The Dugout, a Black Anarchist Podcast, 1:00:23.000 --> 1:00:25.200 or you can go to our Instagram at Dugout Podcast 1:00:25.440 --> 1:00:28.000 and check out the link in our bio to get 1:00:28.080 --> 1:00:30.520 us on Spotify or any of those major platforms. Because 1:00:30.520 --> 1:00:32.880 sometimes it's still a little hard to reach out to 1:00:32.960 --> 1:00:36.080 us because we did a podcast called The Dugout in America, 1:00:36.480 --> 1:00:39.160 so it's very baseball heavy things. It's kind of hard 1:00:39.200 --> 1:00:40.320 to find our show. 1:00:40.720 --> 1:00:43.800 Whenever you're listening to this podcast, just go over listen 1:00:43.840 --> 1:00:46.919 to The Dugout, a Black Anarchist podcast, or just start 1:00:46.920 --> 1:00:51.000 getting into baseball. That's another thing you could do if 1:00:51.000 --> 1:00:55.640 you want, sofa, are you into baseball? Basketball? I know 1:00:55.720 --> 1:00:58.240 you're into basketball, but I was wondering if you're multi 1:00:58.880 --> 1:01:05.680 sport us. I don't dislike baseball, but it's not a passion. Okay, 1:01:05.720 --> 1:01:06.200 fair enough. 1:01:06.280 --> 1:01:08.400 Yeah, I only ever played in the outfield and my 1:01:08.400 --> 1:01:09.960 parents would always gett mad at me because I just 1:01:10.000 --> 1:01:12.920 did like gymnastics in the outfield and was never there 1:01:12.920 --> 1:01:14.040 when the ball was coming my way. 1:01:14.120 --> 1:01:20.760 Exactly, exactly, all right, We will see you all on Wednesday. 1:01:20.920 --> 1:01:29.240 They Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff is a production 1:01:29.320 --> 1:01:32.520 of cool Zone Media. For more podcasts on cool Zone Media, 1:01:32.680 --> 1:01:35.919 visit our website Coolzonemedia dot com, or check us out 1:01:36.040 --> 1:01:39.400 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get 1:01:39.440 --> 1:01:40.280 your podcasts.